A loading dock has no business disrupting the peace of the Surfside condo memorial | Opinion
I am a commissioner of the Town of Surfside — I am outraged.
Two years ago, our town suffered an unimaginable tragedy when Champlain Towers South collapsed one June night and 98 people were killed. That’s 98 out of our community of 6,000. If that ratio were applied to New York City, my home, on Sept. 11, 2001, it would be as if 125,000 had perished.
A memorial to this horrific event has been Surfside’s priority ever since we could think clearly again. Knowing that the property would likely be sold to private developers, my predecessors on the commission had the wisdom to set aside all of 88th Street along the property’s northern edge for a pedestrian memorial.
But now this important memorial is in jeopardy.
On Aug. 31, the Planning Board approved 4-1 DAMAC’s plans to redevelop the property. But that vote, sadly, was based on deception, leading to an approval many now regret. Those plans located the building’s loading dock on 88th Street, to receive garbage trucks, moving vans, delivery trucks and construction vehicles, all through the memorial.
The excuse given for such disrespect, was a dozen variations of, “The Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) told us to put it there.” We now know this assertion is not true.
As reported in the Herald, FDOT gave no such instruction, knew nothing of the plans for a memorial or its resolution, and did not forbid a loading dock on Collins Avenue. It was all a deception, one that was convincingly delivered.
How did we get here? Deliberations on the Surfside Commission either are in lockstep or stifled. Discourse that questions, prods and seeks the truth is in short supply. Information that reaches commissioners before and during meetings is managed to limit options, perspective and opinions.
There have been many instances along the way, but regarding 88th Street and the memorial, the staff conversation with the developer should have started with, “You cannot be on 88th Street.” It was staff’s job to be skeptical and inquisitive. If we don’t question what we see, how can we determine right from wrong.
Here, the right thing should be obvious. Remove the loading dock altogether from 88th Street. Relocate it to the southwest corner of the building; vehicles can access it from Collins Avenue. The time lost to the developer in redesigning is of its own making. As Lindsay Lecour, the lone voice of reason on the Planning Board said, anything less than relocation, “will cost our town the integrity of this memorial.”
Marianne Meischeid has been a commissioner of Surfside since March 2022.
