In recent weeks developers of all stripes - heck, people who just think they could be developers - are flocking to the island to jump on the redevelopment bandwagon that promises to transform the beach.
Incredible sums are being offered for property, the most breathtaking deal being the $40-million paid by Tampa doctor Kirin Patel to purchase 2.7 acres containing four dilapidated motels across the street from the gulf. The amounts being paid for land are so high that property assessments all over the beach are skyrocketing.
People who own property on the island, especially on the tourist-oriented south end, never have been so popular. Have you seen that TV commercial where loan officers are gathered like hungry animals outside the door of a woman considering a home equity loan? Put would-be developers in the place of the loan officers, pacing outside the doors of beach property owners, and you'll get the picture.
The result of all that wheeling and dealing, so far, has been this: The island is awash in condominium projects and proposals, from small complexes to 15-story towers, and three large resort hotels are in various stages of consideration at City Hall.
There is one common denominator for these new projects: They are what the developers call "high end." They are designed for a market of well-to-do people with lots of money to spend on a vacation or a home on Clearwater Beach. Standard rooms in the proposed resort hotels easily will fetch $200 a night. Condominiums, depending on their location and view, will sell for anywhere from several hundred thousand dollars to more than $1.5-million.
It is a trend that is snowballing. And that has some people worried, including Jack Heckert, president of the Clearwater Beach Chamber of Commerce.
"You need a proper mix. I'm concerned that Clearwater Beach is going to become nothing more than high-end resorts and condominiums and nothing in between," he said.
Clearwater Beach has always been a place where middle-income people could vacation. The motels were mostly small, the room rates reasonable, the restaurants inexpensive. You could take the kids, get a $50- or $60-a-night room, spend the day on the beach, get a good grouper sandwich for dinner, take a 50-cent stroll on the pier at sunset, and buy your souvenirs at the T-shirt shops.
Will there be a place for the middle-income tourist in the Clearwater Beach of the future? Or will even those of us who live in Clearwater have to travel somewhere else for an affordable night on the beach?
Clearwater city officials insist that is not their aim. They want Clearwater Beach to continue to be a vacation destination for families, and not just rich ones.
Yet the city carefully engineered this trend toward high-end development. Clearwater Beach was dying a lingering death, with aging motels, falling room rates, increasingly shabby infrastructure and bargain-basement retail offerings, until the city government focused on saving the beach. It threw open the door to change.
The city invested in infrastructure improvements, changed its codes, adopted a creative redevelopment plan called Beach by Design and sought out developers. In hopes of luring a catalytic resort project to Clearwater Beach, the city also created a "bonus density pool" that handed developers extra hotel units above what would normally be allowed if they agreed to build a high-end resort hotel in certain defined areas of the island.
The city made no secret of its interest in attracting development that would appeal to the high-income tourist. Officials thought that was the best way - perhaps the only way - to quickly turn around the beach's decline. They knew they needed to attract developers with deep pockets who could afford the land prices on Clearwater Beach and the high-income tourist who would spend plenty of money while vacationing here.
Helped along by certain economic conditions, the city's plan has worked and congratulations are in order. The bonus density units for resort hotel builders are all spoken for. Condominium construction is transforming older single-family and motel properties. When all those new units are occupied, the impact will cascade into the retail district and revitalize that component of the beach economy, too, bringing more good restaurants and stylish shops.
If city officials truly don't want the middle-income tourist pushed off of Clearwater Beach, the time to act is now. Just as the city created a plan to attract high-end hotels, it can plan to attract new, midprice motel development. Motels like Comfort Inn, Best Western, Courtyard and many others provide vacation destinations for middle-income travelers, and there is plenty of room for more of them in sections of Clearwater Beach that have not yet been redeveloped.
However, they may not show up unless the city opens the door. With land prices escalating rapidly on the beach, it will be increasingly difficult for smaller projects like midprice motels to be financed.
To attract resort development, the city designated areas of the island appropriate for resort hotels. The city created the bonus density pool as an incentive to make resort hotel construction more workable for developers. The city reached out to high-end developers, held their hands and, if they had a great plan, removed the rocks from their path to success.
Why shouldn't the city consider doing the same for would-be developers of midprice motels? Why not amend Beach by Design to designate areas well-suited to that kind of development? Why not create a package of incentives to make that kind of development more feasible? Why not reach out to the chain motels and those who build them, hold their hands and kick the rocks out of their path?
If Clearwater officials want to preserve the opportunity of a Clearwater Beach vacation for average-income tourists - and that's most of us, after all - they can do it. They just need a plan.
