Longboat Observer
YourObserver.com
THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 2013
good neighbors
3A
by Kurt Schultheis | Managing Editor
IPOC, Ocean Properties reach agreement Ocean Properties Ltd. has a plan for the Longboat Key Club and Resort that calls for 350 tourism and residential units on the club’s southern parcel. What a difference a new owner makes, according to Longboat Key Town Commission candidate Irwin Pastor. Pastor, vice president of the Islandside Property Owners Coalition, told the Longboat Observer last week that Ocean Properties Ltd. has reached a tentative settlement agreement with IPOC for a future scaled-back renovation of the Longboat Key Club and Resort. Ocean Properties executives met with Pastor and IPOC President Bob White before they purchased the club Oct. 31. “They made it perfectly clear they love the character of the island and said they
some pig
don’t want to fight with property owners,” Pastor said. According to Pastor, Ocean Properties executives have agreed to a proposed settlement that mandates the company come before the unit owners to present a future project before it’s presented to the town. Pastor has seen preliminary plans for a project that calls for roughly 350 tourism and residential units that would all be placed on the south parcel near New Pass. Nothing will be put on the north parcel. That is a relief to property owners, says Pastor.
“If something like that is eventually submitted, it’s much more appropriate for the Key as a whole,” Pastor said. “I’m not just working behind the gates here, but have this whole island’s best interests at heart.” Ocean Properties executives declined to comment. No application for a Key Club project is expected soon. Ocean Properties officials are currently working with the town to get its other Key property, the Longboat Key Hilton Beachfront Resort, renovated. Ocean Properties wants to redevelop 102 rooms at the existing resort and add 85 more rooms that
would be built in a new guest tower. Pastor, IPOC’s official mediator with Loeb Partners Realty when it owned the Key Club and filed a renovation application that never came to fruition, says Ocean Properties’ relationship with IPOC is strong. “Ocean Properties Ltd. is a good neighbor,” Pastor said. Pastor said he believes that Loeb never had any intention of building a new Key Club project. “We had a negotiation with Loeb executives that was presided over by a judge a couple of months before Ocean Properties bought the club,” Pastor said. “They wouldn’t even talk at the session, and I walked out knowing there was already a buyer in place.”
by Robin Hartill | City Editor
Subcommittee ready to present to P&Z Board The Property Maintenance Code Subcommittee discussed parking and trailer restrictions at its final meeting Tuesday.
Molly Lefevre and Lance Plowman give Bacon bread bits as a treat a week after he narrowly escaped a fire.
Bringing
Bacon, a miniature potbelly pig, broke through a window last week to escape a house fire. He survived with a few scratches.
home Bacon W
hen Molly Lefevre learned that her rental home was on fire last Tuesday, she worried that Bacon was burning. Bacon isn’t breakfast to Lefevre and her boyfriend, Lance Plowman. It’s the name of their black miniature pig that Plowman brought home as a 3-week-old piglet from an animal auction in Arcadia a year-and-a-half ago. He was home when the fire broke out last week at 6430 Gulfside Road. He survived with just a few scratches on his belly and snout. Bacon apparently knocked down a screen as smoke filled the room and broke through a small glass panel of a jalousie (louvered) window, somehow managing to squeeze himself, potbelly and all, through the small opening. Plowman, a boat captain, saw the fire from afar and thought it was a brush fire until a friend called to say that the house was burning. Lefevre was working at the Cortez Kitchen when she started getting frantic phone
calls. She rushed home and found that firefighters had blocked off the area. Bacon, however, had fled the scene. He wandered to a neighbor’s yard, where he planted himself under a palm tree. He was eating the orange nuts that fell off of it. Lefevre still isn’t sure how Bacon managed to wiggle his way through the tiny window opening. She credits Bacon’s survival skills to the natural intelligence of pigs. “He is smart, but sometimes it’s like he’s too smart,” said Lefevre, who bottle-fed Bacon when he was a piglet. “It’s like having a 3-yearold who knows how to get open the drawers and open the cupboards. Thankfully it came in handy for this situation, because that’s my little boy.” Another factor that worked in Bacon’s favor: He’s physically fit — at least for a pig. He doesn’t pig out all day. He swims, takes regular walks and enjoys trips on the boat. “That’s probably what
Robin Hartill
saved him,” Lefevre said “For a potbelly pig, he’s a lot smaller and not quite as potbellied. He’s kind of in shape.” Unfortunately, two other pets at the home didn’t escape: a rabbit named Moustache, and a 4-year-old Australian Rottweiler, named Mia. Jose and Paola Chichande, who rented the other part of the L-shaped home, lost Moustache and Mia in the fire. “That’s the only thing I wish I could have saved was the dog. Everything else was salvageable,” said Jose Chichande, a Harry’s Continental Kitchens waiter and manager who was at the beach with the couple’s 4-year-old daughter, Emma, when the fire engulfed the home. He tried to open a door for Mia in the house when he returned, but flames burst out of the door. Since last week, he has had a difficult time explaining to Emma that Mia isn’t coming back. The Chichandes have stayed at a friend’s condominium since the fire and will probably rent a home in the
Longbeach Village. On Sunday, friends held a fundraiser for the family at Skinny’s Place on Holmes Beach. Although friends have discussed holding another fundraiser, Chichande said he doesn’t want another event. “I really feel like I have enough to get by,” he said. “I appreciate everything everyone has done, but now I have to work hard to get through this on my own.” Lefevre and Plowman, who were able to save some of their belongings, also want to rent a place in the Village. It’s tough to find a landlord who will rent to a couple with a pig, but Lefevre said that pigs are actually “very clean animals.” Plus, they come with an added benefit — they don’t bark like dogs. Although Lefevre is relieved that Bacon survived, she is also “heartbroken” about the death of Mia. Before the fire, she was already planning to bring Bacon to walk in the Humane Society of Manatee County Pawsin-Motion parade March 9. But, now, she plans to organize a team of Bacon and other pets and name it “Team Mia” in honor of one of Bacon’s best dog pals.
Before members of the Planning & Zoning Board Property Maintenance Code Subcommittee could officially shift into parking gear at the group’s final meeting, they wanted to discuss an issue that’s trailed the Longboat Key Town Commission off and on in recent years: parking and trailers. Subcommittee members recommended Tuesday, Feb. 12, that the commission consider regulating the type of surface material that can be used for parking. Ultimately, members opted not to make a recommendation that the commission consider restrictions on the number of cars that can be parked in a driveway. The group recommended limiting the number of boat trailers that can be parked to one per house in an open area. Code Enforcement officer Amanda Nemoytin said she rarely receives complaints about parked cars but frequently hears concerns about boat trailers, particularly during season. Currently, the town restricts house campers, trailer homes and motor homes to no more than five days in a location within a 30-day period. The group recommended the same restrictions for storage trailers and pods. “You don’t want to eliminate all possibility of storage parking because who’s going to mow your lawn, and if you’re moving, you’re going to need a truck parked for a couple of days,” Town Planner Steve Schield told the subcommittee. The subcommittee met for four consecutive weeks to discuss whether town codes should be strengthened to address issues such as peeling paint, caving rooftops, ripped screens and broken doors, windows, stairways and railings. It formed after the Jan. 15 P&Z Board meeting, during which board members discussed whether restrictions could improve the Key’s appearance without encroaching on property rights. The subcommittee will present its recommendations at the P&Z Board meeting at 9 a.m. Tuesday, Feb. 19.