Published by former Mayor George Gardner February 10 2016
The Report is an independent publication serving our community
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City's PUD revisions
'incredibly important'
St. Augustine's City Commission Monday adopted what Mayor Nancy Shaver called, "one of the most important pieces of work that we will do."
An amendment to the planned unit development (PUD) code includes requiring additional documentation, notifications outside defined neighborhoods and additional public hearings and reviews before the Planning and Zoning Board begins its review.
"(PUDs) spark a tremendous amount of interest and emotion and passion" said the mayor. "This is a foundational piece and it's incredibly important."
Commissioner Nancy Sikes-Kline commended "staff for working on items for the PUD. It's our responsibility to make things as clear as possible, in plain English, for applicants as well as staff."
Only Commissioner Todd Neville voted against the measure, saying, "I think we're getting into excessive bureaucracy here."
Shaver urged further modifications, including "something that demonstrates the financial capability of the applicant, more detail on what is the content of each phase and organization of the application to reflect the five criteria the commission is required to assess."
Planning and Zoning Director David Birchim said some elements can be added to the application process, but checking on developers' private financial resources would be difficult.
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Freedom Flight
by Candlelight
Flight to Freedom, recounting the dangerous journey of a freedom seeker escaping from a life in slavery to a new life of freedom in Spanish Florida, will be presented February 20 at the Castillo, in cooperation with the Fort Mose Historical Society and the Florida Park Service.
Overhear the conversations of people met by that freedom seeker along the way - some hoping to help, others hoping to return him to owners in the English colonies to the north, all by candlelight.
45-minute programs at 6, 6:30, 7, 7:30, 8 and 8:30 pm. Tickets at the Castillo ticket booth first come, first served, $10 adult, $5 ages 5 to 15, children under 5 free. Call (904) 829-6506 ext. 233.
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Madeira extensions
move to February 22
A vote to rescind its January vote denying time extensions for the Madeira planned unit development was easily passed by the City Commission Monday.
City Manager John Regan said, "The commission sent a very clear and concise message that time extensions for PUDs are not automatic, and particularly if they lapse for some time they have to be updated to some degree.
"The vote (to deny) created unintended consequences," he added, particularly for the 74 residents currently in the development and ongoing real estate transactions.
The matter will go on the commission's February 22 agenda for public hearing and final action.
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It was the citizens, and the professionals, the historians and the scholars - they were the ones who showed up and stopped the bill.
Commissioner Nancy Sikes-Kline, on efforts to stop a bill in the state legislature which would allow permits to dig for artifacts on state lands.
If I'm not here at the next commission meeting (February 22) it may be because I'm jumping out of a plane on February 19 in support of Army recruiting. I'll be in Miami jumping with the Golden Knights.
Mayor Nancy Shaver, who accepted an invitation from Army recruiters.
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St. Augustine now has refined definitions of dormitories and hostels in the city code, following passage of an ordinance Monday.
Flagler College President Bill Abare pushed for some modifications before the final action. One succeeded, to change language from "limited to" to "such as" referring to listed accessory uses - book store, library athletic facilities and cafeteria.
The ordinance followed three years of effort by neighborhoods and several delays on the Planning and Zoning Board agenda to make it to the City Commission.
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 St. Augustine's Golden Age of film making
One hundred and ten years ago, movie making came to St. Augustine.
"The first film known to have been made in St. Augustine was a ten-minute travelogue entitled A Trip to St. Augustine released by the Selig Polyscope Company in June of 1906," Flagler College History Professor Emeritus Tom Graham writes in a manuscript he's preparing for publication.
"St. Augustine's unique Spanish architecture would prove an irresistible draw for makers of documentary films in following years, but soon it would also attract makers of photoplays that required out of the ordinary settings.
"The first such company of movie makers would arrive a little more than two years later. In succeeding years St. Augustine's old Spanish structures, Flagler's magnificent hotels, and the area's semi-tropical landscape would stand in for Spain, Italy, France, Brazil, Egypt, Arabia, South Africa, Hawaii, and even California."
Graham writes that cold weather brought movie makers to Florida most headquarters in New York City, Fort Lee, New Jersey and Philadelphia.
"The French-based company Pathé Freres took a six-month lease in 1914 on a portion of the tract then called Neptune Park, which was located just on the northern outskirts of town. An original character, Luella Day McConnell, fresh from the gold fields of the Yukon, had recently purchased it.
"A writer for Motion Picture News reported, "The new Pathe outdoor studio in St. Augustine is distinguished by at least one unique feature. On the grounds of the property is located a spring, which tradition in the old Spanish city states is the spring visited by Ponce de Leon.
"The Edison film Rorke's Drift became a major production involving hundreds of people from the community, both as "supers" in the film and as spectators to the movie-making action. The film is taken from an incident in the Zulu war in South Africa when a band of African warriors overran a British outpost at a place called Rorke's Drift. Edison needed two armies, and so recruited men from town."
Among those early films, A Florida Enchantment is perhaps the best known, partly because it has survived while the vast majority of other nitrate cellulose films made at the time have turned to vinegar vapor and dust. Early stars included Theda Bara as "a vampire in the 1915 A Fool There Was.
Graham's book will cover the golden age of St. Augustine silent film making, 1906-1926.
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History's Highlight
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This year the Sisters of St. Joseph of St. Augustine celebrate their 150th anniversary. A documentary, Legacy of Faith, will be aired on WJCT March 24, 8 pm; March 27, 1 and 7 pm, and March 30, 11 pm.
September 2, 1866, the eight arrived at Picolata Landing, knowing little English, unfamiliar with the subtropic climate, uncertain what the future would hold, but ready to serve the "dear neighbor."
 Their arrival was requested by Bishop Augustin Verot in February, 1866, in a letter to the Superior in Le Puy, France, Mother Leocadie Broc: "I have five to six hundred thousand Blacks without education, without religion, and without Baptism for whom I wish to do something ... It is my wish, that you understand clearly and perfectly, that it is for the care of the Negroes (newly freed African Americans), and for them only, that I am seeking Sisters of your Order for my Diocese."
Verot took the nuns under his personal instruction in English "so that they can get to work as soon as possible," Historian Michael Gannon writes in Rebel Bishop. "The lessons must have proceeded at an accelerated pace, for on February 9, 1867, less than two months later, the local Examiner noted 'a school has been opened for the colored children of the place under the superintendence of the Sisters of St. Joseph.'"
The paper judged that "it is right to begin at the children, and the two races now necessarily in presence of each other can but be benefitted by proper instruction and education." As a free school, it "leaves no pretext to them (Negroes) to remain in ignorance."
The Sisters opened that first class for Black male children in a house on the O'Reilly property on St. George Street and by December were visiting and caring for sick African American men, women and children in their homes. In January, 1867, the Sisters opened classes for black children in the O'Reilly House on Aviles Street, which became their first convent and first school.
That first school was called St. Cecelia, renamed St. Benedict the Moor when it was relocated to the property of that newly established parish, St. Benedict the Moor, on Central Avenue (today Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue) in 1914.
In 1874, the Sisters opened St. Joseph Academy, and in 1916 opened the Cathedral Parish School.
Today the Sisters of St. Joseph of St. Augustine continue to work in collaboration with others to bring union and reconciliation to our world, "that all may be one."
Photo: First students of the Sisters of St. Joseph, 1867, O'Reilly House exhibit
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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 a former newspaper reporter and editor. Contact the Report at gardner@aug.com or gardnerstaug@yahoo.com
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