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Published by former Mayor George Gardner January 9 2013
The Report is an independent publication serving our community.
Contributions are greatly appreciated. Click or mail to
George Gardner 57 Fullerwood Drive St. Augustine FL 32084
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450 mission shift
Focus now on infrastructure for 500th
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At the end of the day, we don't intend to raise money and spend it on a party. We intend to raise money for investment in the infrastructure of St. Augustine, guaranteeing that when the world gathers to celebrate our 500th anniversary ... the St. Augustine they celebrate will be economically sound, clean and healthy, quaint and charming, and even more vibrant than the city we live in today.
The message comes at the end of Making it Happen on the city's 450th website, a treatise that notes, "Small cities like St. Augustine can't count on the state or federal government to provide for essential services like re-development and historic restoration.
"... Specifically, we need to use the umbrella of the 450th Commemoration to explore alternative means of creating sustainable revenue streams that will fund our future needs."
A mission statement prepared early in planning for the 450th called for "commemorative ceremonies, festive events, musical and dramatic performances, engaging public education programs, authentic recreations and restorations, publications, exhibitions, and research (on) the rich history and cultural diversity of St. Augustine over 450 years."
The mission statement on today's 450 website is "The St. Augustine 450th Commemoration is an opportunity to make our city an even better place to live and visit."
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State Road 16 is a major entry into St. Augustine - and it's getting a new dressing this year.
Beginning this week and continuing into fall, the roadway will be resurfaced from just east of I 95 to San Marco Avenue - a 5-mile stretch, and new sidewalks will be added on both sides of the road from just west of Interstate 95 to Kenton Morrison Road - the Publix intersection, a distance of 3.5 miles.
Hubbard Construction Company of Winter Park is handling the $6.2 million project.
Commuters Note - In the section of State Road 16 from Lewis Speedway to San Marco Avenue, no daytime lane closures are allowed due to high traffic volume. Nighttime lane closures in this section will be between 7 pm and 7 am.
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Commentary
450th management
is city management
The shift in city management's focus on the 450th should not be surprising.
In the hands of a city manager, any community effort will ultimately go to his core function - infrastructure.
City Manager John Regan warned, even as he took the 450 planning reins from Mayor Joe Boles and an indifferent City Commission, that historic commemoration is not a core function of city management.
Regan made one ill-advised effort to shift the 450th to a community-based foundation, in desperation giving $275,000 in city money to a lawyer after Boles' vision of top-down, funds first, then projects failed.
With the failure of that effort, Regan then hired a trio including a communications manager whose focus has been on the web and social media, a fund-raiser who hasn't been able to raise funds, and a development director whose most visible achievement has been a First America series.
Perhaps the nearly $200,000 in those salaries and remainder of the $328,000 annual 450th budget could be put to better use dressing up the streets around St. George to expand commercial opportunities, and hiring economic development specialists.
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Garage revenue
falls short of goal
The city's goal of $1,050,000 in additional revenue from the Visitor Center parking facility fell $287,000 short in the first year of a $10 all-day fee, but that was "made up for by cost cutting measures," Assistant City Manager Tim Burchfield says.
Responding to a Report item, Burchfield said, "The $385,170 figure you refer to is a gross amount which includes items other than the parking fee" and the plan to increase the ParkNow card holder all-day fee from $1 to $3 is "an effort to establish a sinking fund for future repairs that will be needed over the life of the structure."
Fiscal year-end figures (October 2011 - September 2012) provided by the city showed $1,966,802 in revenue, compared to $1,301,972 before the $10 rate adjustment.
Total vehicle count declined in that two-year period from 352,735 to 297,815, but the numbers were stronger as the city moved into the 2012 holiday season - with vehicle counts of 23,506 in October 2012, compared to 23,486 in 2011, 27,936 in November (23,648 in 2011), and 36,578 in December (32,553 in 2011).
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Ponce's 125th trumps 500th
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2013 is the 500th anniversary of Ponce de Leon's discovery of Florida and the new world, but his namesake Hotel Ponce de Leon takes center stage in St. Augustine through the thorough planning of the hotel's steward, Flagler College.
 | Hotel Ponce de Leon in its heyday.
Flagler College photo |
Festivities open tonight with Palace in Paradise: The Hotel Ponce de Leon Turns 125, part of the Discover First America! series, at 7 pm in Lewis Auditorium.
The "grand opening" of the hotel is Saturday, January 12, the 125th anniversary of today's National Historic Landmark, with free access to the hotel's corridors, grounds, and to Henry Flagler and friends from 9:30 am to 2 pm.
At the adjacent Crisp-Ellert Art Museum Planning and Painting in Paradise: The Art and Architecture of the Hotel Ponce de Leon will present contributions of architects John Carrère and Thomas Hastings, builders McDonald and McGuire, and artists who worked in the Hotel's artist studios during the early years. The exhibit continues through February 22.
Tuesday, January 15, at 7 pm at Lewis Auditorium, Executive Director John M. Blades of the Henry Morrison Flagler Museum, "Whitehall," in Palm Beach will present "Amazing Things About Henry M. Flagler Very Few People Know," and Tuesday, January 22, at 10 am in the college's Flagler Room Dr. Tom Graham will discuss "Life and Leisure in Flagler's St. Augustine" to open the Spring 2013 Flagler College Community Lecture Series The Hotel Ponce de Leon Deconstructed: Building the Future for Modern America.
Visit www.ponce125.com for details.
Ponce de Leon will be remembered January 23 at 7 pm in Lewis Auditorium in Founding of Florida: Juan Ponce de Leon, part of the Discover First America! series.
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News and Notes
Arbor Day marks 30th Tree City year
 Arbor Day will be celebrated with ceremonies Friday, January 18, at 11 am at the Hamilton Upchurch Park off Anastasia Blvd. The brief ceremonies include the tree planting, recognition as Tree City USA, a presentation by R. B. Hunt Elementary School students, and Smokey Bear assisting in distributing a variety of saplings.
Day off is 'Day of Doing'
Planning to turn "a day off into a day of doing," the St. Paul School of Excellence Charter School kicks off this year's Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day Celebration with an inaugural "Dreamers to Doers" 5K Run/Walk through Lincolnville Monday, January 21.
Race time is 8:30 am; register online at www.RaceSmith.com or at St. Paul Church 3-5 pm Sunday January 20.
Also Monday, the 28th annual Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. commemorative breakfast 7:30 to 10 am at First Coast Technical College.
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History's Highlight
Legacy of Henry Flagler
2 years, 7 months, 30 days to St. Augustine's 450th anniversary
He came out of upstate New York, an itinerant minister's son, whose vision forged the Standard Oil empire and continued with the idea that the sub-tropical wilderness that was Florida could become a tourist mecca.
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Portrait Flagler commissioned as a Christmas gift to Dr. Andrew Anderson in 1900.
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After developing Standard Oil with John D. Rockefeller, Flagler turned to the needs of his wife, Mary. Doctors advised the healthful climate of Florida to ease her bronchitis, and the Flaglers found St. Augustine. Here, he convinced himself, an American Riviera could be fashioned.
He needed to convince no one but himself - wealthy beyond belief after his successful oil venture.
It would take that wealth to realize his vision. There was not only the cost of construction of a magnificent hotel, then another, but there were existing properties in the core area of his vision - churches, a jail, and the trickling Sanchez Creek running through the middle of land he purchased from Dr. Andrew Anderson.
Undaunted, he built new churches and public buildings elsewhere, and filled in that stream, and converted dirt streets into brick boulevards, and built a waterworks and rail station to serve the wealthy patrons he anticipated from the dead of winter up north.
The expense? While building the Ponce de Leon Hotel, he remarked: "I think it more likely I am spending an unnecessary amount of money in the foundation walls, but I comfort myself in the reflection that a hundred years hence it will be all the same to me and the building the better because of my extravagance."
After discovering more dependable warm weather further south, he continued his rail line and mecca-building further along the coast, leaving behind a legacy combining the Spanish heritage of St. Augustine with the magnificence of the gilded age of the late 1800s.
If his mind drove him south, his heart remained here. Henry Morrison Flagler died May 20, 1913, at the age of 83 at his palatial Whitehall at Palm Beach. He lies today with his first wife, Mary, daughter Jennie, and infant granddaughter Margery, in a tomb at his Memorial Presbyterian Church in St. Augustine.
Excerpts from Henry Flagler in St. Augustine Bedtime Stories. Read more about these dramatic accounts of famous people and events in St. Augustine's history - in booklets designed for quick reads before bed. Information here.
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The St. Augustine Report is published weekly, with additional Reports previewing City Commission meetings as well as Special Reports. The Report is written and distributed by George Gardner, St. Augustine Mayor (2002-2006) and Commissioner (2006-2008) and a former newspaper reporter and editor. Contact the Report at gardner@aug.com |
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