Customers combined shopping and fun as they sipped champagne and tried on Stella & Dot jewelry

and Amanda Johnson one-of-kind dresses. Here, birthday girl Sophia Frances wears an Amanda Johnson crown.

Photo provided

Terra Holdings/Brown Harris Stevens has a rebranded office in Lake Worth’s arts district. ABOVE: (l-r) Jennifer Spitznagel,

David Burris, artist Maria Paz, Ava van de Water, Susan Burris, Nasrin Bakonyi and Lena Ingraham.

Photo provided

By Christine Davis

    Following last year’s acquisition of Manatee Cove Realty, Terra Holdings/Brown Harris Stevens celebrated the grand opening of its rebranded office at 619 Lake Ave., Lake Worth, in conjunction with an opening of artist Maria Paz’s work in February.
    “We are delighted to present the Brown Harris Stevens brand to the Lake Worth community with our new signage and custom window displays,” says Jennifer Spitznagel, senior broker associate and director of the Lake Worth office. “We’ve timed the grand opening so we can include our northern clients who are down for the winter months. We are also very excited that our office will continue to feature a rotation of work by local artists. We are proud to uphold the Lake Worth LULA theme of a town for and about art.”
    LULA is the arts district between Lucerne and Lake avenues.
                                
    Premier Estate Properties with offices in Boca Raton and Delray Beach was recognized with four Outstanding Performance Awards for 2016 during the Leading Real Estate Companies of the World Performance Summit in March.  
    The Momentum Club honor signifies an improvement in the company’s focus on serving clients worldwide by making introductions to other Leading Real Estate Companies of the World members. The Pinnacle Award celebrates the firm’s achievement in successfully assisting more clients with their real estate needs, working in partnership with other member firms.
    Premier Estate Properties’ other awards were presented in recognition of its expertise in the high-end market for superior performance in overall agent productivity, as well as for its results in assisting clients with luxury real estate needs in far-reaching locations.
    The summit was at the Fontainebleau Hotel in Miami Beach and was attended by 2,000 luxury real estate professionals.
                                
    The Boca Real Estate Investment Club presents Giselle Cheminand, president and CEO of GCI Worldwide Corp., at the club’s meeting at 7 p.m. April 13. Registration begins at 6:30. It will be held at the Renaissance Boca Raton Hotel, 2000 NW 19th St. The cost is $20. For information, call 391-7325 or visit www.bocarealestateclub.com.
                                
    An ocean-to-lake, 3-acre home at 1370 S. Ocean Blvd. in Manalapan has sold for $40 million, according to public records. The seller was a Boca Raton-based limited liability company, EB ESM31 LLC, which is controlled by Edward M. Brown, president and CEO of The Patrón Spirits Co. and a former Seagram executive. The buyer is Borogoves Ltd. of Jersey. The home was rebuilt by the sellers. Previous owners of the 1972-era home included Lois Pope and Frank McKinney. Jack Elkins and Bunny Hiatt, of The Fite Group, represented the sellers. Farid R. Moussallem, of Compass Florida in Miami Beach, represented the buyers.
                                
    A 6,500-square-foot, six-bedroom Bermuda-style home at 1500 S. Ocean in Manalapan has come on the market for $34 million, offered for sale through Crista Ryan, an agent with Tina Fanjul Associates Real Estate. Built in 2008, it sits on 1.6 acres with 178 feet of ocean frontage and 139 feet on the lake, offering expansive views of the water from almost every room of the house. For information, call Ryan at 313-1327. The home was owned by Fred Marcon, who died in January.
                                
    Krishna and Nirmala Tripuraneni sold “Nirvana,” their Mediterranean-style, six-bedroom, 12,244-square-foot home at 840 S. Ocean Blvd., Manalapan, for $20.23 million on Feb. 23, according to public records. Attorney Rani Newman Mathura was listed on the deed as trustee of the 840 South Ocean Blvd Florida Land Trust, the entity that bought the property.  Douglas Elliman agent Chad Carroll represented the sellers. Corcoran Group agent Jim McCann represented the buyer. Krishna Tripuraneni, a Wellington gastroenterologist convicted of tax fraud in 2015, is due to be released from prison in April, according to the Federal Bureau of Prisons.
                                 
    Diamond Award winner Susan Saturday (left) and Pearl Award recipient Rebecca Zerbo (right) were honored  at the Greater Boca Raton Chamber of Commerce’s 11th annual DIAMOND Award Luncheon in February at the Boca Raton Resort & Club.
    Saturday is senior vice president and chief human resources officer at Bluegreen Vacations and BBX Capital Corp. She currently serves as vice chair on the Chamber’s board of directors and serves on the Golden Bell Education Foundation’s board of directors.
    The Pearl Award is given to a graduate of the Chamber’s Young Entrepreneurs Academy. This year’s winner, Zerbo, founded Positive Pocket, a nonprofit organization that offers educational programs for youth and adults who suffer from the negative effects of bullying.
                                
    On April 5 student entrepreneurs from the Boca Chamber’s Young Entrepreneurs Academy will present their business plans before a panel of local leaders of industry that include St. Andrew’s School, IBM, Comerica Bank, Bluegreen Vacations and TouchSuite.
    In addition to allocating money to the students’ businesses, the business leaders have selected a student business group that will advance to the Young Entrepreneurs Academy Saunders Scholars National College Scholarship competition.
                                
    The Delray Beach Rotary Club honored Atlantic High School teacher Paul Musser and student Zhanelle Murph as distinguished teacher and student of the month in February. Atlantic High Principal Tara Dellegrotti was inducted into the club.
                                
    Professionals with more than four years of post-graduate work experience can now pursue an MBA with a specialization in marketing or entrepreneurial management in downtown Delray Beach. Lynn University collaborated with the Greater Delray Beach Chamber of Commerce to host the program in the Chamber’s office at 140 NE First St.
    Through online classes as well as classes during the evening, students can obtain their degrees while working. A  degree can be completed in 12 months for less than $30,000.
    The curriculum was designed by Lynn’s College of Business and Management. Chamber leaders will lend their network and expertise with guest speakers and executive mentorships to complement coursework. This partnership model is a pilot program for the university.
    Applications are due by June 30. The GRE or GMAT is not required for admission. For information, visit www.lynn.edu/DelrayMBA.
                                
    The most chatter at the March 27 Lantana Town Council meeting was generated by the news that the 73-acre Water Tower Commons project would include a 44,000-square-foot Walmart Neighborhood Market. The town had hoped for a store that catered to more of a niche market.
    Ken Tuma, representing the developer, Lantana Development, said the store wouldn’t be a superstore  — no TVs, luggage or tires in the inventory — but a considerably upgraded Walmart with lots of windows and attractive presentations of organic fruits and vegetables. It’s being designed to compete with Publix.
    More news on Water Tower Commons, being developed on land previously known as the A.G. Holley property, is expected April 24 when the town will look at plans for the residential phase of the development.
                                
    The retirement community Abbey Delray, at 2000 Lowson Blvd., Delray Beach, has announced plans for an expansion and redevelopment estimated to cost $31.5 million, with construction to start by the end of this year.
    Abbey Delray will have a new assisted living and memory care building, fitness center, spa, a new restaurant and redesigned exterior features.
     The community offers services to more than 400 residents in 350 homes and villas, as well as onsite assisted living and skilled nursing residences.
                                
    Eau Palm Beach Resort & Spa and Four Seasons Resort Palm Beach were designated five-star hotels by the Forbes Travel Guide for 2017. Eau Spa and Palm Beach Spa at Four Seasons Resort Palm Beach were designated five-star spas. Jove Kitchen & Bar at the Four Seasons was designated a four-star restaurant.
                                
    Crane’s Beach House Boutique Hotel & Luxury Villas in Delray Beach will offer discounts of up to 30 percent for stays between April 30 and Oct. 5 for guests who reserve before April 11. For information, visit www.cranesbeachhouse.com.
                                
     Easton Art Gallery and the Luxury Performance Automotive Group will co-host the Art for Autism Auction from 6 to 10 p.m. April 8.
    Artist David Banegas and Biana Pinchuk, a 14-year-old operatic singer and violinist, will provide entertainment. The art auction will benefit the Dan Marino Foundation and Surfers for Autism. It will be held at Luxury Performance Automotive Group, 1800 N. Federal Highway, Delray Beach. Admission is $25.

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

Mary Thurwachter contributed to this story.

By Emily J. Minor

    COUNTY POCKET — Sandra Strosky Gallagher, a beach lover who came to Florida on a spring break getaway right after college and never lived up north again, died March 2 after a brief illness. She was 53.
    Mrs. Gallagher lived in the so-called County Pocket and was well known for her animal rescue work, especially with cats. She was one of the originals from a cadre of ocean lovers who live in the small oceanfront section that is ruled by neither city nor village politics.
    “The ocean was basically her yard,” said her sister, Lynn Chrzan. “People knew her for keeping things pretty along the beach.”
    A New York native and one of five children, Mrs. Gallagher grew up in Lackawanna, N.Y. After high school, she attended Erie Community College, where she received a degree as a denture technician. Through the years, though, she also worked in several veterinary offices. She gave many hours and much support to Peggy Adams Animal Rescue League.
    Chrzan said her “baby sister” went into the hospital with what they think was pneumonia and then developed a host of confusing symptoms that eventually claimed her life. “We’re not really sure what happened,” she said.
    Mrs. Gallagher had been married to her husband, Brad, since 1987. They have one son, Jacob.
    Although separated in age by nearly eight years, Chrzan said she and Mrs. Gallagher were always close. Their birthdays are just one week apart, and Chrzan said she remembers the day when the infant Mrs. Gallagher came home from the hospital. “My parents said, ‘Here’s your birthday present,’ and she was mine ever since,” Chrzan said.
    Chrzan said the family is considering a bench along the beach to commemorate Mrs. Gallagher’s love for the ocean and her neighborhood.
    A memorial service will be held at 11 a.m. April 1 at Cason United Methodist Church, 342 N. Swinton Ave., Delray Beach.
    Besides her husband, son, and sister, Mrs. Gallagher is survived by three brothers, Edward, Mike and John Strosky; mother-in-law, Elsie Gallagher; and several nieces and nephews. She was preceded in death by her parents, Mike and Florence Strosky, and her father-in-law, Bernard B. Gallagher Sr.
    The family asks that any memorial donations be sent to Peggy Adams, 3100 N. Military Trail, West Palm Beach, FL 33409.

Condo balconies are cantilevered.

Rendering by GS4 Studios

By Sallie James

    A proposed six-story, 70-unit condo complex slated for the southwest corner of South Ocean Boulevard and East Palmetto Park Road got a thumbs up from Boca Raton’s Planning and Zoning Board last month.
    Next, the Ocean Palm project will head to the City Council for review.
    Planning and Zoning Board members also unanimously voted to recommend amending the future land-use map and change zoning in the area to make way for the nearly 300,000-square-foot project, which will rise to 65 feet. They reviewed the project for consistency with the city’s comprehensive plan, compatibility with surrounding development and availability of public services.
    Traffic studies indicated the project would produce fewer trips per day than if the land were developed to its maximum allowed density.
    If approved, the project would add an estimated $127 million in taxable value to the city, up from the property’s current taxable value of $12 million, said attorney Bonnie Miskel, who represents the developer.
    The 3.52-acre property is across the street from an entrance to South Beach Park. It’s bordered on the north by East Palmetto Park Road, on the east by South Ocean Boulevard, as State Road A1A is called there, on the south by Palm Avenue and on the west by Southeast Wave Crest Way.
    If the City Council approves the contemporary-style condo, it would be flanked by 8-foot-wide sidewalks and include an underground parking garage with 150 spaces. A public linear park would also be constructed near the project, Miskel said.
    The property for the project consists of three parcels: one vacant, one with an unoccupied office building and parking garage and one with a 20-unit condo. The condo building and office building and garage would be torn down to make way for Ocean Palm, Miskel said.
    Jan Grenell, who lives in the 100 block of North Ocean Boulevard, warned that the area is already congested without adding more residences.
    “We have an issue with traffic right there,” Grenell said. “I have seen almost more tragic accidents in the past couple months than I have ever witnessed in my life. You have cars that are almost taking out those bikers. It is ridiculous. It needs to be addressed before you do anything else there.”
    Cynthia Wohl, who lives in the 200 block of Wave Crest Way, wondered if flooding would get worse with more development. “The flooding in the area is horrible,” she said. She worried more water would get pushed down her street, along with more traffic.

By Steve Plunkett

    The group that wants to invalidate an ordinance reserving city-owned land on the Intracoastal Waterway for public uses has withdrawn its lawsuit but has not dropped its complaint.
     ForBoca.org Inc., which is led by former Chamber of Commerce chief Mike Arts, will seek a decision from an administrative law judge, or hearing officer, instead of a circuit judge.
     “We definitely are pursuing the case, but we’re pursuing it administratively as opposed to through the court for technical reasons,” said Gerald Richman, the group’s West Palm Beach attorney.
     The ForBoca.org lawsuit Richman filed in January said Boca Raton’s new ordinance limits the use of city land on the Intracoastal — and the Wildflower property in particular — in a way that is “wholly and patently inconsistent” with the city’s comprehensive plan. The filing postponed a planned discussion by the City Council on how to implement the ordinance.
     Boca Raton filed a motion to dismiss the suit in February, arguing in part that a challenge to the ordinance’s validity should be heard by an administrative law judge rather than in circuit court.
     Richman said the administrative route was “clear.”
     “We feel good about our chances for success on that,” he said.
     Richman’s motion to withdraw the lawsuit was made March 21 “without prejudice,” which means ForBoca.org can refile its complaint in the future.
     Arts headed the Greater Boca Raton Chamber of Commerce for two decades and was on the City Council from 2006 to 2009. Tallahassee lawyer Mark Herron is also a ForBoca.org director.
     ForBoca.org’s third director, former City Council member Al Travasos, said in late March he resigned his position after seeing the lawsuit and was trying to get his name dissociated from the group.
     Boca Raton bought the 2.3-acre Wildflower parcel, at the northwest corner of the Palmetto Park Road bridge over the Intracoastal, for $7.5 million in 2009. It had been negotiating for several years with the Hillstone Restaurant Group to put a restaurant there along with a waterside walkway open to the public. Fences now enclose the property.
     A citizen-launched petition drive posed the ordinance as a referendum question on the November ballot. It won by a 2-1 margin.
The council in July changed the land-use designation and zoning of the northern part of the site to allow business. The southern portion was already zoned business.
     The former Wildflower nightclub got special permission to put a parking lot on the then-residential portion, which would not be allowed today.

By Steve Plunkett

    The city will have a “public outreach meeting” April 3 to discuss its waterfront parks and gather ideas from Boca Raton residents.
    The session, hosted by Fort Lauderdale-based consultant EDSA Inc., is designed to give the public a chance to “ask questions, express opinions and make suggestions and comments” on current and future uses of the city’s waterfront properties, which include Spanish River, Red Reef and South Beach parks and the vacant Wildflower parcel.
    Jennifer Bistyga, the city’s coastal program manager, has said EDSA is considering passive park ideas, launch facilities for kayaks and paddleboards and at Red Reef Park, perhaps adding some pavilions. The consultant will use the public input to develop conceptual plans.
    The city and the Greater Boca Raton Beach & Park District also want input on what to do with the district-owned Ocean Strand property, almost 15 undeveloped acres between Spanish River and Red Reef parks.
    Separately, city officials are pursuing plans to build two double boat ramps and refurbish a canoe trail and boardwalk at Rutherford and Lake Wyman parks.
    Beach & Park District officials rescheduled their regular monthly meeting from April 3 to April 4 to accommodate the outreach session.
    “We’re anxious to see what’s up,” said Arthur Koski, district executive director.
    The meeting will come after a series of inconclusive discussions over the past eight years on what features Boca Raton residents would most like added to their parks.
    City Council member Scott Singer held an unofficial gathering at the Downtown Library in September just to talk about what to do at the Wildflower parcel. It attracted about 130 people and generated a list of ideas ranging from a waterfront boardwalk to a giant checkerboard to a lush hanging garden.
    In June, the city told the Beach & Park District to hold off on developing a master plan for Red Reef Park after a district consultant spent two years preparing three alternatives for commissioners to consider. The city owns the park; the district pays all its operation and maintenance expenses and for capital improvements.
    In October 2011 residents trekked to the municipal complex on North Congress Avenue to hear presentations from restaurateurs, other business people and an architect on what to put at the Wildflower site. The Hillstone Restaurant Group was negotiating a lease with city officials when voters approved a citizen-initiated referendum in November reserving the spot and other city-owned land on the Intracoastal Waterway for public uses only.
    And the Beach & Park District abruptly stopped planning at Ocean Strand in February 2012 after a consultant spent a year studying the parcel and nearby city parks and concluded there was no public outcry to develop another park at the beach. The district has owned the pristine site since 1994.
    “You can plop a ball field almost any place you want to. We shouldn’t squander [Ocean Strand] on just whatever recreation need might pop into our heads,” Robert Langford, then the district’s executive director, said at the time.

If you go
What: Waterfront master plan input session
Where: Downtown Library, 400 NW Second Ave., Boca Raton
When: 6 to 8 p.m. April 3

By Steve Plunkett

    Just like last year, a mommy leatherback turtle has kicked off nesting season in Boca Raton.
    Gumbo Limbo Nature Center spotters found 2017’s first sea turtle nest March 25 in Spanish River Park. The location was well north of a city project placing sand on the beach south of the Boca Raton Inlet.
    Nesting season in South Florida is March 1 to Oct. 31. Boca Raton’s daily numbers are posted at www.gumbolimbo.org/nesting. Last year’s totals were 729 loggerhead nests, 38 green turtle nests and 18 leatherback nests.
    The Gumbo Limbo 10K, a 6.2-mile run along A1A and neighboring Intracoastal Waterway neighborhoods that benefits the nature center, will be at 7:15 a.m. April 9 at Spanish River Park. A 1-mile fun run will be at 7:20.
    Entry fees for the 10K are $30 through April 3 ($20 for students age 19 and younger) and $35 afterward. Finishers this year for the first time will receive a medal. The fun run is $15. Everyone who registers in advance gets a T-shirt.

New Commissioner Elyse Riesa takes her oath of office at Town Hall on March 23,

assisted by Deputy Town Clerk Lanelda Gaskins.

Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star

By Rich Pollack

    When Highland Beach commissioners decided to break with years of tradition and move the polling place for municipal elections into the town’s public library, skeptics worried that a lack of parking, confusion and other issues would negatively impact voting.
    But commissioners, concerned about impartiality and thinking elections should be held on neutral public property rather than at nearby St. Lucy Catholic Church, decided to move forward anyway.
    The gamble paid off.
    “It was perfect,” said Vice Mayor Bill Weitz, who was one of the strongest supporters of moving the election site. “This town has shown that elections can be held at a municipal facility.”
    During a special commission meeting last month to swear in the winners of the March 14 election — Mayor Carl Feldman and commissioners Elyse Riesa and Rhoda Zelniker — Weitz took the opportunity to answer each question that had been raised.
    “Did a lot of people vote?” he asked. “Yes. Did people vote unimpeded? Yes. Did people have a problem getting to the voting site? No.
    “Did people have easy access getting to the voting site? Yes. Were there huge lines at the voting site? No. Did people have an opportunity to speak to candidates who were on the side in an appropriate free-speech area without being harassed or hassled? Yes. And most of all, was there a parking problem? Hell no.”
    By the time the polls closed at 7 p.m., 760 voters had cast ballots at the library, according to Town Manager Valerie Oakes. Another 372 voted via mail-in ballots, according to the county supervisor of elections. The total of 1,132 ballots were cast by almost 32 percent of the 3,558 registered voters in town.
    “Getting a turnout of more than 30 percent in a municipal election is incredible,” Weitz said.
    To ensure the safety and convenience of residents, the commission took the unusual step of closing all the town’s administrative offices and the town’s post office as well as the library, freeing up parking spaces that normally would be used by municipal employees and visitors.  
    “At no point was the parking lot ever full,” Oakes said. “There were no accidents or incidents.”
    To avoid confusion, the town sent postcards announcing the change to all registered voters and posted additional signs on Election Day announcing the polling location.
    In addition to welcoming newly elected members, commissioners recognized the accomplishments of outgoing Mayor Bernard Featherman, who had to give up his seat after six years because of term limits.
    “It’s been one of the great privileges of my life to be able to serve you, the people of Highland Beach,” Featherman said. “I have loved the job as your mayor, I have loved working with our wonderful staff, I have loved working with our outstanding commissioners, and I have loved this special slice of heaven and the people I have met here.”
    In the mayoral race, Feldman, who relinquished his post as commissioner, outpolled former Vice Mayor Ron Brown 612 to 502, or 55 to 45 percent.
    Incumbent Zelniker turned aside a challenge from architect Barry Donaldson to keep her commission seat, 601 votes to 511, or 54 to 46 percent.
    Newcomer Riesa gathered 527 votes (48 percent) to Melissa Ebbs’ 468 (43 percent) and Carl Gehman’s 102 (9 percent).

By Mary Hladky
    
    New downtown transportation alternatives are edging closer to reality — if the city can find business partners willing to help.
    City Council members, sitting as the Community Redevelopment Agency board, agreed at their Feb. 27 meeting to request proposals from private companies on how much they will charge the city to help it launch downtown transportation options.
    The goal is to decrease downtown traffic congestion by getting people out of their cars and onto shuttles or trolleys.
    The need for such service became more pressing when the Downtowner, which began operating in the city in 2015, left at the end of December after launching operations in Tampa in October.
    The Downtowner, which continues to operate in Delray Beach, provides free door-to-door service in electric carts that people can summon via a mobile app.
    Downtowner CEO Stephen Murray declined to comment on why he ended service in Boca Raton.
    “It is best for us to stay internal with our affairs,” he said.
    The Boca Raton City Council wants proposals for a similar service as well as a shuttle or trolley program that would use fixed routes in the downtown.
    Council members agreed they want to set up public-private partnerships that will limit how much the city pays for the transportation services.
    Important details, however, remain undecided. Council members did not say precisely where in the downtown the services would operate, or specify trolley routes. They also did not address operating hours.
    How to pay for the city’s share of the costs also has not been ironed out. But the Florida Department of Transportation has awarded the city a $1.5 million grant that could be used to purchase vehicles. That money won’t be available until 2020, but Mayor Susan Haynie said it may be possible to get that date moved up.
    Downtown Manager Ruby Childers estimated that a trolley system operating days, nights and weekends and picking up passengers every 10 minutes would cost $3.2 million for the trolleys, signage and trolley stops. Annual operations would cost $1.8 million.
    Tampa is spending $420,000 a year for the Downtowner service, plus $140,000 to buy vehicles, Childers said. The program is supposed to pay for itself in three years, and city subsidies will be eliminated.
    Council members indicated that is more than they are willing to pay.
    “The cost of what Tampa is doing seems incredibly rich to me,” said council member Scott Singer, who doubles as CRA chairman.
    Haynie spoke of a “limited city subsidy.”
    Council members left details undecided in part so companies interested in operating the services for the city would not be constrained in offering up ideas. Haynie said she is “confident” companies will be interested in getting involved.
    Council members also considered seeking proposals for a bicycle-sharing program that would allow people to pick up a bike from one location and return it there or at a different location. But they decided to take up that idea at a later date.
    The city’s efforts to relieve downtown traffic congestion include construction of a downtown parking garage. A consultant is working with the city to help decide the best location and size.
    A very preliminary cost estimate ranges from $28 million to $50 million for a multistory building, not including land acquisition. Land costs would be avoided if the city decides to build on land it owns around City Hall.
    The consultant’s recommendations are expected later this year.

By Sallie James

    When most city bars and restaurants are shutting down for the night, the after-hours crowd at Nippers and the Blue Martini is just starting to drift in.
    But the last call for alcohol may get moved up, and the owners of these bars say the change would put them out of business.
City Council members at their March 28 meeting introduced an ordinance prohibiting businesses from serving alcohol after 2 a.m. The change only affects bars in the once-unincorporated Town Center area that were previously allowed to stay open until 5 a.m. Nippers and the Blue Martini Lounge are in the crosshairs.
    “I will be shutting down. It will put me out of business,” said Nippers owner Carlos Ber, who owns the 30-year-old watering hole at 21069 Military Trail. “I serve food here until 4:30 a.m. This is where everybody comes to unwind.”
    Bruce Gregory, general manager of Blue Martini, echoed Ber’s concerns.
    “If we were to lose those three hours, it would be catastrophic to our business,” Gregory said. “If there is anything we can do to make the situation better . . . we are all supporting it.” Council members did not discuss the ordinance, which will be further reviewed at a later date.
    The city generally prohibits the sale of alcohol between 2 and 7 a.m. However, when the Town Center area was annexed in 2003, city officials agreed to grandfather in existing businesses that served alcohol under county rules until 5 a.m.
    Ber said Nippers gets 75 percent of its business from customers who arrive between 2 a.m. and 5 a.m.
    Most of Ber’s clientele are bar and restaurant employees who frequent his business when they get off work.
    Nippers has a staff of about 17 and a maximum capacity of 175. Ber said occasional fights break out, but nothing serious.
    “I have called the police four times in the past few years. Nothing big,” Ber said.
    Mayor Susan Haynie proposed the ordinance.
    “Some of the residents, especially out in the Via Verde area, have been speaking with me with concerns regarding a couple of establishments that ... have alcohol sales well into the morning hours,” Haynie said at the council’s Feb. 27 workshop.
    The new ordinance, if approved, would give businesses 120 days to comply.

    Boca Raton hopes the Florida Inland Navigation District will help pay to revitalize canoe trails and boardwalks within Rutherford and Lake Wyman parks.
    City Council members March 28 agreed to apply for a cost-sharing FIND grant to cover approximately half the $320,000 cost of engineering, permitting and design of the project.
    The grant would come from the district’s 2017 Waterways Assistance Program, which has provided more than $205 million to local governments over the past 28 years.
    The grant would also help pay for the engineering, permitting and design costs of environmental enhancements in the two parks and the development of a coastal hammock along the FIND property in Lake Wyman.
— Sallie James

Jason Richter, Delray Beach Ocean Rescue, climbs a temporary lifeguard tower recently. The tower is a replacement

for N-1, the defunct tower pictured at rear. The city wants to replace all of the lifeguard towers,

ut the timing depends on the availability of money.

Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star

By Jane Smith

    As the city begins its $3.1 million upgrade to the promenade along the beach, the sorry state of its eight lifeguard towers is even more noticeable. Especially to Delray Beach residents such as Chris Heffernan, who runs on the beach each day and has befriended the lifeguards.
    The investment adviser has become an advocate for new lifeguard towers. One tower, just north of Atlantic Avenue, has a shattered and partially boarded front window. It can’t be used. The city posted a large “No Trespassing” at the base of the stairs leading to the tower.  
    That forces lifeguards to sit in a portable fiberglass tower nearby. The lifeguards rotate tower positions so that no one is assigned permanently to one of the four portable towers. The fiberglass towers hold the heat and must be abandoned when a lightning storm approaches, according to the city’s Fire-Rescue Department. The lifeguards are part of the Fire-Rescue Department.
    On a chilly mid-March morning when the temperature dipped below 50 degrees, new lifeguard Jason Richter was happy to climb into the portable tower, wearing “city-issued pajama pants.” With only two months on the job, he has yet to spend time in the fiberglass tower during the summer.
    Heffernan began his lifeguard-tower quest in July when the city’s Environmental Services Department held an open house with its designer for the beach promenade work. At the time, Don Cooper was the city manager. Cooper said the plan was to replace one lifeguard tower a year, according to Heffernan.
    Capt. Kevin Saxton, the fire-rescue spokesman, said the eight towers have impact glass and “most of the windows can’t be locked due to corrosion.” The oldest tower is 13 years old and the newest one is 10 years old.
    Five of the eight towers have cracked front windows and seven are still in use, Saxton said. The cracks are the result of vandalism. The new towers will have lockable shutters.
    The towers will need permits from the state because of their location on the beach, said Vanessa Dornisch, environmental specialist with the state Department of Environmental Protection.  
    The current plan calls for two towers to be replaced annually starting in October, Saxton said. “Whether or not they stay in the budget is up to the city,” he said.
    “It’s hard to say we have a world-class beach without first-rate facilities,” said Mayor Cary Glickstein, who supports replacing all the towers at one time. “However, as mayor, I am just one of five members on the commission.”
    Last year, the fire chief recommended that all lifeguard towers be replaced during the current budget year until the need for new fire-fighting equipment became apparent because of the aging fleet, the mayor said.
    The lifeguard towers, estimated to cost $77,400 for two, will be discussed in May as part of the city’s capital improvement budget process, Glickstein said.
    Then, the commission will determine priorities and what can be done in the next budget year.
    Even so, the mayor — who is a surfer and lives on the barrier island — likely will support replacing all of the towers in next year’s budget.
    “Nearly 2 million people visit our beaches every year,” he said.
    “We have wisely invested in sidewalk, landscape and pavilion improvements, dune restoration and beach renourishment.
    “We will soon replace our rescue towers to ensure all beach visitors enjoy a great experience from their arrival to hitting the water.”

Brooke Thabit, who was born in Boca Raton, became an ambassador for Wings of Life

after a diving accident left her paralyzed. Thabit has regained some movement in her arms.

Photo provided

By Sallie James

    Brooke Thabit was a competitive surfer, with a job in a surf shop and big plans for her future, when a carefree dive off a dock left her paralyzed.
    On Labor Day 2012, when she was 17, Thabit fractured her neck when she launched into water that turned out to be waist-deep.
    Today Thabit, who was born and raised in Boca Raton but lived in Stuart when the accident happened, is an ambassador for the Wings for Life Run. The organization raises awareness and money for spinal cord injury research. Neither Thabit’s limited mobility nor her wheelchair defines her ability to contribute. She will participate in the May 7 run in Sunrise.
    “I’m still alive,” said Thabit, a student at the Savannah College of Art and Design in Atlanta. “It was very hard and it still is hard, but I have gotten more used to it now. I am hoping with time and with a cure, things will happen.”
    The Wings for Life Run kicks off at 7 a.m. at BB&T Center in Sunrise and winds through the city, eventually making a northwest turn along U.S. 27. The event is a running and wheelchair event held across 34 countries. All participants are to begin at exactly the same time around the world.
    Participants set their own goals and they don’t head toward a distant finish line. Instead, the finish line catches up with them. A half-hour after the race starts, a moving finish line, the Catcher Car, follows participants along the course, gradually getting faster until each one is caught. The first people passed after a few kilometers are the first to celebrate their accomplishments, while the last man and woman to be caught are declared Global Champions. (The record is 88.44 kilometers.)
     The entry fee is $60, and proceeds go to spinal cord research, with administrative costs covered by the Red Bull Foundation.
Thabit has limited movement in her arms, thanks to a surgery called a tendon transfer in which her biceps muscle was moved to her triceps. She also underwent a nerve transfer that may eventually give her movement in her hand, said her mother, Alison Thabit.
     After she was injured, Brooke Thabit spent a month in intensive care, then was transferred to the Shepherd Center in Atlanta, where she underwent extensive rehabilitation for her spinal cord injuries.
     “We are so proud of her tenacity and her hard work,” said her mother, who moved the family back to Boca Raton after her daughter was injured. “She has never said, ‘Mom, why did this happen to me?’ ”
     Her goals and dreams are different from what they were when she was 17, but she’s determined to make a difference. She hopes to use her studies in interior design to make universal design/disabled accessible architecture look less sterile, and wants to study overseas.
     She recently began driving a modified Ford Explorer.
     “It was really hard in the beginning but I try not to dwell on it too much. Your perspective is everything. The people you surround yourself with are really what life is about,” Brooke Thabit said. “People who love you will do everything for you.”
     Alison Thabit said the family has received support from all sides. “I am so happy for her to be living. She was one of the most independent 17-year-olds.”
     To register or donate, go to  www.wingsforlifeworldrun.com/us/en/sunrise-fl/

Contractor Weeks Marine pumps sand from the shoal just outside the Boca Raton Inlet on March 28. The shoal sand was placed on beaches south of the inlet. Photo by Palm Beach County

By Steve Plunkett

    The city’s dredge contractor was asked to cut a 20-foot-deep channel through the ebb shoal just outside the Boca Raton Inlet that has been giving boaters fits since last summer.
    But Weeks Marine Inc. was not going to remove as much sand as the city originally planned because of uncertainty over a legal challenge lodged by Hillsboro Beach, said Jennifer Bistyga, Boca Raton’s coastal program manager.
    “Only a portion of the ebb shoal will be dredged,” she said. “I cannot stress enough that this is only in one small portion of the shoal.”
    The contractor finished the renourishment of the central beach area from the inlet north to Red Reef Park before tackling the shoal problem. It moved 530,000 cubic yards of sand from borrow areas offshore to make a 1.45-mile stretch of the beach 170 feet wider.
    The renourishment was interrupted in April 2016 by weather delays.
    The city announced that Weeks Marine had finished the central beach project and was moving to work at the inlet March 18, a day after the state Department of Environmental Protection dismissed Hillsboro Beach’s amended challenge. The town just south of Deerfield Beach had failed a second time to demonstrate “substantial environmental interests,” the DEP rul
    “The petition is devoid of any facts that exceed the general interests of the citizens of the town of Hillsboro [Beach], other than the economic interests that are not protected by this proceeding,” the department said.
    But Hillsboro Beach filed a notice March 20 that it would contest the dismissal in the Tallahassee-based 1st District Court of Appeal.
    A total of 80,000 cubic yards of sand from the shoal was to be placed on Boca Raton’s south beach, from the inlet south to the Deerfield Beach city limits. The DEP had given the city permission to move up to 100,000 cubic yards of sand south of the inlet and up to 80,000 cubic yards of sand north. Hillsboro Beach, which counts on the natural flow of sand south to help maintain its beaches, complained that no sand should go north.
    “Hillsboro Beach does not object to the dredging, only to the placement of the material north of the inlet,” said Kenneth Oertel, that town’s Tallahassee-based environmental-law attorney.
    Bistyga said the shoal sand would be moved by about April 1, weather permitting.
    Boaters took pictures last summer of one another standing waist-deep in the middle of the Boca inlet. Operators leaving the inlet had to make a sharp turn south to avoid bumping or worse on the shoal, then watch carefully for swimmers and snorkelers at South Inlet Park before heading east into the ocean.
    The Boca Raton City Council approved spending up to $2.4 million in February to move the shoal sand. That total will be prorated, Bistyga said.
    “The city will only pay the contractor for the sand that was placed on the beach and the other project-related components associated with south Boca,” she said.
    The central beach renourishment was estimated to cost $11.3 million with the state and county contributing about $4 million. The city and the Greater Boca Raton Beach & Park District split the bills 50-50 for beach renourishment and dredging.

By Steve Plunkett

    Andrea O’Rourke, who as president of the Golden Triangle Homeowners Association often criticized downtown development and traffic congestion as enemies to quality of life, plans to be “a voice of the residents” in her new seat on the City Council.
    “I’m super excited, very hopeful, [and] looking into the future,” said O’Rourke, who replaced Deputy Mayor Michael Mullaugh on the dais.
    O’Rourke outdueled Emily Gentile, secretary of the Beach Condominium Association, and Andy Thomson, a business litigation lawyer who grew up in the region and moved to Boca Raton in August. O’Rourke garnered 5,614 votes (48 percent) to Gentile’s 1,372 votes (12 percent) and Thomson’s 4,621 votes (40 percent) to win Seat B.
    City voters March 14 also re-elected Mayor Susan Haynie and council member Scott Singer.
    Haynie bested immigration lawyer and BocaWatch publisher Al Zucaro 6,452 votes to 5,311 votes (55-45 percent). Singer kept Seat A by collecting 8,095 votes to the 3,317 that went to Patty Dervishi of the Golden Triangle HOA (71-29 percent).
    Turnout in Boca Raton was 18.5 percent, with one-third of the ballots cast by mail.
    O’Rourke, 69, is the only council member who lives east of Dixie Highway. She resigned as editor of Zucaro’s BocaWatch website to run for office. Now she is studying the issues the city faces as she prepares for the council’s goal-setting sessions in May.
    “It’s really hearing from the residents, hearing what their priorities are,” she said. “During the campaign, there was no question. Unequivocally, people are concerned about the traffic, the overdevelopment and the quality of life.”
    O’Rourke, a graphic designer who moved to Boca Raton 37 years ago, said she is not coming in “to tear things up” and does not want residents speaking at the council podium after being surprised by development proposals.
    “I’m looking for collaboration and open dialogue,” she said. “I want the residents involved first, before these things get to City Hall.”
    Mullaugh, 76, was appointed to the council in December 2008 after Peter Baronoff resigned because of family health matters. A lawyer, Mullaugh managed a division of Mellon Bank’s trust department. After moving to the city in 1997, he was president of Ruth and Norman Rales Jewish Family Services in Boca Raton and Delray Beach.
    Mullaugh was term-limited out of office after being elected without opposition in 2011 and defeating three challengers in 2014. He was chosen deputy mayor in March last year.

By Steve Plunkett

    The last week of March was scheduled to be a busy one for construction teams at the new Spanish River interchange on Interstate 95.
    Workers closed Spanish River Boulevard overnight March 28 to pour a bridge deck. They also planned to close Airport Road overnight March 30 for a bridge deck pour.
    Also on March 30, they expected to permanently close the old northbound exit ramp to westbound Yamato Road. The exit ramp — with traffic signals, and lanes for both westbound and eastbound vehicles — was to open March 31, Florida Department of Transportation spokeswoman Andi Pacini said. The schedule hinged on having good weather, she added.
    Work on the $69 million interchange will reach the 90 percent completion point on or about April 7, Pacini said. Crews started their work in January 2014. It will be Boca Raton’s fifth entrance/exit on I-95.
    The project is now scheduled to wrap up in late September and last 1,502 days, about a month longer than planned. Pacini said weather woes and holidays caused the delay.
    The I-95 southbound exit ramp over Yamato Road is the only one of 13 bridges left with substantial construction to do, Pacini said.
    “We will complete the substructure in the next few weeks and will set beams in late April. These will be the last beams on the project,” she said.  
    The popular T-Rex Trail just west of the interstate reopened to pedestrians and bicyclists in late December after being blocked for 16 months. The trail connects De Hoernle Park and Yamato Road.
    Besides the interchange, the project includes widening Spanish River Boulevard west of FAU Boulevard, building 13 bridges between Spanish River Boulevard and Yamato Road, adding auxiliary lanes and traffic signals on Yamato, and installing sound walls along Yamato and on the east side of I-95 north of Yamato.
    The new interchange is expected to make the lines of motorists exiting I-95 at Glades Road shorter and ease traffic on Glades and Palmetto Park roads.
    As construction continues, the interstate between Glades Road and Congress Avenue may have up to three lanes closed, as needed, from 10 p.m. to 5 a.m. Sundays through Thursdays. The project area is 2.5 miles long.

Five-oh splashes in the surf at Red Reef Park before Caitlin Bovery (left in blue shirt) repositioned

the recovered sea turtle deeper in the water so it could swim away. Bovery said juvenile turtles are not used

to moving on sand. A boat propeller made the gash in Five-oh’s shell.

Photos by Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star

Mitchell Kay (center) photographs Five-oh in the tank the young turtle called home for almost a year.

A satellite tag attached to Five-oh’s back enables its movements to be tracked.

By Steve Plunkett

    A scrappy young sea turtle that survived what should have been a fatal encounter with a boat propeller in the Intracoastal Waterway last Easter has hightailed it from Boca Raton for the calmer St. Lucie River more than 60 miles north.
    Five-oh, named after the TV police drama Hawaii Five-0 in honor of the Boca Raton officers who stopped its initial bleeding, reached the waters around Stuart two days after its March 9 release. A GPS device epoxied to the turtle’s back shows it hasn’t strayed far since.
    Mitchell Kay was hosting a barbecue at his home off the Intracoastal just south of the Spanish River Boulevard bridge on March 27, 2016, when he heard unusual splashing and discovered the turtle struggling in the canal, a fresh gash halfway across its back. Its left rear flipper was nearly severed.
    “It looked like it was going to drown,” Kay said.
    He whipped out his smartphone and Googled “wildlife rescue” for help, but most agencies were closed for the holiday. He finally got in touch with the Gumbo Limbo Nature Center, which alerted the police.
    Meanwhile, one of the barbecue guests, Tory Fritz, grabbed his scuba mask, snorkel and fins from the back seat of his car and jumped into the water.  
    “He actually lifted the turtle onto a JetSki platform,” Kay said. Video that Rocio Centurion, Kay’s girlfriend, took of the rescue shows Five-oh trying to help with its front flippers as Fritz pushes from behind.
    A police squad car and the marine patrol unit were next to arrive. Officers carefully lifted the animal onto land and applied pressure to stop the blood. Kay said the turtle had been struck by a boat probably minutes before. “It was a brand-new wound,” he said.
    Gumbo Limbo’s sea turtle rehabilitation team credited Kay’s and Fritz’s quick response with saving Five-oh’s life. Many rescues fail because turtles in distress swim away after being spotted and cannot be found, said Caitlin Bovery, the team’s assistant coordinator.
    “The fact that they jumped in and put the turtle on a JetSki launch was critical,” Bovery said.
    She got in the back seat of a police cruiser for the trip back to Gumbo Limbo.
    “It was my first time in a cop car, I had a sea turtle next to me, and no one got a picture,” Bovery said.
    Five-oh had the first of two CT scans and spent the next nine days in “dry dock” before undergoing surgery to reconstruct muscle tissue and repair its flipper. Staff veterinarian Maria Chadam used negative vacuum pressure to help heal the gash and covered the wound with bandages and zip ties.
    Bovery said Five-oh, a juvenile loggerhead less than 10 years old, probably was looking for food in the Intracoastal. Green turtles often show up in the waterway, she said.
    “It’s not terribly common to see loggerheads in the Intracoastal like that,” she said.
    Kay called the waterway near his house a high-speed zone and said “unfortunately there’s a lot of inexperienced operators” who don’t watch out for marine life.
    Barrier island residents Phil and Judy Messing donated Five-oh’s satellite tag, which will transmit GPS signals for about a year. Go to www.gumbolimbo.org/satellite-tracking for a link to the turtle’s movements.
    The loggerhead has a lifespan of up to 100 years. Five-oh’s sex will become apparent when it reaches adulthood in 10 or 15 years, Bovery said.
    Five-oh was Gumbo Limbo’s third loggerhead release of 2017, following Holiday on Feb. 16 and Velociraptor on Feb. 28. Holiday was found near the St. Lucie Nuclear Power Plant just after Thanksgiving with 7 feet of fishing line coming out of her rear; an X-ray showed a large fishhook in her throat. Velociraptor was a pier-hooked juvenile that healed fast after a “quick and easy” hook removal surgery, rehabilitation coordinator Whitney Crowder said.
    Several greens have also been released this year.
    Crowder called Five-oh a “very special” turtle. “This little fellow surpasses all other previous patients here in our rehab facility by staying here for almost one year,” she said. “He really was a miracle.”
    Gumbo Limbo took in more than 100 sea turtle patients in 2016 and released 38 rehabilitated patients within the year, Crowder said.

Volunteers serve homeless and low-income people at the Caring Kitchen in Delray Beach,

which CROS Ministries runs. The kitchen has about 150 volunteers.

Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star

By Mary Hladky

    Twenty minutes before lunch was served, homeless men, women and a few children began lining up outside the Caring Kitchen in Delray Beach. A few chit-chatted and a man and woman with a disagreement shouted at each other, but most waited silently.
    Precisely at 11:30 a.m., the doors opened and the people filed in past a table with free toiletries.
    Franklin Nelson, an Army veteran who was volunteering at the hot meals program that day in February, exchanged pleasantries with each person and made sure the line moved smoothly.
    Other volunteers ladled pasta with meat sauce, salad and a piece of garlic toast into Styrofoam containers. After taking one, each person could then head to the dessert table, where more volunteers offered homemade cookies and chocolate cake.
    Some people sat to eat at tables squeezed into the small room. Others opted for solitude, and moved outside.
    Nelson said he has family members and veteran friends who are living on the streets. So when he happened on Caring Kitchen, he decided to volunteer.
     “I wanted to do something to help the community,” he said. “This was it.”
     Homelessness is a longstanding problem in Palm Beach County and across the country, and one that defies easy solutions.
     People can fall swiftly from a stable life because of lost jobs, overwhelming medical bills, mental illness or drug dependency. The proliferation of sober homes in the county,  notably in Delray Beach, adds another cause: People kicked out of the homes for violating rules can end up on the street.
     Palm Beach County’s Homeless Point-in-Time Count, released March 22, showed that 1,607 people were homeless countywide, an 11.5 percent increase from the last count in 2015.
     That total undoubtedly is too low, since many homeless don’t want to be counted for a host of reasons, including fear that they will be separated from their children or uncertainties about how their information will be used.
     But Wendy Tippett, the county’s director of human and veterans services, doesn’t believe the count, conducted over 24 hours in late January, actually reflects an increase. That’s because this year those collecting the data were allowed to count as homeless those who denied it, even though it was obvious they were living on the streets.
     Ten percent of those counted as homeless this year live in Delray Beach, 7.6 percent in Boynton Beach and 3.27 percent in Boca Raton.
     Even if the number of homeless people did not grow, the count showed troubling increases among two groups. Homeless people 18 to 24 jumped 73 percent, while homeless people 60 and older went up 33 percent.
     One reason for the youth jump, Tippett said, likely is that more people are willing to come out as gay, lesbian or transgender. When they tell their parents or caregivers, some are asked to leave their homes, she said.
     A problem facing older adults is that there are so few nursing homes or assisted living facilities that people living on Social Security or Social Security Disability can afford, she said. Once discharged from hospitals or other facilities, they end up homeless.
     But the count also pointed out successes. Chronic homelessness dropped by 49 percent and homeless veterans decreased by 62 percent because of a rapid re-housing financial assistance program and a housing voucher program provided through the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Those programs are potentially threatened by President Donald Trump’s plans to cut $6 billion in HUD funding.
     “I definitely think we are improving and the numbers reflect the ability of the very low income and disabled to secure safe, decent and affordable housing,” Tippett said.
     Yet the high cost of housing in Palm Beach County puts many people at risk of homelessness.
     The average monthly cost of a two-bedroom apartment is $1,500. To afford that, a family needs an income of $45,000 a year, Tippett said. Yet about 80 percent of county residents earn less than $35,000 a year, she said.
     Services are available, but they fall short of the need.
     The Senator Philip D. Lewis Center opened in 2012 in West Palm Beach as the county’s first homeless resource center. It provides 20 beds in a women’s dorm and 40 beds in a men’s dorm for temporary housing.
     To get services, homeless people are assessed at the center. Each gets a case manager who determines that person’s needs and which community service providers can meet those needs.  
     The Homeless Coalition of Palm Beach County operates as an umbrella organization of those service providers, such as Gulfstream Goodwill Industries and Adopt-A-Family of the Palm Beaches.
     Tippett wants to open another resource center that will move the county toward the goal of having a total of four.
Despite these efforts, many homeless people struggle to get on firmer financial footing.
     That has created tension in cities, where residents complain about homeless people camped in parks or other public places and call on the police to do something about the situation.

Homeless people have rights
     A homeless man and city workers at Veterans Park in Delray Beach last month said police come to the park at various times and tell the homeless people who are sleeping there to move along.
     But police are in a tough spot.
     Delray Beach Police Lt. Russ Mager knows homeless people make many other people uncomfortable. But they, too, have rights, he said.
     If they are breaking the law, police can take action, he said. Their mere presence is another matter.
     “It is not a crime to be homeless,” Mager said.
     The Police Department is hiring a service population advocate to link those who need services to those who provide them, an initiative pressed by Chief Jeff Goldman.
     The new hire would work with people who are homeless, mentally ill or evicted from sober homes.
     To do more to address homelessness, the City Commission created the Delray Beach Homeless Initiative in August. Its members have 18 months to develop recommendations.
     But they are looking at ways to take action before that. One of the first steps was to increase the number of volunteers helping the county complete the homeless count in the city, out of concern they were undercounted in the past, said Ezra Krieg, who co-chairs the initiative with Delray Beach Police Sgt. Darrell Hunter.
     Another idea was hatched when the city learned public schools within its boundaries have 192 homeless students in kindergarten through grade 12.
     “That was a call to action,” said Janet Meeks, deputy director of public affairs.
     The students get free meals at school. To help them on weekends, the homeless initiative is raising funds — with a goal of $60,000 — from local businesses and service and religious organizations that would go to the school district to pack meals in backpacks for the students on Fridays, Krieg said.
     Another priority is to find a new and larger location for Caring Kitchen, whose presence at 196 NW Eighth Ave. does not please neighborhood residents.
     “This is an essential community program,” Krieg said. “We need to find a place.”
     The city now recognizes that it can’t expect the county, service organizations and volunteers to resolve homeless issues on their own, said Krieg, director of housing initiatives at Gulfstream Goodwill and the former director of the Lewis Center.
     “The county is doing its part,” he said. “Unless the city also steps up, we won’t be able to address this issue in Delray Beach.”

Nonprofits loom large
     Even though the county has set up infrastructure to help homeless people, much of the actual work falls to volunteers and nonprofits.
     The Caring Kitchen, operated by CROS Ministries, has about 150 volunteers. With a staff of just three people, “We need all of the volunteers to provide all the services we provide,” said assistant program director Shona Castillo.
     That includes serving about 60 breakfasts and 160 lunches each weekday, and dinners four days a week.
     Other services include helping homeless people get IDs, which are frequently lost or stolen, and apply for food stamps and Medicaid. If someone has a friend or relative in another city who can help, Caring Kitchen staff confirms that and then pays for a bus ticket.
     Its small building is a hive of activity in the mornings. Cars and trucks pull up frequently to drop off food donations. A table behind the dining area is stacked with bread donations. Boxes of canned goods line one wall.
     The volunteers said they are enriched by their efforts. “I enjoy what I do — helping people,” said Nelson, who recently had to stop his daily trips to the center to undergo medical treatment.
     Sadakatzahra Glemeau, who was serving iced tea at lunch in February, described the Caring Kitchen as a “warm environment.”
“It doesn’t make you feel like an outcast,” she said.
     CROS Ministries also operates food pantries in Delray Beach and six other cities in the county as well as in Martin County that provided food to nearly 50,000 people over nine months last year.
     Clients include seniors, the working poor, unemployed and homeless. “They are trying to make ends meet. They need us,” said Melanie Winter, the Delray Beach food pantry coordinator.  
     When Caring Kitchen is closed, Cason United Methodist Church picks up the slack.
     Every Saturday at 9 a.m., volunteers distribute brown bag lunches prepared by volunteers at St. Edward Roman Catholic Church in West Palm Beach and nonperishable lunches that Cason volunteers assemble with the help of Publix, which provides breads and desserts, said bag lunch coordinator Sara Knight.
     The church, at 342 N. Swinton Ave., also has held memorial services when a homeless person dies. The sister of a man who died “said it really helped her to know he had friends and people who cared for him,” Knight said.
     Cason is among 19 interfaith congregations in Delray Beach that work with Family Promise of South Palm Beach County, on the campus of St. Vincent Ferrer Catholic Church.
     Each congregation has agreed to provide shelter at night for homeless families for one week each quarter. They are housed in rooms in the church, are provided meals and have access to showers and computers.
     During the day, when their children are in school, the parents go to Family Promise, where they receive a mental health assessment, and referral to mental health treatment, if needed.
     Family Promise provides resources to help unemployed parents find a job and instructs them on financial management. Case managers work to keep the parents moving toward self-sufficiency, including saving enough money to rent an apartment. Families are in the program 30 to 90 days.
     Seventy-five percent of the 16 families helped last year “graduated” and almost all remained employed and housed for the 12 months they are tracked.
     Although not designed specifically for homeless people, CityHouse in Delray Beach helps single mothers and their children, who can stay in the program for up to two years.
     CityHouse places the moms and kids in five units of a seven-unit apartment building, whose location is not disclosed. One unit serves as a family room for classes, meals and celebrations. An in-house manager supports and encourages them.
     The concept of the program, which is supported by private donations, is that the lives of kids won’t improve unless the mother is stable and able to care for them.
     “Our goal is to help the women become financially independent and develop a healthy support network,” said executive director Lisa Wanamaker.
     “On average, I get a phone call or email three times a week from a mom who is sleeping in her car with her children, or just had a baby and nowhere to go. The need is enormous.”

 Native plants keep the dunes healthy

Bay bean (Canavalia rosea), a vine that trails along beach dunes and coastal sand,

blooms most of the summer and sporadically the rest of the year.

Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star

By Deborah S. Hartz-Seeley

    Although some may consider coastal wildflowers to be weeds, those of us living along the ocean should think of them as some of our best friends. By putting their roots down in search of water, they also secure the sand.
    “And that helps prevent beach erosion,” says Jeff Nurge, co-owner of Native Choice Nursery in Boynton Beach. These native plants also act as a buffer between what lies inland and the wind and waves off the ocean during heavy weather.  
    Besides storm protection, the vines and shrubs offer sustenance for butterflies, birds, bees and other insects. And they provide shelter for wildlife such as small mammals, snakes and lizards as well as 30 species of what are considered rare animals, according to the Florida Department of Environmental Protection.  
    But even though they are valuable to man as well as nature, dunes are not immune to man’s impact. Many have been destroyed and replaced with buildings, parking lots and other construction.

Seeds of the bay bean are buoyant, which allows them to be distributed by ocean currents.

The purplish-pink flowered plant is part of the pea family.

Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star

    “Our beaches are never going to be natural again,” says Nurge. In fact, only 35 percent of native dune vegetation remains undisturbed along Florida’s 1,260 miles of coastline, according to the DEP. Many seaside residents and towns are doing their best to preserve and even grow the dunes by installing native plants, including flowering vines and shrubs, at appropriate places in the sand. So the next time you go to a beach where the dunes are preserved or being restored, take a moment to look around and notice what’s growing.  
    “Knowledge is power and if you are knowledgeable about the dune plants, you will have an interest in them and be more prone to protecting them and all they offer us,” says Nurge.
    To make your dune visit more informative, we asked Nurge to provide a list of some flowering plants you can find on the dunes in Palm Beach County. Take these pages the next time you visit the ocean.
    “If you can identify the plants around you, you’ll get more enjoyment out of your visit and it will be more of an interactive experience,” says Nurge.

Coastal flowering plants

Bay cedar (Suriana maritima), a low bush that can grow into a tree, sports tiny yellow flowers.

It hosts the rare mallow scrub-hairstreak and martial scrub-hairstreak butterflies.

Its seeds are dispersed by water so it tends to grow at the bottom of the dunes.

Photo by Jeff Nurge/Native Choice Nursery

Beach morning glory (Ipomoea imperati), a vine with white flowers displaying yellow centers,

grows on the downside of the dunes where moths and other insects nectar on it. You’ll find it bathing in full sun.

Photo by Jeff Nurge/Native Choice Nursery

Beach verbena (Verbena maritima) grows near the water. Therefore, it is rare to find it on our local dunes,

where much of its habitat has been replaced by condos and other homes. If you hope

to see this vine with its purple flowers, look in areas that are 100 to 200 yards back from the water line.

Photo from Wikimedia Commons

Blackbead (Pithecellobium keyense) is a large prickly shrub that can grow into a tree on the back of the dune

where a hammock is forming. Its flowers look like powder puffs that range from white to deep pink. After its flowers

fall off, the plant forms black seeds. It is a host plant for large orange sulfur and Cassius blue butterflies.

Photo by Jeff Nurge/Native Choice Nursery

The dune sunflower (Helianthus debilis) seeds readily, so you’ll find a lot of it growing on the dunes.

If you see this plant, bees and butterflies will not be far away as this flower provides plenty of nectar.

Photo by Larry Allain hosted by the USDA-NRCS PLANTS Database

Where to find coastal wildflowers

Here are some places in Palm Beach County where dune flowers grow:
    Delray Municipal Beach — It runs for 6,840 feet along South Ocean Boulevard (A1A) from Casuarina Avenue and the Seagate Beach Club north to the first beachfront home.  The most mature section of renovated beach can be seen north of Sea Spray Avenue, with street parking available. The section around East Atlantic Avenue is slated to be restored within the next year.
    Gumbo Limbo Nature Center — 1801 N. Ocean Blvd., Boca Raton; 544-8605; www.gumbolimbo.org. Part of Red Reef Park, this area will give you a view of what the dunes and beaches were like before man started building east of A1A.  
    MacArthur Beach State Park — 10900 Jack Nicklaus Drive, North Palm Beach; 624-6952; www.macarthurbeach.org. This park has four habitats, including pristine beach and dunes.
Protect our dunes. It’s the law. At the beach, stay on the designated pathways and walkovers to protect the vegetation. Also, state and local laws make it illegal to dig up the dune vegetation or take any part of the plants, including flowers, clippings and seeds. They must be left in their natural state, said Nora Fosman, senior environmental officer for the city of Boca Raton

The Jamaican caper (Capparis cynophallophora) is a flowering shrub that can grow into a tree at the back of the dunes. Its white flowers turn purple and look like bursting fireworks. After it blooms, the plant produces fuzzy, brown bean-like pods that split open to reveal a sticky orange-red flesh containing its seeds.

Photo by Jeff Nurge/Native Choice Nursery

The endangered necklace pod (Sophora tomentosa var. truncata) gets its name from the shape of its seedpod,

which looks like strung beads. The seeds are poisonous to humans. The plant’s yellow flowers attract hummingbirds

because of their shape. They also attract a variety of butterflies, including the cassius blue and mangrove skipper.

Photo by Stephen Brown/horticulture agent, UF/IFAS Lee County Extension

Railroad vine (Ipomoea pes-caprae) is related to the beach morning glory and has many of the same characteristics,

except that its flowers are purple. A fast grower, it can cover the dunes quickly. Although you might think the shape

of its flower would attract hummingbirds, the plant grows too low to the ground for them to hover and sip nectar.

Photo from Wikimedia Commons

Sea oxeye daisy (Borrichia frutescens) is a vine ground cover that grows on the back side of the dunes in lower areas.

Here it forms a thicket that helps secure the dunes by gathering and holding sand. Its quarter-size flowers look like daisies.

They attract insects such as butterflies, beetles and wasps. The plants may have either silvery gray green

or bright green foliage; the dunes have two varieties.

Photo by Larry Allain hosted by the USDA-NRCS PLANTS Database

White sage (Lantana involucrata) has white flowers with yellow centers and petals that fade to pale pink.

This delicate flower attracts many different birds plus butterflies and bees. Its purple fruit is toxic to humans.

Although it needs light, you’ll find this plant in hammock areas, where it is prized because it is wind-tolerant.

Photo by Jeff Nurge/Native Choice Nursery

Beach planting and cleanup event
   

    The Institute for Regional Conservation will hold a volunteer day at Atlantic Dunes Park in Delray Beach from 9 a.m. to noon April 8. Volunteers of all ages are needed to help remove invasive plant species, plant native species, and pick up trash and recyclables.
    The institute will provide the tools, plants and light refreshments. Volunteers should bring sunscreen and gloves, and wear long sleeves, long pants and a hat. Atlantic Dunes Park is at 1605 S. Ocean Blvd. Meter parking is available just west of State Road A1A.

By Janis Fontaine

    St. Vincent Ferrer Parish will host a traditional Seder on April 10, when Jews worldwide celebrate their feast of Passover.
    In addition to a full-course dinner, the celebration will include spiritual music and fellowship. Msgr. Stephen Bosso, professor of sacred scripture at St. Vincent de Paul Regional Seminary, will lead.
    The celebration will take place in Kellaghan Hall at St. Vincent, 840 George Bush Blvd., Delray Beach, beginning at 6:30 p.m.
Tickets are $25. Reservations are required. Call 665-8566 or email familylife@stvincentferrer.com.
                                  
    Don’t throw it away! Donate it!
    The Pastoral Ministry’s second annual rummage sale is coming up April 30 at St. Mark Catholic Church in Boynton Beach, and if you have items to donate, the organizers ask that you drop them off by April 29.
Their list of preferred items includes jewelry, home decor, antiques, collectibles, furniture and working appliances.
    Things that they do not want? Clothes, shoes, CDs, cassettes or books.
    You can also purchase a table to sell your items and keep your profits. Tables are $25 for a 6-foot table and $40 for a 12-foot table. Refreshments will be provided by the American German Club, and if you spend $10, you get a free lunch.
    Proceeds benefit St. Mark’s Pastoral Ministry. For a table or to make a donation, call Sister Mary Joan at 735-3530.
                                  
    Talk theology over a beer. Pub Theology, a group from the First United Methodist Church of Boca Raton, meets at 7 p.m. on the first Tuesday and the third Wednesday of the month at Biergarten in Royal Palm Place, 309 Via de Palmas No. 90, Boca Raton, for conversation, fellowship and open discussion, served with the beverage of your choosing. For more information, call 395-1244 or visit www.fumcbocaraton.org

Send religion news to Janis Fontaine at janisfontaine@outlook.com.