Miami Mayor Francis Suarez is a celebrity in the world of cryptocurrencies for his much-publicized efforts to turn the city into a Bitcoin haven. He proposed paying city employees in Bitcoin and allowing citizens to pay taxes with crypto in February, recently hosted a major Bitcoin conference and is courting the global exodus of mining firms fleeing China after crackdowns. The city even lent its name to a new token that it hopes to make money from, called MiamiCoin. 

Now, emails, presentations, and reports obtained by Motherboard using a public records request show just how the quest to make Miami crypto central has gone over the last few months, and the answer is: not particularly well. 

In April, city officials researched whether other cities had entered into contracts with companies to pay their employees in Bitcoin; they found no precedent for this. In addition, a draft report sent around in late April noted numerous concerns with the plan, including that people must convert cryptocurrency to dollars to pay taxes. It goes on: 

"Second, once Bitcoin is received by an employee it is not insured by the government like U.S. bank deposits are. This means that Bitcoin stored online does not have the same protections as money in a bank account. Additionally, there may be no or minimal customer service options when using Bitcoin because it is inherently decentralized. 

Third, there is no guarantee that someone receiving Bitcoin as a salary will make money because the price of Bitcoin fluctuates. It is conceivable that an employee's salary paid on Friday could lose a significant amount of value by Saturday."