By Mary Hladky

Attorneys are still aiming for suspended Boca Raton Mayor Susan Haynie to go to trial in October or November on public corruption charges, but no date was set at a July 15 court hearing.
The next hearing on the status of the case will be on Sept. 10.
After the brief hearing, Bruce Zimet, Haynie’s criminal defense attorney, said she is ready for trial.
“She is engaged and anxious to be vindicated,” he said.
Zimet declined to comment on discovery recently filed by Assistant State Attorney Brian Fernandes, including city documents that show Haynie voted on a matter involving James Batmasian that was not cited in the charges filed against her last year.
Haynie, 63, a fixture in Boca Raton politics for 18 years, did not appear at the hearing. She has pleaded not guilty to the charges.
Haynie was arrested on April 24, 2018, on charges of official misconduct, perjury, misuse of public office and failure to disclose voting conflicts. She faces more than 20 years in prison.
Then-Gov. Rick Scott suspended her from office, but she has not resigned. Scott Singer was elected mayor on Aug. 28 for the remainder of Haynie’s term.
Prosecutors contend in charging documents that Haynie used her position on the City Council to vote on four matters that financially benefited Batmasian, the city’s largest downtown commercial landowner, and failed to disclose income she had received from him.
The investigation by the Palm Beach County State Attorney’s Office found that Haynie failed to report $335,000 in income on financial disclosure forms required by the state, including $84,000 from Batmasian or his company Investments Limited, from 2014 through 2017.
New discovery filed by the state in June shows a fifth instance in which Haynie cast a vote on a Batmasian request.
Batmasian wanted to build eight townhouses on 1.1 acres at 101 Pine Circle, a couple blocks west of City Hall. He sought city permission to rezone the property to allow 9.5 units per acre rather than the existing zoning of five units per acre and to abandon a 10-foot public utility easement, according to city documents.
The Planning and Zoning Board unanimously recommended approval on Aug. 20, 2015, and the City Council unanimously granted approval two months later on Oct. 27. After several neighbors expressed concerns about traffic safety on the street, Haynie proposed adding a condition aimed at improving safety, which other council members supported.

Batmasian bought the property for $737,000 in 2012, and sold it for $1.5 million in 2016, county property records show. The town homes were never built.
Before Haynie’s arrest, the county Commission on Ethics, which also investigated her for voting on matters that financially benefited Batmasian, reached a settlement with her in which they reprimanded and fined Haynie for failing to disclose a conflict of interest but dismissed a second allegation that she misused her public office.
The state Commission on Ethics in October found probable cause that Haynie violated Florida ethics laws in eight instances, but that case is pending resolution of the criminal case.
The state commission, which also probed Haynie’s financial links to Batmasian and Investments Limited, found that she failed to disclose income, acted to financially benefit herself and her husband, and improperly voted on matters that benefited Batmasian and his wife, Marta, without disclosing a conflict of interest.
The evidence gathered against Haynie by the three agencies is similar. One key difference is that while state prosecutors originally determined Haynie voted on four matters that financially benefited Batmasian from 2014 through 2017, state ethics investigators found 17 votes between 2012 and 2016.

By Dan Moffett

The Palm Beach County Zoning Commission unanimously approved a variance request for the developer of the Gulf Stream Views townhouse project on July 3, allowing the construction of 14 small swimming pools on the property.
The approval came over the objections of two dozen residents of Briny Breezes and the County Pocket who attended the hearing — and also the objections of the commission’s own staff.
County planners and plan reviewers had recommended that the request from New Jersey-based NR Living be denied, asserting that the developer failed to satisfy several criteria necessary for allowing the exception.
Rachel Streitfeld, a Miami-Dade County lawyer who represents the residents, said they are considering appealing the decision.
“We may want to take it to the County Commission,” Streitfeld said. “We have other options we want to think about as well.”
The zoning board’s ruling allows the installation of 7-foot-by-14-foot plunge pools behind each of the development’s 14 units, seven along Briny Breezes Boulevard and seven along Seaview Avenue. County code calls for a 28-foot setback between swimming pools and the street, but the zoning commissioners approved a variance that allows a setback of about 17 feet. Developers say they need the swimming pools to attract buyers for the units.
County planners had opposed the exception, saying essentially that the pools were an amenity, not a necessary part of the plan, and not having them wouldn’t create a hardship for NR Living.
Commission Chairman Sheri Scarborough and Commissioner Robert Currie disagreed, arguing that because the county months ago required a central roadway into the project, the developer was left with nowhere else to put the pools. Denying them now would
present a hardship for the developer, the commissioners said.
“There is no need or hardship requirement met for adding 14 pools,” Kristine de Haseth, executive director of the Florida Coalition for Preservation, told the commission. “There’s no reason for adding this to the project this late in the game.”
Residents complained about flooding problems since late last year when dozens of trucks of fill were hauled into the 2-acre site to raise the grade to 16 feet. But commissioners dismissed those complaints, saying the issue before them was the swimming pools — not drainage problems or runoff from the site.
“This is not a hardship for developers. The hardship that is happening is to neighboring residents who now are experiencing flooding,” said Liz Loper, who lives on Winthrop Lane in the Pocket. “Now I have to place sandbags at my front door when it rains.”

Said Streitfeld: “With the fill, they’ve created a fortress. And these folks are about to become the moat.”

Influx may be ‘new normal,’ force beachgoers to adapt

Clayton Peart of Universal Beach Services rakes sargassum into the sand on Delray Beach’s beach. The sargassum, which began to arrive in February, helps preserve the beach and protect and nourish sea turtles. Jerry Lower/The Coastal Star

By Cheryl Blackerby

Scientists say sargassum, a golden-brown seaweed, is overwhelmingly a beneficial and essential part of the environment.
But what had been a small scattering of seaweed in summer months years ago is now piles of seaweed arriving on beaches starting in winter. When the sargassum rolled onto Florida beaches in early February, some snowbirds were irate.
The seaweed is ugly, it smells, it brings plastic and other trash tangled in the mats, say beach residents, and it mars the white beaches that are Florida’s tourism bread and butter. Others are worried that the seaweed is disturbing turtle nests. So far it hasn’t.
To make matters worse, a new species of sargassum is piling up on South Florida’s beaches, and that isn’t good news for beachgoers.
Scientists have confirmed there are now three species of sargassum coming from two places, not just the traditional species originating in the Sargasso Sea — which means there’s a lot more of it.
Two species ride the currents from the Sargasso Sea in the North Atlantic to Florida, but the third species comes from the equatorial Atlantic. This sargassum, which has thicker mats and broader leaves, first arrived in 2011, the result of an enormous, unprecedented seaweed bloom that now stretches from Brazil to Africa and up to the Caribbean and Florida.
“This seems to be somewhat of a new normal, and we don’t know how long it might go on. But the world is changing,” said Dr. Amy Siuda, assistant professor of marine science at Galbraith Marine Science Laboratory, Eckerd College in St. Petersburg. “It likely has to do with climate change, and we have to adapt as humans to these changes. Unfortunately, that might mean our beaches don’t look the way they used to. We need to figure out how we can use the beaches in a new form.”
From the Dune Deck Cafe in Lantana in late June, diners watched 6-foot-wide floating mats of seaweed coming in like an invading army from as far as the eye could see. Swimmers navigated around them, and snorkelers tried not to get underneath the thick tangles.
Some want the seaweed hauled off ASAP. Others appreciate the fact that it helps keep expensive sand on the beach and will collect even more sand.

Cleanup can be exhausting
Clayton Peart hears it all. His family has owned Universal Beach Services in Delray Beach since the 1970s. He picks up the sargassum and painstakingly separates the trash from the seaweed, and then takes the plastic and other trash to recycling. But the seaweed can pile up again hours later and certainly by the next day.
Beachgoers often give him a thumbs down as he works, not realizing he has permits from the Florida Department of Environmental Protection and Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, which are looking over his shoulder. He is also working with groups that monitor sea turtles. They text him shortly after dawn when they survey the beaches, mark the turtle nests and give him the OK to start work.
“It’s almost like you have to be there around the clock. It’s exhausting,” says Peart. He buries the seaweed in the tideline and fills in low spots where escarpments have been formed by beach erosion.
He encounters all kinds of trash that comes in with the tide. He has picked up thousands of bottle caps, cigarette butts, plastic in every form, shotgun shells, flares, broken up sailboats, car tires and a rusty all-terrain vehicle.
“A couple of days ago, a wedding party left fake flower petals and candles all over the beach,” he says. The party was on Delray Beach.
Lately, as he cleans behind condos and hotels from Boca Raton to Palm Beach and other South Florida beaches, he has seen beachgoers picking up trash with him, and he is getting an occasional thumbs up. He asks that the beach cleaners leave it in piles so it’s easier for him to pick up.
“People say I’m causing erosion, but it’s the opposite. I am being a caretaker,” he says.

Universal Services driver Alcides Rodrigues shows a day’s load of trash that he picked up at Delray Beach. On days with lots of trash, a temporary worker helps out. Photo provided

Cleanup is expensive, and with more and more sargassum arriving every year it is requiring herculean manpower to keep up with it. The City of Delray Beach pays $79,000 per year for beach cleanup, according to a city agreement.
Most agree the seaweed should be buried or removed if it is rotting and emitting noxious fumes. Scientists are working on ways to use it as biofuel, fertilizer, mulch and food.
The other option is to do nothing or just enough to protect turtles and try to educate people about Mother Nature. When it concerns beach-loving tourists, most beachside towns would say that’s not an option.
One place that sargassum is left alone is Bahia Honda State Park in the Florida Keys. On Valentine’s Day, the sargassum was 6 inches thick on the Atlantic beaches, but visitors, including French and Italian tourists, didn’t seem bothered by it. They spread beach mats on new golden seaweed, walked the sandy tideline, and photographed seabirds feeding in the seaweed on the beach.

Essential to sea turtles
But these tourists are largely different from those on hotel and condo beaches in Palm Beach County. Those in the state park are there to see nature, which on this visit included sargassum. Rangers tell them the benefits, including that it’s a lifeline for sea turtle hatchlings that travel the ocean on sargassum the first two years of their lives.
“We’ve been pleasantly surprised at people’s reactions after we explain that it’s a natural phenomenon,” says Donald Bergeron, Bahia Honda State Park manager. “We monitor the loggerhead and green turtle nests and haven’t seen any problems with sargassum covering the nests or hatchlings having trouble going over the seaweed. We have cycles of seaweed — it comes in and goes out. Nature takes care of it.”
The turtles in Palm Beach County are also faring well in spite of the sargassum.
“It’s been a great nesting year so far. We’ve had some of the highest numbers since the 1990s, loggerheads in particular,” says David Anderson, sea turtle conservation coordinator at Gumbo Limbo Nature Center in Boca Raton. As of June 29, “we have 605 loggerhead nests and 145 green turtle nests. And we are just getting started with green turtles.”
Sargassum potentially can cover nests or impede hatchlings on their path to the ocean, but there have been no problems so far, he says. “The turtles are big animals, with mothers weighing 300 pounds or so. It doesn’t bother them at all. They will plow right through in order to get on the beach.”
Turtle monitors are out every day at sunrise to check for mother and hatchling turtles’ tracks on a 5-mile stretch of beach between the Highland Beach border and the border with Deerfield Beach. Nests are checked during the two-month incubation period, and sargassum is brushed off during the last month if it covers a nest. “Then we text beach rakers and give them the go-ahead. The beach rakers are all well-trained to steer clear of nests,” he says.
Anderson and Dr. Siuda want people to keep in mind that sargassum is essential for sea turtles’ survival in the ocean. Siuda compares sargassum to a coral reef.
“Coral reefs are this unique community in the ocean and so is sargassum. It hosts nursery turtles. It serves as a feeding habitat. You’ll find mahi-mahi and tuna around it feeding on the smaller fish, which are feeding on the organisms that live within the sargassum. They’re feeding in the open ocean where food is sparse,” she said.

Thriving in changing seas
Siuda and colleagues discovered the new type of sargassum by finding that the community of organisms living on it was from the equatorial Atlantic. “It has a genetically different population of organisms,” Siuda said.
They also found that this particular seaweed does not exist in the Sargasso Sea. “It doesn’t seem to be able to survive. It may be too cold,” she said.
This new sargassum appearing on Florida beaches has been in the equatorial Atlantic at least since the 1930s, although research shows it was rare, she said.
“And then something changed to allow it to bloom in such abundance. Whether that is increased nutrients from the Amazon or increased upwelling at the equator bringing nutrients to the surface, we don’t know yet,” Siuda said.
Meanwhile, beachgoers may need to look at sargassum as far more friend than foe.
“If people understand the importance of sargassum in the ocean environment, then they might be a little more understanding of it, and a little more protective of it coming up onto the beaches,” she said.

Don Edge at his Hypoluxo Island home, which he designed and built 60 years ago. Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star

By Ron Hayes

On a cold January afternoon in 1952, a young man named Donald Edge stepped off a curb in downtown Detroit and landed in West Palm Beach.
“I was leaving home in the dark and getting home in the dark,” he remembers, “so when I stepped into that pile of slush, I said, ‘That’s it, I’m going to Florida.’”
Edge arrived in town that year with a degree in architecture from the University of Michigan, a few months’ experience as a draftsman for a boss he didn’t love, a new brown Chevy with a mortgage on it, and $100 in his pocket.
He was 24 then. He is 92 now.
In the 68 years between, Don Edge helped create Manalapan’s swanky La Coquille Club, where the Eau Palm Beach Resort & Spa stands today.
He founded his own architecture firm.
He designed a dozen Seventh-day Adventist hospitals in eight states.
In 1969, he designed the controversial wraparound building that both concealed and enlarged the county’s historic 1916 courthouse, then saw his work demolished 35 years later when the original building was uncovered and restored.
Today, he lives in the waterfront home he built on Hypoluxo Island 60 years ago, with a cat named Oreo and a memory lively enough to recount all this.

•••

Summer 1952.
“I was working for Byron Simonson, an architect who had a divided, one-room office in Phipps Plaza in Palm Beach,” he begins. “There were about 12 architects in the area then, and his was the only office with air conditioning.”
Simonson’s draftsman had left to fight in the Korean War, and his secretary remembered Edge’s application.
That summer, the architect had been hired by a man named Spelman Prentice, a grandson of John D. Rockefeller, to design a small resort hotel on the dunes in Manalapan. Simonson did the rendering, and then Edge drafted the detailed drawings from which the contractor would work. The drawings took six months. He was paid $85 a week.
“I was there in the office when Mrs. Prentice named it,” he says.
Simonson, Prentice and his wife, Lola, had just returned from a drive along A1A.
“They were standing by my drawing board, and Mrs. Prentice, who spoke French, mentioned that Spanish names were so common, French would make a name stand out,” Edge remembers. “She pronounced it ‘lah ko-KEE’ and said it meant ‘the seashell.’ That was it, we were named.”
The Prentices were used to getting what they wanted. When they realized the 18-foot dunes were so high guests wouldn’t be able to see the ocean from the roadside rooms, they wanted the dunes bulldozed.
That didn’t happen, but when the Prentices found they wouldn’t be granted a liquor license with only 20 rooms, they ordered more rooms. Still not enough, so they added a restaurant, with a bar on the second floor, high enough so drinkers could see over the dunes.
“The Prentices were difficult clients,” Edge says. “They wanted a lot of changes, mostly expansions, but they realized they’d have to pay for it. They wanted an elite place.”
And they got it. The hotel soon became a private club, and in its heyday, La Coquille welcomed the Duke and Duchess of Windsor and Vanderbilts, Fords and Whitneys to its English china, Irish crystal and French linens.
Ethel Merman sang a duet with Henry Ford Jr. there, Ginger Rogers graced the dance floor, and Esther Williams swam in the pool.
Don Edge had an off-season summer membership.
“It was $100 for three months in those days, and I was trying hard to earn $10,000 a year,” he laughs. “I didn’t associate with the classy members. No, no. They knew I was a flunky. But I did get the first drink from the bar. The bartender was setting up for the opening night gala, and he asked me if wanted a drink.
“… a Manhattan, I think.”

•••

In 1954, Edge and Simonson went their separate ways. His previous draftsman was home from the war, and because both men were fellow Christian Scientists, Edge figured he’d be let go. He went to work for William Manly King, who had designed the Comeau Building in downtown West Palm Beach and Lake Worth High School.
In 1956, he married Alice Nan Divine, with whom he would have three children — Carol, Karl and Nan.
And on April 9, 1959, the Edges moved into the 3,000-square-foot waterfront home he’d built on Hypoluxo Island.
Edge designed the house, paid a contractor to put up the walls and supports, and did the rest himself.
“There were probably 10 houses on the north end of the island, and 10 to 20 on this end back then,” he recalls. “No houses on either side of me, and one between me and the street. It was remote. Most of our friends said, ‘You’re going where? Way down there?’
“Can you imagine raising three kids on this island? They had jungles to play in!”
He’d bought the 6,000-square-foot lot two years earlier for $6,000.
“That was a whole year’s pay!”
Today, the lot alone is appraised at $600,000, he says, and $1.2 million if you add the house. Which is not for sale.
“What the hell would I do in a condominium?” he exclaims with a derisive chortle. “I’d go nuts.”
The next year, he opened his own firm, Donald R. Edge, Architect, in Phipps Plaza, where he’d worked eight years before.

•••

Edge is an affable man.
“It’s Don,” he will tell you, not Donald. Reminiscing, he’s friendly, chatty, candid and cheerful, until the saga of the old 1916 neoclassical county courthouse in West Palm Beach comes up. Then you can’t mistake a slight note of disgruntlement creeping into his voice.
“It was quite controversial at the time,” he concedes.

ABOVE: Don Edge was the draftsman for the original La Coquille Club. This is a 1960s postcard of the club. The club was later replaced by what is now the Eau Palm Beach Resort & Spa. The property in the background is now Plaza del Mar. BELOW: Edge also designed the plans for this wrap around the old Palm Beach County Courthouse. Photos provided by the Historical Society of Palm Beach County

The original courthouse, built for $135,000 when Palm Beach County had 18,000 residents, was soon outgrown.
In 1927, an addition doubled its size, but by 1967, the courthouse was again too small.
Rather than tear it down, the county hired Edge’s firm to design a new building around the old building. Finished in 1972, the modern, “wraparound” courthouse was described by some as a 232,150-square-foot box.
Less generous critics compared it to a bus station,
By 1995, when the current courthouse, even newer and even bigger, opened across the street, Don Edge’s 1969 wraparound was destined to fall so the original building could be restored and become home to the Historical Society of Palm Beach County.
In 2004, Hedrick Brothers Construction undid what Edge had done.
“It was a lovely building, but it had no windows,” he says. “But when you took the cost, $5.5 million, and divided it by the total square feet we added, which was 180,000, it was about $30 a square foot. That’s a huge bargain.”
Bitter would be too strong a word, but thinking about it, he’s clearly saddened.
“When they took it down, it hurt,” he says. “I avoided it like the plague. And I still don’t think that old county courthouse is a gem.
“I guess I’d consider myself a modernist.”

•••

The old, original La Coquille clubhouse is long gone now.
Byron Simonson died in 1972, the same year Spelman Prentice sold the property. After passing through several owners, it closed for good in 1983 and was torn down in 1986 to make way for the Ritz-Carlton Palm Beach, now the Eau Palm Beach Resort.
La Coquille Club is still there in spirit today, a dining room with membership limited to Manalapan residents. Edge hasn’t visited in years.
Spelman Prentice died in 2000 and Donald R. Edge, Architect, closed in 2001.
Edge did some more independent work, then retired for good on Jan. 25, 2007, his 80th birthday.
Alice, his wife of 53 years, died in 2009. A portrait of her as a teenager sits on a table in the living room, a lovely young woman with a 1940s hairdo and a timeless beauty.
“She was fantastically good for me,” he says. “She was outgoing while I was kind of inward-bound.”
But he’s still here, still in the house they shared all those years, now with Oreo the cat, a back that gives him some trouble these days, and a woodworking shop where he carves driftwood and refinishes furniture.
“I got nothing to do,” he jokes, “and I can’t get it done.”
The secret of a long life, he believes, is a good wife and a lack of stress. And a lack of stress comes from having a good wife.
“I never smoked, but I do have a glass of red wine every night,” he says. “I pay $10 for a big bottle at Publix.
“Alice and I used to have a glass of red wine together every Friday night when I got home from work, and then when the kids were grown, we’d have one every night, and I still do.
“I still have a glass of wine with her every night.”

Harry Valentine of coastal Boca Raton says people at the Arts Garage are like family to him. Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star

By Stephen Moore

Harry Valentine’s love affair with the Arts Garage began a year and a half ago when he was wandering around downtown Delray Beach and heard music coming from the venue.
“It was the music that first attracted me to the place,” he said. He stood outside for a while taking in the tunes and thought about going inside. One of the employees had seen him there and called House Manager Suzanne Haley, suggesting she might have another volunteer out front.
“I just went inside to check it out,” Valentine said. “The manager came out and invited me in to listen to the music.”
He started volunteering that night.
But there is more to this relationship. Valentine, who lives in coastal Boca Raton, credits the people at the Arts Garage for helping him deal with a debilitating condition and giving him a “second family” that supports him.
He has multiple chemical sensitivity, a disorder that leaves the body susceptible to scents, smells and aromas that could send someone with the condition to the hospital or leave him bedridden.
The symptoms people report include headache, fatigue, dizziness, nausea, congestion, itching, sneezing, sore throat, chest pain, changes in heart rhythm, breathing problems, gas, confusion, trouble concentrating, memory problems and mood changes. Possible triggers that set off symptoms include tobacco smoke, auto exhaust, perfume, insecticide, new carpet and chlorine.
There are no universally accepted treatments for multiple chemical sensitivity.
Valentine receives acupuncture treatments and physical therapy, has sessions with a chiropractor and occasionally has to breathe with an oxygen tank. Sometimes, he uses a walker.
Valentine and his wife of 12 years are divorcing. They had been together for 14 years. She was his primary caregiver. 
“It’s now the people who attract me to this place,” said Valentine, 73. “They keep it fresh. There is just a lot of good energy and I guess because I have been so isolated, folks here sort of become a second family to me.”
Marjorie Waldo, president and CEO of the Arts Garage, says Valentine is amazing. “I had no idea he was ill,” she said. “I saw him working as hard or harder than any volunteer. He’s here to the last minute.”
When Waldo decided to do a promotional video featuring the people who work behind the scenes, Valentine was asked to be part of it.
“We wanted to highlight what is behind the curtain,” Waldo said, “some of the heart of the Arts Garage. So we made a list of people who could tell the story of the other side of the Arts Garage, and that is when I found out about his illness and I was blown away. He told me we were one of the reasons he was not in assisted living. He was energized by what we do and finds so much joy here. It is so moving to me.”
Valentine doesn’t let his condition get in the way of hard work. He volunteers when he can and is considered one of the most reliable Arts Garage workers.
“Thank God for Harry,” said fellow worker Joyce Winston, who has volunteered at the Arts Garage for nine years. “He is a hard worker, helpful and very conscientious. I know about his illness, but he handles it well.”
With two master’s degrees, one from Harvard in public administration, Valentine was used to giving orders rather than taking them as chief of examinations for the state of Maryland. He retired in 1996 and moved to Boca Raton for health reasons.
“I welcome the opportunity to represent the Arts Garage. They have a really good air quality,” Valentine said.
His duties typically include getting to work early to deal with chairs, tablecloths, changing batteries, setting up the concessions, escorting patrons to their seats, helping people with disabilities with whatever they need and handing out programs.
“Things can change and I am hopeful about my situation,” he said. “But there are people much worse than I am.”
And things are changing for Valentine. Last month he went swimming in the ocean for the first time in five years.
“I’ve been trying to get up to swimming again,” he said. “I live right across the street from the beach. Usually I need someone to be around if I go swimming, so yesterday it was calm and I just dove right in. I didn’t go far, but I did dive in. There is a Spanish saying that applies to me. Poco a poco.”
In English it means little by little.

The Arts Garage, at 94 NE Second Ave. in Delray Beach, delivers innovative, diverse and accessible visual and performing arts experiences to the South Florida community. For more information about volunteering, call 450-6357 or visit www.artsgarage.org.

By Sallie James

Boca Raton Regional Hospital has finally officially merged with Baptist Health
South Florida.
The official merger was announced on July 1, more than a year after Boca Regional began
discussions with Baptist in hopes of elevating the hospital’s position as an academic referral
center in South Florida.
It was the final step in growing up for a beloved community hospital born out of tragedy in 1967.
The poisoning deaths of two young children became the impetus for its funding. The town had
about 10,000 residents at that time and a devoted group of volunteers with a mission.
The new partnership ensures both not-for-profit organizations will continue to meet their mutual
missions and commitments to elevate health care within the communities they serve in an area
that reaches across four South Florida counties.
“Our organizations share the same calling to improve the health and well-being of individuals
and deliver compassionate healthcare to our patients at the highest standards of excellence and
safety. We foresee an exciting future at Boca Regional Hospital that will cement its title as the
preeminent healthcare provider in the community,” said Brian E. Keeley, president and CEO at
Baptist Health.

By Jane Smith

Delray Beach commissioners agreed to add four firefighter/paramedics when approving a $1.95 million mid-year budget amendment on June 18.
The four firefighter/paramedics will cost $160,000, said Laura Thezine, acting finance director. The amount covers the entire cost of the firefighters for the rest of the budget year that ends Sept. 30, according to Kevin Saxton, Fire Rescue spokesman.
Adding the positions fulfills the previous commission’s promise to add 12 firefighter/paramedic jobs that had been cut from the budget during the recession.
During budget hearings last year, Commissioner Ryan Boylston insisted that the commission make good on the promise and fill the final four positions.
“Back in 2016 and 2017, the fire department was running constantly from one overdose to another,” Mayor Shelly Petrolia said after the June 18 commission meeting. In mid-2017, Delray Beach turned the corner and began responding to fewer fatal overdoses. The drop was attributed to local and county efforts.
The city’s new law regulating sober homes went into effect in July 2017. That’s when the city began requiring sober homes and other group homes to apply annually for a reasonable accommodation and limited the distance between two new group homes. The city also required the sober homes to become certified.
In addition, the Delray Beach Police Department hired a special populations advocate who works with drug abusers to help them find treatment locally or send them home.
At the same time, the Palm Beach County State Attorney’s Sober Homes Task Force began arresting rogue treatment center operators and moving to strengthen state laws.
That’s why at the start of the city’s financial year last October, Petrolia wanted to hold off on hiring the firefighter/paramedics and spend the money elsewhere. She suggested waiting until the mid-year budget amendment when the city often has a surplus.
The bulk of the money for the $1.95 million budget amendment would come from three sources: $795,000 in increased property tax revenues, $539,000 reimbursed from the county school district and $400,000 in investment interest income. No money would need to come from the city’s reserve funds.
The money reimbursed by the school district was for providing city police officers in the local schools. The reimbursable amount was budgeted to make sure expenses matched revenues, Thezine said.
In addition, about $900,000 was budgeted to fulfill the city’s obligation under its tennis tournament contract. The amount had not been previously budgeted, even though commissioners had asked the previous city manager to do it.
The budget amendment also covers $87,500 to help cover the cost for instructors who provide paid lessons to tennis center members, $72,421 in unanticipated retirement pay for firefighters, $111,612 for additional repairs and maintenance by Public Works, and $74,975 for new computers and equipment at the Emergency Operations Center.
Commissioners passed the budget amendment 4-0. Boylston was on vacation and could not be reached electronically to attend the meeting.
Delray Beach will set a tentative tax rate at its July 9 City Commission meeting. At the Aug. 13 workshop, commissioners will discuss the city’s budget.

In other news, Delray Beach reached an agreement on June 14 with India Adams, a former assistant city manager who was fired March 6. She will receive a gross sum of $9,459.52 to cover 50 percent of her unused sick leave and 100 percent of her unused vacation days.
In exchange, Adams agreed to not make disparaging comments about the city, its staff or elected leaders. She will not release any confidential information she has about the city and will alert the city if she receives a subpoena about her Delray Beach position.
In turn, the city will not contest any unemployment compensation claims that Adams may make. Ú

By Dan Moffett 

 After running its own police department for more than a half-century, the town of South Palm Beach has decided to join forces with the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office.
 The Town Council voted 4-1 on June 18 to approve a draft contract for services with the sheriff that would begin on Oct. 1 and run for 10 years. Councilwoman Stella Gaddy Jordan voted against the merger agreement, saying she wanted to see the final version of the contract before considering approval.
 “I just hope everybody is happy with us moving forward in this town,” said Mayor Bonnie Fischer. “It was a big step but I think it’s going to be good.”
 Interim Town Manager Robert Kellogg told the council the deal could save the town as much as $1 million over the first five years of the contract. The terms call for the town paying the Sheriff’s Office $1.05 million for the first year, with 2 percent increases the following two years. The agreement sets a 5 percent limit on increases for the last seven years.
 Council members credited Kellogg and Town Attorney Glen Torcivia, who oversaw Lake Worth Beach’s switch to the Sheriff’s Office a decade ago, with negotiating the 10-year commitment, an unusually long term for interlocal law enforcement agreements.
 For Sheriff Ric Bradshaw, taking over South Palm Beach is a significant inroad into the county’s barrier islands. The sheriff has service contracts with 10 other municipalities, and one in the works with the newly formed Westlake community, but currently has only a limited presence along the coast.
 The preliminary deal, which requires final approval from the council likely at the July 23 town meeting, would cut South Palm Beach’s department from eight uniformed officers to seven deputies. Police Chief Mark Garrison would stay on as a sheriff’s sergeant with administrative duties, and six of the town’s officers would be considered for the remaining positions in the restructured force.
 “You’ll see the same people here,” sheriff’s Col. Tony Araujo said during a 90-minute presentation to the council. “They’ll just be wearing green uniforms instead of blue. The town doesn’t lose its identity.”

Capt. David Moss of the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office introduces representatives of the agency at a June 18 workshop meeting in South Palm Beach. Mary Kate Leming/The Coastal Star

 The draft contract does not specify which officers would be retained in the town and which might be reassigned, however. Officers would have to satisfy PBSO standards to make the transition and remain in uniform.
 Compensation for the town’s officers became an issue earlier this year with the release of an analysis of starting police salaries that showed South Palm ranked last among 23 agencies surveyed in the county. Starting pay with the sheriff is about $54,200 a year, compared with the town’s current $43,500. Officers also cited the opportunity for advancement in an agency with some 4,300 full-time employees as well as better benefits as reasons for switching.
  “Every officer here is in favor of this,” said Councilman Mark Weissman. “It would be fiscally irresponsible for the town not to do this.”
The difference in pay scales makes it easy to understand why South Palm Beach officers wanted to become deputies. Kellogg said the preliminary agreement calls for the sheriff to accept a year-for-year transfer of officers’ experience. An officer with 15 years’ experience in the town, for example, could be credited with 15 years’ experience with the sheriff.
For 18-year veteran Garrison, the move from chief to sheriff’s sergeant could mean a pay increase of some $30,000 to perhaps $115,000 per year. Experienced deputies earn $90,000 or more, meaning several of the town’s officers could receive raises of $20,000 or more.
 Weissman, who joined the council in March, championed the sheriff’s deal. Two decades ago when he was a city commissioner in Parkland, he persuaded the community to merge its department with the Broward County sheriff’s.
 Councilman Bill LeRoy also was an outspoken supporter of the move.
 “You don’t take care of your people, you’re going to lose them,” LeRoy said, “They came to us and this is what they want.”
 Weissman and LeRoy also made the case that merging with the sheriff would limit the town’s liability issues. The size of the agency and its budget safeguard South Palm from possible legal issues if something goes wrong.
 “This is a no-brainer,” LeRoy said. “It’s definitely the way to go.”

Who says it doesn’t snow in June? At South Palm Beach’s June 18 workshop meeting, I watched a town get snowed under so deep that resident “snowbirds” will see Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office cars and uniforms patrolling their 5/8ths of a mile stretch of A1A when they return next winter — and for the next 10 years.
The “this isn’t a sales pitch” sales pitch from PBSO created a paralyzing white-out for both residents and the Town Council. How could anyone shovel against the desires of their beloved police officers, the dazzling benefits of PBSO and potential budget savings? The drifts were so high that no one asked hard questions, and by the end of the evening even anti-big-government residents were embracing big government.
It’s possible council members asked difficult questions while touring PBSO’s state-of-the-art communications center earlier in the month. But, at the June workshop no one questioned the impassioned pleas of South Palm Beach officers for the better pay and benefits package it seems only PBSO can offer. No one asked the officers why they hadn’t already interviewed and been hired by PBSO if these were their dream jobs.
With so many officers added for school district security since the Parkland murders, there’s no shortage of law enforcement jobs in the area — but these are competitive.
The promise of “the same officers just in different uniforms” may fall apart once all officers are required to meet PBSO hiring standards for road patrol positions. Time will tell.
At the workshop, the blizzard conditions increased with the razzle-dazzle of all the amazing resources the PBSO has to offer.
Has no one paid attention to their county tax bill? Forty-seven percent of the county’s general fund budget goes to the sheriff’s office. It’s a number that seems to increase each year as the PBSO absorbs more police departments.
Taxpayers in South Palm Beach are already paying for homicide investigators, marine patrols and helicopters. The PBSO has always responded when needed in South Palm Beach. The investigation into the fatal car accident on A1A in January is in the hands of PBSO’s traffic homicide division. If you haven’t seen a marine patrol boat lately it’s likely because PBSO moved its marine patrol headquarters out of the Boynton Inlet several years ago. But if a boat filled with drugs or refugees washes up, trust me, marine patrol will arrive and there will be helicopters.
PBSO deputies are some of the very best and I have no doubt that every officer working in South Palm Beach will continue to protect and serve. But when the majority of a town’s personnel are assigned to an outside agency, it’s hard to imagine there won’t be an erosion of home rule. If a town’s law enforcement team no longer needs to ask management and elected officials for resources each budget season and no longer needs to stay in their good graces to remain employed, you’ve simply traded home rule for a big contract with an outside agency — one with its own rules, procedures and hiring and firing protocols. The days of council members having their favorite sources within the Police Department will end when it’s the sheriff who is providing their salaries, equipment and benefits.
Each of our coastal municipalities is facing budget concerns about liability insurance costs, pension plan expenditures and ongoing maintenance of equipment. But with home sales back at pre-bust highs, and new construction and tax revenues on the rise, let’s hope these other cities and towns are able to push back against any unexpected snowstorms for a very long time.

— Mary Kate Leming, Editor

By Dan Moffett

The full cost of Manalapan’s plan to dramatically expand its Police Department is reflected in a proposed total budget for 2019-20 that has grown about 37 percent over the last two years.
During a workshop on June 26, Town Manager Linda Stumpf told commissioners the proposed budget of $5.5 million is up $319,797 over last year, with most of the increase ($214,243) because of an upgrade to the police pension plan.
After a series of car thefts late in 2017, the Town Commission approved an ambitious plan to create four new police positions, add private security guards, certify a marine unit and improve the department’s technology.
Today Manalapan has 15 sworn officers, two of them part-time, and deploys three patrol cars on the streets at all times. The town has a new license plate recognition camera system, new dispatch center and private security guards assigned to the Point Manalapan gatehouse.
The town’s budget for police salaries has grown 80 percent over the last five years — from about $521,000 in 2015 to a proposed $941,000 — driven in part by increasingly competitive officer recruitment in South Florida.
The total proposed cost of policing the town is $2.58 million, up from $1.4 million five years ago.
Stumpf told the commission that maintaining last year’s tax rate would create a $263,350 budget shortfall, even with an expected 2 percent rise in assessed property values. But with the town having $2.5 million in uncommitted reserves, one of the highest per capita tax bases in Florida and one of the county’s lowest tax rates, covering that deficit isn’t a problem.
“I’d like for us not to raise the millage rate,” said Mayor Keith Waters.
Commissioners agreed, and gave tentative approval to last year’s millage rate of $3.03 per $1,000 of taxable property value, slightly above the rollback rate of $3.02 that would hold year-over-year revenues flat.
Stumpf is recommending a 4 percent raise for police officers and town employees. Manalapan will pay Miami-based SPERE Security $213,000 to station guards at the Point’s gatehouse in the next year.
Another increase in the proposed budget comes from Palm Beach County Fire Rescue. The cost of service for the town is up about $66,000 to $1.25 million.
In other business:
• During the regular monthly meeting on June 25, commissioners gave final approval to a zoning ordinance that changes the building rules for seven lots at the town’s southernmost entrance.
The ordinance essentially flips the current housing pattern and allows primary residences to be built on the ocean side of State Road A1A. Palm Beach developer Jeff Greene owns three of the lots and wants to build houses on the east side of the road.
• The commission is also moving forward with zoning changes for the Plaza del Mar commercial district. The commission’s consensus is to prohibit convenience stores, vape shops, tobacco shops and drive-thrus. The town would place restrictions on medical marijuana dispensaries but, because of state law, cannot prohibit them.
Waters said he hopes to have the changes in place by the end of the summer. “I don’t want to drag this out more than it needs to be,” he said.

As Palm Beach County public schools break for the summer, it’s important to remember that not every student looks forward to days away from school. In fact, one in four children doesn’t know where they will get their next meal.
Palm Beach County is the 10th-largest school district in the country, and more than 60 percent of our students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch.  For many, breakfast and lunch at school may be the only meals they eat. 
In 2018, Palm Beach County Food Bank served more than 3,600 children with our Food4OurKids program. Year-round, we fill nutritional gaps that children face during school vacations and weekends. As many of us schedule activities during the summer, please remember that hunger is a year-round problem. Your continued support of Palm Beach County Food Bank is greatly needed and always appreciated.
For more information, please visit www.pbcfoodbank.org.

Marti LaTour, Board Chair,
Palm Beach County Food Bank

In April, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis announced $26 million in additional federal funding for Florida’s State Opioid Response Project. The project aims to reduce opioid deaths, prevent opioid abuse among youth, and increase recovery services and access to treatment.
That last part needs to be a top priority of the project. Recovery services and access to quality care — specifically, equitable access to care — needs to become a hallmark of every comprehensive opioid response program, so that those who have overdosed don’t experience a revolving door from ambulance to emergency room and back to the street. America has the best substance abuse treatment in the world, but it is strongly correlated to socioeconomic status. Doctors, judges, lawyers, pilots, nurses and numerous other professionals all have access to resources that allow for treatment plus continuing follow-up care to prevent relapse. But when it comes to those with less money or fewer professional resources, our system defaults to bury people in prison, or directly in the ground.
If we want to see systemic change, we need our hospitals’ leadership to empower our medical professionals with “warm handoff” programs. We achieved this before in mental health, and we can do it again with substance use disorders. If a patient shows up with self-inflicted cuts, he or she will go from the ER to a follow-up system that includes 72 hours of safe, supportive services, a lethality assessment with medical professionals, and referral to appropriate care.
The American Medical Association has classified substance use disorder as a disease for over half a century. And yet somehow, even with tens of thousands of cases over the last decade of overdose victims being expeditiously discharged from emergency rooms, only to often turn up dead a short while later, we still don’t classify medically dying and being resurrected with lifesaving medication, like naloxone, as “self-harm.” Until we classify killing oneself via overdose — even with reversal — as self-harm, we’re going to see our death toll, already at more than 70,000 Americans per year, continue to rise.
Probably the single most important step toward saving lives on the front lines is seeding hospital systems’ boards of directors and trustees with individuals who have a comprehensive knowledge of substance use disorders and mental health concerns. Boards with this knowledge can advocate for systemic protocols that allow for effective warm handoff to treatment.
The EMS first responders know the current system is broken. So do the doctors, nurses and the families who end up burying those same patients. Hospital systems are a critical stakeholder in addressing the leading cause of death for Americans under age 55. It’s unconscionable that we haven’t addressed this glaring systemic deficiency in a meaningful way by 2019.
Andrew Burki,
Chief Public Policy Officer,
Hanley Foundation

A prefabricated four-story wall is lifted into place at the site of the old community center, across from the restored high school (far left) and Schoolhouse Children’s Museum. Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star

By Jane Smith

After 20 years of talking and planning, another three hours of delays seemed appropriate as residents waited to watch the first City Center wall go up in the Town Square project that officials hope will create a downtown for Boynton Beach.
“It’s like waiting for Christmas,” said Allan Hendricks, a landscape architect who lives in Boynton Beach. He was waiting for the 330-ton crane to slog across the muddy field on a rainy mid-June morning.
Thuy Shutt, assistant director of the Boynton Beach Community Redevelopment Agency, amazed a small group with her knowledge of concrete and how prefabricated walls can make the building process go quickly. She’s an architect by training.
“Everyone in my office asked where I was going,” Shutt said as she rushed out the door for the wall-raising. She was dressed for the rainy weather in black rubber boots.
Boynton Beach’s elected leaders and city officials have talked about needing a city center, an official downtown, for about 20 years. Without a downtown plan and incentives, developers went to the Congress Avenue corridor for housing and retail opportunities.
The “Tilt Wall” event was promoted on social media and drew a small crowd of adults and children.
City and CRA staff attended, including the city manager, library director, public art manager, recreation and parks director and development director. The mayor and two city commissioners were there, along with a past mayor and his wife.
“What you’ll see today,” said Colin Groff, assistant city manager in charge of the Town Square project, “are four-story interior walls being raised. Then, the two-story exterior walls will be raised.”
They are put together like Tinkertoys, he said.
The crane was able to raise an 82-ton, four-story wall by using four long cables that were attached at eight lift points.
The City Center will house the Boynton Beach government offices and the city library in a four-story building with 110,000 square feet.
The building is part of the $250 million Town Square project, a public-private partnership between Boynton Beach and E2L Real Estate Solutions. The city’s estimated share is $118 million. The 16-acre area is bordered by Boynton Beach Boulevard on the north and Southeast Second Avenue on the south.
The City Center will be finished in May 2020, Groff said.
The renovation of the historic high school will be done in October. Its deadline was pushed back so that it won’t open before it can be used for arts and cultural classes and banquets. Right now, the area has limited parking until a six-story garage can be built just south of the City Center.

ABOVE: A chick pleads with an adult for food. BELOW: A few minutes later, its wish was granted. Photos by Jerry Lower/The Coastal Star

By Rich Pollack

The least tern, a migratory bird threatened with a loss of natural beach habitat, appears to be making a comeback in Boca Raton.
This year, for the first time in many seasons, wildlife biologists have spotted at least six tern chicks on Boca Raton’s beach and are optimistic about the future of the local least tern beach colony, one of only two in South Florida.
"This is a big deal because the least tern is a state threatened species," said Natasha Warraich, assistant regional biologist with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, who has been monitoring the colony. "It’s exciting that their eggs are actually hatching."
Two years ago, wildlife biologists spotted a nesting pair of least terns with eggs, but those eggs did not hatch. Warraich said that this year the colony has grown to about 20 pairs and that could mean additional chicks.
Survival of the chicks — which still face the threat of predation — could eventually lead to a strengthening of the colony, which appears to migrate to the same beach area in Boca Raton from its winter grounds in Central America.

By Dan Moffett

Years of neglected infrastructure maintenance have left Ocean Ridge with a hole in its budget that town commissioners will have to reach deep to fill.
“I’m the bearer of bad news,” acting Town Manager Tracey Stevens told the commission during a May budget workshop. “Your capital expenditures are going way up this year due to the infrastructure needs.”
The good news for Ocean Ridge is that it has a healthy reserve fund and a growing tax base to soften the blow. Property values in the town rose about 6 percent in the last year to an estimated $1 billion, according to the Palm Beach County Property Appraiser’s Office, driving up tax revenues.
Commissioners are hoping to hold the current tax rate of $5.35 per $1,000 of taxable property value despite the rising costs and major capital projects in the $8.1 million 2019-2020 budget.
Expenditures overall are up 14.66 percent and the town is facing a deficit of about $510,000, most of it going to cover the needed infrastructure repairs and upgrades for fire hydrants, water lines and storm drains.
“We have two choices,” says Mayor Steve Coz, “raise taxes or tap into reserves. Or we could do a combination of both.”
Ocean Ridge has about $4.8 million in unassigned reserves on hand, or roughly 67 percent of the annual general fund expenditures. Town auditors have told commissioners 45 percent is considered satisfactory, and even after tapping into the reserves, about 48 percent of annual expenditures will remain. So the reservoir of ready cash should be large enough to handle emergencies.
Recapturing the police contract with Briny Breezes could bring in an additional $180,000 in revenues. Ocean Ridge held the contract until losing it to Boynton Beach three years ago. Police Chief Hal Hutchins said he hopes to have a decision from Briny by Aug. 1.
The commission denied Hutchins’ request to spend $20,000 on body cameras. Three commissioners — Coz, Vice Mayor Don MaGruder and Phil Besler — said they were opposed to the idea philosophically, and the tough budget year was no time to reconsider.
The commission also persuaded Hutchins to wait a year before buying a new $48,000 vehicle for the department.
Results of a salary survey found that some of the town’s top employees were underpaid compared with those in surrounding municipalities.
Commissioners approved a total of about $13,000 to boost the salaries and benefits of two police lieutenants. Hutchins also got a roughly $16,000 boost to $120,000 per year.
The commission agreed in principal to make permanent the promotions of Stevens, the former town clerk, to manager and Karla Armstrong to the clerk position. Both have received high praise from commissioners. Stevens will get a $27,000 raise to about $102,000 and Armstrong will go up $15,000 to $60,000.
Still, the town will save about $40,000 between the two positions compared with salaries in the survey.
“All I’m trying to do is save money,” Coz said, saying the pay was appropriate for two relatively inexperienced employees. “I think it’s fair for people who have days on the job, not years.”
MaGruder and Commissioners Kristine de Haseth and Susan Hurlburt supported spending $23,000 to participate in a regional study of the long-term effects of sea rise on the town.
Residents also should expect their solid waste and recycling fees to go up by a modest amount in the next fiscal year.
The commission plans to formally set a maximum proposed tax rate at its next budget workshop on July 15 beginning at 5 p.m.

By Dan Moffett

Ocean Ridge has taken the first small steps in what figures to be a very long journey to replace the town’s septic tanks with a municipal sewer system.
During their regular meeting on July 1, town commissioners unanimously approved hiring Raftelis Financial Consultants from the Orlando area to assess the costs and financing options for the conversion.
Raftelis, the only bidder for the assignment, has municipal clients across the country but recent work in Monroe County is particularly relevant. Company Vice President Tony Hairston told the commission his firm had helped in the conversion of tens of thousands of septic tanks in the Florida Keys, including those in Islamorada, Key Largo and Marathon.
Hairston estimated roughly $45,000 in initial costs to help Ocean Ridge develop a business plan for the multimillion-dollar, multiyear project. Raftelis consultants will charge the town $192 per hour.
Also, the commission has completed appointments to the newly created citizens advisory committee on septic to sewer conversion. The members are Roy Schijns, Ron Kirn, John Lipscomb, Arthur Ziev and Neil Hennigan. The committee and the consultants will hold their first meeting on July 15 beginning at 10 a.m. in Town Hall. Representatives of Boynton Beach Utilities are also expected to attend and make a presentation.
Mayor Steve Coz and commissioners say they believe it’s inevitable that state officials eventually will make septic conversion mandatory.
In other business:
• Acting Town Manager Tracey Stevens told the commission that the Florida Department of Transportation has rejected the town’s request for a crosswalk on State Road A1A near the Crown Colony Club and Fayette Drive. Stevens said state officials believe results of a recent traffic study showed that the crosswalk wasn’t warranted.
• Commissioners unanimously approved spending $91,253 to repair a drainage outflow pipe on Spanish River Drive.
Town engineers believe the 12-inch pipe has collapsed and is contributing to continuing street flooding problems in the Inlet Cay neighborhood. Stevens told the commission that homeowners’ overgrown vegetation in the easements is impeding the progress of repairs on the island. She said the town has repeatedly requested cooperation from the residents.
“We will continue to explore our options,” Stevens said, “though they are limited without the necessary easements.”
• It doesn’t look like Ocean Ridge will be getting its own ZIP code anytime soon.
Coz had floated the idea earlier this year, and the commission asked former Commissioner Robert Sloat to investigate how the town might pursue it.
“It’s a long, arduous process to get our own ZIP code,” Sloat told the commission during its June 3 meeting.
He said the federal government would require the town to survey residents to find out if they want it, and help from the South Florida congressional delegation might be needed for the effort to move forward. The town also likely would be responsible for coming up with its own post office, delivery truck and postmaster.
Sloat said, based on his research, the impact on insurance rates would be negligible, however.
The greatest barrier to getting a distinct postal code probably would be size. The U.S. Postal Service typically gives ZIP codes to cities and towns with populations between 10,000 and 25,000. The population of Ocean Ridge is about 1,900.
“It sounds like it’s running into a stone wall,” Coz said.

By Steve Plunkett

Town commissioners rejected an appeal by resident Martin O’Boyle to let him build a “promenade” 30 to 36 inches higher than his sea wall and extending 12 feet into the canal behind his yard, unanimously agreeing that the structure should comply with the building code for docks.
At the outset of a June 14 hearing by commissioners sitting as Gulf Stream’s Board of Adjustment, O’Boyle attorney Scott Weires challenged Town Manager Greg Dunham over the definitions of “dock” and “promenade.”
“You believe that that [promenade] is still similar to a dock for some reason. You’re indicating that it looks like a dock and that’s why you believe the promenade section should also be defined as a dock?” Weires asked.
“That’s correct. It is possible that a boat could dock there,” Dunham said.
O’Boyle began applying “informally and formally” for a permit to build over the water in April 2017, Dunham told commissioners. Previous applications referred to the proposed structure as a “dock,” but the most recent one, dated March 11, 2019, elevated it over the sea wall and called it a “promenade” with “no boat docking.” A small section at the eastern end was 5 feet wide and labeled “boat dock.”
“We really wanted to expand the backyard,” O’Boyle’s architect, Robert Currie of Delray Beach, told commissioners.
Weires argued during the almost three-hour hearing that the town code does not define “promenade” or prohibit building one.
“We have constitutional protections to do what we want with our property subject to reasonable zoning regulations,” Weires said. “So I can build it unless you specifically tell me that what I want to build is caught within the definition that prohibits what it is that I want to build.”
Part of O’Boyle’s reasoning that he could build the structure was based on a 2013 dispute he had with the Board of Adjustment over a front entry feature he planned for his house, at 23 Hidden Harbour Drive. After he was denied a building permit, he filed approximately 400 requests for public records and 16 lawsuits against the town in a six-month period. He also painted signs and cartoons on his house criticizing town officials.
In July 2013 the town and O’Boyle settled their differences over the entryway and records requests up until that time, with Gulf Stream agreeing to pay its litigious resident $180,000 for his legal costs and O’Boyle withdrawing his lawsuits. Both sides also promised to reach a development agreement granting permission for the home’s 25-foot-tall front entry.
O’Boyle contended he could construct a promenade because the settlement agreement references the town code as it was in 1981, the year he built his home and before Gulf Stream made rules for docks.
But the town said the agreement applied only to a “building envelope” defined as the area “between the Intracoastal Waterway, the private roads, and the common property line to the west.”
The settlement “does not apply to structures in the water,” Town Clerk Rita Taylor wrote O’Boyle in March, denying his application because the proposed dock was wider than 5 feet and lacked setbacks from neighboring properties.
In other business:
• Dunham said about two dozen homeowners still have stakes to keep traffic off their yards after Mayor Scott Morgan sent a letter asking residents to remove them. Dunham said he would send a follow-up letter seeking compliance.
• Commissioners awarded an $8,450 contract to low bidder C Knowles Construction to make repairs inside the Place Au Soleil gatehouse following mold remediation.
• The next Town Commission meeting will be July 9, a Tuesday, instead of the usual second Friday of the month. Commissioners will discuss the town’s proposed budget for 2019-20.

By Dan Moffett

Two very familiar suitors have come forward and offered to provide police services to the town of Briny Breezes for the next three years.
One is Boynton Beach, the holder of Briny’s current police contract, which expires on Sept. 30. The other is Ocean Ridge, which policed the town for some 30 years before raising its price and losing the contract to Boynton Beach in 2016.
The proposal Briny’s next-door neighbor submitted to the Town Council suggests it is firmly committed to winning back the lost contract. Ocean Ridge proposes charging Briny $180,000 for the first year of a three-year deal, with subsequent annual 3 percent increases.
That number is significantly below the roughly $219,000 the town is paying Boynton Beach this year, and lower than the $215,690 Boynton says it wants to renew the existing agreement. Briny council members will get the chance to hear the details of both proposals during a special workshop scheduled for Aug. 1. Boynton Beach will make a one-hour presentation on its plan beginning at 3 p.m. in Town Hall, immediately followed by a one-hour presentation from Ocean Ridge.
Besides cost, enforcement issues are likely to come up during the workshop. Alderwoman Christina Adams has complained about how police have handled recent trespassing violations and parking offenses.

In other business:
• Council members assigned Town Manager Dale Sugerman and Town Attorney Keith Davis the task of working out details of a new building permit process with Briny’s corporation.
In May, Alderwoman Kathy Gross proposed allowing the corporation to deal directly with building contractors and the town’s building official when residents apply for permits. The idea is to streamline the process and reduce the workload of town staff.
Corporate officials have been open to the plan but want more details. Sugerman and Davis said they would draft a proposed agreement outlining the process and bring it for consideration at the next meeting on July 25.
The vote to advance the proposal was 3-1, with council President Sue Thaler dissenting and Alderman Chick Behringer absent.
• Ownership of Briny Breezes Boulevard continues to be a nagging issue. Sugerman said Palm Beach County officials have told him the 30-foot-wide right of way belongs to the town and the county claims no ownership. However, developers of the Gulf Stream Views townhouse project in the County Pocket maintain their northern property line runs 4 feet into the current paved road.
Sugerman and Davis said they would research property records to try to confirm ownership and the precise location of the right of way. The manager said it may be necessary for the town to hire a surveyor to resolve the issue.
• During a budget workshop before the June 27 meeting, Sugerman told the council he recommends holding the tax rate at the statutory maximum of $10 per $1,000 of taxable value for the next fiscal year. Briny has maintained that maximum rate since 2009.
The Palm Beach County Property Appraiser’s Office brought good news: Briny’s property values have risen 8.8 percent over the last year, to about $53.8 million. The office said it was the seventh-highest increase among the county’s 39 municipalities.
Property tax revenues figure to rise with the valuation to about $510,300, up from $470,200.
Higher interest returns on reserves, lower legal fees and potential savings on a new police contract are other positives for the next budget year. Sugerman proposes spending $10,000 to replace aging chairs and desks in Town Hall.
The council will hold its next budget workshop at 3 p.m. July 25, immediately before the regular town meeting.

ABOVE: Project engineer Michael LaCoursiere uses renderings and photos as he explains Gulf Stream Views to Briny Breezes and Pocket residents. BELOW: Pocket resident Marie Chapman expresses frustration with flooding in her neighborhood. She said it wasn’t a problem until construction started. LaCoursiere said the area needs a new drainage system. Photos by Jerry Lower/The Coastal Star

Related Story: Zoning board unanimously OKs swimming pools for townhouse project

By Dan Moffett

Developers of the Gulf Stream Views townhouse project say they are running out of ideas for allaying the flooding concerns expressed by neighboring residents in Briny Breezes and the County Pocket.
“I don’t know what else we can do,” Michael LaCoursiere, the project engineer, told a group of several dozen homeowners during an often contentious meeting June 17 at the Delray Beach Marriott.
LaCoursiere said the old neighborhoods in Briny and the Pocket need a drainage infrastructure overhaul that is beyond the scope of what New Jersey-based NR Living can offer.
“A major community-wide project is what your community needs,” he said. “They’re doing what they can as developers.”
LaCoursiere said the project is being built to retain on-site the rainwater of a 100-year storm, beyond the permitting standard of a 25-year storm. The developers say they have complied with every requirement Palm Beach County, FEMA and state officials have made.
Marie Chapman, who lives on Winthrop Lane in the Pocket, said she believes the project already has caused drainage problems. Recent heavy rains backed up sewers, she said, and left “shin-deep water” in her yard. Her neighbors echoed similar complaints.
“My house is 80 years old and it never flooded before you guys started construction,” Chapman told the developers. “And we’re just into hurricane season. I’m not sure you’re aware of why we’re so angry.”
Residents say that for decades the dormant 2-acre project site served as a drain field for runoff from Briny Breezes and the Pocket. That ended when construction began.
Chapman said the standing rain water and subsequent sewer problems are raising health issues. “You guys have had a huge impact on our day-to-day lives,” she said.
Kristine de Haseth, executive director of the Florida Coalition for Preservation, said homeowners have had to hire a lawyer and engineer in an effort to protect their property rights.
“These folks are flooding,” de Haseth said. “They’re digging into their pockets to solve a problem they didn’t create.”
Glenn La Mattina, NR Living senior vice president, said developers are willing to consider possible solutions from residents. “We are open to suggestions,” La Mattina said.
LaCoursiere said the developers have cleaned out existing catchment drains outside the site and are considering installing trench drains on the Seaview Avenue swales.
“That’s not a real significant thing,” LaCoursiere said, “but I imagine that in your eyes any drop of water that we save from going down that hill is a benefit to everybody out there.”
La Mattina said developers would back off plans to remove invasive plant species from the sea grapes along the oceanfront after hearing residents complain about potential damage to the dunes.
NR Living organized the meeting to inform residents that the developers would seek a variance from the county to allow construction of 14 7-by-14-foot plunge pools, one behind each unit along the southern and northern property lines. The county’s Planning & Zoning Commission scheduled a hearing on the request for July 3.
Bradley Miller of Boynton Beach, the project’s planner, said developers are asking county building officials to loosen swimming pool setback requirements. If the county rejects the request, Miller said developers will install patios instead.
Developers say the pools were added to the plan as an amenity that would enhance marketing to high-end buyers. Pre-construction prices for the three-bedroom units range from $1.8 million to $2.7 million. The project is scheduled for completion early next year.

Briny Breezes park manager Donna Coates jokes with World War II veterans Ed Manley (left) and Peter Bialowas during a Flag Day event on June 14. When asked whether they would serve again if duty called, Bialowas was quick to answer that he would. Always the joker, Manley said that ‘considering the shot I took to the tush, I would have rather spent my younger days dancing.’ Dozens of residents gathered at the Memorial Fountain for ceremonies that included the unveiling of pavers in the veterans’ honor. Jerry Lower/The Coastal Star