MIAMI – In an exclusive interview with Local 10 News on Monday, the current chair of the Miami-Dade School Board spoke about the criminal charges levied against her former colleague on the board, Lubby Navarro.
Navarro, 49, was arrested Thursday on grand theft and fraud charges, having been accused of making more than $100,000 worth of personal purchases on her school district credit cards in 2022, just before she resigned from the board over a new state law prohibiting lobbyists from holding elected positions.
Read more details — including the full arrest warrant — here.
Mari Tere Rojas, the board’s current chair, addressed Navarro’s arrest in Monday’s interview with Local 10 News.
“Everyone is innocent until proven guilty in a court of law, however, is it disappointing that this situation that we’re confronted with right now is a reality,” Rojas said. “Yes, it is disappointing.”
She also spoke on the board’s fiscal responsibility with plans to address the issue at the next meeting.
“Everything concerns me,” Rojas said of prosecutors’ findings. “We are required to ensure that fiduciary responsibilities that we have are fulfilled.”
Prosecutors alleged that Navarro’s $100,000 spending spree included food, household goods, appliances, vacations and even the bizarre purchase of two silicone pregnancy bellies, all in an effort to win her now-ex-boyfriend back.
She’s also accused of purchasing multiple items for his business with taxpayer money before they broke up.
“Any at all situation that currently exists that needs to be strengthened, then it is imperative that we do everything in our power so that allegations such as these do not ever occur again,” Rojas said.
To that end, Rojas said she’s introducing a item at Wednesday’s school board meeting prioritizing an audit of the purchasing card process and additional auditing of school board member offices, plus those of the superintendent and the district’s general counsel.
“The perception obviously is not a positive one,” she said.
Prosecutors said high-ranking district staff noticed the spending irregularities after Navarro resigned and they were left to reconcile her credit card statements.
The investigation shows that while Navarro had a $6,000 monthly spending limit, in 2022, for 10 out of 12 months, she requested credit line increases.
In August and September, it was increased from $6,000 up to $15,000.
The county’s inspector general is also looking into how this went unnoticed for an entire year.
Dan Stermer, a former prosecutor and Weston mayor, who also sits on the oversight committee for the Broward County inspector general, said it’s clear something went wrong.
“It appears as if the oversight and the inspection and the audit of those statements may have laxed,” Stermer, who’s now the managing director of consulting firm Development Specialists, Inc., said.
Navarro bonded out of jail and is awaiting trial.
She’s also on leave from her position as director of government affairs for Memorial Healthcare System, which is part of the South Broward Hospital District.