PelicanPress SIESTA KEY
AN OBSERVER NEWSPAPER
SCHOOLS
ODA students put heart into jumping. PAGE 1B
OUR TOWN
+ CB’s receives customer kudos CB’s Saltwater Outfitters recently heard from a happy customer, a common, but no-less welcome trend for the Key business. A visitor from Minnesota wrote the staff at the Stickney Point Road company to say he and his wife had debated about renting a boat for a day when they were in Sarasota for a recent vacation, but they had had a bad experience on an earlier trip. Nonetheless, after discovering CB’s website, they decided to give boating one more try. Not only was CB’s staff helpful, Chris Hunter wrote in an email, one person even gave Hunter great tips on fly fishing for redfish. He added, “We had a fabulous day on the water and generated a ton of memories to carry us through the rest of an icebound winter ....”
Thursday, FEBRUARY 23, 2012
DIVERSIONS
inside Pine View, Bay Haven artists show off work.
Rod Rawlings walks in the shoes of a literary giant.
INSIDE
BUDGET QUESTIONS
PAGE 3B
By Rachel Brown Hackney | Managing Editor
What does the upkeep cost? County commissioners Tuesday debated the cost of Village upkeep, questioning whether county staff had over-estimated expenses for the current fiscal year. Although they unanimously approved a revised ordinance governing Siesta Village maintenance, the Sarasota County commissioners Tuesday questioned whether staff was estimating too high a budget for the expenses. After Mark Smith, a representative of the Siesta Key Village Main-
tenance Corp. Board of Directors, said figures staff had given him indicated the upkeep for the current fiscal year would be about $55,000, Ryan Montague, of the county’s Mobility/Traffic Engineering and Operations office, told the commissioners Smith’s figures did not reflect a full quar-
ter of county expenses. Total year-to-date operating costs were $38,460, Montague added. If the county continued to provide the level of service it had been offering in the Village since the contract with vendor JWM Management Inc. expired in August, Montague said, the total
+ More newsracks coming to Siesta Siesta Key Village Association President Russell Matthes reported recently to members that he is continuing to work on securing the installation of more modular newsracks on the Key. Not only does the Village need at least one more of the structures, he said, but also he wanted to see some installed near the Siesta Public Beach and on the south end of the Key. Referring to the clutter of newspaper boxes by the beach, he said, “That’s just ugly.” Those boxes had been removed from the shopping center on the southwest corner of Stickney Point Road and U.S. 41, he added. The Sarasota County Commission last year approved an ordinance calling for the use of the newsracks.
for the 2012 fiscal year would be about $183,000. However, Commissioner Joe Barbetta said his calculations showed the total should be about $120,000 for the year. Then Montague explained that
SEE VILLAGE / PAGE 12A
SAVORING SCIENCE Rachel S. O’Hara
Nicole Jolly, 9, has fun trying to touch a piece of string stuck to her nose while holding on to the Van de Graaff generator during Southside Elementary School’s Science Night Feb. 16. For more photos, see page 2B.
‘Keep it going’
By Rachel Brown Hackney | Managing Editor
SCVB wants to maintain No. 1 beach momentum The Sarasota Convention and Visitors Bureau has offered to help Key businesses build on the No. 1 beach ranking Siesta won last year. With Sarasota County having recorded its best summer ever in 2011, in terms of tourist tax collections, the Sarasota Convention and Visitors Bureau has asked Village merchants to help it keep the momentum well beyond season.
SCVB President Virginia Haley told Siesta Key Village Association members this month that her board of directors had challenged the staff “to make sure we top (last summer).” Although Dr. Beach — Dr. Ste-
phen P. Leatherman, of Florida International University — will name a new No. 1 beach in May, Haley said, “When we have the No. 1 beach designation, we keep it forever.” The only factor that could cause
the beach to lose the designation, she said, would be the failure to keep maintenance efforts at the high level that has been the norm on Siesta. “What we’re really interested in is any kind of summer promotions,” Haley said during the SKVA’s regular meeting Feb. 7.
SEE TOURISM / PAGE 2A
INDEX Briefs....................4A Classifieds ........ 11B
Cops Corner....... 10A Crossword.......... 11B
Neighborhood...... 1B Opinion.................8A
Sports.................. 7B Vol. 42, No. 30 | Three sections Weather............. 11B YourObserver.com