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We had a Select Committee that spent six months listening to the original three proposals for our beach casino/park. Why the city manager decided on this process is anyone's guess as we had just spent $13 million on our beach redevelopment/revitalization and built a new casino. All we needed was an employee who could manage it all properly and lease the upstairs space.
Commissioner Andy Amoroso volunteered himself to be on the Committee and the majority commission agreed--Amororo was their guy. The city manager who claimed he was "the father of the ITN" opened up this secret process (Invitation to Negotiate)--secret because the public was not allowed to attend. It was totally his idea but this entire commission voted for the process, including the Mayor. Not sure why no one even asked "why" this particular process or why we needed it. Later on, the City Attorney confessed that it is used when you don't have a clear intent on what you want to do...a process to give us ideas.
So, you just go out, form an appointed committee even including the Inspector General of PBCounty to make it all very legitimate, spend money and go off willy nilly because you just can't figure it out. Perhaps some money bags developer will come in with a public/private partnership and get his grubby hands on our beach property...wink, wink. They get to manage the casino complex and we get relief from maintaining it. Such a deal. Does anyone believe for one second that the majority commission did not know what it was all about? John Szerdi was still buzzing in their ear.
At the April 28, 2015 meeting, the Evaluation Committee (dissolved on that date) made three recommendations to the City Commission:
1. That the City Commission direct City staff (William Waters) to develop a request for qualifications (RFQ) for a qualified firm to prepare a traffic/development impact study with related evaluations in order to discern viable levels of development and intensity of uses at the beach.
2. That during the budget process, the City Commission hold a separate workshop on the Beach Fund in order to address policy decisions that must be made for the FY 2016 Beach Fund budget.
3. That the City Commission continue negotiations with Anderson Carr (on behalf of Oceanside Bar & Grill) for the lease of the upstairs vacant space at the Casino Building and management/lease of the ballroom.
The Evaluation Committee also recommended that the foregoing be concluded within six (6) months.
As far as I know, none of this was ever done. The Evaluation committee was a waste of time but at least we got to understand what Hudson Holdings wanted to do on our beach property...and a vast number of people believe that they still do. They wanted to DESTROY our Olympic pool, build a convention center with a private beach club and take over the management of our casino along with the parking income and build a parking garage. They wanted control of our beach park.
Please remember all of this when you cast your vote on March 15.
12 comments:
It's actually not an Olympic pool
It actually IS an Olympic Pool for national and collegiate meets.
To be an Olympic pool it would have had to host official Olymoic Games. It may qualify as Olympic size, but most certainly is not an Olympic pool.
No way has HH given up on the beach, they will be back.
An Olympic pool is determined by its size. 50 meters by 25 yards that qualifies it as an Olympic Pool. Highschool and college meets can compete there. The depths at the length changed but it was for international meets when it was built. 3.5 feet to 4 feet for turns is now the standard.
Oh my, more smoke and mirrors. Who does and does not agree it is an Olympic pool--does that really make the decision it should be filled in? Let's be honest. Hudson doesn't care, it was in their way and since they control this trio-kaboom, pool gone to make way for Hudsontown on the beach. On the down low, shhh. Can't have the voters find out. If you follow the sequence of events I think the most likely explanation without all the bs fed to us is this. Dirty Szerdi and his employer decided that a piece of the beach would be included in their purchase of the Gulfstream. We don't want any height restriction getting in the way either. That's a nice little extra perk, huh? A private beach club for your hotel without a pool, solves that problem for HH. Since the IG is friends with Bornstein, he will rubber stamp a secret process so the principals can do their dirty work under the radar of Lake Worth Citizens. Ha, ha--they think it's just to rent the vacant space, just because that's what we told 'em. Dumb schmuks, they won't figure this one out with approval by the IG until it's way to late. Most will happen in off season and few will notice anything until it's a done deal. If Scott can take a public park for baseball stadium--we can easily steal a beach. Yeah, let's add a Big Convention Center right on the beach. We don't have to pay for any land--and that can stock our hotel year round. Their pool is impeding our plan. Fill it in. We might give them a kiddie pool if we decide to be charitable. I mean since Hudsontown will soon own 500 properties in Lake Worth, we obviously can say what we want and get it. We own a commission after all. The majority anyway and the bowtie is so accommodating we won't even break a sweat.
Thank the Lord for Chris McVoy. If he hadn't happened on to this it might all be happening right now. And Szerdi had the nerve to deliver that rediculous diatribe after Ryan was duly elected--that this was all just malicious evil rumors. Let's call it exactly what it is: attempted beach theft and other public property approved by the trio of Pam, Andy, and Scott. And Szerdi still acts as though this has nothing to do with him being kicked out of office.
I like the new candidates. But with the above behavior, I think I would vote in my dog before I'd trust these guys again. Definition of insanity: doing the same thing and expecting a different outcome. Expect more of same from the gang of 3.
Sounds like Andy is a very unethical person. How horrible of him. Do you know he sells things he buys at Dollar Tree for a dollar for $3, $4, $8 in his store. He does so many unethical and corrupt things, price gouging and who knows what else, HE will end up in jail one of these days for all his shananakins.
Andy is a businessman...get off it. This has nothing to do with ethics.
And then there's big-eyed Scott Maxwell and Pam Triolo- Whaaaat? We didn't know ANYTHING about what was going on in these secret meetings!!!
Yeah, right. You thought your citizens were stupid. You crapped your panties when the people rose up in fury and kicked Dirty Szerdi to the curb.
Now it's your turn. We citizens aren't stupid. And we don't like liars like you. Buh-Bye
Hey--a favor--can we stop with the crude expressions. You can make your point without them. Thanks, guys.
5:52 is pretty spot on. HH is a force to be reckoned with, and all those folks who are supporting their Gulfstream rezoning are going to be in for a surprise when HH seeks rezoning, density waivers, set back waivers, parking waivers for all their other properties in this City.
All of sudden folks in South Palm Park neighborhood might realize that HH cares nothing for our City, for our neighborhoods or for our rules, they just want their profits. Soon enough they will be looking to turn So. Federal Hwy into Delray and many will say, yay, we want to be Delray, until they have a 5 story condo pop in their back yard and no sunshine from the west anymore and their quiet side street filled with overflow cars (parking waivers), and flooding (green space waivers), etc.
The "people" from south palm park are the rudest pigs in the city. And apologies to the pigs in using them in the same sentence as these arrogant jerks. I don't care what happens to this neighborhood. They deserve everything that they get.I hope the city puts a big sewer treatment plant right in the middle of them. They deserve to get buried in high rise canyons,illegal B&B's and sober homes.Maybe St. Joan of the holy CRA can come and cover their pristine streets with graffiti.
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