Rey Valdes resigns from his position as Doral’s City Manager

DORAL, FL – On Monday, Sept. 30, during a special council meeting, the public learned Rey Valdes presented a resignation letter directed to the City of Doral council.

The council was about to discuss item 5B of the agenda on “establishing an annual procedure to evaluate City Manager’s salary and salary evaluation discussion” when Councilwomen Maureen Porras, proponent of the item, said she was just informed Valdes had presented a letter of resignation. “Therefore, this item is moved, so I’m going to move to withdraw it,” Porras said.

“Yes, that is correct. I have to resign effective five minutes ago,” Rey Valdes said. “As we all know, the reason this special meeting was called was to conduct an evaluation of the city manager and specifically evaluate his salary. I want to go on the record to state that this proposed reduction in pay had nothing to do with my job performance, but rather this was in retaliation for refusing to be the puppet of certain council members who are present here tonight,” he added.

The City Manager, appointed in June 2024 in replacement of Interim Manager, Kathie Brooks, who replaced Barbara Hernandez after she was removed from her position, also mentioned the financial impact of this reduction “would have resulted in some members of my senior staff earning more than myself and, frankly, this would have been unjust and unacceptable. I was directed to terminate several employees, not due to their job performance, but rather because they were appointed by the former city manager.”

According to Valdes’s, the aforementioned it’s a direct violation of the city charter since elected officials are not to be involved in any aspect of the administration, including the hiring and termination of employees.

“Behavior such as this by elected officials is something that shocks the conscience and goes against the morals of any decent human being. Holding public office is a privilege that should not be abused by those in power to serve their own agenda. Shame on you,” Valdes said while pointing out in the past eight months, the City of Doral has had four city managers who were “either terminated or forced to resign”.

“Clearly, it is not the city managers’ the ones who are the problem. Let me repeat that: four city managers in eight months. The city managers are not the problem. Do you understand that?”

Following his intervention, there were accusations and arguments between Valdes and councilmembers Maureen Porras and Digna Cabral under a very tense atmosphere. 

The City of Doral Council agreed by vote to extend his employment for 90 days until December 31st at his current salary, and Doral’s Mayor, Christi Fraga, will now start a process with Human Resources for his replacement.