RAINS FLOOD BARKY PINES SANCTUARY SEE STORY, PAGE 3
ITID TAKES FIRST LOOK AT 2019 BUDGET SEE STORY, PAGE 4
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TOWN-CRIER WELLINGTON • ROYAL PALM BEACH • LOXAHATCHEE • THE ACREAGE
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Wellington Students Headed To The U.S. Air Force Academy
Volume 39, Number 22 June 1 - June 7, 2018
Serving Palms West Since 1980
MEMORIAL DAY IN WELLINGTON
Out of thousands of applicants to the U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado, three students from Wellington — Zach Beatty, Wyatt Boswell and Mikey Garofalo — were nominated and admitted into the prestigious institution. Beatty and Boswell just graduated from Wellington High School, while Garofalo attended Palm Beach Central High School. Page 3
Wellington Chamber Luncheon Focuses On Community Redevelopment
On Wednesday, May 23, the Wellington Chamber of Commerce hosted a luncheon at the International Polo Club Palm Beach that featured guest speaker Assistant Village Manager Jim Barnes on the theme of “Community Reinvestment and Redevelopment.” Barnes has been Wellington’s assistant village manager since November 2015. Page 7
WRMC Reunites Patient With Emergency Crew That Saved His Life
Wellington Regional Medical Center hosted a “Call of the Quarter” celebration on Friday, May 25 to recognize Palm Beach County Fire-Rescue’s Engine/Rescue 34 for their continued service to the community and reunite the crew with a patient they recently provided lifesaving care. Page 9
Haitian Educators Group Hosts Annual Scholarship Dinner
The Haitian Educators Association of Palm Beach Inc. held its fourth annual Elcy Andre Scholarship Award Dinner on Sunday, May 27 at the Madison Green Country Club. Fifteen area students were chosen to receive scholarship funds to further their education. Mentors will be following the students’ progress. Page 11
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The Village of Wellington held its annual Memorial Day Ceremony on Monday, May 28. The parade portion of the event was canceled due to forecasted rain. Despite the stormy weather, many residents and veterans showed up to remember fallen heroes and support those who serve and have served. Shown above, veteran Dennis Masch salutes the U.S. Coast Guard wreath. MORE PHOTOS, PAGE 17 PHOTO BY DANI SALGUEIRO/TOWN-CRIER
Rain Pummeled Lox Roads; Manager Hopes August Vote Could Help Fund Road Work
By Ron Bukley Town-Crier Staff Report Loxahatchee Groves roads have suffered with the recent rains, with two roads closed due to flooding until the town drained the water. “We have temporarily recovered both North B and North E roads,” Town Manager Bill Underwood told the Town-Crier on Tuesday. “We had them closed, but we opened them today. They were both opened mid-morning. The cut-through at 140th [Avenue] in front of Sunsport Gardens is closed. It’s got a washout.” Underwood said that while largely passable, the roads remain in pretty poor shape. “They’re passable now, but they are dirt roads, and it does rain,” he said.
“We have a lot of heavy traffic that uses them.” He said the roads will be OK, but only until the next significant rainfall. “Hopefully not tomorrow,” he said. “Hopefully, we’ll get another week.” Underwood said that the town’s road maintenance contractor is at work trying to keep the roads passable. “The problem, I’m sure everyone knows, is that for a long time, there has not been any road material added to these roads that are having the most significant problems,” he said. “Unfortunately, the town paid the water control district and depended on the water control district to maintain those roads in an adequate condition. When we
got them, they were inferior, and they have not improved. However, I don’t have the money that we gave them to spend on it, so we’re kind of in a rough spot here. I’ve asked the people’s patience until we can get appropriate funding in place to actually take care of the roads.” Underwood pointed out that the town’s previous road contractor, Bergeron Land Development, made an assessment of the last of the roads to be dedicated from the Loxahatchee Groves Water Control District to the town and determined that they needed about $600,000 worth of fill to bring them up to grade. “We didn’t have the $600,000 See LOX ROADS, page 4
McDonald’s Receives OK For Courtyard Shops Renovation
By Dani Salgueiro Town-Crier Staff Report The McDonald’s restaurant in the Wellington Courtyard Shops recently received approval from Wellington’s Architectural Review Board for building renovations. Located on the southeast corner of Wellington Trace and Greenview Shores Blvd. in between the Shell gas station and Chase Bank, the older-looking McDonald’s is slated to undergo a makeover into a more modern-looking fast-food restaurant. The Courtyard Shops plaza was constructed in 1991. Some parts of the plaza, like the former Hollywood Videos building, underwent renovations in 2009, but this particular McDonald’s has never been renovated. The McDonald’s, along with the nearby Shell gas station, Chase Bank, Bank of America and Wells Fargo Bank, still have the original 1991 building features. At the Architectural Review Board meeting on Wednesday, May 16, village staff presented the McDonald’s request: renew exterior elevation and signage
— with some technical sizing deviations — and a small site plan amendment to modify parking spaces in order to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act requirements. The proposed, revamped building will utilize similar colors, brick veneer and bronze metal accents to match the current look of the main buildings of the plaza. McDonald’s is requesting two primary wall signs, two secondary wall signs, a drive-thru menu sign, a digital pre-sale sign and internal directional signs. The sign sizes that the restaurant is requesting are the technical deviations, which are not unusual for fast-food chains throughout the village, according to the staff report. The famous “M” McDonald’s logo is proposed at a size of threefeet, six-inches and four-feet wide, on top of the front door, on the left front part of the building. With an adjacent “McDonald’s” sign at the top right side of the building, the total sign space in the front face of the building will amount to more than typically allowed by the village code.
“Together the wall signs have an overall square footage of 46.8 square feet, which is only 6.8 square feet more than what is allowed by code,” Senior Planner Kelly Ferraiolo said. Along with front signage, McDonald’s seeks a modification for their drive-thru signs. A drivethru menu sign should only be 16 square feet in sign area, according to code. McDonald’s is requesting a 20-square-foot drive-thru sign, with an additional 11-square-foot pre-sale sign — a total sign area of 31 square feet. There are several businesses throughout the village that have been previously granted variances for their drive-thru signs, such as PDQ, Taco Bell, Starbucks and Dunkin’ Donuts, who all have drive-thru signs larger than what code allows. The size of the drivethru sign that the McDonald’s at the Courtyard Shops seeks is smaller than the commonly requested signs. “The most commonly requested sign size is 32 square feet,” Ferraiolo explained, adding that the See McDONALD’S, page 15
Traffic-Calming On La Mancha Will Not Move Forward
By Dani Salgueiro Town-Crier Staff Report The majority of residents living along La Mancha Avenue in Royal Palm Beach did not vote to support a traffic-calming plan on the neighborhood road. While more votes came in to support the project than oppose it, the vote count came in far short of the 50 percent support needed among all property owners for the project to move forward. The project to implement trafficcalming devices on the roadway resulted from a petition made at a Royal Palm Beach Village Council meeting in May 2016. A traffic study was completed in June 2017, which showed that 85 percent of the 1,000 to 3,000 vehicles driving on La Mancha Avenue daily were driving above the speed limit of 35 mph. The results of the study classified La Mancha as a neighborhood road that could benefit
from road devices aimed to slow down traffic. The village held a special meeting on Thursday, April 26 to inform residents about the proposed traffic-calming plan for La Mancha Avenue. With the Royal Palm Beach Traffic Calming Policy, the village aims to address traffic-related issues in neighborhood streets, such as La Mancha Avenue. The proposed speed controls were to be for two segments of La Mancha Avenue, south of Madrid Street and north of Madrid Street. On La Mancha, engineering consultant Simmons & White recommended that residents vote to implement speed tables and radar speed signs as an effort to slow traffic down. Ballots were due by May 10 and were tallied and certified on May 17. The total ballots cast See LA MANCHA, page 15
RPB SUMMER KICKOFF
The Royal Palm Beach Parks & Recreation Department kicked off summer with an Early Childhood Special Event for children ages 2 to 11 years old on Saturday, May 26 at the Royal Palm Beach Recreation Center. The fun event was hosted by Early Childhood Adventures. Shown above are Elena and Emma Leffler with mermaid Tamie Lakeman. MORE PHOTOS, PAGE 5 PHOTO BY DENISE FLEISCHMAN/TOWN-CRIER
ITID Roads Holding Up Under Rain With Extra Staff Care
By Ron Bukley Town-Crier Staff Report Indian Trail Improvement District roads and swales held their own during recent rains, although there was some flooding, and swales were shown to be deficient in some areas. ITID staff is now working to repair and grade roads that were damaged during the deluge, according to District Manager Rob Robinson. “We fared very well with the rain,” Robinson said Tuesday. “We received the amount of rain that was forecast, which was a blessing. We actually fared very well with our drainage system. What we’re doing now is turning our attention to the roads. We received 70-someodd work orders that came in over the weekend. We got five or six an hour, and we’re working on addressing every single one of them. So, if our residents will please be patient, we will get to every single street. We have just about 200 miles of dirt roads out here, so
it’s going to take us a while to get down every single one.” Robinson said there is a plethora of potholes that need to be filled in. “We’re actually taking some steps with local providers to accommodate that,” he said, explaining that ITID staff was using a polymer-based compound that works extraordinarily well, but they are waiting for a pallet of the material that was supposed to arrive last week. “We’re actually going to go to a local vendor that’s going to make us a cold patch, and we’ll be applying that on the roads. Unfortunately, for it to hold up really well, we need [the roads] to be dry,” Robinson said, pointing out that rain is likely for the next week. “We’re going to work a long weekend. It looks like the summer season is upon us, where we get rain every day at three o’clock, but we’re just going to have to work accordingly.” He said the daily rain has made See ITID ROADS, page 4
National Interest In District 18 Congressional Race
By M. Dennis Taylor Town-Crier Staff Report One of the three congressional districts serving the western communities promises to be among the most-watched U.S. House of Representatives contests in the nation this fall. Florida’s 18th Congressional District, which includes parts of Royal Palm Beach and all of The Acreage, as well as much of northern Palm Beach County and the Treasure Coast, is shaping up to be a high-interest match-up as first-term Republican Rep. Brian Mast seeks to secure a second term in a seat that until 2016 was represented by a Democrat. Until 2016, it was the seat of Democrat Patrick Murphy, who
did not seek re-election in order to wage an unsuccessful bid for the U.S. Senate. Mast took the seat, garnering 53.6 percent of the vote. He has been in the news recently when it was rumored he was under consideration for a position in the Trump administration as the Secretary of Veterans Affairs. “It is an honor to receive the recognition [of being considered] for the great work we have done for veterans,” said Mast, a highly decorated military veteran who lost his legs while deployed in Afghanistan. Five candidates qualified to run for the seat: three Republicans and two Democrats. Mast, who qualified by petition, faces primary challenges from fel-
low Republicans Dave Cummings and Dr. Mark Freeman, who paid the filing fee. Freeman lost to Mast in a six-way primary battle in 2016. The Democratic primary features Lauren Baer, who qualified by petition, and Pam Keith, who paid the filing fee. Mast’s top priorities are water issues, efforts to stop the Brightline high-speed rail, beach re-nourishment, rebuilding and reforming the military and helping veterans. He said that no issue is more important than making progress on water issues: rehabilitating the Lake Okeechobee dike, updating flood control data, research and development on water filtration technology, and discharging water
only when necessary in order to prevent algal blooms. He sits on the House Veterans Affairs, Transportation & Infrastructure and Foreign Affairs committees. “This was my first week as a member of the House Veterans Affairs Committee,” he said. “In this new role, I’ll have an even louder voice to advocate for veterans in our community and around the country. Improving care for our veterans starts with reforming the Department of Veterans Affairs and increasing oversight.” After retiring from the U.S. Army, he continued working in counter-terrorism and national defense with the Department of Homeland Security. Mast received
a degree from the Harvard Extension School and volunteered to serve alongside the Israel Defense Forces. His relatively moderate views on some issues — he came out in support of some gun control regulations after the Parkland shooting — have generated ire among more conservative members of his party and caused him to be considered vulnerable. As the incumbent, however, he remains the odds-on favorite in the three-way Republican primary. Cummings, one of his two primary challengers, said of his political effort, “We are a not a corporate or special interest funded campaign. We are ‘by the people, See CONGRESS, page 7