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Two neighbors lead drive for dredging

The Sunset Park men gather support for a special assessment district to clear waterways near their homes.

By SHERRI DAY
Published November 4, 2005

SUNSET PARK - Craig Shatto bought a house on West Shore Boulevard last year in spite of the traffic whizzing past the front door. Out back was serenity, courtesy of his very own canal.

But low tide brings disappointment, along with foul odors, debris and a mountain of slick mud. As evidence, he points to the homes that line the canal, which have boat slips but no visible boats, kayaks or canoes. The water is just too shallow.

"We bought it for the water rights, and we're paying taxes to show that," said Shatto, a Realtor and developer. "We want the waterway."

Since October, Shatto and his neighbor Michael Weigner have been trying to gather support for a canal dredging plan in which the city would clean up and maintain clogged waterways in neighborhoods along West Shore Boulevard and Davis Islands. But homeowners on the canals would pay an assessment, perhaps as much as $600 a year for the next 20 years. If Shatto and Weigner can get enough support, they intend to petition the City Council to create the special assessment district.

The clock is ticking.

To qualify for the city's 2006-2007 budget, special assessment districts must be formed by Dec. 31, city officials said. Meeting the deadline is a monumental task for two men trying to solve the nearly 3-decade-old tug-of-war over who is responsible for the city's canals.

"I look at this as a compromise," said Weigner, 37, a sales manager who moved to the neighborhood in 2000. "If you ask me, "Is the city responsible? Should they do it?' Yes, absolutely they should. But I don't want to wait until I'm 60."

Earlier this year, about two dozen homeowners on Shatto's canal began taking steps to hire a contractor to clear the canal behind their homes. But the group stopped after meeting Tampa stormwater director Chuck Walter at a Sunset Park Area Homeowners Association Meeting. Walter said he had been working on possible dredging scenarios at the request of Mayor Pam Iorio. The city had just received a $1.3-million federal grant and wanted to explore ways to use the money to help with dredging.

Walter presented several dredging scenarios to a group of homeowners Oct. 17.

In the first plan, he said, residents could create a special assessment district to address the 27 clogged canals in the West Shore area and four canals on Davis Islands. Only homeowners who live on canals that are less than 3 feet high at low tide would pay an assessment, Walter said. That includes 550 property owners in the West Shore area and on Davis Islands, according to the plan.

The annual assessment would fund the one-time dredging of canals, improved navigational signs and routine maintenance.

Using the federal grant to offset costs, individual assessments would be about $8,500, or about $600 a year per household. Residents could apply for a hardship status that would defer payment to a later time, possibly at the point of sale, Walter said.

Under the second plan, the city could use the federal grant to dredge four canals: Currituck, Dundee/Lake Kipling, Neptune Channel and Spring Lake. Homeowners would bear no cost. The city would wait for additional grants to dredge the remaining clogged canals.

If community members want to pursue either option or an alternative plan, they will have to make the first move, Walter said.

"There's no charge to action on this," said Walter, likening the plan to neighborhoods that want special street lighting. "This is an amenity. If residents want to do this, they need to contact our office because there are people on the other side of this issue as well that don't want to do it."

Sam Mirabella Jr. is one of them.

"The city's trying to negate the responsibility to maintain these canals by getting us to agree to it," he said. "You have some landowners that have bought on very shallow water, and they know that they could probably improve the appreciation of their home by a few hundred percent by getting this cleaned, so I understand their agenda. But it's not everybody."

Some homeowners, including Mirabella, oppose the project because they think a 2003 state environmental protection consent order required the city to dredge Sunset Park's canals. It does not, said John Thomas, an environmental attorney who represents Sunset Park.

So far, Shatto and Weigner said, the responses they have received from residents have been overwhelmingly positive. They are confident they can gather enough comments to approach the council before the end of the year. But should they fail, they refuse to give up.

"We're not going away," Weigner said. "We will roll into January with the same steam."

Homeowners interested in organizing their neighborhoods or voicing their opinions about the dredging options can call Craig Shatto at (813) 503-3329 or Michael Weigner at (813) 282-8380.

- Sherri Day can be reached at 813 226-3405 or sday@sptimes.com

[Last modified November 3, 2005, 08:47:07]