sun 304

What happened at the meeting Monday evening in Sarasota with the speed and noise issues?

enticer

They are keeping you out of the loop

Formula Outlaw

City Commissioner Lou Ann Palmer removed it from the agenda for that meeting.

There is a special meeting tonight with "three pro/three con" meeting with I believe Ms. Palmer and the Mayor to discuss a compromise between the boaters and snobs. Mike Erturk (President of OPBA), Joe Spina (Addiction) and Billy Glueck (representing the racers) are the three supporting us. Couldn't get three better choices. I'm sure we'll hear the results of that meeting sometime this evening.

addiction

The meeting was held at 2:30pm this afternoon.

The two main issues discussed were speed and noise in the North Bay. The residents there have requested that we run at least one mile from that waterfront community. The water is less than 3' deep any closer! Also, if you have switchable exhaust, please engage quiet mode while traveling in that area. Regarding the speed issue, there is no law in the bay, but we are asking that our performance boating community watch their speed in the North Bay area if there are too many boats in the area Just use common sense. The residents main issue is the noise they hear from boats running to close to shore. Please see what everyone can do to try and reduce this. Another smaller issue aslo surfaced. The neighborhood group found this website and were hurt by our comments. Mine especially! I explained that this site is for performance boat enthusiasts and sometimes vent our feelings in hard ways but these comments really mean no harm. Actually, Yvonne Lacey is very pleasant and Lou Anne Palmer is a class act! I wish I had her caliber of city official in my other business areas. There was a woman named Jennifer who represented the marine life issue too. Her point really boiled down that there should be no boating activity on the bay and that marine life should prosper. Billy and I stated that we enjoy the marine life in these waters and never want to see it in danger.

Jenn, I would love to see an utopian seaworld probaly more than you, but sadly I do not think this will ever happen.
Captains, watch out for the slow moving sea life and feeding dolphins always. We all know they are one reason that we all got into boating in the first place.
The City Attorney stated that the Sarasota Bay is divided into 4 different areas. They are controlled by 1) The City of Sarasota 2) Long Boat Key 3) Sarasota County 4) Manatee County. They would have to get approval from all four to pass any type of speed limit. He also stated that the local govt does not have the ability to pass a speed limit on Federal waters. ie the ICW. We agreed that we will communicate to all our performance boaters to try our best to reduce the noise in their area. Billy also stated that he will be riunning and testing in the bay on Thur. He will try to avoid this area but he will be traveling fast. I alos, stated that I always run far from shore and will try to avoid this area too. I will try to run in the Gulf when I can, but if conditions are questionable, I will not risk my equipment or my life! I suggest all you guys do the same.
The majority of the neighborhood group seem to be happy with our good faith arrangement.
However, Richard Clap the President of the group seems to still want and stir things up. He has stated that he will write a letter to all Condo Associations, Marinas, The Hyatt, ect... that says to call the police if you hear a boat noise or if you think a boat is speeding! He did not bend at all. He contradicted our facts and had one sided biased information. He reminded me of a certain science teacher that thought I would never be succesful because I was bad at tech physics. Gee, lets see that teacher makes $65k/year and last time I looked at my net worth, it was over 10 million! So much for his opinion. I did finally get through to this teacher when I told him that I will never need this information after college and everyone has different abilities. He agreed one day and gave me a "C" when I should have failed. After graduation, I took him out to lunch in my brand new Jaguar! He got the point and laughed!
But, this other guy wants his way or nothing! The statement he made is clearly an attempt to get more people up in arms and to join his cause, Not to mention the nuisance phone calls to the local enforcement agency. He stated that he is not a boater! It is my opinion that he should not be able to enforce his opinion or his will on others! Everyone in this Country has certain freedoms. Just because he does not like anothers choice does not mean that it should be outlawed! The marine police officer that was present even told him that these calls must be warranted not just prejudice. Please do not harbor ill feeling or post negative threads about this individual. Even though we disagree with his views, this is America and he has the right to them. Perhaps, he will come aroun like my old teacher too. We can only hope that he will see that everyone has the right for the "pursuit of happiness".
I hope that his opinion does not represent his whole organization. The others seem to have accepted our help.
We have volunteered to help this community on our own! We did not have to agree to anything. We would rather have peace than war.
Let's ban together and show them that we are a respectable, caring, and family oriented organization!

If you have any questions or comments, please call LISA MATHEWS (941) 232-4524

Thanks!

SCRAPMAN1

THE BOTTOM LINE IS THIS- THE MAIN ISSUE WE BELIEVE IS THE POKER RUNS GOING THROUGH NORTH BAY- I.E. THE LAST PRA RUN IN OCTOBER WHERE MOST PEOPLE WENT THROUGH THE BAY ON THE WAY BACK. FOR WE AS A GROUP IT WILL NOT BE HARD TO NOT HAVE POKER RUN TRAFFIC GO THROUGH THE BAY. THE MAIN COMPLAINT IS THE LARGE FAST 100 MPH AND UP BOATS COMING THROUGH IN FORCE. IT IS NOT NECESSARY TO PUSH THIS ISSUE. IN NO WAY SHAPE OR FORM DID WE SAY THAT WE WOULD FROWN ON TESTING OF RACE BOATS OR LOCAL MANUFACTURER PLEASURE BOATS IN THE BAY NOR DID WE SAY THAT WE WOULDNT OPERATE OUR PLEASURE BOATS IN NORTH BAY WE JUST AGREED THAT IT WOULDNT BE HARD FOR EVERYONE TO TAKE IT EASY THROUGH THE NORTH SECTION OF THE BAY WHERE THE COMPLAINTS ARE COMING FROM. MOST LOCAL RACERS AS WELL AS POWERBOATERS UNDERSTAND TO STAY CLEAR OF THE NORTHEAST SECTION OF SARASOTA BAY WHERE THERE ARE SHALLOWS. LET ME REPEAT THAT WE ARE NOT GIVING UP ANY RIGHTS TO USE THE BAY IN ANY WAY WE ARE JUST ASKING EVERYONE TO WORK TOGETHER TO TRY TO KEEP THE PEACE IN OUR COMMUNITY. AS A WHOLE I THINK TODAYS MEETING WAS POSITIVE AND I THINK THIS WILL NO LONGER BE AN ISSUE WITH A LITTLE EFFORT FROM EVERY ONE INVOLVED INCLUDING THE COMPLAINTANTS. I KNOW THAT YOU FOLKS ARE READING THIS WEBSITE AND I HOPE YOU TRY ALONG WITH US TO BE REASONABLE IN YOUR EXPECTATIONS. I WOULD LIKE TO COMPLIMENT COMMISSIONER LOU ANN PALMER AND SGT ABBOT ON THEIR UN BIASED PROFESSIONALISM AND EVERONE ELSE ON THEIR OVERALL PLEASANTNESS .

Formula Outlaw

I am not surprised at all about your opinions of Lou Ann Palmer. In my discussions with her she was always above board, straightforward, and seemingly very very honest.

All in all with everything considered it appears this meeting went as well as could be hoped for. It is unfortunate that one individual seems hellbent on forwarding his own agenda with no regard for other people and what they might enjoy. Thankfully, these types of people seem to be in the minority.

I would not think that any of us would have any problems with the proposed suggestions. If nothing else it shows that we, as a group, are at least willing to work towards a workable compromise. Let us as a group worry about ourselves and conduct ourselves accordingly. Let us NOT worry about those that we can do nothing about. Give someone enough rope and they will usually hang themselves.

Good job guys. You make us proud.

ApachePete

Great outcome!

Great job by those who did the heavy-lifting!

Let's all simply do our part to respect other's sensibilities and concerns.
I don't think it's in the least bit unreasonable!


Live, and let live. :

I continue to believe that "offshore" should really be OFFSHORE

CigDaze

Excellent. Thank you all for your time, willingness to cooperate, and open-mindedness. I think we can all bend a little in this case, to preserve our ability to share the waters responsibly, rather than forcing further leglislation.

"Live and let live!"

Loan Ranger

Scrapman is correct in his comments regarding poker runs. During the Labor Day run I would guess at least 40 boats ran the ICW rather than the gulf. The gulf was 3 feet or less that day and a beautiful ride. We need to be very conscious of our actions for the good of our sport. Great job to everyone involved in addressing this issue.

SCRAPMAN1

I will be mailing out a letter to all poker run organizers and race organizations, marine industry businesses informing them of some local concerns regarding Sarasota Bay and the area of question. Bottom Line. Sarasota Bay is approximately 21/2 miles wide, just try to stay clear of the east side of the northeast of Sarasota Bay. It has shallows and the speeds like what we've seen with the PRA event recently so close to these homes, they got close , we need to be smarter and inform all boaters who come to our area to boat of these concerns. I'll post the letter in 48 hours for all to see on the site with the chart of concerns. Local boaters don't usually get so close to the area of concern. We have GPS.. Sarasota is a great place to live,work, and play and we love all our visitors and the boating is great. Lets keep it that way. We are working together on this. We don't want to change anything- just inform all who come to our area about of boating and certain concerned area's. Going testing today in Sarasota and the weather if just great. Lisa Matthews ( lost my own password) used Billys screen name this time.