PelicanPress SIESTA KEY
AN OBSERVER NEWSPAPER
FREE • Thursday, JANUARY 10, 2013
INSIDE
DIVERSIONS
Elling Eide’s lifelong dream takes shape. PAGE 3A
Couple’s glass collection features more than 250 works of art. INSIDE
OUR TOWN + Kiwanis Club organizes project The Siesta Key Kiwanis Club and Transition Venice are collaborating to collect unharvested fruit for the All Faiths Food Bank, as part of the Sarasota Fruit Share project. Last year, Kiwanians harvested 2,400 pounds of fruit and this year their goal is to harvest 25,000 pounds. For more information, call 4048094 or email communityfruit4all@gmail.com.
NEIGHBORHOOD
Two area residents are heading up a successful MIA recovery group. PAGE 1B
smoke rings by Alex Mahadevan | News Editor
Court strikes smoking ban Sarasota County can’t enforce an outdoor smoking ban on most public-owned land.
Molly Schechter
Ben Murphy and his dad, restaurateur Sean Murphy
+ Eat Here opening is a family affair Restaurateur Sean Murphy opened his third “Eat Here” restaurant Dec. 29. The “soft opening” test drive Dec. 28 was a family affair including Murphy’s wife, Susan Timmins, and son, Ben. Murphy’s partner, Skip Sack, and his wife, Gail, had a gang at their table. Murphy thanked “the best partner in the world,” along with contractor Don Southerland and kitchen designer Paul Guillaume. He also acknowledged Stan Rutstein, of Michael Saunders & Co., for “staying with it until he got the deal done,” referring to the lease on the space, which had never before been a restaurant.
+ St. Michael to collect canned food St. Michael the Archangel Catholic Church is collecting canned goods for local food banks Saturday, Jan. 12 and Sunday, Jan. 13. The community is encouraged to drop off canned goods in a food-bank bin behind the church, located at 5394 Midnight Pass Road. For more information, contact the church at 3494174.
As of Dec. 10, smokers on Siesta Key Beach are no longer confined to specific smoking areas at the beach pavilion. Cigarette smoking is now allowed on Siesta Key public beach. Sarasota County Judge Maryann Boehm ruled Dec. 10 the city of Sarasota could not issue citations for outdoor smoking. The ruling also applies to county-owned, non-school property, such as Lido Beach, according to Sarasota County Attorney Stephen DeMarsh’s Jan. 8 commission report. The American Civil Liberties Union fought the city ordinance,
painting the ban as a tool in the war on the homeless. Chapter 386 of the Florida Statutes, the Florida Clean Indoor Air Act, prevents outdoor smoking by anyone under 18 within 1,000 feet of school property and gives the state power to regulate any other outdoor smoking. “This is really disturbing to me,” said Sarasota County Commissioner Joe Barbetta during the meeting. “I can’t believe this is happening.”
dirty politics
by Alex Mahadevan | News Editor
Dr. Stephen P. Leatherman, also know as Dr. Beach, lauded the ban as one of the reasons Siesta was voted the No. 1 beach in America in 2011. “Well, that’s a shame,” said Warren LaBonte, owner of the Siesta Key beach pavilion restaurant. “We have a beautiful beach and the whole point of the ban is to keep (cigarette butts) off the beach.” The material in cigarette filters takes up to three years to degrade
Rachel S. O’Hara
naturally, according to a 2001 study by the Environmental Protection Agency. Cigarette can kill wildlife if ingested. “They won’t even let us have straws here at the beach pavilion,” LaBonte said. Commissioners in October directed staff to research smoking bans near county facilities. “Youth athletic leagues are an issue,” said County Administra-
SEE SMOKING / PAGE 2A
Former GOP chairman resigns from boards Bob Waechter left the Tourist Development Council and the board of Zoning Appeals but remains on the Siesta Key Association Board of Directors. Bob Waechter has been on boards that shaped Sarasota County policies, has run political campaigns and dealt in thousands of square feet of property since he moved in 1977 to Siesta.
Speaking in his raspy voice, Waechter often sparks laughter with witty addendums to Siesta Key Association Board dialogue during monthly meetings at St. Boniface Episcopal Church.
But Jan. 3, Waechter was absent from his usual spot, stage right of the tables in Room F, at the church. Despite resigning from the Sarasota-Manatee Airport Authority, the Sarasota County Tourist Development Council and the Board of Zoning Appeals, Waechter is still technically a member of the SKA Board of
Directors, said the organization’s president, Catherine Luckner. Waechter’s career imploded after the Sarasota County Sheriff’s Office charged the 70-year-old Republican with identity theft connected to two fraudulent campaign contributions made under the name of an expected
SEE WAECHTER / PAGE 2A
INDEX Briefs....................4A Classifieds ........ 13B
Cops Corner..........9A Crossword.......... 12B
Opinion .............. 8A Real Estate.......... 8B
Sports................ 15A Vol. 43, No. 24 | Three sections Weather............. 12B YourObserver.com