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Why is Margate Vacant?
• Former Margate business owner talks of bad experience owning a builiding in the city
By
Rick Wilson, President Dudley Holdings, Inc., Write-in Contributor
Tuesday,
May 10, 2011
In 1988 I started a business in Margate. The business grew and soon I bought property and built a significant building in the city. In the interest of civic duty, I felt compelled to become a Board Member at Northwest Focal Point, donated monies there and offered my consulting services to City Manager at the time, Lenny Golub, at no charge.
I can't tell you how many things I did for the city. The list is long. My business employed over 30 workers.
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Several years later, I built a small Industrial complex in the city, employing over 100 people with 10 different businesses generating well over $150,000 in real estate taxes and who knows how much economic revenues.
In other words, I was entrenched in Margate. During that time I had interaction with City Commissioners from time to time and felt as though they knew me and appreciated my efforts. I couldn’t have been more wrong.
In June 2007, I was blessed to sell my business to a large firm that continued business in town and leased my building. After a year and a half, this firm consolidated and moved operations northward. My building was sublet to an “Investigative and Recovery business.” This business applied to the City for its Occupational License (now called Business Tax Receipt) was interviewed by all departments and approved. The City accepted application monies and cashed the check. The new business owner moved in, spending thousands of dollars to renovate the building. The business quickly employed 12 people.
Fast forward. The tenant has been there about a year and a quarter as of February 2010. The City discovers that it never physically sent the new business owner his business tax receipt and now feels the tenant is in violation of city zoning laws, despite the fact they never notified him of same.
They said the business was performing Automotive Services in a M-1A business district, which doesn't allow for it. Please know that this building is surrounded with Maroone and Holman auto body shops clearly performing automotive services. I now get involved in an effort to keep the business and its employees in the city. I request a meeting with the city’s zoning head. I am denied.
I ask for a meeting with Code Enforcement and they tell me they can't talk to me.
I ask for a meeting with Margate City Commissioner, Joe Varsallone. He doesn't reply.
At this point it is explained to me by Margate Code Enforcement that Margate City Attorney, Eugene Steinfield, has placed a "gag" order throughout the City denying me the chance to speak with anyone.
Now I retain a lawyer who meets with Steinfeld and City Planner, Ben Ziskal, who among other things asks for a meeting with the Board of Adjustment to hear my case.
Steinfed denied me the meeting - a clear violation of my legal right as indicated by ordinance. Steinfeld says no meeting, see you in court.
I hire a consultant, the now late, Jack Tobin, at a cost of $1,500 to speak to them. Steinfeld essentially tells him to "pound sand." Jack didn’t understand his response either.
Next comes a hearing with Special Magistrate, Mitch Kraft (who since has faced four felony counts for violating public trust). After about two and a half hours (no joke) of Steinfeld calling witnesses, presenting charts and visual ads, interviewing me and my tenant, Mr. Kraft denies our request for this company to remain at the location and orders my tenant out.
I spent $1200 for two attorneys to represent me at that meeting. It could very well be the longest Zoning meeting in front of the Special Magistrate in the history of the City (for a trivial matter) and likely the most dramatic, as Steinfeld was yelling and screaming. By the way, this is all reflected in public record and hearing transcripts.
Now I decide to appeal to Broward County Courts, because no one in their right mind can understand all of this. Many, many, lawyers looked at it for me and agreed it was ridiculous. A simple matter that could only benefit Margate if it were resolved quickly and fairly, and with all zoning laws met and no jobs or tax revenues lost. I appealed the Magistrate’s decision May of last year and it continued from there.
Meanwhile, Mitch Kraft is arrested for all these felonies. Strangely enough, Conspiracy is one of them. There's a surprise.
Now that Kraft is facing charges, I ask to meet with Margate's new Magistrate. I am denied.
My tenant runs into Commissioner Varsallone who comes and visits my building and my tenants business and tells him he can't understand the problem. Varsallone says he will look into it and get back to us. He never does. I call him myself, and he says hello, recognizes my name, and hangs up. If Varsallone was impacted by Stienfeld’s gag order I’ll never know.
As of October last year, I had spent more than $28,000 in legal fees in the appeal process and still had not gotten the chance to appear in front of a Broward Court.
Steinfeld calls for a Penalty Hearing with the new Special Magistrate. He does this despite the fact that I’m in appeal and doesn’t have the common courtesy to wait for a resolution from a judge. He demands that I appear, at which time I am subject to a fine up to $ 1,000 a day for the last several months.
Facing over $100,000 in fines, I give up in November last year and order my tenant out. I closed the building. Yes, another vacant building in Margate thanks to City officials.
Now comes the good news, on April 29, I sold my building ending a 22 year run in Margate, And yes, the City came in and "nit-picked" it for violations prior to giving the new owner a Business License. I even spoke to the Code enforcement people who said they have never seen anything like this vendetta against me.
I think the residents of the City might be interested in my story so that they can understand why economically it is suffering and essentially has no hope of growing. And they will understand why there are a bunch of vacant buildings laying around.
After owning and developing over five million dollars worth of property in the city, I took my money to Coral Springs to develop commercial property there. They have welcomed me with open arms with some discussion of economic incentives - much, much different than in Margate.
Everyone needs to know. The City is driven and run specifically by City Attorney, Eugene Steinfeld, the City Manager and generally the Building and Zoning Department. They control everything. They control new development, existing business, and prospective new business via the permitting process, they even control commissioners by either keeping them unknowingly complicit in their actions or by keeping them ignorant. Commissioners’ power has eroded over the years. As a whole, they’ve been there way to long, switching back and forth as Mayor and seem complacent. More residents should call for Charter Review.
Aside from the new Lady Commissioner, who I feel we are blessed to have and of whom I am impressed, this is a classic case of the inmates running the asylum.
God Bless Margate, I wish the Citizens well, but will have nothing to do with it ever again.
Margate City Attorney email
Letter to Rick Wilson from City Attorney
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