Jesse Scheckner
Miami-Dade voters this month will choose between three candidates for the District 3 seat on the County Commission. Two have held the job before and squared off for the job 12 years ago.
But their roles are now reversed. Keon Hardemon is defending his position after a single four-year term in the seat. He hopes to repel a challenge from Audrey Edmonson, who soundly defeated him in their first meeting and now hopes to do so again to reclaim her old place on the 13-member panel.
Also running is construction executive Marion Brown, a candidate with little political experience and a comparatively paltry war chest.
Situated in a center-east portion of Miami-Dade, District 3 covers the unincorporated neighborhoods of Brownsville and Biscayne Shores, and a large chunk of Miami — including Liberty City, Little Haiti, Overtown, the Upper East Side, Edgewater, Buena Vista, Allapattah, Wynwood, San Marco Island and Watson Island. The villages of Miami Shores and El Portal, where Edmonson served as Mayor, also fall within its borders.
Edmonson, 71, served on the Miami-Dade Commission from 2005 to 2020, when she was forced to leave office due to term limits county voters overwhelmingly approved in 2012. Those rules don’t bar former officials from running again after leaving office, however, and after a brief run for Congress in 2022, she now wants her old job back.
She said many of her former constituents have encouraged her to run, complaining that Hardemon doesn’t make himself available to them. Hardemon, 40, disputed that claim and pointed to funding he delivered to the district for affordable housing, anti-poverty efforts and anti-gun violence initiatives like the $90 million Peace and Prosperity Plan as evidence of his hard work.
In 2020, he won the District 3 seat with 67% of the vote. It was a far better outcome than in 2012, when Edmonson beat him by 24 points.
The soft-spoken yet persuasive policymaker is now strongly positioned to ensure that doesn’t happen again.
Since winning in 2020, Hardemon has raised more than $1.3 million. He’s known to county voters, having previously served on — and chaired — the Miami City Commission. Today, he also leads the county’s Airport and Economic Development Committee and Tourism Development Council.
Hardemon said he wants to add more affordable and public housing to Miami-Dade’s inventory in a second term while building on his existing accomplishments.
In private life, he works as a criminal defense lawyer, leaning on his experience in the Miami-Dade Public Defender’s Office. His list of current clients includes former Miami City Commissioner Alex Díaz de la Portilla, whom Gov. Ron DeSantis removed from office last year after his arrest on felony bribery and money laundering charges.
A therapist by training, Edmonson’s impact on District 3 in general and Miami-Dade at large is indelible. Among other things, she led a countywide effort to stop the theft of copper wiring from Miami-Dade’s street lighting system, spearheaded a push for new guidelines for crane operations and introduced legislation to reestablish the county’s small business loan and bond programs.
If she wins a trip back to County Hall, Edmonson vows to prioritize community development, public safety and affordable housing while shoring up county infrastructure against sea-level rise.
She’s been less than forthcoming about her campaign finances. An April press release from her campaign announced she’d raised more than $100,000 by late July, but her campaign account shows she added about $45,000 since January. Florida records do not show her attached to any state-level political committees.
Brown, 59, is the lone Republican in the race. Hardemon and Edmonson are Democrats.
Brown is also a rather new participant in the electoral process. State records show he only registered to vote in Miami-Dade in May 2023 and that he has yet to cast a ballot.
Through early August, he raised $2,500. He has no campaign account. During a July 23 forum by the Miami Foundation, he said his “main thing is slowing down gentrification.”
The Miami-Dade Commission is nonpartisan, as are its elections. Edmonson, Hardemon and Brown are all on the Aug. 20 Primary ballot in District 3.
If no candidate receives more than 50% of the vote to win outright, the two top vote-getters will compete in a runoff culminating in the Nov. 5 General Election.
