THE WEEK IN REVIEW 12-5-2009
Commentary by Dogfish
Our longtime struggle to obtain a city manager is finally over. After changing the rules (I mean the City Charter) so that the city could hire Jim O’Reilly fulltime, the city council found themselves negotiating from a point of weakness, what I mean by that is they all five voiced total agreement that they wanted Jim O’Reilly as CM, then they had to negotiate an agreement (a contract) with Jim because after all he knew he had them over the barrel, so to speak, and since Jim wanted to make more then all the other city employees, he had to be paid higher then the current IT manager Sam Rivera, who gets around $100,000 for the year. Interim City Manager O’Reilly refused to move on certain issues such as picking a new police chief or figuring out what the council expects from a full time city attorney, citing that the new city manager might not like his picks. I guess all that is a mute point and we can get on with hiring those two important positions.
The annual Tree Lighting ceremony on Monday November 30th was well attended with easily 200 kids in attendance and close to that many adults. This annual event, at least last year, is usually bitterly cold, but this years event was greeted by warm evening temperatures and our antique fire engine brought Santa to our fair city to take last minute requests from our children.
The Bench fiasco: Sometimes things come up before city council that for all intents and purposes are benign. So most of us thought when Rick Kriessman with the support of Michele King proposed that the Lions club be allowed to place benches around town, primarily at the bus stops. That it would be a welcome addition to our towns infrastructure, Too many of our bus stops, have no benches, no trash receptacles nor do they have cigarette butt receptacles either. In the rain or the pounding heat, bus riders in our town (for the most part) have to stand or sit on the curb while waiting for the bus. If we are going to have a bus stop then we should have a bench along with a trash can and a butt receptacle. Further information on this controversy can be found in other areas of the Watchdog.
Chamber Mixer Business Showcase: On Thursday the chamber had their annual holiday business showcase/mixer at the Casino. The Karaoke was disastrous, the food offered, mainly hors d’oeuvres and cookies were well, less then satisfactory, but most disappointing was that after many months of prodding the city to add the locally popular beer Dos Equis to the list of available brews, which they did, they have now withdrawn that brew. I had to go to Peg’s, which fortunately wasn’t sold out (hear that O’Reilly?).
Cathy Salustri’s article in the Gabber brought some irate comments from those mentioned.: After sitting through last Tuesdays city council meeting where the regular group of citizens voice their complaints, added by a few extra voices, Ms. Salustri decided that some of the rhetoric was getting tiresome and in her opinion was even wrong. Now, I have not studied the Sunshine Law nor the impending suit regarding the future of Clam Bayou, so I can only say that calling citizens “nutcases” because they care more then most citizens about what is happening in this town is just palin out of line.
Building Department: Stories of the incompetence in our building department continue to cross my ears and while I won’t go into any detail, since I am on their list of persecuted individuals, it appears that many citizens feel that the Community Development Department headed by Fred Metcalf is incapable of getting any thing done in a timely manner. Perhaps it’s all those special projects they take on, like the attempt to annex our neighbors twice over the last four years.
Boca Ciega Yacht Club: The yacht club hosted a benefit for the Sea Scouts on first Friday and while the rain poured down outside, effectively canceling First Friday in downtown Gulfport, 150+ citizens, sailors and Scouts enjoyed an huge potluck, entertainment from a wonderful Bluegrass group “Gator Grass” and raised over $700 to help the scouts with their programs.
While at the Yacht club, I picked up a Southwinds Magazine (the magazine for sailors in Florida) and three articles in it caught my attention regarding relevance to Gulfport.
The first was the problems that Sarasota was having with their Mooring Field plans, not unlike our own plans for a mooring field south of the Williams Pier. Although Sarasota spent many hours and dollars to get to the point they are at, the testing of the mooring anchoring system was, to say the least, disappointing to the advocates of the field. The mooring anchors are required to be able to withstand a pull of 18,000 pounds; thirty three of the 37 anchors installed failed that test. Now to be fair the city of Sarasota did much research and spent many dollars deciding how deep the anchors had to be, and passed this along to the contractor, who has now withdrawn the contract as they are unable to meet the holding requirements. The purpose of the Sarasota Mooring Field was to regulate the boaters staying in vessels offshore and according to some, the ones that were becoming eyesores. With the loss of the contractor, it now becomes dependent upon the city to find a new contractor and continue the process. Meanwhile a change in the city council of Sarasota has lessened the interest in the mooring field. And boaters who were removed from the mooring field site are slowly beginning to return to their previously anchored spots.
On a personal note: Having lived on my boat for almost ten years, and I did extensive cruising throughout the Caribbean and Florida, I would not pick up a mooring anywhere, period, I know what my anchor will do, how it will hold my boat and seeing many moorings weighted down with old engine blocks, cement block or sometimes just tied to another anchor, I would choose my own anchor over a mooring every time.
In the letters area of Southwinds, Capt Jay from the vessel Rainbow Dreamer, gave a hearty high ho to the city of Gulfport and the Marina Staff on their helpfulness and the friendliness of the town and the many activities available for visiting boaters. This a delightful change from the slamming we used to get from boaters in this publication, stemming from what many considered police heavy handedness towards visiting boaters. Let’s hope that with the appointment of a new police chief that our new tradition of being friendly to boaters will continue.
As of October 1, 2009, the state of Florida has statutized what many boaters felt was their right to anchor unregulated by local governments. In the past, and I will use Gulfport as an example, local governments enforced a law stating that a boat could only be anchored for 72 hours. Our own law enforcement went out and affixed those colorful “little” abandoned vehicle stickers telling the boat it had to move once it had stayed in that spot for 72 hours. I have no idea how often they did it, but the impracticality of having landlubbers dictate what is safe to a boater and his boat is ludicrous. If ones anchor is holding and the boat is staying in position, requiring them to move every 72 hours creates numerous end results. 1) They may to choose to move on, denying the city of any more revenue that might derive from their stay. 2) They will tell other boaters that the location is not boater friendly and therefore discourage boaters from coming and spending money in that location. 3) If they decide to stay, and move their boat, not only will they be stirring up the seabed where they were anchored, but they will disturb the sea bed where they move to anchor. 4) Every time one anchors there is a chance that the holding will not be good and the boat could “drag” anchor.
Well let’s get on to the laws as they stand now. First they defined a “Live aboard vessel”. Apparently like everything else in our land, definitions if not Statutized are open to a wide variety of interpretations. Now a “live aboard vessel” is a boat that is not used for navigation. EVER.
Boats used for navigation, even if rarely, now are protected under state law and cannot have their anchoring restricted by a local city or county outside of permitted mooring fields. Cities and counties will be expressly forbidden to enact, continue in effect, or enforce any ordinance or local regulation regarding the anchoring of vessels other then live-aboard vessels outside the marked boundaries of permitted mooring fields
To put it in English, Gulfport and all other cities cannot tell a boat to move from their location under any circumstance, I would guess with the exception of public safety issues, they cannot regulate how long they stay, what they look like nor where they can anchor, with the exception of permitted mooring fields.
Currently in the state of Florida there are three permitted mooring fields. Key West has one as does Ft. Myers Beach and Fernandina Beach. I was surprised that Vero Beach, the mooring field touted by Gulfport’s mooring field advocates as an example of how a mooring field would benefit Gulfport, was not on the list.
I believe this is why the force behind us building a mooring field has such a drive within our city government. They want the ability to regulate what is parked out there. And under the new law, when Gulfport obtains a regulated mooring field, they will have the right to determine who can park there. But outside the field, there will be no regulation upon anchored vessels to be put upon by the city. As an aside, with the retirement of Bob Worthington, and the apparently uncontested seat going to Dr. Jennifer Salmon, the city council majority might swing towards not continuing on with the construction of a mooring field.
Well as mentioned earlier, First Friday was a wash out, literally, it poured. That’s really too bad as the merchants of Gulfport depend a lot on the pre Christmas shopping of our visitors to that event. Hopefully the Third Saturday will bring out those last minute Christmas shoppers.
Holiday Hoopla: The continuing weather played an important part of the turnout reality that the Hoopla had hoped for. Rain in the morning and a cold north wind convinced almost half of the vendors to not show up for the event, and I would guess about 90% of the expected crowd also found that the weather made a significant impact on their plans. I also attended the Corey Avenue art fest on Saturday and they too lacked from potential customers.
Wednesday the 2nd found water on Shore Drive: Did you miss it, Shore drive, courtesy of the full moon and the south wind found itself underwater, sea water, that is. Likewise the high tide brought up the water levels on 49th Street and 58th Street. Sure global warming might be the cause, but it sure shows how unprepared the city is to deal with the rising sea levels, assuming the seas are actually rising and that Gulfport is not sinking.
[...] Theatre & V.I.P. Dinner for 4 at Mattison’s City Grille located in downtown Sarasota. …THE WEEK IN REVIEW 12-5-2009 | GULFPORT WATCHDOGCommentary by Dogfish Our longtime struggle to obtain a city manager is finally over. After changing [...]