The hot discussion item at the Holmes Beach City Commission meeting June 13 was on the cutting-room floor when all was said and done in the chamber at city hall, 5801 Marina Drive.
Funding for the Center of Anna Maria Island was listed for discussion under new business until Commissioner Jean Peelen questioned it.
“I don’t understand why it’s back on the agenda when it’s already been decided,” Peelen said.
Peelen’s motion to remove the topic from the agenda carried by a 4-1 vote, with only Commission Chair Judy Titsworth objecting.
The commission voted in April to give $10,000 to the center despite having budgeted $45,000.
“Our $10,000 allocation so far this year should at least be topped up to the budgeted amount,” Mayor Bob Johnson wrote in a report to the commission before the meeting. “The city has an obligation to meet our parks and recreation facilities and services obligations of our comprehensive plan.”
It’s the lowest funding allocation from the city for the center since it began supporting the nonprofit operation in fiscal year 1998-99. In the past eight years, commissioners allocated $22,500-$22,542 for the center.
Titsworth said she placed center funding back on the agenda because questions were raised and more information became available.
The other commissioners disagreed and refused to again discuss center funding.
After the topic was removed from the agenda, center executive director Kristen Lessig and treasurer Jim Froeschle left the meeting, which was attended by about a dozen people. They said they had hoped to speak on behalf of increased funding.
“I’m really disappointed by the hate I see up here,” Froeschle said, while staring at the commissioners before exiting city hall.
“I am ashamed,” Titsworth said. “They deserved to be heard.”
The center offers an array of services for Anna Maria Island and funding provided by Holmes Beach is minuscule, said Lessig.
“They sent a message,” she said. “They aren’t supporting the community center.”
Froeschle said the fact most commissioners weren’t willing to again discuss funding for the center is “despicable.”
“They can’t afford to provide the services we do,” he said in an interview outside city hall. “This will blow back on them.”
The center, 407 Magnolia Ave., Anna Maria, offers fitness, education and cultural programs.
Center fundraising, however, has fallen critically short for the past eight years. The deficit for the 2016-17 fiscal year, which ends June 30, had grown to $240,000 at the end of March.
It is likely the center will lose more than $200,000 when the fiscal year ends June 30, according to Froeschle. The center has lost more than $200,000 annually since the new building opened in 2009, he said.
“I thought the commission was supposed to make decisions for the good of the community,” Froeschle said. “What they just did is kill funding for a major attraction for residents.”