Environmental analysts Antonio Rodriguez and Victoria Strange look at an insect in the midst of a saw palmetto, one of the dominant scrub area plants.  Photos by Joe Capozzi/The Coastal Star

By Joe Capozzi

For nature lovers, Palm Beach County’s best-kept secret might be a 36-acre oasis of wilderness surrounded by an industrial park, police station, public health facility, ballfields and residential homes on the north end of Lantana.
The Lantana Scrub Natural Area, tucked inside a densely populated area between Interstate 95 and U.S. 1, would seem like an easy place to reach. But getting there is part of the adventure.
The newest of the county’s 34 natural areas, the Lantana Scrub has no parking lot. Eight parking spaces will be designated later this year at the Palm Beach County Public Health Department parking lot off Southwinds Drive, which borders the Lantana Scrub’s southwest boundary. 
For now, visitors can access a half-mile hiking trail and maintenance roads by entering two public maze gates, at the northeast and southeast corners of the property. There is no designated parking at those entrances, either. And the maze gates, open to the public from sunrise to sunset, are tucked away from the road. 
The gates are fairly easy to find if you have a little patience and determination. At both entrances, noise emanates from trucks coming and going from a Waste Management Recycling Center on Hillbrath Drive.
Once you are on the interior paths, all signs of the busy urban surroundings give way to the peace and solitude of towering scrub pine trees, lush silver and green saw palmettos and tweeting songbirds. 

Fallen trees, like this one near a path, are left to naturally decompose in county-managed natural areas like Lantana Scrub.

Formerly part of the now closed A.G. Holley State Hospital property, the Lantana natural area is named for its Florida scrub and scrubby flatwoods, home to Florida rosemary, powder-puff lichen and hog plum. 
Wildlife includes gopher tortoises, Eastern Phoebe songbirds, red-bellied woodpeckers, golden-winged skimmer dragonflies and raptors like osprey, Cooper’s hawk and swallow-tailed kite.
The only reminders of civilization are the faint buzzing of airplanes taking off from the nearby Lantana airport. 
“It’s a great start. I want to see more of this,’’ Abbe Gleicher of Boynton Beach said on a recent Lantana Scrub tour guided by analysts with the county’s Environmental Resources Management Department.
“Every area needs nature. Nature decreases anxiety and increases a sense of well-being and health,’’ she said.
The Lantana Scrub is owned by the state, which has leased it to the county since 2012 for an annual $300 fee. Before the county started preparing it as a natural area, the site historically had been used as a homeless encampment. 
The maze gates, with information kiosks, were added in 2018. Hiking trails were cut in 2020. The county is waiting on additional signage before designating the eight parking spaces at the health department later this year. 
“This is a really cool site. It’s very intact considering how much development surrounds it,’’ said Victoria Strange, an ERM analyst. 
Abundant flowering tillandsia, dancing lady orchids and air plants can be found in the open scrub of the eastern half, just west of the Lantana Sports Complex. 
The dancing lady orchids were introduced to the site by Pine Jog Environmental Education Center.
“There’s a lot of wildlife that uses this little fragment, too, because there’s nothing else in the area until you get to Hypoluxo,” the scrub area about 2 miles south, Strange said.
“There’s a bunch of predatory birds. There’s a Cooper’s hawk nesting pair that is very active on site. An osprey comes here with his fish and hangs out with his fish on the snags’’ of the scrub pine, she said. 
ERM’s recent tour of Lantana Scrub highlighted some of the natural area’s tiniest inhabitants — insects, from silver garden spiders to ox beetles.
“It’s kind of like bird- watching,’’ said ERM analyst Antonio Rodriguez, who used his i-Naturalist app to identify the diverse invertebrates. 
“It’s pretty fun to collect a whole bunch of different species, to say you’ve seen it.’’

If You Go
What: Lantana Scrub Natural Area
Where: Adjacent to the Lantana/Lake Worth Health Center at Andrew Redding Road and Southwinds Drive.
Open: Sunrise to sunset; no designated parking, accessible by pedestrian traffic only.
For more information: https://discover.pbcgov.org/erm/NaturalAreas/Lantana-Scrub.aspx

Toni Cvetko is chairwoman of Art in Bloom, set for March 4-5. Garden club members create floral arrangements based on students’ artwork. Here she is at the 2019 show. Photo provided

This is the third in a series on five local garden clubs.

By Jan Engoren

Think a green thumb and a basic knowledge of plants are prerequisites to becoming a member of a garden club?
Not so, says Lorelei Wolff, co-president of the Boynton Beach Garden Club along with Delray Beach resident Toni Cvetko. The two are friends from New Jersey and past members of a junior woman’s club there.
“It’s a misconception to think that you need to have a knowledge of plants to join the Boynton Beach Garden Club,” Wolff says. “I knew nothing about gardening before I joined. But, I had an interest.”
The club, which began in 1938 with its first president, Bertha Chadwell, is open to all and members do not have to live in Boynton Beach.
The club, which had 44 members as of February, was founded to encourage home and civic beautification. Those goals still stand, but have widened in scope to include more environmental and conservation issues.
Expanding the knowledge of gardening, cultivating an appreciation of floral arts and realizing beautification efforts in the community are all part of the mission. Over the past two years of the coronavirus pandemic, the club has been meeting by Zoom.
One of the club’s earliest projects, in 1952, was to create a proper cemetery for residents. That year, the club turned the cemetery over to the city. Another project in the early years was to plant trees, including the now 65-year-old kapok tree that stood in front of the Boynton Beach High School on Ocean Avenue until it was uprooted and replanted across the street three years ago, as part of the city’s redevelopment plan.
Before it was known as Federal Highway, Route 1 was the only highway to run up the eastern coast. When it was widened and renamed Federal Highway, the Garden Club planted and maintained 2 full miles of the road.
In 2017, Cvetko saw a program the club was having about orchids and wanted to learn more.
“I thought — why not try it?” she remembers.
Before joining the club, Cvetko had no plants on her lanai. As a full-fledged member and co-president, she now has 15 plants thriving on her patio, including a spider plant, a ponytail palm tree in a pot and seven blooming orchids.
The current programming theme is “Go Wild, Go Native!” — as in using wildflowers and opting for native plants whenever possible.
Some outgrowths of that philosophy are the Butterfly Garden the club members created and maintain at the Schoolhouse Children’s Museum on Ocean Avenue; the memorial garden they planted at the High Point Condominiums where they hold meetings; and the community garden where they planted firebush, milkweed, elderberry, blue porterweed and the club’s flower, the allamanda, at Northwest Sixth Avenue and Seacrest Boulevard, on a plot the city donated in 2018. Last year, the club added orchids to the mix. Wolff gives credit to the city and its mayor for their encouragement.
“Mayor Steven Grant has been very supportive of our efforts,” says Wolff.
The club also does philanthropic work with the Rustic Retreat Retirement Home on Federal Highway, maintains the Blue Star marker on Federal and is a member of the Mounts Botanical Garden.
In January the club held one of its main fundraising events — a potluck lunch and auction — at Sterling Village condominiums.
On March 4-5, the club will host one of its signature events, the annual Art in Bloom, a Boston tradition that began at the Museum of Fine Arts 40 years ago. The event is replicated in Boynton Beach every March at the Schoolhouse Museum.
Art in Bloom, of which Cvetko is chairwoman, invites garden club members to create floral arrangements based on the works of student artists from Poinciana Elementary School. The arrangements are then judged in a variety of categories, including best use of color, best use of texture, best interpretation of the art as well as a category for people’s choice.
Cvetko lists a few other characteristics that make the club distinct. The monthly newsletter includes informative columns including one titled, “Ask AMI,” which stands for Any Member Interested.  
“It’s an opportunity to get advice from the collective wisdom of our fellow BBGC members,” she says.
Another column, “The Culinary Gardener,” details information on an herb, then includes several recipes using that herb.
“The Butterfly Corner” column provides detailed information about butterflies and how to make sure that they have the necessary plants and flowers to thrive.
“Joining the Boynton Beach Garden Club is a great learning experience,” Cvetko says. “You have the chance to learn from every chairperson and committee member.
“You get the opportunity to go places such as the McKee Botanical Garden in Vero Beach and the Heathcote Botanical Gardens in Fort Pierce, and do things you might not ordinarily do,” she says. “I’ve created so many friendships and met so many interesting people and learned how to garden all at the same time.”

For more information, visit the club on Facebook or at boyntonbeachgardenclub.org.

Art in Bloom
Where: Schoolhouse Children’s Museum, 129 E. Ocean Ave., Boynton Beach.
Evening reception: 5-7 p.m. March 4, desserts and refreshments included. Free.
Art display: 10 a.m.-4 p.m. March 5. Entry is free. Admire the artworks and vote for the people’s choice honor.
More info: 908-757-0116 or 561-742-6780

Mia Bonutti, a senior at Oxbridge Academy in West Palm Beach, stands inside the 30-foot camper she renovated for her independent study project, which allowed her to tackle a real-life topic of interest. She hopes to donate the RV to an organization that will use it to house homeless people. Photos by Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star

By Janis Fontaine

Mia Bonutti likes solving problems. When the coronavirus pandemic hit, she hunkered down with her family in Manalapan, watching news reports. At the same time, Mia, a student at Oxbridge Academy in West Palm Beach, was considering ideas for an independent study project.
The tiny-home craze caught her attention, and she likes woodworking and getting her hands dirty. Homelessness is a huge problem. She thought: Could I build a tiny home and give it away to a homeless person?
She talked it over with her dad, Peter Bonutti, an orthopedic-reconstructive surgeon and inventor.
“My dad and I know nothing about plumbing,” Mia said, so her dad suggested they find an older RV with good bones and refurbish it. Before long, a 30-foot, 10-year-old trailer with a small pop-out and intact plumbing was parked at Oxbridge Academy, ready to be worked on. She and her family paid $7,000 for the camper and eventually invested $4,000-$5,000 in improvements.
Mia gutted the vehicle, then renovated it mechanically and remodeled the interior. Teachers and advisers helped her with things she wasn’t familiar with, like electrical work.
“The demolition,” she said, “was the hardest part.” It took five months, working part-time, and recruiting friends to help.
Once the RV was stripped down to the bare walls, the fun part started. The camper, once a boring brown, is now finished in tasteful white and gray. The kitchen has white cabinets and bead-board paneling, an oven, stove and microwave and blue gingham-check curtains on the windows. The counters are a combination of gray and white synthetic material that looks like quartz and butcher block.
The living area is bright and airy, with flowing white privacy curtains. There’s plenty of storage, and a flat-screen TV is tucked into the built-in shelving unit. A dining table and chairs, and two couches with animal print pillows, offer comfortable seating.

Mia shows off the remodeled interior, a far cry from the stripped-down RV. Gutting it took five months. Her advice? ‘If you have a dream, keep at it.’

The bathroom has a corner shower and the bedroom has more built-in storage and a headboard that resembles black subway tile.
Finding a place to donate the camper has come with its own challenges. She was just a day away from donating the RV when a friend’s research showed her that her ideals didn’t line up with those of the charity. The group wanted to auction the RV for cash and use the cash to help the homeless.
“I wanted someone to live in it,” Mia said. Throughout the project, Mia had imagined a person making the space a home. Plus, she questioned how much of the proceeds from the sale or auction would actually go to help homeless people.
Mia had to make a difficult decision and a difficult phone call. Her mother, Simone Bonutti, is the vice mayor of Manalapan and could have easily handled the matter, but Mia didn’t ask her to do that.
Eventually, Mia connected with the Veterans of Foreign Wars of the United States in Ocala. The VFW is a nonprofit service organization that can help veterans find housing — and hope.
Mia learned the VFW planned to use the RV as part of transitional housing to get veterans off the street until the organization found permanent housing. The RV would be a temporary home for a plethora of people passing through the Ocala facility on their way to self-sufficiency.
“It seemed like a good fit,” Mia said. But that plan didn't pan out and as of late February, nearly two years since she hatched the RV idea, Mia was in search of other options.
Mia, now a senior, hoped to have the issue resolved to let her focus on lacrosse season, which she calls “long pants season” because of her leg bruises. Mia is team captain and goalie, after first being recruited from the soccer team, where she’d already proved fearless on the field.
“I just stay focused and keep my eye on the ball,” she said. “I know my teammates are there to help me out.”
In the fall, Mia will move to Charlottesville to attend the University of Virginia, where she’ll study chemical engineering. She says CE is a degree with lots of applications and opportunity, and that a path heavy on math and science and light on English fits her.
Mia, the oldest of six kids, says being big sister brings a lot of responsibility — especially when she was the only kid with a driver’s license and everyone else needed rides.
At 18, she already has one patent with her dad and a few in the works. For athletes, pierced earrings and sports add up to a problem, so Mia and her father designed and patented unisex sports-safe earrings.
Mia also makes stuffed animals and hats for the babies in the NICU at Holy Cross Hospital in Fort Lauderdale, where her aunt is a nurse.
“My mother calls me a grandma because I like to knit and crochet,” Mia says with a laugh.
But really, Mia likes doing things for other people. Her altruism even got her a bit of national attention: Kelly Clarkson’s daytime television show has asked Mia to submit a video about her project.
A significant part of the Oxbridge Academy philosophy is its focus on character development within a culture of kindness.
Mia and her classmates take the “kindness” seriously, participating in canned food drives and other volunteer activities. It goes hand in glove with the self-directed independent study programs that ask students to tackle real-life issues.
“I learned a lot from the project,” Mia said, “but I think the biggest life lesson was: If you have a dream, keep at it. Nothing happens overnight.”

Photo provided by Mia Bonutti

Cats have delicate systems and can become ill if their diets change abruptly. This is an issue because of pandemic-related shortages, rising prices and shipping delays. Photo provided

By Arden Moore

Since the pandemic began two-plus years ago, grocery shopping has never been the same. It has turned into a treasure hunt of hope as you push your cart up and down the aisles in search of fresh eggs, your favorite brand of toilet paper or even pizza dough.
Or, you find yourself reading signs that limit how many paper napkins, sports drinks or pounds of bacon you can buy.
We aren’t the only ones feeling the impact of product shortages, rising prices and shipping delays. So are thousands of cats in Palm Beach County who depend every day on the generosity of volunteers to feed them in community cat colonies, small shelters and foster homes.
Before the coronavirus hit, Susan Carmichael, founder of Florida’s Forgotten Felines, never had an issue fulfilling her standing order of 100 cases of canned cat food with a PetSmart store in Boynton Beach to feed more than 400 community cats.
John Wood of Adopt a Cat Foundation Inc. could count on buying plenty of canned cat food at bargain prices at Pet Supplies Plus for his group’s kittens and cats up for adoption.
Dawn Herrmann of Truly All Cats Trapping and Rescue used to breeze into Publix any time to pick up ample amounts of Friskies canned food for her group’s cats in foster homes and in cat colonies. The shelves were always well stocked.

Empty shelves like these at a Boynton Beach Publix are a common sight. Coastal Star staff

Today, they and other cat rescue groups are traveling farther, paying more and seeking food alternatives for their dependent felines.
“Friskies pate is a favorite canned food for many of the cats, but now, it is the hardest to find,” says Herrmann, a registered nurse from Lantana who co-founded the group with Kara Sullivan. “The shelves are empty at Walmart and Publix. We pay about 50 to 60 cents a can for Friskies, but sometimes have to buy more expensive brands that cost up to $2 a can.
“Making matters worse, some of our cats only eat pate or they will lap up the gravy and leave the rest of the food. It is easier to mix medications in pate than gravy-based cat food.”
Carmichael has been feeding cats in need since 2002. She is 76 years old and is doing her best to locate affordable canned food in chicken flavor, a protein favorite for her felines.
“Not all cats like fish and will not eat say, a tuna-flavored can of food,” she says. “It’s very challenging now, but my biggest reward is when a sweet feral cat I feed finally lets me pet her.”
Wood is the president of Adopt A Cat Foundation, committed to finding permanent homes for rescued cats and kittens. The game plan for his team of volunteers is to communicate and be creative in searching for affordable canned cat food.
“When any of us are able to buy 24 or 36 cans at a time, we consider it a major score,” says Wood, a property management administrative assistant from West Palm Beach. “It is not good for a cat’s digestive system to suddenly switch diets, so we work together and do the best we can to find the canned food.”
If you abruptly switch a cat’s diet, it may cause vomiting, diarrhea and stomach pain. Feline tummies can be sensitive, especially if changes in food flavors and forms happen suddenly.
Veterinary nutritionists recommend the 3-3-3 rule, in which you give a cat two-thirds of his current food mixed in with one-third of the new food for the first three days. Then during the next three days, switch the amounts to one-third of the current food with two-thirds of the new food.
Within seven to 10 days, most feline digestive systems are able to tolerate the new food without digestive upset.
Fortunately, large shelters in the area, such as Peggy Adams Animal Rescue League based in West Palm Beach, are not experiencing cat food shortages.
“Large brick-and-mortar places like ours and Tri-County Animal Rescue in Boca Raton have contracts with major pet food manufacturers who supply us with food to feed our animals at the shelter at deeply discounted prices in exchange for promoting their brand of food at our shelters,” says Paul Bates, communications manager who oversees the trap-neuter-vaccinate-release program at Peggy Adams.
Bates works with several TNVR groups in the county that feed cat colonies. He has been suggesting that they expand their searches by looking for canned cat food at major wholesale stores like Sam’s and Costco or going online at Chewy.com.
“These big-box stores and online places like Chewy have large warehouse space to house the cat food. Supermarkets don’t have that kind of storage space or the money to place large-quantity orders,” Bates says.
Herrmann hopes that the supply of preferred canned cat food will catch up with demand soon.
“This canned cat food shortage is not just affecting us, but everybody, so any donation of wet food is much appreciated,” she says.

Arden Moore, founder of FourLeggedLife.com, is an animal behavior consultant, author, professional speaker and master certified pet first-aid instructor. She hosts Oh Behave! weekly on PetLifeRadio.com. Learn more by visiting www.ardenmoore.com.

How to Help
All three of these are designated 501(c)3 nonprofits and accept donations of food, money and volunteer time:

Adopt a Cat Foundation: http://adoptacatfoundation.org, 561-848-4911. Its shelter is at 3110 45th Street, Suite E in West Palm Beach and its thrift shop is at 889 Donald Ross Road in Juno Beach.
Florida’s Forgotten Felines: https://floridasforgottenfelines.org, 561-252-2545. Founder Susan Carmichael prefers phone calls over email.
Truly All Cats Trapping and Rescue: https://trulyallcats.org, 561-801-8228, rescueme@trulyallcats.org.

ABOVE: A beamed-ceiling great room with floor-to-ceiling windows features a living area, casual dining arrangement and wet bar. BELOW: This estate in Delray Beach is walled and gated for complete privacy and has 110 feet +/- of direct oceanfront. Photos provided

This recently reinspired contemporary home has 8,566 +/- total square feet. It has a crisp architectural design that features an open floor plan built around the incredible views of the ocean. With seven en suite bedrooms, three of which are on the ground floor, there is plenty of room for a larger family or one who welcomes plenty of seasonal visitors. An additional family room (with custom built-ins) and a morning bar, two bedroom suites plus an expansive VIP suite, all overlook the ocean from the upper floor.
Outside, recreational amenities abound: a covered dining loggia and a freestanding arbor surround the beachfront heated pool and spa — all set within a huge patio connected to the wet bar and kitchen for seamless indoor/outdoor entertaining opportunities.
Inside features include wood-plank and slate flooring, detailed ceiling features and stunning window design through which to view the ocean.

Offered at $21,995,000. Contact the Pascal Liguori Group at Premier Estate Properties, 900 E. Atlantic Ave., Delray Beach, FL 33483. Pascal Liguori, 561-789-8300 or PascalLiguoriGroup.com. View more at www.rx10758571.com

The master suite has a sitting area as well as sliding doors in a bay configuration that opens to the deck and ocean beyond.

Dramatic skylights and task lighting crown a center island gourmet kitchen, which has polished concrete countertops.

Second-floor balcony overlooks the dune walkover to the beach and ocean.

Each month, The Coastal Star features a house for sale in our community. The House of the Month is presented as a service to our advertisers and provides readers with a peek inside one of our homes.

Atlantic Crossing is at Atlantic Avenue and northbound Federal Highway in Delray Beach. Photo provided by Edwards Cos.

Related story: Delray Beach: Bar planned for Atlantic Crossing postpones request for 2 a.m. closing

By Larry Barszewski

Atlantic Crossing is ready to make a splash in downtown Delray Beach.
There could be ripple effects for decades as the 9-acre project east of Federal Highway transforms a critical section of the city’s bustling Atlantic Avenue.
The $300 million project, in the works for more than a decade, will — by April, if the developer’s latest estimate is accurate — let people shop in its first stores, eat at its first restaurants, work in its first offices, live in its first apartments and stroll through one of the tree-graced plazas that its owners hope will make it a destination within a destination downtown.
“It’s a huge project for the downtown as it fills in a transitional gap that we’ve seen for a while, from our core historic downtown to the bridge,” says Laura Simon, executive director of the city’s Downtown Development Authority.
Where to begin?

The missing link
Atlantic Avenue is booming, with a restaurant and nightlife scene that rivals other famous South Florida destination streets such as Las Olas Boulevard in Fort Lauderdale and Clematis Street in West Palm Beach. On the beachside, the avenue is a hot spot for visitors enamored with the “sea” in the city’s Village by the Sea moniker.
But the stretch of the avenue from northbound Federal Highway to the Intracoastal Waterway bridge has struggled over the years to find its identity.
The Blue Anchor restaurant and pub, with its imported façade from a 19th-century London establishment, made a home on the south side of the avenue there, along with a few other restaurants, shops and a bank. The north side was marked by a blighted vacant lot of a one-time gas station, along with an antiques mall and financial center. Atlantic Plaza, the main attraction, had a combination of restaurants, shops and offices geared more to drivers pulling in than to pedestrians strolling by.
Atlantic Crossing will take up the whole northern portion from northbound Federal to Veterans Park at the base of the bridge. It aims to attract both motorists and pedestrians — as well as have a built-in customer base of people taking up residence in its apartments and condos.
“We have always viewed Delray as a highly desirable location for residents, workers and retail/restaurant customers,” says Don DeVere, vice president of the Ohio-based Edwards Cos., which is developing the project.

Hidden parking
A key to integrating the project into the pedestrian-friendly nature of the downtown is its out-of-sight parking. While the surface layout is geared for walkers, the underground space accommodates the cars that will bring the visitors to Delray Beach.
There will be more than 1,000 parking spaces in the development when it’s completed. The single-level main garage, underneath the buildings along northbound Federal Highway, can be accessed from a street into the development from Federal Highway or by taking Northeast First Street and then entering the project.
The underground garage, with its 442 spaces, covers 3.6 acres. That’s almost the size of three football fields.

By the numbers
When built out, Atlantic Crossing will have 261 apartments, 82 condos, 83,462 square feet of Class A office space, 39,434 square feet of restaurants and 37,642 square feet of shops.
It has been opposed over the years by nearby residents who fear it will create a traffic jam at the bridge and is too big to fit Delray’s village character.
Only a portion of the space is in the first phase — and only a portion of the first phase is getting set to open: just two of the six buildings that are part of the overall project which broke ground in 2018. The two buildings have ground-level shops and restaurants, with 85 apartments on the upper floors of one and two floors of office space over the shops in the other.
“For us, that corner has been dormant for a very long time,” Simon says. “To have those opening up for business and the additional parking that’s there, it’ll just continue to bring more pedestrians and spread the downtown out and really bring back life to that area.”

A different downtown vibe
While Atlantic Crossing doesn’t have the ambiance of the restaurant-lined, two-lane portion of the avenue between Swinton Avenue and Federal Highway, it’s ready to set a different mood. The narrower, oak-tree-canopied historic section of the avenue will now give way to a more open, palm-tree-lined gateway to the beach.
“Landscaping on both sides of Atlantic has been installed and the patio at the corner of Atlantic and Federal has been carefully detailed to entice customers,” DeVere says. “But most important are the buildings themselves, which have been carefully designed to contribute to the Atlantic Avenue streetscape.”
Walkways within the development will have plenty of trees, art and seating, and will connect to Veterans Park along the Intracoastal Waterway.
Instead of a monolithic project design, the buildings each have their own theme, to give the impression they developed organically over time. The styles range from Mediterranean architecture to the sleek look of Florida stone sidings, some buildings classic and others modern.
Simon appreciates the open space in Atlantic Crossing, but wishes it had more.
“Open space is very important in urban centers,” Simon says. “Our hope is we can really enhance the Veterans Park area to become an accessible area for people to be outside and take advantage of that open space in a denser area, because it’s going to be dense.”

Economic impact
Data going back to 2014 estimates the construction itself will create more than 1,000 jobs exceeding $60 million in annual salaries, while there’ll be 600 permanent jobs once the project is finished, accounting for about $30 million a year in wages.
Atlantic Crossing is expected to produce $2.6 million in new annual tax revenues for the city and $2 million in building permit fees.
As for the people who will be living at Atlantic Crossing, it’s estimated they will be spending about $6.1 million a year in the city.

Construction crews work on Atlantic Crossing, a $300 million project that will span two blocks from northbound Federal Highway to Veterans Park. Two of the six buildings that are part of the first phase are expected to open by April and include apartments and a few restaurants and other businesses. Tim Stepien/ The Coastal Star

Long-awaited opening
Projected completion dates for the first phase have come and gone, and now the developer is saying the initial openings are just around the corner, by April. “We expect at least one retail store, offices and the first set of apartments to be open the first quarter of this year,” DeVere says.
His company initially thought 2020 would see some openings, but that time line got pushed back to mid-2021, then late 2021. The more recent delays, the developer says, are directly attributable to labor, material and supply chain problems brought on by the pandemic.
“It’s hard to predict with so many variables,” DeVere says. In addition, even if construction is completed, it may take businesses or offices extra time to build out and occupy their interior spaces.

Signed and on board
A number of the businesses moving into Atlantic Crossing are coming from their previous digs at Atlantic Plaza, including Merrill Lynch financial services and Chico’s, a women’s clothing store that will now have full frontal exposure on the avenue.
“We have seen very strong demand for office [space] at this location and hope to have the remaining space leased within 60 days,” DeVere said on Jan. 25. “We already have significant interest in the phase two office space.”
Le Colonial, a Vietnamese restaurant with a French flair, has the prime spot at the corner of Atlantic and Federal, in the same building as Chico’s and Bounce Sporting Club, a high-end bar that combines sports and nightlife and plans to open in the summer.
In the building to the north are two other restaurants, The Hampton Social — a nautical-themed restaurant out of Chicago, with a coastal menu that aims to replicate the feel of the Hamptons in New York — and Ó·Ra Cucina and Bar. As many as eight first-floor suites are available in the two buildings for other businesses wanting in.
As for the new apartments, Atlantic Crossing plans to begin leasing in February.

Wide, but not so tall
Atlantic Crossing, when completed, will be the biggest project ever downtown.
It has a large footprint of two full city blocks, but it’s not reaching for the sky. Developers say the size of the buildings is more in keeping with the small-town vibe the city tries to exude, with two at three stories, two at four stories and two at five stories.
“The sun always shines here in Delray Beach. We’re not shaded by tall skyscrapers,” Simon says. “You’ll hear that from some of our long-standing retailers, that they enjoy being on the sunny side of the street. It makes a difference. People feel different, happy.
“Atlantic Crossing is on the sunny side of the street,” she says. “The good news is it’s not a 40-story building.”

Farewell, Atlantic Plaza
Members of Delray’s Simon family designed and built Atlantic Plaza, with its easily remembered 777 E. Atlantic Ave. address next to Veterans Park and the Intracoastal, drawing customers from the beach to the east and the city to the west.
The plaza was a shot in the arm for Atlantic Avenue when it was built in 1985, the year before the city’s Community Redevelopment Agency was created and the renewal of Atlantic Avenue began in earnest.
“It was meant to be that catalyst for change, to also enhance that part of the district, to expand that district to the bridge,” the DDA’s Simon says.
Her father, Roy Simon, designed Atlantic Plaza, and her uncle, Sandy Simon, was its lead developer. The family is sad to see it go, but knows Atlantic Avenue is ready for a new catalyst, which the city hopes Atlantic Crossing will be.
“My father has lived here for 91 years in Delray Beach,” she says. “Our family has been here since 1912. So, there’s change. That happens. It’s part of life.”

By Larry Barszewski

King tides are serving as an early warning system for communities along the Intracoastal Waterway, providing seasonal examples of flooding that — in future decades — will become more frequent and more intense as sea levels rise.
The main barriers keeping salt water from flooding even more waterfront property and streets during the king tides are the existing sea walls, but most of those structures probably aren’t high or strong enough to protect against the rising sea levels to come.
In January, Delray Beach became the first city in southern Palm Beach County to shore up its sea wall regulations to address climate change. City commissioners at their Jan. 11 meeting set a minimum height for sea walls and approved other policies for when new or replacement sea walls will be needed.
The new regulations won’t force all property owners whose sea walls are lower than the minimum height to come into compliance. They will apply only to new sea walls, those on properties undergoing major renovations, those in need of major repair and those that fail to stop water from washing over them and flooding neighboring properties or streets.
If cited by the city, owners will have a year to make repairs and meet the new height requirements.
“It’s not just about water coming through your sea wall or over your sea wall and affecting your neighbors, it’s also if your sea wall is damaged to the point where you’re losing material through the sea wall and into the Intracoastal Waterway,” Delray Beach Public Works Director Missie Barletto told waterfront property owners at a December forum about the changes.

Different approaches
Other coastal communities are still considering what to do.
In South Palm Beach, Town Manager Robert Kellogg is looking to see if the state approves new building inspection requirements in response to the collapse of Champlain Towers South in Surfside in June.
“We are waiting to see if the state does anything with requiring inspections to high-rises,” Kellogg said of legislators. “If they do, we would then incorporate sea wall standards into any changes we would make to the code.”
Other communities know it’s only a matter of time before they will have to act. Many belong to the Coastal Resilience Partnership of Southeast Palm Beach County, which developed a climate change vulnerability assessment for its partners last year.
“We are still working together as a group to update the vulnerability assessment, and have started discussing sea walls as an action area,” Ocean Ridge Town Manager Tracey Stevens said in an email to The Coastal Star.
Besides Ocean Ridge, the other partners are Boca Raton, Delray Beach, Boynton Beach, Highland Beach, Lantana, Lake Worth and Palm Beach County.
Highland Beach has had a minimum sea wall height for new construction on its books for years, but Mayor Doug Hillman said the town needs to take a closer look at how it will adapt its regulations to the growing threats from global warming.
“It’s a very big subject and a very costly one for our residents, so it’s not just something we can ignore,” Hillman said. “You don’t want water flowing over the land and then getting into the homes. And you can’t make a decision when it’s too late.”

Full disclosure
The Delray Beach regulations require someone selling property in an affected area to disclose in the sale contract — in all caps — that the property is “in a tidally influenced area.” The notice says the buyer may have to meet minimum standards “during construction or substantial repair to the property or the sea walls,” or when needed “to abate nuisance flooding.”

How high to build
One of the most confusing aspects of sea walls is how their heights are measured. If the height is based on an old surveying system, known as NGVD 29, the recorded height is about 1.5 feet lower than if measured on the newer system, called NAVD 88. Some cities, such as Highland Beach, may use another Federal Emergency Management Agency standard called “base flood elevation.”
NAVD 88 is “a surveyed elevation, which is a benchmark point in space,” said Cynthia Buisson, assistant public works director in Delray Beach. “Sometimes when we think of elevation, we think well that’s just the water level, but the water level changes with the tide, with the season, and what I’m referring to is a surveyed elevation.”
Highland Beach last year began using base flood elevation because its previous 6 feet NAVD 88 minimum requirement was getting confused with that height using NGVD 29, which is lower, said Jeff Remas, the town’s floodplain administrator. The change also makes the town proactive as sea levels rise, he said.
“This way, as the flood maps raise the base flood elevation, the sea wall height requirement also increases without the need for legislative intervention,” Remas said in an email to The Coastal Star.
Delray Beach’s new requirements are lower than what’s already on the books for new construction in Highland Beach. In fact, what Highland Beach has as the minimum allowed for new sea walls — the base floor elevation — is the maximum height for Delray Beach.
In Delray Beach, using the NAVD 88 measurements, the city is requiring sea walls be built to a minimum height of 4.2 feet and that the structure be able to accommodate a cap that reaches a height of 5 feet if needed in the future.
“We’re going to continue to monitor sea level rise. There may be changes that come forward. Instead of having to replace your entire sea wall, you can just add a cap for that additional level of protection,” Buisson said.
Delray’s 4.2 feet minimum compares to minimum sea wall heights of 3.9 feet in Fort Lauderdale, 5.7 feet in Miami Beach and 5 feet for Broward County.
Delray’s maximum height of 5 feet or the base flood elevation, depending on location, compares with maximum heights of 4 feet in Lighthouse Point and 5 feet 10 inches in Pompano Beach. Fort Lauderdale also uses base flood elevation as a maximum.
About 70% of current sea walls in Delray Beach are below its new minimum and only about a quarter are in good or satisfactory condition, a 2018 city survey showed. The survey covered about 20 miles of privately owned sea walls and 1 mile of public sea walls.
Buisson said a sea wall has a life expectancy of about 30 years, so Delray Beach officials don’t want to make them be higher than needed during that time.
“Some folks think that we’re not going high enough,” Buisson said. “The whole idea is to still allow you to live on the water, enjoy why you bought the house on the water, while still protecting yourself and your community.”

Hank Davis of Delray Beach rescued this green turtle while fishing along the beach in Briny Breezes. Photo provided

By Larry Keller

As if a green turtle dubbed Brontosaurus didn’t have enough obstacles to reaching old age — ingestion of and entanglement in plastic debris and fishing nets, boat strikes, discarded fish hooks, ocean pollution and climate change — it also had to fend off a shark attack.
In late December, Hank Davis was fly fishing in Briny Breezes when he noticed a group of children staring at a turtle struggling to swim no more than six feet from shore.
“I thought that’s strange, because turtles don’t usually come in that close, especially if there are a lot of people around,” said Davis, a retired psychology teacher in the international baccalaureate program at Atlantic High School and a Delray Beach resident.
“I got this guy to hold my fly rod … and I put one arm underneath her and tried to support her head. She didn’t try to get away. I’m pretty confident she was in shock. She was sort of flipping her fins and looking around. Her right flipper was just shredded … there was a lot of ragged tissue.”
Davis carried the turtle up to the beach. Then he called Joan Lorne of the conservation group Sea Turtle Adventures. She came immediately.
Davis placed the turtle on a wet towel on the floor of the passenger side of Lorne’s vehicle and she drove the critically wounded critter to Gumbo Limbo Nature Center in Boca Raton, which provides medical care and rehabilitation to injured and sick sea turtles.
The turtle was “quiet and docile” during the drive, Lorne said.

Emily Mirowski, Gumbo Limbo sea turtle rehabilitation assistant, displays the turtle, named Brontosaurus, which lost most of its right front flipper. Jerry Lower/The Coastal Star

“The front right flipper was for the most part bitten off,” said Emily Mirowski, Gumbo Limbo sea turtle rehabilitation assistant. “She still has her shoulder area.”
The turtle’s front left flipper was intact but had some teeth marks, and there also were shallow bite marks along the carapace, or shell.
Gumbo Limbo’s veterinarian and rehab specialists gave the turtle iron and vitamin supplements for blood loss, and sutured wounds to both front flippers. The injuries were cleaned with a solution, and raw honey — which has antibacterial and antifungal qualities — was applied to them. The turtle continues to receive antibiotics.
“She was a really healthy turtle before the shark injury.” Mirowski said. “She was robust. I don’t think she had any barnacles on her, or algae growth.”
She was named Brontosaurus because Gumbo Limbo is giving its patients dinosaur names until it reaches the end of the alphabet. And while Brontosaurus is called “she” by everybody, her gender won’t be evident until she’s at least a more mature 20 years old, said Gumbo Limbo’s manager, Leanne Welch.
The most common sea turtle malady the nature center treats is fibropapillomatosis, Welch said. That’s a disease that produces cauliflower-like tumors on a sea turtle’s body, even its eyes and mouth. Shark bite injuries to local sea turtles are neither common nor rare.
“We see maybe three or four a year,” Welch said. “There aren’t really a whole lot of sharks in our area that can take out a full-grown sea turtle. Our sharks here have a tendency to be a little smaller.
“With sea turtles, what we’ll see more often is evidence of an old injury that is healed.” But a turtle that is already sick and floating on the surface “is an easy mark.”
So is a youngster like Brontosaurus. She is estimated to be 5 to 7 years old and weighed a dainty 23 pounds when she arrived at Gumbo Limbo. Adults on average weigh about 350 pounds, but can reach 500 pounds.
Brontosaurus will be released back into the sea, likely in the spring, when it’s expected she will be fully healed and finished with her course of antibiotics, Mirowski said.
Until then, Gumbo Limbo visitors can view her swimming in one of the tanks she and other patients occupy.
“She is a popular turtle and we get a lot of questions about her,” Mirowski said.
“She’s already super strong and healthy. She’s swimming pretty well. She’s not struggling. That’s a good sign she’ll do really well in the wild.
“She still has the humerus bone near the shoulder region of the flipper. She’ll be able to use it, especially if she’s a female. She would still be able to come up on land and use it to nest.”
Unlike other species, green sea turtles eat a mostly vegetarian diet of sea grasses and algae. This gives their fat, not their shells, a greenish hue and accounts for their name. They are a protected, threatened species. Green sea turtles nest in more than 80 countries, and generally do so on south Palm Beach County beaches from May through September.
They can live to age 70 or older. Even with all the impediments Brontosaurus must overcome to survive that long, she has a chance. After all, sea turtles have endured for 100 million years — and perhaps were contemporaries of the actual brontosauruses.
Welch wouldn’t bet against her making it. “Sea turtles are remarkably resilient,” she said.

A morning walk on my birthday produced an unusual find along our shoreline. Mary Kate Leming / The Coastal Star

Gifts come in many forms. Some wrapped, some written, some plucked from the side of the roadway. Flowers, music, books, chocolate, wine are all received with gratitude. My favorites, however, are most often those found in nature: a hummingbird hovering nearby, eye contact with a sea turtle just off shore, a whale breaching within sight of the dune. And sunrise — the magical kaleidoscope of shifting colors just before the sun pushes above the horizon.
On Jan. 17, my birthday wish was to extend my normal morning walk all the way to the Boynton Inlet. My husband joined me and as the sun rose on a spectacularly beautiful, crisp, clear day, we picked up bits of sea glass and lovely little shells as we strolled along. The morning was surely a gift.
As my bare footprints followed me north, living starfish and sea cucumbers washed ashore. This doesn’t happen often on this stretch of beach, so we joined other beachcombers in returning them to the sea in hopes the incoming tide would carry them back beneath the waves. It was a shared effort in a good cause.
At the north end of Boynton Beach’s Oceanfront Park, a large shell rolled up the empty, smooth beach and landed near my feet. I was giddy. In my 35 years of walking this beach, I’d never found a shell like this. It was flawless and beautiful. I looked around to see if someone perhaps had placed it there, but saw only two young women on beach chairs, staring hard into their cellphones. I scooped up the shell and walked on. They never looked up.
What was this shell, where did it come from and how did it end up on this beach at this moment? My shell book provided few answers.
I decided to search out a shell expert to determine how rare a find it was. On the Broward Shell Club Facebook page I posted a photo and a description of where the shell was found.
Members of the page were as blown away as I was. I was getting psyched that maybe I’d found something truly rare and valuable.
Then one of the administrators posted: “GREAT SHELL! Sadly, it must have been dropped there because it is found Live in the Indian and Pacific oceans. Not the Atlantic.”
He included a Wikipedia link for Tonna tessellata. There it was, my shell from another ocean.
I’ll likely never know who left this gift on a cold January morning, but I thank them. It reminds me that not only are the best gifts often from nature, but also sometimes from complete strangers.

— Mary Kate Leming, Editor

Professor emeritus Eric Shaw reclines at home 21 stories above Boca but does not feel retired. He mentors Ph.D. students and says life is a self-improvement project. Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star

By Tao Woolfe

After four decades of telling students that neither marketing — nor money — is inherently evil, Dr. Eric H. Shaw stepped away from the lectern to powerfully demonstrate this principle.
Just before Christmas, the marketing scholar and professor emeritus pledged $2 million to Florida Atlantic University, his alma mater and longtime employer.
“Most people believe money is the root of all evil, but it’s not — it’s greed,” he said.
Money can, and should, be used as a force for good, Shaw believes. Giving back to the college, he said, is his way of paying it forward.
Shaw’s donation will help students involved in various fields of study, said Chris Delisio, FAU’s vice president for institutional advancement.
“Dr. Shaw is a special, special person,” Delisio added. “Gifts like this do not happen every day. We are incredibly grateful for his kind generosity.”
Specifically, the $2 million donation will provide scholarships and excellence awards to student athletes, and to business, honor society and music students. Shaw said the money will be awarded as a series of gifts while he is alive and will continue to be distributed as a planned endowment after his death.
Shaw, 78, who is unmarried, received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in business administration from FAU in 1972 and 1973, and earned a Ph.D. in 1985 from Temple University.
He began teaching marketing at FAU in 1973 and has since held positions as marketing department chairman, dean and a member of FAU’s board of trustees, among other roles.
Shaw also has been an active member of Boca Raton and Palm Beach business and charitable organizations.
Although retired from regular teaching duties, he has served as FAU’s emeritus professor of marketing since 2014. He also mentors marketing Ph.D. students around the world, he said.
“These students have a narrow area of study — the history of marketing thought,” Shaw said. “They take a broader view than most, looking at how marketing impacts society and how society impacts marketing. It’s not just about how to make money.”
Shaw said he made much of the money he is giving away by serving as an expert witness in court cases involving several South Florida businesses and national corporations. He was called to testify about such issues as wrongful termination of marketing contracts, deceptive marketing practices and trademark infringement, according to his extensive curriculum vitae.
Shaw has written extensively about marketing history, practices and schools of thought. He is cited as an expert and scholar in many marketing books and essays by other authors.
In a 2015 piece he wrote for the Journal of Historical Research in Marketing, Shaw discussed how much he loved teaching — and learning from — his students.
“I thoroughly enjoy teaching the history of marketing thought class,” Shaw wrote. “Every time I reread familiar sources and hear the fresh perspectives of my students, I learn from the process. It improves my understanding, forces me to rethink ideas long taken for granted. …
“This old professor, of course, can only hope that his youthful students learn as much from such a class as he does.”
Asked about his future plans, the longtime Boca Raton resident said he enjoys his ocean view and his unstructured lifestyle, but he is still a driven man.
“I think of myself as a self-improvement project,” he said. “I am continually working on getting better.”

NOMINATE SOMEONE TO BE A COASTAL STAR
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Even on a cool, foggy morning like Jan. 28, Old Ocean Boulevard is busy with pedestrians, pets, bicyclists and occasional motor vehicle traffic. Jerry Lower/The Coastal Star

By Joe Capozzi

Ocean Ridge officials are seeking volunteers to serve on a task force to come up with ways to protect the growing number of pedestrians flocking to Old Ocean Boulevard. 
Keeping pedestrians safe on the oceanside road has been broached off and on over the years, most recently in 2016 when commissioners explored the idea of changing the traffic flow to one way to create a promenade. 
Although that idea never advanced, Vice Mayor Susan Hurlburt in early January said the issue needs to be addressed as more and more residents move to the area and discover the road as a walking route.
“Old Ocean is becoming crowded,’’ Hurlburt, who takes walks on the road twice a day, said at the Jan. 3 Town Commission meeting. “I’m seeing a lot of speeding, running stop signs, plus it’s really packed. Between the walkers, the bikers, the dogs, the skateboarders and the cars, I’m afraid it’s an accident waiting to happen.’’
The emergence of the coronavirus pandemic in early 2020 has contributed to growing crowds as more people seek outdoor leisure activities, Police Chief Richard Jones said. 
“Old Ocean is a roadway and that is what many folks don’t realize,’’ he said. “They have earbuds in. They don’t pay attention to anything that’s going on around them. They’re just on a mission to walk or exercise, and it’s a beautiful place to do it, but it’s always potentially an unsafe place to do it if you’re not alert to your surroundings.’’
Commissioner Steve Coz said an obvious solution is to increase police patrols to cite motorists who run stop signs or stop along the road to unload beach chairs.  
Hurlburt wants to collect ideas that haven’t been considered in the past, including different traffic calming measures. “Anything we can do to make a safer environment,’’ she said. 
Old Ocean Boulevard runs nearly a mile from Corrine Street in Ocean Ridge to Briny Breezes, east of and parallel with State Road A1A. Much of the Ocean Ridge stretch offers unobstructed views of the ocean.
“It’s the only street of its kind in Palm Beach County,” said Commissioner Geoff Pugh, who suggested the one-way promenade with planters in 2016 when he was mayor.
“You can be the poorest guy in the world and the richest guy in the world and you have the same opportunity to walk directly next to the ocean. It literally is a gem for the town of Ocean Ridge.”
Town commissioners agreed to form a task force of residents. Volunteers should contact Town Manager Tracey Stevens at tstevens@oceanridgeflorida.com or 561-732-2635.
In other business:
• Town employees and visitors will decide on their own whether to wear protective masks in Town Hall. Commissioners considered whether to mandate masks because of the omicron surge and agreed to let employees take an anonymous survey of their preferences. More than 92% voted to make mask-wearing a personal choice, Stevens said. 
• The commission voted 4-1 to participate in a proposed $26 billion nationwide settlement with opioid manufacturers and distributors. If the deal is approved, Ocean Ridge stands to get $32,000 to $36,000 over 18 years. 
The lone no vote came from Commissioner Martin Wiescholek, who offered a sharp rebuke of the deal, noting it will come from a fraction of the combined profits of Johnson & Johnson and drug distributors Cardinal Health, AmerisourceBergen and McKesson.  
“I’m going to make a very bold statement here: Keep your free money. I don’t want it. This is not what this town should be about. We should be ashamed of taking $32,000 for a settlement of 500,000 people that have been killed,’’ he said. “It’s the settlement culture that we have come to accept as part of our daily lives, where corporations can do whatever they want and if they get caught, they pay a little settlement.”

By Larry Barszewski

Manalapan town employees could see a pay boost soon as commissioners seek to be more competitive attracting new police hires and to stanch the flow of town workers leaving for better paying jobs elsewhere.
Town Manager Linda Stumpf said the town hasn’t kept up with the recent salary increases in the area.
“When we did the last adjustment to the salaries, we felt we were really bringing us right up to the mid-high range,” Stumpf told commissioners at their Jan. 25 meeting. “But in three years, with what’s going on, we dropped right down to the bottom again.”
Stumpf said the Police Department is having a hard time filling two vacant police positions, with the town’s $51,200 starting officer salary lower than in any other Palm Beach County municipality except Lake Clarke Shores.
“The last person that resigned took a job, basically, she got a $6,000 raise I think and just went across the bridge” to Lantana, Police Chief Carmen Mattox told commissioners. The officer was already familiar with working with police there and knew everybody on Lantana’s staff, he said.
“It’s kind of like they’re recruiting while they’re on duty,” Mattox said.
Stumpf suggested commissioners consider raising the base police salary from $51,200 to $55,000, while giving all town employees a 2% pay boost. Those changes would cost the town about $59,550 annually, she said. Commissioners asked her to put together a proposal for them to consider at their Feb. 22 meeting.
If those suggestions are accepted, Stumpf said the town may need to go further in the fall, shelving its typical salary increase of 3% and going as high as 5% to keep the town competitive.
“We are now second lowest in the area for certain staffers. Other cities have been bumping up their salaries to police officers and staff, trying to keep up with inflation,” Stumpf said.
One commissioner said the town might want to do more than Stump suggested.
“I really think that it should be looked at in seeing what it’s going to take to really do the right thing, rather than just putting a small Band-Aid on it,” Commissioner John Deese said. “I think we’ve got to look at it and maybe we need to do something even much greater than what you’re proposing.”
Commissioners noted that Lantana took similar action, awarding employees bonuses of up to $2,000 in December and boosting pay 1.5%.
In other matters at the Jan. 25 meeting:
• Commissioners had no objection to Stumpf’s awarding retiring Town Clerk Lisa Petersen a $10,000 bonus for her 18 years of service. Stumpf said the town traditionally awards bonuses to retiring employees who have at least 15 years of service with the town — $10,000 for management and $5,000 for other staff.
Because of coronavirus concerns, Petersen’s retirement party was rescheduled for Feb. 24 in conjunction with the town’s season-opening party.
• Stumpf told commissioners Town Hall has had major roof leaks again in the Police Department section, causing portions of the ceiling to collapse and damaging drywall. The building’s backup generator also broke down. Repairs on both were expected to be completed by the first week in February, although Stumpf said the generator is at the end of its useful life and probably needs to be replaced.
• Commissioners approved changes to the town’s ordinance regarding home businesses, setting up new regulations that align with state laws enacted last year.
• Commissioners said they’re interested in standardizing additional building permit fees for property owners who apply for and receive permit extensions because they didn’t get the work finished before their original permits expired.
Commissioners last year granted six-month extensions to all building permits due to construction delays caused by the pandemic. While commissioners usually charge a fee for owner-requested permit extensions, they now want to set up a standardized system for how those fees are assessed.
Mayor Keith Waters suggested the town should charge for an extension based on the original permit cost. So, if a two-year permit cost $200,000 in fees and the property owner seeks a six-month extension, that would amount to a quarter of the original permit and so would cost an additional $50,000 — a quarter of the original permit fee.
The discussion came about because of a permit extension requested by Frank and Dolores Mennella for work being done at their home at 1940 S. Ocean Blvd. They had already used up the six-month pandemic extension and were seeking additional time to June 1.
Commissioners agreed to the extension but didn’t assess an extra fee, which Stumpf said was the first time they had not charged any fee for an owner-requested extension. Instead, commissioners asked her to bring back a policy covering future requests at their February meeting.

By Steve Plunkett

Wait eight more months for the town’s core area to turn into a construction zone.
The latest schedule, approved by the Town Commission on Jan. 14, shows work on replacing drainage and water pipes and rebuilding roads set to begin in August 2023 and end 18 months later, in January 2025.
An earlier timeline had construction starting in January 2023 and finishing that November.
“It’s not going to be the whole area torn up all at once,” said Rebecca Travis of consulting engineer Baxter & Woodman. “You won’t have open trenches at the end of the day, you won’t have your driveway obstructed. Mail will be able to get in, deliveries and all that.”
The project, being managed by Baxter & Woodman, is divided into two phases: the first phase mostly Polo Drive and west; phase two the core streets east of Polo. Water mains, currently 3-inch to 6-inch asbestos cement pipes, will be upgraded to 6-inch PVC pipe. Similarly, a 6-inch PVC pipe will replace the 4-inch water main in the alley between Polo and Gulf Stream Road.
To alleviate flooding, an aging 24-inch drainage pipe from Polo Drive to an Intracoastal Waterway canal will be replaced with a modern 48-inch outlet, an 18-inch pipe will be added at the west end of Old School Road, and a lake at the Little Club will be expanded by .4 acre. The exact site of the lake expansion is still being decided.
Then streets will be “milled and overlaid or redesigned to a crowned road section with a more consistent slope, and where feasible, will include stormwater inlets and piping to provide a positive discharge of stormwater to an established outfall,” the contract says.
The west portion of the construction, to be done from August 2023 to May 2024, covers Polo Drive, Wright Way, Old School Road, Palm Way, and Banyan Road, Middle Road and Golfview Road west of Polo.
The east phase, set for June 2024 to January 2025, is Gulf Stream Road, Bermuda Lane, Oleander Way, Sea Road west of Bermuda, Lakeview Drive, the alley between Polo and Gulf Stream, and Banyan Road, Middle Road and Golfview Drive east of Polo.
Baxter & Woodman will also provide information for the town’s website to inform residents of progress on the job.
The work, part of Gulf Stream’s 10-year capital improvement plan, is estimated to cost at least $11 million and will go out for bids next January. Baxter & Woodman will be paid $846,440 to oversee the project. Town officials say money from ordinary property taxes and water and sewer fees will pay for the work with no need to borrow or raise taxes.
In other business, Police Chief Edward Allen introduced his newest hire, Joe Yungk, a 15-year veteran of North Palm Beach. The hire brings the town’s police force up to its full 13-officer staffing level.
“He’s well qualified and we’re glad to have him,” Allen said.
Allen also told commissioners about an unusual case involving a perhaps-naked man banging on at least one resident’s front door on Middle Road at 4:30 a.m. The resident called police, who found the man sitting naked in his car. A Golfview Drive resident later reported that his security camera showed a naked man taking a swim in his backyard pool.
“He was apparently on some kind of designer drug,” the chief said.
The man, whom Allen did not identify, told officers he liked to look at real estate investment opportunities in the early-morning hours.
He could not be arrested for trespassing, Allen said, because police encountered him on a public street.

ABOVE: Frustrated residents at Horizon East did not have access to the swimming pool as they waited for repairs to be completed. Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star RIGHT: Photos from a report show erosion under the pool deck and repair efforts to correct the damage. 

By Joe Capozzi

South Palm Beach has settled a code enforcement case with two neighboring oceanfront condominiums where erosion to an adjoining sea wall led town officials to cite the sea wall as an “unsafe structure.” 
The sea wall breaches, initially discovered in November 2020 and brought to the town’s attention eight months later, have been repaired.
The two nine-story condominiums, Horizon East and Mayfair House, agreed to a reduction in the original fines, which would have been $32,250 each. Instead, each condo will pay a $5,000 fine and $1,000 for administrative costs, under an agreement approved Jan. 26 by special magistrate Myrnabelle Roche.
Attorneys for the two condos offered praise for Pompano Beach-based ACP Construction for finally completing repairs that had faced a host of delays. 
Those delays included initial bickering between the two condos after the erosion was first discovered, previous contractors backing out, inclement weather, regulatory red tape at the state Department of Environmental Protection and the pandemic, town records show.
Inclement weather from Hurricane Eta in November 2020, followed by king tides, led to erosion and the formation of a small sinkhole in a section of the wall at the north end of Mayfair House, a condo built in 1974, and the south end of Horizon East, built in 1973, records show. 
The initial breach that led to the sinkhole “appears” to have originated “from deficient sheet piling system and concrete cap” on the Horizon East side, a private engineering firm hired by Mayfair House wrote Nov. 20, 2020.
Although Mayfair made temporary repairs to the wall under the northeast side of its building, the engineering firm wrote in a report on July 1, 2021, that “it was still essential that Horizon East take steps to correct the potential unsafe condition” on Horizon East’s property, said Mayfair House attorney Louis Silber. 
“Without repairing this sea wall, this condition could lead to the eventual development of an imminent hazard to the north side of Mayfair’s oceanside building,” Silber wrote in a Jan. 20 letter to town officials summarizing the history of the erosion problem.  
The Mayfair House engineer’s July 1 report, shared with town officials, was written just one week after the Champlain Towers collapse that killed 98 people in Surfside. On July 16, the town cited both condos for an “unsafe structure” related to the adjoining sea wall. 
More than $80,000 in repairs were finally completed in mid-January and signed off on by town officials, but not before Horizon East board members complained about publicity over the erosion problems. 
“The breach is fixed. There is nothing in danger here,’’ condo board member Steve Karp said in an interview before the magistrate’s hearing. “The building was never going to collapse. It’s in good shape. This is no Surfside.’’ 
The town still has an outstanding code enforcement case related to sea wall erosion against another condominium, La Pensee. On Dec. 22, a special magistrate agreed with the town code officer’s determination that the sea wall erosion violated the town code as “an unsafe structure.’’
 La Pensee has a March 1 deadline to complete the repairs.

By Joe Capozzi

Town officials hope to finalize an interlocal agreement with Palm Beach and Lantana to start a beach and dune restoration along the South Palm Beach shoreline in February. 
All beaches in South Palm Beach abut private land, so the town must rely on Lantana and Palm Beach to renourish its beaches and dunes. 
“We’re in the middle of a sitting duck because we really can’t do anything on our own,’’ Mayor Bonnie Fischer said at the Jan. 11 Town Council meeting. “If nothing else, this is a really good insurance policy for the beach.’’
The proposed project, expected to take two weeks, would involve transportation of sand from an existing stockpile at Phipps Ocean Park and placement on the beaches of South Palm Beach and Lantana.
In the past few months, South Palm’s beach “has really taken a beating” because of king tides and storms, Fischer said. “We continue to do what we can, which is at least getting more sand in the system.’’
In other business:
• At the suggestion of councilman Bill LeRoy, the Town Council will consider a resolution aimed at protecting pedestrians on walkways along State Road A1A that are sometimes blocked by construction vehicles. 
The new measure could require workers whose trucks block the pathway to use flagmen or caution tape to provide a safe way for walkers and joggers to get by without having to go out onto the road. 
“We have to have a safe way for our people to get by because they’re going to (continue walking) whether it’s safe or not,’’ LeRoy said. “We can’t have our people walking on the street. It’s got to stop.’’
• Emergency generators would be exempt from the town’s noise rules under a proposed ordinance approved Jan. 11 on first reading. Most condominium generators exceed the maximum 60 decibels allowed under current town rules. The exemption would have no decibel limit.
• The ice cream social celebrating the life of the late Lenny Cohen was postponed because of the omicron surge and will be rescheduled at a later date.

By Jane Smith

Residents and art patrons waiting to hear about Delray Beach’s plans for its 4-acre Old School Square campus will have to wait until the Feb. 8 City Commission meeting.
At the Feb. 1 meeting, City Manager Terrence Moore told commissioners about the “efforts underway” for developing a plan for the Cornell Art Museum, creating a Delray Repertory Theater and restarting in-person arts classes.
“I’ve had several conversations with outside vendors, such as Live Nation, and will come back with interim agreements in a week,” Moore said.
Live Nation is an events promoter.
Commissioner Ryan Boylston asked, “Ever considered a relationship with the current OSS management as an interim solution?”
No, Moore said. “I made it clear that the city was open for all offers, but they never approached me,” he said of OSS managers.
Commissioner Juli Casale also spoke during the city manager’s presentation.
After voting Aug. 10 to end the lease, she left that meeting saying that if OSS turned over the necessary financial documents, she would reconsider her vote.
“But the OSS managers didn’t provide the required documents and two days later they sued the city,” Casale said at the Feb. 1 meeting.
The current operators of the campus, the Old School Square Center for the Arts, have been waging an emotional battle for the soul of Delray Beach. Commissioners, though, say they are accountable to taxpayers and must ensure that the money OSS gets can be documented.
The commission chamber was packed with OSS supporters after an email blast sent Jan. 30 by the OSS board chairwoman. It asked people to attend the meeting to tell commissioners how important the arts and cultural center is to their lives. Of the 19 public speakers, 17 talked about their love of the center.
“We’re not a management company, but a family,” said Melanie Johanson, curator of the Cornell Art Museum. She lives in New Orleans. “We work ourselves to the bone.”
At the end of the meeting, Mayor Shelly Petrolia expressed how painful the stand-off with OSS management has become because of the lawsuit and the nonprofit’s continuous public outreach.
“This is not easy,” she said. “This is very, very difficult.”
The OSS managers pay the city $1 in rent annually for the campus. The six-month termination notice in the deal means their lease ends Feb. 9.
Since receiving the notice on Aug. 10, the OSS managers abruptly ended the arts classes on Sept. 30 and ended events in the Field House.
They blamed the city’s Community Redevelopment Agency for not releasing the rest of its money for the last budget year. OSS has received only the first-quarter payment of $187,500.
Along with the city, the OSS managers named several other individuals in their Aug. 12 lawsuit. Petrolia, Vice Mayor Shirley Johnson, Commissioner Casale, City Attorney Lynn Gelin, former Executive Director Shannon Eadon and ex-board chair Joy Howell were named.
Petrolia and Johnson joined Casale in voting to end the lease on the advice of Gelin.
The OSS managers tried for an early mediation session, but their motion was denied on Jan. 20.
Casale was dropped from the lawsuit on Jan. 25. Her attorney argued that sitting commissioners are immune to lawsuits for their votes taken while on the dais. He also demanded that if she wins, then the OSS managers would have to pay her attorney’s fees.
The OSS managers’ lawsuit has a calendar call on Feb. 9, when their jury trial request will receive a date.
The campus carries a deed restriction.
It must remain an arts and cultural center. If it does not, the property reverts to the Palm Beach County School District.
The campus has five entertainment venues: the Field House, the Crest Theatre, the Creative Arts School, the Cornell Art Museum and the Pavilion.

By Jane Smith

Fired manager George Gretsas has sued the city of Delray Beach, claiming wrongful termination, and is seeking 20 weeks’ severance pay.
Gretsas’ claim also asks for his benefits of car allowance, cellphone allowance and health insurance premiums, about $145,000 in all.
In addition, he wants the city to pay for his attorney’s fees. Gretsas hired G. Ware Cornell Jr., based in Weston, to represent him in the Dec. 30 lawsuit.
Gretsas could not be reached for comment, including a request for explanation as to why he waited more than a year to sue the city. Gretsas was fired in November 2020.
His attorney responded via a Jan. 24 email to The Coastal Star: “It is not my firm’s policy to discuss pending litigation with the press. Consequently, neither George nor I will be responding to your inquiry.”
The city’s outside counsel, Michael Gore of the Jones Foster law firm in West Palm Beach, sought 20 extra days to respond by Feb. 14. The judge agreed on Jan. 21.
Gretsas, who previously was Homestead city manager, started in Delray Beach on Jan. 6, 2020. Less than six months later, he was suspended with pay on June 24, based on accusations of bullying and creating a hostile workplace atmosphere, especially for women.
He chose to fight the charges but was faced with new violations uncovered by the city’s internal auditor, Julia Davidyan. She found he violated the city charter by improper spending and hiring.
Gretsas was fired five months later, on Nov. 20, 2020. He did not attend that hearing because he was in Montana, awaiting the birth of a child.
In the lawsuit, Gretsas claims he was fired for his “refusal to give cover to the mayor and commissioners” on the reclaimed water controversy. The highly treated wastewater became an issue just before Gretsas started.
His lawsuit also mentions allegations of corrupt activities “such as awarding a $50 million contract to a crony of a commissioner who was still on felony probation.” The lawsuit does not name the contract, the commissioner or the contractor.
In December 2021, the city won a wrongful termination lawsuit filed by former manager Mark Lauzier, who was fired in March 2019.

By Joe Capozzi

The thieves rode in on a jet ski. 
Under cover of darkness, they boarded boats tied to docks in Ocean Ridge and Briny Breezes and sped off with tens of thousands of dollars in high-end electronic equipment and fishing gear. 
In all, 18 pleasure boats were entered between 2 a.m. and 2:30 a.m. Dec. 31 by two thieves on a single jet ski, according to images captured by two private surveillance videos, Ocean Ridge Police Chief Richard Jones told The Coastal Star.
Of that total, eight or nine boats were hit in the Briny Breezes Marina, said Michael Gallacher, general manager of Briny Breezes Inc. 
The boats were boarded between the Briny Breezes Marina and the canals behind Waterview Drive, Ixora Way, Harbour Drive North/South and Ocean Harbour Estates Canal, Jones said.
One video shows a suspect climbing off the jet ski and entering a boat while another holds onto the sea wall so the jet ski does not float away with the current, he said. No evidence indicates that more than one jet ski was involved.
All but two of the 18 boats either had electronics and fishing gear stolen or wires cut from the equipment. The most popular items stolen were Garmin and Simrad GPS devices and depth finders with a combined value of about $100,000, Jones said. 
“The target seems to have been newer, high-end electronics,’’ Gallacher said in an email to residents, noting that GPS devices, radios, scuba gear and other equipment were not removed from smaller boats.
The Ocean Ridge Police Department, which also patrols Briny Breezes, is encouraging all boat owners to lock their hatches and to remove and secure all electronics that are removable from their boats when not in use. 
‘‘We are working an active investigation with a couple of identified suspects,’’ Jones told the Briny Breezes Town Council on Jan. 27. “I can’t share any details, but we are working an investigation that may lead to some additional details.’’
Jones called it “extremely unusual’’ for people arriving on personal watercraft to commit crimes in Ocean Ridge.
But he said it’s not uncommon in other waterfront municipalities for thieves to arrive on various watercraft, from small boats to kayaks and paddleboards, many of them stolen.
Although jet skis are loud at full throttle, they can be relatively quiet when idling, which explains why homeowners never heard them. 
“It is likely that these suspects use any type of watercraft they can steal to commit these crimes,’’ Jones said. Anyone who has questions or information about these thefts can contact Detective Aaron Choban at 561-732-8331 or achoban@oceanridgeflorida.com.
Police also want to hear from residents who may have captured suspicious video images from their home surveillance systems.

By Mary Hladky

Steve Abrams intends to resign as executive director of Tri-Rail following controversy over construction defects that delayed the commuter railroad’s extension of operations into downtown Miami.
Tri-Rail has long planned to run trains into Brightline’s MiamiCentral station, and the upscale train company is constructing a platform for them.
But in December, Abrams told the board of the South Florida Regional Transportation Authority, which operates Tri-Rail, that a structural engineer working for Tri-Rail discovered problems that include a platform too narrow to accommodate Tri-Rail trains and station bridges that possibly are not strong enough.
Board member Raquel Regalado, a Miami-Dade County commissioner, expressed anger that the board was just then hearing about the issues when Tri-Rail knew about them in April. She called on Abrams to resign, the Miami Herald has reported.
Abrams, a former Boca Raton mayor and Palm Beach County mayor and commissioner selected to run Tri-Rail in 2018, told The Coastal Star that he has the support of most board members but Regalado has been a constant critic.
That prompted his decision, made during a Jan. 28 SFRTA board meeting, to seek a negotiated separation agreement, he said.
“It is the accumulation of the fact that, although I have the support of the majority of my board, I have one board member who is intent in undercutting my ability to perform,” Abrams said.
“In my judgment, I have accomplished a lot here and in a 30-year career,” he said. “It has been a good record. I am not willing to be trashed by this commissioner.”
Abrams said he is open to remaining on the job until a new executive director is hired.
Abrams blames the construction defects on Brightline, whose workers are constructing Tri-Rail’s part of the MiamiCentral station. “Brightline gave us a defective platform,” he said.
Tri-Rail’s consultant issued a report critical of Brightline’s platform work and the bridges that link the train tracks to the station.
In retrospect, Abrams said, he should have alerted the board to the problems sooner. “I have taken responsibility for that,” he said.
He delayed, he said, because he knew there were defects but did not know how extensive they were or what needed to be done to fix them. He wanted to first get a report from a structural engineer to provide the board with that information.
In response to questions from The Coastal Star, Brightline provided a Dec. 14 letter from its president, Patrick Goddard, to Abrams that acknowledges problems with the platform, which he said were discovered by Brightline last April, and that Brightline is obliged to fix them.
Brightline suggested at the time that the easiest and quickest way to resolve this is for Tri-Rail to modify its trains’ entrance and exit steps, an idea that he said Tri-Rail’s engineering team agreed with. Tri-Rail had not taken steps to do so in December but last month presented a timetable for making the changes.
Goddard, however, denied that there are any problems with the station’s structural designs or with its bridges. A Dec. 21 letter from a Brightline consultant to Goddard said the bridges are appropriate and safe.
He outlined two other matters Tri-Rail has not yet addressed, saying they were the most significant impediments to starting Tri-Rail service into MiamiCentral.
Abrams told The Coastal Star that there aren’t quick and easy answers to a number of the issues. For example, the train steps could be modified, but he needed to find out if that change would create problems at Tri-Rail’s other stations.
Looking back on his tenure with Tri-Rail, Abrams said “we have had some great accomplishments.”
When he was hired, Tri-Rail had a $16 million deficit, which is now erased. Train tracks that were in disrepair were replaced and, as a result, speed restrictions on trains were eliminated. That, in turn, helped Tri-Rail improve its on-time performance to 93%, he said.
He also noted that the American Public Transportation Association found that Tri-Rail was second only to Denver’s commuter railroad in how quickly it recovered ridership lost during the coronavirus pandemic.

Related story: Delray Beach: Taking shape — Atlantic Crossing gets ready for its first openings

By Larry Barszewski

A battle over late-night downtown activity was put on hold when representatives of the Bounce Sporting Club planned for the $300 million Atlantic Crossing development temporarily withdrew their request to have a 2 a.m. closing time.
Downtown Delray Beach residents living near the Intracoastal Waterway have objected to the proposal, which had already won the 4-3 approval of the city’s Planning & Zoning Board in December.
The issue was supposed to come to a head at the City Commission’s Feb. 1 meeting, but that changed a day earlier when Neil Schiller, an attorney for the high-end sports bar and restaurant, requested a delay.
“Based on the outpouring of community feedback related to our application, my client would like to withdraw this application from consideration from tomorrow’s noticed City Commission meeting to be heard at a properly noticed meeting in the future,” Schiller wrote to the city.
Many people living near the development currently under construction have complained they can already hear the noise from late-night establishments along Atlantic Avenue west of Federal Highway in the heart of downtown. They don’t want a new after-midnight establishment closer to their homes east of Federal and outside of the officially designated entertainment district, which is west of Federal.
Bounce representatives say they’ve been misunderstood, that they’re not seeking to be a nightclub pounding out live music in the early morning hours. They say what they’re trying to ensure is that their patrons can watch — uninterrupted — West Coast games, pay-per-view events and other televised sports that might go past midnight.
Jack Indekeu, president of the Palm Trail Homeowners Association, told his neighbors that Bounce’s decision to withdraw its proposal is only a partial victory against the restaurant that anticipates opening this summer.
“Given Bounce’s prior aggressive tactics and propaganda, it’s very likely that they will continue their lawyering and lobbying and re-apply for conditional use at a later date — regretfully, they may try to bounce back,” Indekeu said in an email blast to neighbors.
Residents have said they do not want the city to set precedent by allowing a 2 a.m. closing at Atlantic Crossing. But two bars on the south side of the street across from Atlantic Crossing already have those extended hours — the Hurricane Bar & Lounge and the Blue Anchor restaurant and pub. Those establishments were grandfathered-in when the city set earlier closing times in the area.
Prior to withdrawing its request, Bounce had agreed to close its outdoor dining area, all its doors and windows — and not have any live music — after 11 p.m. It also said it would have at least six security personnel on duty between 11 p.m. and 2 a.m.
While commissioners did not get a chance to vote on Bounce’s extended hours request, they did not stop a separate item that will allow Bounce to change its entrance. The alteration will turn what would have been an enclosed area of Bounce restaurant space at the corner of Atlantic and Southeast Seventh avenues into an open-air lobby where lines can form to get inside. Some opponents have complained the change could create a rowdy, noisy atmosphere as people queue up.
Arlen Dominek, who lives at the Barr Terrace condos across the Intracoastal Waterway from Atlantic Crossing, told commissioners that the change was not acceptable.
“I want it to be the kind of place that appeals to many different people,” he said.
Atlantic Crossing expects to finish construction of part of its first phase in the first quarter of 2022. That includes the buildings that will house Bounce, three other restaurants and Chico’s women’s clothing store.