The Marineland Town Commission wants its attorneys to reopen its contract with the company managing the town-owned marina in hopes of extracting more money than the $18,000 a year the marina has been paying the town even as the company’s revenue has grown nearly 180 percent in 12 years.
No matter how strong its reasons for reopening the contract may be, the town faces a difficult way ahead, especially if the marina is not receptive to renegotiations.
None of the contractual conditions that would allow for altering or ending the current contract have been met. The contract was extended for 10 years in 2023 with the unanimous approval of the town commission. Mobius Marine, the company running the marina, has no incentive to reopen the contract, especially since the relative pittance it has been paying the town since 2014 was never indexed to inflation, and wasn’t changed with the 2023 contract extension. If the town were to push for litigation, its own shoddy procedures and records, many of them nonexistent, would undermine its case.
Still, at their last commission meeting on April 16, the three commissioners who account for the entire population of the town–Mayor Buddy Pinder, Dewey Dew and Jessica Finch–voted to direct the attorneys to start negotiating, if not just yet. The somewhat confusing vote was to be prepared to start negotiating, pending the commissioners’ list of contractual points they want to make. The commissioners are to turn in that list at the next commission meeting on May 21.
“We’d like to see that incorporated in an amended contract, and that provides specific, clear direction to us,” Joe Saviak, one of the town attorneys, said. The other is Jeremy Blocker. “We need to engage in discussion, negotiation with them to effectuate those amendments, if possible.”
The town is struggling financially. It has lost a third of its property tax revenue as the Dolphin Adventure attraction returned to nonprofit status. Town attorneys are recommending renegotiating contracts with both the marina–managed by Mobius Marine Inc.–and Ripple Effect Ecotours, which offers boat tours, kayak sales and rentals and other services to local visitors. Revenue from Ripple Effect is not as substantial as from the marina.
The Marineland marina has twice benefited from Flagler County tourism tax revenue subsidies–in $150,000 in 2010 and another $150,000 in 2018. Mobius began managing the marina in 2011. According to its 10-year financial data, the 20-slip Marina had revenue of $112,425 the year it signed the 2014 contract version with Marineland (the version in effect currently). In 2025, Mobius had revenue of $313,284, a 179 percent increase.
Meanwhile, the amount of money Mobius is paying Marineland has decreased 28 percent in the same period, when adjusted for inflation: The company has been paying the same $18,000 a year since 2014. Had there been an inflation adjustment each year, the company would have been paying Marineland $25,000 this year. Instead, the $18,000 it is receiving is equivalent to $13,000 in 2014 dollars.
Initially, Mobius was paying the town 60 percent of marina revenue and taking 40 percent. In 2014, that changed to the flat $18,000. If the same percentage share had been preserved, the town’s revenue in 2025, from the marina, would have been significantly higher. (It isn;t clear how the earlier contracts defined “earnings.”)
But a four-page memo by the attorneys on potential renegotiations draws a grim picture of Marineland’s own position, and not just regarding its contract with Mobius. There are no minutes of the 2023 meeting when the contract was extended. There is no audio recording. There is no official document that shows how the vote broke down, or if it was, in fact, unanimous. The attorneys are relying on former Town Attorney Dennis Bayer’s recollection that it was unanimous. There is also a document bearing a former mayor’s signature, certifying the extension.
The attorneys researched the 2011 request for proposals, when the town was looking for management companies to take over the new marina. They couldn’t find it. There is no way to know how many companies responded to the RFP. Eight pages from the 2014 contract are missing.
So are records dating back to the commission’s original approvals of the contract. So are records about the commission itself, and its makeup. Bayer recalled to the attorneys that sometime around 2005, the commission’s membership decreased from six to three members. How was that done? No one has any idea.
It should have been a charter amendment. The charter has not been amended since its 1969 adoption. It could have been done by ordinance. “The specific ordinance or charter amendment has not been located,” the attorneys wrote in their memo. That sets up the possibility that the current commission’s makeup is not legal, if challenged in court: the town would have no records to prove it so, other than the 1969 charter, which calls for six members.
“It is clear from meeting minutes that the Town Commission has operated with three members for a number of years lending credence to that reported history,” the attorneys write in hopes of protecting the town’s rear in their memo. The memo also notes that “Other local government boards in Flagler County operate with three members.” While community development districts and the east Flagler mosquito board do, no major governments, and certainly no municipal government, does. Even Beverly Beach, a town slightly more significant but less storied than Marineland, has six commissioners.
The memo includes a four-page outline excerpted from the Mibus contract that sets out permissible reasons to sever the contract. which could be the basis for termination by the parties. These are included at the end of this memo. “For these defenses to operate and void the contract, they must be proven factually in a court of law,” the memo states. “Facts would have to be gathered to support and prove one of these recognized defenses to contract formation and enforcement.”
Opposing counsel in a court of law could brandish the Marineland attorneys’ own memo to show why the town has no factual records to back up its claims.
Nevertheless, the town is proceeding with direction to the attorneys, expected in a few weeks, to challenge Mobius Marine.
He attorneys’ memo provides a few recommendations that, while written in neutral language, reveal to what extent the town had lost its administrative and legal bearings: “All final and actionable votes by the Town commission during Town commission meetings need to be recorded and retained within accessible meeting minutes,” read one recommendation.
“All Town contracts should contain an amendment provision and process.”
“Retention and access to Town contracts and their supporting documents should be guaranteed with a records management system.”
The attorneys also suggest town staff should preface agenda items with analyses to help commissioners understand the issues and make informed decisions–a routine part of any other government. But Marineland’s staff works by the hour, a few hours a week, and some of the recommendations may not find a receptive ear from a staff whose town manager is paid $250 a month (before taxes) and whose town clerk is paid $500 a month. The highest paid members of the town administration are the attorneys, at $24,000 a year–33 percent more than the Mobius revenue, and that’s due to increase to $30,000 next year, then $36,000 in year three (or twice the current Mobius contribution).
What extra money the town could extract from the marina may prove to be more elusive than commissioners admit.
JimboXYZ says
Since the original contract & extensions weren’t indexed for inflation & the most recent extension was 2023 for the next decade. Maybe this is a message ? They are going to run this extension to 2033 & see where they are, leave their options open that day. Maybe Mobius Marine isn’t in the future ? It’s a Marina, Mobius Marine isn’t the only one that can operate & manage the Marina ? Considering that Marineland is going bankrupt for the population of 15 the City is ? None of this seems to be a priority ? How competent to hold or even qualified to have been hired are any of the 15 residents of Marineland to hold those positions for their relative city government ? Seems there’s an apathy of concern to operate a strip of land, that loosely calls itself the City of Marineland, that is more dependent upon county governance for a reality. When Marineland went bankrupt, sold off, was there much reason to really care what direction the City was going ? I mean the homeowners there own their property(ies). Sooner or later those residents will be forced to be relatively annexed by the County & very little will change for what currently is or won’t be in place there in the future. Marineland is & has always been Flagler County. Maybe there’s a deal where St Johns takes over from Matanzas Inlet to the South end of Marineland’s city limits ? Maybe Flagler County takes complete control over the city, only retaining the name for historical sake ?