BRADENTON — The future of Bradenton’s community redevelopment agencies may depend on who controls the money. A prolonged debate between Bradenton officials broke out Wednesday morning over the future of the four city CRAs, including the 14th Street West CRA, Central Community Redevelopment Agency in East Bradenton, Bradenton CRA and the Bradenton Downtown Development Authority,…
A fragment of rare pine rockland is not a slum — for the time being, anyway. Miami-Dade County Commissioner Dennis Moss said Tuesday he was indefinitely postponing a plan to declare land around Zoo Miami blighted to help pay for a Disney-style theme park while he worked out a better way to balance environmental concerns…
The company that owns and runs the largest mall in America wants to build an even bigger one in northwestern Miami-Dade, a roughly 200-acre entertainment complex with submarines, a Legoland, sea lions and an artificial ski slope. Backed by the owner of Minnesota’s Mall of America, American Dream Miami is proposed for land at the…
SEBRING – A two-year artistic journey came to a close Tuesday for Michigan sculptor Ray Katz as “Stargazer” glided onto a concrete pad at downtown’s Centennial Park. The 600-pound sculpture made of welded and fabricated aluminum is one of nine artistic pieces on display for viewing as part of the 2015 Downtown Sebring CRA Sculptures…
INVERNESS — Merriam-Webster defines blight as something that spoils the appearance or completeness of a thing. Urban blight is an area in a “damaged or worsened condition,” according to the dictionary. Then there is the Inverness City Council’s definition of blight, as spelled out in a resolution passed this week: A condition detrimental to the sound…
Carmike Cinemas opened a new 12-screen theater Friday along U.S. 1, bringing the movies back to New Smyrna Beach for the first time in almost a year. The city’s old movie complex, the Beacon 12, had been open at 1401 S. Dixie Freeway in the New Smyrna Beach Shopping Center since 1995, but closed in…
DELAND — An Orlando-based developer — which recently opened a beachside hotel in Daytona Beach Shores — has bought an old building with plans of turning it into downtown DeLand’s only large hotel. Avista Hotels & Resorts has purchased the Gould Building at 308 N. Woodland Blvd. for $900,000 in a transaction that closed Thursday. The…
Saturday’s Downtown Marketplace starts around 6:30 a.m. on Friday for Ahmet Sezgin. He starts to mix 12 batches of dough that will eventually turn into around 80 loaves of bread spread across his table for hungry shoppers at the weekly market. In its 21st year, the market set in the Park Avenue Chain of Parks…
Ocala Mayor Kent Guinn said he is not heartless when it comes to homeless people. He just wants them out of Ocala’s downtown so others can visit the shops and restaurants without being harassed by panhandlers who, he contends, sometimes become aggressive. Guinn said he has reached out personally to down-and-out individuals outside Starbucks, his…
SCOPE OF WORK The City of Deerfield Beach is requesting sealed proposals from qualified contractors, herein called the Contractor, each Contractor is asked to provide prequalification documents demonstrating experience in constructing Park Projects equal to or larger than the construction of Sullivan Park Expansion Project. The scope of services consists of furnishing all labor, supplies,…
FLORIDA: Florida’s court clerks are leading the nation in making electronic state court records available to the public online. But in the process, they’re creating two-tiers of public viewers with varying privileges based on how much information users are willing to provide about themselves. Any member of the public will be able to look up…
Irving Friedman, an 89-year-old disabled World War II Navy veteran and recovering heart patient was in a panic after Florida Power & Light said in a letter that it would cut off his power Thursday. Friedman, of Port St. Lucie, like 82 other FPL customers, had declined a change-out from an analog meter to a…
PORT ST. LUCIE — The city has put an end to the handsome cash handouts that have buried the municipality deep in debt. The City Council on Monday unanimously restricted borrowing through what’s known as covenant to budget and appropriate bonds. They are bonds for a specific purpose, and have specific guidelines for payback, but…
INVERNESS — Merriam-Webster defines blight as something that spoils the appearance or completeness of a thing. Urban blight is an area in a “damaged or worsened condition,” according to the dictionary. Then there is the Inverness City Council’s definition of blight, as spelled out in a resolution passed this week: A condition detrimental to the…
Some members of Live Oak’s Community Redevelopment Agency (CRA) are calling for an expansion of the roughly 1,000-acre CRA district to include more areas in need of development. CRA member and city Councilman John Yulee brought up the possibility of expansion during a workshop on Tuesday, Feb. 18, stating he would like to expand the…
Like parents who fret when they hand the car keys to their teenage children, county governments are understandably loathe to let go when they approve Community Redevelopment Areas for municipalities. Given the amount of money involved, it’s appropriate for counties to ensure the CRAs are effectively targeted and properly managed. But they shouldn’t become back-seat…
SEBRING — Downtown Lake Placid is almost full. Only two buildings on Interlake Boulevard and two on Main Street are empty. Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Eileen May is almost satisfied. What else would she like to see? “Live music outside, at night. A sidewalk café. A place to have wine, dinner,” May said. “I…
Empty homes. Lots overgrown with grass and weeds. A discarded mattress or old couch. Tires and bags of trash abandoned on street corners. Blight can pop up anywhere, and its effects on a neighborhood can be crippling, from degrading an area’s image to dragging down property values on surrounding occupied homes. While efforts to clean…
LAKELAND | The Lakeland Area Mass Transit District said it can no longer bear to lose tax revenue to city and county redevelopment districts and has asked for a break. In the aftermath of voters’ rejection of the My Ride/My Road one-cent sales tax in November, transit services face major cuts. “We’re looking at layoffs,…
SARASOTA – Developer Christopher J. Brown said Thursday he has no immediate plans to build on a Main Street site he recently acquired where a 15-story condominium tower was proposed a decade ago. Brown bought the 0.3-acre property, near the corner of Main Street and Pine Place, for $1 million from Kansas City Life Insurance Co.…
PANAMA CITY — Panama City Downtown Improvement Board has laid out a plan to pay off its debt. The DIB will pay $20,000 using the $55,000 loan granted from the city in March and then pay $5,000 each proceeding month, eventually out of DIB funds. Chairman Jim Hayden said they are hoping to have the…