By Emily J. Minor

    GULF STREAM  — Walter Helmut Baum, a well-known lifeguard at Delray Beach’s Anchor Park S5 beach lifeguard station for nearly two decades, died June 17 from complications of a stroke he suffered five days earlier. He was 55.
    Jill Baum, his wife — whom he met on the beach, at that very station about 15 years ago — said it was all quite a shock.
    “He had no history of heart trouble, high blood pressure, cholesterol. Nothing,” she said. “He was a stud.”
    Mr. Baum was also quite the character.
    He loved to be called by all sorts of names, which he often pulled from nowhere. Among his favorites? Rocket Wildcard, Perry, Waldi, Wally, Helmut and Papa.
    He often dressed like a caricature of himself — maybe a soccer cap, a Dolphins jersey, and sports socks pulled up to his knees. And he often carried a to-go cup when he walked out of the house, a sweet cottage the couple bought in 2014 several years after their daughter, Juliet, was born.
    Mr. Baum was born in Graz, Austria, on July 23, 1961, the only child of Walter and Gerda Baum. After living through the war, the couple left Austria, eventually ending up in Washington, D.C. Mr. Baum, only 3 years old at the time, spent the rest of his youth there, his wife said, and attended the German School Washington D.C.
    After high school, he moved to Florida to study hospitality at Florida International University. It was then that his love affair began with the ocean and surfing.
    After a decade or so of working in hotels, Mr. Baum decided to go for his dream — ocean rescue. He worked out, schmoozed the beach-patrol secretary, worked out some more, and made the Ocean Rescue Lifeguard/EMT team.
    And he was loved.
    When his boss visited him in the hospital a few days after his stroke, as he was very much slipping away, he came to for a moment and winked at her, his wife said. “Walter was a character,” she said, simply.
    But while he was usually the life of any party, Mr. Baum was also extremely emotional, she said. After his mother and stepfather were killed in a car accident about five years ago, “he was a mess,” she said.
    His own father lived nearby and — oddly, in retrospect — suffered a stroke during a family birthday celebration about a year ago. He then lived five days, just like Mr. Baum.
    Through all that sadness, Mr. Baum latched onto the two big loves in his life: his wife, Jill, whom he married in 2004, and their daughter, Juliet, now 6. About two years ago, he even left beach patrol and took a lifeguard position at a city pool so he could spend more time with family.
    His wife said he was hit hard in 2014 when their daughter was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes, a chronic disease that requires insulin delivery. Indeed, the family is asking that memorials for Mr. Baum be made in his name to: Juvenile Diabetes Research, 1641 Worthington Road, Unit 340, West Palm Beach, FL 33409.
    “He was a sensitive guy,” his wife said. “But he was so handsome and he had such charisma.”
    Services were June 21 at the family’s church, First Presbyterian Church of Delray Beach. Besides his wife and daughter, he is survived by longtime family friend Marguerite Rosner, whom he called his ”fairy godmother.” His dog, Brandy, also survives him.

By Steven J. Smith

    BOCA RATON — Bernell Stein lived a remarkably self-sufficient life marked by successful forays into retail sales, the founding of several businesses and ultimately a devotion to community service, according to her daughter, Elodie F. McAllister.
    “She was fiercely independent and really lived life on her own terms,” McAllister said. “Some might say she wasn’t exactly a people person. She went down a lot of different roads, but she always looked out for my brother Arlen and me.”
Ms. Stein died in her Boca Raton home May 17 following several years of declining health. She was 82.
    McAllister said her mother always embraced life, asserting, “it was never dull.”
    Born in St. Louis on June 23, 1934, Ms. Stein excelled at U-City High as a senior year delegate for Junior Achievement. Although she attended Washington University for only one semester before opting to get married at 18 to start a family, her daughter said she found her calling in retail sales after her 1969 divorce and later in developing her own businesses.
    “She worked at a department store in St. Louis and later founded the dating service Zodiac Introductions,” McAllister said. “She was always interested in astrology and felt it was relevant in matching people romantically by their birth signs.”
    McAllister said her mother founded another business, Creative Professional Marketing, before moving the family from Creve Coeur, Mo., to South Florida in 1971. It was here that she got into real estate and joined the Boca Raton Chamber of Commerce.
    “She loved the sand, the water and the warm weather,” McAllister said. “She hated the cold and the snow. Florida was paradise to her with the palm trees, banana trees, orchids and roses she surrounded herself with.”
    In the last 20 years of her life, Ms. Stein enjoyed donating her time to the Boca Raton Library, the Children’s Museum and the Gumbo Limbo Nature Center, to name a few.
    “That was when she was in her 60s and 70s and was retired,” McAllister said. “She always wanted to stay involved with the community.”
    Ms. Stein also liked to travel alone, visiting such places as China, Bali, French Polynesia, Europe, the Galapagos Islands, South America and Canada’s Yukon Territory, to name a few.
    McAllister said for many years she and her mother were very different people, but in the end she realized how alike — and connected — they were.
    “That was actually the theme of my eulogy,” she said. “We didn’t always understand or appreciate each other when I was young, but as I got older I realized that in my own way I was a lot like her — bucking trends, not caring so much what others think, shunning popular fashions. She was very independent minded, which takes courage in our society.”
    In addition to her daughter, Ms. Stein is survived by her sister, Marilyn (Lou) Salini, of St. Louis; son, Arlen (Patti) Fischlowitz; grandchildren, Elyssa (Ben) Holzer, Andrea Fischlowitz (Brandon Weiss) and Ross B. McAllister; and great-grandchildren, Jude William Holzer and Mika Priscilla Weiss.  In lieu of flowers, the family requested donations to Trustbridge hospice in West Palm Beach or M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston.

Property Matters, a real estate company with an Anglo-American team, has launched its first office

in Boca Raton with plans to expand into locations along the coast from West Palm Beach to Miami Beach.

Property Matters was founded by partners Ted Brown, Simon Isaacs and Paul Ross. The office is in The Monterey,

Suite A, 5499 N. Federal Highway, Boca Raton. Here, Paul Ross (left), Simon Isaacs (center)

and Ted Brown pose in a British telephone booth, signifying the Anglo- American roots of the company.

Photo provided

Most 90-year-olds could use a little TLC. For only the second time in its history, the 1926 Colony Hotel

on Atlantic Avenue in Delray Beach was tented for termites in June and reopened June 16.

The grand old dame is recognized by the city as a historic landmark

and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Jerry Lower/The Coastal Star

By Christine Davis

    Cathy Balestriere, board chairwoman of the Greater Delray Beach Chamber of Commerce, announced the installation of an interim leadership team following the recent resignation of Karen Granger as president and CEO.
    “We are grateful for Karen’s accomplishments and years of dedicated service to this valuable organization. We wish her well in her future and look forward to her continued participation as a valued member of our community,” said Balestriere.
    The new leadership team, Vin Nolan and Donald S. Schneider, will serve as interim co-CEOs until a permanent replacement is in place.
    Nolan comes to the chamber from the Florida Small Business Development Center at Palm Beach State College, where he was regional director and managed staff that provided consulting services to small businesses throughout the county. Prior to that, he was economic development director for the city of Delray Beach.
    Schneider is a business executive who had global leadership roles at corporations that included General Electric, Bertelsmann, The New York Times Co., AON and ADVO, with particular emphasis on financial services, technology, start-ups and turnarounds.
    “Together, they will oversee the chamber’s day-to-day operations, as we initiate a search to find a new CEO,” Balestriere says.
                                
    More than 45 vendors and 250 guests participated at the Greater Delray Beach Chamber of Commerce’s annual Delray Business Expo in May. The event was sponsored by The Conde Center for Chiropractic Neurology, CenterState Bank and Signarama.
                                
    Sarah Pearson was promoted to executive vice president of the Boca Chamber in May. She has been with the chamber since 2011, previously serving as the senior vice president of external relations.
                                
    During September, diners can enjoy bites of the Big Apple through the Boca Chamber’s inaugural Boca Restaurant Month, which will have a “Boca Loves New York” theme. Participating restaurants will serve three-course meals at reduced prices and offer at least one New York-inspired dish or cocktail.
    Lunches will be priced at $21 through $25, and dinners will be priced at $36 through $40. For a list of participating restaurants visit www.bocarestaurantmonth.com.
                                
    Glenn Jergensen, executive director of the Palm Beach County Tourist Development Council, is scheduled to be the featured speaker at the Greater Boynton Beach Chamber of Commerce’s networking luncheon at 11:30 a.m. July 12. It will be held at Benvenuto Restaurant, 1730 N. Federal Highway, Boynton Beach. Cost is $35 for non-members. Call 732-9501.
                                
    The Festival Management Group’s Sizzlin’ Summer Social Series offers three evenings that combine craft cocktails, activities and food pairings.
    “Rum, Rhythm & Rumba,” from 8 to 10 p.m. July 8, will feature a Fred Astaire dance program, along with pineapple rum punch, spiced-rum Planters Punch, Cruzan Apple craft cocktails and light bites.
     At “Vodka Riot,” 7 to 9 p.m. Aug. 12, vodka-infused dishes will be offered by chefs Joey Giannuzzi of the Farmer’s Table, Blake Malatesta of MIA Kitchen Bar, Eric Baker of Max’s Harvest, Jessie Steele of Death or Glory and Thomas Op’t Holt of 50 Ocean.
     At “Bottomless Bloody Mary & Brunch on a Stick,” 1-3 p.m. Aug. 27, meals on a skewer to go with each Bloody Mary will be prepared by chefs from Ceviche 401, Harvest Seasonal Grill & Wine Bar, Death or Glory, and Pizza Rustica.
     These events will be held at the Old School Square Fieldhouse, 51 N. Swinton Ave., Delray Beach Tickets cost $45 and must be purchased at least two days before each event.
                                
    BizBash ranked the South Florida Garlic Fest third among the most popular Food & Restaurant Industry events and ranked Delray Affair second among the most popular Parades & Festivals in its 2017 list of the Top 100 Events in South Florida. BizBash considers the event’s influence, innovation, reach and economic impact.
                                
    Eric Gordon, chairman of Akerman LLP law firm’s Labor & Employment Practice Group, was installed as president of the South Palm Beach County Bar Association on June 10 at the Association’s 56th Annual Installation Gala at the Woodfield Country Club in Boca Raton.
    Gordon will serve a one-year term. For two decades, Gordon has represented employers in labor and employment matters across a range of sectors, including telecommunications, hospitality, health care, retail and financial services. His work has earned him recognition in “The Best Lawyers in America” for employment law and Florida’s “Super Lawyers” for employment and labor and business litigation.
    Gordon previously was the managing partner of Akerman’s Palm Beach County offices. He formerly served on the board of directors for the Economic Council of Palm Beach County, the Education Foundation of Palm Beach County, and as a trustee for the Greater Boca Raton Chamber of Commerce. He also is a past president of the Human Resource Association of Palm Beach County.
                                
    In May, members of the Realtors Association of the Palm Beaches voted to merge with the Greater Fort Lauderdale Realtors. This merger will form the third largest local Realtor association in the nation in becoming the Realtors of the Palm Beaches and Greater Fort Lauderdale, according to the National Association of Realtors.
    “The merging of these two boards represents more than 25,000 association members and 30,000 MLS subscribers. The merged association’s multiple listing services will carry more than 40,000 on-market listings, totaling over $21 billion in inventory,” said John Slivon, president of the Palm Beach County association.
    Dionna Hall will be installed as the CEO of the merged association and MLS.
                                
    Holliday Fenoglio Fowler announced June 15 that it had closed the $59.75 million sale of Peninsula Executive Center, 2381 and 2385 Executive Center Drive, Boca Raton. HFF marketed the 187,784-square-foot, Class A office property for the seller and found the buyer, C. Talanian Realty Co.  Also, HFF worked on behalf of the new owner to secure $33.5 million in financing through Principal Real Estate Investors.
    Peninsula Executive Center consists of two four-story office buildings and a 742-space parking structure. The property is 97 percent leased and is anchored by Newell Brands. The HFF team was led by senior managing directors Chris Drew and Hermen Rodriguez, director Ike Ojala, associate director Brian Gaswirth and associate Matthew McCormack.
                                
     “Mar-Cielo,” a home at 701 S. Ocean Boulevard, Delray Beach, sold for $13.375 million on May 16, according to public records. The 1948-era, five-bedroom house, with 7,000 total square feet, sits on over an acre with 120 feet on the ocean. Bradford Miller of the Corcoran Group represented the seller, 701 S. Ocean LLC, which lists Thomas J. Campbell as the registered agent and manager.
    Previously, the property sold for $12 million in 2015.

The Palm Beach Kennel Club’s greyhound adoptions received assistance from (l-r) Theresa Hume and Sherri Carter

of the kennel club; Elizee Michel of Westgate CRA; Carolee Ellison (with Stretch) of Awesome Greyhound Adoptions;

Duane Meeks of Potentia Academy; Dick Busto of Autism Project of Palm Beach County; Pat Rooney Jr.

and Alexis Barbish of the kennel club; Lynelle Zelnar of Forgotten Soldiers Outreach, and Jon Buechele Jr.

of Pathways to Independence.

Photo provided

                               
    The Palm Beach Kennel Club’s sponsoring of free adoptions resulted in 56 greyhounds finding homes during National Greyhound Pet Adoption Month in April.
    Palm Beach Kennel Club works with Awesome Greyhound Adoptions, Elite Greyhounds, Forever Greyhounds, Greyhound Pet Adoptions/Florida Southeast and Greyed A Greyhounds.
    The Kennel Club will also sponsor free adoptions in October. The adoption groups offer applications online and will interview potential families. Once applicants are approved, the pets are placed and the groups offer continued support.
                                
    “Guess you could say I flunked retirement,” George Kientzy laughed as he described the overwhelming, heartfelt response from customers and friends that led him to forgo the idea of closing his jewelry store, Kientzy & Co.,  on east Atlantic Avenue in Delray Beach.
    “The outpouring from the community was amazing, so we have decided to scale back our hours instead of closing,” Mary Kientzy added.
    The store’s hours will be Tuesday through Thursday, 10am-4pm while the summer sale continues. Stop back in to say hello again, 1053 E. Atlantic Ave., Delray Beach, 561-272-4545.

Send business news to Christine Davis at cdavis9797@gmail.com.

By Mary Hladky

    Boca Raton was the fastest-growing city in Palm Beach County last year, adding 2,570 residents.
    Boynton Beach and Delray Beach also showed strong population increases from 2015 to 2016, according to U.S. Census Bureau statistics released in May. Boynton Beach gained 1,676 residents, or a 2.3 percent increase, while Delray Beach grew by 1,178, or 1.8 percent.

    Taken together, South Palm Beach County’s growth rate outpaced that in other parts of the county. But all cities and towns countywide have posted gains since the 2010 census, and the county’s total population increased 9.4 percent.
    “Boca is obviously a place a lot of people want to live in,” said Deputy Mayor Jeremy Rodgers, whose city grew 2.75 percent last year.
    New residential construction, including The Mark at CityScape, Palmetto Promenade and Via Mizner, have bolstered the downtown population, while expansion of major employers such as Florida Atlantic University, LexisNexis and Cancer Treatment Centers of America have created jobs, he said.
    “We are the affordable Palm Beach,” said Boynton Beach Mayor Steven Grant in explaining his city’s 10.8 percent population growth since 2010.
    Boynton Beach’s three-bedroom, two-bath housing prices are considerably less than those in Delray Beach or Boca Raton, attracting people to his city even if they work elsewhere, he said.
    “Developers are building in Boynton,” he said, citing residential projects such as 500 Ocean at Ocean Avenue and Federal Highway and Cortina on Congress Avenue at Old Boynton Road. Others include the huge planned Town Square redevelopment in “downtown” that includes apartments and condos, a hotel, retail and a new city hall and police and fire station. “We do not feel they are building buildings to be vacant. Residential units will be filled.”
    And that means his city will continue to grow, Grant said.
    Delray Beach Mayor Cary Glickstein said the blossoming of Atlantic Avenue and a trend of people moving out of suburbs and into coastal urban areas have benefited his city.
    “Atlantic Avenue has become an amenity for northern Broward County and essentially all of Palm Beach County,” he said. “We aren’t the seasonal town we used to be.”

Census does not account for seasonal changes
    The city does not rely on census data to plan for the future because seasonal residents are not counted, Glickstein said. While the census shows the city growing by 11.3 percent since 2010 to 67,371 residents, Glickstein believes it is closer to 100,000 during the winter season. The city, he said, must be able to provide services to that many.
    By adding 263 residents since 2010, tiny South Palm Beach’s population has grown to 1,434 for a 22.4 percent gain that is the second highest in Palm Beach County.
    While no new residential units have been built in the town since 2010, Town Manager Bob Vitas said the number of full-time residents has grown as more people decide to live in South Palm Beach permanently.
    “You are seeing a transition between former units used exclusively by snowbirds acquired by people establishing permanent residences,” he said.
    The same dynamic has boosted Manalapan’s population to 457 residents, up 12.5 percent since 2010.
    About 15 new homes have been built in the town in recent years, most occupied by younger couples, said Manalapan Mayor Keith Waters.
    “We are seeing a lot more families with children in school,” using their homes as a primary residence rather than a second or third home, he said. “It has been an enormous growth over the past few years.”
    The growth won’t continue since the town is nearly built out, Waters said.
    The quirkiest fact in the census data is that Briny Breezes grew by just one resident last year and by three since 2010 to a total of 604.
    Elsewhere in South County, Gulf Stream’s population rose 1.7 percent last year and 8  percent since 2010, Highland Beach’s was up 0.9 percent last year and 6.2 percent since 2010, Lantana’s increased 0.8 percent last year and 5.7 percent since 2010, and Ocean Ridge’s jumped 1.1 percent since last year and 7.7 percent since 2010.

Growth adds to tax base
    Growth is a good thing for cities and towns, since it translates into a growing tax base.
    “It is the economic lifeblood of any city. You can’t survive without net growth,” Glickstein said.
    But it also creates a need for more municipal services, including police, fire rescue and trash pickup.
    In one example of what that means for Delray Beach, Glickstein noted the city launched a three-year plan last year to boost the number of first responders.
    In Boca Raton, growth has strained trash and recycling services, and officials are considering whether they should raise fees or contract out those services if that would reduce the cost to the city and ultimately to its residents.
    Rodgers said the City Council will weigh the options over the next two months.
    “We have already exceeded capacity,” Rodgers said. “If we do privatize, it is calculated to save money for all residences.”
    Because their growth is relatively small compared with big cities, Manalapan and South Palm Beach officials said they have not felt budget pressure.
    “The demand on town services remains constant,” Vitas said. “There is no spike in that demand.”
    The census data shed light on the nature of population growth in South Florida.
    While Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties continue to grow, the year-over-year population changes show that growth is slowing down, especially in Miami-Dade, said Maria Ilcheva, senior researcher at the Florida International University Metropolitan Center.
    Population growth in Miami-Dade and Broward is fueled mainly by international migrants rather than people moving in from other parts of the United States.
    Domestic migration is the bigger contributor to growth in Palm Beach County. Last year, 12,473 people migrated here from elsewhere in the U.S., while 8,443 were international migrants.
    That may be changing, Ilcheva said, but it is too soon to tell for sure. Both types of migration peaked in Palm Beach County in 2015, and not enough time has elapsed since then to see a clear trend.
    The Miami-Dade numbers are especially stark. International migrants totaled 41,830 last year, but 30,560 local residents left. Those leaving are white non-Hispanics, Ilcheva said.
    She points to two primary reasons for the local outflow: the high cost of housing and traffic gridlock.
    “They are not necessarily changing their jobs, but changing their place of residence to Broward or even Palm Beach County,” she said.
    Of the three counties, Miami-Dade’s median household income of about $43,000 a year is the lowest. For those earning that amount, housing “is not only not affordable, there is just no housing produced for families,” she said.
    The Hispanic population is growing faster in Palm Beach and Broward than in Miami-Dade, she said. In Palm Beach, the Hispanic population increased by 19 percent between 2010 and 2015 to a total of 300,776. Broward saw a 20.3 percent increase while Miami-Dade’s was up only 10.2 percent.
    While Palm Beach County’s traffic congestion may seem less severe to a Miami-Dade driver, it is a big issue locally. The same holds true for housing prices.

Price of housing a crisis
    Hundreds of people attending a Palm Beach County Housing Summit in West Palm Beach in May heard experts say that the county’s median home price of $327,000 is unaffordable to 75 percent of households.
    The county’s median gross rent of $1,900 is out of reach for 80 percent of renters, said Edward “Ned” Murray, associate director of the FIU Metropolitan Center. About 30 percent of renters spend more than 50 percent of their income on rent.
    Attendees were told that more affordable housing must be built if the county wants to keep existing businesses and jobs and attract new ones.
    Glickstein described housing costs as “one of the most intractable public policy issues we face as a city, state and country.”
    “Affordable housing is a national crisis,” he said. “The market is driving these prices. There is very little local government can do unless it wants to get into the business of rent control and other price suppression measures. Those things have never really proven effective.”
    While Delray Beach, like other South Florida cities, requires developers to build affordable housing, the amount produced is insufficient to meet demand, Glickstein said.
    “I would like to see the development industry reinvent the housing model,” he said, although the way to do so is not obvious.
    Developers “can make the economics work, except for the fact land is so scarce in the tri-county area. Lack of supply is driving land prices so that the affordable model doesn’t work anymore.”

An adult least tern offers food to a young juvenile on the beach in Boca Raton near the south edge

of Spanish River Park in mid-June. Based on the size and color of feathers, a Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission

biologist estimated the youngster was about 3 weeks old and capable of flight. Least terns are unique

in that they nest on bare beach sand and rooftops; it has been more than 20 years since successful beach nests

have been recorded south of Lake Worth. A nest near this location was destroyed by predators in May.

Jerry Lower/The Coastal Star

Highland Beach Police Officers Dwayne Fernandes and Paul Shersty

helped rescue four people in a sinking boat on one of their days off.

Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star

A tow boat arrives to haul in a boat that took on water about a mile off the Boynton Inlet.

Highland Beach police officers assisted with the rescue.

Photo provided

By Rich Pollack

    Paul Shersty and Dwayne Fernandes had planned a quiet Friday morning fishing on one of their days off last month.
    Instead, the Highland Beach police officers ended up saving four people — and four stowaway kittens — in a daring rescue full of surprises.
    “I don’t know what we would have done if they weren’t there,” said Richard Bengal, a passenger on the boat owned by his friend Joe Trebbe. “We would have been in serious trouble.”
    Shersty and Fernandes arrived about 9 a.m. at a popular fishing spot about a mile off the Boynton Inlet when they heard people shouting and saw waving passengers on a boat about a half mile away.
    At first the two thought the people were cheering because they’d caught a big fish, but it became apparent they were in trouble.
    As Shersty and Fernandes got closer, they were taken aback to see two men standing in almost a foot of water on the boat. Shersty was also surprised to see Bengal, a friend with whom he had grown up.
    On the sinking boat, that wasn’t the only surprise.
    As the water rose, Bengal, Trebbe and their rescuers heard meowing under the boat’s console. Soon, four soaked black-and-white kittens, apparently stashed there by their mom while the boat was in storage, emerged.
    “They had no idea there were kittens on the boat,” Shersty said.
    While the passengers on the boat were panicking, Shersty and Fernandes relied on their police training and experience to remain calm and develop a plan.
    Although the seas were only moderately choppy, the waves were big enough to keep Fernandes from getting his boat close enough to pick up the boaters. Instead, they devised a plan to tow the boat to shore while calling for a tow boat designed for similar missions.
    The challenge, Shersty said, was to use their small boat to tow one that was getting heavier by the minute as it was taking on more water than could be forced out by a barely functioning bilge pump.
    Eventually, the tow boat arrived and took over the rescue operation, taking the stricken boat through the Boynton Inlet with the help of marine patrols from the Boynton Beach Police Department, the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office as well as the U.S. Coast Guard.
    Shersty, an experienced boater and angler, says he had some doubts the rescue that morning would be successful.
    “If any one of several things had gone wrong, the people on the boat would have been swimming,” he said. “I told [Fernandes] they must have had a guardian angel looking after them.”
    After the boat reached shore, Boynton Beach police turned the kittens over to Palm Beach County Animal Care and Control.
    Shersty said he and Fernandes were just happy to be in the right place at the right time as water came over the transom of Trebbe’s boat and shorted out the electrical system.
    “If we had come five minutes later, there would have been nothing there,” Shersty said. “That boat would have sunk.”
    He said that the rescue made him decide to double- check the equipment on his own boat.
    “I went out and bought two new bilge pumps and a battery,” he said.

By Mary Hladky

    Boca Raton residents and visitors suddenly seem poised to have plenty of alternatives to driving their cars around downtown.
    After talking for months about what type of transportation services should be offered to lessen traffic congestion, City Council members, sitting as the Community Redevelopment Agency board, heard at their June 12 meeting that at least two companies want to soon start service with electric vehicles.
    And the Downtowner, whose departure from Boca Raton in December prompted council members to seek a replacement, is willing to return to the city.
    Mike Trombino, who launched Slidr in Asheville, N.C., last year, said his company expanded to Naples this year, plans to start operating on Columbia, S.C., in July and in four more cities in 2018. It provides on-demand service via an app and by telephone.
    Some cities subsidize his service, but Trombino indicated he might forgo that in Boca Raton.
    The Free Ride, which began service in East Hampton, N.Y., in 2011 and now operates in 11 cities including West Palm Beach and Fort Lauderdale, is planning to start service in downtown Boca Raton and eventually expand to other areas of the city.
    The company also has an app for on-demand service.
    “I believe we will be on the road by Oct. 1,”  said Michael Liss, an attorney who represents The Free Ride.
    Downtowner CEO Stephen Murray, whose company operates in Delray Beach, Tampa and two other cities, declined in March to say why he pulled out of the city.
    “We’re very interested in coming back to the city of Boca,” he told The Coastal Star on June 12.
    City Manager Leif Ahnell said any company could start providing service immediately as long as no city subsidy is involved.
    Even though they are pleased the companies want to operate in the city, council members agreed to proceed in July with a request for proposals from private operators. That process could be halted if Slidr and The Free Ride are operating successfully in the city.
    “I would love to see private industry step up as soon as possible,” said Deputy Mayor Jeremy Rodgers.
    A survey completed in June showed that Boca Raton businesses, residents and visitors want alternative downtown transportation.
    The city posted the survey on social media, emailed it to downtown businesses and sent it to downtown property managers to share with their tenants. The Downtowner emailed the survey to its former Boca Raton riders.
    A total of 1,759 downtown residents, visitors and people who work downtown responded, a far higher number than city officials expected.  In all, 75 percent were interested or very interested in using an alternative downtown transportation service.
    Sixty-five percent favored an on-demand service, while 19 percent wanted a trolley system that would have a fixed route downtown. Most wanted electric vehicles.
    The main reasons they cited for coming downtown were dining, shopping, nightlife and special events. Fifty-eight percent of the respondents live downtown.
    “There is definitely a demand for some kind of alternative service,” said council member Robert Weinroth.

Parking garage discussed
    Council members next turned their attention to building a badly needed downtown parking garage.
    The working assumption has been that the garage would be built on city-owned land behind the downtown library, two blocks north of City Hall and the Police Department and west of the FEC railroad tracks.
    The city has tried for years to find a site closer to the heart of downtown, but landowners have been unwilling to sell their property.
    Some council members began rethinking the location in May after Kim DeLaney, director of strategic development and policy for the Treasure Coast Regional Planning Council, said library land west of the railroad tracks would not be a good location for the garage.
    Weinroth said he was “probably wrong” to support the library site. Mayor Susan Haynie agreed that is the wrong location.
    DeLaney’s argument “is persuasive,” Weinroth said. “A garage between Dixie and Federal is much more valuable and gives us the garage we need.”
    Council member Scott Singer agreed a site east of Dixie Highway would be best. “But we don’t own it,” he said.
    “I submit that the best solution is proceeding now with the planned site the city currently owns, rather than spend many millions to buy new downtown parcels (something we’ve been exploring to no avail),” he wrote on his Facebook page.
    Council members will address the matter again at a July 24 CRA meeting when they expect more input from DeLaney and a city consultant.

By Mary Hladky

    Years after the Midtown “live, work, play” development was conceived, the project is at an impasse without any of the city approvals needed to move forward.
    Angelo Bianco, managing partner of developer Crocker Partners, tried to change that at a June 12 City Council workshop, as he pressed to have the city’s Planning and Zoning Board consider on July 20 proposed ordinances that set a framework for how the project can be built.
    “Being kept in a state of limbo is not fair,” Bianco said. He later added, “We just can’t not move forward. At some point, you are taking away our rights as landowners.”
    But council members urged Bianco to continue working with city staff to finalize ordinances both he and staff can support. If so, staff will recommend that the planning board and City Council approve the ordinances.
    Council member Robert Weinroth counseled Bianco not to resist more talks and negotiation with city staff.
    “I know you are frustrated,” he said. “Don’t make a mistake by forcing this.”
    The Midtown project, located between Interstate 95 and Town Center at Boca Raton, envisions a place where people will live and walk or take shuttles to their jobs in the area, shopping and restaurants.
    As many as 2,500 mostly rental units would be built on nearly 300 acres where no residential now exists. A Tri-Rail station would be built at Northwest 19th Street to bring people to and from the area.
    City officials like the concept, which is similar to transit-oriented developments springing up across the country designed to reduce traffic and energy use. But the devil is in the details.
    The city annexed the area in 2003 and the original county zoning has remained in place. Crocker Partners and its development partners want new zoning ordinances that would regulate a “planned mobility development” as well as a “transit-oriented development” that would allow higher densities and less space set aside for parking.
    City officials want to make sure the ordinances are crafted to safeguard city interests and avoid unintended consequences.
    City staff and the developers have been working on that and changes have been made. But from the perspective of the developers, the process has been painfully slow, costing them time and money.
    Meanwhile, questions have been raised about whether too much residential would be built, if adequate parking space has been included and if Midtown would further clog area roads.
    Another complication is that the proposed ordinances are just the start of the process. If they are approved, the developers will design the project and then submit plans to the city for approval.
    As a result, the planning board and council have no idea what Midtown will look like. Examples presented by the developers of what they have built elsewhere have created confusion, prompting the developers to explain repeatedly that these are conceptual ideas only, and not what is intended for Midtown.
    As the impasse continued, the council in May called for a “reset” on Midtown, with the city taking a stronger hand to speed up the process. But the city and the developer did not discuss specific points of disagreement at the June 12 meeting.
    Bianco said he thinks the proposed zoning ordinances are ready for presentation to the planning board.
    Deputy City Manager George Brown disagreed. He suggested additional changes that Bianco said he was hearing about for the first time.
    “This is treating us in an unfair manner that does not have precedent with other developers …,” Bianco said. “We just need to move it along.”
    One sticking point is the proposed Tri-Rail station, which Crocker Partners initially said was crucial to the project. The developer wanted the ordinances approved by March so funding for the station was not jeopardized. That deadline, set by Tri-Rail, has passed, but some funding agreed to earlier remains available.
    An April report by Brown says previous versions of one of the ordinances drafted by the developer states that the Tri-Rail station would be “planned, funded and committed to” by Tri-Rail. The city wants the station to be “planned, funded and under construction.”
    The report also says the proposed ordinance states the train station is not required until 1,300 rental units have been approved for development. At that point, up to 1,200 more units could be built if the train station is “committed to.”
    “As proposed, the applicant’s ordinance may result in 2,500 units without a train station,” the report states.
    City staff questions if Midtown qualifies as a transit-oriented development if no station is built, the report said.
    The developer commissioned a traffic survey for the area, which states there will be no additional traffic generated by renters if 1,300 units are built, as long as shuttles are operating.
    The traffic survey was updated on April 25 and May 11, but Brown said in a June 5 memo to the council that staff has not reviewed the updates. That memo also said staff has not reviewed proposed changes to the ordinance the developer submitted on April 27 and May 15.
    Parking also remains a sticking point. Crocker Partners had proposed less parking than required elsewhere based on the idea that renters and others coming to shop and dine would use Tri-Rail and the shuttles.
    Crocker Partners has since increased the amount of parking, but city staff still questions whether it will be enough to meet demand.  One-bedroom units would have one space, two-bedroom units 1.5 spaces, and three-bedroom units would have two spaces.

By Steve Plunkett
    
    Storm clouds are gathering again between the Greater Boca Raton Beach & Park District and the city of Boca Raton.
    The cause of the renewed friction is the continuing failure of the two governments to hammer out a master interlocal agreement to replace a handful of agreements defining which side does what. The district uses its tax dollars to have city workers take care of its parks and pay for the operation and capital improvements at Red Reef Park and some other city-owned facilities.
    District Chairman Robert Rollins said the latest version of the proposed agreement was an improvement over the original, but he still was not happy.
    “For 22 years we’ve had separate ILA agreements that have worked marvelous without any complications that I can see. So to begin with, I’m not sure why we need a master ILA,” Rollins said.
    Rollins rode the train from Tampa to Boca Raton and said he had plenty of time to review the proposal, which the city first offered in December 2015.
    The main sticking point was when a second round of playing fields would be built at De Hoernle Park, which is on city property. The district built the first group of fields in 2012, and commissioners hoped to keep the same contractor. But Boca Raton did not give its OK.   
    “This interlocal agreement has already held up phase 2 for a couple of years if not more,” Rollins said. “I kept looking in here for a statement that said, you sign this ILA agreement and you can get started on phase 2 tomorrow. It’s not in here.”
    Rollins said he also was concerned about not having input anymore on the scheduling of fields, adjusting user fees at parks and the effects of future annexations by the city.
    Vice Chairman Steve Engel said city officials seem to treat the district as if it were a city agency.
    “We’re a state agency, and as such we have a different set of rules that we have to play by,” he said, noting the thousands of district residents he represents who live outside city limits.
    At the district’s June 19 meeting, Arthur Koski, its executive director, said Boca Raton’s proposed budget does not reflect what has been discussed during negotiations of the master interlocal agreement.
    “So that would mean that the actual interlocal agreement would not take effect in the fiscal year ’17-18,” Koski said. “That’s not to say we can’t negotiate it during that year, but it probably would be effective in the following fiscal year.”
    District commissioners thought they reached an agreement on De Hoernle Park at a joint meeting with City Council members in mid-2015.
    “We promised the city we would do sports turf at Patch Reef [Park], we’re doing it,” Rollins said. “We promised the city that we’d do half the beach renourishment; we signed that, we’re doing it. Those are the two things that were hanging us up on this. And so we’ve made that commitment, we’re true to our word when we say we’ll do something. Let’s see if we can’t knock this thing out and get phase 2 kicked off.”
    The two sides planned to meet July 24 primarily to discuss a separate interlocal agreement covering the potential purchase of the Ocean Breeze golf course.

By Rich Pollack

    Small coastal communities in South Palm Beach County continued to have few serious crimes in 2016, with most experiencing crime decreases last year, according to statistics released last month by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.
    At the same time, the larger cities in south Palm Beach County all experienced more crime in 2016, as did Ocean Ridge. The increases were driven in large part by a growing number of thefts from unlocked vehicles.  
    Along the coast, South Palm Beach and its neighbor to the south, Manalapan, experienced large percentage drops in crime, with South Palm Beach dropping close to 43 percent and Manalapan dropping by more than 40 percent. Those percentages, however, can be misleading because of the small number of crimes.
    In South Palm Beach, the number of crimes dropped from 14 to 8. In Manalapan, the number of crimes dropped from 27 to 16. Highland Beach, which like South Palm Beach is almost entirely residential, experienced four fewer crimes than it did in 2015, while Gulf Stream had 10 reported crimes, the same as 2015.  
    Ocean Ridge was the exception among the small towns, with 80 crimes, nine more than in 2015. Although the number of major crimes in the town dropped in every other category — including burglaries, which dropped by 58 percent —  the number of larcenies jumped 60 percent from 40 in 2015 to 64 in 2016.  “We believe that about 85 percent of the burglaries to vehicles could have been prevented by people simply locking their car doors and removing their valuables,” said Ocean Ridge Police Chief Hal Hutchins. “If we remove the opportunity, we can displace the criminals.”
    Hutchins said geography and the physical layout of Ocean Ridge may partially explain why the town experienced an increase in thefts while neighboring communities did not. He pointed out easy access to Ocean Ridge from Interstate 95 and explained that there are more public-access areas, including parks, than in other communities.
    In some other coastal communities, a drop in the number of larcenies helped drive an overall decrease in the number of crimes.
    In Highland Beach, which had a 10 percent decrease in overall crime last year, 22 of the 36 reported overall crimes were larcenies. In 2015, there were 32 reported larcenies.
    Police Chief Craig Hartmann gives some credit for the drop to residents, who he says are doing a better job of locking their cars and alerting police to any suspicious activity.
    “We’ve been working with the community to make sure they understand this is an epidemic,” Hartmann said. “We’re putting information out to let residents know how they can avoid becoming a victim.”
    Highland Beach police officers just recently began making presentations at homeowners associations and condo association meetings and began distributing door hangers that say “Always Lock Your Car.”
    Larger cities have also been spreading the word, but thieves have still been able to find many unlocked cars with valuable items inside.
    In Delray Beach, for example, 2,218 larcenies were reported in 2016, 288 more than in 2015.  In Boynton Beach, there were 310 more larcenies in 2016 than in the previous year, and in Boca Raton the number of larcenies increased by 210 in the same time period.
    “Vehicle burglaries account for a large percentage of our crime statistics,” said Dani Moschella, the Delray Beach Police Department’s public information manager. “Most of those crimes were to unlocked cars, and often the victims’ property was clearly visible inside the vehicles. Bags, sunglasses, cash, sometimes even purses, were all left in plain view.”
    In Palm Beach County, the number of overall crimes increased by 2.2 percent, with larcenies and other property crimes largely driving the increase. Violent crimes against people decreased, with the county experiencing 21 fewer homicides, nine fewer rapes and close to 90 fewer robberies, according to FDLE Uniform Crime Report statistics.

By Steve Plunkett

    It’s no secret Boca Raton loves its longtime city manager. Ditto for the city attorney.
    City Manager Leif Ahnell presented the City Council a four-page list detailing 150 projects and activities he oversaw the last fiscal year for an executive performance review June 13.
    “It’s not intended to be a comprehensive list, but it’s just to give everybody some perspective on the services and the scope of operations that we actually are responsible for here and the management,” Ahnell said.
    City Attorney Diana Grub Frieser compiled a three-page, single-spaced “brief overview/highlight” of legal services she provided. The most important function for her office of five, she said, is “to every day kind of anticipate” the city’s legal needs.
    Ahnell’s list noted that in fiscal 2016 the city reviewed almost 22,000 job applications, hired 296 employees and performed nearly 75,000 building inspections. During the recession, Ahnell said, the city stopped giving raises to general employees for four years.
    “As it turned out the city attorney and I went five years with no raises,” he said.
    Since there were no raises, the council also stopped doing performance reviews — until this year.
    Ahnell said he is responsible for a nearly $700 million budget and supervises eight departments with 68 divisions.
    “Really we’re 68 different businesses that we’re kind of running and close to 1,800 employees being managed,” he said.
    More items from the list: City Hall handled about 2,300 public records requests in the 2016 budget year and 43 percent more in the current year. Police answered nearly 60,000 emergency calls.
    “I think that what people don’t appreciate is that, in addition to the 150 items that you’ve discussed here, that you are the conductor of the city,” council member Robert Weinroth said.
    “I really am very impressed by the ability of you to keep this city running and keep the five of us relatively satisfied,” Weinroth said, adding he’d give Ahnell an A “or an A-minus at worst.”
    Deputy Mayor Jeremy Rodgers also was happy with Ahnell’s work.
    “We’re on worldwide lists of best places to live, work, go to school, all those things. … That’s not saying we can’t constantly improve — because I think we constantly seek that and that’s important — and it’s a testament to you and a testament to your hiring and our great staff that you’ve brought here,” Rodgers said.
    Council member Scott Singer called Ahnell a “high-level” manager.
    “I struggle to find an area of improvement to even suggest,” Singer said. “Mr. Ahnell succeeds in areas that I can’t even fathom.”
    Mayor Susan Haynie was equally positive.
    “My only criticism of you is I wish I saw you more out and about town, but I think you’re chained to your desk trying to do all these things,” Haynie said. “Your longevity is a testament to your quality.”
    When it came to the city attorney, Weinroth, who had complained about bad legal advice, was complimentary after Frieser’s successful defense of him in an ethics complaint.
    “On the whole I think you’re doing a very good job,” said Weinroth, giving her a B-plus.
    Singer said he would not want a city attorney presenting a long list of accomplishments.
    “The less that you can put on paper, the less we have to talk about, the fewer lawsuits we have to win or fight, the better,” he said. “It’s what we’re not hearing — that’s good counsel.”
    Haynie noted Frieser’s work on the free-speech zone and other accomplishments.
    “What you’ve done assisting us with the sober home issue was really, really wonderful —the alcohol sales, those were all tough things,” the mayor said.
    There was no talk of pay raises for the two officials.
Later this summer, the council will review Ahnell’s proposed budget for fiscal 2018, which will include money for raises.
    Ahnell has entered the state’s Deferred Retirement Option Program, or DROP, which means he will retire within five years and receive all his retirement benefits for that period in a lump sum or rollover.
    The performance reviews occurred in a nearly empty council chamber at the end of a four-hour, 15-minute meeting that followed a 2½-hour meeting earlier that day.
    Council member Andrea O’Rourke worried that residents missed the discussion of all Ahnell and Frieser do.
    “I think it would be a great idea to publish this list,” said O’Rourke, who suggested putting a special button on the city’s website.
    The lists are attached to the agenda posted online for the June 13 meeting.

By Rich Pollack

    Completion of a new luxury condominium complex as well as several large new homes has helped push property values in Highland Beach to record levels, surpassing those set prior to the economic downturn that began in 2008.
    The Palm Beach County Property Appraiser’s Office estimates the total 2017 taxable value of property in Highland Beach at $2.39 billion, surpassing the previous record of an estimated $2.3 billion in 2007.
    The $2.39 billion appraisal this year represents a 7.84 increase over 2016, when taxable property values in town reached $2.21 billion, surpassing the $2 billion mark for the first time since the Great Recession.
    One reason for this year’s increase, city leaders say, is the completion of 3200 S. Ocean, a 20-unit, luxury condominium complex with units starting at $1.4 million. In addition, there have been several expensive new homes built near the Intracoastal Waterway, or facing the ocean on sites where smaller homes were torn down.
    “We’ve had a lot of new construction in town,” Mayor Carl Feldman said.
    There has also been an increase in remodeling of older condominium units as new owners move in.  
    New construction and additions accounted for close to $52 million of taxable value, according to the property appraiser.
    The increase in property values could result in an additional $542,137 in tax revenue coming into town coffers if town leaders choose to keep the tax rate at $3.25 for every $1,000 of assessed value, according to Finance Director Cale Curtis.
    That is a big if, however, since the town is just starting the budget process and a final tax rate won’t be set for several months. How much the town will spend is still to be determined.
    “We don’t have all the final figures in yet,” Feldman said.
    In the past two years, as property values have increased, Highland Beach commissioners reduced the tax rate. In 2015, commissioners dropped the rate from $3.70 per $1,000 of assessed value to $3.50. Last year it dropped to the current tax rate of $3.25.   
    The Town Commission will hold budget planning sessions in the next few months that are open to residents.  
    In other news:
    Highland Beach commissioners voted to disband the town’s volunteer Code Enforcement Board and replace it with a special magistrate — who would act as a judge — to preside over contested code violation cases.
    Last month, commissioners voted to hire attorney William Doney, of the West Palm Beach firm of Caldwell Pacetti Edwards Schoech & Viator, to serve in that position at a rate of $185 per hour.
    The commission selected Diane James-Bigot as the alternate special magistrate.
    Doney, a member of the Florida Bar since 1977, specializes in municipal government and currently serves as a special magistrate in Lantana and Haverhill. He has previously been a special magistrate in Wellington, Mangonia Park and Loxahatchee Groves.
    Town officials say they expect the number of cases coming before Doney to be minimal since most residents and visitors comply with code-violation citations.
    Highland Beach is continuing to search for a full-time code enforcement officer, a newly funded position.

Caitlin Bovery, sea turtle rehabilitation assistant coordinator, records a video of Gumbo Limbo senior aquarist Keith Herman

and manager Leanne Welch as they dump plastic bottles into the center’s near-shore reef aquarium.

The bottles, 70 pounds’ worth, were collected from the beach and surrounding areas. The intent was

to show visitors how plastic and other debris create floating patches of garbage in oceans.

Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star

By Steve Plunkett
    
    First, numbers from the “Marine Debris Timeline” exhibit at the Gumbo Limbo Nature Center:
    • Two to four weeks: how long it takes a banana peel or paper cup to decompose in the ocean.
    • 10 to 20 years: the time a plastic shopping bag lingers in the water.
    • 450 years: the long life in the Atlantic Ocean of a disposable diaper.
    The numbers helped frame four days of special activities at Boca Raton’s wildlife sanctuary as center personnel observed World Oceans Day on June 8. The celebration included a coastal cleanup, the “trashing” of an aquarium with plastic bottles and creating a “blanket” of Mylar balloons collected from the city’s beaches.
    Ali Courtemanche and Sydney Jimenez, marine turtle specialists at Gumbo Limbo, needed only a week to gather 53 Mylar balloons left over from beach parties. Taped together, the balloons, which take 50 to 100 years to disintegrate, formed a blanket 21 feet long and 5 feet wide.
    World Oceans Day is intended to raise awareness of how manmade debris affects marine life. The marquee event at Gumbo Limbo was a contest to guess how much plastic was floating in the center’s near-shore reef aquarium.
    In a media-only event that Gumbo Limbo posted on its Facebook page, workers dumped tubs of plastic into the octagon-shaped pool.
    “That was really cool, something we have never done before,” environmental program coordinator Kristin Child said. “We just emptied 70 pounds of plastic bottles and assorted plastic containers into our near-shore reef aquarium, and it is floating around like the Pacific gyre,” an ocean garbage patch.
    Gumbo Limbo senior aquarist Keith Herman said the 70 pounds equaled one-tenth of the amount of plastic that humans drop into oceans around the globe each second.
    Herman decorated the center of the adjacent mangrove aquarium with 34.2 pounds of debris he picked up in just one hour walking on a path to the Intracoastal mangroves on the center’s property. He did not have to cover much ground to collect it.
    “I went within 20 to 30 feet on either side,” Herman said.
    Laura Reams, visiting from Maryland, came closest out of about 400 entries in guessing how many bottles were dumped in the Great Gumbo Garbage Patch.
    “She guesses 1,282 and the actual number was 1,306,” Child said.
    Reams’ prize was to become the adoptive mother of a sea turtle at Gumbo Limbo. Visitors usually donate $50 to adopt a resident turtle or $25 to adopt a hatchling.
    All the plastic in the aquarium was removed and recycled.
    “Please reduce, reuse, and recycle … you can make a difference!” the center urged its Facebook friends.
    Lanai Robinson, who made up the one-woman Team Honeybee, collected a winning 254 pieces of trash in the six-hour coastal cleanup contest June 10.
    “We did not go with weight, because it is easy to pick up big things and harder to pick up the small things,” Child said.
Robinson won a package of reusable water bottles, gloves, grabbers and sunscreen, so she could continue her cleanup work.
The Gumbo Limbo efforts were echoed the following Tuesday in City Hall.
Margaret FitzSimons and Cristina Hicks, the chair and vice chair of Boca Raton’s Green Living Advisory Board, asked City Council members to stop the use of plastic trash bags at the beaches.
    “This really undermines all of the work that Gumbo Limbo is doing to try to eliminate plastic just from our consumer cycle. It ends up in our oceans, and turtles think they’re jellyfish; they end up eating them. And we’re putting more turtles at the hospital at Gumbo Limbo because of that,” Hicks said.
    She and FitzSimons also asked that recycle bins be placed at the beaches.

By Steve Plunkett
    
    The year 2017 ushered in a new era of goal-setting for the City Council.
    For the first time, officials posted video of the sessions on Boca Raton’s website, and actions were given completion dates.
    Also, the council did not set five top goals and five high goals. Instead it tasked City Manager Leif Ahnell with making progress in 17 policy areas.
    “Give me the six that are most important to you,” said Lyle Sumek, the consultant who facilitates the sessions.
    Council member Scott Singer was the first to balk, citing the timeline he and his colleagues set for updating the city’s land development code.
    “Some of [the items] have more council action; some of them have less council action. It’s hard for me to prioritize that way,” Singer said.
    Council member Robert Weinroth agreed.
    “We’ve winnowed down hundreds of items to get to these, now 17, and I’m not quite sure whether there is a value to now winnowing it down any further,” he said, adding “these are all priorities.”
    Council member Andrea O’Rourke had similar ideas.
    “If we talk about business retention, expansion strategy and actions, and then compare that to, you know, the city campus master plan, I can’t compare those two in order,” O’Rourke said. “They’re both actions that need to be taken.”
    Ahnell said if all 17 items were staying on the list, the priorities did not matter.
    “We’re going to have to work on all of them,” the city manager said.
    The areas Ahnell’s staff will focus on developing policy choices for the council include the land development code; business retention, expansion strategy and action; and the city campus master plan.

    Others are:
    • the city’s economic development plan;
    • a smart city/technology business development strategy;
    • an innovation office;
    • development process streamlining;
    • human resource planning, succession planning and development/direction;
    • city services and staffing levels;
    • the Greater Boca Raton Beach & Park District;
    • a Florida Atlantic University campus agreement and town and gown workshop;
    • the university district conceptual master plan;
    • a complete streets policy;
    • a comprehensive waterfront master plan;
    • a downtown traffic alternative study;
    • the Midtown development;
    • and art in public places.
    The council also expects to open the city-owned Wildflower parcel on a temporary basis in September and have its seawall rebuilt, a pathway constructed and an overall design for a passive park completed in September 2018.
    Former Deputy Mayor Constance Scott, who now handles local relations for Florida Atlantic University, was disappointed that no top or high priorities were set, saying that lets the public know what is important to city leaders.
    “I believe in the process,” she said.
    Video of the goal-setting sessions is on the city’s myboca.us webpage. Click on Government, then Agendas & Minutes. The sessions were held May 4 and 5 with the follow-up workshop June 13. Ú

By Steve Plunkett
    
    The city-owned Wildflower parcel on the Intracoastal Waterway now has the papers to prove it’s a park.
    City Council members changed the site’s designation on Boca Raton’s comprehensive land-use plan to “recreation and open space” and rezoned the property as “public land.” Before, the 2.3-acre property at the northwest base of the Palmetto Park Road bridge was labeled “commercial” and zoned for “local business.”
    No members of the public commented on the changes at the council’s June 13 meeting. Neither did council members. The comp plan ordinance required at least four votes for adoption. It and the zoning ordinance both passed 5-0.
    Last July, council members changed part of the vacant parcel from residential to commercial to accommodate a long-planned restaurant. Boca Raton bought the land in 2009 for $7.5 million.
    But voters decided in November to reserve all city-owned land on the Intracoastal for “public recreation, public boating access, public streets, and city storm water uses only.”
    In other business, the council approved hiring Applied Technology and Management Inc. to provide engineering services for a seawater intake and pump station system for Gumbo Limbo Nature Center’s saltwater tanks.
    The previous month ATM won the contract to develop architectural plans for the restoration of Lake Wyman and Rutherford parks.

Delray Beach’s team wore pirate costumes during its presentation as the city earned an All-America City award

for the third time. From left are Mayor Cary Glickstein, Education Coordinator Janet Meeks and Joe Gillie,

retired president of the city’s Old School Square complex.

Photo provided

By Jane Smith
    
    The Delray Beach trio came to the All-America City convention with data to show the city had improved grade-level reading and reduced chronic absenteeism among kindergartners through third graders in its public schools.
    But what made Delray’s presentation stand out from those of the 26 other finalists at the Denver convention was the pirate skit — performed in costume.
    Delray Beach won the award from the National Civic League for the third time. It recognizes the best in civic innovation.
Education Coordinator Janet Meeks, Mayor Cary Glickstein and veteran performer Joe Gillie — the retired president of the Old School Square complex — represented Delray Beach at the mid-June convention.
    Meeks and Glickstein held up a treasure map while Gillie gave a dramatic reading of the journey the city made in reaching its grade-level reading goal. They wore tricorne hats, eye patches with skull-and-crossbones logos and long-sleeved navy T-shirts, each with an All-America patch on the upper left chest.
    “It was fun,” Meeks said. “We found gold through reading.”
    No other groups wore costumes at the convention, she said.
    The pirate skit was based on the Palm Beach County School District’s summer reading program, Meeks said. The district has four themes in this summer’s program, including one on pirates.
    The push for the award started in 2012 when the city joined the Civic League’s campaign to improve third-grade level reading levels.
    Delray Beach partnered with the school district to collect data for the city’s public schools from kindergarten through third grade.
    “The whole community worked together, scaling and aligning resources,” Meeks said. “We started with $14,000 to $15,000 of seed money, and now we have $5 million in resources,” including 50,000 books, donated over five years.

Critters in crisis discover

cops are friends — and saviors

Gulf Stream Police Chief Edward Allen holds Chief, a kitten rescued from construction debris.

Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star

Resident Peter Klein heard the kitten’s meowing for help from under this mountain of lumber.

By Arden Moore

    Members of the Gulf Stream Police Department stand ready to assist anyone in their coastal town, and that includes those who meow, waddle or swim. In a recent four-day span, a tiny orphaned kitten, seven trapped ducklings and a tangled sea turtle owed their gratitude — and their lives — to police officers who patrol this 2-mile stretch of A1A and part of U.S. 1.
    Chief Edward Allen, who rose up the ranks and now heads this department in his 29th year of service, has learned to expect anything and everything when it comes to patrolling this community that swells up to only about 900 during snowbird season.
    “As a police department in a small community, we don’t have animal control or other departments that bigger cities have, so our department must be adaptable and be able to do a little bit of everything,” says Allen. “But even I must admit, that was one unusual week when it came to critters needing our help.”
    The triple rescue began on a Wednesday when Gulf Stream resident Peter Klein was taking a walk through his once-quiet neighborhood now disrupted by construction crews building large homes in various stages of completion surrounding Klein’s home. “Construction activity in Gulf Stream has been proceeding at an unprecedented pace,” says Klein, a corporate attorney. “With all this activity, there is plenty of debris everywhere and there are plenty of opportunities for animals to get into trouble.”
    During his walk, Klein zeroed in on a strange sound coming from a residential construction site across from his home. As he got closer to a high stack of construction debris, he cringed as he identified the source of the sounds.
    “Mew! Mew! Mew!” came urgent and loud cries from a tiny kitten trapped under the mountain of lumber with nails jutting out, concrete pieces and old scaffolding.  
    “I couldn’t see this kitten, but definitely knew he was tiny and he was scared,” says Klein, who with his wife, Jennifer, happily share their homes with a few cats. “This kitten had the lungs of Pavarotti. It was evident he was in distress and it was truly heartbreaking.”
    Recognizing it was too dangerous to attempt to remove the debris to reach the trapped feline, he tried contacting the construction project manager. Without a response, he then headed to the Gulf Stream Town Hall and told employee Rebecca Tew about the kitten.
    “I went back home and within 10 minutes, it seemed like the entire day shift of the Gulf Stream Police Department rolled onto the site,” Klein says. “Two more town employees also arrived. These guys dug in and shifted every piece of rotten wood on the pile and under the bottom piece, discovered a feral kitten aged 3 to 4 weeks.”
    In the hot sun, Allen supervised and helped as Lt. John Haseley, Sgt. John Passeggiata, Officer Randy Wilson, plus maintenance employees Brian Dietrick and Wayne Songer spent about 45 minutes to remove the pile. As soon as the kitten was spotted, Songer scooped him up in his gloved hand. Jennifer Klein then placed the kitten in a pet carrier.
    “I told them that despite sweating inside your blue uniforms and bulletproof vests, you got right in there and saved a life today,” says Peter Klein.
    The Kleins then drove this injured and dehydrated kitten to the Colonial Animal Hospital in Boynton Beach for medical care.
“He weighed 9 ounces, had lesions on his face caused from rubbing against the wood and was dehydrated,” describes Klein. “I’m about $680 into veterinary bills for him, but he has definitely found a home with us. He is healing and definitely playful.”

Gulf Stream Police Chief Edward Allen and Peter Klein with Chief, the kitten police officers saved

after Klein heard the kitten crying at a construction site.

‘He was tiny and he was scared,‘ said Klein, who kept the cat.

Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star

    Coming up with a name for this kitten was easy for the Kleins.
    “We named him Chief in honor of Chief Allen,” says Klein. “He was in charge of the rescue and he mobilized these guys. He was the boss and I figured this little kitten will be the boss of me.”
    Allen learned of the kitten’s name a day after the rescue.
    “When I first heard this, I thought they were joking, but I realize it is a compliment to me. And yes, this is the first time I’ve had a cat named after me,” says Allen.  
    Three days later, the Gulf Stream police answered two more rescue calls. Two paddle boarders alerted Sgt. Bernard O’Donnell that they spotted a sea turtle entangled in fishing line out in the ocean. Two more people on water scooters assisted in bringing the turtle to shore and removing the tangled line.
    A team from the Gumbo Limbo Nature Center in Boca Raton arrived and transported this 300-pound turtle to the center’s sea turtle rehab facility to care for him while he recoveries from his injuries.
    And later that day, police rescued ducklings in distress. O’Donnell and Officer Ramon Batista answered the call concerning seven ducklings trapped inside a storm drain. They were able to remove the grate from the drain and scoop out the ducklings, which quickly waddled to be reunited with their relieved mother.
    All in a day’s work in Gulf Stream, right, Chief?
    “We certainly had a run on animals in need that week, but we are very glad that everything turned out great,” he said. “We never know what the day will hold for us being in this small town, but it is definitely rewarding to do something for a good cause.”

Arden Moore, founder of www.FourLeggedLife.com, is an animal behavior consultant, editor, author, professional speaker and master certified pet first aid instructor. Each week, she hosts the popular Oh Behave! show on www.PetLifeRadio.com. Learn more by visiting www.fourleggedlife.com.

By Steve Plunkett

    Officer Nubia Plesnik, part of the police team that charged former Vice Mayor Richard Lucibella with resisting arrest last fall, has filed a lawsuit against him claiming battery and negligence.
    Lucibella “committed a battery upon [Plesnik] by intentionally causing harmful or offensive contact with [her] by pushing [her] and further physically contacting her during the course of the arrest,” Plesnik’s lawsuit says.
    In a second count, the suit alleges Lucibella’s actions were negligent.
    As a result, the suit says, Plesnik “has suffered and will suffer bodily injury and resulting pain and suffering, disability, disfigurement, inconvenience, mental anguish, loss of the capacity for the enjoyment of life, expense of hospitalization and/or surgery, medical and nursing care and treatment and related expenses, loss of earnings, loss of the ability to earn money in the future, and/or an aggravation of previously existing conditions.”
    Lucibella has $10 million in insurance for personal liability. Plesnik’s suit says she is seeking at least $15,000 in damages, the legal threshold.
    Richard Slinkman, her lawyer, said Plesnik only wants what a jury feels is fair and just.
    “I can tell you that I do not expect such to be in excess of Mr. Lucibella’s $10 million insurance policy,” Slinkman said.
    The complaint was filed in Palm Beach County Circuit Court on June 6, but as of June 27 Lucibella had not been handed the lawsuit.
    “He is evading service,” Slinkman said.
    Lucibella did not answer a phone call seeking comment.
    Ocean Ridge Police Chief Hal Hutchins said Plesnik and fellow arresting Officer Richard Ermeri both returned to full duty as soon as they were cleared by their physicians.
    “No special assignments were made to accommodate them,” Hutchins said.
    But Plesnik has not fully recovered, Slinkman said.
    “Though she can fully perform the functions and duties of a police officer, she suffers from pain in her shoulder with activities, including necessary physical activities on the job,” he said.
    Lucibella faces a felony charge of resisting arrest with violence; after reviewing the case the state attorney’s office added a felony charge of battery on a law enforcement officer. The battery charge covers Ermeri only; the resisting arrest with violence covers Ermeri “and/or N. Plesnik ... by offering or doing violence to the person of such officers,” the charging document says.
    Lucibella also is charged with misdemeanor use of a firearm while under the influence of alcohol. He has pleaded not guilty to all charges.
    Lucibella’s trial, originally scheduled for April and then July, is now postponed until October. His criminal defense attorney, Marc Shiner, and Assistant State Attorney Danielle Grundt told the judge they could not finish depositions in time for a summer trial.
    Plesnik, Ermeri and Sgt. William Hallahan went to Lucibella’s oceanfront home Oct. 22 after neighbors reported hearing shots fired. They confiscated a .40-caliber handgun and found five spent shell casings on the backyard patio.
    With Lucibella was one of the officers’ supervisors, Lt. Steven Wohlfiel. Both men were “obviously intoxicated,” the police said.
During the arrest, Lucibella was pinned to the patio pavers and suffered injuries to his face and ribs. Shiner has said the officers overreacted.
    Plesnik and Ermeri said in their initial police reports that they went to MD Now, the department-approved urgent care center, Plesnik for “injuries to the left side of my body,” including shoulder, arm, wrist and foot.
    Plesnik, who was hired by Ocean Ridge in March 2013, also reported being placed on restricted duty.
    Officers later determined the confiscated handgun belonged to Wohlfiel, who was fired in January for his role in the incident. He is appealing his dismissal.
    Wohlfiel’s lawyer, Ralph King, petitioned a circuit judge on May 31 to order Town Manager Jamie Titcomb to hold an evidentiary hearing that is required by the town’s charter and would allow Wohlfiel to present and confront witnesses. Wohlfiel also wants back pay until the hearing can be held.
    Town Attorney Brian Shutt would not comment on the Wohlfiel case other than to say Ocean Ridge’s insurance company has hired a lawyer to defend the town.
    Lucibella resigned his vice mayor and town commissioner positions in December.

By Lona O'Connor

    Please don’t call Stanley Althof a sexologist, even though he is the recipient of a lifetime achievement award named for Masters and Johnson, two of the most famous names in sex research.
    “I’m a psychologist specializing in sexual medicine,” he says.
    He is sitting on a loveseat in his West Palm Beach office, under a reproduction of The Kiss, a famous Gustav Klimt painting of lovers embracing.
    Aside from that one genteel reference to sex, you would be hard-pressed to know that this is the office where Althof helps individuals and couples untangle the most intimate aspects of their lives.
    Althof, who lives in Lantana with his wife, Marcie, has long been involved in the process of selecting human subjects for drug trials, including those to correct erectile dysfunction.
    At the moment, he is seeking male subjects for the medical trial of a new drug for premature ejaculation. Premature ejaculation can be episodic or fleeting; each man’s physiology and temperament are different. Or it can continue a long time, sometimes triggered by disease or surgery.
    The men he seeks for the drug trial must be between the ages of 18 and 60, healthy and in a relationship lasting six months or longer. They cannot have problems with substance or alcohol abuse and they must have suffered from premature ejaculation for a long period of time.
    Althof’s practice has focused on all aspects of sexual function, as well as counseling transgender surgery candidates. He has also worked with medical professionals accused of sexual misconduct, and he ran the sexual health center at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland.
    Considered a “key opinion leader” in the field, he has written more than 150 medical articles and developed questionnaires for subjects of drug efficacy trials for Viagra and Cialis.
    The new drug, called IX-01, is being developed by Althof’s longtime associate Ian Osterloh, one of the researchers who identified the active ingredient of Viagra for erectile dysfunction.
    Althof assisted Osterloh in the selection of test subjects for Viagra, and when Osterloh later formed his own company and bought the rights to develop IX-01 to treat premature ejaculation, Althof was a natural choice to help find test subjects. He and others are collecting about 200 subjects nationwide for the trial.
    IX-01, now in its second round of human trials, decreases the amount of oxytocin in the body. In studies on mice, less oxytocin lengthens the time before ejaculation.
    Other researchers tried using a similar method, but with no success. “They were on the right track with the wrong drug,” Althof said, “The drug didn’t penetrate the blood-brain barrier. This one does.”
    So far, IX-01 has helped test subjects to delay ejaculation three to four times longer, with few side effects. The federal Food and Drug Administration has given the go-ahead for Osterloh’s company to increase the dosage in the second round of tests.
    Althof is not surprised that he has gotten calls from women.
     “Women are often frustrated or angry that their partner doesn’t do anything,” he said. “I’ve already had two or three calls from women asking about the study.”
    After phase 2 of the study is done, a third trial will take place with many more subjects. Then the researchers must present their data to the FDA for consideration. If all goes well, the drug could be on the market in about two years.
    At the moment, IX-01 is the only product being developed by Osterloh’s company, Ixchelsis.
    “There’s a large market for this,” Althof said. “You’re talking millions in research.”
    But not millions for Althof.
    “I get paid a consulting fee, that’s it,” he said. “If the drug works, I don’t get any money.”

A love story at home
    Aside from his work in sex therapy, Althof has a love story of his own.
    Back in the 1960s, Althof’s girlfriend was Marcie Sothern. Their families lived on the same block in Manhattan. But their paths diverged when Althof went to Stuyvesant High School and Marcie attended the High School of Performing Arts.
    They married other people, had families and lost touch for decades. Then, a few years ago, Althof was introduced to the son of the ex-wife of an old friend. The man was new to Cleveland, so Althof invited him to dinner. As they talked, the man mentioned that he worked for Weight Watchers.
    “Oh,” said Althof, “then you must know Marcie Sothern, Carole’s daughter. I dated her in high school.”
    “You dated Carole’s daughter?” the man stammered. “She’s my boss!”
    Carole Sothern founded Weight Watchers’ Palm Beach County franchise and her daughter — married name Marcie Sothern Gorman — later took over as the franchise CEO.
    Both Gorman and Althof were single again and this time they married. That was 15 years ago.
    “And that was without the internet,” Althof said with a smile.
    He moved his practice from Cleveland to accommodate his wife’s many connections here. While Gorman was still a teen, her family had moved to Hollywood, and she attended South Broward High School and the University of Florida.
    After moving on from her duties at Weight Watchers, she returned to her high school specialty, theater, becoming the producer of numerous musicals at the Kravis Center in West Palm Beach.
    It looks like a match that was meant to be.
    “Marcie in her own right and I in my own right were successful,” Althof said. “Our families knew each other. But it’s all about love.”

    For more information about the drug trial for IX-01, contact Stanley Althof at sxa6@case.edu or phone his office at 822-5454.

Lona O’Connor has a lifelong interest in health and healthy living. Send column ideas to Lona13@bellsouth.net.

By Christine Davis

    Boca Raton Regional Hospital’s Marcus Neuroscience Institute has initiated a phase-two clinical trial of the immunotoxin MDNA55 in the treatment of patients with recurrent malignant brain tumors.
    Highly toxic to brain tumor cells, MDNA55 targets a cytokine, interleukin 4, which is found on the surface of most recurrent brain tumors. A protein derived from a bacterium associated with pneumonias and skin, tissue and urinary tract infections, MDNA55 is considered a targeted therapy because it is made to attach only to tumor cells. Most normal brain cells have no interleukin 4. As such, the trial aims to kill brain tumor cells and not harm healthy cells.
    The immunotoxin gets to the tumor through convection enhanced delivery, which is a therapy that introduces medication to the brain through tiny catheters implanted in the tumor for several hours.
    “Research to date on the therapy has been encouraging. In previous studies, complete or partial responses were seen in 56 percent of patients with these tumors,” said Dr. Frank Vrionis, director of the Marcus Neuroscience Institute. “Given those promising results, this therapy has received fast-track designation by the FDA, which expedites the development and review of drugs through trials such as ours.”
    Because of the nature of these malignancies and the complexity of the brain, long-term remissions can be difficult to obtain.
    “Recurrences, regretfully, are the norm despite radiotherapy, surgery and chemotherapy,” said Dr. Sajeel Chowdhary, director of neuro-oncology at the institute. “When they occur, options are limited, as most patients have already received all known available treatments. Our investigation into the use of immunotherapy for them is of the utmost importance and has the potential to pay great dividends.”
    The MDNA55 trial is one of 10 at Boca Regional’s Marcus Neuroscience and Lynn Cancer institutes that are investigating brain tumors, and part of a clinical research initiative between the hospital and Florida Atlantic University’s Charles E. Schmidt College of Medicine.
    For information and enrollment, call Boca Raton Regional Hospital’s Office of Research at 955-4800.
                                
    In May, Boca Raton Regional Hospital received the 2017 American Heart Association/American Stroke Association’s Get With The Guidelines — Stroke Gold Plus Quality Achievement Award with Target: StrokeSM Honor Roll Elite. The award recognizes the hospital’s continued success in providing up-to-date, evidence-based treatment guidelines to improve patient care and outcomes in the community.
                                
    Patricio Espinosa, MD, MPH, was appointed chief of neurology at Boca Raton Regional Hospital’s Marcus Neuroscience Institute. He joined the medical staff at the institute in December 2014 and served as director of neurology since December 2015.

    In his new duties, Espinosa will lead the program’s team of neurologists and provide support to the institute’s clinical and research efforts. He offers specialized expertise in adult neurology, epilepsy and sleep disorders.
                                
    Delray Medical Center performed its first incisionless surgery to treat heartburn.
The transoral incisionless fundoplication procedure, or TIF, uses a new device for the treatment of gastroesophageal reflux disease.
    Many patients on reflux medication cannot eat certain foods or need to sleep sitting up. Also, long-term use of medication can lead to inadequate absorption of minerals, resulting in bone fractures, explained Dr. Andrew Zwick, gastroenterologist at Delray Medical Center.
    “After the TIF procedure, clinical trials show that most patients can eat and drink foods they avoided for many years. Reflux no longer impacts their life like it previously did.”  Because the procedure is incisionless, there is less pain, reduced recovery and no scar. 
                                
    Congestive heart failure is on the rise, affecting more than 5 million people in the United States. Doctors at Bethesda Heart Hospital and Bethesda’s Research Center, in conjunction with Research Physicians Alliance, are studying a treatment for chronic heart failure through a national clinical trial, DREAM-HF-1.
    Using stem cells, this study aims to enhance the function of the heart muscle by regenerating heart tissue. The treatment involves obtaining stem cells from healthy donors, which are later injected into the heart muscles of study participants via catheterization procedures.
    Cardiologist George K. Daniel, M.D., is the principal investigator, with medical cardiologist Christina Michael, M.D., evaluating the study patients.  For more information, call Bethesda Health Research Center at 374-5020.
                                
    Boca Raton-based Cancer Treatment Centers of America Global has appointed Ankur R. Parikh, D.O., as medical director of precision medicine.
                                
    Whether it’s a silver bullet or snake oil, sales of the essential oil copaiba are increasing, because more than 54 million Americans suffer from some form of arthritis, and side effects of conventional treatment include gastrointestinal bleeding, heart attacks and stroke.
    As a result, new therapies are being tested, including Copaifera reticulata, or copaiba, but researchers from Florida Atlantic University caution that randomized trials are necessary to know whether this treatment is effective, and their commentary is published in the journal Integrative Medicine.
    “The only published data on copaiba on humans includes one case series and one small randomized trial of another inflammatory condition and not arthritis. To complete the totality of evidence, copaiba should be first tested in a randomized trial against a placebo in patients with inflammatory arthritis,” said Charles H. Hennekens, M.D., Dr.P.H., senior academic adviser to the dean at FAU’s Charles E. Schmidt College of Medicine and senior author of the paper.
    “If such a trial shows a net benefit, then the next step would be direct randomized comparisons against nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs and cyclo-oxygenase-2 inhibitors,” the two common conventional treatments.
Send health news to Christine Davis at cdavis9797@gmail.com