Greg Chavarria stunned the Fort Lauderdale commission when he announced plans to resign from his $291,000-a-year job as city manager on June 1 for personal reasons.
Even more stunning news came Thursday, two days before Chavarria’s official departure, when the Broward County Inspector General released a report stating that Chavarria had not lived in Fort Lauderdale for the first fourteen months of his term, as required by the city charter .
Investigators used data from SunPass to substantiate the claim that Chavarria was not living in Fort Lauderdale when he took over as city manager, the report said. According to the report, Chavarria did not live within the city limits until September 2023, 14 months after he took the job.
The inspector general charged Chavarria with criminal misconduct when he changed his address with the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles to that of a condo unit in La Cancha that was not his legal residence.
“While falsely promising the veracity of the address of his legal residence, Mr. Chavarria committed perjury, not in an official proceeding, and made a false official statement, (amounting to) first- and second-degree felonies,” he said. the report. .
Chavarria, 46, could not be reached for comment Thursday.
Investigators from the Inspector General’s Office offered Chavarria the opportunity to speak with them, but he declined on April 11, the report said.
Before the end of a commission meeting on April 2, Chavarria announced his intention to resign as Fort Lauderdale city manager.
That evening, Mayor Dean Trantalis had a hard time hiding his shock: “Wow. So 60 days? Are you staying with us for 60 days? OK. I’m at a loss for words right now. We will simply adjourn the meeting.”
Trantalis said he had no idea Chavarria was under investigation until he received the inspector general’s report Thursday.
The mayor, a staunch Chavarria fan, defended him, saying he believes the charter should be updated and that the city manager should no longer live in Fort Lauderdale.
“I don’t see how being in a city affects a manager’s ability to do his job well,” Trantalis said. “I would like to see that part of our charter removed.”
The mayor also targeted the anonymous tipster.
“I am surprised and disappointed that people are trying to disparage the good name and good work of our city manager,” he said. “This is nothing short of a cheap political ploy by those who feel they have been left out of the process. And now we are left without leadership and without direction.”
Vice Mayor Steve Glassman said he was not aware that Chavarria had been the target of an inspector general investigation, but he was not at all surprised.
“There have been people wanting to get our city manager for a while now,” Glassman said. “For me (living in the city) is not really important these days. For me, it’s much more about the work product than where they sleep.”
Commissioner John Herbst wasn’t surprised either.
“There had been rumors,” Herbst said. “Apparently someone took those rumors to the OIG.”
If Chavarria had not already quit, Herbst said he would have pushed for his resignation.
“The committee would have discussed it and decided what action would be taken,” he said. “It is conceivable that the committee could not have taken any action. If it had been up to me, we would have had no choice but to remove him.”
It was too early to say Thursday whether the Broward District Attorney’s Office would review the case. “The case has not yet been received by our office,” said Aaron Savitski, spokesman for the Attorney General’s Office. “Prosecutors will review it once we receive the OIG’s findings.”
Here are more details about what the Inspector General’s investigators found:
Chavarria was living in North Miami Beach when the commission appointed him city manager on July 23, 2022, according to city employment records.
Chavarria tried to make it appear as if he lived in Fort Lauderdale when he changed his legal address to an apartment in La Cancha on Feb. 25, 2023 — seven months after taking over as city manager, the report said.
Chavarria not only violated the city’s requirement that the city manager live within city limits, but he also violated state law by falsely swearing to legally reside at an address that was not his legal residence, the report alleges.
“Finally, Mr. Chavarria’s routine commute between February 25, 2023 and September 15, 2023 also showed that he was not legally residing at the La Cancha address,” the report said.
“We checked SunPass transponder data for the transponder and license plate number of Mr. Chavarria’s vehicle,” the report said. “SunPass transaction history revealed that the SunPass transponder routinely traveled north of North Miami Beach and south of Fort Lauderdale via the I-95 Express lanes between February 25, 2023 and September 15, 2023.”
In total, the transponder used either the I-95 Express lanes to travel north at the start of a work day, south at the end of a work day, or both north at the start of the day and then to the south at the end of the same working day. working day out of 94 days, or about 67% of working days between February 25, 2023 and September 15, 2023, the report said.
“The activity on the transponder associated with Mr. Chavarria’s vehicle showed a marked decline after mid-September 2023,” the report says, “coinciding with the date he reported living at Society Las Olas with the Director of Human City Resources.”
Susannah Bryan can be reached at sbryan@sunsentinel.com. Follow me on X @Susannah_Bryan
