Key Club vote reactions pour in…

Updated June 16, 2010. Following Monday afternoon’s approval of an alternative Islandside redevelopment plan, letters have started arriving. Tell commissioners what you think. Post a comment below or send to letters@lbknews.com.

You are to be commended

Dear Commissioners:

You are to be commended for reaching out to foster a compromise solution that helps to reduce the massive scale of the proposed development and I express my support for the ordinance, which you have voted to approve.

Charles Ewing
Longboat Key

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Sorry I voted for you

Commissioner Lynn Larson:

I am so sorry that you will have to look for pedestrians before driving onto Gulf of Mexico Drive. I am even more sorry about your “yes” vote yesterday. But, I am most sorry that I voted for you.

Lynda Kunkin
Longboat Club Road

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I’m very disappointed

Commissioners:

Just wanted to let you know I’m very disappointed in what you decided yesterday. I think it’s a big mistake for LBK and its residents.

Ray Biscoglia
Longboat Key

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Not funny, just tragic

Longboat Key Commission:

The commission has approved a redevelopment project that the Longboat Key Club has rejected as “not feasible”. The plan was put together by the mayor, two lawyers or maybe three, the planning director, and commissioners during an exhausting 72-hour period of consultation. Well guys and lady, I hope you have a plan B that will address the needs necessary for this island community to move forward because what you approved lacks a developer. The LBKC has left the table and takes its $400 million dollar project with it. Your job now is to figure out how to get redevelopment on Longboat Key going with $0.00.

You are going to spend 40 to 50 million dollars for sand. This sand is to last maybe four years? Negations are continuing with town employees over pay and pension issues. The unfunded liabilities of the current pension plans could be 25 million come October of this year. The north end of the island is washing away and homes and roads are threatened. Property values are projected to fall another 10%. Tax revenues will not be adequate with out a tax increase or a decrease in services, the Colony is toast, and that new beautiful “Welcome to Longboat Key” sign seems a bit inappropriate. The mayor hopefully has an ace in the hole or else all he did was overplay a weak hand and lose $400 million. But maybe Bob White will invite IPOC, the commission and the planning staff to a meeting at the massive Sarasota Yacht Club Convention Center to discuss the implementation of your project. I suppose one could look back on all this and find some humor in this process except that it really is truly tragic.

The voters of Longboat Key look forward to hearing about plan B.

Patrick Mellett
Longboat Key

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Redevelopment is vital

Commissioner Larson:

Please make a motion for reconsideration or for a re-vote before the second reading. My wife and I are winter residents of LBK and strongly believe that this redevelopment is vital to the future well being of the Key. I think you may have been misled by Spoll and the others Monday. IPOC’s interests do not represent the best interests of Key residents as a whole. Thank you.

Gary Bender
Longboat Key

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Correct the blunder

Commissioners:

You do need to get this key club application right! Do what you have to do to correct this apparent commission blunder of great proportion. Your job was to vote up or down on the application as presented to you last Wednesday, June 9. Project redesign is for their architects not for you. Extraction of dollars is not something you should press hard for. It is not right! Please do whatever is necessary to move this forward. Time is rapidly running out for the applicant on this application. Please get on with this.

Ron Johnson
Longboat Key

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Go slow, be judicious

Commissioners:

We all want the Longboat Key Club to be a successful resort with a beautiful golf course and all the amenities attached to it, such as an accessible driving range, visible open space and roads without bottlenecks. It pleases me to see that both sides are willing to compromise. Let us not destroy the beauty of this Shangri-la-like island in the name of progress. With compromise we can achieve that which everyone wants, i.e. uncluttered beauty. We can have it all if good judgment prevails, as I know it will. Over-expansion will be detrimental to our beautiful paradise. Go slow and be judicious.

Barbara J. Struth
Longboat Key

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Congratulations

Honorable Mayor and Commissioners:

Congratulations on wisdom and judgment in decision making, for listening to your professional Planner, for giving the Longboat Key Club the opportunity to expand and modernize without caving in to greed, excess and intimidation, for sparing all concerned years of litigation and neighbor-against-neighbor animosity, for preserving green space that will make the Resort a more attractive destination. Having spent several years as an elected commissioner in another City, I know that compromise is the lubrication of good public policy. So thank you.

Bill Sand
Longboat Key

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Thank you for tempering Loeb

Longboat Key Town Commission:

We would like to thank the town commissioners for tempering Loeb Corporation’s proposed massive condo/hotel/convention development. As residents of Lighthouse Point, we are encouraged by the commission’s approval of a downsized plan, although we remain concerned of the overall density and its impact on the island-side community and town as a whole. While the approved plan by the commission doesn’t eliminate Loeb’s posturing of a ‘walkout,’ it does go toward mitigating the effects on us who live here without that option.

We thank IPOC for keeping our voices heard. When hundreds of different people come together against a special interest like Loeb Partners, it demonstrates the bond among Longboat Key residents to preserve this special place.

The commissioners have done an honorable job trying to help both parties meet in the middle. For this effort we thank you.

Andrew Charabin, Dawn Holland, Elizabeth Simonson, George Skestos, Kenneth Sanborn, Laura Burrows, Marianne Betagole, Paul Holland, Peter Simonson, Robert Martin, Robert Betagole, Shan DiNapoli, Tina Skestos, Tom DiNapoli, Trish Sanborn & Yvonne Martin
Lighthouse Point Drive
Longboat Key

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Going too far

Dear Mr. Mayor:

While I am pleased to see that four members of the commission showed they cared about the residents of LBK; I still think we are going too far to accommodate the Loeb Group. Why we want to increase the density of our Key to help some over leveraged short-term investors is beyond my understanding. In a few years they will be long gone and we will be left to deal with the aftermath; the compromise that we have here is most likely the outcome they wanted all along. As I said in previous correspondence I wouldn’t let them build a pup tent.

Please pass this email on to the others on the commission. Thank you.

Jim Sullivan
Longboat Key

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We applaud you

Commissioners:

As owners of property on Longboat Key my wife and I applaud your adoption of the alternative ordinance offered by the town instead of the full proposal put forward by the Longboat Key Club. The alternative ordinance represents a reasonable compromise, which should benefit both the Longboat Key Club, and the overall economic well being of Longboat Key without the burden that would have resulted from adoption of the full plan proposed by the Club.

In my view Longboat Key does not have the size or infrastructure to support the Key Club full plan and if adopted would ultimately have had the opposite effect to that sought, namely, traffic chaos, decreased tourism, erosion of property values and a decreased tax base. Thank you for having the foresight to maintain what we all love about Longboat Key.

Jim Ware
Longboat Key

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Pass the compromise

Commissioner Larson and the Town Commission:

Wisely, Monica Simpson, the town planning director, recognized the serious flaws in the original Loeb expansion plans. I would urge the Town Commission to pass the ordinance on second reading, which reflects an excellent compromise plan. This revised and down-sized plan will still allow Loeb to increase density and foot print, but will provide more open space than the original Loeb proposal and allow for the open, green space of a driving range which not only functions as an integral part of any golf course of quality, but also is more in tune with the aesthetic needs of the area.

I am a Florida resident, living at Regent Place, Islandside. My husband and I have been members of the Longboat Key Club since 1990. Thus, I fully appreciate the commercial needs of Loeb as balanced against the necessity of making sure that Longboat Key remains the jewel in the crown of all of Florida.

The best way to ensure both goals is to approve on second reading on June 28 the ordinance, which scales back the original proposal while still permitting Loeb a very significant economic development opportunity.

Geri J. Yonover
Longboat Key

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Stay strong

Longboat Town Commission:

Thank you for passing the ordinance, which provides all parties with significant benefits. Loeb has the lion’s share of what they wanted and the town has provided them with the flexibility to make it work. You have shown that Longboat Key can foster change, but will not abandon its fiduciary responsibility to residents who purchased and reside on the Key.

No doubt, you will receive adverse feedback about the demise of Longboat Key if the private Key Club does not get everything it wants, but that is not true. We have a great location with fine beaches and excellent public amenities. These are challenging times that require teamwork, leadership, empathy, and disciplined long-term thinking. Stay strong and encourage the LBK Cub to take advantage of the generous opportunity that you gave them.

Robert Clark
Longboat Key

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We want the Key Club to do well

Dear Mr. Lenobel:

Thank you and the other commissioners for your stand regarding the Key Club expansion. I support the Club’s desire to build the hotel and the meeting facility. There are many unsold condos on the island and building more condo units doesn’t help the economics of our island in any way. Like most of the residents, we want the key Club to do well. The golf course certainly needs improvement and the retention of the driving range is welcome. We have a beautiful area and your stand against crowding and over development is most welcome. Thank you.

Don and Carolyn Judd
Longboat Club Road

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Elected leaders do not understand

Town of Longboat Key:

How is it possible for the commissioners to decide to rewrite the Key Club plan? The time for re-writing was over. Maybe it is their way to say “no” without saying what they really feel. In any case, it shows that we have not yet elected leaders who understand what the people want. The entire key needs to be updated and take part in the twentieth century.

Anne Arsenault
Whitney Beach

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Continue along this path of compromise

Commissioners:

Please stay firm and continue along this path of compromise. The mass expansion of the Key Club will not be a plus in the long run. It will ruin the beauty of LBK to have 2 walls of buildings, packed close together and totally massive.

The club is getting $25 million of land. Sure they are going to threaten. But they have never done any of the improvements they have promised in the passed. So how do we know they will ever build this hotel, put the proper grass on the golf course, etc. Don’t let them get away with loose promises. It must be made clear that they are not calling the shots, the town is. We do not want a development of this size on such a small parcel of land. It is wrong. Please protect LBK.

Barbara Chase
Longboat Key

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What is substantial?

Mayor:

“The commission can amend the plan at second reading on June 28, but Persson said the amendments cannot be substantial or it will trigger a re-write of the ordinance and therefore it would go back to a first reading in the fall.”

The commission appears to be faced with a daunting and delicate situation. Go an inch too far and I suspect it goes to court. Words such as on thin ice and walking on soft-boiled eggs come to mind. Who will ultimately decide what is substantial?

Gene Jaleski
Longboat Key

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Actions were disgraceful

To: LBK Town Commission

As a concerned citizen of LBK, I attended all the Town Commission meetings regarding the LBK Club re-development plan. And In my opinion, your actions today, regarding the Club’s re-development plan were disgraceful.

You, in great haste, voted on an Ordinance of considerable length and far reaching implications to the residents of Longboat Key that most of the Commissioners never read. In fact, the Commissioners only received a copy of the Ordinance a few minutes before the meeting. One Commissioner actually described the actions of the Commission during the meeting as being dictatorial. The Ordinance was drafted by unknown persons away from the eyes of the interested parties and quickly jammed thru to a vote.

The vote was taken so quick without any explanation of what was actually being voted on, that, I believe the outcome of the vote would have been different if the Ordinance and its implications were correctly understood. Then the meeting was immediately adjourned. There were so many different plans on the table that it would have been wise for the Commissioners to be polled on the true understanding of the Ordinance. After all, this is a $400,000,000 dollar development that will benefit the citizens of Longboat Key and the Sarasota area. My discussion with one of the Commissioners after the meeting, indicated to me, the implications of the vote were not understood.

In my opinion, the commission had failed the citizens of Longboat Key and played to the special interest of IPOC to the detriment of the rest of us. This will go down as one of Longboat Key’s greatest failures. What a disappointment.

Bill Salmon
Longboat Key

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An extremely sad day on Longboat key

Dear Commission:

First, I would like to thank you, Commissioner Brown, for being the lone vote for the proposal that the Longboat Key Club brought back to the table after a weekend of furious work and compromise.

That said, it was apparent by Bob White’s request today to move the project over to Harbourside, that there will be no satisfying him or his group. One would have thought that you all could have figured that out when he proposed to have the sandbar at New Pass removed. He does not speak for the majority of this Island, but somehow he carries enough weight to keep you from approving the project.

Much has been said about Commissioner Larson’s vote in the final few minutes of the meeting but the writing was on the wall when six of you sided against the club earlier and Commissioner Brown was the only one who could see the big picture. I think we were all shocked and dismayed to witness the continued moving of buildings and the Chicago Style politics including financial blackmail being practiced right in front of us. It is doubtful that the Hilton, Publix or any other business would now want to even attempt to do any type of development in Longboat Key. Who could blame them?

I will never be able to understand what happens to you intelligent and seemingly caring people once you get elected to the Town Commission of Longboat Key. We do not elect you because you were once, in a former life, a doctor or a town planner, or a land use attorney, or an architect, or a builder, or an airline pilot, or a developer, or a mayor, or a communications guru or a CEO or a newspaper editor or a CIA operative or a hotel manager. We elect you because we believe you when you tell us that you have the best interests of the community as a whole in mind. We appreciate that you bring incredible experience to the table but we are not asking you to apply it literally. We expect you to respect the people who are today doing the jobs you once did. That is why they are the experts and you are retired. They are in touch with the way things work today, not they way they did back when you were doing their jobs.

Today was a very sad day. There was absolutely no leadership… ego and posturing were allowed to take center stage. You made no sense at all, acting as if this was the first time you had been asked to think about the design of this project, moving buildings, stacking garages and just being obstructionists. Then, when you hastily decided to vote, no one in the audience understood what you were voting on and I have to wonder if you even understand what you did.

A leader would have realized that the project being discussed was not so insignificant that it should be hastily voted on so that you did not have to worry about Commissioner Hal Lenobel being able to return after lunch or whether or not you would be on time for a funeral. Both the condition of Commissioner Lenobel’s wife and the funeral service for Andy Cail could have been treated respectfully by simply requesting that the meeting be recessed at lunch and resumed on Wednesday or Thursday. What was the rush? Why were you so willing to just pull the plug on this project?

You have wasted the time of all of the citizens who have been coming to these hearings for years. You have wasted the time of the attorneys on both sides and you have caused incredible expense to be incurred by all the parties involved as well as the town. You have misled us but shame on us for not paying attention. The fact that you still have not acted upon the visioning plan was a huge red flag but we believed that you were so busy working on the project that you just had not gotten around to it. The truth is, you have no use for it. You have made a mockery of the voters who campaigned for you and believed that you would do the right thing. When all is said and done, no one will blame Bob White and his IPOC group or the Longboat Key Club for this failure to rejuvenate and revitalize Longboat Key. I hope that you all have very strong shoulders because the responsibility for this debacle sits squarely on them.

Marnie Matarese
Sarasota

Dear Marnie:

You owe me an apology for including me in your diatribe. You have no idea what I was trying to do on the Ordinance vote. Shame on you.

Dave Brenner, town commissioner
Longboat Key

Dear David Brenner:

Please explain to me what you were trying to do because I am not the only one who is clueless. I would welcome some understanding of what the heck happened. I will even apologize ahead of time. I am sorry if you do not deserve to be included in my being upset but can you imagine how all of us feel? We were shocked today. Please enlighten me.

Marnie Matarese
Sarasota

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Saddened yet appreciative

Dear Mayor Spoll, Vice Mayor Brown & Commissioners:

On behalf of the St. Armands Circle Association Board of Directors and the businesses on St. Armands Circle, I would like to sincerely thank you for all of your hard work and inordinate amount of time that you have committed, especially over the past few months, to the Longboat Key Redevelopment Project.

Although we are deeply saddened, and disheartened, by today’s vote we do appreciate all of your efforts in trying to find the most positive solution, and compromise, which would benefit all partied involved and ultimately the entire community.

Diana M. Corrigan, executive director
St. Armands Circle Association

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You killed Longboat’s future

Dear Commissioners:

Yesterday you killed Longboat Key’s future. Through greed, overweening egos and sheer incompetence you blew it. Our tax base is now further damaged. Town revenues will continue to follow our property values down. We’ll never get back those 500 hotel rooms we lost and the revenue they provided.

Mr. Spoll… you bear the most blame. You authored “poison pill” ordinance and rushed it through a vote, gaveling the meeting to a close before anyone else could offer an amendment.

Now we’re finished as a town. Declining tax base, the Colony rotting, the LBK Club fading and you guys are demanding bribes from the White Knight who would have turned the town’s direction around. A disgusting display of Lilliputian thinking.

I still can’t believe what you guys did. Maybe you should all run for office in Washington, you’ve certainly got the mindset for it.

Shannon Bolser Gault
Longboat Key

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The Bottom Line

Town Commission:

When all is said and done the bottom line is that you Commissioners and Town Staff, “working for us,” couldn’t figure out a way to facilitate a $400 million investment by a quality landowner to improve their property on Longboat Key. This during a major recession and with the support of a large majority of residents. Rationalize all you want, but that’s the bottom line. Voters expect results. You failed.

Local central government riding roughshod over private property and enterprise. Central planning by committee from on high by you, who know better, and at the very same time ineffectively trying to “negotiate” a multimillion dollar cash settlement from the Club for votes. Embarrassing. “Welcome” to Chicago.

That’s your legacy.

Potential investors on and off island are going to see this process and decision as unmistakable evidence of a radically protectionist investment “market” and act accordingly. If you think you can spin this as basically a pro-Club decision and make them the “bad guy” you are dead wrong.

Too bad for us all, including the elite “behind the gates.”

Bob Gault
Longboat Key

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Bribes for approval

To: Commissioners Bob Siekmann, Lynn Larson, Phillip and Mayor George Spoll:

The free-for-all I witnessed today at the meeting was an embarrassment to our town. For the Longboat Key Club to be treated so unprofessionally was humiliating. And I have voted for all of you.

Designing from the dais like you were playing Monopoly…demanding bribes for your approval…illegal when private industry tries it, but OK for public officials! And a demand for an “appraisal” of the Club’s land value? What…you want a percentage? This is not how grown ups do business.

All that work and all that time and you vote in a “stealth” ordinance designed to be fatal to the Club’s proposal, that many in the audience thought was a vote “for” the revitalization. Why? So you can say “I voted for the Club while I voted against it”?

Just be honest. Yes or No but not “maybe…if you do it my way.”

Shannon Gault
Longboat Key

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Criticism undeserved

Town Commission:

Factually, the Key Club is a minor contributor to the tax base of the island, paying less than $40,000.00 in ad valorem taxes a year. Whereas a single tower at L’Ambiance contributes 3 times that much in real estate taxes each year. The aggregate of the property owners at Island Side pay perhaps thirty times more than the Key Club.

Maybe the happy residents of our island to not want to see our community become a tourist trap. Maybe all the people who paid top dollar for the exclusivity of Longboat Key do not want to be another Boca Raton.

I personally find the comments coming from you two to be in general non-constructive for our community.

I wish you two would pay as much attention to facts as you do to overly harsh criticism of good people, including myself, who are earnestly trying to do the best for our community.

What makes the two of you believe you somehow know more than anyone else? Even the town manager was forced to respond to your last over-the-top tirade about the planning manager. Please try to add to the conversation instead of frequently firing-off mostly undeserved criticisms.

Gene Jaleski
Longboat Key

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How did this happen?

Dear Mayor Spoll:

While I can understand the purpose of having a proposed ordinance for discussion to center upon, it is difficult to imagine that the result of today’s meeting was what was contemplated. I have no idea whether the Longboat Key Club will walk away from a circumstance they have said they cannot live with. They should not be blamed if they did, and if that happens it should not be seen as anything but a tremendous loss for Longboat Key. It serves no purpose to make threats about remembering at the ballot box. It should be a time to reexamine how a proposal that was not sought got on the table and then approved.

At heart, it appears as if the Town was a victim of its own greed. It wanted a five-star hotel, improved golf course, and the amenities of the wellness center. It seems to have accepted that the meeting facility was central to the hotel operation. “ Give us that, you said. And also, give us $4 million or more. And give us a sidewalk, even though the root systems of the existing trees and bushes would give pavement at the expense of green. And even though we do not play golf, give us a full driving range as a symbolic gesture. And those condominium units you, the applicant, say are essential for success: we either don’t believe you or don’t care. That is your problem. As long as we get our share, we don’t want the North Parcel “invaded.” As a citizen, it hurts me to say that it would serve the Town right if it wound up with nothing but a deteriorating property as the prize for playing hardball. But it hurts us all.

It was obvious during the rushed vote (and the wisdom of those circumstances should be reflected upon) that at least one commissioner had little idea about what the actual vote was on. That responsibility rests with that commissioner. However, the haste to adjourn and exit the room made an unseemly end to this process even more so.

The Town appeared to be intent upon not getting snookered by the out-of-town sharpies, and as a result may well have outsmarted itself. Mr. Mayor, it was obvious you did not appreciate Mr. Brody’s anecdote about most jurisdictions actually chipping in for projects such as what was proposed. But that is how governments without an overly inflated sense of their worth do behave. They bid for progress.

The notion that the Town was going to be bestowing some one-way gift is mistaken. The investment that would have been made by the applicant is its part of the mutual benefit, as would have been the development fees and ongoing stream of taxes.

I do not know if there is anything to be salvaged here, but if there is, I hope you and your fellow Commissioners will take a deep breath and save this project.

Terry Gans
Longboat Key

Dear Terry:

I would ask you to go to Town Hall and obtain and read a copy of the Key Club 2007 Performa that is in the public record, before you shed too many tears over the KC’s financial plight. I read in the Performa a tale that appears to indicate a rather tasty investment that has returned tens of millions in profits over the past twenty years. In 2005 the KC took in 8.5 million in dues and 3.5 million in initiation fees. In 2006 the KC took in 11.1 million in dues and an additional 1.3 million in initiation fees. Over a ten-year period dues averaged 8 million and initiation fees around 1.3 million.

The national yearly average for maintaining a top-of-the-line golf course is around 1 million for eighteen holes, or in the case of the KC’s 45 holes, 2.5 million. There are some additional expenses that do not include Inn on the Beach which is owner financed. Once again I would not shed too many tears for the poor old decaying Key Club. To me their P/E looks admirable.

We can argue about “vested rights” and the question becomes whose. The Key Club is a minor contributor to the tax base of the island, paying less than $40,000.00 in ad valorem taxes a year. Whereas a single tower at L ‘Ambiance contributes 3 times that much in real estate taxes each year. The aggregate of the property owners at Island Side pay perhaps thirty times more than the Key Club. If yesterday had been a stockholder’s meeting, the KC might have been viewed as a minor stakeholder.

Wouldn’t we all have been more comfortable if Mr. Brody had discussed actual finances? IPOC tendered specific examples of viable condotel projects. In return the KC offered little more than non-specific denials of the presented facts. The Performa seems to indicate that the KC is not suffering financially. The KC could have presented financial arguments at any time over the past two years. They chose not to.

I believe that the entire Key Club application has been, as they say in southern California, a bit of a legal garden-trample. I would hate to see the process go before some judge. Perhaps the commission was inadvertently wise in the path they chose between a rock and a hard place.

Gene Jaleski
Longboat Key