De-constructing Longboat Key

I admit I am apprehensive about the flurry of activity taking place in our town government during our summer doldrums. There are more town commission appointed committees than I can keep tabs on. Each one seems to be tasked with rewriting major parts of our comprehensive plan, a plan that has created one of the most successful communities in America.

To date our energetic commission has not told us why we need so many committees making so many major revisions to the town's land use policies. Since the commission has chosen to use committees to carry out the commission's grand design, very little that is being done is recorded or tracked by the two town newspapers. It appears that the commission is operating in a stealth mode via committees and when no one is around.

Somewhere down the road, or at the end of the summer, we will see a glimmer of the commission's grand design for our island, and one suspects that the developers will be happy.

Since there is little to no unused land on Longboat, one wonders how and where the developers plan to create something out of whole cloth, so to speak. If the commissioners do not have a fairly robust development effort in mind, one wonders why the long hours, during what is usually a quiet period in town government, and why all the committees?  Do they see opportunities to expand tourism and increase retail business on our island?  And if so, where do they see these opportunities?  It has been over 5 years since the 250 room referendum was approved by the voters, and not a single room has been taken.  Publix may actually reduce retail at Bay Isles, including all the shops behind Avenue of the Flowers that they now own. One doubts the owners of all the newly acquired land on the north end of the island at Whitney Beach Plaza will be using the land as any sort of retail center. They have had enough time to understand what happens on Longboat during the nine months of off-season to want to repeat the mistakes of their predecessors.

For now it appears that both tourism and retail are diminishing on Longboat, in spite of the assurances by some commissioners that they will save Longboat by promoting new tourist facilities that will in turn support a burgeoning retail renaissance on Longboat. I do not see that happening even after the commission has done serious damage to what have been an effective comprehensive plan and building codes. Have many residents have said they even want more tourists and more development?  Have residents been asked whether they want it?

If all this extra effort, and all the hours of committee meetings, and all the extra costs of  two town attorneys, is on behalf of the Key Club, I will be stunned at how the tail now wags the dog on Longboat. Hopefully all this effort is not for one developer, who says he plans to build a hotel at one of the least desirable locations one can imagine. There are already too many lovely, sparsely occupied, hotels located right on some of the most beautiful beaches around. The Key Club hotel has no Gulf beach, only a view of an ordinary and noisy bridge and the boat docks of a few nice homes on Lighthouse Point. I doubt a hotel will be built at that location. Mr. Lesser understands location, location, location.

Why then all the sound and furry and rush to recast our comprehensive plan as a testament to lax control of land use and overly permissive building codes? Do the commissioners really believe they are fashioning a panacea for our future?  The coming economic times may have a far greater impact on our futures than any machinations of a small group of like-minded individuals, well-intentioned though they might be, who have gained the power to alter what was working, without really understanding what the ramifications might be.

I do not believe our beautiful community should welcome developers. They make their money and then leave. If we are doing well, as I believe we are, there is really nothing that needs doing. Especially increases in density solely for the sake of promoting retail commerce which is what some of our commissioners are telling us.

A School on Longboat Key

Talking with friends who have children and live on Anna Maria Island, I have learned that they love Anna Maria Elementary School. The same is true for my friends with children in St. Stephen's School in Bradenton. What if Longboat Key had a small first class middle school? I know people with young children move to Anna Maria Island because of the highly regarded elementary school. I also know parents who are concerned about finding quality schools in Manatee County after their children reach 5th grade and have to leave the Anna Maria school. I have personally worked with students attending the nationally ranked Pine View public school in Sarasota County. I has greatly impressed.

Would a quality math and science magnet school on Longboat attract families to our community? Talking to friends in places such as Rye and Scarlsdale, New York, their schools attract families who purchase homes and pay high taxes to have access to some of the best public schools in the country.

There could be a captive school population comprised of students graduating from the Anna Maria school who already live in close proximity to a school located on the north end of Longboat Key. I have neighbors who willingly transport their children to Bradenton charter schools because education is important to them.

I have no idea what the new owners of Whitney Plaza have in mind for all the land they have recently acquired on the north end of Longboat Key. With the specter of a new Publix retail complex at Bay Isles, the new owners may be dissuaded from retail development on the expanded Whitney Plaza site. For years I have advocated a tasteful low-rise residential development (two stories over parking and not more than 35 feet high) on the property as the best and most appropriate use of the land, in keeping with the beachy residential flavor on the north end of Longboat. However, I also recognize there could be density issues trying to build homes on the Whitney land. The Conrad Beach development, now a decade old, still has vacant lots for sale, so selling planned unit developments on the north end appears to be challenging, especially in this depressed real estate climate. Mixed-use has not worked well at Lakewood Ranch where there are numerous condominiums over empty retail shops. This is an unattractive situation for the condominium owners who are powerless to improve their situation.

There may be an opportunity for a top-notch school to attract families to Longboat who are in search of a good educational experience for their children. Additionally, I believe that parents of students graduating form the Anna Maria Elementary School would welcome a middle school close to home for their children.  A good charter school would attract families and improve the demographic mix on Longboat Key.  Keep in mind, one year-around family of four is equal to 8 snowbird conominium units in terms of yearly on-island retail sales. 

The town and the community needs to look for new community alternatives as we look into the future. Longboat taxpayers are major supporters of the county school systems. Perhaps it is time to get something in return and help our community at the same time.

Of course people can raise all sorts of arguments about the difficulties of creating a new charter school on a barrier island. However, we need to seriously explore opportunities instead of using negativity as a rational for doing nothing.

All Together Now

Are you, like me, wondering what the Publix folks have in mind for Avenue of the Flowers. I have great respect for Publix's business acumen, so I doubt we will see them build a larger retail complex.
We will probably see a modest expansion of the current market with added drug and liquor operations and otherwise a reduction in retail space within the complex. However, this is a guess and it might be totally off-base.

Over the past few years several residents have advanced concepts of turning Avenue of the Flowers  and the surrounding Bay Isles area into a community activity hub, where island residents and visitors can congregate and share social activities such as dining and casual refreshments, etc. I think this is a good idea for our community. However, a greatly expanded retail presence is not practical given our seasonal demographics. Several tourists have responded to my past articles saying they wish there was a place where they could meet people on Longboat. Perhaps the Bay Isles locality is the logical place to start. Perhaps Publix will seek people oriented businesses such as Starbucks, and other casual meeting establishments, where people may enjoy one another's company. Whatever happens at Avenue of the Flowers, I believe it will need to draw people out of their self-sufficient condominium complexes and offer a unique and compelling social experience. There are a sufficient number of year-round residents and visitors on Longboat to support a properly sized and populated commercial center on the Publix property.

A town community center located adjacent to the new Publix center can further aggregate social activities around a central geographical hub that is already well established. On the north side of the Publix site lie several banks, the town library, town hall and several churches. Locating a community social and recreational facility in the existing Mattison's building, that lies adjacent to the south side of the Publix property, would further concentrate social activities in the area and offer patrons easy access to nearby cafés and casual meeting places. A community center located adjacent to the Publix redevelopment could be mutually beneficial for both the community center and whatever Publix developes at Avenue of the Flowers.

If we manage to create a viable critical mass of activity in and around the new Publix renovations, we just might attract enough people to sustain a healthy retail presence at that location, while at the same time creating a social activity hub within our community that is essential, if we are to attract the next generation of people looking for an exclusive, beautiful, thoughtfully developed island community.

I wonder what the new owners of Whitney Plaza and environs are thinking. If Publix does create a new attractive retail center at Avenue of the Flowers, that can only decrease the need for additional retail operations on the north end. If the new owners at Whitney Plaza decide to reintroduce retail operations at the north end, I suspect the same thing will occur that happened when Publix opened years ago, and that was to siphon business away from the two northern shopping centers.

In spite of the proclamations made by some commissioners that we need more retail and more tourists on Longboat, I suspect the business community is smart enough to read the writing on the wall. Longboat Key became an affluent seasonal retirement community because that is what perspective home buyers were looking for. As a result of two decades of slow development, we are finally just that, and now all the spare retail real estate needs to also fall in line with the community profile that has evolved over the years. We are what we are and that is a good thing according to the great majority of residents and visitors alike.

Longboat Key is and remains an exclusive, beautifully developed, jewel on the west coast of Florida. The housing problems will pass and we will all be thankful that we did not succumb to the aspirations of the developer element within our community. I think we will find that being an upscale seasonal second home community will remain attractive through the years and that property values will benefit from our exclusivity and low density.

However, we do need to change to some degree with the times. A centralized community district will enhance our lifestyle and offer residents convenient access to social activities including a recreational center in the Mattison building beside the Publix property.  I, among others, believe that we need to strive to create a critical mass of things to do, places to meet people and shop at the center of our island. Having a recreation center as part of that complex appears to be an essential element to the mix of activities. The opportunity to create a vibrant community center in the Mattison property, for a relatively small investment in renovating the building, is too good to pass up. We need to start moving to secure the now vacant property and to turn the building into a part of a greater town center.

Let's all get together and promote a new town center.

The best laid plans of mice and men

Commissioner Duncan is now advocating a long-range 25-year plan for our community. I guess he is saying that we need to follow his plan if we ever want to see our community prosper again. Unfortunately, none of us will be around to see if he was right. As justification for his call for long-term planning, Commissioner Duncan states " the town has to look no further than the current state of the island’s deterioration, in the form of aging shopping centers and foreclosed homes."

I do not disagree with Commissioner Duncan that our residents and town government need to become more pro-active in maintaining all aspects of our community. We differ is tactics and strategies.

Commissioner Duncan uses the community center as a focal point in his discussion and appears to be advocating a community dialog, whereas Commissioner Brown appears to feel that he and his fellow commissioners are the only people who need to be involved in both the design and the method of financing a community center. I prefer Commissioner Duncan's more inclusive approach. Commissioner Duncan raises the question if we even need a community center. A few weeks ago I proposed re-purposing unoccupied commercial property as a community center, both to test the waters for a need for a center, without committing the community to yet more bonds, and alleviating the glut of empty commercial buildings on the island. We could also have a community center up and running before the coming season. I do not see any downside to this idea.

It has now been 18 months since the current commission assumed power and assured our community that they would solve all the problems left unresolved by their predecessors. I believe the phrase "fix town hall" was used at one point. I do not see that anything has transpired since then. Actually, it looks like we have actually slipped further behind. The Key Club expansion has experienced one setback after another during the 2.5 years since the KC hearings first began. I remember the town attorney saying that he and the town planning staff would resolve any lingering questions in a couple of weeks. That was long ago and the most recent missive from the town attorney, concerning referendums, portends of even longer delays. I have always advocated a responsible rejuvenation of the Key Club since it is is an attractive and classy part of our community. The KC helps us stand out as an affluent retirement community. Unfortunately, the Loeb group chose an uncompromising political solution that has become a statutory and legal quagmire, with no end in sight, inspite of the town attorney's repeated assurances that everything will be OK any day now. The commission should have prevailed upon Loeb to come up with a viable project. They did not and a majority of the commissioners still press forward with their grand design for us all without paying any attention to the economic and legal realities that surround them.

Some of the actions by our commissioners, including what I believe to be unfortunate exchanges between commission members and residents who are experts in the area of land use, seem to be leading our town towards becoming a poster child for a possible future Florida Harris Act ordeal.

Commissioner Duncan is quite correct in his assessment that commercial property is deteriorating on Longboat and that more and more homes are coming onto the market. It would be nice to counter his appraisal with some good news. However, the longer our country sinks into economic decline, the more people will hit the wall, and be forced to unload the economic burden of a second home that they only used a few months a year. This is an economic reality for a seasonal retirement community. No amount of long-range planning will alter the course of events. Commissioner Duncan decries employing tactics where he feels long-range strategies are needed. I disagree. When the house is on fire it is not the time to look into pension plan alternatives with the fire fighters union. We need to take more immediate measures to improve our community image and to attract the baby boomers to buy here instead of Anna Maria Island or The Villages in central Florida.

I have written several columns about what I believe we need to do to improve our market position and that does not include still more hand-picked committees of head-bobbers to rubber stamp the ideological beliefs of the current people in power. I wish the current people in power were more effective than they have been over the past 18 months. From failed referendum votes to a stalled Key Club project, to failing to look at the root cause of our failing commercial real estate, there's a lot of smoke and a lot of rhetoric and little else.

The realities of the national and global economics cannot be solved by strategies, no matter how well-meaning. No one knows what socio-economic conditions will prevail twenty years from now or even next year. We need to be nimble and seek solutions for tomorrow not after we are all dead and gone.

One place we need to start looking is in the area of retail real estate. Remember we have enough retail real estate to support a community of 75,000 people. We actually have fewer than 8,000 averaged over the year. If people want to have the commercial tail wag the dog, then we will need to tear down a lot of older two astory condominiums to make way for tall buildings that will house 75,000 people on a year-round basis. That most likely means tourists, since our current residents don't stick around after April. If we manage to get 75,000 people to stay on Longboat during the hot season, than we will have an economic base to support the present commercial real estate property, and I guarantee we will have terrific traffic jams every day. Of course, we will need new water, sewer and electric services along with a solution to the impediments of the Circle and Bradenton Beach. I already know people who prefer to live on Anna Maria rather than fight the traffic at the Cortez Road light in Bradenton Beach.

Short of accomplishing all the above, there is simply too much land on this island zoned commercial. If Publix does decide to fully develop their land at Avenue of the Flowers, that will draw customers away from the Center Shops and any future for the new mega Whitney Plaza. One can only divide a pie so many ways before everyone goes hungry.

We need good news now. We need a community center now, not years from now. A lot of delay and strife will occur if the commissioners attempt to force an unpopular tax burden on the voters, before we even know if the people will support a community center. Keep in mind that the proposed town budget shows a deep cut in funding for recreational activities. Let's use common sense not theoretical strategies and lets get moving and get something accomplished. There has been too much posturing and not enough actual improvements over the past 18 months.

See picture at: http://lbk-folk.blogspot.com/2011/06/best-laid-plans-of-mice-and-men.html