Coral Gables Commission candidate Melissa Castro never voted until last week

Image via Melissa Castro.

The first time Coral Gables Commission candidate Melissa Castro ever voted, it was likely for herself.

That’s according to Miami-Dade Elections Department records, which shows Castro, 38, had not been registered to vote in the county until this year.

She registered Jan. 12 without party affiliation and cast her first ballot last week, during the Coral Gables biennial election.

Castro’s name appeared on the ballot second from the top among candidates for the City Commission’s Group 4 seat, one of two races on the ticket.

She secured 39% of the vote. Her opponent, consultant Ivette Arango O’Doski, took 47%. Since neither received more than half the votes necessary to win outright, they’re now competing in an April 25 runoff.

O’Doski, 48, first registered to vote on Feb. 20, 1997, county records show, and her precinct was Coral Gables Senior High. She’s voted about 40 times since, most recently during the 2021 and 2023 Coral Gables elections and the 2022 Primary Election.

Castro, a psychologist by training who took over her late mother’s permit-expediting business in 2020, told Florida Politics her decades-long abstinence from the electoral process wasn’t from a lack of caring but because she was absorbed in her work helping people with autism and her parental duties.

She said not voting until now is among her “highest regrets.”

“I’m not the first nor will I be the last to have not realized at a young age the importance and privilege to vote,” she said.

“I was so immersed in a world captivated by treating children and young adults on the spectrum and bringing up my children that I didn’t participate in politics. In fact, I’ve never been a politician. It is only after becoming involved in my community as I have that I realized not just the importance but also the need to be involved, to vote. That is the main tool I have to make a difference in the city that I live in and love.”

She added, “I understand not voting is not ideal in my political candidacy, and that’s why I’m here today, trying to make a difference and represent the residents.”

Questions have been also raised about Castro’s Coral Gables residency. Per city rules, an eligible candidate for Coral Gables office must be a U.S. citizen, registered to vote and have lived in the city for at least one year prior to Election Day.

Castro maintains she has rented a condo in the same building off of Douglas Road within the city’s bounds for more than eight of the last 10 years, including the last four years.

It’s where her mother lived before, she said, and it’s “very secure, which is important to me as a mother with two kids.”

The Coral Gables runoff between Castro and O’Doski is on Tuesday, April 25.