A calm has come over city hall in Bradenton Beach thanks to some cooperation.
The commission reached consensus March 13 to agree in concept to resolve four lawsuits filed against the city. The agreement brings the city closer to the global settlement proposed earlier this month by Mayor Bill Shearon.
As Shearon predicted, all parties have some skin in the game.
“Not everybody is going to love every piece of this,” city attorney Ricinda Perry said.
“We are recommending that everybody lays down their arms,” attorney Chuck Johnson of the Bradenton-based Blalock Walters law firm said.
Johnson, acting for the city, guided commissioners through discussion of the four suits and Perry asked commissioners and plaintiffs what they specifically agreed to in each case.
Attorneys were to begin drafting the settlement agreement immediately after the meeting and to try to complete it for the next commission meeting, set for noon March 19 at city hall, 107 Gulf Drive N.
Commissioners agreed to dismiss the forfeiture proceedings Vice Mayor Jack Clarke initiated against Shearon last year and to repeal the pending resolution that began the forfeiture process against the mayor.
In exchange for those concessions, Shearon agreed to drop his lawsuit against the city, filed in November 2014, to prevent what he called a “flawed” forfeiture process from moving forward.
Meanwhile, ELRA Inc., the corporate entity of Ed Chiles’ Beachhouse Restaurant, agreed to drop its February 2014 lawsuit against the city that alleged Shearon exceeded his authority by acting as a strong mayor.
Tjet Martin agreed to drop her November 2014 lawsuit against the city in response to failure to deliver requested public records and a $780 bill from the city attorney to review emails included in the request.
Finally, Martin and Jo Ann Meilner agreed to drop their lawsuit against the city regarding its joint development agreement with ELRA involving beachfront property south of the Beachhouse Restaurant, 200 Gulf Drive N., Bradenton Beach.
Instead of a parking lot with five spaces, the city’s portion of the property will be a park, possibly with a physical fitness theme.
The commission agreed to adopt a small-scale comprehensive plan amendment written specifically to guarantee ELRA parking on its beachfront lot between the city property and the restaurant, a point of contention in the Martin-Meilner lawsuit.
If the comp plan isn’t amended now, said Chiles’ attorney. Robert Lincoln of Sarasota-based Icard Merrill, the same issues involving parking on the ELRA lot “can come back to haunt everybody in the future.”
Perry explained the timeline. First, all parties will abate their lawsuits. Then, while Lynn Burnett, an engineer for the city, begins to close out the DEP permit for the city park, minus parking, Alan Garrett, the city’s contractual planner, will determine a timeline for processing the comp-plan amendment; possibly two months, Perry said.
The commission will be required to approve an amended site plan for the city park and the comp plan for the ELRA parking lot. Then all four lawsuits would be dismissed.
All parties agreed not to refile their lawsuits.