Wife to join husband on small Miami-Dade town’s council after winning election recount

How do you follow the Sunshine Law when you’re married to a fellow town council member?

That question will now be tested for the first known time in Florida’s history.

The tiny town of Medley will have a husband-wife duo serving on its council simultaneously after Karina Pacheco defeated Lourdes Rodriguez in a Jan. 25 special election by just two votes, 199-197, a result that was confirmed Friday in a machine recount by the Miami-Dade elections department in Doral.

Pacheco will join her husband, Ivan Pacheco, on a town council that is already a family affair. Edgar Ayala and his daughter, Lizelh Ayala, are two of the other five elected officials.

The other is the town’s top administrator, Mayor Roberto Martell.

Pacheco’s election could test the boundaries of Florida’s Sunshine Law, which bars two members of the same municipal board from privately discussing any matter “which will foreseeably come before the board for action.” Dating back to 2018, when the couple were on the ballot together but only Ivan Pacheco won, the husband and wife have insisted amid several subsequent campaigns that they can serve and live together without breaking the law.

Both Karina and Ivan Pacheco declined to speak with the Miami Herald after the election results were certified Friday, leaving together in the same car.

Bob Jarvis, a law professor at Nova Southeastern University, said there is nothing illegal about a husband and wife sitting on the same town council in Florida. But he said it will be difficult for the Pachecos to stay within the boundaries of the law.

“They have to understand that they live under a microscope and they have to govern themselves accordingly,” Jarvis said. “Most couples would not do this because they wouldn’t want people to be questioning everything that they’re doing.”

Barbara Peterson, executive director of the Florida Center for Government Accountability, told the Herald last month that spouses on the same council “must be extremely careful to avoid discussing council business except at meetings held in strict compliance with the sunshine law.”

“They should be aware that they will be subject to heightened public scrutiny,” Peterson said.

As the recount took place Friday, Ivan Pacheco stood in an area designated for members of the public and carefully recorded the process on his phone through a glass divider. At one point, he questioned an elections department staffer about her handling of ballots during the manual audit of the results.

The machine recount was triggered because the two candidates were separated by just 0.5 percentage points. (A hand recount would have taken place if the margin was 0.25 points or less.)

Pacheco initially led by just one vote, 196-195, after the votes were counted Tuesday. Five additional ballots that had mismatched or missing signatures were cured by a Thursday deadline and approved by a canvassing board consisting of Medley Town Clerk Victoria Martinez and two county judges, Carlos Gamez and Lizzet Martinez.

Tuesday’s special election was brought on by the November arrest and suspension from office of Councilwoman Lily Stefano, who was charged with stealing food from a charity founded by retired football star Santana Moss.

Medley, an industrial town in West Miami-Dade, has about 1,000 residents and one precinct.

There is no rule in Florida against spouses serving together on an elected board. In 1989, the state’s attorney general said in an advisory that Florida’s anti-nepotism law “does not prohibit a husband and wife from simultaneously serving on the same town council.”

This was Karina Pacheco’s fourth run for Medley town council since 2018, when she and her husband were first on the ballot together and her husband was elected to a four-year term.

“You would think you’d want more independence on the town council,” said Jarvis, the Nova Southeastern professor. “But who are we to question the wisdom of the voters?”