By Jane Smith

    Boynton Beach’s Community Redevelopment Agency picked the highest bidder, The Collage Cos. of Lake Mary, to do the third phase at the city marina.
    CRA Assistant Director Michael Simon explained that the three companies were ranked on their qualifications and responses to the request for proposals. “Rankings were based on the RFP,” he said. “It was not a low-bid situation.”
    The lowest bidder was Lunacon Construction Group of Miami, at $545,795. The second lowest bidder was West Construction Inc. of Lake Worth, at $650,991.80. Collage Cos. came in at $785,612.
    Collage also built the harbor master building and fuel docks at the marina, completed in February 2015 at a cost of $974,545.
    “A few years ago for the harbor master building, we were the low bidder. The same firm that’s ranked No. 1 now got the bid,” said Matthew West, vice president of West Construction. “For us, due to what appears to be something very clear going on, we are no longer going to participate in procurement opportunities for the Boynton Beach CRA — should the board decide to move forward with this and take staff’s recommendation.”
    CRA board member Mack McCray asked Simon whether there was anything going on.
Simon said, “No, nothing.”
    The project includes a new marina boardwalk entrance with a seat wall, lighting, landscaping, existing roadway realignment and improvement. The total project cost will be $943,704, which covers Collage’s bid of $785,612, $35,000 for new hardwood to match the wood used in the project’s finished phases and a 15 percent contingency fee.
    The CRA board, composed of five city commissioners, voted 3-2 in favor of the staff’s proposal.
    Board member Justin Katz voted no. “I’m not in favor of green space just for the sake of having green space,” he said. He wanted to see more active uses to draw people to the marina.
    “We need something more attention-grabbing to put the marina on the map, even more so than it is already,” he said.
    He admitted that he did not have a business idea in mind.
    Board member Joe Casello also voted no. He was against demolishing the old dive shop, which needed county approval. The county gave a $2 million grant in 2006 to preserve the marina and keep it open to the public.
    “We didn’t explore enough what could be done with that building,” Casello said. “I’m not in favor of a plain vanilla plan that doesn’t show any imagination.”

By Jane Smith

    The city will soon ask private firms to submit development plans for its four-block Town Square, the Boynton Beach City Commission decided in July.
     Commissioners want the proposals to include the 1927 historic high school, the library, the Schoolhouse Children’s Museum and the amphitheater. The proposals also should contain a new City Hall and green space with entrance features at Ocean Avenue. City Hall would be moved off Boynton Beach Boulevard, considered premium development space.
     The commission will entertain offers of moving the police headquarters and Fire Station No. 1 out of Town Square. Some possibilities discussed include: a combination building in the Heart of Boynton to help jump-start that area; a police headquarters built on city property on High Ridge Road adjacent to the Fire Rescue Emergency Operations Center; or a new Fire Station No. 1 built on AmeriGas property on Federal Highway, recently purchased by the city’s Community Redevelopment Agency.
     The most important thing, said Assistant City Manager Colin Groff, is for the commissioners to remain flexible in their request and “allow the market to drive the private uses.”
     That’s why he suggested an option for the high school that would allow development teams to keep the façade and footprint or re-create the historical portions of the school.
     That option did not sit well with the Save Boynton High group, which staged a rally last August when the then-mayor had called for the building’s demolition.
     Group member, Susan Oyer, said she wants to see the high school contain civic uses from three other nearby city buildings — Civic Center, Madsen Center and the Art Center — that will be demolished. She also wants to allow commercial space for restaurants, art galleries, gift shops and event space for weddings, reunions and other receptions to take place there.
     The city’s Community Redevelopment Agency recently received a $100,000 federal grant that it can use to help stabilize the high school. The grant has to be matched, which the CRA can do easily. Last fall then-Mayor Jerry Taylor directed the CRA to set aside $200,000 for demolishing the nearly 90-year-old building. He later changed his mind.
     A snag could come from the outcome of a lawsuit filed by architect Juan Contin. In 2013, he sued the city after his plan to turn the high school into an event center was approved by the City Commission then denied by a zoning vote.
     In arguing recently against the city’s motion to dismiss, his attorney David Sales called the Boynton Beach commission decision “goofy.” The case remains open in Circuit Court.
     The City Commission will review the Town Square proposal in September before it is sent out to the development community. Then the commission will wait about six months for the teams to send in their proposals. It will be at least a year until shovels go in the ground, said City Manager Lori LaVerriere.
     When the proposals return, then the city will know better what its costs will be for the new police headquarters and Fire Station No. 1, Groff said.
     A combined headquarters and fire station would cost an estimated $30 million, a separate police headquarters building on High Ridge Road would cost about $28 million and a new fire station would cost about $5 million, according to city documents.
     But costs could be lower depending on how the design teams propose developing Town Square, Groff said.
     The commission would then decide how to pay for the public safety buildings, possibly through a general obligation bond or a revenue bond.

By Dan Moffett

    Already lagging months behind schedule, Gulf Stream’s project to move its utilities underground faces a new obstacle in a lawsuit filed by the town’s litigious resident Chris O’Hare.
    In a complaint to Palm Beach County Circuit Court, O’Hare argues the town should not use money from its general fund to pay for the project because that unfairly burdens residents in the Place au Soleil subdivision, which is west of the Intracoastal Waterway and already has its utilities underground.
    O’Hare says the town was supposed to pay for the underground project through a special assessment on homeowners who would benefit from it. Place au Soleil residents were exempted from the assessment, O’Hare says, and their tax dollars in the general fund shouldn’t be used to pay for work in other neighborhoods.
    “When the cost of the project exceeded the revenue raised by the special assessments on the specifically benefited property in the limited portion of the town,” O’Hare says in the suit, “… the town ignored its earlier legislative findings and chose to use general funds to make up the deficit. This imposes an ad valorem tax burden on properties in the un-benefitted area.”
    In May, the Town Commission unanimously approved taking roughly $570,000 out of the general fund to cover the estimated cost overruns in the project’s second phase. Town Manager William Thrasher said the town had to use the general revenues because it stipulated six years ago when the project began that there would be no additional assessments.
    Thrasher told commissioners that Place au Soleil accounts for about 8.5 percent of the town’s total taxable value, so the subdivision would account for about $45,500 of the project’s additional cost.
    “We were moving ahead quite well on phase two,” said Mayor Scott Morgan. “I thought we had the wind behind the sails. However I was served with a lawsuit at my home by Mr. O’Hare seeking an injunction to stop the underground project with a declaration from the courts that it should be paid by the phase two residents, not out of the town’s general fund.
    “And of course with Mr. O’Hare, always a claim for monetary damages. I don’t know what effect this will have on the undergrounding that we have struggled to put in place and advance.”
    Morgan said the town intends to contest O’Hare’s suit and keep the project moving.
     In recent weeks, attorneys for the town have won decisions in other suits filed by O’Hare and Martin O’Boyle, who have dozens of cases pending against Gulf Stream:
     • A three-judge panel at the Fourth District Court of Appeal upheld a 2-year-old lower court ruling that rejected O’Boyle’s claim that the town overcharged him for copying 4,573 pages of public records. “The Town was authorized to charge up to 15 cents for page,” the court said in ruling against O’Boyle. “It charged only 11 cents per page.”
     • Palm Beach County Circuit Judge Meenu Sasser dismissed with prejudice a  3-year-old suit O’Hare filed over the town’s rejection of permits for renovation of his home. Sasser said O’Hare had failed to “exhaust his administrative remedies” with the town before coming to court.
    • U.S. Magistrate Judge William Matthewman issued a blistering rebuke of O’Boyle over a subpoena for a deposition in a federal case. In ruling against O’Boyle, Matthewman charged that he had “made false statements and wasted the time of this Court” and “blatantly failed to comply” with federal rules. The judge called O’Boyle’s claims “frivolous” and said his behavior constituted “misconduct.”
    In other business: Commissioners have approved a tax rate for the 2016-17 budget of 4.59, or $4.59 per $1,000 of assessed taxable value — 4.1 percent below the rollback rate of 4.79. Included in the new budget is $650,000 to cover legal expenses, down from $1 million last year. Property values in Gulf Stream have risen 5.5 percent to $1.02 billion over the last year.
    • On July 11, Vice Mayor Robert Ganger resigned the seat on the Town Commission he has held since 2012.
    “My physicians have advised me that I need to concentrate on recovery of mental processes that were lost when I had a stroke in April 2016,” Ganger wrote in a letter to Morgan. “I began a long therapy program today and am optimistic of that outcome.
    “Needless to say, my support of the town and its commission is enduring, and I hope to find ways to support your efforts as my recovery progresses.”

Delray Beach code enforcement officers Joe Lucarelli (left) and Robenson Dejardian (blue shirt in rear)

walk with beach visitors accompanied by their service dog. The visitors — who declined to be identified —

are permitted to bring their service dog to the beach. Lucarelli monitors the beach shortly after sunrise

several days a week as part of a stepped-up effort to reduce the number of animals on the city beach.

Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star

By Rich Pollack

    The honeymoon is over for people who violate Delray Beach’s ordinance prohibiting dogs or any other animals on the city’s public beach.
    Beginning this month, police and code enforcement officers will be writing citations to violators, with those citations carrying a $50 fine for uncontested citations or a $125 fine if the citation is disputed.
    As part of a stepped-up effort to reduce the number of animals on the beach — mainly dogs — code enforcement officers and police officers issued 11 written warnings to violators through the first 29 days of last month, according to city records.
    Several of those citations have been written by Joe Lucarelli, a Delray Beach code enforcement officer who is on the beach shortly after sunrise several days a week in an effort to ensure dogs don’t get to the public beach where kids could be playing or others could be sunbathing.
    “This phase is an educational phase,” Lucarelli said late last month.
    While there have been one or two dog owners who were unhappy with increased efforts to enforce the local ordinance, Lucarelli said the majority of violators have been cooperative.
    “Most of the people take the warning without attitude,” he said.
    Some beach visitors are accompanied by service dogs, which are permitted.
    During the current enforcement effort, Lucarelli has heard a variety of excuses, with some residents telling him they were unaware of the pet ban.
    To ensure awareness, the city has placed signs along State Road A1A at most of the walkways leading to the beach. Some residents, however, still say they didn’t know about the rules.
    One of those residents is Laura Santos, who brought her 7½-year-old miniature pinscher, Isabella, to the beach shortly after Lucarelli and another code enforcement officer, Robenson Dejardian, had left.
    Santos said she was aware of efforts to step up enforcement of the ban, but had been told by other residents that it was OK to bring her pet to the ocean. When she learned that the ordinance was indeed in effect and that citations will be issued, Santos decided to leave.
    “I want to be able to bring my dog to the beach but if I can’t, I won’t,” she said. “I’m not going to come here and get a ticket.”
    Santos said she can understand the concerns of residents worried about the possible health hazard that could result from dogs on the beach.
    While she is conscientious about picking up after Isabella, she said she has seen some dog owners who are not as responsible.
    Concerns about noncompliance with the city’s ordinance surfaced during a May City Commission workshop meeting in which a proposed pilot program for a designated dog beach was shot down.
    While there were many proponents of the pilot program, an equal number of residents told commissioners they worried that dogs on the beach posed a health and safety issue and complained that the city ordinance wasn’t being followed.
    Prior to the stepped-up enforcement that began in June with awareness and educational outreach campaigns, no citations for violations of the ordinance had been written by police officers this year, according to city records. Only nine citations had been written in 2015.
    Delray Beach police officers are part of the stepped up enforcement effort and have been issuing written warnings. The Police Department also enlisted volunteers and community service aides to increase awareness, but they are no longer active in the effort because they don’t have ticket-writing authority.

By Jane Smith

    Special events will be reviewed — again — this month.
    This time, Delray Beach city commissioners will approve a policy that follows directives given last year, while providing flexibility for city staff and promoters. The policy will go into effect Oct. 1, the start of the city’s budget year.
    Commissioners want to limit the number of events that would close major streets to just one a month and seek full cost recovery for city staff, property, equipment and other items needed for the festivals. Some also want to ban festivals from the Old School Square grounds, owned by the city.
    “There was a time when we wanted anything and everything and we got it, and then some,” Mayor Cary Glickstein said. “We are not that town today.”  
    At the July 5 commission meeting, he said, “Despite the popular myth out there on social media, the commission is not looking to get rid of events.”
    Since late spring, city staff has been using a guideline created by the special events task force. Delray Beach city staff, event promoters and representatives of the Downtown Development Authority, Old School Square, the Delray Beach Marketing Cooperative and the Greater Delray Beach Chamber of Commerce provided input.
    A smaller group meets monthly to review the festivals.
    The city commissioners listed six major events they want to host or see happen in the downtown: Veterans Day Parade in November, holiday parade and events in December, tennis tournament in February, St. Patrick’s Day Parade in March, Delray Affair in April and July Fourth events. No other major events are allowed in those months in the downtown core.
    The Howard Fine Arts Festival already secured the 2017 dates of Jan. 21 and 22 when it will close a section of East Atlantic Avenue, east of the Intracoastal Waterway. The main road closing and multiple days held classify the festival as a major event.
    Nearly every event saw its costs double after the city’s finance department figured out a way to bill organizers for city salaries, benefits and pension expenses.

Garlic Fest finds new venue
    The Delray Beach Garlic Fest was the first event to test the process. Festival organizer Nancy Stewart-Franczak selected February dates, the same month as the Delray Beach Open, considered a major event.
    The commission, without the mayor, was deadlocked in June about whether she could hold the 18-year-old festival in February because the Tennis Center has booked the Delray Beach Open for that month. Dates for the two events don’t overlap, but city staff starts working on the tennis 10 days before it starts. That work conflicts with the Garlic Fest proposed dates of Feb. 10 to 12.
    The multiple days and the city’s estimated cost of $61,000 put the Garlic Fest into a major event category.
    But Stewart-Franczak pulled her appeal at the July 5 commission meeting.
    She will move the fest to John Prince Park, a county property that sits west of Lake Worth.
    “We will have more of everything — bigger bands, more vendors,” she said. The Garlic Fest will be able to offer amusement rides because it received special approval, she said. It will be held Feb. 10-12.
    “It was a blessing that we were not approved,” she said. “We were trying to follow the rules, but it never felt right to reduce the size of the festival.”
    The event will still be fenced, but it will now be called the South Florida Garlic Fest.
    In late July, Stewart-Franczak also pulled the application for the 5th Annual Wine & Seafood Festival, slated for Nov. 12 and 13 on the Old School Square grounds. Her letter said there wasn’t enough time to plan the festival. She thanked the city team for working with her on the event, which was estimated to cost $44,204 in city services. The festival raises money for the Greater Delray Beach Chamber of Commerce and provides rental income for Old School Square.
    The mayor, though, would like to ban events from the Old School Square grounds. “At the end of the season, it looks more like the South Florida Fairgrounds than the historic park and public gathering place it was intended to be,” he said.
    Glickstein objects to the chain-link fencing the festivals use to close off the event to nonpaying customers. The fencing, he said, “sends the wrong message for how a city should maintain a public, historic property.”  Old School Square is on the National Register of Historic Places.
    The city and its Community Redevelopment Agency are spending more than $1 million this budget year and next to repair and replace roofs on the Old School Square complex, paint the buildings and fix underlying problems with the grounds. The City Commission and the CRA board will have a joint meeting Aug. 23 to discuss progress at the Old School Square.
    Once that work is finished by December, “it should be beautifully maintained as an historic park,” Glickstein said, “rarely closed to the public, and with ample walkways, shade trees and places for people to sit and gather without competing with special event schedules.”
    Although the Old School Square organization will see a loss of income by not renting to the festival promoters, Glickstein predicts it will see an increase in its endowment.
    “People want to know their donations are investments in truly public assets, not assistance to private promoters,” he said.  Overall, he wants to see more of a team approach to vetting special events, to include city staff and public safety employees, residents and business owners, along with the event promoters.
    “In August, we’ll decide all of this,” Commissioner Jordana Jarjura said.

By Mary Thurwachter

    Thanks to a $500,000 state grant, approved by the Florida Legislature earlier this year, plans to renovate the old Juvenile Justice building at 901 N. Eighth St. off Lantana Road are rolling along. The building, on the northeast corner of the former A.G. Holley property, will become the new digs for the Police Department.
    The Town Council formally approved the grant agreement with the state Department of Economic Opportunity at its July 25 meeting.
    The building, currently uninhabitable, had sustained extensive water damage from a leaky roof.
    The grant will be used for improvements, including mold mitigation, air conditioning replacement, plumbing, electrical work, and outdoor improvements such as fencing, paving and landscaping.
    Mayor Dave Stewart said the grant is significant. “The town takes in just under $3 million in property taxes, so when you talk about getting a $500,000 grant it’s like 20 percent residents won’t have to pay,” he said.
    “The process will begin by awarding a contract to an architect, who will revise and prepare architectural drawings for this project,” said Lantana Police Cmdr. Robert Hagerty. “Once we have these, we will be advertising a request for proposals from local contractors to complete the scope of work determined for this building. We anticipate being able to move in by July 1 of 2017, or sooner.”
    For the past several years, the state-owned building has been used for training police officers and sheriff’s deputies.
    Lantana has a lease on the building through 2048.
    Stewart wanted the building, next to Lantana’s new Sports Complex, to be used as a recreational facility, but other council members preferred the plan to turn the 10,000-square-foot building into a police department. Currently, the department is housed in two smaller buildings next to Town Hall at 500 Greynolds Circle.
    The new location will put police in close proximity of Water Tower Commons, a retail and residential complex being developed on Lantana Road east of I-95.
    The present police buildings will be used to house other town departments.

By Mary Thurwachter
 
    The economy has had its ups and downs during the past eight years, but one thing hasn’t changed: Lantana’s tax rate. It’s been $3.24 and is projected to stay the same for the ninth consecutive year, 2016-2017.
    On July 11, the Town Council set the proposed rate at $3.24 per $1,000 of taxable value. Two budget workshops have been held already and public hearings are scheduled for 5:30 p.m. Sept. 12 and Sept. 26 in council chambers.
    Anticipated property tax revenues for 2017 are $2,753,485, up $282,048 from 2016’s revenues.
    “Property taxes are projected to account for 21.5 percent of the anticipated revenues in the current fiscal year and are expected to increase to 27.8 percent for the new fiscal year,” said Town Manager Deborah Manzo.
    Lantana received notification from the Palm Beach County property appraiser of an 11.7 percent increase in the value of taxable property within the town, from $800.1 million to $894.7 million.
    Capital purchases range from $5,625 to replace a postage machine in the finance department and $50,000 for manhole repairs.
    The town anticipates an increase in insurance costs, both for employees’ medical and dental insurance and for general liability, property, casualty and workers’ compensation.
    Town employees can expect a cost of living raise, calculated at 0.9 percent based on March’s consumer price index. Merit raises, tied to evaluations, could be as much as 5 percent.

By Willie Howard

    Manalapan needs water customers in Hypoluxo if the town wants to stay in the water business.
    Hypoluxo officials understand that, so they’re looking for rate cuts as they consider where to get water after the town’s water contract with Manalapan expires in September 2020.
    During their July 20 meeting, Hypoluxo council members said they are in a good position to negotiate lower water rates — rates that could take effect well before the town’s contract with Manalapan ends.
    “Manalapan needs to show us some good faith now, not in 2018 and not in 2020,” Hypoluxo Vice Mayor Michael Brown said.
    “If they don’t show us good faith now,” Brown said, “we should tell them that in 2020 there’s a very, very good chance we’re going to go with Boynton Beach.”
    Manalapan officials have been discussing whether to sell the town’s water system to Boynton Beach. If they plan to keep the system, they need a long-term water supply agreement with Hypoluxo, a consultant told them in June.  About 600 water customers in Hypoluxo use about a third of the water produced by Manalapan’s plant and provide about half of the system’s revenue, according to consultant Kevin O’Donnell of Nova Energy Consultants in Cary, N.C.
    Brown said Manalapan should at least eliminate the 20 percent nonresident surcharge that Hypoluxo water customers pay.
    Brown also suggested that Hypoluxo approach Manalapan about becoming part owners of the Manalapan water plant so that Hypoluxo would have some control over the town’s water supply in the years ahead.
    O’Donnell told Manalapan officials in June that the town’s water system is profitable and worth keeping — but only if they keep Hypoluxo customers connected.
    He recommended offering Hypoluxo customers a 20 percent rate reduction if Hypoluxo officials agree to use Manalapan water for 30 years after the current contract expires.
    Town Manager Linda Stumpf said Manalapan commissioners have taken the consultant’s rate-cut recommendation “under advisement” but have not discussed lowering rates for Hypoluxo customers beyond that.
    Brown said he liked the quality of Manalapan’s water. But he said Manalapan’s rates should be based more on water consumption and less on base rates tied to meter sizes.
    Hypoluxo Councilman William Smith said water suppliers should compete for the town’s customers just as providers of garbage collection and other services do.
    “Let them come in, make presentations, and we’ll choose,” Smith said.
    Hypoluxo Mayor Ken Schultz said officials from Boynton Beach and Manalapan would make separate water-supply presentations to the town council at the August and September council meetings.
    Stumpf said Manalapan will make a water presentation to the Hypoluxo council at some point,  but she said it would not be in August.

By Dan Moffett

    South Palm Beach struggled more than its coastal neighbors to recover from the damage of the real estate crash during the Great Recession. For five years after the 2008 downturn, the town showed virtually no recovery at all.
    But property values finally have started to show signs of life — with a 5.4 percent increase in 2015 and this year a 7.9 percent rise that matches the average improvement throughout Palm Beach County.
    Total property values in South Palm Beach have climbed to $301 million, up from $279 million last year. For the eighth year in a row, the Town Council has set the tax rate at $4.32 per $1,000 of assessed value.
    After nearly a decade of belt-tightening, the town has some budgetary breathing room, with $1.6 million in the reserve fund and another $1.5 million set aside for the long-awaited beach restoration project.
    “You almost have 11 months of operation in the reserves,” said Town Manager Bob Vitas. “Property value is slowly growing as it did before the insanity started.”
    “We’re in good shape,” said Councilman Robert Gottlieb.
    And the town figures to be in even better shape soon.
    Developer Gary Cohen has dropped his request for a referendum on height limits for his condominium project on the old Palm Beach Oceanfront Inn site. Cohen is moving forward with construction of a 30-unit building that will be marketed to high-end buyers.
    Town officials believe that, once completed, the project has the potential to add between $50 million and $100 million to the tax rolls. Depending on how sales go, the property could increase the town’s valuation by perhaps as much as 30 percent. In the interim, the town will collect a steady stream of building permit fees from the project, which is expected to pick up steam by year’s end.

Sand shifted north, for now
    Cohen raised some eyebrows among South Palm Beach residents in July with the disclosure he had donated to the town of Palm Beach 6,300 cubic yards of sand excavated from the site to help replenish a 1,300-foot strip of beach between Via Marina and Hammon Avenue.
    Some South Palm residents wondered why Cohen’s Paragon Acquisition Group couldn’t have given them the sand to help repair their beaches.
    “They wanted to give it to us,” Mayor Bonnie Fischer said, “but they just couldn’t do it.”
    Fischer said that state environmental agencies restrict sand donations to shores that have dry beaches and gradual slopes that allow sea turtles to enter the water. South Palm Beach doesn’t have that, and the town also couldn’t provide access for delivery.
    “Eventually, we’ll be getting that sand anyway,” Fischer said with a smile, predicting that ocean currents gradually will move Cohen’s sand south from Palm Beach back near to where it was.

New manager praised
    Council members are giving Vitas high marks for working overtime to provide line-item detail in this year’s budget, a departure from previous practice. The new manager, who came to the town in November, said officials now can see exactly where each dollar of spending goes.
    “Breaking out the costs gives more transparency,” Vitas said. “When it comes to budgets, you have to do it right, or just don’t do it. It’s that simple. It takes away a lot of the debates and fuels happiness instead of fights.”
    Fischer called Vitas’ budget approach “phenomenal.”

The plan by EDSA Inc. of Fort Lauderdale, which includes new benches,

refillable water bottle stations and paddleboard racks, was praised for its simplicity.

Rendering provided

By Jane Smith

    Delray Beach will soon have upgrades to its best asset: the beachfront.
    The $3 million project will create a 12-foot-wide promenade on the west side of the dunes.
    Improvements will include new benches, waste/recycling containers, bike-sharing racks, water fountains combined with refillable water bottle stations and surfboard/paddleboard racks.
    The main pavilion at Atlantic Avenue and A1A will be opened on the north end to make it more usable.
    EDSA Inc., of Fort Lauderdale, received unanimous City Commission approval in July for its simple and natural design. (Vice Mayor Al Jacquet left the meeting early before the vote was taken.)
    The engineering firm took the conceptual drawings donated by architect Bob Currie to create its design scheme. Currie is vice president of the Beach Property Owners Association, which has been working on beachfront design plans for more than seven years.
    “I’m impressed with EDSA,” said Bob Victorin, the association’s president. “They captured what the residents wanted — a natural design.”
    The firm was open to taking suggestions from residents, commissioners and BPOA members, he said. He liked the 31 portals that EDSA wants to save to allow beach access between the dunes.
    Jim Smith, chairman of Safety as Floridians Expect, told the City Commission, “The update of the beach promenade will be but one of your many legacies. The EDSA design plan is brilliant in its simplicity.”
    Commissioners also gave the city manager and staff authority to move the project along. The final design will be reviewed by the commission before it will be sent out for bidding. The goal is to have the majority of the project done by January.
    The area from Casuarina Road north to the end of the public beach, about 1.3 miles, will be redone in this project. EDSA will be paid $429,350, plus $35,000 for expenses.
    In addition to the final design and construction oversight, the firm will secure state and local permits. “They will be with us until the ribbon cutting,” said John Morgan, director of the city’s Environmental Services Department.
    The commission liked the city standard benches and trash/recyclable containers in gray because green would stand out more at the beach initially and then fade and have to be repainted more frequently.
    The height of the sea grape canopy also was discussed, with Commissioner Shelly Petrolia calling it a distinguishing characteristic for the city’s beach.
    The sea grapes will be trimmed as part of the dune management project, separate from the beach promenade.
    Commissioners like the idea of walking under the sea grape canopy to get to the beach. But Morgan reminded them that the sea grapes were dominating the beach plantings, creating a “monoculture” and not allowing other lower plants to survive.
    The mayor said Morgan and the dune management consultant should determine areas where the trimming needs to be done and to consider the health of the dune first.
    “I’m excited about the project,” Petrolia said. “But we will get pushback (from residents) when the sea grapes are trimmed.”
    In other business on July 5, the commission approved:
    • Hiring the Wantman Group of West Palm Beach to do a structural engineering design, engineering and permitting needed to raise the seawall height by approximately 3 feet and replace the public docks on the east side of Veterans Park. Both have been damaged by many years of seasonal high tide events. The firm will be paid $57,830.84 for the work, which also will include overseeing the construction.
    • Creating a pilot employee parking program at the South County Courthouse Parking Garage.
    Business owners would pay $20 per employee monthly for their workers to park there, with the goal of getting their vehicles off Atlantic Avenue and side streets to allow customers or diners to use the parking spots.
    The program, which had a soft launch Aug. 1, will have a full launch in November and last for one year.
    Weekdays, 200 spaces will be available between 3 and 6 p.m. with an additional 150 spaces available from 6:01 p.m. to 3 a.m.  Weekends and holidays when the courthouse is closed, 350 spaces will be available between 11 a.m. and 3 a.m. the next day. All vehicles must be removed before the next court business day. The Delray Beach Police Department will enforce that rule.
    The Downtown Development Authority is working on finding a partner to provide transportation to  downtown for employees and back to the garage when their shifts end.
    The garage also will be open for special-events parking at a cost of $5 per vehicle.

See related stories:

Frankel pursues federal options

Task force takes on local issues

By Jane Smith
    
    The city’s public safety departments will be able to hire 12 staffers to assist with the growing drug-overdose problems, under a proposed tax rate set by the Delray Beach City Commission.
    Police and fire-rescue staff have responded this year to 293 heroin overdoses as of July 27, compared with 195 for all of last year, according to the Delray Beach Police Department. The overdoses are increasingly fatal, despite police and fire-rescue’s use of Narcan to counteract the high.
    In all of 2015, 10 people died from heroin overdoses compared with 28 so far this year.
    City Manager Don Cooper described the $110.04 million budget as having a back-to-basics focus, in his executive summary of June 24. From the city’s goal-setting sessions of October and January, he gleaned a list of priorities: police, fire rescue, code enforcement and parks.
    Repairing and replacing city assets is underway, with work started on Old School Square, a contract awarded to determine the cost of work on the public docks and seawalls at Veterans Park, and work started on the beach promenade.
    The proposed tax rate of $7.21 per $1,000 value is lower than the current year’s rate of $7.34, according to the city’s finance department. The tax rate will go into effect in the budget year that starts Oct. 1.
    Most Delray Beach property owners won’t see a reduction in their property taxes because property values increased by an average of 10 percent in the city, the county property appraiser determined. Homeowners with a $50,000 homestead exemption will see their taxable property values increase by .7 percent.
    The proposed tax rate has two components. The operating tax rate is $6.96 per $1,000 value while the debt service rate is 25 cents per $1,000 value.
    Tax rates had to be set by the end of July for the county property appraiser to mail notices in mid-August to every property owner. The notices cover assessed values and proposed tax rates. The rates can be lowered but not raised during the city’s budget hearings in September, Cooper said.
    At the July 12 commission meeting, Mayor Cary Glickstein asked whether the city can afford the reduction when he quizzed the city’s financial officer: “Are we going to regret setting that number?”
    No, said Jack Warner, chief financial officer.
    Most of the city’s property value increase occurred in the city’s Community Redevelopment Agency district that covers more than 1,900 acres from the interstate to the beach. The CRA, which gets a percentage of the city tax dollars over a base rate set in 1995, and the city have their spending goals closely aligned.
    As an example, the CRA will pay for two new officers downtown in the next budget year to allow 24/7 coverage of that district. The CRA estimated that cost to be $188,625 for salaries and benefits.
    The city would pay for two additional police officers and eight fire-rescue employees in next year’s budget.
    The city also is relying on the CRA to pay for the improvements at Old School Square, estimated to cost $1.1 million. The repairs should be finished by December.

By Jane Smith

    With $275,000 in hand from the Florida Legislature, Palm Beach County State Attorney Dave Aronberg led the first meetings of the Sober Homes Task Force in mid-July at the West Palm Beach police station’s community room.
    His chief assistant, Al Johnson, had spent the past three months assembling the group that includes elected officials, industry workers and advocates, prosecutors, fire-rescue workers and town attorneys.
    At the second session, held two days later, nearly half had connections to South County coastal cities. At this meeting Aronberg gave each task force member a business card with a toll-free hotline (844-324-5463) for the public to report questionable business practices of recovery industry providers.
    The task force goal is finding ways to clean up the sober home industry by the end of the year. It will focus on four areas: regulation, clarifying laws, policies and marketing plans.
    “Lives are at risk,” Johnson said. “This is not about shutting down sober homes or recovery residences. But it’s about protecting the vulnerable patients.”
    He rattled off overdose data for Delray Beach. For all of 2015, the city had 195 heroin overdoses compared with the first six months of this year, when the city recorded 242 overdoses from heroin.
    Justin Chapman, a prosecutor with the Southwest Florida State Attorney’s Office, was hired to run the task force. He talked about stopping rogue treatment centers from giving kickbacks to sober homes to get patients on the centers’ treatment plan and run up insurance bills.
    Ted Padich, formerly with the state Division of Insurance, is another new hire. Both also will be involved with the law enforcement group of the task force.
    Rogue providers will find the loopholes, said Suzanne Spencer, executive director of the Delray Beach Drug Task Force. She encouraged strong enforcement of the rules.
    Former Delray Beach City Commissioner Adam Frankel said he was from the “rehab capital of the world where not a day goes by when you don’t see a kid lugging a suitcase down the street,” indicating the person was just evicted from a sober home. He wants to see a no-nonsense approach to clean up the recovery industry.
    Boca Raton City Councilman Scott Singer simply asked for help maintaining the quality of life in his city’s communities.
    Most agreed that stronger regulations are needed for treatment centers because the Department of Children and Families does not have the money to do it adequately. The task force will look at whether the state’s Agency for Health Care Administration is more suited to do the job because it licenses health care facilities.
    Sober homes, though, can’t be regulated because of federal housing and disability laws. Recovering drug and alcohol users who live together while maintaining sobriety are considered a family and a protected class.
    The voluntary certification provided by the Florida Association of Recovery Residences has fallen behind, even though providers pay a fee to be certified. The certification just became mandatory July 1 for state-licensed treatment centers that send their patients to sober homes.
    Treatment centers can bypass the law by opening their own recovery residences or patients can choose on their own to live in a noncertified place, said a DCF spokeswoman.
    Some attendees, including Andrew Burki who heads the Life of Purpose Treatment at Florida Atlantic University, said third-party brokers are a major problem. He thinks the task force needs to define “brokering” so that the law is better enforced.
    “We can’t prosecute our way out of a systematic problem,” Johnson said. “Once the lights go out, the roaches come back out.”
    George Jahn, who runs Sober Living in Delray Beach, said brokering was a criminal enterprise. “People doing it are in it for the money, not the heart,” he said.
    A county fire-rescue employee, Matt Willhite, suggested that standards need to be written for who can run a sober home, its capacity and the type of care given.
    Johnson said he’d like “to stop the commerce between recovery residences and marketing providers, the flop houses who give heroin to vulnerable addicts to get them back into rehab.”
    The task force has a schedule that calls for two meetings each month through June. The public meetings are held at the West Palm Beach police station. The law enforcement group meetings are closed to the public.

By Steven J. Smith

    A very big 2016 election year offers candidates at nearly every level, and the Aug. 30 primary ballot promises some hot races.
    At the federal level, candidates will vie for seats in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives.
    For U.S. senator, the Republicans will pit Marco Rubio against Carlos Beruff, Ernie Rivera and Dwight Mark Anthony Young, while Democratic candidates Roque “Rocky” De La Fuente, Alan Grayson, Pam Keith, Reginald Luster and Patrick Murphy all vie for their party’s slot. Augustus Invictus and Paul Stanton will run as Libertarian Party candidates.
    U.S. congressional candidates include Republicans Carl J. Domino, Mark Freeman, Rick Kozell, Brian Mast, Rebecca Negron and Noelle Nikpour, and Democrats Jonathan Chane, Randy Perkins and John “Juan” Xuna.
    At the state Senate level, District 29 will see Democrats Mindy Koch and Kevin Rader face off. Democrats Bobby Powell and Michael Steinger will compete for District 30 and District 31 will be decided among Democrats Jeff Clemens, Emmanuel G. Morel and Irving “Irv” Slosberg.
    State House races are as follows: for District 85, Republicans Rick Roth and Andrew Watt; District 86, Republicans Laurel S. Bennett and Stuart W. Mears; District 86, Democrats Tinu Pena and Matt Willhite; District 87, Democrats Darren James Ayoub, Virginia Savietto and David Silvers; District 88, Democrats Edwin Ferguson, Angie Gray and Al Jacquet; and District 91, Democrats Kelly Skidmore and Emily Slosberg.
    Other state offices include Republican state committeeman and Groups 1 and 4 in the Fifteenth Judicial Circuit.
    A constitutional amendment is also on the ballot, which would “authorize the Legislature, by general law, to exempt from taxation the value of solar or renewable energy source devices.”
    In Palm Beach County, primary races will take place for county court judge, county commissioner, School Board members, sheriff, property appraiser and supervisor of elections, special taxing districts and committeeman/committeewoman officers in 12 precincts.
    Early voting for the primary election runs Aug. 15-28. Early voting sites will be open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Voters must bring a current picture/signature ID.
    The deadline to request a vote-by-mail ballot is Aug. 24. All vote-by-mail ballots must be received at the Supervisor of Elections main office (at 240 S. Military Trail, West Palm Beach, FL 33415) by 7 p.m. on Election Day.
    For a list of the 15 early voting locations, contact the Palm Beach County Supervisor of Elections Office at 656-6200, or by email at mailbox@pbcelections.org. Or log on to www.pbcelections.org.

By Jane Smith

    The feds may be coming to the rescue of South County coastal cities beleaguered by the proliferation of sober homes.
Their chief ally is U.S. Rep. Lois Frankel.
     In mid-July, she met with one of the original authors of the Americans with Disabilities Act and the 1988 law that added disability status to the Fair Housing Act. Recovering drug users living as a family while maintaining their sobriety are considered a disabled class that is protected under federal law.
     The law’s author suggested that Frankel reach out to individuals in the disability rights community to help make the case that “over-concentration of sober homes creates de facto segregation and violates the long-standing principles of integrating disabled individuals into the community,” according to Frankel’s July 15 letter.
     Boca Raton Mayor Susan Haynie appreciates Frankel’s efforts. “She really is attacking this on all levels. It’s really a federal issue,” Haynie said. “We tried on the local level and failed. Statewide, the voluntary certification is a step in the right direction. But the rubber meets the road on the federal level.”
     In addition, Frankel and 16 congressional colleagues sent a letter in early July to the U.S. Government Accountability Office asking for help in determining the number of sober homes nationally, statewide and locally.
     The letter also asks the GAO to determine the regulations that cover sober homes, the range of services they provide and their roles in Medicaid and other federal insurance programs for drug and alcohol abuse.
     “There is so much that we don’t know about sober homes,” said Frankel, a Democrat, who persuaded eight Republican representatives to sign the letter. “Parents who send their kids to sober homes to recover from addiction don’t know if they are effective. When problems arise, local governments do not know how to regulate and address community concerns.”
     Delray Beach Mayor Cary Glickstein marveled at the coast-to-coast support for the sober homes issue. “It illustrates that we are getting national support from both sides of the aisle and reiterates (that sober home proliferation is) not a parochial problem,” he said. “If there ever was a bipartisan issue, (this) is one.”
     The city’s public safety departments spend an increasing amount of time responding to overdose calls. In the first six months of 2016, Delray Beach saw 242 overdose calls from heroin alone, compared with 195 heroin overdose calls in 2015.
     Frankel’s letter follows one sent by Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., in early June to the GAO. Warren had two Republican co-signers: Sens.Marco Rubio of Florida and Orrin Hatch of Utah.
     Warren’s office publicist said the office would let her letter speak for itself. A call to Rubio’s office was not returned.
     The GAO said it has accepted the requests, “but the work is not expected to get underway until late this year. Once it begins, the first steps will be to determine the exact scope of what we will cover and the methodology to be used.”
     Boynton Beach Mayor Steven Grant said his city would not wait until the feds can act. The city will proceed with its local business certification program to identify all home-based businesses and ensure the city is collecting the appropriate tax from the business.
     Meanwhile, Haynie and Glickstein are waiting for the joint statement promised by Frankel after attending a sober homes forum in May. Before the forum, Frankel and an assistant HUD secretary toured sober home locations in Delray Beach. They saw luggage, clothing and furniture on front lawns, indicating evictions.
     The assistant secretary was shocked and said he would go back to Washington and secure a joint statement from HUD and Department of Justice lawyers that cities could use as a basis for local regulations.
     In her mid-July update, Frankel said, “The agencies have assured us that they are working hard to release the new joint statement in the near future, possibly as soon as August.”

Former world-class tennis player Wendy Overton now lives in Gulf Stream

and sells real estate out of Delray Beach.

Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star

    The popularity of tennis in the ’70s and ’80s was such that many of its stars were recognized by their first names: Chrissie, Martina and Billie Jean were among those whose surnames seemed an afterthought.
    Not far behind was a Wendy — to be precise, Wendy Overton, who rose to as high as No. 4 in the U.S. and No. 10 in the world, and since has climbed high in the ranks of the south Palm Beach County real estate market.
    A top seller with Corcoran Realty of Delray Beach, Overton is not far from amassing 30 years while ringing up hundreds of sales — a good number of which involve properties east of the Intracoastal.
    “I have to admit I’m a bit of a workaholic,” she said, “but that’s in my makeup.”
    Overton is among a select group of former players to whom every tennis professional in the world today owes a debt of gratitude. There was no women’s tennis tour when she graduated cum laude from Rollins College in Winter Park in 1969. She was one of a handful of top players — a group that included Billie Jean King and Rosie Casals — who planted the seeds for the Women’s Tennis Association at a meeting at a hotel in London just before the Wimbledon tournament was held in 1973.
    “All the women who were entered (in Wimbledon) were there,” recalled Overton, 69. “We met in an auditorium, and Billie Jean was up on the stage, and she said to Betty Stove, from the Netherlands, ‘Lock the door. Anybody who wants to leave can leave, but nobody else is coming in.’
    “That’s when we founded the Tour.”
    After spending nine years as a touring pro, Overton spent 10 as director of tennis at Hunters Run in Boynton Beach, where the tennis program had five members when she joined and about 6,000 when she left.
    When Hunters Run built a stadium court, members chose to name it after her.
    She also has accomplished much since leaving tennis for business, becoming a founder and director of Women’s Sports Legends, a sports marketing enterprise, and becoming a member-elect of Who’s Who in American Colleges and Universities.
    She currently sits on the committee of the Bethesda Pro-Am Golf Tournament and has given time to the Caring Kitchen, the Delray Beach Historical Society and the Achievement Center for Children and Families.
 — Brian Biggane

    Q: Where did you grow up and go to school? How do you think that has influenced you?
    A: I grew up in Ormond Beach and started playing tennis at age 7. My first tournament was a state event in Jacksonville, and I went on to win the state championships in the 14-, 15-, 16-, 17- and 18-and-under age groups. Winning state championships qualified me for nationals, and I reached the semifinals in singles in nationals and won the doubles on grass courts in Philadelphia.
    All those experiences helped my maturity process a great deal, but I went to Rollins on an academic scholarship, not an athletic scholarship, because Title IX hadn’t been passed yet and there was no such thing as athletic scholarships for women.
    Our team at Rollins was very good; I played No. 1 singles throughout my four years there and we did well on the national level. I was getting to know people from around the country in tennis and forged relationships that I still have today.

    Q: Tell us about your tennis career and how it helped shape the person you have become.
    A: Two years after I came out of Rollins about 12 to 15 of us — led by Billie Jean King, Rosie Casals, Virginia Wade from England, Francoise Durr of France — decided to start the Women’s Tennis Association. The USTA, which actually was the U.S. Lawn Tennis Association at the time, told us not to do it, but we still did it.
    We had a board of directors and I was on the first one. I had a very bad temperament on court, so they made me chairwoman of the disciplinary committee. But going through that whole experience taught me a lot about standing up for what you believe in and remaining on course to get things done.
    My nine years as a touring player gave me great experiences. One of my biggest victories was beating Billie Jean at the Virginia Slims of Jacksonville in the semifinals. I don’t even recall who I played in the finals.
    
    Q: Any special memories from Wimbledon or the U.S. Open?
    A: Some of my best Wimbledon memories were made representing the U.S. in the Wightman Cup matches there against England.
    The U.S. Open is a much bigger event for me. We would stay in New York and ride out in limos.  I made it to the final eight one year, which gives me tickets for life for the final eight, food included. I won the U.S. Open Seniors doubles championship with Rosie Casals in 1987 and in 1997 with Anne Smith from Texas.

    Q: How did you choose to make your home in Gulf Stream?
    A: I always wanted to live there, so when I was teaching at Hunters Run, I had a house in the Hamlet in Delray Beach, and if it would rain I would get in my car and drive through Gulf Stream. There was one little area close to Gulf Stream Bath & Tennis that I really liked; it was called Driftwood Landing, right behind the B & T. There were only about 12 houses back there. So I would always go to that same area, and one time I was driving and noticed a “for sale” sign. There was a guy there washing his dog, and he was the guy who cut my hair.
    I said, “Art, is this your house?” He said, “Yeah, don’t you remember, we bought this place.” I said, “Well, you just finished it.” And he said, “Well, we’re pregnant, and we don’t want to have a baby living so close to the water.” So I asked to come in and look at it and bought it a month later, and I’ve been there 36 years.
I’ve done a lot of work on it over the years. I lost my roof in (Hurricane) Wilma, but put on a third bedroom and third bath, and had to put in a new septic system. I have a home generator.
    Everything has been updated. The kitchen has been redone three times; the bathrooms have been redone. It’s just a great house: pool, dock, 100 feet on the Intracoastal. There are only 12 or 14 homes back there. It’s only nine blocks to Atlantic Avenue, so I walk that every day.
    Q: What is your favorite part about living in Gulf Stream?
    A: It’s a tiny town, a township. We have our own Gulf Stream hall, where we vote, our own police station. It’s just small, which is good. Private. Very private.
    I had a meeting at my house of tennis legends back in the early ’80s and everybody showed up: Billie Jean, Martina Navratilova, Pam Shriver, maybe 17 or 18 of us.
My driveway was full and Martina was driving a Porsche and she pulled it up on my neighbor’s yard. So he called the police, but then he came over, knocked on the door and said, “OK, whose Porsche is this?”
    I said, “I think it’s Martina Navratilova’s.” He said, “Who?” So he’s looking in the living room and there’s Martina, Tracy Austin, all these great players, and he couldn’t believe it. Those were good times.

    Q: Who has been your mentor?
    A: My father, without question. He introduced me to the game and, even though he and my mom split up when I was young, he used to come to all my events. And every time he came I lost. So I said, “Dad, don’t show up, OK?”
    So I was playing in the 18-and-under grass court championships in Philadelphia, in the semifinals, and I looked over and behind a tree, way over there, was my father. I saw him. So I lost, and I knew he had a two-hour drive home, so I waited and called him then. I said, “Hey, Dad, where were you today? Because I saw you behind that tree.” But I got over that and started winning when he came. I looked up to him.
    As far as in the game, Doris Hart, who used to be director of tennis at a club down around Lighthouse Point, helped me a lot. I knew her for years and we became good friends.

    Q: What influence has your success in tennis had in your real estate career?
    A: I’d say almost all of my clients know what I accomplished in tennis. It gave me wonderful connections and friends I still have to this day. Jeanne Evert Dubin has been my best friend going back 48 years, and I’ve sold 11 houses to the Evert family.
A few years back I got the listing for Greg Norman’s house in Jupiter, largely through Chris Evert at the time they were together. But it was overpriced and didn’t sell.

    Q: What book are you reading now?
    A: Killing Lincoln, by Bill O’Reilly. I majored in history and public affairs in college and have always had a love for history. I feel like Lincoln was a great president, and his term came at a hard time.

    Q: Is there a quote that inspires you?
    A: “Go for it,” by Billie Jean King. When she played Bobby Riggs in Houston (in 1973), she was also in a tournament prior to that match. So we said, “Billie Jean, you’ve got a lot riding on this match. Don’t blow it by playing in a tournament. You’re going to get tired.” She said, “Don’t worry. Go for it!” She was great and she killed him.

    Q: Who would play you in a movie?
    A: Candice Bergen. She’s about my age and I always liked her in that sitcom Murphy Brown. She has a great sense of humor.

    DELRAY BEACH — Kenneth Michael Van Arnem Sr., 65, of Delray Beach (formerly of Detroit) passed away on July 18.
    Mr. Van Arnem, an early pioneer in the computing industry, attended the University of Detroit and served in the Army from 1970 to 1971 during the Vietnam War.  After being awarded the Bronze Star for bravery, Mr. Van Arnem created and ran the Gulf Coast RV Park.  
    Mr. Van Arnem went on to hold key positions with such companies as Cybergate, the first ISP provider in Florida, Honeywell and ACTS Computing in Detroit, Universal Computer Leasing in Wiesbaden, Germany, and Total E networking in Paris and London.  In the late ’70s and early ’80s, Mr. Van Arnem was the vice president of operations for the Detroit Express soccer team, and was also a partner in Van Arnem Racing, SCCA and IMSA GT production road racing.
    Mr. Van Arnem returned to South Florida in 1989 with Finalco and then Gemini Leasing in Boca Raton.  In the early 2000s, he became involved with real estate development in South Florida with his brother, and spearheaded such projects as the Casa Bonita condo development, 55 Town Square and Santa Fe Suites.
    Mr. Van Arnem is survived by his children Kerri (Colorado Springs, Colo.), Kassandra (Detroit) and Ken Jr. (Walled Lake, Mich.); grandchildren Devin and Alexis; siblings Nancy (Birmingham, Mich.) and Harold (Ocean Ridge); longtime partner Victoria Spungin; and his service dog, Madam.
    Burial with military honors was held July 22 at the South Florida National Cemetery in Lake Worth. A reception followed at the American Legion Milton Myers Post 65 in Delray Beach.
    In lieu of flowers, contributions may be made to Assistance Dogs International or Milton Myers Post 65.
    Please visit www.LorneandSons.com to sign the online guestbook and share condolences.

— Obituary submitted by the family

By Emily J. Minor

    SOUTH PALM BEACH — Antigone Diane Potonides, a seemingly shy woman with a penchant for outspokenness who delayed her own dreams before launching a career teaching English, died in her sleep at a local nursing home July 2. She was 87.
    Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., the daughter of Michael and Mary Koconas, Mrs. Potonides was 8 years old when the family moved back to Cyprus for her father’s health. She returned to the States when she was barely 19 years old. Within the year, she had married Homer Potonides, a man she’d met at school in Cyprus.
    In the early years of their marriage, Mrs. Potonides worked at the local telephone company in New York, helping to put her husband through college. Homer Potonides, who preceded her in death, would go on to become an accomplished aeronautical engineer, holding many patents and working on high-level rocket ships, said the couple’s daughter, Mary Ann Babnis.
    After Mr. Potonides’ career was off and running, and after the couple had had their two children, Mrs. Potonides finally began her college studies.
    Mrs. Potonides earned a bachelor’s degree in English from Hofstra University, and then a master’s degree in English from Queens College. She also studied abroad one summer at Cambridge University and another summer at Oxford.
    Eventually, she taught English in Massapequa, N.Y., for 22 years.
    Mary Ann Babnis remembers her mother as quiet — certainly more quiet than their outgoing father. But she was also full of convictions and would very often “write letters about things she was passionate about,” her daughter said. She felt deeply about certain social issues and worked hard to “better the world for others,” Babnis said.
    “She wasn’t very outgoing, and the last 10 here she was very quiet,” Babnis said. “But she was accomplished, and she cared deeply about certain things.”
    Among those passions was her work with Daughters of Penelope, Senior Club at St. Catherine Greek Orthodox Church, West Palm Beach, and the Philoptochos Society, which means “Friend of the Poor.”
    Babnis said some of her mother’s volunteer work went mostly unnoticed during her and her brother’s childhood years.
 “She was named Penelope of the Year one year,” she said, “and some of this I didn’t even know until I started digging through some papers and things.”
    But quiet or not, Mrs. Potonides apparently loved learning. After the couple had moved to South Palm Beach for good in 2002, she continued taking courses with the Lifelong Learning Society at Florida Atlantic University, her daughter said. Mrs. Potonides also loved music, lectures and travel. And she loved the ocean view from their condo.
    Mrs. Potonides was buried July 11 at Our Lady Queen of Peace Cemetery in Royal Palm Beach. Memorial gifts can be made to the church choir at St. Catherine Greek Orthodox Church, 110 Southern Blvd., West Palm Beach, FL 33405; or the Alzheimer’s Association, Southeast Florida Chapter, 3333 Forest Hill Blvd., West Palm Beach, FL 33406.
    Besides her daughter, survivors include the couple’s son, Roy Potonides, and a granddaughter, Christina Diane Babnis.

By Rich Pollack

    A popular beachfront pavilion in Delray Beach that was destroyed in what has been described as a suspicious fire will be rebuilt, but when it will reopen and how much it will cost the city to rebuild it are yet to be determined.
    Delray Beach firefighters were called to Atlantic Dunes Park, just north of Linton Boulevard on State Road A1A, at about 3 a.m. on June 28 and discovered the large pavilion engulfed in flames.
    Parks and Recreation Director Suzanne Fisher said firefighters were unable to save the pavilion, which collapsed under the heat.
    The city plans to rebuild the wooden structure, Fisher said, but is waiting for information from the insurance company before determining when a new pavilion will be built.
    “It’s really a gem on Delray Beach,” she said. “It serves such a need.”
    Built in 1977, the pavilion was popular with beachgoers, families and others celebrating weddings or family reunions, as well as with visitors who stopped by on a regular basis in the early morning to take in the surroundings.
    The city’s only large shelter available for rental on the east side of State Road A1A — just a flight of stairs from the beach — the pavilion brought revenue into the city with rentals costing $110 for two hours and $200 for four hours.
    “It was very heavily used,” Fisher said.
    As a result of the fire, the city was forced to cancel a number of bookings and offer refunds.
    The fire also resulted in the closing of the park because of safety concerns, but Fisher said city crews did an outstanding job of clearing and opening the site in time for visitors to watch the July Fourth fireworks from the beach.
    The fire at the pavilion was one of three set that same morning, and fire officials have classified the other two — both not nearly as extensive as the one at Atlantic Dunes — as suspicious.
    The Atlantic Dunes fire was investigated by the city and the state Fire Marshal’s Office but the cause remains listed as undetermined.
    “It will remain that way until a tip is received,” Delray Beach Fire Rescue Capt. Kevin Saxton said, adding that anyone with information should contact Delray Beach police or Delray Beach Fire Rescue.

Lisa and Chris Ruth have expanded their FirstLight Home Care franchise to include a location in Broward County.

Photo provided

By Christine Davis

    A move from Manhattan to Gulf Stream two years ago marked the start of a new business venture for Lisa and Chris Ruth. They opened nonmedical homecare franchises, FirstLight Home Care of the Gulf Coast and FirstLight Home Care of the Palm Beaches.
    This year, they opened a third location in Deerfield Beach to serve communities south of Palm Beach County, and they now employ 150 caregivers.
    The business answers a community need — providing home care for people, mainly seniors, who require assistance to stay at home.
    Good caregivers are crucial.
    “Both of us had grandparents with Alzheimer’s,” Chris says. “We’ve seen good and not so good caregivers, and we are always looking for great caregivers to provide exceptional care, and it’s satisfying to see the difference they make in our clients’ lives.”
    Their business services run the gamut from offering a bit of respite to family caregivers by taking over driving or grocery shopping to advanced care for clients who have suffered strokes and need mobility assistance, for example.
    “Our typical clients are the adult children with kids of their own, who are worried about their parents,” Chris says. “These seniors are at home or in some sort of facility, and their adult children want to get their parents more help.”
    When choosing employees, the Ruths carry out background checks and drug testing. They ensure licensing, insurance and bonding. They provide special training when necessary.
    The couple decided to get into the home care business after moving to Gulf Stream. They have two children, 7 and 10, and chose to live in the coastal town because of the schools, Chris says.
    “We made that decision first and then answered, ‘What should Lisa and I do?’ ” Chris says.
    A venture capital investor, Chris had started Halyard Capital, investing in media communication and business services, before owning and running Northern Gulf Partners, a business focused on redevelopment opportunities in Iraq. Lisa ran leadership development for Raytheon before the two married.
    So, they have finance and human resources covered, and after catching up with an associate, Bernard Markey, now director of FirstLight Home Care, they settled upon their niche.
    What sets them apart is their hands-on attitude, according to Chris.
    “We focus on quality. We have an online portal, for instance, that allows our clients to review caretakers’ daily notes. For employees working hourly, they call an 800 number from the client’s phone. It’s like a punch card. We know when caretakers arrive and, if they’re late, within three minutes we’re calling to make sure everything is OK.
    “We have a very personalized custom approach. I’m often the one going out meeting with the clients to get a sense of what kind of caretaker would be the best fit. That’s pretty distinctive.”
    Costs depend on the level of care, from $75 a visit on up, but sometimes clients don’t realize that some financial help is available.
    “Here’s one of my favorite stories,” Chris says. “The daughter, in her early 70s, was the primary caretaker for her dad, a highly decorated World War II vet who was in a wheelchair.
    “And when she got sick with breast cancer, his situation was put in real jeopardy. The Military Order of the Purple Heart got in touch with us and we were able to get him services through the Veterans Administration.
    “That paid for a significant portion of his care, enough to keep him safe at home while his daughter was going through her own chemo treatments. When we started out, even before the VA committed, I said we were going to help if it didn’t work out. And it did work out and transformed their lives. We love helping people like that.”
    For more information, visit http://www.firstlighthomecare.com/home-healthcare-palmbeach-jupiter/

or call 271-4644.

By Jane Smith

    Delray Beach won’t have to pay more than $25 million in damages to the developers of the stalled Atlantic Crossing project after a federal judge dismissed the case and sent the remaining seven claims back to state court.
    “I’m very pleased with the court’s ruling, which dismissed all federal claims against the city,” said Mayor Cary Glickstein. “As it stands, the ruling eliminates the possibility of any federal court damage award against the city, which was the thrust of their case.”
    The remaining state court claims don’t seek monetary damages, he said.
    The mayor’s deposition, one of 16 allowed in June, never took place. “It was only required in connection with the federal court claims, which have all been dismissed,” he said. “I presume my deposition would not occur unless the state court deems it necessary.”
    The proposed Atlantic Crossing project sits at the main intersection in the city’s downtown — the northeast corner of North Federal Highway and East Atlantic Avenue. The 9.2-acre development lies just west of the Intracoastal Waterway with the city’s Veterans Park in between.
    When finished, Atlantic Crossing will contain 343 luxury condos and apartments plus 39,394 square feet of restaurants, 37,642 square feet of shops and 83,462 square feet of office space.
    The $200 million project was proposed by a partnership between Ohio-based Edwards Cos. and Ocean Ridge resident Carl DeSantis. Edwards bought DeSantis’ share in June for $38.5 million. But both would have shared in the proceeds if the federal case had been decided in favor of the developers.
    “We are reviewing our legal options to move Atlantic Crossing forward and secure our property rights,” said Don DeVere, vice president of the Edwards Cos.
    Atlantic Crossing began in 2008 as Atlantic Plaza II before the recession. Fast forward five years, Edwards was brought into the project, which was renamed Atlantic Crossing.
    The development team sued Delray Beach in June 2015, claiming the city has not certified its site plan that was approved in November 2013 and affirmed by a previous City Commission in January 2014. Last October, the lawsuit was moved to federal court.
    In April, while the federal lawsuit was on hold, the City Commission rejected the project’s modified site plan that added a driveway and redesigned the valet area into a circular path from a horseshoe-shaped version. The plan also called for improved contrast for the two loading docks and a pedestrian crosswalk moved north in the project to improve its safety.
    The changes, though, were not enough to satisfy two Delray Beach commissioners and the mayor. They want a real street with sidewalks and bike lanes instead of a driveway and extra turning space so that vehicles can leave the underground garage safely.
    The ownership of two alleys and NE Seventh Avenue is in dispute. Both are needed to complete the project, the development team and the city agree. As recently as July 12, city commissioners agreed to ask for the return of the alleys and street.
    The development team had amended its federal complaint four times in less than 1 year. Federal Judge Donald Middlebrooks dismissed the two federal counts on July 25.
    The Florida Coalition for Preservation lauded that decision as a “victory for the commission and the people of Delray Beach.”
    The grass-roots coalition for responsible development also said in a statement that the developers’ attorneys “attempted to overwhelm private citizens (including the coalition) for both public and private communications about the project.”
    The coalition recommends that the litigation be dropped and the time be spent on making Atlantic Crossing work better.