Meeting minutes
Here’s the brief highlights of the Fort Myers Beach Town Council meeting held Monday, Feb. 6.
Gretchen Johnson awarded Outstanding Citizen Award
Island residents poured out support for the nomination of Gretchen Johnson for the beach’s 2016 Outstanding Citizen Award.
Johnson is a 90-year-old beach resident who has been involved in many groups and organizations, including the Fort Myers Beach Art Association, Civic Association, Kids Foundation and Pilot Club, and is also a member of the revered Cupcake Ladies who serve treats to visitors in Times Square on the town’s birthday, Dec. 31. She was heavily involved in helping the town get incorporated, and, according to comments received by the town, she also brought baked treats to all the Transition Team meetings.
“At 90 years of age, Gretchen has more energy than the Energizer Bunny,” said one nomination supporter. “She is part of the glue that holds our island together.”
Historic structures gain recognition
Several beach homes and properties received historic recognition by the Historic Preserveration Board. Silver Sands, built in 1921; Morey and Rebecca Nakaya home, 160 Coconut Street, built in 1958; and the Privateer, the first high-rise condominium on this island, built in 1967.
TPI to redesign Times Square without land swap
Former deputy town manager and TPI spokesman John Gucciardo spoke to the Fort Myers Beach Town Council during public comment Monday and said the town could anticipate an application in staff hands by the end of February. The new plan will not include a land swap which would have had TPI swapping spaces with Lee County for the Seafarers Plaza. TPI’s Tom Torgerson had hoped an in-kind land swap would be beneficial for any future traffic improvements, giving TPI-owned land over to the public at the base of the bridge while allowing his development to rise up nearer Estero Boulevard. Lee County indicated to TPI and to the town that it will continue to use the plaza it owns as a construction staging site for the Estero Boulevard project. Gucciardo said TPI will be connecting with residents over the next few weeks to show the new planned development contained only on TPI property, and offered the chance to speak to the council either individually or in a workshop to discuss the project. Several council members declined to meet until an application was put forward.
Council Member Anita Cereceda was not pleased with no action from the county on Seafarers.
“I found it disingenuous that they have no plan and want to remain like that at our front door,” she said.
Wolf disqualified by clerical error
Long-time beach resident Lorrie Wolf attempted to run for the March town election and was told she was qualified – until a resident noticed what the town clerk, the notary and Wolf had missed.
Wolf turned in her documents to run for a seat Jan. 18, two days before the deadline. She was missing one signature on her oath document, a glaring blank dotted line that was missed by all official parties involved. A resident pointed out the missing signature to Interim Town Manager Jim Steele on Jan. 25, five days after the qualifying week closed and after Wolf had already been assured she was qualified. Steele consulted with Town Attorney Dawn Lehnert and ultimately disqualified Wolf.
Wolf spoke before the council Monday, not to demand inclusion in the election but ask the town to set up a better process for qualifying candidates and have a designated person or committee to do so.
“The same mistake was made by three separate people. The mistake was not made with any malice, but the decision does not seem fair or just on such a small island,” Wolf said. “I turned it in early just in case I made a mistake. But I’m here to request the town make the qualifying process more linear.”
Council clashes on FDOT study
While most of Monday’s meeting was relatively peaceful, the meeting’s close was not. Council Members Anita Cereceda and Rexann Hosafros and a member of the public, Bev Milligan of Estero Island Taxpayers Association, criticized Council Member Tracey Gore’s representation of the town.
Gore serves as the town’s representative on the Lee County Metropolitan Planning Organization. At the MPO’s Jan. 20 meeting, Florida Department of Transportation spoke to the board about its San Carlos Boulevard traffic improvement study. Gore and Lee County Commissioner Larry Kiker said the study contained too many methods that had been tried before, and that FDOT should take a step back and reanalyze.
Gore said the MPO reached a consensus that the study was going in the wrong direction, but her fellow council members were “chagrined” that she voiced her own personal opinion without consulting the rest of council.
“I would never dream to represent an opinion of this board without talking to it,” Cereceda said. “The fact that an action was taken to derail a plan That action should not have been spearheaded by one of our members.”
Gore said the point of the discussion was not to stop improvements to San Carlos but to redirect the study toward more public input. However that was the next step in FDOT’s strategy – a public workshop had tentatively been set for later in February.
Cereceda said she’d like to see a policy put in place to prevent a council member for speaking on behalf of council without prior consensus on the recommendations of the board. Hosafros asked that Gore relay to the rest of the MPO that she had not expressed an opinion of the entire board.
The discussion got heated, even as Mayor Dennis Boback tried to maintain decorum on the dais.