By Steve Plunkett
Replacement of Gumbo Limbo Nature Center’s seawater pumps and piping should begin soon following green lights in April from the Greater Boca Raton Beach and Park District and the Friends of Gumbo Limbo.
But funding the long-awaited $3.4 million project was not without drama. First, city officials trimmed one of three pumps, the emergency generator and 300 feet of underwater pipe from the plans to get the cost down $500,000.
Then John Holloway, executive director of the Friends, urged the group’s supporters to “help Gumbo Limbo’s endangered sea turtles and fish” by signaling concern to district commissioners. Forty-seven people emailed the district, including Friends who don’t pay district taxes from Delray Beach, Ocean Ridge, Broward County, Pennsylvania, New York, Ohio and Minnesota.
But commissioners, who budgeted $2 million in 2015 for the project’s then-estimated cost, stuck to their currently budgeted $3.2 million at their April 5 meeting.
“I regret the way this Gumbo Limbo project is turning out, but I think we’re doing the right thing for our constituents,” Commissioner Robert Rollins said.
Commissioner Craig Ehrnst said the Friends, the city and Florida Atlantic University, which has a lab at Gumbo Limbo and uses 20% of the pumped seawater, should chip in.
The Friends, he said, have over $3 million in their budget.
“I think they should contribute to this project and I think it’s kind of wrong for them not to contribute,” Ehrnst said.
The Friends and district officials huddled over the next two weeks to reach an agreement for the not-for-profit organization to provide $144,246 — enough to get construction started. Holloway said the amount was in addition to the $300,000 his group gives Gumbo Limbo every year and came “despite the center being closed for over a year now and our access to donations from visitors and retail-store commerce being eliminated.”
Still unresolved is the source of a 10% contingency fund for the pumps and piping, about $300,000.
The project’s projected cost swelled from $1.3 million in 2013 to $1.5 million two years later, to $2.5 million in 2018 and $3.2 million the next year.
The new pumps will go in Red Reef Park east of A1A and “push” seawater to Gumbo Limbo’s aquariums instead of “pull” it under A1A like the outdated current pumps do, said Jennifer Bistyga, the city’s coastal programs manager.
In other business, Florida Power & Light offered to install charging stations for four electric vehicles at the district’s Sugar Sand Park, Patch Reef Park and the Swim and Racquet Center in exchange for the district’s paying about $3,600 a year more on its electric bill.
FPL already has put EV chargers at City Hall, the Downtown Library and Spanish River Library, and the city’s Spanish River, Red Reef and South Beach parks, a company representative said.
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