One of the city's pipes delivering water to your home or business...

CAUTion is advised...

"Going A-Wall" Event/Mural Painting Downtown Lake Worth

From the mailbag: Persons Interested in Lake Worth Doing Some Cyferin' Re-Post

Editor's Note: It has been many days since this was posted and no one has offered an alternative analysis of Mr. Ovtime's numbers. I will publish any alternative analysis by any party if one wishes to challenge the findings.

My wife and I are investigating whether to operate a Bed & Breakfast in Lake Worth, FL. A good friend who lives in town went over the pros and cons. For the most part, it all evened out taking into account the improving economy, a stable municipal government, and overall attractiveness of Lake Worth as an investment opportunity. The one outlier is the city's proposed bond issue up for a vote in August of this year. We are really not the patient type so we had an enterprising researcher (Nick Ovtime, CPA) advise us about what we could expect if the bond issue passes. A big tax bill could be the deal breaker.

The property is actually two properties on Golf Vista Boulevard. It overlooks the Municipal golf course and very close to the intracoastal. It has so much potential, however, more taxes would chop away at our renovation budget.

Here is the information our crack researcher discovered:

The property is two parcels with 7 rooms.According to PAPA the assessed value was $407,361 in 2011, $448,098 in 2012, and $492,908 in 2013.

The total taxes for those years was $12,288 ($10,390 AV/$1,898 non-AV) in 2011, $12,792 (total AV/non-AV) in 2012, and $13,865 ($11,975 AV/$1,890 non-AV) in 2013.The AV taxes have Lake Worth operating at $2,708.28 for the 2013 taxable value. Multiplying .00345 times $492,908 yields a tax of $1700.53 ($141.71 per month/$32.70 per week); the current adjusted rate of .00318 yields $1,567.45 ($130 per month/$30.14 per week).

Mr. Ovtime went on to divide that by the 7 rooms we are considering on the property and that total is $4.30 per room/per week. If my wife and I manage a 50% occupancy rate (taking into account our media savvy and business skills that is a no-brainer) the increase we would expect if the bond issue passes is $1.23 per room/per week.

Our project manager, Ms. Renee Sance, anticipates room rates advertised from $149 to $249 per night.

Mr. Ovtime cautioned his numbers could change. But even if they did he anticipated his $1.23 per room/per night number calculation would be off by pennies.

At our last meeting my project manager and CPA concluded that if the Lake Worth 2020 bond measure passes the impact on our future B&B would be insignificant. Ms. Sance even suggested the bond passage would become an advantage for the project, she reasoned if the whole city looked more appealing and more people frequented the downtown, we would attract more customers.
That's why Renee Sance is such a good manager. She can see past next week. 

1000 Friends of Florida closes Palm Beach County office | www.mypalmbeachpost.com

This is a sad story and a cautionary tale. The 2011 re-write (elimination) of growth management controls severely impacted state authority of local comprehensive plan review. There was a need for this oversight in Florida and there are going to be causalities. The rollback of the 1000 Friends of Florida strength is one of them. Much of this article, click title for link, is about a Joanne Davis who lives in Lake Worth and worked for them for 15 years. Due to budget cuts, she works for them no longer.

Oil company leaders:They have made us look like criminals - WINK-TV News

A petroleum drilling firm in Collier county is fighting back regulators at the Department of Environmental Protection for the right to continue their past drilling practices, which include a form of fracking. Click title for link.

A bleak week, news from Greenfield, CA

Assault with Deadly Weapon
07/26/2014
100 Block 11TH ST & OAK AV

Assault
07/25/2014
EL CAMINO REAL & ELM AV

Theft
07/23/2014
300 Block EL CAMINO REAL & PALM AV

Traffic Advisory - Bridges to Palm Beach island...

The Flagler Memorial Bridge spans are in the "open" position with no anticipated impacts to marine traffic. Restrictions and openings at the Royal Park Bridge and Southern Boulevard Bridge have been adjusted as follows: The Royal Park Bridge opens once per hour at 15 minutes past the hour with no openings from 7:16 a.m. to 9:14 a.m. and from 4:16 p.m. to 6:14 p.m., Monday through Friday. On weekends and Federal holidays, the bridge opens twice per hour at 15 minutes past the hour and 45 minutes past the hour.  The Southern Boulevard Bridge opens twice per hour on the hour and at 30 minutes past the hour with no openings from 7:31 a.m. to 9:29 a.m. and from 4:01 p.m. to 5:59 p.m., Monday through Friday. On weekends and Federal holidays, the bridge opens twice per hour on the hour and at 30 minutes past the hour. Information is published in the Coast Guard Local Notice to Mariners at www.navcen.uscg.gov.   
For information about the Flagler Memorial Bridge Replacement Project, please visit the project website: www.flaglerbridge.com or contact Public Information Officer Tish Burgher by phone at (561) 702-9096 or email at tish@qcausa.com. 

Southern Boulevard, over the Intracoastal Waterway in the City of West Palm Beach and the Town of Palm Beach, will have alternating traffic, 9 a.m. until 3:30 p.m., Monday, July 28, through Thursday, July 31, for work order repairs. 

"Oh, the humanity..."

Readers familiar with the local interwebs will recognize kkss21 as Katie McGiveron's "handle." Here she rants about another meeting to discuss the LW2020 plan. I guess someone doesn't want to let the real story get in the way of their story. Katie is leading the Citizens Against Unfair Taxation PAC, a political committee formed under the auspices of Palm Beach County, along with former Mayor and Atlantis resident Dennis Dorsey. Mr. Dorsey pays nearly $13,000 a year in Atlantis for property taxes.

I guess Katie thinks that the city has done enough educating the public with previous meetings.

From last Friday's (7/25/14) High Noon in Lake Worth episode...

Here are a few quotable quotes from West Palm Beach City Commissioner Shanon Materio. Click title to listen to archived audio of the show. Most readers will know that Shanon and her husband Phil own property and a business on Dixie Hwy. in Lake Worth, McMow Art Glass. She also had a seat on the Lake Worth Community Redevelopment Agency board for a while.

She is a supporter of and an advocate for the LW 2020 bond initiative that will appear on the August 26th ballot. Here are her views on the plan which you can hear for yourself at the 49 minute mark of the show:

"My husband [Phil Materio] and I learned as much as we could about it. We did as much homework as we could which is easy to do here. And we have the real numbers, there's a lot of numbers being thrown out there, we have the real numbers and the financial impact on us, taxable, and we know that our taxes are going to go up. There going to go up about $800 a year. We have a big piece of commercial property that's 10,000 square feet on Dixie [Highway]. But we also own a house behind it.
So altogether we support it a hundred percent. A hundred and twenty percent. If you could support it two hundred percent I would support it two hundred percent. This is going to be, first of all, the beginning of a new Lake Worth. And a lot of the things people are afraid of ? I'm not quite sure what they're afraid of. To be able to get our dirt roads paved, to get our sidewalks fixed, to get our curbs fixed."

And then again at the 51:00 minute mark:

"It's [the LW2020 bond plan] a big important step. It's the first time that I can remember, since we did downtown, that there is something on the horizon that is exciting. And that you can see that this is going to have important results for everybody."

West Palm Beach Mayor: election competition good | West Palm Beat

Short piece by Eliot Kleinberg on the West Palm Beach election coming up in March of 2015. No one is getting a free pass this time. He reviews which seats are up, which includes the Mayor's. Click title for link.

When West Palm Beach commissioners Shanon Materio, Kimberly Mitchell and Sylvia Moffett were reelected without opposition earlier this year, Mayor Jeri Muoio said at the time she supported the three and would have campaigned for them but wished, for democracy’s sake, that some others had filed to run.
In the 2015 election, she’s getting her wish. All three races are contested — including hers.

Excerpts from the Lake Worth Herald editorial titled, "Now is the Time", July 24, 2014

Three excerpts from the Lake Worth Herald editorial titled, "Now is the Time", July 24, 2014, on the City of Lake Worth's bond referendum on August 26:

"This is not the commission who neglected the infrastructure. Those commissions are no longer in control of the purse strings. They are no longer able to mismanage a bond issue. Many past commissions did some great things for Lake Worth, some things we are now finding were done at the expense of proper infrastructure maintenance. Now is the best time to fix the foundation of our city and make it better for future generations."

[later...]

     "There are pros and cons to every decision the City makes and this issue is no different. Overall, there is nobody standing up and saying 'Our roads are wonderful,' 'Our water pipes are just fine,' or 'It's okay to keep patching pipes and potholes at much greater expense than necessary.'
     It will never be more cost effective than now to repair the weaknesses in the infrastructure and prepare Lake Worth for the future."

[and...]

     "No business is going to swallow higher taxes without finding a way to pass it along. How much is it really? Five dollars a month rent increase? Three dollars a night on hospitality accommodations? Maybe a few pennies on retail items? Businesses won't cry about that, they will complain about the total annual amount and never openly admit they will do what it takes to pass it along and stay in business.
     In five years, when the roads are all paved, cleaner water is being delivered, rain whisks away down the storm sewers and we don't flood, nobody will say 'Darn I'm glad we did it.' They will take it for granted. It will be a way of life in Lake Worth."

For the entire editorial, read more City of Lake Worth news, and enjoy the clever musings of our Pelican Pete go to: LWHerald.com

Believe it or not...

There was a time, not so long ago, when our resident naysayers didn't like the notion of Publix coming to our downtown. They didn't see the need for the CRA's investment in the project, could care less about the infrastructure improvements as part of the project and preferred to talk about plastic bags and where Publix sources their tomatoes. Oh, yeah, they were also saying it would ruin single family neighborhoods.

In these images, Tom McGow highlights what conditions were like prior to the arrival of the grocery store now and makes the argument for the store.

This looks a lot like my sidewalk in College Park

‘Going A-Wall’ mural project brings color to downtown Lake Worth | www.palmbeachpost.com

Everyone should get downtown and check out the new additions to our art scene. Where once were plain walls, now there are colorful murals. Read about the Post's take on display, click title for link. Here is a bit from the article:

The man behind the colorful event was Bruce Webber, who hopes Lake Worth will take after Wynwood, Miami’s booming art district.
Bruce knew art was changing when the Florida palm tree paintings that hung in his 44-year-old Lake Worth art gallery were just not selling like they used to.
He was looking for something fresh, and during the 20th annual Lake Worth Street Painting Festival back in February, he found it.
[later in article]
Four more mural-paintings are slated to take place again in November, continuing the push for an active art district in the heart of Lake Worth.
“This is only the beginning,” Bruce said. “If you don’t change with time, you’re going to get left behind. That’s exactly what we’re trying to do.”

College Park Neighborhood Special Meeting Saturday, August 23rd 5-7 PM

College Park Neighborhood Special Meeting
Saturday, August 23rd
5-7 PM
First Congregational Church
1415 North K Street

Everyone is invited!

The College Park Neighborhood Association is holding a special meeting 
on Saturday, August 23rd to allow friends and neighbors another 
opportunity to hear directly from the City about the Lake Worth 2020 
plan and the bond referendum that will appear on the ballot in the 
August 26th election.

Representatives from the City will be on hand to present detailed 
information about what the plan will include city wide and block by 
block, the proposed timetable for the improvements that are planned as 
well as what passage of the bond will cost individual property owners.

A special table will be set up with City staff members and computers 
to calculate the cost in actual dollar amounts based on information 
retrieved from the Property Appraisers website for individual 
properties using the most conservative parameters.

As a Neighborhood Association, College Park neither supports nor 
opposes any candidate or question that comes before the voters. The 
purpose of this meeting is to offer neighbors an opportunity to learn 
more about the bond referendum so that they can make the most informed 
choice when they vote. This is not a formal debate on the question 
from those in favor of or opposed to the bond. This is strictly to 
provide information to anyone who wants it. Comments and questions 
will be welcomed and answered.

Neighbors from anywhere in the City of Lake Worth are invited to 
attend and participate. Coffee, cool beverages and light refreshments 
will be served. Polling place information for the election on Tuesday, 
August 26th will be available. The question as it will appear on the 
ballot is as follows:

OFFICIAL BALLOT
CITY OF LAKE WORTH, FLORIDA
BOND REFERENDUM ELECTION – AUGUST 26, 2014

APPROVAL OF "LAKE WORTH 2020" BONDS FOR PUBLIC INFRASTRUCTURE PROJECTS 
WITHIN THE CITY.

Shall the City of Lake Worth be authorized to issue bonds to acquire 
and improve roadway, sidewalk, streetlight, streetscape, drainage and 
water and sewer facilities located within the City in one or more 
series not exceeding a total principal amount of $63,500,000, payable 
from an annual ad valorem tax maturing not later than 30 years from 
the date of each issuance and bearing interest at a rate not exceeding 
the maximum legal rate?

For bonds _____ 
Against bonds