South Beach Wine & Food Festival changes Miami's culinary scene, impacts economy

For Miami restaurateurs, this is Showtime.

With dozens of top chefs — Bobby Flay, Todd English, Daniel Boloud and Masaharu Morimoto among the list — in town for the South Beach Wine & Food Festival, the pressure is on everywhere, from Michy’s to the new Catch Miami. The goal: Show everyone from around the country that Miami’s food scene has arrived on the national stage.

Chef Michelle Bernstein’s staff whipped up dishes designed to impress guests at Michy’s — like foie gras, oxtail and apple tarte tatin — while she juggled menus for multiple events. Bernstein kept her cellphone handy to make sure any chef friends could get a table, even though her namesake restaurant was sold out.

As always, Joe’s Stone Crab was a must-do stop for many, including Paula Deen and New York restaurateur Danny Meyer. Aussie Chef Curtis Stone attracted a string of admirers as he ate his way around town, with stops at Prime 112, Pubbelly Sushi and Puerto Sagua. Khong River House and Yardbird Southern Table & Bar hosted Meyer, The Food Network’s Anne Burrell and Chef Anita Lo.

Michael’s Genuine was another hot spot.

“This is kind of our coming out party for Khong and it’s our chance to knock it out of the park and wow people,” said John Kunkel, owner of Khong and Yardbird.

Prime 112 owner Myles Chefetz admits he’s a fanatic about checking plates when they come back from a chef’s table. And he’s always on the lookout for the table ordering 20 different items, because that’s usually a restaurateur doing research.

“If you have Jean-Gorges or Bobby Flay eating at your restaurant, you want to make sure he has a great experience,” Chefetz said. “You want to put your best foot forward because you know you’re going to get scrutinized.”

The Food Network South Beach Wine & Food Festival is not just a forum for impressing the culinary elite. It’s among the top three tourist draws for Miami restaurants and hotels. In its 12th year, the festival draws more than 60,000 people to Miami Beach for a weekend of decadence, featuring more than 50 events spread over four days.

It is neck and neck with two of the area’s other most prominent weekends: Art Basel and Presidents’ Day (which coincides with the Miami International Boat Show).

There’s the immediate economic impact, of course, but the festival has made its mark in other ways: helping transform Miami’s food scene from a cultural wasteland to one of the country’s hot spots, one where top chefs all want to set up shop.

“Twelve years ago I don’t know if you could even name five really good restaurants. Now, you can’t think of where you want to eat because there are so many good restaurants,” said Lee Brian Schrager, festival founder and vice president of communications for Southern Wine & Spirits, its host. “What the festival can take credit for is introducing the culinary world to the great talent down here, and really highlighting South Florida as a great dining destination.”

There has been plenty of indulgence to go around. Flay finally broke his losing streak and took home top honors at the Burger Bash with his award-winning crunchified green chili burger. At the Q, barbecue lovers had their choice of Al Roker’s lamb ribs with baked beans or Geoffrey Zakarian’s smoked tagarashi crusted tuna, among other offerings.

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South Florida “dreamers” gather for information, maybe some financial aid

Carmen cleans Miami houses for $200 a week. So she turned up as early as she could Saturday at Miami Dade College to ask for the $465 grant that would pay for the application to legalize her undocumented daughter’s immigration status.

“This is a blessing,” the Peru-born Carmen said as she waited nervously, green application folder in hand, to chat with one of the immigration rights activists manning desks around the MDC classroom.

A coalition of activist groups hosting the session Saturday was taking the first applications from low-income migrants for the $465 grants – the cost of applying for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program for undocumented youths.

The volunteers were also, as they have been doing at 14 to 15 clinics since August, providing legal advice to youths and parents dealing with a sometimes confusing process of filing the DACA applications to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

“We work hard so they can have a future,” said Sandra Leyes, an Argentine who arrived in 2000 on a tourist visa with her then 3-year-old son. Gian is now a high school freshman with hopes of becoming a doctor with a specialty in sports medicine.

Leyes said she and Gian were at the clinic to make sure his application was correct and avoid having to pay an immigration lawyer for counsel, but they did not need the $465.

But Carmen said she definitely needs the money because her income barely covers costs. Her daughter Marianne is a senior in high school – top 10 percent of her class – and wants to be an architect.

Colombia-born dishwasher José said it would take his family months to save up the money for his son’s DACA application — if no one gets sick because they have no health insurance. Like others at the sessions, he asked that his last name not be published for fear of repercussions.

Immigrant rights activist Gaby Pacheco said the coalition sponsoring the clinics is hoping to provide the $465 grants to least 50 low-income youths. The groups already have received a $10,000 gift from the Fragomen law firm in Coral Gables.

Most of the DACA applicants seen at the South Florida clinics have been from Latin America, but one came from South Africa and another said he was a Roma – a gypsy – whose father might have been born in Bulgaria.

Youths at the clinic Saturday seemed to prefer to speak in English, jelled their hair in the latest style, wore tight jeans and hoodies and played with smart phones and portable game consoles. Their parents preferred to speak Spanish.

Manning the DACA information and application desks during Saturday’s session at the MDC InterAmerican campus on 27th Avenue and Southwest Eighth Street were law students from Florida International University, the University of Miami and St. Thomas University.

An immigration attorney reviewed the completed DACA applications, and then sent the youths and families to the Ecuador-born Pacheco if they wanted to apply for the $465 grants.

The volunteers have seen about 30 potential applicants at each of the clinics for undocumented youths held all around South Florida since August and completed applications with about 75 percent of them, Pacheco added.

The volunteers also are taking a survey in the hopes of explaining why the number of undocumented youths applying for DACA is far below the estimates of how many would apply.

Estimates of the number of undocumented youths in Florida alone range from 85,000 to 160,000. But the latest U.S. government report showed 19,336 individuals have requested DACA in the state.

Jose Machado, a leader of the group Students Working for Equal Rights (SWER), has said his own study showed the top reason for the gap is the $465 cost of the application to DHS.

Some fears of deportations may also linger, said Juan Carlos Gomez, head of the Carlos A. Costa Immigration and Human Rights Clinic at the FIU law school. And perhaps some have been waiting for the politics of immigration reform to settle down.

Republican presidential candidates promised tough anti-immigration policies if elected, Gomez noted. And now Republicans and Democrats in Congress have been talking about different immigration reforms.

Among the groups sponsoring the clinic and grant projects are SWER, Gomez’ clinic at FIU, the Florida Immigrant Coalition, and DREAMERs’ Moms. Their next clinic will be from 9 a.m. - 4 p.m. on March 2 at the FIU law school, 11200 S.W. Eighth St.

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Double Take Celebrity Lookalikes

Alice Eve and Brooklyn Decker

ETonline has found the lookalikes to the stars and, as it turns out,
it's their Hollywood peers. Click the pics and let us know if you think
these celebs bear a resemblance to one another.

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Upper East Siders boo Christine Quinn over waste transfer station support at mayoral forum

They trashed her!

Upper East Siders opposed to the construction of a waste transfer station in their neighborhood booed City Council Speaker Christine Quinn at a mayoral forum today for her continued support of a controversial project that would send garbage trucks rumbling throughout posh area streets.

“I am not changing my position on the [marine transfer station],” Quinn declared to the crowd inside the New York Foundation for Senior Citizens on E. 93rd Street.

In the wake of Superstorm Sandy, new concerns have emerged about the E. 91st site, which is now classified as a flood zone, but Quinn said structural changes would be made to prevent any storm damage.

Warzer Jaff

Christine Quinn at today's mayoral forum

Immediately, the crowd jeered and heckled.

“Why have you never visited the site?” one person demanded.

Quinn did manage to raise a stink — about the jeers.

“Hang on — if you want an answer you have to listen,” she barked. “You can scream and yell. You could throw soft things after, but you have got to let me answer if I listen to your question with attention.”

She said that the five borough plan, which she supported in 2006 and of which the East Side station is a part, is meant to take the burden off of low income neighborhoods which traditionally get saddled with the stinky facilities. Part of the city scheme — the Gansevoort Street recycling center — sits in her own district, she noted.

“I can’t stand up in this neighborhood and say your neighborhood takes something if mine does not take one.”

Still, the heckling continued.

“Don’t expect us to vote for you!”

“That’s fine,” Quinn snapped.

Meanwhile, City Council Comptroller John Liu, who has previously supported the plan, flipped his position at the forum because of Hurricane Sandy-related issues.

“It doesn’t make sense to proceed while turning a blind eye to that simple fact,” he said.

Former City Comptroller Bill Thompson and Public Advocate Bill de Blasio, who voted in favor of the 2006 plan, said concerns over flooding left them both on the fence, and said they both planned to visit the site. The forum was sponsored by Rep. Carolyn Maloney.

cgiove@nypost.com

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South Florida hospitals could lose $368 million from sequestration

A detailed survey shows that South Florida hospitals could lose $368 million over 10 years in federal budget cuts starting next Friday, if the sequestration program kicks in as scheduled.

The Florida Hospital Association, using data from the American Hospital Association, estimates that over the next decade, sequestration would cause Miami-Dade hospitals to lose $223.9 million and Broward facilities $144.4 million under the Congress-mandated budget cuts that hit virtually all federal programs unless Republicans and Democrats can work out a compromise.

The New York Times and other national news organizations are reporting that sequestration, unlike the New Year’s fiscal cliff, seems virtually certain to take place.

The law requires across-the-board spending cuts in domestic and defense programs, with certain exceptions. Because healthcare represents more than one in five dollars of the federal budget, it will be a huge target for cuts.

For hospitals and doctors, the major impact will be felt in Medicare cuts, which according to the budget law are limited to 2 percent of Medicare payments. Medicaid, food stamps and Social Security are exempted from cuts, according to the Bipartisan Policy Center.

The FHA study calculates that over 10 years, Jackson Memorial Hospital stands to lose $30.6 million, Mount Sinai Medical Center on Miami Beach $27.3 million, Holy Cross in Fort Lauderdale $23.8 million and Memorial Regional Hospital in Hollywood $21.4 million.

“The problem with sequestration is that it just makes broad cuts across the board,” said Linda Quick, president of the South Florida Hospital and Healthcare Association. “The Affordable Care Act is looking at all sorts of intelligent ways to reduce costs,” including coordinated care that will stop duplicated tests and reduce hospital readmissions. “But sequestration takes an ax, and that doesn’t make any sense.”

FierceHealthcare, which produces trade publications, says sequestration cuts over the next decade will include $591 million from prescription drug benefits for seniors, $318 million from the Food and Drug Administration, $2.5 billion from the National Institutes of Health, $490 million from the Centers for Disease Control and $365 million from Indian Health Services.

The National Association of Community Health Centers estimates that 900,000 of its patients nationwide could lose care because of the cuts. The group said the cuts were “penny wise and pound foolish” because they would mean less preventive care while more and sicker patients would end up in emergency rooms.

Like the fiscal cliff, Republicans and Democrats agreed on a sequestration strategy, with the idea that the drastic measure would force the two sides to reach agreement on more deliberative budget adjustments. That hasn’t happened.

The White House reports that the law will mean that nondefense programs will be cut by 5 percent, defense programs by 8 percent. But since the first year’s cuts must be done over seven months, that means in 2013, nondefense programs need to be cut by 9 percent, defense programs by 13 percent.

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In David Rivera investigation, suspected ringer charged in federal court in $81,485 scheme

A one-time candidate whose suspicious campaign finances led to an investigation of former Miami Congressman David Rivera was formally charged Friday in federal court with three crimes.

Justin Lamar Sternad pleaded not guilty to conspiracy, false-statement and illegal campaign-contribution charges.

Sternad, however, is expected to strike a plea deal as he cooperates with federal authorities as part of their investigation into Rivera, a Republican, and the former U.S. representative's close friend, Ana Alliegro, who managed Sternad's disastrous campaign. Sternad ran as a Democrat.

Neither Rivera nor Alliegro is listed by name in the 10-page federal charging document, which lists nameless “co-conspirators.”

The co-conspirators helped steer $81,485 in cash to Sternad, who intentionally disguised the illegal campaign contributions by failing to list them on his federal campaign-finance reports.

The money paid for printing and mailing services for a batch of fliers, some of which attacked a Rivera rival, Democrat Joe Garcia, who beat Sternad in the Aug. 14 Democratic primary for the Kendall-to-Key West Congressional District 26 seat. Garcia went on to beat Rivera in the general election.

During the primary, Garcia's campaign complained that Sternad was a ringer, a stand-in attack dog doing Rivera's bidding.

Rivera, who has maintained his innocence, refused comment but pointed to past statements in which he said he never has been informed by authorities of a federal investigation.

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Vin Diesel 'Riddick' Still

Fast & Furious star Vin Diesel is returning for a third time to his Riddick character this fall, and he's teasing fans with a brand-new image of his title character sitting on a throne with a troubled brow, very reminiscent of Arnold Schwarzenegger's pose at the end of Conan the Barbarian. Coincidence?

Pics: Role Call -- Who Got Hired in Hollywood

Diesel posted the shot on his Facebook page with the accompanying caption: "It has been 9 years since The Chronicles of Riddick was released... all along I knew I would eventually have to return to that dark place, the mind of an Alpha Furyan..."

Following 2000's Pitch Black and 2004's The Chronicles of Riddick, the new sci-fi film, simply titled Riddick, is set to hit theaters and IMAX on September 6 and reunites Diesel with director David Twohy for a more pared-down film in which our anti-hero finds himself up against an alien race of predators. Activating an emergency beacon, he catches the attention of two passing ships – one carrying a new breed of mercenary, and the other captained by a man from Riddick's past.

Video: Watch Vin Diesel Cover Rihanna's 'Stay'

Also co-produced by Diesel, the Riddick cast includes Karl Urban, Katee Sackhoff, Bokeem Woodbine, Dave Bautista, Jordi Molla and Matt Nable.

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Man pleads guilty to smuggling military-grade sniper scopes

A man pleaded guilty today to illegally trying to smuggle restricted military-grade night-vision sniper scopes out of the US to Ukraine.

Volodymyr Ponomarenko was charged in Brooklyn federal court with attempting to ship the high-tech devices overseas without a Customs export license that is required to transport restricted technology out of the country.

US Customs and Border Protection officers at New York's JFK airport had discovered the items in Dec. 2011 during a search of parcels destined for Ukraine, officials said.

Inside they found two night-vision rifle sniper scopes, a thermal imaging camera, and three high-powered sniper scopes, Brooklyn federal prosecutors say.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents traced the shipment to a freight forwarder in Elizabeth, NJ., and eventually tracked down and arrested Ponomarenko - who is a citizen of Ukraine, prosecutors said.

Under federal law, certain types of rifle scopes cannot be exported without a special license from the US government out of concern that they might be diverted to terrorists, insurgents, or others who could utilize them to kill US armed forces overseas, officials said.

Ponomarenko faces up to five years in prison when he is sentenced.

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Miami Springs hotel makes Top 10 list

The Comfort Suites Miami Airport North, just over a year old, is winning praise.

The 102-suite hotel, at 657 Minola Dr. in Miami Springs, was named one of the top 10 airport-adjacent hotels in the nation by TripAdvisor.

The hotel earned its seventh-place showing thanks to reviews by travelers. The travel site said the list was based on the most highly rated hotels within two miles of major airports in the United States.

Comfort Suites, which opened in November of 2011, was lauded by reviewers for its free breakfast buffet, 42-inch high-definition TV sets and heated outdoor pool. The hotel also offers free parking and free shuttle service to and from the airport.

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South Florida existing home sales, prices rose again in January

The median price of an existing single-family home in Miami-Dade County rose 14.8 percent to $194,000 in January from a year earlier, according to the Miami Association of Realtors.

The median price of a condominium in Miami-Dade jumped 24.1 percent year over year.

Compared with December 2012, the median price for a single family home fell 9.4 percent in January and was off 4.9 percent for condos.

Sales of previously owned homes and condos in Miami-Dade rose 7.5 percent in January to 1,947 units. That included a 19.1 percent spike in the sale of existing single-family homes while condo sales were essentially flat, with a 0.3 percent increase in volume year over year.

The scenario was similar in Broward County, where the median price of an existing single-family home jumped 24.5 percent to $224,088 in January from a year earlier, according to the Greater Fort Lauderdale Realtors.

The median price of a condominium or townhouse in Broward increased 26.5 percent to $94,900 in January from a year earlier.

Sales of single-family-home in Broward increased 15.3 percent in January to 1,033 from a year earlier, while closings on townhouses and condos increased 10.7 percent year over year, the Realtors group said.

Extremely tight inventory continues to shape South Florida’s recovering housing market.

“There’s like nothing for sale. Inventory is so tight,’’ said Lisa Dority, an agent with REMAX/Advance Realty. “When something comes on the market, it’s a stampede with multiple offers and back-up contracts.’’

In Miami-Dade, the total inventory of residences available for sale plunged 10.7 percent in January to 13,316 from a year earlier, with single-family home inventory down 12.9 percent and existing condominium listings off 9.3 percent, the Miami Realtors group said.

In Broward, the number of single-family homes available for sale on the multi-listings service plunged 26.5 percent in January to 4,510 from a year earlier. The number of available listings of condos and townhouses on the market was down 11.2 percent year over year to 6,407 units in Broward in January, the group said.

The months of supply of existing single-family homes fell to 3.8 months in Broward, while the inventory of condos and townhouses shrank to 4.7 months. A six-month supply of homes for sale is considered a balanced market between buyers and sellers, while a lower level favors sellers, helping fuel price increases, Realtors say.

Broward homes are selling more quickly and for levels closer to their asking prices in Broward. In January, existing single-family homes fetched 93.4 percent of their listing price, up from 90.9 percent a year earlier. Condos and townhouses went for 93.8 perenct of their asking price, an increase of 1.4 percent from a year earlier.

The median days on the market was 48 for a single-family home, down from 53 a year earlier, and 42 days for a condo or townhouse, down from 43 in January 2012.

“I’m seeing strength right across the board,’’ said Charles Bonfiglio, president of the Greater Fort Lauderdale Realtors and head of AAA Realty Group. Many Broward residences are fetching multiple offers, frequently above the asking price, he said.

Statewide in Florida, sales of existing homes jumped 11.7 percent in January to 13,679 units from a year earlier, while condominium and townhouse sales totaled 6,670 units, a 2 percent increase year over year, according to the Florida Association of Realtors.

The median sales price for a single-family existing home across Florida rose 12.4 percent to $145,000 in January from a year earlier while the median price for condomiums and townhouses was up 18 percent year over year to $112,000, the Florida Realtors said.

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