Celena Brown is a resident of Clarksville, Ga. She keeps a boat docked at the Marineland marina and travels down to spend time there as often as she can. She was there early the morning of May 17, a Sunday, when a man approached her.
“There was a gentleman out there whose name escapes me right now, but he said that he’s with Jacoby and that they own Marineland, and are selling the slips,” Brown told the Marineland town commissioners at their last meeting, days after the encounter.
The man, whose name she did not recall, was asking her if she was interested. The selling price was $195,000. The Jacoby reference is to Jim Jacoby, the Atlanta-based developer and co-owner of JDI Marineland, which owns most of the non-public land in Marineland and has been in negotiations with Flagler County, the University of Florida and the Department of Environmental Protection to sell all but one of its parcels.
JDI also owns six of the Marineland marina boat slips. Selling might be part of the company’s interest in divesting itself of holdings in Marineland.
“I found out that you were having a meeting here and I thought I would stop by and see what’s going on,” Brown told the commissioners. She wanted to know if the town was selling the marina or selling slips, and whether she had to find another place to dock her boat.
The commissioners appeared stunned. “We should have been notified right away that this happened. I knew nothing about it until she said something right here,” Marineland Mayor Buddy Pinder said. “There should be no solicitation whatsoever. I don’t think any of us authorized anybody to come over there and try to sell you a slip.”
“I don’t think it’s appropriate at all,” Town Commissioner Jessica Finch said.
It so happened that on that May 21 evening agenda, the Town Commission was to discuss an amendment to the town’s boat slip lease regarding the six slips owned by JDI. “The goal is to ensure the parties have a clear and shared understanding of the specific slips associated with the existing leasehold rights,” JDI’s attorney John Henry November wrote Marineland Town Attorney Jeremiah Blocker in April. “We are hopeful that this issue can be resolved as quickly as possible.”
The request refers to Section B of the 2009 lease, which specifies ownership of six boat slips “located contiguously along the north seawall of the Marina,” and which were to be in addition to the 85 slips the town was planning to build at the time. The lease gave the Centex Real Estate Corporation–the predecessor to Pulte Homes, then JDI–rights to access the slips.
The day of the meeting, the item was pulled from consideration at JDI’s request, pending further clarifications from the county attorney’s office, who’d been in contact with the town attorney.
On its face, there was no direct connection between the selling of the slips and the clarification of the lease, though it appears that the two are in fact related, if JDI and the county are wanting to ensure that properties are correctly identified.
Still, Pinder appeared unaware of the maneuvers, especially in light of the solicitation Brown had described. “I think we need to talk to our legal counsel and see what we can come up with,” he said. On June 8, Joe Saviak, who is also Marineland’s attorney, said there had been no developments since that meeting.
Marineland acquired the marina from Centex in 2009. It had previously been a private marina, but had closed in 1999 from disrepair. The marina was to be part of Marineland’s own revitalization. The town won a $202,000 grant from the Florida Inland Navigation District, of which Flagler County is a party (property owners pay a modest few dollars to the district every year), and a $150,000 grant from the Flagler County Tourist Development Council to build 21 slips, 85 percent of which were to be preferentially used by homeowners in what was to be Pulte’s development. The 2006 housing bust put an end to development plans. (See: “How Marineland Got Public Dollars To Build a (Mostly) Private Marina.”)
Before conveying the marina to Marineland, Centex had long-term leases attached to nine slips–six to the Marineland Research Resort, two to the University of Florida Whitney Lab, and one to the National Estuarine Research Reserve. “Upon conveyance of the marina business to the Town, the leases shall be assigned to the Town at no expense to the Town,” a joint 2010 agreement between Marineland and the county stated.
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