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City, St. Petersburg College to partner on new project
By BOB McCLURE
Article published on Tuesday, Sept. 23, 2008 |
SEMINOLE – The city and St. Petersburg College are engineering another partnership that could lead to a city-operated marina in Hurricane Hole, a 55-acre tract just west of Bay Pines Hospital on the Intracoastal Waterway.
The area includes a large lagoon that feeds into the Intracoastal and a parcel of land that lies to the east of Madeira Beach Middle School. The site has two homes on it that once served as housing for the administrators of Bay Pines Hospital.
City Manager Frank Edmunds said the college, which owns the property, has applied for voluntary annexation into the city, which Edmunds said would open the door for the city to possibly lease part of the area for a marina. A decision on the annexation is expected in October by City Council.
“Right now the (lagoon) is used for the storage of derelict boats,” Edmunds said Sept. 18 at the monthly Seminole Chamber of Commerce luncheon. “Redevelopment is possible there with a possible marina that would provide additional ad valorem tax revenue to the city.”
Susan Reiter, director of facilities planning and institutional services for SPC, said any redevelopment of the area won’t happen any time soon.
“We still have to work out the specifics as to how it’s going to work,” said Reiter. “It will take a year to a year and a half to go through all the development issues as to what we want to put there. We’ll put our team together and then talk to the city and see what the city has in mind.”
Reiter said one of the biggest obstacles to get past would be all the state and federal environmental regulations that affect the area.
“Some of this parcel is under water but we think there is enough land for a small science facility and classrooms, perhaps with a wet lab and a dry lab,” Reiter said. “We need to take a good, hard look at the egress and regress from that site. Right now it’s on school board property and will that work in the future? Probably not.”
Reiter also mentioned the possibility of partnering with the Pinellas County Schools as a part of the middle school’s magnet program for marine science.
“The college has leased the land for years from the federal government and there was a time frame that it would be turned over to us,” said Reiter. “That was in the last couple of years.”
The partnership with the city will be the second. The two entities currently partner on the Seminole Community Library, which is on the Seminole campus of SPC.
“We have a good working relationship with Seminole,” Reiter said. “We’re excited about our next partnership.”
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Article published on Tuesday, Sept. 23, 2008
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