January 15, 2006
BYLINE: ALDO NAHED
Debris from 16 sunken North Bay Village houseboats lay scattered in the waters of Biscayne Bay more than two months after Hurricane Wilma wreaked havoc on two adjacent marinas, leading city officials to deem them “unsafe.”
The two marinas on West Harbor Drive still have not been cleaned up. And most residents — either those who’ve abandoned their sunken vessels or those who still reside in homes that still float — have accumulated fines of $250 a day since an eviction order in November.
At Tuesday’s North Bay Village City Commission meeting, the issue was raised when former marina resident Fane Lozman criticized City Manager Charity Good for not enforcing clean-up or the fines.
”She’s clueless as to how to enforce the fine,” said Lozman, whose own calculations place the total amount of marina fines at $242,500, as of Tuesday.
Lozman, who left following the eviction order, has not been fined.
Lozman wants the marina rebuilt to current code so he can move his houseboat, now floating on Biscayne Bay outside city jurisdiction, back to a safe marina slot.
Good did not have a dollar amount for the fines when contacted Wednesday, but said she has been in contact with the Department of Environmental Resources Management and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission to enforce state clean-up.
”But they haven’t taken any action,” she said.
She added that Big Tuna Salvage contacted the city building official on Wednesday, “saying they will begin clean-up this week.”
The city is still trying to collect $44,000 from Gator Harbor West Marina for clean-up related to two vessels sunk during Hurricane Katrina in August.
”We have an environmental nightmare and a possible environmental disaster,” City Commissioner Tzvi Bogomilsky said. ”It’s not our goal of foreclosing the property. We want the compliance.” Other commissioners and Mayor Joe Geller agreed that the clean-up is taking too long.
The houseboats are a ”part of our community,” Geller said. “We need to allow them back here.”
aldo nahed 