BRADENTON BEACH – At the June 5 Community Redevelopment Agency (CRA) meeting, Mayor John Chappie accepted responsibility for the Florida Department of Transportation-mandated removal of the newly planted coconut palm trees on Gulf Drive.
“I did make a mistake at the beginning when we had the 19 palms that were planted in the FDOT right-of-way and that’s all on me,” Chappie said.
The trees were planted the week of April 24 on the Gulf Drive South roundabout and traffic islands as part of a CRA-approved project that included Bridge Street. The $50,000 coconut palm project is a public-private partnership between the city and developer Shawn Kaleta’s Beach to Bay Investments LLC.
That portion of Gulf Drive South is a state road and falls under the jurisdiction of the FDOT. The city was notified by FDOT that coconut palm trees are not allowed on state roads due to safety concerns about visibility, along with falling fronds and coconuts.
“Darryl (FDOT Scenic Highway Coordinator Darryl Richard) was very kind and very efficient with trying to get ahold of us,” Chappie said. “Once he got ahold of us I was out of town for a week at the hurricane conference, but within 24 hours, I considered it an emergency situation that those needed to get out of the right of way because they were concerned that it doesn’t meet their standards.”
Chappie said the city would have to fill out a permit form and go through the FDOT process to plant in the traffic islands and roundabout.
“He (Richard) did say, the rule is four inches in circumference,” Chappie said. “The Alexander palms (which were previously in the roundabout) were four inches in circumference but apparently, 10 years ago or whenever it was, there wasn’t needed permission from FDOT to put them in. So my thought was on trying to replace those, they didn’t look very healthy and that’s all on me of course.”
According to Chappie, four of the 19 palms were taken back to landscaper M&F Lawn Care’s yard. Chappie said the trees may be relocated to Lou Barolo Park or the city police department.
Chappie said he will be meeting with Miguel Mancera of M&F Lawn Care and city attorney Ricinda Perry to determine what is needed to finish the project.
Chappie then spoke about the trees along Bridge Street.
“There were a total of 60 palms that have been delivered. We planted 56 palms on Bridge Street, on First Street and the pier dock area,” he said.
Chappie said that four or five of the smaller palms were leaning and didn’t appear to have a good connection with the root ball.
“Miguel assured us that he was guaranteeing everything that was planted,” Chappie said. “I talked to him yesterday. We need to get together to go over everything, to continue to do some of the beautification that we like.”
IRRIGATION PURSUED
Chappie brought up an irrigation system installation on Bridge Street which had received CRA approval for a cost of up to $7,500.
Police Chief John Cosby, who is currently serving as interim public works director following the resignation of Tom Woodard, weighed in.
“I don’t think the amount of money that’s budgeted is going to cover it,” Cosby said. “In order to run the line down the entire street on both sides we’re going to have to lift the bricks out of the crosswalks to put the pipe underneath it, otherwise we’re going to have to bore and boring is very expensive so that brick would have to be removed and the lines run so the whole street has irrigation. I don’t know that $7,000 is going to cover it but we’ll get some estimates and bring those back and we’ll go from there.”
MAYOR RESPONDS
At the June 6 city commission meeting, Chappie responded to press coverage of the city’s lag in producing a fully-executed agreement between the city and developer Shawn Kaleta ensuring Kaleta’s assumption of responsibility for newly-planted coconut palm trees on Bridge Street.
The Sun’s news coverage included a timeline of events, including emails from the city, that showed that a signed agreement for the coconut palms between the city and Kaleta was not in place until May 28 – more than a month after the trees were planted the week of April 24. The Sun also published two editorials criticizing the process and the project.
Chappie did not name The Sun and did not refute any of the facts in the stories.
“As everybody knows, we’re five people up here and we are a weak mayor form of government, we are equal, and we assign people to oversee on certain projects,” Chappie said. Ricinda (City Attorney Ricinda Perry) has gotten the brunt of a lot of projects to do and unfortunately has gotten a lot of the brunt of the criticism.”
