Conch House decision today

Conch House decision today



By KATI BEXLEY
kati.bexley@staugustine.com
Publication Date: 10/27/08


St. Augustine City Commissioners will decide today whether to approve the Conch House redevelopment, after the board was split on the project and tabled it.

Mark Knight, city planning and building director, said Sunday that property owner David Ponce amended the project and took out the convention center. Instead, he is asking the commission to allow him to expand the restaurant already on the property and include a banquet room in the proposed new hotel.

Ponce did this because some commissioners strongly opposed the project's convention center and said it would bring too much noise and disrupt Davis Shores, the neighborhood that surrounds the Conch House.

Ponce wanted to build a convention center after going through meetings and hours of discussion at the Planning and Zoning Board.

The board and the public wanted the Conch House's Reggae Sunday -- a weekly drinking event -- to be stopped. Neighbors have complained for years about problems Reggae Sunday brings to their area.

Ponce agreed to cut the event and replace the revenue by building a convention center for parties such as weddings. Some city commissioners said this wouldn't be any better than Reggae Sunday.

The Planning and Zoning Board approved the project, but the City Commission was against the convention center.

Ponce is asking the commission to grant him a Planned Unit Development for a trio of three-story condominium buildings of 32, 20 and 12 rooms staggered along Comares Avenue. The middle one will serve as both a condo and a hotel. The project also would include renovating the existing Conch House Restaurant and adding a new marina restaurant and a bar with 177 seats.

Ponce had also held public meetings with the Davis Shores neighborhood and changed the project in an effort to work with the city and residents. But Knight said petitions have circulated in the last week stating residents are now once again against the project.

Knight said that Ponce could go ahead with some of redevelopment plans without the commission's approval because the area's zoning allows it. Ponce could build condominiums and a 30-unit hotel with a banquet room.

"There are quite a few things he could do with it without (the commission's approval)," Knight said.

IF YOU GO...

* The St. Augustine City Commission is meeting today at 5 p.m. in the Alcazar Room at City Hall, 75 King St. There will be a public hearing on the Conch House redevelopment project.


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