Turtle Nests at Lake Worth beach
On Tuesday night, staff kept using the word grant while discussing the beach. The beach redevelopment is from a 2002 $50 million Recreational and Cultural Obligation Bond Referendum which resulted in funding for the City of Lake Worth Municipal Beach redevelopment project in which we, the voters, approved of this Bond that included $5 million for our beach redevelopment and we have been paying on this Bond ever since on our advalorem tax bills.
By accepting the Bond, the City of Lake Worth must maintain the beach in a non-discriminatory basis for 30 years thus the reason why decal parking anywhere on the beach property was eliminated. The 55 or so spaces that we will get are not part of the Bond money and will be located on the north side of our beach down closer to A1A. You want to go to the Pier--put on your hiking shoes.
At the time we talked about the beach redevelopment, it was very clear that we or anyone involved in the project would protect turtle nesting at the Project in accordance with all applicable laws and regulations. We talked about proper lighting. We made it clear what we wanted and those involved had no problem. We talked about pavers on the walkways and then that was going to be too expensive and were informed that it would now be monolithic slabs.
At the end of it all we will be lucky that we have any upper level parking as the design elements of the project are getting chipped away. Who in the heck needs wind turbines? This plan was devised by a bunch of selfish "green" people who had more brains than sense-- cuckoo over all things green, friends of Rene Varela and Cara Jennings and I would wager to say, people who seldom if ever go to the beach.
To me, to tell us now, after we discussed this a year ago, that the turtle lighting is going to cost us a small fortune ($2 million dollars) when it was less than $100,000, is totally unacceptable. Commissioner Maxwell asked why could learned professionals be off by this amount of money? The answer basically was that the lighting package at the upper parking lot was not addressed. Someone failed in the design. Someone failed to consider upper level lighting? Who do we hold responsible? I hold Staff responsible and whoever got the contract for our beach redevelopment. This is OUR money they are screwing with. No one is giving or granting us anything. Someone on the Commission should have demanded all of the documentation and everything from the charettes and get to the bottom of the responsibility. Perhaps they did. People need to be held accountable. They NEVER are in government. Usually it is, "Oh well, let's vote on the cost overrun."
Literally we are taking $5 million from the PB County Bond, to lose control of our beach and to redesign parking lots that when completed, will give you no ocean view when you drive up to the beach. You will be able to drop off your family at the top and drive back down to the lower level (the Greater Bay concept) to park unless you are lucky enough to find a parking space across from Benny’s, as these spaces will be reduced by 164. Have you seen the beach lately? The trees, bushes and grass that are all in place look great. There is no need to pull these all out to redesign parking lots. Insane is getting to be my favorite word lately.
$5 million is a hell of a lot of money but not enough for those contractors and architects involved. Can we please locate the missing $3.5 million in our beach fund, tell the County and Burt to stuff it. Tell those contractors at the beach to do the same. Let's spruce up our beach leaving control of it to Lake Worth and to our turtles. It is the Lake Worth taxpayer who pays for all the maintenance, the lifeguards, the parking pay stations, you name it. Retain our decal parking allowing us to park anywhere on our property. Jungle Jims and more seagrape are not important.
Spending $5 million dollars to fix up our beach is absurd but the mentality is "Well, we have the money; we need to spend it." Has any government ever turned down money with strings in their entire lives? To even think about spending one dime more than the $5 mil is out of the question.
I agree with you that we should give the $5million back. I have stated all along that we were selling the beach to the county as THEY dictate what we can and cannot do there IF we take their money. Same goes with the boat ramps.
ReplyDeleteI can't stand the arrogant blowhard Burt Aronson and Mary "Let Lake Worth Burn" McCarty. Why didn't he go to jail too?
GIVE THE MONEY BACK and let US maintain control over OUR BEACH!
I have always said that if we couldn't keep the beach property painted we had no business as a city running a multimillion dollar beach building. It continues to amaze me that this city makes so many million dollar plus mistakes that we the taxpayers have to eat. I still can't believe that we would sell control of this property to the County for just 5 million dollars. Suppose we told the county to keep their money and charged non-residents $20 a day to park at the beach. How much would that generate a year. How much would that generate in 30 years. Way more than 5 million. A good business man would make our beach property bring in millions of dollars in revenue. Problem is our city can't even paint the beach, can't collect millions owed to us by other cities for sewer services provided, can't collect utility bills, can't pave our roads, can't maintain our neighborhoods with code enforcement and most of all can't move forward without falling back. Until we figure out that the business of running a city is serious and start electing new commissioners with real business backgrounds we will repeat the same mistakes over and over. Don't tell me that 2 million for lights was an oversight. Sounds like we are being taken.
ReplyDeleteIt is staff that runs this city. However, the Commissioners are the ones who need the expertise in order to ask the difficult questions and get answers that make sense.
ReplyDeleteJohn, you have been saying this for years now and you are so right. I used to chuckle at it when you said that we can't even paint the benches and now we want to do .........????????
The problem, as I see it, there are way too many people taking advantage of LW and through our ignorance, they have been getting away with it. That also has to do with change orders we constantly get and approve for thousands that add up to God knows what.
To charge cars $20 a day would not work. We are in direct competition with the County park right next door. There are other beaches that are free like Manalapan. Also, what about the person who just wants to drive over there to park and walk up to see the ocean. $2 an hour is expensive as it is. It would kill our Casino merchants and Benny's.
Where is our original beach fund money? Did they spend it on employee retirement funds?
ReplyDeleteI think the proposed plan is great, I've lived in LW for 10 years and I never understood why so much of our beach property was black top. I'd much rather have green space and picnic areas close to beach and parking down below.
ReplyDeleteAs for cost over-runs, sadly I'm not the least surprised.
Gld you like it. Let me ask you one question--do you go to the beach to picnic (there are picnic tables already there) or do you go to the beach for the same reason 99.99% of people go there--to swim and take in the sun?
ReplyDeleteMaybe I'm odd but I like our beach just fine the way it is.
ReplyDeleteThat's what you get when it comes to the beach. Some people want a park and make the people walk up the hill. Freakin idiots. Those who actually use the beach want to park across from it. Pragmatic. The guy who has been here for 10 years. Did you move here from a place that had a beach or did you go to some lake outside of Detroit and spread a blanket for fun? Cough up the money or go to Kreusler Park.
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