Mayor pushing for waiver of West Palm height limit

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Mayor pushing for waiver of West Palm height limit

By Thomas Collins

Palm Beach Post Staff Writer

Wednesday, March 08, 2006

WEST PALM BEACH - The way Mayor Lois Frankel sees it, her plan is almost too good to be true:

The city sells its city hall land to WCI Communities and Miami Beach-based Dacra for $26 million or more. WCI gives the city the old Helen Wilkes Hotel site along Flagler Drive, which is valued at $13 million and could be turned into a city park. All the city has to do is abolish a height limit approved by voters in 1996 so that WCI and Dacra can build a condo and four- or five-star hotel, both possibly as tall as 18 stories.

Chart:Frankel wants to waive height limit

"The most important thing for us to do I think is to build and develop a good quality, livable city," Frankel said on Feb. 21 when she unveiled her proposal to an invited group. "So this is not just about money, all right?"

City commissioners have the legal authority to undo, with three votes, what 60 percent of voters said they wanted. But whether commissioners should give themselves the moral authority is another question, and it may turn out to be the biggest battle of Frankel's tenure as mayor - and one she is already waging like the longtime political warrior she is.

The $26 million would almost exactly cover the city's shortfall in the cost of building its new city hall a few blocks away, giving Frankel ammunition against opponents who say the project is too expensive.

But Frankel has come under fire for not publicly advertising the Feb. 21 city hall meeting with community leaders, which has since been shown on the city's cable TV channel. Another meeting between Frankel and business leaders earlier that day was not videotaped.

While the proposal offers a lot of perks for the city and generated rave remarks from the select group at the meeting, granting a height increase without asking for another vote of the people might prove a tough sell once the entire city has its say.

Other city leaders say they're eager for that to happen.

"Right now, there's an information void," said Commissioner Ray Liberti, adding he wished Frankel's meeting had been open and included the city commissioners. "It's very important in public administration to close that gap."

Still, four commissioners, including Liberti, say they like Frankel's proposal and declined to say that another vote of the people is absolutely necessary.

Commissioner Bill Moss said: "My preliminary feeling without having all the details is that I want to be able to support a project that will preserve and protect that waterfront and I think this is the one way to do that."

"I like the idea of creating open space," Commissioner Jim Exline said. He added that the "referendum is to protect the waterfront," which he said Frankel's plan accomplishes.

"The proposal as I'm hearing it does have some good ideas," Commissioner Ike Robinson said. "The only hang-up is, the only red flag, there was a citizens' referendum. How do we handle that?" He said he wants to gather public input both on the project's merits and on whether a referendum should be held.

Only Commissioner Kimberly Mitchell said that the height limit shouldn't be changed without another vote - regardless of what the city would get in exchange for it.

"They took the time and the energy to put that on the ballot and vote for that, and I would not do something to disrespect that," she said.

Rivals will have to play catch-up. Frankel's meeting had the effect of giving her a head start in the debate, which she says is proper even while she says the meeting was not secret, noting that 100 people were invited.

"If I wanted to slam-dunk this I could have put it on the agenda, brought it to the city commission, lined up everybody and that would have been it," Frankel said. "But I didn't want that to happen."

Instead, she described her dilemma to the group on Feb. 21. The alternative to undoing the height limit, she said, is that WCI goes forward with plans for a five-story condo that would block the city hall site's water view, making the property much less valuable. She said the commission needs to vote by March 31, when a building moratorium - which has kept WCI's plans at bay - expires.

"I want you to help be my ambassadors and I want you to call these city commissioners because in 30 days, I lose the Helen Wilkes site and I'll be damned if I lose the Helen Wilkes site - I want that to be a public park so I need you seriously to call your commissioners for me," she told the crowd. "Start coming in on public comment, send e-mails, whatever is your good persuasive power."

Frankel noted that many buildings taller than five stories were built after the 1996 vote because of technicalities. And she said there are so few properties left to be developed in the area where the referendum's height limit applies - east of Olive Avenue in the downtown - that allowing an 18-story building on the city hall site would hardly make a difference.

"Is the referendum really now a concept that is worth anything?" she said.

Some critics say that is a matter for an open debate and say they're upset that there hasn't been one yet.

Frankel said she asked a staff member to invite to the Feb. 21 meeting a group that represented a "cross section" of the city. City spokesman Chase Scott went further, saying "all active neighborhood presidents were invited - all of them."

Among those who were excluded were two neighborhood presidents who have expressed views contrary to those of city leaders: Carolyn Wright, Southside Neighborhood Association president and chairwoman of a referendum effort questioning the cost of the city's new city hall/library project, and Tom Conboy, president of the Poinciana Park Neighborhood Association who has criticized the city's handling of the old Hillcrest neighborhood's development.

"If you're looking for feedback, you're going to invite anyone and everyone who's stood up and tried to get a neighborhood association together," Conboy said.

Wright said she wouldn't expect to be invited.

"She does not invite anyone who disagrees with her, and I disagree with her not only about the plan but about the process," she said. Wright is married to Don Wright, who draws the daily editorial cartoons on The Palm Beach Post's opinion page. Don Wright also is a member of the paper's editorial board that discusses issues and forms the opinions reflected in the unsigned editorials. Editor John Bartosek said Don Wright will not participate in board discussions or draw cartoons on city issues while his wife is involved with the referendum effort.

Frankel said Conboy wasn't invited because of a "personal" tension between him and the city's neighborhood liaison. Wright wasn't invited because her association doesn't have regular meetings, she said. Wright says her group does hold regular meetings.

Those who were at the Feb. 21 gathering liked what they heard.

"I can't fathom a reason somebody wouldn't want to go forward with this project," said Steve Allred of the Northwood Coalition of Neighborhoods.

But there were some questions.

Steve Mayans of the Providencia Park Neighborhood Association asked about protections against other sites being built higher than five stories, but said, "My concern might be less so with this project simply because the trade-offs are too worthwhile." Frankel told him the added height would be allowed just for the city hall site.

Frankel asked for a show of hands from those who support her proposal. A roomful of hands went up. That was enough for Frankel. She didn't even ask for a show of hands those from those who didn't support it.

"There's nobody left not to like it."