The Interior Department has ruled in the dispute over a proposed restaurant at Archibald Park on Madeira Beach.
By AMY WIMMER
Published August 20, 2003
MADEIRA BEACH - It took nine months, the interference of one high-powered federal official and a few flared tempers, but Frank Chivas and Madeira Beach can open a restaurant at Archibald Park.
An official from the U.S. Department of the Interior outlined the parameters for the restaurant in a letter faxed to the city Friday. Most of the federal government's requirements are aimed at making the old Archibald Park "Snack Shack" more of a public park facility and less of a private restaurant.
Among other requirements, Bill Huie, manager of the Federal Lands to Parks program for the region that includes Florida, has instructed the city to clearly mark restaurant facilities as open to the public, "not limited to, or restricted to, patrons of the restaurant."
Huie wrote that the signs, posted on restrooms and on the expanded deck Chivas has added to the building, "clearly state that these facilities are also part of Archibald Memorial Beach and are indeed open and accessible, at no charge, to the public for park and recreation use."
Neither Chivas nor Madeira Beach City Manager Jim Madden could be reached Tuesday, so it remains unclear whether Chivas will continue with his plans for the restaurant. According to Jack Tipton, director of the Pinellas County Building Department, no work has been done on the building since Feb. 23, so Chivas will have to reapply for building permits if he doesn't resume work within the next few days.
The controversy over the park - and, more specifically, the restaurant - began last year when the descendants of the men who donated the park land 70 years ago learned about the proposed restaurants. The city's plan would have allowed local restaurateurChivas, who owns the Salt Rock Grill in Indian Shores and other establishments, to turn a deteriorating concession stand into a full-service restaurant.
The family stepped in, charging that the original deed that conveyed the land protected the property from commercial uses. Chivas' plans have been held up for months as lawyers for the Department of the Interior and the city have negotiated what could be allowed on the property.
The requirements outlined in Huie's letter include:
A change in the language of a lease between Chivas and the city. The lease will now be called a "concession agreement." This stipulation was added because a 1972 agreement between the federal government and the city, in which federal officials turned over the property to Madeira Beach, specifically said "the property shall not be sold, leased, assigned or otherwise disposed of."
Signs must be placed along Gulf Boulevard and the beach side of the property. "The prominent locations of these signs, along with their text, dimensions and coloring, must be carefully selected in order to ensure that the general public is clearly aware that the property is a public park."
Last month, National Park Service Director Fran Mainella stepped into the situation at the request of a friend, who knows the Archibald family. At the time, Alex Archibald, grandson of beach pioneer Albert Archibald, who helped donate the park land, held out hope that the federal government would come down firmly on the side of keeping commercial activity out of Archibald Park.
Said Archibald at the time: "You can't take away the public beach and put a restaurant in there."
Archibald could not be reached for comment Tuesday. But Maureen Cadzow of Seminole, a family friend who has worked on the Archibald family's behalf to protect the park, said Tuesday that she was pleased that the Department of Interior ordered the city and Chivas to make the restaurant more public.
She also said she isn't sure the Department of the Interior went far enough.
"The requirements are pretty tough, and at this point I would think that nobody would have the nerve to step outside that, but you never know," Cadzow said. "Obviously at this point, the National Parks Service is going to be watching it very, very closely."
