Council/ committees joint sessions net results
The Fort Myers Beach Town Council continued its joint sessions with town advisory committees on Wednesday, Aug. 3, with a morning workshop involving the Cultural and Environmental Learning Center Advisory Board and an afternoon workshop involving the Anchorage Advisory Committee.
CELCAB
At 9 a.m., Council met with CELCAB members and liaisons to discuss criteria in the board’s vision statement for Mound House as well as the decision progress on getting the historic museum complex open through an agreed-upon management plan.
“This document is not to sell our vision to the Town, but rather to allow you to see that this is a means we have to identify the scope under which we were working and making recommendations,” said CELCAB chair Betty Simpson.
“CELCAB members have worked for years to steer the Mound House initiative and be supportive of what the Town Council wishes to make this a reality,” added CELCEB vice chair Barbara Hill.
The two bodies took steps in refining the “shared” vision phrasing. CELCAB members will now modify their collective mission, present it for approval to their own board at their next meeting on Aug. 25, and then bring it to the Sept. 6 Town Council meeting for final approval. The quest is to add the vision to the Mound House website.
The two-hour meeting also reviewed how the “phased project” at Mound House is moving forward since the property was open on April 6. Since that time, the site has received 938 registered visitors. Visitation was reported to have increased through generated publicity.
Since the reopening, limited tours have been conducted on the 2.8 acres of landscaped bay front grounds that were updated with an ethno-botanical shell trail featuring tropical plants, trees and an orchid that thrived during the early 20th century. The tour extends to an underground exhibit where visitors can walk inside a shell mound built by the Calusa Indians and view the historic archaeological site. The site has been open 12 hours a week on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Saturdays for general public tours. A kayak launch has also been updated and is now safer for usage.
However, the property is currently closed until October to remove lead paint on the house structure. Volunteer efforts and a continuous training program for that cause is being focused on during the closing.
“The program generated approximately 40 volunteers,” said Town Cultural Resources Director Teresa Schober. “So far, we have had around 1,800 volunteer hours in the four months. That’s a dollar value in the $30,000 range in contributions to the site.”
In the future, Council will conduct a separate workshop to discuss impending steps toward making the full property available to the public and restoring Mound House to its original 1921 grandeur using Florida’s historic preservation standards. Addressed items will include a proposed observation deck (which has already been funded by the Lee Council Tourist Development Council); additional parking at 213 Connecticut St.; the additional cost to reopen the site as a whole (roughly $100,000 to $150,000 was discussed); and a fee schedule for visitors.
“We should not mix up the vision with the strategy. The strategy will take into account the realities,” said Councilwoman Jo List. “We, as a Council, have an obligation to manage the taxpayers’ money as best and efficiently as we can. Personally, I think the fatal flaw of this whole project has been getting caught up in the disparities of what people envision for the property. I do believe that CELCAB has worked so hard to bring some sort of focus that all of us in town can agree is our vision.”
The Town has received recognition for its professional restoration practices by the Florida Trust for Historic Preservation and has been awarded a preservation award for educational programming at Mound House. There are hopes it will receive future recognition as a historic site on the Natural Register of Historic Places.
AAC
At 2 p.m., Council met with AAC members regarding several issues pertaining to the Town’s public mooring field. AAC chair Kathy Light informed that the committee formed in November 2003 for a specific purpose to clean up the Back Bay and form the East and West mooring field.
“At that point, there were lots of boats that anchored in the Back Bay, either derelict boats or boats that were breaking loose and damaging property,” she said. “Essentially, the first part of its existence was to put in a 70-ball mooring field and plan for a dinghy dock. Once the field was put in, the master plan was to have a committee that acted as a liaison between patrons and our uplands services provider to watch after it.
The AAC, which provides publicity for the field in national magazines and publications and helps drive tourism to the area, also serves in a capacity for other Back Bay issues such as boats that are anchored outside the Town’s jurisdiction.
The committee is looking to obtain additional dinghy dockage for visiting cruisers. One can be found under Matanzas Bridge, which provides great access for the Times Square area. An informal access before the mooring field was installed was behind Topps SuperMarket.
“We’d really like to have another dinghy dock to be in the thought processes,” said Light. Other access options expressed were Snook Bight Marina, since it offers marina facilities and a restaurant onsite or Gulfview Road or Avocado Street behind the Town Hall area.
Part of the service for the mooring field is to provide pump-out service for patrons to the mooring field. The Town must use a pump-out provider to empty that boat, and it is an added expense. AAC members inquired about a sewer lateral, but Town Manager Terry Stewart informed that the county owns the sewer system. Town locations for sewer service include the North Pump Station on Lagoon Street and the Mound House.
“We could identify a place where it can physically be done, and it can be permitted at that location,” he said. “We could find out how much it would cost and look at what it is costing us on an annual basis and weigh that against the cost of the installation over a five-year period and see what the payback is like.”
AAC also is seeking assistance from Lee County to help offset costs in providing a like service for boats in county waters to discourage some boaters from avoiding rules and dumping the contents of their toilet facilities into the Back Bay. Water quality is the issue here as well as an enforcement issue with Coast Guard and Lee County Marine Patrol.
“We’re hoping to lower the cost with county assistance and get more compliance with (the rules),” said Light.
“We need to contact the appropriate county personnel and say, ‘Here is the issue. We deem this is something that is viably important to water quality. Can we get your full cooperation?'” said Stewart. “We’ll look at the law enforcement end of it as well.”
The AAC board also asked Town officials to maintain a good working relationship with Matanzas Inn as its Upland Services Provider. The local inn has received many good reviews for its cruisers’ services, but Town-developed customer-service surveys were discussed to provide feedback. Another suggestion was to set up a radio base station at the provider location instead of a hand-held radio for communications.
The advisory committee members also asked Town officials to maintain marine control funding in the budget. No cuts were reported.
Maintenance to keep the mooring ball field functioning was the last issue discussed. This involves a diver replacing mooring systems on a batch basis and a maintenance budget was deemed important to be maintained. There was no problem reported among Council members with this issue.
“This mooring field has really been a benefit to a lot of the residents on the island,” said long-time AAC member Bob Beasley. “Before this mooring field, it was like cowboy land out there. When we had storms, a lot of people would anchor their boats and leave up north. Those boats would break loose and drag into docks in the canals and tear the pilings out. That was the situation for years and years and years.
After they put this mooring field in, all of that stopped. It is a very important asset to the Beach.”