Angler's Lodge Part Two: Just Sit And Listen...

Welcome back.

So, where were we? Ah yes, “citizens be damned” and all that.

In case you missed it, take a look at Part One HERE. We could go on endlessly about PAR’s continuing campaign of intimidation and insipid influence over just about everything it covets, including a location for the Angler’s Lodge. That intimidation of citizens and dissenting business owners continued after we posted Part One and we expect it will continue as long as Micheal Coleman believes it works. And while we would love to continue to regale you with more tales of Coleman’s tactics, like sending his lawyer to City Hall to demand a look at the Historical Society’s leases with the City, we have come to realize what many others have already realized: the attempted intimidation is tired, boring and would verge on comical, if it wasn’t so, well, creepy. Just ignore him.

Let's get started with Part Two after you click the "Please Read More" link below:


That we are even having a debate over stuffing the Angler’s Lodge into City’s lone green public oasis on an otherwise greenless Pine Avenue speaks loudly to the disdain and single-minded purpose with which Sissy Quinn and PAR have set about to make it happen. The evidence of this contempt is everywhere. We talked about Commissioner Chappie’s letter in Part One in which he just naturally assumed, based obviously upon Quinn’s insistence, that the old house would be plunked down where she said it would be plunked down (and where PAR wants it plunked down). Quinn also has posted a Facebook affiliated website stating:

“The Anna Maria Island Preservation Trust needs to raise $500,000 to move the lodge across the Lake LaVista Canal and up Pine Avenue to the City of Anna Maria Historic Park where both structural and maintenance repairs will bring it up to city's codes.”

I know, I know. First Quinn said she was accepting donations, then when AMIHS offered $1,000 she said she wasn’t and now it appears she is again, even though the total raised on the web site says “$0”. Perhaps that’s a good question from one of the Commissioners on Thursday night, huh? One hopes Quinn hesitated for even just a second before posting a website asking people she does not know to send her money to move a house to land she does not own and that she is not even close to securing. But, probably not.

In her June 24th letter to the City which you can read HERE Quinn says the Commissioners will need to “decide whether extending the park is more important than saving the Lodge.” We’ll talk about the whole “extending the park” red herring in a bit. First though, remember this has never been about “saving the Lodge” as much as it has been about putting the Lodge within site of PAR’s front porch. Quinn has turned down cash money offered specifically to “save the Lodge” because, she says, the location she wants is “in limbo.” There are potential locations at the City Hall Complex (no offense to shuffle board and horseshoe enthusiasts), Bayfront Park (what better use than as a beach front pavilion with food concessions and water sport rentals, a bait shop, a Community Center annex…the possibilities are unlimited) but as she admits in her letter she has not “solicited space anywhere else.” Beginning to get the picture?

Quinn touts her company as an island-wide organization but she has admittedly not sought potential sites from Holmes Beach or Bradenton Beach. Heck, her Vice President David Teitelbaum is Mister Bradenton Beach and should at least be able to get the discussion moving down there, don't you think? Of course, locations in those towns would not be genuflecting-distance from Micheal Coleman’s pulpit either.

In contrast, the Historical Society’s President Melissa Williams has actively investigated other sites in the City of Anna Maria and has actively communicated with city officials of both Holmes Beach and Bradenton Beach. Some may view this as doing Quinn’s job. After all, Quinn’s the one cutting the deal with the Lodge’s owner, right? But ironically Williams is merely continuing to do what the Historical Society has quietly and concertedly been doing for 20 years: actually seeking solutions to preservation possibilities instead of setting agendas and demanding acquiescence from anyone who may have the audacity to ask questions. Williams may very well not be successful with Holmes Beach or Bradenton Beach but the point is she is trying.

For perspective, the Anna Maria Island Historical Society, Inc. was founded in 1990 and incorporated as a non-profit in 1991. Its two founders, Carolyne Norwood and Pat Copeland are still active with AMIHS and continue to play a large role in its success and community involvement. And “community” means the entire island. The Historical Society’s president is a Holmes Beach resident, several Bradenton Beach historical structures have received preservation recognition from AMIHS and even mainlanders make up a portion of their membership. The AMIHS campus is on city owned property at Pine Avenue and Crescent and consists of a main museum building that houses the Society’s collection, the 1920’s Belle Haven Cottage and an historical native plant garden and park replicating the site as it would have appeared to visitors nearly 100 years ago. The Historical Society makes sure visitors realize that this park is no afterthought, in fact just the opposite. As much if not more thought, time, effort and money have gone into investigating and celebrating the park's history and importance to the island as any of the Museum's exhibits. Not unlike an archeological site revealing a way of life from long ago, its provenance is perhaps more significant than many artifacts and structures of the day.

Local native plant guru Mike Miller’s website http://www.perfectisland.us/ does an extraordinary job of documenting the genesis of the park’s rebirth in the early 1990’s. You can click HERE to see before and after photos and commentary from Mike explaining the early efforts at obtaining grants and other funding to populate the park with native species. Of particular importance to our discussion is Mike’s “Photo Map” you can view by clicking HERE. The scaled schematic of the site links you to photos of each plant species and its location within the park and graphically illustrates the absurdity of jamming another building into the island’s own little Eden. During the July 8th city commission meeting, former Mayor SueLynn raised a few eyebrows when she discounted, no, ignored the efforts of guys like Doug Copeland, George McKay and Mike Miller with the park over the last two decades. Perhaps SueLynn needs to re-educate herself. And we all, most assuredly the City Commission, must take a careful look at what some otherwise impressive individuals who, drafted by Quinn and Company to tow her party line, have added to the discussion.

Believe me, Gene Aubry knows architecture. Galveston born and raised, he was instrumental in much of that coastal city’s preservation renaissance in the 1970’s and early 80’s. Any architect who can boast Philip Johnson, one of the preeminent architectural designers of this century, as a colleague and collaborator has my respect. Go google Rothko Chapel (or click HERE), one of my few true sanctuaries in my Houston days…really, go ahead, I’ll wait…I lived a block away and I can tell you it is humbling. Apparently, Aubry’s chief benefactor throughout his career was Dominique De Menil, arguably the doyenne of modern art and design in America this century. Look her up HERE, it’s impressive, like a baseball player having George Steinbrenner (may he rest in peace) assisting with his career, only she was prettier.

Back in March, Aubry wowed the commission and crowd with a wall length rendering of his aggressive vision of Pine Avenue. The drawing seeded the current Pine Avenue parking debate and envisioned more parking spaces than palm trees but it did contain at least one hopeful element. Aubry’s plan placed a large and prominent “Central Park” on the very spot currently occupied by the AMIHS and its historical gardens. He sang the virtues of true green space, buffered from the noise and congestion his parking plan would inevitably cause. But at least he recognized the uniqueness of the idyllic spot and the necessity to preserve and in fact increase its existing green space.

But as you can see from Aubry's July 11th email to the city HERE, after Quinn brought Aubry into her Angler’s Lodge efforts he seemed to have taken a hard right turn from the green space lane. Let’s just say that it looks like his efforts on behalf of Quinn didn’t turn out the way either of them would have hoped.

First, Aubry's email refers to “another drawing…which was not to scale” which is this one (you can click on any of these drawings to enlarge them for easier viewing):

This is the Historical Society’s own rendering and, as you will see below, it actually is to scale and accurately reflects the site, its buildings and relative dimensions. Ironic? Just wait.

Aubry then says, “My drawing clearly showed, to scale, how beautifully the Lodge sits on the site without crowding existing vegetation or buildings.” Well, not really. Instead of telling you, we’ll just show you. This is Aubry’s sketch as it was submitted to the Historical Society at the meeting Aubry refers to with Bob Welch:

No really, it is his sketch, promise. And below is the same sketch overlayed on top of an actual legal site survey detailing lot lines, building locations and pertinent dimensions, all drawn and certified to scale:

It takes a minute to acclimate yourself with the overlay comparison but Aubry's sketch is in blue and the legal survey is a lighter gray underneath.

Now maybe he was rushed or didn’t really think the thing would be a central issue in the City Commission’s decision. Or maybe he assumed, like County Commissioner Chappie, that Quinn’s deal was a done deal so no big deal. But the drawing is clearly not something he spent a great deal of time honingand anyone can have a bad day. It gives me no satisfaction to offer a critique of the work of a gentleman who is so accomplished at what he does. I am no architect. I have trouble drawing stick men. But it does not take an architect to see that Aubry’s sketch has major issues.

First, his scaled dimensions are uniformly wrong. The museum building and the jail are both shown several feet off of center. Belle Haven Cottage (not Roser Cottage as his email says) is not placed in same zip code as where it actually sits (even though he “got a dimensioned plan of the entire site”?). Lot 12 is too wide, lot 13 is too thin and every lot is drawn too deep by several feet. But perhaps the scariest aspect of his sketch is he draws lot 10 as 52.1 ft as originally platted. Oops. In 1973 the City deeded lot 9 and the east 14 ft. of lot 10 to Gertrude Blassingame (you can see the deed by clicking HERE) and any legitimate survey or “dimensioned plan” rendered since then would note that significant fact. You can see the 14 ft. strip shaded on the right side of the overlayed certified survey. But Aubry plops Quinn’s 38 foot wide pipe-dream smack on top of a lot that is actually only 38 feet wide.

Nitpicking you say? Oh really? It wasn't the Historical Society in an email or at a commission meeting microphone questioning the legitimacy of the various renderings. Aubry's email dismisses outright the AMIHS drawing above as “not to scale” and he refers the city commission to his “correct drawing to use in [their] deliberations.” SueLynn stood before the city commissioners on July 8th and snidely sought to discredit AMIHS’s drawing as not to scale and unworthy of consideration. As you can see in this overlay of the legal survey, AMIHS's rendering is actually spot on save for a minor shift of Belle Haven Cottage:

Don't count on retractions from either and, of course, decide for yourself which rendering you’d prefer to have your commissioners rely on in their “deliberations.” But, the choice seems pretty to clear to us.

Ultimately though, this shouldn’t be about dimensions and surveys and lot sizes.

First, it should be about Sissy Quinn’s company and its complete lack of a track record, a vetted vision or, most importantly, existing funding and a proposed plan for the future funding of such a significant undertaking. I won’t rehash Part One of this piece but take a look for yourself and decide whether you want your City Commissioners legitimizing such an enterprise by providing the legal framework within which to operate on Quinn’s wing and a prayer.

Secondly, even assuming Quinn’s organization can find a White Knight with deep golden pockets and gets its stuff together in warp speed time, should that really be the direction you want your city commission to take your city's and this island's heritage? This should be about the citizens' vision of Pine Avenue, not Micheal Coleman’s vision. City Commissioner Chuck Webb has reiterated the City’s need for green space at every opportunity the last few years. He again featured it prominently in his otherwise misguided letter to the local press last week. Make sure he remembers his dedication to green when this Angler's Lodge matter is being discussed on the dais. If he so much as blinks in Quinn’s direction, remind him of his words and let him know you expect his vote to reflect those words. The guru du jour lately has been Dan Burden, granted a “walkable cities” expert without peer. How tragically ironic would it be for your city commission to rip out the only green and shaded walk on Pine Avenue to satiate PAR's hunger for a Pine Avenue Micheal Coleman's way?

Finally, listen to your friends and neighbors. Read what they have to say HERE, HERE and HERE. Join them and let your commissioners know that you want the AMIHS’s native plant garden and park to remain untouched. Let them know they should make every effort at every opportunity to expand the park not limit or diminish it. And take a few minutes in the next few days to stop by the Historical Society campus to take a walk back in time yourself. Grab a book and pack a lunch.

Better yet, find one of shaded benches and just sit and listen. It's why you live here.

All the best.

Bill Yanger