Key West lawmakers on February 1st unanimously approved an unbudgeted $53,600 increase for youth athletic leagues, which was recommended by the city’s Parks and Recreation Advisory Board but opposed by the city manager and finance director, who had recommended the increase wait until the next fiscal year’s budget process. The Parks and Recreation had voted to do just that, wait, at its September 2021 meeting because the PAR board had been unable to meet in June, July and August during the budget process due to a lack of a quorum. (It also canceled its recent January 2022 meeting for the same reason.) But in mid-January, Mayor Teri Johnston forwarded the PAR board’s funding request to City Manager Patti McLauchlin anyway, asking that it be implemented in the current budget.
But what about the cruise ships?
City Attorney Shawn Smith reminded commissioners that the cruise ship summit scheduled for Feb. 3 had been canceled because the draft ordinances enacting the new cruise ship limits were not ready and commissioners want the public to have ample time to review them before the meeting.
“We’d like to include the first reading of those ordinances at the commission’s Feb. 15 meeting to give the public seven days to review the proposed ordinance,” Smith said.
Johnston said she’d rather schedule a special meeting “if we can do it earlier.”
The timing of that meeting remains to be seen.
In other commission news, Key West officials are closely watching bills in Tallahassee that would regulate liveaboard boaters and provide additional managed moorings in the waters surrounding Key West.
“House Bill 1026 would provide 250 more moorings, although other bills would reduce that number to 100 moorings,” Doug Bradshaw, the city’s ports and marine services director, told the city commission on Feb. 1. “So we’re trying to look at our actual number of liveaboard residents who are not currently on a mooring to determine how many additional ones we’ll need.”
“I believe there’s probably an average of about 200 liveaboards. So 100 new moorings would be a little low, but 250 may be too many.”
Bradshaw reminded the commissioners that “some people will simply never live on a mooring because there’s a monthly cost associated with it.”
There’s also a cost associated with road construction projects and road closures that have left several downtown business owners frustrated for as long as six months.
“I’m sure my colleagues and I have all received the same complaints from businesses,” Commissioner Sam Kaufman said at Tuesday’s meeting, asking McLauchlin, “Is there a way to better inform the public about time frames of road projects and about who’s doing the project, because often it’s not a city project, but the county or the aqueduct authority.”
McLauchlin assured the commissioners, “We can do better sending out press releases. I know it’s a source of frustration. We’re encouraging and allowing businesses to put out signs saying they’re still open during the construction. I’ll continue to walk downtown, talk to them and see what we can do to ease the pain.”
Kaufman also suggested the city work with the county, state and utilities “and encourage them to do these projects in the off season rather than in the peak of tourist season.”
