BRADENTON – More than 50 concerned citizens and city officials gathered on Friday to protest Manatee County’s plans to build a 1,500-space, three-story parking garage at Manatee Beach in Holmes Beach.
The protesters made their voices heard along Manatee Avenue in front of the county administration building in downtown Bradenton.
The scheduled protest coincidentally occurred a few hours after Gov. Ron DeSantis signed House Bill 947. Introduced by State Rep. Will Robinson (R-Bradenton), supported by Sen. Jim Boyd (R-Bradenton) and unanimously approved by the Florida House and the Florida Senate, HB 947 allows Manatee County to build a parking garage on the county-owned Manatee Beach property in Holmes Beach despite the city’s prohibitions on the construction of a parking garage.
The parking garage must still comply with the height restrictions contained in Holmes Beach’s city charter, which will limit it to three stories with parking on the roof. To make room for the garage, which is expected to fill the entire existing parking lot, the vintage concession stand and other buildings at the beach will be demolished.
The estimated $45 million construction process is expected to take two years.
Protesters speak
Holmes Beach Mayor Judy Titsworth and city commissioners Dan Diggins and Carol Soustek participated in Friday’s protest.
“I’m glad the bill was either signed or vetoed because I didn’t want it to just go unnoticed,” Titsworth said. “Now people know what DeSantis believes in – the loss of home rule and big government overreach. That completely circumvents our ability to govern and people don’t have a voice anymore. It’s wrong.
“The parking garage is unfunded, so the county’s going to have to find the money. I hope they don’t dip into reserves because we need those reserves, especially with the increased magnitude of the hurricanes coming our way. And there’s a lot of infrastructure in the county that needs funding. We’re dealing with a county water pipe issue right now. I hope they put the emphasis on things like that instead.”
Titsworth said the fight is not over.
“We have legal recourse and a couple other things we’re working on that I think could make an impact,” she said. “The citizens have to take their stand and tell the people they elected how disappointed they are.”
Titsworth said the city will have no input or oversight of the construction of the parking garage.
“They made sure we didn’t have a seat at the table. I’ve never seen such hostile local bill,” she said.
Diggins said, “I think it’s heavy-handed government at its worst. This bill was passed to solve an undefined problem. They never brought us a plan to say this is what we’d like to do with the studies about drainage, traffic and beach carrying capacity. If those things were done, we’d be open to consider it. This whole thing was done bass-ackwards.
“It was basically done because some county commissioner got their feelings hurt,” Diggins said. “We passed an ordinance that banned a parking garage. It had nothing to do with the county’s plans and that set this whole thing in motion. Once (Manatee County Commissioner) Kevin Van Ostenbridge saw that, he threatened us with retribution; and apparently, this is part of that retribution.”
Diggins and Titsworth were asked if the county ever considered buying the nearby vacant Bank of America property and building a parking garage there instead.
“I brought that up in front of Kevin and he said, ‘Why would I do that when we already own the county beach?’ He didn’t want to do it,” Titsworth said.
“I talked to Kevin before I was a commissioner and I brought up that suggestion. He said why would we do that? We already own the county beach,” Diggins echoed.
Soustek said, “There’s a lot of people here that are very concerned. We appreciate everyone who takes a stand against big government trying to take away home rule rights from the cities. It’s not the solution. It’s just another problem. There are other solutions. There are studies that were done in the past and they recommend off-Island mass transportation to the Island. That would help with the traffic. I think they should have taken a lot more time to look into the matter before they pushed it through.”
Holmes Beach resident and Island business owner Morgan Bryant helped organize the protest.
“I want to preserve Anna Maria Island. We don’t need a 1,500-space parking garage. It’s sad that the first thing people are going to see when they drive over the bridge is a giant parking garage,” she said.
“The biggest thing here is big government overreach and circumventing our home rule and our city’s ability to preserve itself. I was upset driving over here when I heard the news. I don’t know that this protest will change anything, but at least our voices will be heard. I hope the city and the county can find a better solution. People need to be made aware of the parking spaces we have throughout Holmes Beach and the Island. I grew up in east Bradenton. I understand why people get upset when they can’t find parking spaces, but there are parking spaces,” Bryant said.
“Some of us are also concerned that this will open up the door to a higher structure and before you know it, we’ll have a whole bunch of high-rises on the Island,” former Island resident Carla Ballew said. “We’re trying to keep the jewel that it was, which it’s not anymore, but we’re still trying to preserve some of that quaintness that used to be Anna Maria Island.”
“The county has completely mishandled this entire situation from start to finish. This is an absolute misuse and waste of our tax dollars,” Speak Out Manatee founder Talha Siddique said. “The county has closed off far more beach parking than the city of Holmes Beach has and that’s almost $50 million that could go to schools, teachers, our police and firefighters and our crumbling infrastructure. Our elected officials want to put our money towards something we don’t want. At its core this is a local issue. Our county commission didn’t want to work out a deal with the city. That’s why we need to speak out and we need to vote in 2024. If these county commissioners aren’t going to vote in accordance with what we want them to do, we have an opportunity to take anybody out of office who doesn’t want to listen to us.”
Longtime Island resident Tom Aposporos said, “The governor signed the bill and it surprises me because I understood he was a believer in home rule. This is the antithesis of home rule. Can you imagine a parking garage staring you right in the face as you’re driving onto that bucolic Island? And making traffic worse, not better. How can anyone who has an ounce of decency think that’s a good idea?”
Regarding Robinson and Boyd’s legislative efforts, Aposporos said, “I’m surprised. I’ve never had a reason to disrespect either one of them. I do not understand this at all. I think there has been political intrigue between the local governments and those gentlemen as state officials, but somehow I think that can be worked out. It doesn’t have to become this draconian decision to build a multi-story parking garage in the middle of a beautiful place. It will not accomplish what they’re saying it will accomplish and I hope that all comes out in the courts.”
Charlene Smock and Brandi Brady were among those holding blue and red signs that said, “Danger Will Robinson.” Smock lives in Palma Sola and Brady’s family has owned and operated the West Coast Surf Shop next to Manatee Beach for more than five decades.
Regarding DeSantis signing the bill, Brady said, “We just found out and we’re devastated. You’re going to fill that big concrete building on the beach with a lot more people coming to the Island and leaving the Island. All the tourists that come into our shop love the Island the way it is and everybody we’ve talked to is against the garage. That might be great for our business, but no. We have enough business. Everybody has enough business. The traffic’s going to be even worse,” Brady said.
Smock said, “Think about emptying that parking garage with 1,500 cars all trying to come out at once during bad weather.”
Smock suggested the county finish its Coquina Beach parking improvements so those temporarily unavailable parking spaces are available again.
