Top Stories this week on Anna Maria Island: Wednesday, June 23, 2010
Solemn oath
Janet Vosburgh and Bob Bartelt take their oaths of office June 17. The commission unanimously appointed Vosburgh to the Ward 4 commissioner after Bartelt vacated it to step in as mayor following the resignation of Michael Pierce earlier this month. Islander Photo: Lisa Neff
The first tropical storm of the 2010 hurricane season was christened June 26.
Tropical Storm Alex formed in the western Caribbean and, on Saturday morning, was heading toward the Yucatan Peninsula with maximum sustained winds of 40 miles per hour.
Tom Breiter of Anna Maria’s Bayview Plaza management team has apologized to Mayor Fran Barford for asking her to tell political candidates and members of the Recall Stoltzfus Committee that the plaza is off-limits for campaigning.
Even before she received Breiter’s apology letter on June 15, Barford said she told Breiter that the issue “is between the (recall) committee and the plaza, not the city.”
Anna Maria Commissioner Harry Stoltzfus is asking the city to pay $7,500 for legal expenses he incurred in defending a complaint to the Florida Commission on Ethics filed by Holmes Beach businessman John Cagnina.
The FCE denied the complaint on the grounds that it did not have jurisdiction in the matter and that Cagnina had “other avenues” to seek relief.
The trial of two men accused of the April 2008 home invasion and beating of former Anna Maria Commissioner Linda Cramer is scheduled to begin at 9 a.m. June 28, according to the Manatee County Clerk of the Circuit Court website.
Voter registration is open for the August primary election until 5 p.m. Monday, July 26.
The ballot for the primary, which is Aug. 24, will contain county commission, federal and state legislative and statewide primaries, as well as school board contests.
Races for Island offices, which are nonpartisan, will take place in the general election Nov. 2. Registration for the general election will close Oct. 4.
Qualifying for the Nov. 2 general election in Holmes Beach ended June 18.
In Holmes Beach, offices up for election are the mayoral post held by Rich Bohnenberger and commission seats held by Sandy Haas-Martens and John Monetti.
All three filed qualifying papers for re-election.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association June 16 expanded the closed fishing area in the Gulf of Mexico to capture areas of oil moving north off the Florida panhandle’s federal state waterline.
According to a NOAA news release, the closed area represents 80,806 square miles, or 33.4 percent of Gulf of Mexico federal waters. Federal waters on the west coast of Florida include areas beyond 9 nautical miles offshore.
Deepwater Horizon oil hasn’t drifted in the direction of Anna Maria Island, but some tourists are drifting in from the northern Gulf Coast.
“A lot of businesses have said they are picking up people,” said Anna Maria Island Chamber of Commerce president Mary Ann Brockman.
In mid-May, with the leak continuing at British Petroleum’s Deepwater Horizon well and the spill growing at a rate of about 2 million gallons of oil a day, Island businesses and Florida tourism bureaus were inundated with questions about the impact.
Grassroots organizers hope to hold the nation’s largest anti-drilling demonstration June 26, when protesters gather for Hands Across the Sand.
On Anna Maria Island, Hands Across the Sand coordinators, using social media and online mapping at www.handsacrossthesand.org, hope to draw enough people to line long stretches of the beach.
Paula Shortz prays nightly that when she takes her morning beach walks she sees only black skimmers, not skimmer vessels.
“I’m just horrified at the thought of oil off our beach,” said Shortz, a resident of Longboat Key.
Shortz gathered with hundreds of people in the Anna Maria Island Community Center gym June 17 for a town meeting on the Deepwater Horizon oil disaster.
During his first day as pastor of the Episcopal Church of Annunciation, the Rev. Harry Parsell scanned the faces of the congregation. They looked hurt, as though joy had been drained from their cheeks.
“Man,” Parsell thought to himself, “I’ve got to wake these guys up.”
The U.S. Supreme Court in a unanimous ruling June 17 upheld a Florida Supreme Court decision that the state did not take private property without just compensation when it renourished private beaches in Walton County.
Representing the state before the Supreme Court was Florida Solicitor General Scott Makar, who grew up in Holmes Beach and graduated in 1977 from Manatee High School.
Chris Pate of Holmes Beach won the grand prize in The Islander's annual Top Notch contest with his photograph of a wave-skater at White Avenue beach. Pate won $100 from the newspaper, plus gifts from Islander advertisers, including a $50 gift certificate from the Chiles Restaurants Group, a $50 certificate for Hair's to You Salon, a $25 certificate from Mister Roberts Resortwear, a $10 certificate for Minnie's Beach Cafe and the framing of the winning photo by Karly Carlson Custom Framing. The weekly winners received Islander "more-than-a-mullet wrapper" T-shirts and front-page placement of their photos. Next week, The Islander's honorable mentions in the popular contest.
