PARKER — City officials have canceled a grant to renovate a waterfront park, as ownership of the property continues to be in doubt.
After council members hosted a series of workshops last month, city staff canceled the grant application for state funds to repair the Donalson Point park and mailed out letters to connect neighboring property owners with one another.
Parker staff informed state agents last week that a $60,569 grant requested for boat ramp repairs and construction of a dock expiring in mid-February would no longer be necessary.
“That created a sense of urgency, but it became pretty obvious they were not going to produce an outcome where the city would have clear title,” said Mayor Richard Musgrave. “So we decided to drop it.”
Parker still is expecting to get nearly $1 million as part of the 2011 BP Settlement to build a 500-foot fishing pier at
The funds for the other two restoration projects would be available without Donalson Point as part of the package, officials said, but funds have yet to be secured by Parker.
Local meetings of the Florida Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) and the Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) fell through last week due to dangerous weather conditions.
In researching Donalson Point park to receive the funds, the city discovered the park — waterfront property which it maintained with public funds for decades — was actually private and split among the 51 surrounding property owners in Donalson Point subdivision.
To the city’s legal counsel, a clarifying document from 1973 gave communal ownership of the park and laid out appropriate uses. Formerly a hidden treasure for boating on big tourism holidays, the document restricts “any vehicular traffic, the launching of boats, or the use and possession … of any motor boat, vehicle or motorized apparatus whatsoever.”
A letter from the city went out to the 51 property owners and identifies about 47 individuals’ contact information and includes a separate sheet to determine each owners’ preference for the park’s fate.
Several residents at the city’s workshop were vehemently opposed to forming a homeowners association to take over the park.
By accepting ownership rights neighbors could restrict usage to the community only and amend the clarifying document to allow motorized vehicles. However, the community would be liable for the property and would have to maintain the property including the repair of a deteriorating boat ramp.
The code magistrate will be gathering those forms and then will share those preferences with the rest of the vested owners, Musgrave said, but the city wanted to get its hands clear of the situation.
“A couple residents have reached out to host a meeting,” Musgrave said. “I’m just trying to be responsive to whatever they desire.”