Penalties for cutting trees at Barnes and Noble
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Published by former Mayor George Gardner March 5 2014
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Penalties for B&N trees
ten 2 inch trees, $7,200
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Two inch replacement tree at Barnes and Noble, one of ten replacing six 15 inch canopy oaks removed without a permit.
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The county has required ten 2-inch replacement trees and $7,200 to the county Tree Bank fund for the unpermitted cutting of six 15" oak trees in January around the Barnes and Noble Bookstore on US 1.
Measurements are at a tree's trunk.
Retail Strategies LLC of Jacksonville "contracted the removal of six live oak trees," County Environmental Division Manager Jan Brewer said. "We required 90 inches of removed tree inches to be mitigated - 20 inches can be replanted so 70 inches are mitigated via a tree bank fund payment calculated at buying nine 8" trees."
Brewer said existing power lines on the property limited replanting to ten trees.
"At this time we do not have any provision in the Land Development Code for fines," she said.
City Planning and Building Director Mark Knight says in the city, trees more than 18 inches "would be protected trees and subject to a $5,000 fine per tree. If under 18 inches an after the fact tree permit for $50 would be required as well as one for one replacement."
St. Augustine Street Tree Advisory Committee Chair Chuck Lippi, commenting on the Barnes and Noble tree cutting, suggested "Something to consider for our city ordinance. When property owners are fined for unpermitted removal of trees, the tree service involved in the illegal removal should also be fined."
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4th Annual St. Augustine Celtic Music & Heritage Festival this weekend at Francis Field features whisky tasting and pre-festival party Friday and St. Patrick's Day Parade Saturday at 10 am.
Presented by Romanza, festival headliners are Black 47 on their farewell tour and the Dublin City Ramblers.
Celtic music, dancing, clans, highland games, food, vendors and Kids' Zone. 11 am - 10 pm Saturday and 11 am - 6:30 pm Sunday. Details, tickets on the website.
Be a Menorcan
Discover St. Augustine's Menorcan heritage Saturday through singing, dancing, displays and storytelling The Minorcan Heritage Society annual celebration 11 am - 3 pm at Llambias House.
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Archaeology month
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Florida celebrates Archaeology Month 2014 with the theme
Tracing Florida's First People: Paleoindians, and there's plenty to hear and discover here in the nation's oldest city.
Tues March 11, St. Augustine Archaeological Association presents archaeologist James Dunbar discussing The Demise of Keystone Species during the Paleoindian Times, how the Florida environment changed between prehistoric periods. 7-8 pm, Flagler Room at Flagler College, free.
Thurs-Sat, March 13-15,
a three-day conference at Flagler College,
Franciscan Florida in Pan-Borderland Perspectives
explores the Fransican mission system in Florida and beyond. Historians and archaeologists from around the world will present their research. To learn more or register, visit the
Thurs March 13, 1:30-2:30 pm, Archaeology Hike at Fort Mose features rangers discussing the local environment and the history of Fort Mose, while Florida Public Archaeological Network (FPAN) representatives will speak about the archaeological discoveries at the park. Free.
Image" Archaeology Month 2014 poster features Warm Mineral Springs in Sarasota County, an important Paleoindian archaeological site. Over 14,000 years ago during the last Ice Age, the Paleoindian people lived throughout Florida. They hunted megafauna (large anmals), as well as smaller game, and foraged for plants and other resources that dotted a colder and much drier land. These explorers set the stage for thousands of years of Native American culture and tradition.
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Stormwater rates - and projects - up
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Describing impervious areas
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Stormwater rates will change with our April utility bills as the city begins an aggressive capital improvement campaign.
Residential customers will pay a flat rate, while non-residential properties will be computed on developed, impervious areas. Impervious areas are those that don't allow soil penetration, like roofs, driveways, sidewalks ...
The monthly rates:
Small home (1,443 sf or less) $3.64
Average home (1,444 to 4,400 sf) $7
Large home (4,400-plus) $11.20
Mobile home $5.95
Non-residential customers $7/billing unit/month
Look for capital improvement projects on South Dixie, Sidney, and downtown, and 16 neighborhood projects throughout the city.
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Profile
Passion for acting and reenacting
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Gerald Eubanks with his Cross and Sword collection
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On any given day you might find tap dancers, singing by aspiring artists, play auditions - anything and everything in Gerald Eubanks' mind, heart and soul at his St. Augustine Community Theatre in the Ponce de Leon Mall.
The native St. Augustinian, retired after 14½ years as a teacher and another 15½ as a vice principal and principal with the county school system, has a mission "to inspire creative flow, to encourage artistic bent, and especially to reach out to the underserved - those whose cultural yearnings are not being satisfied."
But this day he's musing before shelves of carefully marked boxes - TUNICS, ROBES, CHILD CAPES, ROMAN HELMETS ...
"I have been storing them for more than a decade," he says of his collection from the official state play Cross and Sword and Passion Play, performed at the amphitheater and at The Castillo de San Marcos. Cross and Sword was introduced for the city's 400th anniversary in 1965 and continued at the amphitheatre which was built for it until 1996.
He's also refurbished the original play wagon for the St. George Street Players, presenting for years the plays of 16th century Spanish dramatist and author Lope de Rueda along and around St. George Street.
"I hope to have a true renaissance of the St. George Street Players and The St. Augustine Passion Play," says Gerald, who was in the last cast of Cross and Sword and served on its last board.
If he has time, that is. Gerald has years of television, film and stage credits, and lends his baritone voice to such reenactments as Frederick Douglass and Booker T. Washington, and to the reading of the Emancipation Proclamation here.
Contact Gerald at 904-874-0334 TRGEE@aol.com.
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History's highlight
Walls do good defenses make
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1 year, 6 months, 4 days to St. Augustine's 450th anniversary
Account based on information from the National Park Service teacher guide and City Archaeologist Carl Halbirt.
While numerous outposts protected St. Augustine in its earliest days, British settlement of the Carolinas brought protection needs of the town closer to home. 
Carolina Governor James Moore's 54-day siege in 1702 was thwarted by the newly completed Castillo de San Marcos. But the townspeople had suffered great hardship crowded into the Castillo, and they wanted to make sure that no enemy would be able to occupy their town again.
In 1704 work began on the Cubo Line. This wall behind a moat, with redoubts, or cannon batteries, protruding from the wall a musket shot apart, stretched a half-mile from the Castillo to the San Sebastian River, a shallow, marshy stream just west of town.
A palisade most likely made of pine, it rotted within two years of construction and underwent four major reconstructions as well as numerous smaller repairs and modifications during its useful life of 140 years.
Deciding this wall was not enough, in 1706 work was started on a similar wall, the Hornwork, so named because of the "horns" or bastions at each end, about a half mile north of the Cubo Line, further blocking access to the city from the north.
The Hornwork, or Hornebeque, was built to replace the deteriorating Cubo Line.
In 1718 another wall, the Rosario Line, was built along today's Cordova Street running south from the Santo Domingo Redoubt for nearly a mile before turning east to the bay. Except for the Matanzas Bay on the east, St. Augustine was now a walled city, one of three walled cities in North America - the others Charleston and Quebec, Canada.
In 1762, just two years before Florida was turned over to the British by treaty, still another wall, the Mose Wall, was built from Fort Mose to the San Sebastian River.
Although James Oglethorpe captured the outpost forts of San Diego, Mose, Pupo and Picolata in 1740 and laid siege to St. Augustine from Anastasia Island, the inner defense walls successfully kept the British from occupying or burning St. Augustine during this attack.
The Tennaille wall, built about 1790, connected the west ends of the Cubo Line and Hornwork.
Capture 449 years of St. Augustine history with St. Augustine Bedtime Stories - Dramatic accounts of famous people and events. Details 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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