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HomeMy WebLinkAboutHPB Minutes 2012-0905 SUMMARY MINUTES City of Sunny Isles Beach Historic Preservation Board Meeting 18070 Collins Avenue, ft Floor Meeting Room Wednesday, September 5, 2012, 7:00 p.m. 1. Call to Order by Chairperson: Action: Chairperson Joe Masters called the meeting to order at 7:00 p.m., and each Member introduced themselves. The following Board Members and City Officials were present: Committee Members: City Officials: Joe Masters, Chairperson Acting City Manager Fred Maas Cassey Gabor, Vice Chairperson Deputy City Attorney Fernando Amuchastegui Shari Blank City Clerk Jane A. Hines._ CMC Jorge Camaraza Warren J. Stamm (arrived at 7:05 p.m.) Absent: City Liaison: Janet Cini (excused/ill) Richard C. Schulman, City Historian Trina Duluc (excused/ill) 2. Approval of Minutes: • February 15, 2012 Historic Presentation Board Meeting. • July 17, 2012 Historic Presentation Board Meeting. Action: Cassey Gabor moved and Shari Blank seconded a motion to approve the above- mentioned Board meeting summary minutes. The motion was approved by a voice vote of 4-0-3 (Janet Cini and Trina Duluc absent; Warren Stamm arrived late) in favor. 3. Update/Report on the Reconstruction, Design, and Permitting of the Sunny Isles Beach/Newport Pier. Action: Acting City Manager Fred Maas reported that he has been in contact bi-weekly with the Project Managers of the Pier, they send us weekly updates which are passed on to the Commission. The number one concern that they have, and it is something that is always out of our control, is the weather. The weather dictates not only how much work they can do but the type of work they can do, and we had a two-day setback due to Tropical Storm Isaac. What happens is that the barge has to be taken out of harm's way, it has to be repositioned, and they have to do a number of setups so they can work from the barge onto the Pier. Fortunately it was a very short delay but their concern is between now and the end of the year with the Project completion. How many more of these setbacks will they get, and it doesn't have to be a tropical storm, it can be a series of nor'easter that comes in where the wind creates a heavy wave action and the barge cannot withstand that and so it has to be moved out. If we get some decent weather and they are able to stay on schedule, it looks as though we would be able to do some type of soft opening either on New Year's Eve or New Year's Day,and that was the hope of the Commission. Even if there are some safety concerns, we will cordon off that area and we would have a scaled back ceremony. He has expressed to the Project Managers the wishes of the Commission and the community, and so they have a Project completion date of January 18, 2013. We are hoping if all goes well, they will be able to meet the soft opening on New Year's Eve and the completion date on January 18, 2012. Summary Minutes: 2012-0905 HPB Mtg Page 1 of 5 Acting City Manager Maas responded to questions posed by the Board. City Historian Schulman said they are in the process of putting the pilings in now, and Acting City Manager Maas said absolutely, in fact a lot of them are already in. They are now doing the auger cast pilings which are the ones closer to the building, and you are starting to see it all take shape on the west end. We have had a couple of questions, in case you have either observed it or will be asked in the future, rather than it being a flat Pier, if you look at it you will see like a 5-degree rise,then it will go level,and then another 5-degree rise, and as you go further out there is a little bit of an elevation, that is by design. The Pier is designed so that the water flow can go through the pillars and not take the Pier out from the wave action on windy days. Actually there is a Pier built just like this one in Delray Beach with that same type of incline,and so it has been tried and tested before. The Pier has that aesthetic look to it but it is really concrete,the finish is going to make it look like wood. Acting City Manager Maas said he has a question for the Board that someone asked him. Will there be something taken from the old Pier such as a section of wood or anything like that to be incorporated into the new Pier, has that been discussed? City Historian Schulman said none of the wood pilings or anything else has been taken back. What we are planning on putting at the entrance of the Pier is the statue of the boy fishing that is here in the lobby. It will be on a stand with a plaque denoting when the Pier was originally built, when it was done again in 1984,and at the opening ceremonies when we open the Pier officially. Shari Blank asked if we had photos of the original Pier, and City Historian Schulman said yes, they are in History Hall, we have got quite a few even from the 1920's, 1930's, 1980's. Jorge Camaraza asked why none of the original wood was saved, and Ms. Blank said she understood that it was in very poor condition. Cassey Gabor asked about the status of a restaurant, and Acting City Manager Maas said there are a couple of people who have submitted their interest, there are two that he is familiar with that are looking at the design and expressing their interest and asking questions. There is nothing firm yet. Ms. Gabor said she believed it would be like a food court, some restaurants,and Acting City Manager Maas said that was one idea and they would always entertain if there was someone, the proper person who wanted to come in and make an offer, all those things are being considered. Ms. Gabor asked if they would allow liquor or beer,and Acting City Manager Maas said now you are getting into State licensing and he is not sure if that has been discussed but if the license was there before, it would be grandfathered in. If Dr. Comfeld happened to own the place before and had that license, it would be transferrable. Ms. Gabor said we should talk more about the plaque, what will be written there, and what kind of material will it be made out of. City Historian Schulman said the plaque that we are going to prepare will be made out of corrolon which will last forever, we have it on the historic bridges. The wording has been written and approved by the Mayor and it will have the seal of the City. He read the wording into the record "Sunny Isles Beach Newport Fishing Pier Built in 1936, Designated as an Historic Site on January 21, 1982 by Dade County Preservation Board, Re- Designation: July 14, 2005 by the City ofSunny Isles Beach. Rebuilt: 2012 by the City ofSunny Isles Beach and Dr. Robert Cornfeld". He said it will be about 14" by 14", it will fit on the pedestal below the statue of the boy fishing, it will be a light blue, and it will be ready by late November or early December. Ms. Gabor asked if it will be lit up at nighi, and Mr. Schulman said yes, we plan on having it lit by flood light, maybe two lights, at the entrance of the Fishing Pier. He said the Historic Preservation Board will be invited prior to the opening to take a look Summary Minutes: 2012-0905 HPB Mtg Page 2 of 5 at the Pier. Mr. Camaraza asked if fishing will be allowed, and Mr. Schulman said yes, and he understands there will be fishing equipment and supplies there for sale. 4. An Update/Discussion on the Sahara Motel Camels. Action: City Historian Richard Schulman reported that five(5)camels and riders in front of the Sahara have been a landmark for several years. We have been trying to get the Condo to donate them to the City so we can use those landmarks as memorabilia in one of our parks. One of the camels lost its head some time ago and it was replaced by the Condo Association and so we didn't have to spend any money to replace it. We are getting to the point that we are hoping to have those camels donated by the Dezer Corporation, and he asked Warren Stamm for an update. Mr. Stamm said the Dezer Corporation is a significant property owner here on Sunny Isles Beach and one of those properties is the Sahara where we have a significant number of units. As a result of that we have some clout with the Association and what goes on there. As the units come up for sale we are interested in acquiring them because we think it is a very good property, and the camels play an intricate part of that. Clearly, when they are in a position to be able to have more of a say or control over the Board then we would be in a position to make a decision as to what is going to happen with the property in conjunction with the land owners. Then we would be able to provide something with respect to a donation as we did on some of the other motels that we control and the Sahara controls. He would like to come back to this Board before the end of the year and be able to give more of a positive feedback on where they are at and hopefully at that point to look at a possible scheduling of what the company is going to do with the camels. Ms. Gabor asked what the situation is, and Mr. Stamm said they have the Golden Nugget and tore it down, and are now building the Porsche Tower. He thinks the camels will look great in one of the parks and he thinks that is where they are going. He said that Richard Scholl has been instrumental in getting the head repaired on one of the camels and they look great now. One of his concerns is we will need to find a way to reinforce them because if we put them in a park, you don't want somebody climbing all over them. Cassey Gabor said we should declare the camels right now as artifacts, and that Ellen Uguccioni had told her that we can do that, and we will put up a plaque. Deputy City Attorney Amuchastegui said we would be in the position to discuss that at a future meeting but that is certainly something that the Board could consider. 5. An Update/Discussion on the Ocean Palm Motel Demolition. Action: City Historian Richard Schulman reported that the two-story Ocean Palm Motel was demolished this past month. That property is going to be used as a sales office temporarily by the owner to sell units at the Chateau Beach highrise which is at 175th Street. We collected all the signage and some of the light fixtures from the Motel as memorabilia. We have gotten rid of the minor signs but we did retain the 25-foot Ocean Palm Motel sign that was over the front and the City sold it for$400 on EBay. Ms. Gabor asked why it was not retained as an artifact, and Mr. Schulman said we had discussed it and decided that it would be of no use to fix it up as it would have cost us a lot of money to redo the wiring and it was rusted. That sign was there for 35-40 years. We did retain very nice crystal light fixtures that were in the lobby,and also two heavy bronze light fixtures that were in the front of the Motel. Mr. Grosskauph who owns the property, plans on building a highrise on that Summary Minutes: 2012-0905 HPB Mtg Page 3 of 5 property but he has no details on it. 6. An Update/Discussion on the Improvements to 334 Atlantic Isle. Action: Jorge Camaraza said that the fence is up,and the mailbox is in progress. The house is prepped and ready to be painted. Mr. Schulman reminded the Board that this is an historic site because Harvey Baker Graves lived there for some time in the 1920's and he was the founder of this area. 7. Old Business. 8. New Business. • Warren Stamm said a meeting was held about a week ago at Pelican Community Park regarding Haulover,and County Commissioner Sally Heyman and her group were there. He and a lot of other people of the City attended that meeting. He thinks it would behoove us as a Board and other residents to really pay attention to what it is that they are going to be doing there because they are proposing a lot. He doesn't see where it would be beneficial to Sunny Isles Beach. This is right in our back yard and we should pay attention to what is going on there because it is definitely going to have an impact on us. Tennis courts would have been a tremendous asset to the City to be able to work a deal with the County for us to have tennis courts for the residents to use. Cassey Gabor said she was also at that meeting,and they had spoken about the garbage there after the holidays, and it would not be a very nice entrance into our City. It will bring a lot more traffic to the City especially on weekends because they are going to build restaurants, boat storage/dry dock, etc. Jorge Camaraza noted that it is prime land as there are only so many ways you can get out to the ocean, you have Haulover and Port Everglades. • Warren Stamm said a wide pedestrian walkway was painted in front of the Arlen House,and he wanted to know if that was done by the City. They painted the bricks in the street and it looks really nice, and he was wondering if they were going to do that all the way up the City. • Jorge Camaraza said that pictures of the Pier should be taken as it is being built. Shari Blank and Jorge Camaraza will take pictures. • Shari Blank mentioned that coming across the Sunny Isles Boulevard Bridge the dry dock boat storage looks terrible,there is no back on the structure,and the boats are stacked on top of each other. Jorge Camaraza said it was his understanding that there was a project designated for that piece of land, is that not the case? Deputy City Attorney Amuchastegui said he will confer with the City Attorney tomorrow and follow up with the Board. 9. Date and Time of Next Meeting. Action: After discussion it was decided to schedule the next meeting on Wednesday,January 23, 2013 at 7:00 p.m. City Historian Schulman said by then the Pier will be finished, and we can get everyone together and go out to the Pier. Summary Minutes: 2012-0905 HPB Mtg Page 4 of 5 Deputy City Attorney Fernando Amuchastegui announced that the Dragonboat Race is taking place on Saturday, September 29, 2012 at Haulover. He is organizing a team of about 20 City employees and we will be racing one of the Dragonboats. They have been practicing on Sundays for the last two months at Oleta State Park, at the Blue Marlin Restaurant launch area. There are going to be 32 Dragonboat racing teams from Florida and out of State. These are traditional Dragonboats,they are 46 feet long and can hold 22 people,and it has the traditional dragon head at the front and a tail at the end. They weight up to 700 pounds, they are huge. There is also a drummer on each boat, and we have Assistant City Manager Sharon Ragoonan as the drummer for our team. We have to coordinate the paddling with the drumming. The activities begin at 9:00 a.m. for the whole family, and racing will occur throughout the morning. It is really a celebration of the Chinese culture, and so the City is sponsoring the event and has been working with the Chinese Association of South Florida. The City made a donation to the Association, and we have been working with Johnson,and he is a long-time supporter of the Dragonboat race tradition,and he has been getting them involved and training them. Fernando is one of the team members, and he noted that we have our own logo, design, and tee shirts. 10. Adjournment. Action: Shari Blank moved and Jorge Camaraza seconded a motion to adjourn the meeting,and Chairperson Masters adjourned it at 7:40 p.m. t-iRespectfully submitted, &rss January 23. 2013 Jane A. Hines. CMC, City Clerk Date Summary Minutes: 2012-0905 HPB Mte Page 5 of 5