Ron Campbell painted the yellow submarine for the Beatles’ animated film of the same name. He contributed about 12 minutes of the finished product. Photo provided

Update: Cartoonist cancels Old School Square appearance | Beatles on the Beach Festival postponed

By Ron Hayes

When the second annual International Beatles on the Beach Festival hits Delray Beach on March 26-29, you’ll hear from more than a dozen Beatle imitators — and one Beatles illustrator.

You’ll hear The Bertils from Sweden, The NoWhere Boys from Colombia, Beat and Shout from Brazil and Estefy Lennon, a female John Lennon tribute band from Argentina.

You’ll hear “McCartney Mania,” with a full orchestra, and even a performance by Micky Dolenz, former drummer for those “prefab four,” The Monkees.

Also promised is a display of artwork by the some of the Beatles at the Cornell Art Museum in Old School Square, where you'll have a chance to meet and hear Ron Campbell, but he won't be singing Yellow Submarine.

He helped draw it.

Campbell was 28 and already a veteran cartoonist when he drew sketches used to animate many scenes in the beloved feature cartoon, Yellow Submarine.

It was Campbell who helped bring the Sea of Time sequence to the screen, the Chief Blue Meanie and his sidekick Max, and of course, “Jeremy Hillary Boob Ph.D.,” the Nowhere Man.

Before that, he’d animated the hit Beatles TV cartoons back home in his native Australia, and afterward he’d go on to work on Scooby-Doo and The Smurfs, the Flintstones, Jetsons and Rugrats.

Beloved characters all, but when Campbell appears at cartoon festivals, sharing his memories and selling his artwork, the cartoon characters who draw the biggest crowds are the ones based on four real human beings.

“I’d say it’s 50% Beatles,” Campbell says. “With the Beatles, you not only get the attraction of cartoons, you also have the love of the music.”

A graduate of the Swinburne Art Institute in Melbourne, Campbell was already established, animating Beetle Bailey and Krazy Kat cartoons when his director, Al Brodax, called in the middle of the night. He’d just sold a new show. Would Ron like to direct it?

“What show?”
“The Beatles.”
“Al,” Campbell told him, “insects make terrible characters for a children’s show.”

This was in 1964.

“I was a serious young man listening to classical music,” Campbell says, speaking from his home in Arizona. “This was hundreds of little girls drowning out the music, so I hadn’t taken a second’s notice of it. But I quickly learned.”

The Beatles cartoon TV series ran for four years at the height of Beatlemania, and in 1967 Brodax called again, asking Campbell to contribute to the upcoming feature film.

By then, he’d moved to California, worked for Hanna-Barbera’s Smurfs series and opened his own company, Ron Campbell Films.
He helped complete about 12 minutes of the finished Yellow Submarine film, work that took about eight months.

“I didn’t even mention it when I was giving my bios and stuff,” he says.

But the rock band he hadn’t paid attention to in 1964 didn’t go away, and the psychedelic cartoon he’d help draw still draws praise and fans.

“That’s because their rock ’n’ roll music is good,” he says. “It’s varied, it’s rich, it’s not monotonous, and every song is different, with magical phrasing in it.”

Campbell turned 80 in December. He’s retired now, traveling to Beatles shows about once a month. But while the Beatles and Yellow Submarine have endured, the art of hand-drawn animation that he mastered has faded as Pixar and Disney’s computer-generated imagery has taken its place.

“CGI belongs to the young people,” Campbell says, without bitterness. “It’s got nothing to do with me. CGI is cold, but with great story lines and beautiful design and very expressive production. Computers can do things no human being can hope to do. But hand-drawn work has a softness and pleasantness that computers can’t capture.”

By now, you’re no doubt asking what all who come to his exhibits ask. Ron Campbell drew John, Paul, George and Ringo, but no, he never met them. “I’m sorry,” he tells the fans, “but you can’t shake the hand that shook the hand.”

And surely his favorite Beatles song must be Yellow Submarine?

“Here Comes the Sun,” he says. “And I like Hey Jude. It reminds me of Ravel’s Bolero. But a favorite? That’s impossible.”

If You Go
What: Beatles on the Beach
When: March 26-29, with music events March 27-28
Where: Old School Square and Cornell Art Museum, Delray Beach, and other venues around town
Admission: $29.50 a day for general admission, $89.50 for concert VIP or $152.50 for weekend VIP. VIP tickets cover entry to all events.
Info: www.beatlesonthebeach.com
Meet Ron Campbell: The artist will paint, talk to visitors and show his work at the Cornell Museum from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. March 26-28 and 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. March 29. Admission is free.

By Mary Hladky and Jerry Lower

Any hopes that suspended Mayor Susan Haynie might have had of reclaiming her elected office ended Feb. 27 when both her defense lawyer and the prosecutor asked that her trial on public corruption charges be delayed.

In a four-minute hearing Circuit Judge Jeffrey Dana Gillen canceled Haynie’s March 23 trial date and rescheduled it for July 20. He also told prosecutor Brian Fernandes and defense attorney Bruce Zimet to file any new evidence by June 1.

Fernandes contends that Haynie used her position on the City Council to vote on six matters that financially benefited Jim and Marta Batmasian, the city’s largest downtown commercial landowners, and failed to disclose income she received from them or their company, Investments Limited.

Haynie, 64, has pleaded not guilty to charges of official misconduct, perjury, misuse of public office and failure to disclose voting conflicts. She faces more than 20 years in prison.

Haynie, a fixture in Boca Raton politics for 18 years, has not publicly commented on the case since her April 24, 2018, arrest. Then-Gov. Rick Scott suspended her from office, but she never resigned.

If her trial had started March 23 and she were quickly acquitted, Haynie could potentially have reclaimed the mayor’s seat but only until her term of office ends on March 31.

Scott Singer was elected mayor four months after Haynie’s arrest and is seeking election to a full term on March 17 with only token opposition from Bernard Korn.

Four owners are fighting the sale of the Delray South Shore Club, a timeshare that closed in January. Jerry Lower/The Coastal Star

By Steve Plunkett

The cozy 15-unit timeshare closed its doors the Saturday after New Year’s, employees were terminated, and security guards started patrolling the grounds pending the resort’s sale to a Pennsylvania-based developer.
Owners of most of the 765 timeshare weeks at the Delray South Shore Club are no doubt looking forward to the estimated $16,078 payout for each week they owned at the beachside complex.
But four owners, who collectively have seven weeks, are continuing a legal battle to undo the 498-156 vote to sell the resort, alleging that they and fellow unit owners were duped by misleading information and “scare tactics” from the timeshare’s board of directors, maneuvers they say will lead to windfall profits for two directors who live nearby.
“It’s frustrating for us knowing what is happening and being unable to educate the other owners as well as work through the slow legal system,” said Jacqui Derrick, one of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit filed in Palm Beach County Circuit Court.
The suit originally sought to block the Aug. 5 vote authorizing the sale of the complex at 1625 S. Ocean Blvd.; it was amended to focus on alleged breach of contract by the timeshare association and alleged breach of fiduciary duty by the two directors, barrier island residents Kenneth MacNamee and Robert Deutsch.
“It’s a real family place, and it’s really important that the city of Delray, and other places too, know what these jerks are doing,” co-plaintiff John Runyon of Minnesota said.
Derrick and her husband, Bob, also a plaintiff, live about an hour’s drive from Atlanta and own four timeshare weeks. William Miller of Boca Raton is the fourth plaintiff.
In their lawsuit they assert that the resort’s Declaration of Condominium requires unanimous consent of all unit owners to terminate the timeshare.
Members of the board of directors, who are now called termination trustees following the dissolution of the timeshare, assured the other owners that their attorney, Seth Kolton, is “vigorously defending against the plaintiffs’ baseless claims.”
Kolton argued that the lawsuit should be dismissed partly because MacNamee and Deutsch as members of the board of directors are statutorily immune from personal liability. But Circuit Judge Howard Coates Jr. denied Kolton’s motion on Dec. 20.
MacNamee would tell The Coastal Star little about the case.
“As the defendant in the lawsuit, I look forward to my day in court to set the record straight. Until then, I have ‘no comment,’ ” he said in an email.

ABOVE: Sara Clendenin, 32, who had been coming to the Delray South Shore Club since she was in her mother’s womb, makes a final visit with her boyfriend, Dan Sophie, and her mother, Pat. BELOW: Arlene Stuckenbrock of Chicago and Reed Owen sip Bloody Marys. Stuckenbrock had been coming to the timeshare since 1982. Photos by Jerry Lower/The Coastal Star

MacNamee and Deutsch won seats to the seven-member board in November 2018, the same month they learned they had won a sealed-bid auction arranged by the board to buy 23 association-owned weeks.
Paul Widemer, a former director, questioned MacNamee’s and Deutsch’s qualifications to be directors before the election, saying MacNamee “does excel in being disruptive and obnoxious.”
MacNamee, who lives on a canal three lots off the Intracoastal Waterway, then went to Widemer’s home in Lantana and took pictures. “I don’t know your business background and acumen,” he replied to the 86-year-old widower’s email, “but given your domicile situation, you don’t appear to have been very successful, certainly not in my league.”
The board president sent copies of the email exchange to all owners.
Last February the board notified unit owners that the association had received two unsolicited offers to purchase Delray South Shore. In the same mailing, the board posed a one-question survey: “Do you have any interest in selling Delray South Shore Club? Yes or No.”
The board says “a majority of owners responding to the survey” expressed interest in selling, by its count 272-260. But the plaintiff owners insist the outcome is reversed if you subtract the 23 votes MacNamee and Deutsch acquired in the November auction.
In the subsequent Aug. 5 vote, owners were asked whether to terminate the timeshare and warned of future renovations of up to $2 million.
The board’s mailer stated the case this way: “Simply stated, if the vote passes: DSSC will be sold, and you as an owner in good standing will receive approximately $16,000 for each week that you own. … If the vote fails: You as an owner will likely have an additional expense of $2,000-$2,500 per week that you own, which may be spread over a few years.”
MacNamee first invested in Delray South Shore in 1984 and by 2011 he and his wife, Mary, had acquired a total of eight weeks for $22,548, according to the plaintiffs’ research of property records.
They bought seven more weeks for $3,500 on March 6, 2018, and sold one the next day to Deutsch for $1,000. MacNamee added another week to his holdings that July for $10.
Deutsch’s purchase qualified him to run for a seat on the board that fall. In the association’s November auction MacNamee bought six weeks for $4,560 and Deutsch bought 17 weeks for $11,725, the plaintiffs say.
They also find it suspicious that four of the eight auction winners were on the board of directors.
By their math, MacNamee stands to get $337,638 for his $29,618 investment while Deutsch will convert his $12,725 of timeshare weeks into $289,404.
A subsidiary of U.S. Construction Inc., the Philadelphia firm that bought the Wright-by-the-Sea hotel for $25 million in 2018, submitted the $12.3 million winning offer for Delray South Shore. The lawsuit delayed the deal’s planned Jan. 6 closing.
The other offer, for not as much, came from Delray Beach-based Seaside Builders LLC.
U.S. Construction is also a partner in developing Gulf Stream Views, a 14-townhome project just south of Briny Breezes.
The plaintiffs’ lawsuit says MacNamee and Deutsch breached their fiduciary duty “by knowingly, intentionally and maliciously promoting the sale of the association and self-dealing only to seek a windfall profit from their recent activity of purchasing … many foreclosed units within the association well below market value.”
Jacqui Derrick grieves over the loss of “the average man’s vacation beachside resort” and fears Berkshire by the Sea, at 126 N. Ocean Blvd., may be the next target of developers. The Berkshire board of directors notified owners in 2016 that its timeshare ownership arrangement would expire in 2021 unless they amended the bylaws, “just like what our BOD did to us with the same type of wording. Interesting.”
Runyon, 74, bought his two timeshare weeks in 1999 for $5,000 each and faithfully paid his maintenance fee, which he said was $749 a week last year.
“My goal is to preserve Delray South Shore,” he said. “To those of us who don’t see it the way the speculators see it, this is Florida of the ’80s.”
During the timeshare’s final week, guests basked in the sun, walked the beach and congregated in the cabana, but the mood was bittersweet.
“I love this place,” said Sara Clendenin, 32, of St. Louis, who first visited the timeshare while in her mother’s womb. “We come here every year and know all of the people here. They’re like a whole ’nother family you get to see each year.”
Nancy Fooks from New York, who came on New Year’s Day to say goodbye to the friends and the place, admitted she had been crying over its looming closure.
And Arlene Stuckenbrock of Chicago, who had been visiting the club since 1982, recalled watching her son playing as a child from her patio seat.
“I always had the 52nd week of the year, and sometimes the first week of the year. I won’t be able to do that anymore,” she lamented.

Jerry Lower contributed to this story.

By Charles Elmore

For all the headlines about rising seas, king tides and other climate threats, homeowners in most cities and towns across southeastern Palm Beach County stand less prepared than they were eight years earlier when it comes to flood coverage from the National Flood Insurance Program, records from the program show.
Fewer folks have NFIP policies in nine municipalities in the region, compared to three cities with more.
In Delray Beach, residents shed about 10% of NFIP policies between 2012 and 2019. Boynton Beach residents with policies dropped almost 30%. Policy counts fell more than 40% in Briny Breezes.
After years of NFIP rate increases and added surcharges, some homeowners chose not to renew policies if, say, they were not required to carry flood coverage by a mortgage lender.

Briny Breezes resident Linc Musto said he dropped flood insurance for about four years, but resumed coverage after Hurricane Dorian hit the Bahamas in 2019, narrowly veering from Florida.
“Seeing the widespread devastation in the Bahamas made me realize what we would have faced had its path brought it over to Briny,” said Musto, 85, who worked in the insurance business for more than 50 years.
Paying premiums for flood insurance “might be painful for the homeowners, but it does leave them vulnerable if they don’t have it,” said Jim Wrona, a Realtor with POSH Properties in Ocean Ridge.
The average flood claim runs about $43,000, federal officials say, but crucially, it requires a flood policy to collect. A standard homeowner policy does not cover flooding caused by rising water from lakes, rivers, canals and the ocean.
NFIP, backed by the federal government, accounts for all but 3% to 4% of flood policies in the county, though private insurers have recently ramped up efforts to underwrite more flood coverage. 
Florida residents buy the most NFIP policies of any state by far — about 35% of the nation’s total. But a common refrain heard around the state is that Florida has received only a little over 7% of the NFIP’s payouts during the past four decades. Records show that hundreds of thousands of Florida’s homeowners over the last decade have balked at shelling out more as debts piled up for disasters occurring largely in other states.
The average annual cost of an NFIP policy, including various surcharges, pushed past $1,000 nationally by 2019, federal reports show.
Pricing can vary over time as flood maps are updated and redrawn, and the cost for an individual home can vary widely from the average. John G. Backer, one of the owners of the Gracey-Backer Inc. insurance agency in Delray Beach, recalled an example where the premium was $500 for one property and $5,000 for next door.
“There’s a lot of sticker shock,” Backer said.
In effect, some homeowners choose to self-insure, meaning they watch what happens with flooding threats in their neighborhoods over time and decide whether to shoulder the financial risk themselves.
Flood policies come on top of standard home insurance costs that are in some cases rising even faster, to protect against threats such as fires, hurricanes with high winds and plumbing leaks.
As of December, the average cost of a standard policy climbed above $3,000 annually for the first time in Palm Beach County for Florida’s second-largest insurer, state-backed Citizens Property Insurance Corp.
“At this rate,” said homeowner Marie Berman in Boca Raton, “no one will want to buy in South Florida as insurance is way out of whack. I think this is a huge issue that will affect property values in a huge way.”

Rates being analyzed
Difficult financial decisions for homeowners are likely to get tougher in the months ahead.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency, which oversees NFIP, announced that beginning on April 1, renewal premiums will increase an average of 11.3%. That does not include the effects of proposed risk-based pricing, postponed to 2021, which could raise costs even more for some property owners in places designated to carry higher risks. Others could see lower costs.
“FEMA continues to conduct a comprehensive analysis of the proposed rating structure planned for implementation and effective as of Oct. 1, 2021,” an agency spokesman said. “It is premature to speculate on any changes in premium rates.”
The NFIP remains the dominant player in a realm of insurance where private companies have historically feared to tread because risks are so high. Private insurers have recently dipped a cautious toe further into flood insurance waters, and Backer said he has begun selling more policies from private carriers.
As of Sept. 30, 2019, there were 4,564 policies from private insurers providing a property’s primary source of flood coverage in Palm Beach County, up about 33% from 3,424 a year earlier, according to data supplied by the industry-funded Insurance Information Institute.
The group’s Florida representative, Mark Friedlander, said the data available to him did not show the cities or ZIP codes where the policies were located.
Private agents and companies can also sell and administer NFIP policies through established programs. 
Nationally, the number of NFIP policies has decreased from 5.7 million in 2009 to fewer than 5.1 million as of June 30, 2019, federal records show.

Measures may lower costs
Several local cities are taking steps to strengthen seawalls, improve drainage systems and otherwise reduce flooding risks in ways that can help lower NFIP premiums for their residents.
In December, for example, Delray Beach announced its improved Community Rating System score would save residents about 5% on NFIP policies, or about $450,000 citywide.
In early January, Ocean Ridge Town Manager Tracey Stevens reminded residents that FEMA scheduled an open house for Feb. 4 and 5 in West Palm Beach for property owners to see the latest flood maps and discuss their options.
Ocean Ridge had fewer NFIP policies in 2019 (1,243) than it did in 2012 (1,301), though records show a slight uptick from 2018 (1,237).
Boca Raton, Gulf Stream and Manalapan showed a slight increase in 2019 NFIP policies compared to 2012. Delray Beach, Boynton Beach, Briny Breezes, Highland Beach, Hypoluxo, Lake Worth Beach, Lantana, Ocean Ridge and South Palm Beach registered fewer NFIP polices in that span.
In early 2020, thousands of local homeowners can decide how a flood policy looks in the light of a new year.
“As flood events are one of the costliest disasters each year, FEMA reminds homeowners that anywhere it can rain, it can flood,” a FEMA spokesman said. “On average, 1 inch of rain can cost nearly $25,000 in repairs.”
Federal officials say they’re trying to apply the latest and best technology to the problem.
“FEMA’s goal is to make flood insurance significantly easier for agents to price and sell policies, and in turn, help customers better understand their flood risk and the importance of flood insurance,” the spokesman said.

Public open house on flood insurance
The Federal Emergency Management Agency is hosting a public open house Feb. 4-5 in West Palm Beach on flood maps and rates. No appointments are necessary and members of the public can drop by at any time during two three-hour windows.
Where: Mary V. McDonald-Wilson Center, 1505 N. Australian Ave., West Palm Beach
When: 4 -7 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 4, and 9 a.m.-noon Wednesday, Feb. 5

Waves from boats’ wakes wash over a sea wall and stir up the Intracoastal Waterway in Delray Beach. The city said it would ask the state to consider rising sea levels in setting lower speeds. Some residents have built higher walls but are still concerned about potential property damage and want a no-wake zone. Photos by Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star

Intracoastal residents want city to defy state to lower boat speeds

By Jane Smith

Palm Trail residents are asking Delray Beach city commissioners to take action against rising tides and seas and reduce boat speeds on the portion of the Intracoastal Waterway that runs beside their street.
In the stretch between the bridges at George Bush Boulevard and Atlantic Avenue, slightly less than a mile, residents see weekend boaters zipping by. The speed boats kick up wakes, which crash into and over sea walls and enter backyards and city-owned pocket parks, streets and drains.
The waterfront residents want to see a no-wake zone year-round across the waterway to protect their property and the city property, but the state controls the speed limits in the Intracoastal.
“You have to challenge the archaic rules that don’t take into account what others see as a crisis worldwide,” George Walden told commissioners at their Jan. 16 meeting.

Walden

Walden, who lives on the Intracoastal, plans to raise his sea wall by 15 inches to combat the rising tides and keep his property from sliding into the waterway.
The commissioners, though, decided to take a baby step in that direction.
The city attorney will draft a resolution urging the state to consider the rising tides in their boating speed regulations. “We are preempted from drafting an ordinance regulating boat speeds,” City Attorney Lynn Gelin said.
Even so, some commissioners are leaning toward lowering the boat speed limits.
“We have new issues,” Mayor Shelly Petrolia said at the meeting. “Higher tides were not an issue just five years ago.” She wants to pursue “the low-hanging fruit” that she said should not be difficult to change.
The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission enforces boating speeds and ensures wildlife safety in the Intracoastal.
To include rising tides would be a lengthy, multi-step process, FWC regional spokeswoman Carol Lyn Parrish said.
“The data on the rising tides and king tides has to be there to support restriction of the speed zones,” she said.
FWC maps show boat speeds in the waterway through Delray Beach are limited to 25 mph from Oct. 1 to May 31. The other four months, boat speeds are capped at 30 mph.
Year-round, a 50-foot-wide slow-speed buffer exists on both shores of the Intracoastal.
In addition, boats must maintain idle speed from 300 feet north to 600 feet south of the George Bush Boulevard bridge and slow speed with minimum wake from 300 feet north of the Atlantic Avenue bridge to 500 feet north of the Knowles Park boat ramp.
But boaters go faster than that on weekends, Walden, who lives north of the Atlantic Avenue bridge zone, said in a Jan. 17 memo to commissioners.
“I would invite each and every one of you to sit at my dock on any given weekend to view firsthand the reckless disregard of most boaters,” Walden wrote.

Jill and Eric Schifferli live on Palm Trail and have raised their sea wall by a foot to combat wakes. Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star

Jill Schifferli, who lives on Palm Trail and is president of the Palm Trail Homeowners Association, agrees. “Many residents have raised their sea walls,” she said at the Jan. 16 meeting.
They see the damage from the brackish Intracoastal water in the city’s pocket parks at the end of the streets. When boats go zipping by, residents can see the water bubble up through the drains near the waterway.
After the Schifferlis raised their sea wall by 12 inches, Jill and her husband, Eric, planted native Florida grasses that are salt-tolerant because the tidal flow killed their other grass.
“We want the city to help us with our situation by reducing the boat speeds,” she said. That also would reduce property damage for the city pocket parks and streets, she added.
Steve Plamann, who lives off the waterway on Northeast First Court, is nonetheless affected by rising seas. He said that during Hurricane Dorian last year, tidal water flowed onto his street. “It was the highest I have ever seen,” said Plamann, who has lived there for about 30 years.
Residents who live along the east side of the Intracoastal on the barrier island support lower boat speeds, said Bob Victorin, president of the Beach Property Owners Association.
“We met with the Palm Trail group to discuss this issue,” Victorin said. “Manatee protection is another reason for a low-wake zone.”
Manatee season runs Nov. 15 to March 31. Deaths of manatees have been rising in Florida, Jill Schifferli said at the meeting. In 2019, manatee fatalities from collisions with watercraft were up 10.5% over those in 2018. In 2018, there were 124 deaths; in 2019 the number rose to 137.
Manatees, the state’s official marine mammal, are a protected species in Florida. Also known as sea cows, they are aquatic relatives of the elephant. They often have scars from being run over by boat propellers.
For all those reasons, Palm Trail residents continue their quest for lower boat speeds.
“We implore you to take the necessary next step to create and pass an ordinance designating the area between Atlantic and George Bush a No Wake, Slow Speed area,” Walden wrote on Jan. 17 to the commission.  
He then wants the commission to send the ordinance to the FWC for its approval.
“And should FWC decide to reject the commonsense approach of Delray Beach, I would recommend that the mayor drive (literally) the issue directly to the governor’s office to be appealed and overridden as shortsighted, archaic and out of touch with the realities of 2020.”
Mayor Petrolia agrees about the importance of considering rising tides in the boat speed limits.
“It’s a difficult situation that needs to be looked at. Rising tides should be included when determining boating speeds,” she said Jan. 19.
“We may need to pass it through our sustainability officer and then through the new resilience officer in the governor’s office.”

Paige Kornblue Hunter and her husband, Andrew Hunter, will chair the Rhinestone Cowboy Ball, a Feb. 29 event for the George Snow Scholarship Fund. Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star

By Margie Plunkett

She brings a lot of Boca Raton.
He brings a lot of Texas.
Together they seem perfect to serve as honorary chairs of Boca’s 2020 Rhinestone Cowboy Ball, a Feb. 29 fundraiser for the George Snow Scholarship Fund.
Paige Kornblue Hunter, former WPTV NewsChannel 5 anchor and reporter, and her husband, Andrew Hunter, are the Boca Raton residents chairing the event, whose theme is Boots and Bling.
Paige will also be the emcee.
Andrew commutes to Dallas for a four-day stint each week at the oil and gas company Guidon Energy, where he is a drilling adviser and managing partner.
In addition to having a presence in different states, the two devote time to their family, many charities, their children’s school and their careers.
Ask them how they get it all done, and Andrew will answer. “We live life to the fullest.”
Paige adds, “We don’t sit much.”
A Boca Raton native, Paige, 39, went to St. Andrew’s School and received her bachelor’s degree from the University of Michigan. Her first job out of college was at a TV station in Lake Charles, Louisiana. After that, she returned to Palm Beach County to work at WPTV.
Andrew, 37, is from Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and received a degree in petroleum engineering from Louisiana State University.
The two got together seven or eight years after Paige had returned to Palm Beach County. She was invited back to Lake Charles by a friend who did the weather there. The weather friend was married to a good friend of Andrew’s. That couple set up a Mardi Gras ball blind date for Paige and Andrew, who at the time was working on an offshore oil rig. Andrew picked up Paige at the airport and they headed to the ball. Before long they were engaged.
Paige took a break from TV news at WPTV, and the couple settled in Dallas. They were married in 2011 at the Boca Raton Resort & Club, where Paige’s parents were married in 1975 — and where the Rhinestone Cowboy Ball is being held this year. They lived full-time in Dallas, fixed up a home and had three children there.
They moved back to Boca Raton in 2015. The catalyst for the move was that Paige’s mother, Andrea Berry Kornblue, was battling cancer. “We came back to help her in the fight,” Paige said. Mrs. Kornblue, who died in 2018, was a longtime member of the Junior League and volunteered with many organizations.
The Hunters stayed in Boca Raton, swayed by the lifestyle. “We love it,” said Andrew. “The lifestyle’s so good, especially with kids, that it’s worth it to commute. We have three days a week on the beach with the family.”
Paige is a member of the Junior League and volunteers for organizations such as Boca Raton Regional Hospital, Food for the Poor, American Heart Association and the American Cancer Society. She and Andrew got involved in 2008 with the George Snow Scholarship Fund, which since its inception in 1982 has awarded more than $12 million in educational grants.
Paige’s father, Dr. Edwin Kornblue, who was the first dentist in Boca Raton, knew George Snow, she said.
Andrew is president of the Dallas Fort Worth Chapter of the American Association of Drilling Engineers, an organization that has granted $560,000 in scholarships to engineering students across the country.
Meanwhile, Paige wants to put writing back in her life and by Feb. 1 will have launched her own website and blog. “I miss the writing, getting out there and telling some stories,” she said. Her website will be www.PaigeKornblue.com.
The Hunters have three children: Maya Blue, 7, and twins Clay and Cody, 5. They attend the A.D. Henderson University School at Florida Atlantic University, where Paige is a room mom for both classes and Andrew is on the school board.
Other family members are also nearby. Both Paige’s father and Andrew’s father, Chuck Hunter, are in Boca Raton.
Family and friends are the most important thing in their lives, Andrew said. “We have a very diverse and wonderful group of friends around us. We both like to socialize and surround ourselves with great people.”
Said Paige: “We both like to have fun and live for the day.”

If You Go
What: 2020 Rhinestone Cowboy Ball
Benefits: George Snow Scholarship Fund, one of the largest foundations to offer scholarships to students in South Florida
When: 6 p.m. Feb. 29
Where: Boca Raton Resort & Club, 501 E. Camino Real, Boca Raton
Tickets: Start at $250
Info: 561-347-6799 or www.scholarship.org/events-2/#CB

I’m happy to report that we’re making progress with reducing the use of plastics in the distribution of The Coastal Star.
Beginning next month, we are partnering with Publix Super Markets to improve the delivery of newspapers in the northern third of our circulation area.
If you live in a single-family home in Manalapan or on Hypoluxo Island, you’ll begin receiving your paper in the mail in March. Same goes for readers in Ocean Ridge who live north of Woolbright Road.
By switching to mail delivery we’ll be able to reduce the number of plastic sleeves we throw into driveways and eliminate delivery of wet newsprint.
In some neighborhoods it means that police officers and property managers won’t have to pick up and discard copies when residents are away.
The mailed editions of the newspaper will feature monthly promotional materials from Publix. These same editions will be hand-delivered (as usual) to the condos and townhomes in this geographic area — including South Palm Beach.
There shouldn’t be any delay in delivery. If all goes well, we’ll still get you your newspaper on the first weekend of the month.
We’re excited about this sponsored mail delivery of The Coastal Star.
We hope you enjoy the upgrade to our delivery system, as we look forward — over time — to expanding the practice to the rest of our delivery area.
Please thank Publix for helping us reduce the amount of plastic we’re using along our environmentally fragile coast.
And if you have questions or concerns, do contact our publisher, Jerry Lower, at publisher@thecoastalstar.com.

— Mary Kate Leming,
Editor

By Steve Plunkett

Town officials are considering some quick short-term fixes to prevent ruts from forming along and water from ponding on roadways in the core area.
Gulf Stream is in its second year of a 10-year capital improvement plan to replace water mains and rebuild streets. This year’s work focuses on the water main along the northern section of State Road A1A.
But Town Manager Greg Dunham alerted town commissioners at their Jan. 10 meeting that Gulf Stream’s engineering consultant is developing a plan to tackle minor drainage and pavement edge repairs this year.
“You all know about the areas where ponding and rutting alongside the road have been occurring,” Dunham said.
The problem areas are on Polo and Lakeview drives and Gulfstream, Old School and Banyan roads.
Mayor Scott Morgan embraced the idea.
“It seems wise to try to address the issue of very narrow roads, particularly Gulfstream, and water pooling at Polo if it can be done relatively inexpensively and relatively quickly,” the mayor said. “We feel that expanding Gulfstream Road, particularly on the east side going all the way up, putting a curb down on Lakeview and addressing this Polo piling of water because of the elevated drainage area will make a significant difference to the town quickly and pretty inexpensively.”
Dunham said possible solutions are adding curbs at corners and expanding pavement a foot or so “to prevent rutting from parked vehicles or cars running off the edge of the pavement.”
Other fixes could include putting a stone or rock shoulder along a street’s edge, cutting a swale and resodding it to direct runoff away from the road, removing grass in front of drainage inlets and inlet aprons, and adjusting drainage inlet tops and gates or saw-cutting and raising the road where settlement has occurred.
“One of the best examples of that is the big inlet down at Old School and Polo that always has water ponding around it that can’t get into it,” Dunham said. “So one way to address that is to take the lid off, actually cut the box and lower it so the water can get into it.”
Commissioner Paul Lyons, who lives on Polo, said he was “very much in favor” of the proposal, which engineering consultant Baxter & Woodman will flesh out for the commission’s Feb. 14 meeting.
Planning for the reconstruction of Polo, Gulfstream and other core roads is scheduled for fiscal 2021 in the capital improvement plan with reconstruction work done in fiscal 2022.
Commissioners also discussed a white SUV that is parked almost year-round on a town right of way along Polo Drive. Rather than draw up an ordinance to regulate overnight parking, they directed Dunham to contact the property owner to try to resolve the issue.

The ordinance, which is up for a final vote Feb. 3, would limit artificial turf to back and side yards and ban it in front yards such as here on A1A. Jerry Lower/The Coastal Star

By Dan Moffett

The long-running sports dispute over whether natural grass or artificial turf is the better surface has spread into Ocean Ridge.
But the town’s debate isn’t about games. It’s about front yards.
While updating Ocean Ridge’s building codes last year, officials decided to restrict the use of plastic grass to ensure aesthetic standards were maintained.
The result was an ordinance that came before the Town Commission for a first reading Jan. 6 that lays down some tough and detailed rules for installing synthetic yard surface.
Specifically, Town Attorney Brian Shutt, who wrote the ordinance with the help of the Planning and Zoning Commission, says the law “provides that synthetic turf would only be allowed in the rear or side yards, not to exceed 25% and not visible from the public right of way. Synthetic turf would be allowed in between brick pavers, not to exceed 4 inches in width, and would not be counted toward the 25% maximum amount.”
Shutt said he also “added language to provide that with existing yards with artificial turf, the turf will be allowed to remain until it is repaired or replaced in an amount that is greater than 50% of the total.”
There is also a sunset clause that requires the homeowner to replace the turf after 10 years. Most artificial surfaces are under warranty for between six and eight years, officials say, so the reasoning is the surface won’t last 10 years anyway.
Commissioners approved the ordinance on a 3-1 vote with Mayor Steve Coz on the losing side and Commissioner Phil Besler absent. The ordinance comes up for final approval on Feb. 3.
Coz argued that the new rules were an intrusion on homeowners’ rights. He said the town should at least allow artificial turf on front yards if it is screened from the street by hedges, walls or landscaping. Coz said the turf would also help the town’s drainage problems by reducing the use of sprinklers.
“I do not agree with this ordinance whatsoever,” the mayor said. “If we pass this, what’s next? I don’t particularly like the look of artificial turf, but it’s a private property issue for me.”
Ric Carey, a planning and zoning commissioner, said the panel worked on the ordinance for months and examined other communities’ laws, some of which were more restrictive.
Carey said the intent was to preserve for Ocean Ridge “the lushness of it, the verdant nature, the sense that it’s a coastal paradise. We didn’t feel artificial turf met that criteria.”
John Zessin just installed synthetic grass at his Old Ocean Boulevard home and it has drawn compliments from neighbors and commissioners. Zessin thinks turf is a good solution for yards close to the ocean where salt and sand make it difficult to grow natural grass.
Moreover, he told commissioners, contrary to perceptions, turf is an environmentally sound solution. After all, it requires no water, pesticides or herbicides, and needs no mowing by machines that pollute the air with exhaust. Also, Zessin said, his lawn is made from recycled plastic.
“At what point does this overreach stop?” he asked, imploring the commission not to inflict invasive rules on homeowners.
Commissioner Kristine de Haseth, in strongly supporting the ordinance, said she would be willing to make it even more restrictive.
“This is a community character issue,” she said.

As a resident of Ocean Ridge for the past five years, I have attended five Town Commission meetings, four regarding my building a home and the fifth to defend what I have built.
And while my purpose for attending the Jan. 6 meeting was to provide my perspective on the environmental benefits of artificial turf near the ocean, what I experienced was more abhorrent than the uninformed review of my building project. Perhaps the parallel of the town overreach of “permitting” my project (Planning and Zoning’s architectural condemnation of my home) should be fully expected — because the leader advocating limits on artificial turf was none other than the P&Z.
In the vote to determine whether Ocean Ridge would allow artificial turf to be installed on future projects, the P&Z made two presentations, neither of which had scientific basis for their recommendation to ban it — not even an admission that artificial turf eliminates a number of environmental concerns, such as fertilizers, pesticides, lawn mower emissions, grass clippings or water usage.
No, their concern was purely aesthetic: They didn’t like the way it looked.
And while a debate can be had about the look of artificial turf, the true issue at hand is your commissioners’ belief that they should control what residents do with their private property. In voting that artificial turf could be used on no more than 25% of your total property, town commissioners have taken the right to control 75% of your private property. You can determine what you do to 25% of your property, but get to pay Ocean Ridge 100% when property taxes are due.
So what else does this council get to determine? Future agenda items are sure to include elimination of palm trees, color of grass allowed, strain of grass allowed, house color choices, approved architectural design and of course, banning of Big Gulps.
Every resident of Ocean Ridge should be concerned about the direction of our elected officials, regardless of where you stand on this issue. Your concern should be the loss of your personal freedom and property rights in Ocean Ridge.
Feb. 3 is residents’ last chance to speak up before the council ramrods this ordinance through. Please attend to voice your concerns.
— John Zessin,
Ocean Ridge

At 6 p.m. on Feb. 3, the Ocean Ridge Town Commission will vote on final adoption of an ordinance severely limiting waterless lawns, an ordinance that will significantly impact the private property rights of every Ocean Ridge landowner. Please come and participate in the discussion: It affects you. 
If Ocean Ridge property owners want to preserve their property rights, Feb. 3 will be the time to come and speak!
— Peter Hoe Burling,
Ocean Ridge

Lantana has had many projects and enhancements completed in 2019. Several water mains have been replaced throughout the town to increase water flow and pressure in many neighborhoods. Numerous streets have been repaved.
On our great beach, the bathrooms have been renovated and a deck has been added to the oceanfront pavilion.
Lantana’s town events were a great success, including Movie Nights at the Beach, an Easter Egg Hunt, Fourth of July Celebration, Haunted Nature Preserve and Winterfest, to name a few.
For the 20th consecutive year, the town was awarded a certificate for excellence in financial reporting from the Government Finance Officers Association. We were also proud to receive an award from the Florida Urban Forestry Council for Tree City USA.
Looking ahead, Lantana will continue its focus on projects to improve and beautify the town, including sidewalk improvements, repaving and restriping of roads, improvements to the Lantana Municipal Beach including an ADA accessible ramp, interior renovations to the library and improving town-owned property. FDOT is resurfacing South Dixie Highway and the town will be planting four landscape islands.
Lantana strives to be responsive to the needs of our residents and to make decisions based on what is good for all in the long term. The Town Council and staff continue to work together toward maintaining public safety and enhancing the quality of life here.
It has been an honor to serve as your mayor for the last 19 years and, in 2020, I will continue the momentum of previous years in striving to make Lantana a great place to live, work and play.
— David J. Stewart,
Lantana mayor

A1A in Manalapan was closed from the Boynton Inlet to Plaza del Mar for more than a hour on Jan. 2 as the Palm Beach County Fire Department responded with 12 units, 24 firefighters and command staff to a report of smoke at a home in the 1100 block of South Ocean Boulevard. The source of the smoke was an unknown electrical malfunction, the department said. No fire was found. Jerry Lower/The Coastal Star

By Dan Moffett

Manalapan resident Hank Siemon came to the Town Commission and asked for an exception to building codes so that he can put an unusually long dock behind the home he intends to build on the vacant Intracoastal lot he owns.
Because Siemon is also a sitting town commissioner, and because some of his neighbors objected, the request came with its share of complications before the commission approved it.
Siemon recused himself and left the dais during 90 minutes of discussion at the Jan. 28 commission meeting.
His engineer, William Stoddard, explained Siemon’s problem: He owns a 40-foot boat and the channel along the east side of Point Manalapan on Lands End Road isn’t deep enough unless his dock extends well beyond the code’s maximum limit of 55 feet.
In order to safely navigate his vessel in and out, Siemon needs a dock to extend out 85 feet, Stoddard said. Not getting the variance to build out an extra 30 feet would deny Siemon the use of the boat, Stoddard said, creating an unfair hardship — a criterion for code exceptions — that the town should not allow.
Siemon’s next-door neighbors, Barry and Sigrun Haase, oppose the variance. Their attorney, Jason Mankoff, called Siemon’s request “a self-created hardship.”
Mankoff’s remedy? Buy a smaller boat.
“Owning a big boat is not justification for a variance,” he said. “All the other owners have to deal with the same depth. It’s not a hardship. It’s an inconvenience.”
Mankoff said Siemon was “trying to shift any blockage of his view” to the Haases.
Another neighbor, former Mayor Basil Diamond, also opposed the variance. Diamond said the limit was set at 55 feet to keep navigation lanes open in the shallow channel, and said Siemon had “the wrong boat” for the property.
“If we give variances to everybody,” Diamond said, “then you don’t have a code.”
Further complicating the dispute are plans to install a new water main line through an easement across Siemon’s lot at 1660 Lands End Road.
Commissioner Clark Appleby sided with Siemon. Appleby said boaters have had to adjust to “high tides and low tides that have gotten more dramatic” in recent years and the request for a longer dock is reasonable.
“Having a 30-foot extension is not going to have a huge impact on either neighbor’s view, north and south,” he said.
Mayor Keith Waters said the code allows 55-foot docks or docks that extend into 3 feet of water. For Siemon to get his boat into 3 feet, the dock has to go out 85 feet, Waters said.
“If a resident cannot reach 3 feet of water,” Waters said, “that’s the milestone by which a variance can be requested.”
Commissioners decided that the proposed dock would not obstruct navigation channels. They voted unanimously to grant Siemon the variance.
“I think it’s important everybody understands this,” Waters said after the vote. “This body does not make decisions based on friendships. It makes decisions on what this town is supposed to be doing and what we’re supposed to be doing representing this town.”

By Steve Plunkett

Attorneys for Richard Lucibella and the state of Florida will square off for oral arguments before the 4th District Court of Appeal on Feb. 25.
Lucibella, now 66, is appealing his conviction of misdemeanor battery on Ocean Ridge police Officer Richard Ermeri during an October 2016 altercation in his oceanfront backyard. Ermeri and other town police went to the then-vice mayor’s house after residents reported hearing gunfire in the neighborhood.
The opposing attorneys, Senior Assistant Attorney General Melynda Melear for the state and Leonard Feuer for Lucibella, will each get 15 minutes to present their side to a panel of three judges.
“After the judges confer, a decision is made, and an opinion may be written,” says the West Palm Beach court’s website. “Each case presents its own issues and difficulties; in most cases the decision is made within 180 days from the conference.”
Ermeri, fellow Officer Nubia Plesnik and Sgt. William Hallahan went to Lucibella’s backyard while investigating the 911 calls about gunshots; a scuffle ensued.
In his trial last February, Lucibella was found not guilty of resisting arrest with violence and not guilty of felony battery on a law enforcement officer but guilty of simple battery. He was ordered to pay $675 in court costs.
He wants the appellate judges to vacate his conviction and order Circuit Judge Daliah Weiss to enter a judgment of acquittal or give him a new trial. Melear asks that the 4th District Court of Appeal affirm Lucibella’s Feb. 21 conviction.
Feuer and Melear will present sharply different views of what happened in Lucibella’s backyard.
Feuer, for example, says Ermeri caused the first instance of violence in this case “by grabbing Lucibella’s shoulders to obstruct his entry into his home or prevent him from obtaining a drink.”
Melear, on the other hand, says Lucibella “poked the officer forcefully in the chest while threatening him” after “he first walked aggressively into the officer’s extended hands and grabbed him by the neck.”

By Jane Smith

Sand lost to 2017’s Hurricane Irma on the beaches of Ocean Ridge/Boynton Beach, south Delray Beach and north Boca Raton will be restored starting about Feb. 5.
The projects will be paid for using federal tax dollars authorized by Congress in June under the Flood Control and Coastal Emergencies Act. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will oversee the work.
The approximate cost for restoring the Ocean Ridge/Boynton Beach and Delray Beach sand is $13.7 million, according to the Army Corps. Those three beaches will receive nearly 800,000 cubic yards of sand, equal to the amount needed to fill about 250 Olympic-size swimming pools.
The work will be divided into two parts: Delray Beach and then Ocean Ridge/Boynton Beach. Each will take about 30 days to finish, working around the clock.
“Ocean Ridge will follow Delray. It should get going the first week of March and again wrap up in roughly 30 days or four weeks,” David Ruderman, Army Corps spokesman in the Jacksonville office, wrote in a Jan. 10 email to The Coastal Star. “These dates and timelines may slip forward or backward depending on the weather and mechanical/technical issues, but that is the plan.”
Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Co. of Oak Brook, Illinois, will dredge the sand offshore and then coat the southern coast of Delray Beach, from Casuarina Road to the city line with Highland Beach.
In Boynton Beach, heavy equipment will be stationed at Oceanfront Park. That beach, about 1,000 feet long, will receive extra sand.
The contractor also will restore about 3,000 feet north of Oceanfront Park and about 2,000 feet south of it. Both parcels belong to Ocean Ridge.
A second contractor, Weeks Marine Inc. of Covington, Louisiana, won the $12.8 million contract for the Boca Raton work. Staging will begin in mid-February with the project to be complete no later than April 30, Ruderman said.
The same Great Lakes dredge hired to restore sand in Jupiter will float down the coast to restore the Delray and Boynton/Ocean Ridge beaches. It can’t move in rough seas, said Tracy Logue, coastal geologist with the Palm Beach County Environmental Resources Management department.
Once sea turtle nesting season begins March 1, extra steps are required, Logue said. These include hourly nesting surveys, relocation of or the creation of safe zones for nests affected by construction, and limited lighting at night.
The last step is intended to avoid excessive illumination of the water’s surface while meeting federal standards for construction lighting at night.
“Weather and sea conditions have a lot to do with how fast the work can be done,” said Christine Perretta, whose D.B. Ecological Services monitors sea turtle nests in that Boynton Beach/Ocean Ridge area.
She expects to be called to a pre-construction meeting in mid-February to review the plan for dealing with sea turtle nests.
Leatherback turtles can nest in months outside the traditional nesting season of March 1 to Oct. 31, she said.
“They usually allow work on the beach in the early part of the nesting season. The peak begins May 15, then all work on the beach must cease,” Perretta said.
The monitoring will occur at night if there’s nesting activity, Perretta said. “Monitors will be allowed to move the eggs out of the construction area or create a safe area around the nest that the construction equipment won’t disturb.”

By Jane Smith

Ocean One, a development that Boynton Beach approved nearly three years ago, has received a one-year extension of taxpayer incentives from a reluctant Community Redevelopment Agency board.
Without the extension, the approximately $4.1 million of taxpayer money would have expired on Jan. 16.
“We are all disappointed,” said investor Davis Camalier, who has owned the property since early 1999.
The CRA board members voted unanimously on Jan. 6 to extend the taxpayer incentives for one year, with a six-month update on the progress of finding buyers or investors.
Ocean One already has received development extensions from the city to March 2, 2023, because of governor-declared emergencies for the opioid and zika crises, red tide along the coast and various hurricanes. These declarations allow developers to extend their project timelines.
The approximately 3.5-acre parcel sits at the northeast corner of Federal Highway and Ocean Avenue. The first phase of the project is planned to be an eight-story residential complex with 231 apartments on Federal Highway, just south of Boynton Beach Boulevard.
As part of the incentive approval, the developer also will build 8,765 square feet of retail space on the ground floor, create 50 public parking spaces, construct the complex to green-building standards, hold a job fair and make a diligent effort to hire city residents and contractors for the construction. The incentive money is to be spread over eight years.
To square off the lower portion of the 3.0-acre parcel in 2015, Ocean One requested a CRA-owned sliver of approximately half an acre that borders Boynton Beach Boulevard. But Ocean One wasn’t willing to pay much for that land.
“We have been taken advantage of,” said Christina Romelus, a CRA board member. “We sold the (half-acre) for $10 and have watched property values increase.”
The half-acre piece is now valued at $532,613 by the county property appraiser. At the time of the sale in December 2015, that land was appraised at $480,000.
In exchange for the land at a nominal fee, Ocean One had agreed to build a public plaza by Jan. 20, 2021.
“We are not asking for an extension of the public plaza timeline,” said Bonnie Miskel, Camalier’s attorney. She did not say when the public plaza would be built.
Prudential Life Insurance had been on board to underwrite the 231-unit apartment project but then pulled out, Miskel said.
“In April, my client entertained the idea of selling the property through Newmark Knight Frank Florida,” she said. The Boca Raton firm put together a glossy, four-color multipage guidebook on the property and the apartment market in downtown Boynton Beach.
About 1,300 packages went out and “three serious buyers are negotiating with my client,” Miskel told the board. She declined to reveal the amount spent on the marketing.
The would-be buyers all asked that the taxpayer incentives be extended because downtown Boynton Beach apartment rents are lower than those in Delray Beach and West Palm Beach, Camalier said, though the construction costs are the same.
“I want to keep the communications open between us,” Camalier said.
Romelus thanked him for that statement. “I didn’t know that you were marketing the property,” she said.
Romelus said that residents of the adjacent Casa Costa and Marina Village developments “are looking at your property and saying why isn’t anything happening.”
“They are my constituents. They flood my inbox with emails. I need you to understand that and to be more transparent.”

Councilman Edward Shropshire awaits a decision from the Lantana Town Council on Jan. 22 on whether it would appeal a judge’s ruling that kept him on the ballot. Beside him is a Lantana resident, Catherine Phillips Padilla. Tim Stepien /The Coastal Star

By Mary Thurwachter

Mark Allen Zeitler, a candidate for the Group 3 seat on the Lantana Town Council, got what seemed to be celebratory news on Jan. 15. He was informed by town staff that the man he thought would be his opponent, council member Edward Shropshire, had not qualified for re-election. That meant Zeitler, who did qualify for election, would automatically fill the position when Shropshire’s first term expires in March.
But Zeitler didn’t rush to pop open the champagne — a wise decision as it turned out, because that news, as he had suspected, was too good to be true.
“I’m a wait-and-see person,” said Zeitler, 63. “I knew he was going to court,” which is exactly what Shropshire did. The town, Palm Beach County Supervisor of Elections Wendy Link and Zeitler were named as defendants.
Less than a week later, a circuit judge ruled that Shropshire, 67, could remain on the ballot, despite the fact he had not turned in the petitions from registered voters necessary to qualify.
Shropshire said he believed he had qualified after he turned in the certificate of qualification given by Link’s office to Nicole Dritz, the town clerk, before the Dec. 13 qualifying date and that she did not tell him otherwise. Dritz had two jobs at the time — clerk and development services director, a job to which she had been appointed after Dave Thatcher left in November. She now is no longer the clerk.
The snafu leading up to the ruling began after an anonymous concerned citizen made a public records request to look at the Lantana candidates’ qualifying documents and discovered that three of the four candidates (Philip J. Aridas and Karen Lythgoe for the Group 4 seat, and Zeitler for the Group 3 seat) had filed all necessary paperwork. Shropshire’s documents were missing petitions from registered voters, although he did have a certification from the Supervisor of Elections Office saying that he had the petitions and they had been verified.
After the citizen brought this discovery to the attention of the town clerk, Shropshire was told that his name would not appear on the ballot. And Zeitler was informed he won by default.
In Circuit Court, Judge James Martz ruled in Shropshire’s favor.
During an emergency Town Council meeting on Jan. 22, Town Attorney Max Lohman announced the judge’s decision and asked council members (minus Shropshire, who recused himself for obvious reasons) whether they wanted to appeal. Based on Lohman’s recommendation, they voted not to appeal.
Lohman said that by “enforcing the code and getting the result from the court … the town removed any specter of appearing that the town administration favored an incumbent. We did the same thing we’d have done if it was anybody else.”
Dritz’s telling the candidate he was good to go “was a mistake that could have been significant, but for the court’s ruling,” as Zeitler would then have been named winner.
It’s noteworthy, Lohman said, “that the opponent (Zeitler), also named in the case, did not attend any of the hearings and did not have legal counsel attend any of the hearings. So, at this point, it seems to me appealing the case would almost be as if we were pressing forward that individual’s interest. … I think the result of the court still preserves the interest of the public and the town.”
Zeitler, a political newcomer, said he got last- minute notification for the initial hearing on Jan. 17, and wasn’t able to be there for work reasons and didn’t have time to determine whether he needed counsel. He hadn’t done anything wrong, he said, and didn’t know what he could add to the proceedings. He did, however, suspend his campaign, held up on ordering lawn signs and stopped taking political contributions.
The judge, Lohman said, doesn’t believe that this ruling in any way favors Shropshire. “He did acquire the petitions and in all aspects other than physically submitting them to the clerk, met all the requirements and qualifications.”
The clerk is not responsible for correcting errors in paperwork, Lohman said, but the clerk is responsible for verifying that candidates have submitted all the required documents before informing them that they qualified.
When Mayor David Stewart asked Lohman whether the town was setting a precedent by voting not to appeal, Lohman said, “No, sir, it does not.”
The identity of the concerned citizen was not revealed. No logs are kept of people who come to view public records. “Under law … you are not permitted to require their name, to ask them why they want to see it or anything of that nature,” Lohman said.
After the emergency meeting, Shropshire said he was pleased with the result. He said he thought the county’s certificate of qualification was all he had to turn in to the clerk. “All I really wanted was that the people of Lantana had a chance to decide,” he said.
Zeitler said he was OK with the outcome, too. “This way the voters will decide,” he said.
But regarding correctly filing qualification documents, Zeitler said of Shropshire, “Everybody else got it right and he has been through this before. Makes you wonder about his competence.” The election is March 17.

By Mary Hladky

Frustrated municipal officials are pressing state legislators to give them the power to regulate the use of plastic bags and Styrofoam containers.
They want to take action to protect the environment, but a 2008 state law prevents them from enacting local laws that would discourage or stop residents from using products that do not fully biodegrade and kill sea animals that ingest them.
The effort was launched in October by the Town of Palm Beach, which banned single-use plastic bags and Styrofoam containers in June but was forced to reverse course in August after an appellate court upheld the state law.
The town repealed its ban after receiving a letter from the Florida Retail Federation and the Florida Restaurant & Lodging Association noting the court ruling and warning of a possible lawsuit.
Town officials now are seeking support for a recently introduced state Senate bill and companion House bill that would repeal measures in the state law that prevent local governments from regulating single-use plastic bags and polystyrene, best known by the brand name Styrofoam.
The Town Council passed a resolution in October asking the Legislature to vote in favor of the bills, started a petition on change.org seeking support for the bills, and enlisted Thomas Bradford, former town manager of Palm Beach and Tequesta, to drum up support from legislators and other cities, towns and counties.
“It is not a partisan issue,” Bradford said. “It is about doing something for the environment.”
But it is also yet another attempt by local governments to take back control of matters now regulated by the Legislature. Local officials maintain the Legislature is stripping them of governing powers that are enshrined in the state constitution and known as “home rule.”
“There is a larger issue. It is the attack on home rule and the limitations that have been placed on cities from enacting regulations we feel are appropriate to our individual, specific needs,” said Palm Beach Deputy Town Manager Jay Boodheshwar.
“Having a one-size-fits-all policy is not appropriate,” he said. “The plastic ban is just one example.”
Boca Raton, at the urging of City Council member Monica Mayotte, passed a resolution similar to Palm Beach’s on Jan. 14, a day after hearing passionate presentations about the harms caused by plastics from representatives of Oceana, an ocean conservation advocacy organization, and the Surfrider Foundation, which advocates for oceans and beaches.
The nonprofit Boca Save Our Beaches urged residents to tell council members they support the resolution.
“This is first and foremost a home rule issue,” Mayotte said. “This is the first step.”
Delray Beach passed a resolution in November, Gulf Stream passed one in December and Ocean Ridge in January.
“We’re not supporting the Town of Palm Beach’s efforts at prohibiting plastic straws or plastic bags or anything like that,” said Gulf Stream Town Manager Greg Dunham. “We’re just supporting Palm Beach’s efforts at overturning the state’s preemption of towns and cities to do that on their own.”
“The state chips away at (home rule) every chance they can,” Gulf Stream Mayor Scott Morgan said. “We need to protect our own ability to make our own ordinances, respond to our own residents. …”
Bradford doesn’t know how many other cities and towns have passed resolutions because they often do not let him know when they do. But he thinks there is significant support for the effort.
“These state legislators think they know what the local constituents want, when in reality it is the cities and counties that know,” he said.
Local governments have been fighting to regain home rule for years, but every year more bills are filed that would preempt them from taking action on issues of local concern.
“It is an issue every single year. It is the same thing this year,” said Richard Radcliffe, executive director of the Palm Beach County League of Cities. “It is always ‘we know better than you.’ There are things that need to be done on a local level.”
A January report by Integrity Florida, a nonprofit, nonpartisan research institute, said the trend began in 1987 when the Legislature passed a law that prohibited local regulation of firearms.
“Since the 1987 firearms law, the appetite of the Florida Legislature to preempt local actions has grown enormously,” the report states.
From the 2017 though the 2019 legislative sessions, 119 bills were filed that contain some form of preemption, although only 11 of them became law.
The number increased each year, with 36 bills filed in 2017, 38 in 2018 and 45 in 2019. One month before the bill filing deadline for the 2020 legislative session, which began in mid-January, 16 bills had been filed, running the gamut of issues.
It is clear “there is a concerted and strategic effort in the Florida Legislature to strip local government of its power to act on a wide variety of issues,” the report states.
One of those is the regulation of vacation rentals that for years have drawn complaints from neighbors about out-of-control parties, loud noise and traffic.
The Legislature has been hostile to allowing local governments to set rules for them. In 2011, lawmakers prohibited cities from regulating short-term vacation rentals. In 2014, the Legislature relented a bit, allowing local governments a small amount of control.
Since then, more bills have been introduced to take away local government authority. While those bills stalled, new ones have been filed this year that would prevent local governments from enacting any regulations.
Garnering much attention last year, the Legislature banned local governments from regulating vegetable gardens on residential property.
Even if this year’s effort by local governments to regulate single-use plastic bags and Styrofoam does not succeed, the issue is not likely to go away.
Coastal cities and towns are keenly aware of the harm caused by plastics that break up but do not biodegrade in landfills, rivers and the ocean.
Sea birds, fish, turtles and other marine life ingest it and die. Or they get tangled up in the plastics, leaving them unable to eat or swim.
A report from the World Economic Forum and the Ellen MacArthur Foundation said that by 2050 the oceans will contain more plastic trash than fish by weight if nothing is done.
The Gumbo Limbo Nature Center in Boca Raton drew national attention in October when it posted a photo on Facebook that went viral of a baby turtle that died after washing ashore. A necropsy found that the hatchling had ingested 104 small pieces of plastic.
From the standpoint of local governments, the one bright spot in the battle over local control came last year when Gov. Ron DeSantis vetoed a bill that would have blocked them from banning single-use plastic straws.
Delray Beach is among the cities that have since enacted plastic straw bans. The ban, effective Jan. 1, imposes a $100 fine for the first offense. Hospitals, nursing homes, schools and private use are exempt.
“In fact, the Florida Department of Environmental Regulation has encouraged Florida residents, schools and businesses to reduce plastic straw use,” DeSantis wrote. “Under these circumstances, the state should simply allow local communities to address the issue through the political process. Citizens who oppose plastic straw ordinances can seek recourse by electing people who share their views.”

Jane Smith and Steve Plunkett contributed to this story.

By Dan Moffett

A month into the new year and a new decade, Briny Breezes has a new administrative staff in place at Town Hall.
Council members approved resolutions appointing William Thrasher as town manager and Sandi DuBose as deputy clerk during the Jan. 23 town meeting.
Thrasher is no stranger to Brinyites, having worked for 21 years as manager of neighboring Gulf Stream. He retired three years ago, but was lured back by Briny’s part-time position that will enable him to split time between homes in Boynton Beach and Andrews, North Carolina.
“It’s very feasible in this day and age with electronics to work remotely,” Thrasher said of his plan to work from North Carolina during the summer months when the town’s business slows. “I feel I can accomplish the task.”
Thrasher told the council during a December interview that “management concepts seem to be universal” and what made him successful for two decades in Gulf Stream is likely to be effective in Briny.
“I’ll keep my eye out for projects but I believe there’ll be a time period where I’ll have to learn this community better,” he said of his short-term approach. “I’ve got to get to know the residents and how they might think and analyze things.”
A little over a year after leaving Gulf Stream, Thrasher served a three-month stint as Highland Beach’s interim town manager while commissioners searched for a permanent replacement to Valerie Oakes. Before coming to Gulf Stream, Thrasher worked as financial director of Pahokee, and his experience with budgets is another reason council members approved his hiring. His annual salary is $37,500.
DuBose, a Delray Beach resident, takes over as Briny’s part-time clerk after working four years as clerk for the city of West Palm Beach golf advisory committee. She also spent nine years as an administrative assistant for the city of Lake Worth.
A native of Austin, Texas, DuBose was the council’s choice from dozens of applicants who applied through indeed.com. The clerk job pays $22 an hour.
The two Briny positions came open last fall when Manager Dale Sugerman and Clerk Maya Coffield announced they were resigning, citing a growing workload and inadequate pay.
In other business, the council voted unanimously to hire consultant Erin Deady to help the town win approval of its comprehensive plan amendments from the state.
Town Attorney Keith Davis said state officials want changes to the plan that reflect Briny’s vulnerability to flooding and assess the potential consequences of rising seas. Davis said failure to comply would put the town at risk of losing grant money that could go toward flood mitigation.
Davis recommended Deady, a certified planner and attorney with an environmental law practice in Delray Beach, to “shepherd the plan through” the state requirements. The council approved paying Deady up to $6,000 for the work.