Reading the tea leaves

AL GREEN
Contributing Columnist
green@lbknews.com

In this climate of anti incumbencies, it might be presumptuous to read too much into the thrashing that Lynn Larson gave the incumbent, Lee Rothenberg, but in view of the lackluster campaigning and lack of substance in her early activity, it is very easy to see a revolution in the making.

Lynn Larson, along with David Brenner and Philip Younger are fused together in a slate that collectively is promulgating some major reversals in Town policy.

As most of my readers know, back in the mid-eighties a group of citizens got together to attempt to guide Longboat Key away from the explosion of density, over commercialization and general ugliness that was swamping Florida at the time. If you need any evidence of what was transpiring, just drive down the Tamiami Trail on the West Coast or Route One on the East Coast.

I always thought it significant that the commissioners who created the overall plan wrote in it that the golf course be “always readily available” to the residents. They intended to create a community where everyone in the Town could play golf.

Almost without exception, every attempt to expand commercial or high rise residential was fought tooth and nail. The voters of Longboat Key not only cut the maximum density to six units per acre, a figure that dropped the potential density from 75,000 to 21,000 but placed in the Charter a provision that any rise in density beyond that figure would be subject to a referendum.

Codes were enforced, police and firemen were paid above average and it seemed that the Town was prospering. From an $800 million dollar assessed real estate in the mid eighties, the figure grew to almost $6.5 billion last year. Municipal taxes dropped from 2.5 mils to 1.4 mils.

Whatever the consequences of these policies, it now appears at first glance that the public wants something else.  Lynn Larsen’s first public position was in attacking the Town for not allowing Harry’s Restaurant to spread out onto the sidewalk without a permit. Mrs. Larsen obviously feels that the Town should not be involved in this type of code enforcement if it restricts a business from doing what it feels necessary.

There are other changes that I expect are in the works. If Mrs. Larsen and her colleagues are elected, George Spoll will be the Mayor. Commissioner Spoll has already said he doesn’t believe the Town should be involved with FEMA and their restrictions on height. There has also been discussion in the P&Z about lowering the 30 day residency requirement.

Certainly, nothing that any of the three candidates along with some of the sitting commissioners are saying would give anyone who has any good feelings toward the Sign Code any comfort.

As I wrote in an earlier column, there seems to be building a momentum towards making Longboat more like Bradenton Beach.  The voters have already given back the density to the mom and pop tourist places and with fewer code restrictions, this area could grow.

Candidate Brenner has already said he doesn’t believe the Commission should be involved with site plan reviews, since that responsibility should stay with the P&Z exclusively. Since the P&Z Board has already voted 7 to 2 to allow the expansion of the LBK Club, it is a reasonable assumption that a new commission will not stand in the way of any Loeb Partner plans. They probably would approve Rockefeller Center.

If we take these candidates seriously and we would be stupid not to, there will be future tax cuts. Since everything left standing has already been cut, I would expect to see a move to eliminate the Police Department and replace it with the two counties sheriff’s department. This could be done in an effort to eliminate one pension plan and is the only thing left that would have an impact on taxes.

To summarize, if the voters who didn’t vote this time are not different, but are really just a reflection of the current mood, Longboat Key will be changing course and some of us old timers who thought we had a good thing going are going on the scrap heap. Maybe it is time, I don’t know. There are still more voters registered in the three Sarasota districts and maybe they will realize their peril and come out and vote.  With the Chamber of Commerce, PIC and the Longboat Observer all on one side and a much-muted trumpet on the other, I wouldn’t bet the farm.

Green – Can there be a compromise in the cards?

The attorneys for the Longboat Key Club very astutely pulled back at a very crucial time in their application process. They sensed they were going to lose and asked for a time out.

They now will try to work something out with the group representing the residents of Islandside. I don’t see how under the sunshine law and the quasi judicial process there can be any Commission involvement, but I wouldn’t put it past a Commission that has been as free wheeling as this one.

A talk of compromise puts me in mind of a childless couple who have been living the lifestyle that not having children allows who are now discussing whether they want to have one child or several.  What they don’t realize is it doesn’t make much difference, one child or three it is still an entirely different world than the one they are enjoying presently.

There are also issues that are important to the Town but not relevant to the condo owner’s problems.

For example, a minimum 2% impact fee would be about $8 million dollars. This is important to the Town, of no concern to the residents.

Another of the most important issues facing the commissioners is the issue of precedents.  Anyone who has had anything to do with either government or even a condo board has had experience of having to allow something to exist because they didn’t stop it in the past. This could be something as simple as a fence or the number of pets but it is quite a shock when you are told you have already given up your right to object.

Space doesn’t allow me to list the more than 24 exceptions being requested by the LBK Club but a review of them demonstrates how far beyond this particular decision the results will be felt.I can see both sides trying to work out a settlement but I cannot see how it would have any influence on the actual on the ground performance. Mr. Lesser isn’t going to write a big check to the Town, he isn’t going to proceed with construction if it has to conform to a sequence of acts, especially if it calls for a hotel before the condos or the fixing up of the golf courses before income producing parcels are finished.

Although my ‘good friend’ Joe Lesser, (tongue in cheek) suggested we sit down for a cup of coffee, I couldn’t give him any good advice. I thought they had a good deal with Ca d’ Cuore. I still think if they can get another 30 or so units to add to the Resort, they are getting more than they are entitled to and they should grab the deal.

There is one part of the equation that still bothers me. If you listened to al the people who voiced their opinion at the Commission meeting, you had to be struck by the fact that the people who were pushing for the major changes in the Club operation were the ones who were not now nor would ever be experiencing the changes.  The speakers who were already members and would be directly affected, were against the changes. It shows me that former Mayor and Commissioner Carleton Stewart had the right idea when he proposed that the club be purchased by creating a tax district that would consist of both gated communities. It would have placed the operation of the Club in the hands of the people most involved.

These are not negotiations that will result in the end of the world. The Town will proceed with the rearrangement of the commercial and tourist areas in the new Comp Plan. There will be a place for a hotel on the Colony property, there will be a sizeable addition to the Hilton and the Publix site will turn out to be a commercial bonanza with highly successful individual shops. Things will move forward; the future of Longboat Key is not riding on this possible compromise.

Speaking of the Club, I must tell of one of the dumber moves that they have made. That is at the restaurant they call Portofino.  This building was first built as a restaurant by the owner of the Marina, Bill Vernon. Unfortunately, he didn’t provide any noise abatement so the restaurant failed. It was plainly, too noisy.  The Café On the Bay people took a long lease, spent a fortune putting in sound deadening carpets, ceiling and drapes and opened the Café’ On the Bay, one of the most successful restaurants  on the West Coast.  When the Club bought the Marina, the restaurant closed and the Club redid it for their members. In what has to be one of the biggest goofs I can recall, they then proceeded to tear out the acoustic ceiling, pulled up the carpets and created a sound box that makes it extremely uncomfortable for most of the members. Too bad Joe Lesser didn’t have that coffee, he could have leaned a little history and had a great spot.

There is an interesting side bar to the Commission hearings during their ‘citizens to be heard’ session. That was the total silence from the slip owners who had been treated very shabbily by Michael Welly when he advised them not to exercise their right of first refusal with a promise they would receive special treatment if they acquiesced to the Club taking over the Marina property. If you wondered why no one of the owners of the slips spoke up to tell of their ugly history, it is because they likely made a deal: certain concessions by the Club in exchange for a promise to not appear before the Town Commission.

Green – Has LBK become Beverly Hills the bad way?

Last week, I sat for a few hours listening to the portion of the Town meeting on the Club expansion devoted to “citizens to be heard”. It was not a pleasant way to spend an afternoon.

Maybe it was just my looking at it from an outside view or maybe I was sensitized to it by past experience, but as I listened I saw in front of me a problem far more serious that whether the Longboat Key Club was going to prevail or not.

I saw the making of a serious divide in the community.

The private for profit ownership of the golf club has created a chasm on Longboat that may not be solved whatever comes of this application.

By raising the dues and initiation feel to the extremely high figures, $50,000 initiation fee for example, the club has become a club for very rich people and it was very apparent as I watched as people rose to speak.

When you heard the address of the speaker, you didn’t have to listen to their pleas. If they lived north of the light at Publix, they wanted the club to expand. You got the feeling they really wanted to be linked to Bradenton Beach. The people inside the gates with a few, not too disinterested speakers, wanted the place they moved to and paid for, to stay the same.

To an outsider, Beverly Hills, California speaks of wealth and glamour, to the residents; the question is; “are you SOS”? If you are SOS, or South of Sunset, you are not in the same league.  Will Longboat Key become NOP or not? In other words, will the Town become place where the question will be; “are you NOP, North of Publix?

Will it divide as politically as it once did with the Village feeling they lived in another community?

For this split, I put the blame on the Club.  When the initiation fees and the dues were reasonable, everyone no matter where they lived on the Key could and did belong to the golf club. We all played together, ate together and felt part of the commuity together. Not anymore if last Wednesday was any criteria.

This is going to have a serious adverse affect on the future of the Town. It is going to cost lots of money to all the residents because it will hurt real estate values. Retirement communities in the South need golf availability. Name a development that didn’t first build the club house and the course before they sold the properties. Lesser Realty has placed this facility outside of the reach of middle class and even well financed but cautious investors. For example, I have played well over a 1000 rounds of golf on the club courses but I didn’t play golf until I moved to Longboat. Would I have paid such a huge amount of money if I wasn’t even sure I would like the game? Of course not. If I loved golf but couldn’t see myself paying those huge dues, would I have purchased on the Key in the first place? The answer to these questions is obvious and should be of more concern than a quick sale to the realtors who are enthusiastically backing this venture.

It will prove very interesting to see what affect this new split will have on the coming election.  We know David Brenner will be pushing for the new expansion of commercial activity, the one I call the new Bradenton Beach and he is trying to create a slate with himself, Lynn Larsen and Philip Younger. The backing by the Observer in the Primary of the two least qualified candidates is a harbinger. Since at this writing I don’t know what the Commission will decide so it is too early to make any predictions.

However, this issue is just a first.  It will come up again and again. The Town Tennis Center is now the only place where people from all over the Island meet. The Club used to be that place. The 2400 golfing members were the glue that kept the Town together. Whether Longboat Key will go the way of Beverly Hills is still to be seen but the first examples are not a happy sight, at least from this viewpoint. The Club under this management is a lost opportunity. Could a Community Center be the savior?

The upcoming primary

The three candidates for the First District appeared in two debates, both sponsored by the competing local newspapers.

Although I wasn’t present for the first, former Mayor Jeremy Whatmough summed it up by stating that Mayor Lee Rothenberg stood out head and shoulders above his opponents and was the only one who seemed to understand the problems and had a grasp on how best to proceed.

The second debate, if it were a boxing bout, it would have been stopped in the first round. The first candidate in alphabetical order was Lynn Larsen. Mrs. Larsen described Longboat Key as if she was trying to compose a Dickens novel. She described Longboat Key as“Deteriorating abandoned buildings” spreading over the landscape. She said “the town is on its last legs”.When she went on to talk about policing and how much a  “neighborhood watch” was needed, I was almost afraid to walk to my car after the meeting unaccompanied.

She did make a strong claim for being a woman and very proudly defended her previous profession as a nurse. Having never thought that being a woman or being a nurse was anything but a good thing, I didn’t find that portion of her testimony compelling. The rest of her plea was the usual persiflage of fiscal responsibility and simplifying codes without giving details. We have grown to expect this from candidates with nothing to offer. Mrs. Larsen, I am sure is well meaning and at least is willing to offer her services but these services judging by this appearance would not help advance the cause of Longboat Key.

Leon Pokoik is an entirely different person. He is obviously smart and sophisticated but his entire demeanor and his highly litigious background make it abundantly clear that a position as one of seven, deliberating and trying to find common ground to arrive at conclusions is not the place for him. Mr. Pokoik very clearly adopts the Napoleonic Code. Everyone is guilty until proven innocent. He tosses out charges but is weak on specifics except to say he would save the town money by refusing to allow the Town Manager to drive beyond the the borders of Florida in his Town owned SUV.  If he cannot accept allowing the Manager to use his discretion in the use of his vehicle, how must he feel about allowing this same person the power to run Longboat Key. Once again, I found a candidate who wants to run but hasn’t figured out what it is he wants to do. His advocacy of mixed use had merit but he obviously didn’t know that his opponent Lee Rothenberg was one of the major supporters of a similar proposal that was turned down by the voters

In fairness, Pokoik understands the reality of employee relationships and did not use the underfunding of the pension plans as a whipping boy.  I did get a kick out of his advocating the Sign Ordinance of Hilton Head as simplification. That ordinance is about the toughest sign code in the country, they even make international corporations change their signs. It is a great code and one that would do wonders for Longboat Key but if you think the Chamber is squawking now, try to institute the restrictions of Hilton Head if you really want to hear some noise.

Everything that happened at the debate in addition to the presentation of his two opponents made Mayor Lee Rothenberg look good. When someone complained there weren’t any facilities for children, he was able to point out his fellow commissioners rallied against his appeals, cut the budget, and killed the program. For those who were concerned about the number of police cars on patrol, he reminded them once again, the drive for tax cutting had left the police in a very tight situation. Hopefully Vice Mayor Bob Seikmann, who is unopposed for reelection, who was sitting in the audience, and who has led the fight to cut their taxes, was listening.  This might be the only good thing to come out of that evening’s procedures.

Between the three, Lee Rothenberg is clearly the choice.  The other two should both come in third.

It is getting down to decision time for the Commissioners on the Key Club application. Although they have said they want to look into the Comp Plan first, it is hard to see what they will find. It is ironic but when the 1996 revision was in front of the Commission, then Mayor Bob Drohlich said that since “the Town was already built out”, there shouldn’t be too much time or effort spent on the land use element. Obviously this isn’t the case and the Commission will have to look more to their conscience rather than the Plan to make their ruling.

It might be worth while for them to keep in mind that although this Club expansion looms large at the moment, there are three other major plans either on the drawing board or approaching crunch time. These are the tear down and total reconstruction of the Publix/Avenue of the Flowers Complex, the purchase for use as a hotel of the Colony property, a hotel that also might incorporate the idea of a conference center and the expansion of the Hilton Hotel with their purchase of Sand Cay and Sea and Sand, the two adjoining properties to give them the space they will require. These very viable projects certainly do not speak of a town on it’s last legs but it does speak of a town that has to get their overall future land use, including what happens at the Golf Club, down on paper and not continue to deal with it piece by piece.

If even it wasn’t unconscionable to throw the residents of the Islandside Community under the bus, these other projects should make it necessary for everyone to stop and take a deep breath.

Hopefully the Commission will vote the straight up and down and leave the current ODP in place.  When the owners, whoever they may be, come to the Commission with a plan that has been approved by the  neighbors, they will find a very receptive audience. They probably won’t even need a lawyer, a PA from the steno pool could get it through.