Same old story. Same old you-know-what.

'Revitalization' a threat to Virginia Key

April 3, 1997

The cash-starved city of Miami is again trying to deliver Virginia Key to favored developers and concessionaires.

Under the pretense of "revitalization," nine parcels currently marked for conservation are proposed for rezoning. The result could be hotels, marinas, shops and even houses.

Planners insist the zoning changes are technical corrections that won't affect the character of the island, but there's no reason for optimism. The stewardship of Virginia Key has been one of bungling, neglect and political favoritism.

Practically everything the city touched has turned to failure. The Marine Stadium has been a wreck since Hurricane Andrew. The beach and park on the Atlantic side—refurbished a few years ago at great expense—is now closed, supposedly because of the budget crisis.

It's as if Miami purposely abandoned Virginia Key and let it crumble, in order to stir support for development.

Mayor Joe Carollo has grandiose dreams for reviving the bayfront lagoon area by the Marine Stadium: hotels, restaurants, shops and a Jet Ski extravaganza that would bring needed lease revenues to City Hall.

At least, that's the pitch. In reality, the "technical" rezoning opens the door for transforming the island into another Dinner Key—an aesthetic calamity, and a grab bag for political cronies of commissioners.

For years the city has been aching to carve Virginia Key into a resort. The chief obstacles have been public opposition, and a large, odoriferous sewer plant.

In 1995 commissioners endorsed a preposterous proposal to put an RV park on 153 acres. The "ecologically sensitive" project included 300 motel units, a convenience store and miniature golf.

Voters, who weren't fooled by the city's tree-hugging hype, killed the plan.

This time around, commissioners don't want the public mucking up their big ideas for Virginia Key. Conveniently, rezoning can be accomplished without referendum.

Miami planning chief Jack Luft says there's no reason to worry. The changes, he says, actually will help preserve the island's unspoiled stretches.

Removing the "conservation" designation seems an odd way to protect land, but the city does many odd things at Virginia Key.

Twenty years ago the city leased out prime bayfront to the private Miami Rowing Club. Price: a whopping $100 annually.

Eventually the rowers built an 11,000-square-foot clubhouse, a swimming pool, a banquet hall and bar. In 1987 it was revealed that the club was renting out the facilities, and in one year had collected $147,000.

Guess how much the city got. And when the rowers needed storage space, commissioners generously let them fence off 10,000 square feet of land.

At the time, beet-faced officials denied any connection to the fact that then-City Manager Cesar Odio was a former president and life member of the rowing club.

Another funny coincidence: According to members, security services at the club once were provided by a firm owned by a young city commissioner named Carollo. Small world, isn't it?

Ironically, Miami wouldn't be broke today if it hadn't mismanaged city holdings and given away so many costly favors; if it had collected reasonable rents and leases (not to mention a few debts).

It would be good if the ghost-town lagoon area could be "revitalized" without ruining the rest of Virginia Key, but promises of preservation seem far-fetched. The city can't take care of a beach, much less an entire island.

Rezoning is just the first step toward another giveaway and you don't need to be downwind from the sewer plant to smell the truth.

Explanation for road widening quite a stretch

June 15, 1997

By a slim vote, the South Florida Water Management District last week launched one of the nuttiest schemes in its long nutty history:

Widening the 18 miles between the mainland and the Florida Keys from two lanes to three, with a fourth phantom lane to be prepared but left unpaved.

The new paved lane will be northbound, ostensibly to improve hurricane evacuation. The unpaved Mystery Lane will run southbound, and nobody in authority has convincingly explained its purpose.

Why scrape an extra swath along sensitive marshlands if it's not meant to be paved? Because it is meant to be paved, as soon as local opposition dies down.

Widening the so-called Stretch isn't about hurricane egress or driver safety, it's about cramming more warm bodies into the Keys. It's about selling more rum runners, T-shirts and time shares.

And, most significantly, it's about boosting road capacity to allow a wave of new construction along the islands.

Those most eager for the project are commercial interests and land speculators in the Middle and Lower Keys. The people most adamantly against it are those who live in the Upper Keys and, ironically, drive the hairy Stretch more than anyone.

Originally, the plan called for widening the entire 18-mile leg, which is now two-laned with intermittent passing zones. Opposition to four-laning was so fierce that planners devised a bizarre alternative—two lanes north, one lane south, and the unpaved "footprint" of another southbounder.

In case of what? Unless you're traveling to the Keys by horseback or by wagon train, an unpaved lane is of little use.

Nobody down here was fooled by the phony "compromise." Opponents remained vocal, but the county pushed ahead.

A state hearing officer eventually approved the project. Incredibly, he ruled that expanding the main corridor into the Keys would have no secondary effects; not on the environment, not on growth, not on the quality of life.

Just as Alligator Alley hasn't had an impact on traffic and crime in Naples and Fort Myers. Just as the Sawgrass Expressway hasn't disastrously urbanized northwest Broward. Much.

Safety is a bogus issue. Widening a fast highway always draws more cars, and more cars mean more serious accidents.

Supporters of a new Stretch also invoke images of hurricane stampedes as a reason to widen the road—a groundless argument meant to mask the true agenda: to bring in more people.

The Mystery Lane is no mystery at all. Paving it at a near-future date will be easy, because the water management board will say yes. A slave to politics, the board virtually always says yes.

For folks who live in already-crowded Key Largo, and who don't especially want the Turnpike in their front yard, the last hope lies with two men—Col. Terry Rice of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, and former U.S. Attorney Dexter Lehtinen.

Lehtinen, a longtime advocate for the Everglades, plans to appeal the state's decision, on behalf of Keys conservation groups. He'll argue that four-laning the Stretch will imperil the water and wildlife of the islands.

In the meantime, construction cannot begin without a green light from the Army Corps. Rice, the agency's chief troubleshooter on Everglades restoration, has serious concerns about the far-reaching effects of expanding the entry to the Keys.

Rice is also curious about why the state agreed to the weird idea of a phantom southbound lane. "Why should we fill wetlands," he asked, "to make a lane they say they aren't going to pave?"

Sounds like a ploy to run a big-city freeway straight into Key Largo, but maybe it's not. Maybe it's just the world's most expensive jogging path.