Northpinellas: Tarpon seeks to widen no-wake zone

TARPON SPRINGS -- Like others who live near the Anclote River, Laz Vostitsanos said he often looks outside his Riverside Drive home and watches speed-crazed boaters collide in the crowded waterway.

"I have probably seen every kind of accident, including death," Vostitsanos said. "It looks like Gasparilla parade. It's absolutely crazy."

He and other residents are asking the city to extend no-wake zones, which now go from the Alt. U.S. 19 bridge to Marker 32, which is just east of where Florida Avenue meets the river.

City commissioners agreed Tuesday to put together an emergency ordinance to extend the idle zone on the south side of the river between the spoil islands and the shoreline from Marker 32 west almost to the Pasco County line. The no-wake zone would not extend to the northern bank of the river.

Boaters and people on personal watercraft race through the narrow channel between the islands and the shore at startling speeds, Mayor Frank DiDonato said.

"It is a death waiting to happen, in my opinion," he said.

Commissioners said they will pass the emergency ordinance as soon as possible, but no new signs can go in the water until the ordinance is also approved by the U.S. Coast Guard, the Army Corps of Engineers, the state Department of Environmental Protection and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, Tarpon Springs police Capt. Bob Kochen said.

The approval process could take three to six months, but the city hopes to encourage the agencies to speed up the process, he said.

"We're going to try to expedite this as fast as we can," he said. "We have a major safety issue."

Dozens of people, most of whom support an expanded no-wake zone, attended a City Commission meeting about the issue Tuesday night.

Frank Brock, who lives on Florida Avenue, said boats go within 6 feet of his dock at 40 mph. He suggested that the commission make a no-wake zone from bank to bank, not just between the spoil islands and the southern shoreline.

"I'd like to know why it wasn't done sooner," said Brock, who lives on Florida Avenue.

Commissioners said they would focus on the area by the spoil islands at first, and would address the rest of the river later. Commissioner Beverley Billiris said she wants to know how a no-wake zone from bank to bank would affect commercial fisherman and boats that travel on schedules.

Although nobody at the meeting objected to creating a no-wake zone by the spoil islands, not everybody supports the idea of expanding the zone.

Gary Upchurch, who owns the Landing at Tarpon Springs marina, said he and many boaters who use the marina do not want more no-wake zones. He said the real problem in the river is a lack of enforcement by the city.

Florida Marine Patrol officers work in the river, but nobody from the city has patrolled the river for several years, city officials say. A Tarpon Springs police officer acted as harbor master through the mid 1990s, but that officer was reassigned within the department and nobody from the city has patrolled the river since then.

"The existing no-wake zones are adequate and appropriate," Upchurch said. "What we need to address are boater safety training . . . and the city of Tarpon Springs to patrol this river."

During a telephone interview Wednesday afternoon, Upchurch said he looked out his window and saw a person on a water scooter flying through a no-wake zone at about 20 mph, instead of 3 or 4 mph. Upchurch said he felt that proved his point that additional no-wake zones aren't necessary.

"There are as many incidents of unsafe boating in the no-wake zone as there are in the wake zone," he said.

- Staff writer Katherine Gazella can be reached at (727) 445-4182.

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