LIZ BALMASEDA Herald Staff Writer

When he was in Paris last summer to buy Impressionist art, the mayor of Bal Harbour took a couple of side trips, on city business. He took a train to Deauville to arrange a sister city program with officials of that French resort town. Then he flew to Milan to persuade a group of famous Italian fashion designers to bring their fall collections to his chichi beach village this spring.

Mayor John Sherman's travels cost taxpayers $1,616, part of which is to be reimbursed by the Bal Harbour Shops.

When Medley Mayor Tobie Wilson went to Tallahassee last December for a state hearing on Florida East Coast Railway project plans, he drove his Dodge Trans Van. He's afraid of flying. Wilson, who has no credit cards, dined in cafeterias and stayed at a Days Inn, $35.45 a night, for two: The mayor took along the town clerk, Ella Jane Wilson, who is also his wife.

The total cost of their six-day trip: $578.

In 1984, the taxpayers of Dade County's municipalities paid for trips to places as far away as the French Riviera and as near as Tampa, according to a review of travel records from cities throughout the county, as well as from Metro. Although most Dade governments are stingy with travel allowances, some elected officials have healthy expense accounts that let them take a number of trips a year.

Last week, the Dade state attorney's office subpoenaed records for an investigation into the city-paid trips of Miami Commissioners Miller Dawkins and Demetrio Perez Jr.

Dawkins spent $7,811 on travel last year. In 1983, Perez's travel bill was $7,947, but last year his bill was only $1,091. He spent a lot more time in the office. In fact, he spent $6,731 on office supplies for the year. The investigators are looking into Perez's use of office supplies.

Last February, Miami Mayor Maurice Ferre flew to Caracas for the inauguration of the Venezuelan president and charged the city $672 for the trip. Of the $17,900 spent by Miami officials on travel last year, Ferre spent $5,940.

The Miami mayor isn't the only elected official in Dade who traveled to a foreign country. In the past year alone, taxpayers financed trips to Costa Rica; Cartagena, Colombia; Nice, France; Antibes-Juan Les Pins, France; Milan, Italy; Seattle; San Francisco; Denver; Washington, D.C.; and Boston.

Metro-Dade's eight commissioners and mayor spent only $10,189 traveling last year -- almost all of it for national conferences.

Hialeah Gardens Mayor Daniel Riccio drew criticism from his city council after he went to Costa Rica in May. Riccio, who has a $3,000-a-year travel expense account, defended his $500 trip as an opportunity to "encourage trade between our city and that nation." His colleagues argue that he should have asked for their approval first.

The city of Miami Beach paid $16,577 last year in travel expenses for the mayor and commissioners.

When Beach Commissioner William Shockett returned from a trip to the French Riviera last summer, he handed in receipts totaling $1,985. The commission agreed to pay for $1,000 of the trip, and Shockett paid the rest. The reason he went to France, he said, was to establish a sister city relationship with Antibes-Juan Les Pins.

"A thousand dollars is not a lot of money. It's an intangible thing. . . . Hopefully, it will bring business here, people will come over to visit their sister city," said Shockett, who spent six nights in a $160-a-night hotel.

Four months into its fiscal year, the Opa-locka City Commission has spent $9,272 of its $10,000 travel allotment, according to city records.

Though he claims he has spent less than $1,500 in actual travel, city records show that Mayor John Riley already has overdrawn his travel allowance by $1,175. The mayor gets a $2,000-a-year travel allowance, plus $200 a month for miscellaneous expenses. Riley says he uses his miscellaneous fund to replenish his travel fund.

He says reimbursements he makes to the city sometimes don't get credited, or are deposited into another account. He also points to "business" trips he doesn't charge the city for, such as last month's $2,000 sojourn to Africa for the first World Conference of Mayors.

Riley points out that $747 came out of his travel budget to send three Opa-locka high school students to Washington for a government orientation program. He says he also spent $300 for two tickets to see Alfonso de Borbon Dampierre, the Duke of Cadiz, at a dinner in November.

The problem was, the mayor couldn't go to the dinner, and passed the tickets off to Commissioner Brian Hooten, who says, "I always get John's leftovers."

The commissioner was left with another of the mayor's hand- me-down tickets last weekend, when Riley was supposed to attend the presidential inauguration but changed his mind and went to the Super Bowl -- with his own money, he says. Hooten, then,
went to the inauguration, where he wore a tuxedo rented for $46 with city cash. So now, Hooten has overspent his $2,000- a-year commissioner's travel budget by $8.97.

That's nothing compared with Commissioner Stu Susaneck. He has overspent by $770. Susaneck, who also went to the inauguration, claims the city inadvertently took $400 to $500 from his travel account at some point to cover an awards banquet.

The mayor and commissioners say they won't have to pay back the amounts they overstepped their budgets. And they won't have to give up traveling. Money for trips, they say, will just come from some other city account.

In other Dade cities, the accounting is more tightly regulated.

North Miami council members, for example, are particularly wary of turning in hefty expense accounts to City Manager Larry Casey.

Said Councilman Jim Devaney: "Casey's so damn straight, we just go out of our way to avoid any suspicion. He walks around with his hands in the air.

"I've never been to a conference that didn't cost me money. The allowance never covers it," Devaney said.

After a trip to Washington for a Florida League of Cities convention, North Miami Councilwoman Shelly Gassner crossed several expenses off her bill. She said she got sick for two days and didn't use the meal money. The phone calls were personal, she said, and a $10-a-day bus and taxi allowance went unused. The deductions pared her $982 bill to $897.

At another League conference, in Tallahassee, Gassner saved the city more meal money. The men who took her to dinner refused to let her pay her way, she said. "They would say, 'You're a woman. I never let a woman pay my bill.' "

Veteran Coral Gables Commissioner Bill Kerdyk scribbles his expenses, such as taxi fares, on note paper. Last year, Kerdyk, who has been a commissioner for 18 years, spent $3,594 on trips, mostly to seminars in Washington, D.C., New York, Tallahassee, Indianapolis and Portland, Maine.

In Hialeah, where the mayor and council members have monthly expense accounts, vouchers are not required from their travels.

Last year, Mayor Raul Martinez had an allotment of $1,300 a month for expenses. In 1985, his monthly expense allowance is $1,700. Council members can spend $1,200 a month on miscellaneous expenses.

Mayor Martinez estimates he spends $7,000 a year on airline tickets alone. Since he travels often to Tallahassee and Washington, D.C., Martinez says he puts out about $500 of his own money every month on business trips.

"I have to act as the city's lobbyist," Martinez said. "The extra expenses come out of my own pocket. But I won't spare any expense when I'm working for the city."

Some cities, like West Miami, don't pay for junkets. The only exception was in 1983, when then-Mayor Valerie Hickey- Patton had to fly with her lawyer to Tallahassee to defend herself in an ethics hearing over a conflict-of-interest charge. The city paid $256 for two round-trip airline tickets.

In Sweetwater, Mayor Armando Penedo said, "We can't afford to travel here. We're broke."

And in Florida City: "In the nine years I've been on the commission, I've never heard of anyone taking a trip on the city. I've been mayor for one year, and I haven't taken a trip yet," said Mayor Otis Wallace.

Homestead, a town once loose-handed with its expense accounts, is now rigid with its money. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, councilmen would get lump-sum advances. Officials would spend more than half their allotments without turning in receipts.

The system changed in 1981, when the council passed a law requiring officials to pay their way to conventions and turn in receipts to get reimbursed.

That same year, the Legislature passed a law outlining limits for reimbursement of local government officials. Traveling officials can be reimbursed up to $21 a day for meals, plus the cost of a single-occupancy hotel room. Parking fees, plane tickets, tolls and phone bills also are reimbursed, as long as proper receipts are submitted.

Although cities are not supposed to pay for spouses who tag along on trips, there have been exceptions.

When the North Miami Beach City Council attended the Florida League of Cities Convention in Tampa in October, the city paid a $25 registration for four of the councilmen's wives.

"Certainly I took my wife," said Councilman Jule Littman. "I wouldn't go up without her."

Councilman Harry Cohen, who is president of the Dade League of Cities, said it was the first time he brought his wife, Ann, to a League convention. Cohen, who suffers from heart disease, said she accompanied him for health reasons.

"This time I needed her to help me lobby. I think it's a bargain that she comes with me and makes sure I take my pills on time," he said.

For all their use of public funds for traveling, officials say there are great benefits to taking government-related trips.

"You're really bringing back a lot of money to the cities -- much more than these expenses," said Commissioner Kerdyk of Coral Gables.

While he was in Milan, Bal Harbour Mayor Sherman tentatively lined up a gala fashion show for April 18, featuring the collections of eight top Italian designers. He even persuaded opera celebrity Luciano Pavarotti, who is scheduled to perform in Miami the week of the fashion show, to host the event.

Flying to Europe, staying at fine hotels, wining and dining personalities -- all this is partly to thank for bringing such an affair to Bal Harbour, the mayor says.

"Sometimes you can't stay at a Howard Johnson's if you're trying to interest that category of people."

Contributing to this report were Herald Staff Writers Mandalit del Barco, Celia W. Dugger, Craig Gilbert, Peter Hamm, Evelyn Hernandez, Rick Hirsch, Deb Kollars, Phil Kuntz, Irene Lacher, Ann Macari, James Nelson, Dory Owens, Morris Panner, Connie Prater, Yolanda Ulrich and Christopher Wellisz.