Editorial: Lightner deserves more than patches for its roof

Editorial: Lightner deserves more than patches for its roof Publication Date: 06/06/07
The Lightner Museum -- Florida's Smithsonian -- gushed with water Saturday morning as heavy rains connected with Tropical Storm Barry arrived in our area. To the credit of volunteers, paid museum staff, contracted professional cleaners, the city's own staff and the roofing company, the museum reopened Tuesday. The people involved literally worked around the clock cleaning up the venerable museum and its artifacts.
"The city literally bailed us out," said Bob Harper, the museum's director, of the city's own staff who arrived in the wee hours with all kinds of equipment.
The museum was fortunate. Barry Myers, the museum's curator, got the first call around 4 a.m. that the museum's burglar alarm was going off. Arriving expecting to find a faulty alarm, Myers instead found a waterfall. He swung into action. "Had not the burglar alarm gone off, it would have been worse because no one would have arrived until 8 a.m.," Harper said.
A portion of the roof was in the process of being repaired but Harper is not pointing blame at anyone. Any claim against the roof contractor or his insurance company will be made by the City Commission pending the city's determination of the cause of Saturday's incident and damage reports from the city and the museum about the building and the collections.
The terra cotta tile roof overall is badly in need of repair. Harper said City Manager Bill Harriss has been on top of repairs from the get go. But because of funding priorities, the roof repair has been piecemeal as money becomes available. It would take an estimated $2 million to replace it all.
The city has many infrastructure needs including projects and city services. Each must get in line on the priority list. City Commissioner Errol Jones has championed more taxes to maintain historic buildings. He is critical of the city's failure to fix the roof for at least the past three years. He said he's tried to get the rest of the commission on his side but it has not happened.
The St. Augustine City Commission should look at moving up the roof project on its priority list to get it done. In doing so, it needs to determine what other projects or services can move down the list and the impact of a proposed property tax cut from the state on its overall future spending. That will be tough.
But the Lightner Museum-City Hall building -- one of the city's 19th-century Henry Flagler-built treasures -- deserves extra points on the city's priority list, not just for preservation but for its historic tourism draw, the city's economic backbone. Click here to return to story:http://staugustine.com/stories/060607/opinions_4639064.shtml © The St. Augustine Record