Design Review Board - Regular Meeting

Tuesday, August 18, 2026Official site

The Design Review Board meeting saw one project automatically approved due to a lack of quorum and a board member's recusal. The second project, a new two-story home, was approved with conditions after discussion on landscaping, sod, and design elements. The board also elected new leadership, appointing Danny Garrick as Chair and Angel Lopez as Vice Chair.

About this meeting

Government Body
Design Review Board
Meeting Type
Design Review Board
Location
South Miami, FL
Meeting Date
August 18, 2026

Published excerpts

Only published remarks appear here. The full transcript is not published.

41 sections (from 43 segments)

1:39•Mariano Corral

How are you? Good, sir. Hey, how come? Oh. I must show my happy face.

2:15•Mariano Corral

Okay, so who's today? So besides me today, we've got Angel, myself.

2:54•Mariano Corral

So regardless right now, item one will be approved and everything else will go through staff, correct?

4:23•Mariano Corral

I just spoke to Danny. He's going to show up. He's just having a problem with his computer.

4:55 – 5:31•Mariano Corral

That's strange because I did get it from Nikki and I did get the email from Marcus. Oh, Danny's in. good morning good morning good morning part of me i had some technical difficulties this morning no no worries okay we have quorum now great yes so what i do is i recuse myself for the first item either way and but it still has to be read into the record and i'll i'll i'll just say bye-bye okay

12:24•Mariano Corral

What about the architect? Arturo Fajul is on.

19:59 – 20:14•Mariano Corral

But regardless, in the future, when they do put a pool in there, that's going to take a lot of the solder away anyway, so. And I'll give you a list of it, and I'll give you my comments on some of the things that I see, and then we can go from there.

24:00 – 25:53•Mariano Corral

Yes, I am. Arturo, first of all, let me tell you that I like your home. Okay, that's very important. And I do have some comments and I'll get back. Normally, I do not speak about the architecture. I normally leave it to Angel as the architect, but Even though I'm entitled to it, I try to stay away from it and stay in my lane, but I must say these things. First of all, your articulation of your elements is not boring. They're interesting. The front of the house has a lot of movement. The rear of the house has a lot of movement. On the, shall we say the, let me see, on the south side of the hous

26:07•Mariano Corral

I mean, eventually you're going to have to bring it in back to the city anyway.

26:21 – 26:39•Mariano Corral

Okay. So going back to that north side of the wall, my concern is that we don't have any photographs of what the neighbors are. What do they have on both sides? But your design, in terms of the size of the lot, just fits perfectly, in my opinion, okay?

26:43 – 28:53•Mariano Corral

And so, but, and so, I don't know how the board will feel on that, but I'll leave it again to Rick and Danny and Angel to see if they see what I see. In addition, not knowing where all the underground utilities are, because you do not show them, we have to work with you i am one of them we'll we here are board members we try to work with the applicant to make it easier for you to go through this whole process okay and see and mention things that i see so getting into the landscape portion of it this thing um i came up with nine trees that need to be placed on this site two of them you've got t

29:18 – 30:21•Mariano Corral

Sometimes I get reprimanded here because I don't follow the land development code. I look at the site. I look at what the proper trees and species should fit on that site from that aspect. If we have to go by the code, you have to put large canopy trees in here. And I ask myself this question. Why in the hell are you in a portal? Because of the tightness of the house and the way the tree will grow. But Elizabeth, you're too Spanish stopper. I have one in front of my house. It took 16 years for it to grow to 16 feet. 16 years. I planted in 2005 and it wasn't until 2016 that the darn thing was b

30:23 – 31:07•Mariano Corral

Okay, let me tell you. The backside, when those trees grow to be 15 feet, they'll grow relatively fast. It's going to give you color. Your Hamelia patterns, again, in one season, they should go to be about four feet in height. Correct. In two seasons, you'll grow bigger. So your choice of palette is not my problem. It's the lack of landscape that is my problem. And this is where I think that you guys should balance it out. I'm more concerned with the front. I'm more concerned with the north side of that neighborhood. Take a second look and then go from there. Otherwise, I think I... I don't ha

31:16•Mariano Corral

Elizabeth knows what to do. She knows what to do.

31:22 – 31:43•Mariano Corral

She knows what to do. But again, I understand because of the big window in the front. and you want to see that, what kind of a low shrub? Remember, you've got to meet the woody shrubs. And if you use Fakahatchee grass and so forth, well, that's counted, but it's not considered woody. So as long as you have 70 woody shrubs, you're good to go.

31:55 – 32:18•Angel Lopez

yes um hey how's it going guys um i i generally i like i like the design i just had some questions with regards to the floor plan versus the that rendering that you guys presented it doesn't seem like the front or the rear of these renderings are consistent with what you presented on the floor plan um maybe just provide some clarification and then you know just for you guys personally

32:45 – 32:59•Angel Lopez

I mean, it's kind of tough for us, difficult for us to review set of drawings, I guess. I can, you know, from my years of experience as an architect, I can kind of understand what you're providing, I guess. So the floor plan dictates the design, right? That's what you're telling us.

33:28 – 34:26•Angel Lopez

Yeah. Yeah. It helps. Yeah. It helps a little bit. Yeah. Okay. Because I see that the front, you know, your main entrance is not really, is standing behind the glass, right, from your living room. It's not really standing proud uh like it seems on the rendering and then i guess the elevation now i can kind of see what you're trying to do there um my suggestions architecturally um you know i'm okay with the design you know the design is is fine i see you have many you have a lot of glass which i like um and you know we'll talk about the the on the side elevation uh like moreno uh alluded to but

34:36 – 35:08•Angel Lopez

Um, okay. Well, just, I guess, discuss that with, uh, with zoning at a later time. I just, that's just a suggestion architecturally, if you can expand on that, on that step on the ground floor, if allowed by a setback by zoning. then I would do that just so the door doesn't open right into the edge of that step. The second thing is, as you walk in on the stairs, I see that the second floor, I realize that the second floor has handrails. I didn't see it on the ground floor, but you're going to be providing those handrails, correct? I just want to confirm.

35:11•Angel Lopez

For the stairs, as soon as you walk in. No, when you walk into the house.

35:25•Angel Lopez

No, no, no. The stairwell inside the house to the second floor, that's going to have handrails, right?

35:40•Angel Lopez

Okay, because I'm just clarifying because I think your floor plans do show handrails on the second floor against the wall.

36:06 – 36:43•Angel Lopez

Well, I don't know what you're going to do if it's going to be glass or what you're going to do on that second floor. But, you know, I would suggest that you provide handrails or glass or something, guardrails or something on that second floor. Because right now, I just, facing the front of the house, I see that there's a handrail that stops there. And there's like an, there's a ledge there. And I don't know if that's glass or what that is. So just be clear with that. Okay. And maybe add that to your ground floor plan as well so that it's clear that you're going to have handrails. I only see i

37:04 – 37:19•Angel Lopez

Yeah. Can you, uh, can you share the ground floor plan? I actually, I should, what are you a corral? You just hit share over here and then you say share. And pick the screen. All right, cool. Let me do this. Can you guys see my screen?

37:22•Angel Lopez

It's showing up. Yeah. Yeah. All right, cool. So Sorry, I had a split screen there. So, yeah, on the ground floor here, the handrails, there are no handrails shown on the ground floor.

37:36•Angel Lopez

Oh, that's going to be a glass guardrail, okay, because on the second floor, I see handrails.

37:48 – 38:11•Angel Lopez

Okay, so you are going to have handrails against the wall, okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. All right, on the ground floor, when you walk in, This foyer is kind of tight. I know that there's a stairwell right in front of it, but just make sure that this feels nice and open, right? What's going to be underneath the stairs?

38:39•Angel Lopez

So I could theoretically – Can you reduce the steps and then maybe add another step here?

39:52 – 40:10•Angel Lopez

Yep, I get it. So on the side, like Mariano said, there's not much, there isn't much, many windows or anything. Maybe you could add something here in the garage, and I don't know, you know, The kitchen, that's up to you. The design, you know, I don't know if you want to add any kind of windows or anything here.

40:29•Mariano Corral

It just needs something just to break up. Maybe you don't need a window. It just needs to break up that space.

40:46•Angel Lopez

Okay, it's a suggestion. That's up to you guys. And then in the garage, sometimes people want even if it's a frosted window, so you can get some light in.

41:03 – 41:31•Angel Lopez

And then you've clarified the rear. I'm looking at the rendering. It doesn't show like you have. So you're not going to do a pool right now, and you're not doing the handrails. You are doing the handrails, even though those aren't showing in the rendering. Sorry, I was just confused. But everything else, I guess, seems fine to me. Just make sure if you are proposing a pool in the future, you have enough space back there with your swale and everything. Yeah, that's where it's supposed to go. All right.

43:13•Mariano Corral

I'll make a motion for approval with staff comments and board member comments.

45:13 – 45:56•Mariano Corral

Okay. By the way, let me just say this to you, Elizabeth and the owners. Technically, from my perspective, I would have deferred this, the landscape, to come back at a later date. But because now everything is tied in, if I would have gone for a deferment, that means that the architecture also as well. I'm going to trust you, Elizabeth, that you are going to provide the proper landscape that we requested and so forth and the balance that we requested. And staff will review that because we'll never see this again. All right. But again, in the past, we have been hurt by it. And so I'm going to t

47:02 – 47:14•Mariano Corral

Can we do it right now? Can we do it right now? Because I already got my, I already want to tell you, I'd say Danny to continue as chairman of the design review board.

47:39•Mariano Corral

Under one condition. The condition is we stay here on this board and review everything no matter how long it takes.

48:03•Mariano Corral

All right, so I'll make a motion that Danny Guerra should be the new chair.

48:38 – 48:50•Angel Lopez

I would like to make a motion to elect a chair and vice chair of the design review board in this meeting.

49:11•Mariano Corral

I make a motion that Danny Guerra should be the chair.

50:14•Mariano Corral

I'll make the motion for Angel Lopez to be vice chair.

51:30 – 51:47•Angel Lopez

Okay. I second what Danny said. Thank you very much for putting your trust in me as the vice chair. And I will do the same, you know, considering I'm in the industry. I'll, you know, I'll speak to my board member here and see if, you know, if I can recommend a couple of people.

These excerpts are remarks by officials whose identity a person confirmed, from a transcript generated automatically from the official public meeting video and presented unedited. Accuracy may vary; view the original recording for reference.