A neighbor-led effort · Lauderdale-By-The-Sea, Florida

Nice sunrises.
Fewer highrises.
Let's keep it that way.

We're a group of neighbors who love this one-and-a-half square miles of barrier island exactly the way it is. This November we're backing three Town-First candidates — Randy Strauss, Howard Goldberg and Patrick Ferguson — who honor our non-partisan charter and put Lauderdale-By-The-Sea ahead of any party.

Get the newsletter Meet the slate

Election Day Tuesday, November 3, 2026

— days away

On the ballot Mayor · Commission Seat 1 (District 1) · Commission Seat 2 (District 2) · 8 charter amendments — we say NO on all 8

What "Town-First" means

The Town-First Commitment

It isn't complicated. Every candidate we support has committed to three things. That's what earns our endorsement.

A commitment to the people of Lauderdale-By-The-Sea

Honor our non-partisan charter

Our town charter makes local office non-partisan on purpose. Town-First candidates run that way and govern that way — no party machinery, no outside playbook, no national politics dragged onto a barrier island that has never needed them.

People before party

The job is beach access, sea walls, the pier, parking, the height ordinance, and whether your street floods. Town-First candidates put the residents of Lauderdale-By-The-Sea ahead of any party interest, every vote, every time.

Transparency and accountability

Decisions made in public, on the record, with the reasoning explained in plain language. Questions from residents answered, not deflected. A commissioner who can't tell you why they voted the way they did shouldn't be voting for you.

What we're protecting

Drive north or south and the towers start. Here, they don't.

That's not luck. In 1973 this town decided it would rather have sunrises than skylines and capped new buildings at three stories, something Pompano and Fort Lauderdale never did. In 1996 the voters wrote the limit into the Town Charter themselves: three stories, period. A fourth is allowed only where the ground floor is parking instead of people, and no commission can raise the limit without a vote of the residents. In 2006, after the north end joined the town, residents petitioned and voted to extend it town-wide, Terra Mar to Flamingo, ocean to Intracoastal.

Fifty years later you can still walk from the sand to Anglin's Square, get a coffee, hear a band on Commercial Boulevard, and wade out to a living reef a hundred yards from your towel. Every one of those things exists because neighbors said no to something that would have made a lot of money for somebody else. Three of the five seats that guard that "no" are on the ballot this fall.

1.57 sq mi: The whole town, Terra Mar to Flamingo, ocean to Intracoastal.
6,056: Year-round neighbors. Ten thousand-plus in season.
3 stories: The limit since 1973. Voters locked it into the charter in 1996 and took it town-wide in 2006. Only a vote of the people can raise it.
100 yds: From the beach to the reef. South Florida's beach-diving capital.

Our Town-First slate · November 3, 2026

Three seats. Three neighbors who made the commitment.

Every registered voter in Lauderdale-By-The-Sea votes in all three races. These are the three we're asking you to vote for — and why.

For Mayor

Randy Strauss

Vice Mayor · on the Commission since 2018

Randy has spent eight years on the dais and three decades practicing law, and he raised his two daughters here. He's a Hillsboro Inlet District Commissioner, past president of the Broward Hundred Club, and the kind of angler who knows the reef by heart. He's running on the basics: protect the height limit and the charter, keep town business local, safer crossings and better lighting, careful spending, get the pier open, fix parking.

Why we're backing him Randy has already cast the votes that kept this town low and walkable, including a no vote on all eight charter amendments. He doesn't need to learn the job — and he's never let a party tell him how to do it.

randystraussformayor.com

For Commission · Seat 1, District 1

Howard Goldberg

Chairman, LBTS Chamber of Commerce

Howard is a longtime resident and a working real-estate professional who has spent more than a decade helping people find their way to this town. He's been on the Chamber of Commerce board since 2014 and its Chairman since 2022, so he's sat across the table from every small business on Commercial Boulevard and El Mar that makes the village feel like a village. He co-chaired the Planning & Zoning Board from 2022 to 2024, where the height limit gets defended one site plan at a time, and served on the Town's Audit Board in 2023.

Why we're backing him Howard has already done the unglamorous work: zoning, audits, the Chamber. He understands that a strong small-business district and a small-scale town aren't in tension — they're the same thing.

howard@lbtscommissioner.com

For Commission · Seat 2, District 2

Patrick Ferguson

Attorney · environmental organizer

Patrick is a lawyer (Nova Southeastern, 2015) who has spent nearly a decade as a senior organizer with the Sierra Club's Florida chapter, fighting overdevelopment in state parks and leading the "Stop the Burn" campaign. He sits on the board of Residents for Resilience, a Broward nonprofit, where he co-founded Restaurants for Resilience. When someone proposed renaming Seagrape Drive after a president, Patrick organized the neighbors who said no politics in paradise — and pushed for a charter amendment so residents, not commissioners, decide that kind of thing.

Why we're backing him "Local government should always put the interests of the town and its residents over partisan agendas." He said it before he was a candidate. That's the whole commitment.

facebook.com/VotePatrickFerguson

Seat 2 is the seat Randy is leaving to run for Mayor. Commission terms are four years; the Mayor serves two. All three races are decided town-wide.

Also on your ballot · eight charter questions

Vote NO on all eight. Protect the charter that built this town.

Our Town Charter is the rulebook residents wrote for our own government. This November the Commission is asking you to change it in eight places at once (Ordinance 2026-04). Read together, the changes protect incumbents, weaken the term limits citizens put in place, slow down citizen petitions, and hand pieces of local accountability to the state. This town has done fine under its charter. There is no need for any of this.

The Commission put these on your ballot by a 3–2 vote. Vice Mayor Randy Strauss and Commissioner John Graziano voted no — on first reading and again on second.

1 Extend timeframes for certifying citizen petitions Doubles how long Town Hall can sit on your petition. NO

On the ballot "Shall the Town Charter be amended to extend petition certification deadlines and clarify time calculations?"

What it actually does When residents gather signatures to put an ordinance on the ballot, the Clerk currently has 20 days to certify the petition. This raises it to 30. For petitions to repeal or amend an ordinance, the Clerk's deadline goes from 5 business days to 10.

Why we're voting no Citizen petitions are the one tool residents have when the Commission won't listen. The clock on that tool should not get longer. "Clarify" is fine; doubling the wait is not, and they've been bundled together so you can't have one without the other.
2 Two four-year Mayor terms instead of three two-year terms Voters weigh in on the Mayor half as often, and the total cap on years in office goes up. NO

On the ballot "Shall the Town Charter be amended to change the Mayor-Commissioner's term to a maximum of two four-year terms, effective November 2028?"

What it actually does Today the Mayor faces voters every two years and can serve at most three terms (six years). This makes it four-year terms, two of them (eight years). The same amendment also raises the charter's cap on consecutive years in any combination of offices from 14 to 16.

Why we're voting no A two-year mayoral term is a feature, not a bug: it's the most frequent accountability check residents have. Longer terms plus a higher overall cap means more years for the same people and fewer chances for you to say otherwise.
3 Let a term-limited Mayor run for Commissioner right away Opens a revolving door from the Mayor's chair to a Commission seat. NO

On the ballot "Shall the Town Charter be amended to allow a person who has served as Mayor-Commissioner to run for and serve as a Commissioner at the conclusion of their service as Mayor-Commissioner, if permissible under the maximum term limits?"

What it actually does Right now, when a Mayor's time is up, it's up. The ordinance deletes the words "or a Mayor-Commissioner or both" from the Commissioner term-limit rule (Sec. 6.3), so years spent as Mayor stop counting. A Mayor could step straight into a Commission race without the two-year break the charter requires today.

Why we're voting no Term limits only work if there's an actual exit. Pair this with Question 2's higher cap and a single person could rotate between the dais chairs for sixteen straight years.
4 Fill vacancies with term-limited people, no break required Lets the Commission appoint a term-limited insider to an empty seat without an election. NO

On the ballot "Shall the Town Charter be amended to clarify that the Town Commission may appoint a qualified person to fill a vacancy in the office of Mayor-Commissioner or Commissioner, even if that person would otherwise be required by the Town Charter to take a two-year break in service, potentially increasing the number of persons available for appointment?"

What it actually does Exactly what it says. Someone the charter says must sit out two years could be appointed by the sitting Commission to fill a vacancy anyway.

Why we're voting no Appointments already bypass voters. This lets them bypass term limits too. In a town of 6,000 people there is no shortage of qualified neighbors who aren't term-limited.
5 Write today's district lines into the charter Freezes 2004 boundaries and deletes the equal-population, one-person-one-vote requirement. NO

On the ballot "The Town has used the same northern and southern Commission district boundaries since 2004. Shall the Town Charter be amended to establish the current district boundaries in the Town Charter, including the existing boundary at the portion of the Village of Sea Ranch Lakes bordering the Atlantic Ocean to preserve the current district boundaries?"

What it actually does The ballot language sounds harmless. The ordinance text also strikes the charter section that requires districts to be "of equal population, compact, proportional" and says "the principle of one person/one vote shall be adhered to strictly," along with the requirement that a Florida university review the lines.

Why we're voting no Nobody asked to move the line at Sea Ranch Lakes. What's being removed is the rule that says the two districts must stay roughly equal. That rule protects every voter's weight in the north and the south, and it should stay.
6 Rewrite the rules for removing a Commissioner from office Ethics removals move to a state board in Tallahassee; absences get excused by a simple majority. NO

On the ballot "Shall the Town Charter be amended to clarify standards for forfeiture of office of Commission members by tying qualifications to existing Charter provisions, requiring ethics-based removal to be determined under state law by the Florida Commission on Ethics, requiring incapacity determinations to be supported by medical certification or court order, allowing absences to be excused by majority vote, and excusing the Commission from voting on removals already mandated by other governmental authorities?"

What it actually does Today a Commissioner forfeits office for violating "any standard of conduct or code of ethics established by law." Under this change, an ethics violation only costs the seat if the Florida Commission on Ethics issues a final order, after every appeal is exhausted, that specifically imposes removal. Missing four straight meetings can be forgiven by a majority vote of colleagues.

Why we're voting no This is the surrender of local authority we're talking about. A state process can take years and rarely ends in removal. Accountability for a five-person town commission belongs in Town Hall, in front of the neighbors who elected them.
7 Adopt state law for elections, public notices, and audits Audit deadline slips three months; legal notices can move from the paper to a website. NO

On the ballot "Shall the Town Charter incorporate Florida laws governing municipal elections, public notices, and audits?"

What it actually does Three things: the Town's annual financial audit deadline moves from six months after year-end to nine; legal notices (including notice of a forfeiture hearing) may be posted on a website instead of in a newspaper; and the charter defers to whatever Tallahassee decides about municipal elections, now and in the future.

Why we're voting no Later audits and quieter notices are the opposite of transparency. And "as amended from time to time" means the rules of our own elections change whenever the Legislature changes them, with no vote here.
8 "Correct errors, resolve inconsistencies, clean up language" A catch-all. The Town hasn't published a plain-English list of what changes under it. NO

On the ballot "Shall the Town Charter be amended to correct errors, resolve inconsistencies, and update provisions to reflect current law?"

What it actually does Everything in Ordinance 2026-04 not covered by the other seven questions. Some of it is genuinely typos. Some of it is wording changes to the term-limit sections whose effect residents have not been walked through.

Why we're voting no "Cleanup" is where things hide. When you can't tell what you're voting for, the safe vote is no. Ask the Commission to publish a side-by-side and bring the genuine fixes back next time, on their own.

Questions are listed in the order they appear in Ordinance 2026-04, adopted May 26, 2026; the Broward ballot may number them differently. Ballot language is quoted from the ordinance. The full text is on file with the Town Clerk, 4501 N. Ocean Drive, and in the May 26, 2026 Commission agenda packet. Read it yourself; we did.

Two questions, on the record

Live here, or don't run here.

Our charter is blunt about it. To sit on the Commission you have to be a bona fide resident of Lauderdale-By-The-Sea and actually live in the district you represent (Sec. 6.3). Not own a unit here. Not get mail here. Live here. The rule exists because a town of 6,000 is supposed to be governed by people who'll run into you at Publix and hear about it when the beach parking changes or a sea wall gives.

So we're putting two questions to Mayor Edmund Malkoon, who is asking for your vote on November 3, and Commissioner Richard DeNapoli, whose seat comes up in 2028. Both have public-record answers. We'll print whatever they send us, unedited, right here.

Where do you claim your Florida homestead exemption?

Florida lets you claim exactly one: the place you actually live. It's a public record at the Broward County Property Appraiser. If it's in Lauderdale-By-The-Sea, this takes ten seconds to settle.
Who pays you, and does the Town have a contract with them?

Every elected official files a Form 1 financial disclosure listing their sources of income. It's public. The Town spends real money with outside vendors every year, and residents are entitled to know whether anyone voting on those contracts is also cashing a check from one.

If the answers are "here" and "no," wonderful: we'll say so, and that's the end of it. If they're anything else, you deserve to know before you vote. Answers and documents: hello@letsprotectourparadise.org.

How to help

Small town. Every vote counts, literally.

Town races here are decided by a few hundred ballots. Here's what actually moves the needle.

Check your registration

Moved, changed your name, or not sure? Takes two minutes. The deadline for November is October 5.
Register or update →
Vote by mail

Request a mail ballot from Broward County so you're not scrambling on a Tuesday in November.
Broward Supervisor of Elections →
Show up to a commission meeting

Town Hall, 4501 N. Ocean Drive. Regular meetings are on the town calendar. Sit in the back. Watch who asks questions.
Meetings & agendas →
Talk to five neighbors

Yard signs, a note in the building group chat, a conversation on the beach walk. Ask us for signs and a one-pager.
hello@letsprotectourparadise.org →

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Nice sunrises. Fewer highrises. Let's keep it that way.