Coral Gables Police Chief Dennis Weiner takes city taxpayers for a ride

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Miami Herald columnist Jose Lambiet reports today that Coral Gables Police Chief Dennis Weiner - in less than a year on the job - has been taking the City Beautiful's taxpayers for an expensive ride.

Lambiet recently learned that Weiner - who makes $140,545 a year - has been making a daily, 180 mile round-trip commute from Juno Beach to Coral Gables in his city-issued Ford Crown Victoria.

Since March 2011, Weiner has logged 31,300 miles on his unmarked Crown Vic in addition to using $5,391 in taxpayer-supplied gas.

When he was hired, Weiner promised city administrators that he would move to Coral Gables from Juno Beach, where he was also the police chief. He hasn't.

Lambiet, a former Palm Beach Post gossip columnist, has racked up a lot of scoops lately for the Herald and for his website, GossipExtra.com...some of them having nothing to do with celebrities.

A few weeks ago Lambiet reported that Miami-Dade County State Attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle supplemented her income by lending "$50,000 to a Key Biscayne homeowner at 12 percent interest."

And, last year Lambiet broke the news that a search of the Broward County Property Appraiser's office "turned up 871 people receiving property tax exemptions years after their death."

Lambiet told me today that he was tipped to Chief Weiner's expensive commute while attending an event in Coral Gables a few weeks ago.

Lambiet said Gables City Manager Pat Salerno stonewalled him at every turn as he attempted to learn how much Weiner's daily round-trip was costing Coral Gables taxpayers.

Click here to read more of Lambiet's scoops at GossipExtra.com.