Miami Mayor Francis Suarez: The Recipe for Creating America's Happiest City | All-In Live from Miami
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How did Miami become America's happiest city?
43rd mayor of Miami, served two terms since 2017, and his tenure is going to end in September because he's term limited. Although I hear these days that's flexible, please welcome Francis Suarez.
We were ranked the happiest city in America, the healthiest city in America. The formula for success is simple. Keep taxes low, keep people safe, lean into innovation.
How are things going in Miami? Obviously, you know, we talked to you a couple of years ago when we had our first all in summit here. And you had a no nonsense approach that you thought was going to work with the homeless challenges that we're seeing. I think candidly, We discussed a large portion of the homeless problem in these major cities is an addiction problem.
What strategies did Miami use to decrease homelessness?
And giving a junkie a home doesn't exactly get them off the street. It just doesn't work. And you were one of the first people to say that plainly. How are you dealing with it? Has it gotten worse? Is it an intractable problem? Yeah, take us through it.
So in homeless specifically, we are at an 11-year low. We did our census. We do two census a year. We do one in January, one in the summer. And our January census had us at an 11-year low at 546 homeless, unsheltered homeless in the entire city of Miami. We have a couple thousand sheltered. And I actually raise money on an annual basis as a mayor's ball. I did my mayor's ball last year, and this year I'll be doing it on May 31st to end homeless. We want to be the first major American city to have zero homeless, and we think we can get there. We call it Functional Zero. Thank you. And frankly, the strategy is not that complicated. Obviously, there's a macroeconomic strategy. We have the lowest unemployment in America.
What is Functional Zero in addressing homelessness?
We have the highest median wage growth in America. I lowered taxes to the lowest level in history, and we've seen 140% growth in nine years. So the economy is robust. We were ranked the happiest city in America, the healthiest city in America. Frankly, if you're happy, you're healthy and you're working, you're probably not homeless. And then, of course, we've done innovative things in the homeless space. We've worked with charitable organizations that help people reunify families if they live in other parts of the country. And also we rent homes so that we can get around the building process and give all the same wraparound services. But we sort of hack through that process.
Those 500 individuals who are categorized as homeless, how many of them are suffering from mental illness and or self-medicating slash addicted to drugs?
A very high percentage. I would say 80% plus. That's sort of anecdotal. And I've been out to the streets. I'll be out there before my homeless ball now on May 31st. I'm actually going to spend a night out on the street. And when you talk to them, when you engage in them, a vast majority of them are, unfortunately.
Okay, so let me double click on that. This problem wasn't as acute before the super drugs, meth, like the serious meth. Opioids, yeah. Well, the really serious ones they're making now.
Fentanyl.
How does Miami tackle addiction issues among the homeless?
And fentanyl, right? This combination seems to be, you know, we had people addicted to heroin like Miles Davis and like Philip Seymour Hoffman who produced incredible art and were addicts for 30 years and they went in and out of it. But this drug is... Pernicious, different, deadly, super addicting. How much of the problem are those two drugs specifically, if you double clicked on it?
A big part of the problem, heroin or opioids. He's asking for a friend, by the way. Yeah. I'm asking if you have a hookup. Clearly, clearly.
No, but I'm being deadly serious because we had these homeless individuals in New York, you know, back in the day, in the 70s, 80s. They were kind of like... hobos and vagabonds not seriously addicted, you know, suffering where they're folding over and curled up in a ball from fentanyl.
Well, to your point, I mean, meth and the opioids are incredibly addictive and they're very hard to beat, right? I mean, even people who are wealthy and get addicted to these drugs have a very hard time. The recidivism rate is very high. And so, you know, You just had Antonio on here a minute ago, and he was talking about immigration and the border.
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Chapters
7 chapters
1
How did Miami become America's happiest city?
0:00–0:45
2
What strategies did Miami use to decrease homelessness?
0:45–1:45
3
What is Functional Zero in addressing homelessness?
1:45–3:00
4
How does Miami tackle addiction issues among the homeless?
3:00–7:25
5
What is the relationship between local taxes and city safety?
7:25–10:24
6
What are the challenges of rapid growth in Miami?
10:24–12:47
7
How did private sector initiatives improve Miami's transportation?
12:47–23:46
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