Delray Beach succeeds despite the city’s politics.
Consider Tuesday afternoon’s meeting on the proposal to finance renovation of the city’s golf course with money from leasing a small portion of the site for private development.
Last week, a public forum—at the golf course clubhouse—for bidders to present their plans devolved into something like a school board meeting over masks. Opponents of the plan, known as a public-private partnership (P3), shouted down and heckled those who were trying to present information. Though the city was not providing alcohol, witnesses said speakers brought drinks from the clubhouse bar into the meeting.
Mayor Shelly Petrolia then called the special meeting. After trying to blame City Manager Terrence Moore for last week’s hysterics, Petrolia and Commissioner Juli Casale asked City Attorney Lynn Gelin whether the city could shift some money from the $20 million parks bond to the golf course, even though the money is designated for other projects.
Gelin pointed out that the election is just two weeks away. Perhaps, Petrolia and Casale suggested, the city could conduct an “education” campaign on the idea. Gelin said again that the election is two weeks away.
Gelin should have pushed back harder. People already have voted, based on the idea that the $20 million would go toward projects at Catherine Strong and other parks. No money is allocated to the course. If voters approved the bond and the commission tried to shift money to the golf course, the city would invite a lawsuit challenging the move.
In addition, Petrolia and Casale were part of the commission’s unanimous decision only 10 months ago to hire CBRE to market the course. Petrolia and Casale agreed that, given all of Delray Beach’s needs, the city could not afford between $10 million and $15 million for the course.
Based on that decision, six entities spent time and money to put together bids. City staff have spent lots of time reviewing the bids. Junking the P3 would hurt the city’s credibility and reinforce the notion that factional politics rules.
Petrolia and Casale also tried to blame city officials for not providing enough information on the P3 concept. In fact, the commission had held two meetings on plans for the course. CBRE’s thorough summary of the six bids had been on the city’s website. The Sun Sentinel published a breakdown of the bids almost four weeks ago. This blog has reported on the P3 since the commission approved it.
More likely, Petrolia and Casale wanted to indulge an uninformed slice of the community. Casale is up for a second term on that March 14 ballot, and Petrolia has been campaigning door to door for her.
This isn’t the first example of recklessness. Apparently, the city cut two bidders—E2L Real Estate Solutions and T-36 Golf Holdings—without a formal vote. Commissioner Ryan Boylston, the strongest supporter of the P3, acknowledged the shaky optics but defended the decision by saying that neither company had met the city’s requirement of maintaining an 18-hole, championship course.
Today at 9 a.m., commissioners will hear presentations from the four remaining bidders. A vote on choosing the winner is scheduled for the week of March 20. Ten days after that, Johnson leaves the commission because of term limits. Casale also would be a lame-duck voter if she loses.
Addressing the opponents Tuesday, Boylston laid out the issue starkly. “I will not vote,” he said, to spend as much as $15 million in city money on a course that “maybe 800 to 1,200 residents use.”
Boylston noted that Delray Beach has ways to pay for more important projects—revenue bonds for the water plant, property-tax bonds for police and fire stations and parks. He reminded everyone that the city’s emergency operations center “is the first floor of the Fairfield Inn.” There still are no plans for a new city hall and projects to protect against sea level rise.
Those priorities preclude the idea of using city money on the course. If golfers oppose the P3, Boylston was saying, they are opposing the only way to get a new course.
Information sessions on Delray golf course renovation
One other note:
To appease the opponents, Petrolia and Casale asked Moore to hold as many as three information sessions around the city. All that must happen in the next two-plus weeks.
Ironically, Delray Beach thus will spend more time talking about the golf course plan than about the $120 million in bonds that are on the March 14 ballot—$100 million for police and fire and $20 million for parks. Casale defended it by saying of the opponents, “It’s their tax dollars.” It’s private money.
Petrolia seemingly has spent more time campaigning for Casale than for public safety and recreation. If Casale loses, it won’t affect Delray Beach much, if at all. If voters reject the bond proposals, it will affect Delray Beach a lot.
Casale’s “Harvard” degree
Casale’s opponent is Rob Long, who has served on three advisory boards, most recently the planning and zoning board. In previous posts, I have discussed the main issue Casale is raising against Long: voting on projects whose attorney, Bonnie Miskel, had referred work to Long’s marketing company.
None of that work concerned projects in Delray Beach. The planning and zoning board’s lawyer, who works for the city, said Long did not have to recuse himself. Long publicly noted his work for Miskel when the projects were before the board.
Long has raised two issues about Casale: her business history and her academic record. Let’s examine those.
When she ran in 2020, Casale claimed to have “a bachelor’s degree.” For this campaign, she claimed to have a “liberal arts degree from Harvard,” from which, Casale said, she graduated cum laude.
Long’s campaign used software to search for a Harvard degree and found no record of one. Casale then specified that her degree came from Harvard Extension School, which is part of the university but very different than the undergraduate division known as Harvard College.
The Harvard College admission rate is about four percent. Harvard Extension School is open admission, though people seeking a degree must maintain a B average in three prerequisite courses. In 2021, an article in the Harvard Crimson quoted a member of the extension school graduating class as saying that he wanted “a back door to Harvard.”
Technically, Casale is correct about having a Harvard degree. For someone who has criticized Long for not being transparent about his votes, however, she was not very transparent about that degree.
More questions surrounding Casale’s background
Casale’s commission website says that she moved to Delray Beach in 1985 “after selling a successful business she owned and operated in Connecticut.” Casale, though, has not named the business. Long and his supporters have said there are large gaps in Casale’s pre-2005 background.
Documents from Connecticut show Casale as secretary of a company called Gyro, Inc., in 1986, when her name was Juli Simmons. Since she was born in 1968, Casale would have been 18 at the time. Records show that the owner of the business, in the town of Branford, was her father, Richard H. Simmons.
Records show that the company, an office/industrial cleaning franchise, was dissolved in 1992, reinstated in 2000 and dissolved again in 2021. There are no details to cover that 21-year gap.
Records show that an entity called 67 Millbrook Limited sold a Branford office building last year for $1.17 million. Casale was listed as the principal, but at an address in Meriden, Conn. The previous principal was Avis Simmons, whose records link to Richard Simmons. That address for 67 Millbrook Limited is a prefab home.
At my request, Long provided a detailed chronology of his life since he was born 38 years ago in Pennsylvania. Casale has not returned requests to ask questions about her background.
Name change for Mizner Park street
Boca Raton will rename a street in Mizner Park—but not after the man who made Mizner Park possible.
At the request of Councilwoman Andrea O’Rourke, the stretch of Northeast Fifth Avenue in front of the Boca Raton Museum of Art and the Mizner Park Amphitheater will become Avenue of the Arts. Acting as the community redevelopment agency, which oversees downtown, council members took the action on Monday.
Previously, the plan had been to honor Charles Siemon, the land-use lawyer who crafted the plan under which Mizner park was created as the catalyst for downtown redevelopment. O’Rourke objected. So did some social media natterers who seemed to understand only that Siemon represented developers.
O’Rourke previously had proposed Avenue of the Arts. With the lease of land next to the amphitheater for what backers hope will become a performing arts center, O’Rourke said her choice is appropriate. She also said that making Mizner Park a cultural hub was Siemon’s “vision.”
With his law partner, Wendy Larsen, Siemon founded the Festival of the Arts BOCA. This year’s version—at Mizner Park—starts Friday.
