March, 1999
	Eckerd Presentation is Canceled THE SEMBLER COMPANY has postponed its scheduled presentation to the NSNA general membership of plans for an Eckerd drug store at 4th Street N and 9th Avenue. The presentation had been set for the March 15 membership meeting. The Eckerd Corp. is still evaluating the economic feasibility of a store at that location. Sembler, which would develop and retain ownership of the site, is waiting on Eckerd's decision before moving forward with revised plans. A representative of Sembler met with the NSNA Board of Directors in December and outlined preliminary plans for the site, which would involve consolidating several properties and demolishing several existing buildings. As is, those plans would not meet the standards set out in the city's zoning plan, the North Shore Neighborhood Plan, or the city's Neighborhood Design Review Guidelines. Subsequent to the board meeting, the Eckerd representative, Bill Johnson, met with the NSNA design review committee. No new plans have yet been presented, however. In place of the Sembler presentation, NSNA president Rob Wertz was working to put together a program about the upcoming city election. This would include presentations by the candidates for city council, and an explanation of the various proposals that will be on the March 23 ballot. Among those proposals is the one that would allow the city to purchase the Sunken Gardens tourist attraction. Return to NSNA Home Page | Return to Archives
	North Shore Backs Sunken Gardens By Timothy J. Baker THE NSNA AT its February meeting voted to donate $1,000 to the Save Sunken Gardens committee. Save Sunken Gardens (SSG) is a newly formed political action committee that wants city voters to approve a March ballot question that would allow a public purchase of the 4th Street tourist attraction. Specifically, voters will be asked on March 23 to give the City Council the authority to purchase Sunken Gardens, and to levy a one-time tax of up to 50 mills to help finance the purchase. No actual purchase price is named, and the council would not actually be required to make the purchase. The proposed one-time tax would cost the owner of a $150,000 home about $45, assuming that the property was assessed at about $75,000 and that the owner qualified for a homestead exemption. The NSNA vote to donate money to the SSG committee came after a lively debate, during which questions were raised about whether North Shore should be associated with a political action committee, about the size of the donation relative to the association's bank account of about $10,000, and about whether the association should support a new tax on homeowners. In the end, though, support for the gardens clearly outweighed the objections: the vote was 51 in favor of the $1,000 donation and 4 against. THE DRIVE TO put the Sunken Gardens question on the ballot was led by Lane Lastinger, a former president and current board member of the North Shore Neighborhood Association. He also formed the SSG committee, and in that capacity asked the NSNA for the donation. It was during Mr. Lastinger's tenure as NSNA president in 1998 that Sunken Gardens was named a local historic landmark, giving the facility some protection against redevelopment. The NSNA was the official applicant for the landmark status. The landmark status was opposed by the Turner family, which owns Sunken Gardens. They have been attempting to sell the property for the past ten years, and at the time of the landmarking had a contract to sell to a development company that proposed to build townhouses on the site. That contract fell through after the landmark status was approved. A second contract fell through shortly after that. Although the landmark status may have been the cause of the first contract's failure, it was not relevant to the second contract. Also, the family's efforts to sell began a decade before the landmarking. THE TENUOUS STATUS of Sunken Gardens led Mr. Lastinger to request that the City Council ask the voters to approve a possible purchase of the facility. At first, the council voted against putting a referendum on the ballot. Later, the council reversed course and agreed to the referendum. The reversal came after officials of Lowry Park Zoo in Tampa suggested that they might operate Sunken Gardens as an ancillary zoo if the city would purchase the property. Council members Jay Lasita and Bill Foster attended the NSNA meeting and answered questions about the proposal. Also attending the NSNA meeting was council member Bob Kersteen, who made the motion at Council to put the question on the ballot. Both Lasita and Foster said they would not want the city itself to operate Sunken Gardens, but would instead prefer that a third party such as Lowry Park be involved. If an agreement with Lowry Park could not be reached, they said, other proposals would be considered. Return to NSNA Home Page | Return to Archives
	Master Plan in Works For 4th Street N By Timothy J. Baker THE LATEST ATTEMPT to improve the looks of the 4th Street N commercial corridor may at last bear fruit. The ad hoc 4th Street Beautification Committee was formed in November, 1997, and during the next year made some strides towards obtaining the cooperation that is needed to accomplish anything on 4th Street. Then, in January, the committee met with Mayor David Fischer and several representatives from the city Parks Department. The mayor pitched his administration's efforts to green the city by planting thousands of new trees, and the committee pitched its effort to do something about the bleakness of 4th Street N, one of the major arteries leading into the downtown. SO, CAN'T SOMETHING be worked out here? Yes, it could, but first somebody would have to talk to the Florida Department of Transportation and obtain their cooperation. 4th Street is a state highway, controlled by FDOT, which has a history of being difficult. In fact, FDOT at times has required businesses along 4th Street N to remove landscaping that the city had required the businesses to put in in the first place.. The job of talking to FDOT fell to the city's Parks Department. In February, the committee held another meeting and received good news from Jammi Shelton, of the city's Planning Department. Ms. Shelton brought to that meeting a preliminary plan for landscaping the stretch of 4th Street N between 9th and 30th Avenues. The plan was drawn up by Beth Hammond, a landscape architect with the Parks Department. She was able to identify about 100 locations where trees could be planted in the public right of way. She was unable to find any locations between 5th and 9th, because of lack of space. MS. SHELTON ALSO reported that, while FDOT would not agree to large shade trees such as live oaks along 4th Street, they would agree to smaller, ornamental trees. The specific tree that will be planted has not yet been chosen. The city said it is willing to spend $30,000 out of the current budget to plant trees on 4th Street N and landscape around them. This would not be enough to plant at all the identified locations, but would be a good start. According to Parks Department officials, further funding would probably be sought from the state of Florida and elsewhere so the landscaping could be extended. The committee chair is Steve Lange. If you have any questions, you can reach Mr. Lange at 823-7868. Return to NSNA Home Page | Return to Archives Back to top of page