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Tag: Karen Bell

Bradenton Boiler Room re-opens

Bradenton Boiler Room re-opens

Written by Leslie Lake on . Posted in Business, Restaurants | Bars.

BRADENTON – The cheesesteaks were sizzling on the grills once again as the long-awaited Bradenton Boiler Room opened its doors on July 2.

Under new ownership and with a new name, the former Boiler Room Bar and Grill at 5600 Manatee Ave. W., owned by Matt Lavallee from 1984 until its closure in 2020, has reopened under the partner­ship of Cortez business owner Karen Bell and Cortezians Josh and Staci Wilkinson.

Bradenton Boiler Room re-opens
Bradenton’s Boiler Room opened for business on July 2. – Leslie Lake | Sun

“This is something that the town has missed, at a time of a lot of growth, redevelopment and change we’re kind of trying to bring back something that everybody loves, a time-hon­ored tradition,” Staci Wilkinson told The Sun on July 3. “We’re trying to honor the way that it once was and put our own little flair on it as well.”

Bell, owner of A.P. Bell Fish Co., Star Fish and co-owner of Tide Tables Restaurant in Cortez, partnered with the Wilkinsons, both of whom are Cortez residents and had been employees at her restaurants.

Bradenton Boiler Room re-opens
Bradenton Boiler Room co-owners, Cortez residents Josh and Staci Wilkinson, along with Karen Bell (not pictured), take a quick break from serving patrons at their busy bar and restaurant, – Leslie Lake | Sun

“I met Josh at Tide Tables almost 11 years ago and he was in the kitchen, and I was a bartender, and we worked together as friends for a year, and we fell in love and the rest is history. We’ve been married six years,” Staci said. “We’ve been under one of Karen’s umbrellas for that amount of time. Josh moved over to Star Fish the last two years, so between the two restaurants we’ve worked for her for over a decade.”

The new restaurant layout looks similar the old Boiler Room, with a few changes that include flat screen televisions and one pool table where there had once been two. The menu features cheesesteaks, seven different types of wings, sandwiches, kids’ meals and soups and salads.

The menu description of the cheesesteaks, a staple of the old Boiler Room, states: “What the Boiler Room was known for! In keeping up with that tradition we offer a cheesesteak with ribeye steak, cheese, onions and peppers all on an Amoroso roll.”

Bradenton Boiler Room re-opens
The Bradenton Boiler Room is located at
5600 Manatee Ave, – Leslie Lake | Sun

The opening of the restau­rant, which had been slated for 2024, was stalled follow­ing a series of hurricane-related challenges.

“Right in the middle of trying to get this restaurant up and running, we were really hard hit by the hurricanes,” Staci said. “We live in Cortez and our house was under 4 feet of water, so obviously what we went through and what Karen went through put us behind. We’re just really excited. It’s been a year and a half in the making.”

Bradenton Boiler Room re-opens
Patrons can shoot pool at the Bradenton Boiler Room while enjoying the food and drinks. – Leslie Lake | Sun

The menu recounts the story of the restaurant opening: “After more than a year of challenges – from replacing plumbing and exhaust systems to weathering a tropi­cal storm and two hurricanes – we’re proud to finally open our doors. This milestone wouldn’t have been possible without the relentless dedica­tion of partners Josh and Staci Wilkinson and Karen Bell as well as the unwavering support of Matt LaVallee’s original Boiler Room fans who have followed the reopening of this iconic location.”

The Boiler Room was a large part of Josh Wilkin­son’s early years.

“My husband grew up right around the corner from here and came here his entire life,” Staci said. “I’m from Orlando and never made it to the Boiler Room. The week that they announced they were closing he brought me here once to see the staple item of his childhood, so I had a steak sandwich one time and saw a big part of his childhood before they closed the doors forever and ever. But never say never.”

The Bradenton Boiler Room is open seven days a week from 11 a.m. to 11 p.m.

DeSantis surveys Cortez hurricane damage

DeSantis surveys Cortez hurricane damage

Written by Leslie Lake on . Posted in Community News, Cortez, Featured.

CORTEZ – Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis made a stop in Cortez shortly after noon on Friday, Oct. 11, and got a firsthand look at the damage to the fishing village following Hurricanes Helene and Milton.

DeSantis, FEMA Executive Director Kevin Guthrie, members of the Florida National Guard, and law enforcement, arrived at A.P. Bell Fish Co. and spoke to owner Karen Bell and local fishermen.

“Our docks need a little work, but we’re working on it,” Bell said.

The governor addressed state initiatives for the restoration of power, debris removal and gasoline supplies.

DeSantis surveys Cortez hurricane damage
Gov. Ron DeSantis and FEMA Executive Director Kevin Guthrie speak to AP Bell Fish Co. owner Karen Bell in Cortez on Friday – Leslie Lake | SUN

“We picked up all this debris on Anna Maria because they weren’t doing it quick enough, so we got a lot in Pinellas beaches, Manatee beaches; we got 50,000 cubic yards in 72 hours,” he said. “These were guys working on roads in other parts of Florida, but I had to take them off those jobs and put them here.”

It turns out that debris didn’t make that much of a difference, he said.

“We thought there were going to be projectiles. It didn’t really do that, but still, it’s about city and county getting contracts,” DeSantis said. “He’s (Kevin Guthrie) working with FEMA to be able to get that done more efficiently, but the state of Florida as a whole, we could not possibly clean up all the debris. That’s a local responsibility, but if we can supplement we will.”

Bell said debris removal is minor in the overall picture.

“Everyone here made it, our boats made it, buildings are a little rough and we were lucky compared to a lot of people,” Bell said.

DeSantis surveys Cortez hurricane damage
AP Bell Fish Co. owner Karen Bell, Gov. Ron DeSantis and FEMA Executive Director Kevin Guthrie meet in Cortez Friday to discuss local damage and restoration –
LESLIE LAKE | SUN

“We were just lucky as a whole that the storm weakened,” DeSantis said. “Thirty-six hours before landfall was much more powerful than what it hit at. Whereas Helene accelerated, this one weakened. If it had not weakened, the damage would have been twice as much.”

With more than 4 million homes without power statewide after Hurricane Milton, DeSantis said state power restoration after Hurricane Milton will be the fastest restoration at this scale in American history.

“We brought in people from as far away as California for the linemen,” he said. “They restored 1.6 million people and there are 2.2 million now, but I guarantee you, they’ll have a million more restored soon. They’re working really fast.”

Guthrie said generators and gas are being sent to gas stations.

“The number one priority for us today is not just search and rescue, but it is getting power back on and fuel to the fuel stations,” Guthrie said.

“If they don’t have generators, they may have fuel, but they can’t power it, so FPL’s going to do a good job getting power back on here relatively soon,” DeSantis said. “Any interruption of supply from the port here, we’re also working on that.”

Before leaving, DeSantis said he would be back to partake in local chowder when everything is back up and running.

“We’ll save you some,” Bell said.

Net camp reroofed as suit planned to stop demolition

Net camp reroofed as suit planned to stop demolition

Written by Cindy Lane on . Posted in Community News, Cortez.

CORTEZ – Karen Bell has directed her lawyer to sue to stay the order to demolish a stilt structure known as a net camp just offshore of her commercial fish house, A.P. Bell Fish Co.

After the Manatee County legislative delegation offered verbal support for the net camp at a public meeting on Jan. 6, Florida Sen. Jim Boyd (R-Manatee), Rep. Tommy Gregory (R-Manatee) and Rep. Will Robinson (R-Manatee) made it clear to Bell that their hands are tied on extending the demolition deadline of Sunday, Jan. 24, won by the Florida Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) in the 12th Judicial Circuit Court on Oct. 8, 2020.

Bell had intended to ask the legislators to request that DEP grant a 120-day extension on the demolition order, allowing the Florida Legislature time to draft legislation to protect the camp during the session that begins on Tuesday, March 2.

The delegation made it clear almost immediately that the request was futile.

“Because it’s a court order, they have no authority. I was told to ask the judge for a stay,” Bell said.

Meanwhile, back at the net camp, a work crew appeared on the roof the day after the hearing, prompting rumors to fly about whether the stilt structure was in the process of being demolished as ordered.

It was not.

Guthrie, who built the camp in 2017 and claims ownership based on prior net camps his family built on the spot, instead reroofed the structure last Thursday, Bell said.

Net camps, which once dotted the Cortez waterfront in Sarasota Bay, were used to clean, dry and store cotton nets. They declined in use when netmakers began using more durable fibers, and were made virtually obsolete by the 1994 Florida gill net ban.

Today, only Guthrie’s structure and a historic net camp remain, the latter restored by the not-for-profit Cortez group, the Florida Institute for Saltwater Heritage (FISH).

The 12th Judicial Circuit Court has ruled that the state owns the submerged land under Guthrie’s structure, and that the construction was unpermitted and therefore illegal.

Bell appealed in vain to Gov. Ron DeSantis to overturn the demolition order by Manatee County Circuit Court Judge Edward Nicholas, saying that the Guthrie camp had been rebuilt in the same spot as previous Guthrie camps and on some of the same pilings.

Previously, Bell had unsuccessfully intervened in the lawsuit, floating the argument that the structure has existed on the spot since at least the early 1900s, and, with the submerged lands, is protected by the 1921 Butler Act.

The act awards title of submerged lands to adjacent waterfront property owners who made permanent improvements on the submerged lands. Repealed in the 1950s, the act continues to affect title to submerged lands that were “improved” with construction prior to its repeal.

DEP conceded that aerial images show that a smaller, dilapidated structure existed where Guthrie built his structure, but said the Butler Act did not protect it because it had been allowed to deteriorate and become unusable.

Other stilt structures stand on state submerged lands in Charlotte, Lee and Pasco counties, but DEP maintains that those structures were not allowed to collapse before being rebuilt.

Bell said she is hopeful that her most recent lawsuit to stay the demolition order will be heard before the Jan. 24 deadline to tear down the net camp.

As she wrote to Gov. DeSantis: “These camps are iconic to this community. Artists come from all over the world and have memorialized these structures in their work. I do not understand how my state is not supportive of our history.”

Bell named Agriculturist of the Year

Written by Cindy Lane on . Posted in Community News, Cortez.

CORTEZ – Karen Bell, manager of A.P. Bell Fish Co., is Manatee County’s Agriculturist of the Year.

The Manatee County native was surprised with the honor at the county’s Farm-City Week Kiwanis luncheon on Nov. 19 at the Manatee Performing Arts Center.

“I was invited to give a presentation on the mullet fishing industry,” Bell said, adding that she expected Scott Moore to receive the honor. The local charter boat captain was instead named to the Agriculture Hall of Fame.

“I was shocked,” Bell said. “They told my family and nobody told me.”

Bell was recognized for her lifelong community service protecting coastal and native habitat and spearheading historic preservation in the fishing village of Cortez.

Bell named Agriculturist of the Year
Karen Bell is Manatee County Agriculturist of the Year.

She was a founding member of FISH, the Florida Institute for Saltwater Heritage, and the lead negotiator on the purchase of the 100-acre FISH Preserve east of the village. Bell also has served as chair of the annual Cortez Commercial Fishing Festival, which raises funds to support the FISH Preserve.

Bell also serves on local and national boards representing the fishing industry and gives tours of the packinghouse founded by her grandfather, A.P. Bell.

After gill nets were banned 20 years ago in Florida, mullet landings fell by at least half, according to the narrative provided by the committee that elected Bell: “Through her creative thinking, sheer determination and willingness to take risks, she was ultimately able to grow her business interests through diversification. Her business leadership and example instilled others with courage to take similar risks as the community was weathered each challenge.”

Bell said her father discouraged her from coming back home to Cortez after completing college and serving an internship with IBM, warning her about increasing regulations and tough fishermen. She eventually took over the business from him.

“Dad would be proud,” she said. “I think he’d be proud I stuck it out here.”

Fish house owner in Catch-22

Fish house owner in Catch-22

Written by Cindy Lane on . Posted in Awards, Awards 2019, Environment, Outdoors, Second Place, Special Sections.

CORTEZ – As the Florida Legislative session winds down this week, Karen Bell, of A.P. Bell Fish Co., is caught in a “Catch-22” – she says she’s not allowed to talk to her state elected official about resolving an issue in his district because she is a party in litigation on the issue.

Bell said she has tried to set up an appointment with Florida Senate President Bill Galvano (R-Bradenton) to discuss sponsoring legislation to allow Raymond Guthrie Jr.’s stilt structure to remain standing in Sarasota Bay just south of her fish house.

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2019

Guthrie built the structure in 2018 on the location of several former Guthrie family net camps, which were used by commercial fishermen to clean, dry and store nets, Bell said.

The Florida Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) says it owns the submerged land under the net camp and has ordered Guthrie to demolish the structure, but Bell says her company owns the submerged land pursuant to the 1921 Butler Act, which awarded submerged lands to upland property owners who made improvements, such as building structures, to the submerged lands.

She is trying to prove ownership in court. But because of her pending suit against the DEP, Bell said she was told by Galvano’s assistant that he can’t speak to her.

“It was suggested by DEP staff who came to Cortez and met with us that we talk with our local delegation about submitting special legislation to allow the camp to remain. They told us that other counties (Pasco, Lee and Charlotte) had done this successfully,” Bell wrote in a February email to Galvano’s legislative assistant, Amanda Romant.

Romant replied by email that “Our office has reached out to the Department of Environmental Protection for information regarding the status of the Guthrie Net Camp case. Based on the details they shared, you are involved in pending litigation in the 12th Judicial Circuit that prevents our office from getting involved. If these legal issues are resolved in the future and you would like to update our office again, please feel free to do so.”

Bell responded to Romant that she had no other choice than to intervene legally to prevent the camp from being destroyed, but that she would be willing to “drop the legal opposition if we can get a bill to protect the camp.”

She also noted that the Manatee County Commission passed a resolution last year in support of allowing the building to remain.

The Sun contacted Galvano’s office for an interview on the issue and was told in an email from assistant Katherine Betta that Galvano would respond. Instead, he asked his staff for an update from DEP, she wrote in a subsequent email. That update consisted of a history of court dates in the case, and advised that the next hearing is on June 4.

The Manatee County Clerk of the Circuit Court’s website lists the next hearing as June 3.

“This is ridiculous,” Bell said. “I don’t understand why a lawsuit should prevent me from talking to my elected representative.”

Cortez Guthrie

Bell claims ownership of disputed Guthrie property

Written by Cindy Lane on . Posted in Community News, Cortez, Featured.

CORTEZ – A third party has joined the legal battle over the net camp that Raymond Guthrie Jr. built in 2017, and the disputed submerged lands under it in Sarasota Bay.

A.P. Bell Fish Co., north of the structure, filed suit against the Florida Department of Environmental Protection (FDEP) on May 3 in 12th Judicial Circuit Court in Manatee County, asserting its ownership of both the net camp and the submerged lands.

FDEP sued the wrong party when it filed a complaint against Guthrie in February ordering him to remove the 1200-square-foot structure, claiming he built it without permission on sovereign state-owned submerged lands, according to Bell Fish Co. Manager Karen Bell, who also sued to intervene in the DEP vs. Guthrie case.

“We’re claiming that we have title to the net camp and the submerged lands, and we are intervening because they’re impacting our ownership,” she said. “We own it. We want it there. We’re not going to make him leave.”

In the motion to intervene in the action between FDEP and Guthrie filed on May 4, Bell claims the structure has existed since at least the early 1900s, and, with the submerged lands, is protected by the 1921 Butler Act, which awards title of submerged lands to adjacent waterfront property owners who made permanent improvements on the submerged lands. The law was repealed in the 1950s but continues to affect title to submerged lands that were “improved” with construction prior to its repeal.

FDEP concedes that historic aerial images show a smaller structure where Guthrie built his structure, but the smaller structure became dilapidated, negating a Butler Act claim, according to spokeswoman Shannon Herbon.

The motion to intervene traces Bell’s ownership of the real estate to the 1800s when Guthrie, Fulford and other families from North Carolina settled the area. By the early 1900s, wooden structures built on pilings – called “net camps” or “fish camps” – were numerous in the bay off Cortez, used for supply storage, net mending, and living quarters, and were connected to the mainland by piers, according to the lawsuit.

Bell asserts it is entitled to a disclaimer from the Board of Trustees of the Internal Improvement Trust Fund of the State of Florida, named as a co-defendant in the lawsuit, acknowledging Bell’s ownership.

“A.P. Bell will suffer irreparable harm if BOT and its agent, FDEP, are allowed to continue in their quest to remove and destroy the historic Guthrie Fish Camp structure under the guise that it is on sovereignty submerged lands without this circuit court’s determination of A.P. Bell’s Butler Act ownership claims, in violation of A.P. Bell’s property and due process rights under the Federal and Florida Constitutions,” the lawsuit asserts.

A hearing has not yet been set in the case.