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The Palm Beach Post from West Palm Beach, Florida • Page 173

Location:
West Palm Beach, Florida
Issue Date:
Page:
173
Extracted Article Text (OCR)

2B THE PALM BEACH POST FRIDAY, JANUARY 22, 1988 si Alternatives to jail explored as St. Lucie facility nears capacity By TERESA LANE Palm Beach Post Staff Writer FORT PIERCE Within three years, St. Lucie County could outgrow the 506-bed jail it opened six months ago on Rock Road a sobering thought for county officials who spent $18.5 million on the facility only to be faced with $5 million more in expenses. The need comes as no surprise to planners, who have seen the county's popula tion grow from 87.182 in 1980 to 128.451 this year. While construction of two additional jail pods on Rock Road is on the county's capital priority list, members of the Correctional Planning Committee Thursday said that they are exploring alternatives to incarceration that could be cheaper and more beneficial to offenders.

"I'd like to see work on the new pods begin as soon as possible, but that won't solve the problem forever," said Elton Schwarz, public defender for the 19th Judicial Circuit, which encompasses St. Lucie, Martin, Indian River and Okeechobee counties. "We need to look at things like Palm Beach County's work-release program. That's been a great success down there." Schwarz, a member of the newly formed committee, also said he was looking into how Martin County handles offenders placed on probation. St.

Lucie has no probation officers but contracts with Salvation Army volunteers to perform the service. Regardless of how many inmates would be affected by a work-release or probation program, the committee members agreed that 200 additional beds at the Rock Road jail would be needed in the next three years. The beds are included in a $32 million list of capital projects the county hopes to pay for with a 1-cent sales tax incease that will be on the ballot March 8. f. The County Commission hasn't requested the additional tax yet, but Chairman Jack Krieger said it would probably be approved at Tuesday's meeting.

"I don't think it's any surprise that we need additional jail space," Krieger said. eBartolo to 11,250 fine for dumping sewage By EMILY J. SMITH Palm Beach Post Staff Writer STUART The developers of the Treasure Coast Square mall agreed Thursday to pay an $11,250 state fine after workers deliberately pumped raw sewage into a wetland before the $54 million mall opened last year. Officials with the Edward J. De-Bartolo Florida headquarters met Thursday with state Department of Environmental Regulation officials to describe how the two September spills happened, said Janet Phipps, with DER's enforcement division in West Palm Beach.

"They're very upset and very sorry that it happened," Phipps said. "But it happened." Phipps said DeBartolo representatives did not dispute the DER findings or the amount of the fine. The spills occurred Sept. 3 and 4 when contractors hired to haul raw sewage from the site had problems with the pump truck, Phipps said. Workers got most of the raw sewage into the truck with a makeshift pump.

But about 1,000 gallons wouldn't fit. And it was emptied into a nearby wetland. "They said it only happened one time," Phipps said. "But the guy told our people on site they'd done it at least twice." Samples drawn from the spill area showed extremely high levels of fecal coliform, the bacteria found in raw sewage. The state-accepted level of fecal coliform is 800 colonies per 100 milliliters.

Results from the spill site showed levels as high as 7.4 million colonies per 100 milliliters, Phipps "We're talking raw sewage," she said. "This stuff had never been treated." The spills occurred before the opening of the mall, when the sewage treatment plant was not yet operational. DeBartolo officials last week agreed to pay a $1,000 fine levied by the county Health Department for the spills. The company donated the money to the Environmental Studies Center on Indian River Drive, a center that teaches students about the environment, jj Okeechobee man hopes to rope in gold at Olympics By" JESS W. HENRYES Palm Beach Post Staff Writer OKEECHOBEE Going for the gold is the Olympian challenge at Calgary, Canada, this year, and an Okeechobee man is seeking that honor on horseback.

The 15th Olympic Winter Games are being held in a town famous for the Calgary Stampede, the world's largest rodeo. This year, in addition to the more usual Olympic events, such as skiing and skating, 36 professional rodeo cowboys from the United States and Canada will show their sport to the world. D.R. Daniel, 23, of Okeechobee is one of the best calf ropers in the world and has been asked to join 17 other members of the U.S. team in a rodeo at the Olympics in February.

The two national teams will use their skills to compete for $96,000 in prizes, plus gold, silver and bronze medals awarded by the Canadian Professional Rodeo Association. "Because Calgary is well known for the Stampede, we feel this is a way for a lot of people to see rodeo firsthand for the first time," Mike Whittle, a Canadian rodeo spokesman, said. Whittle said the Olympic Arts medals are not the same as the regular Olympic medals, but will be given to the top three winners of the saddle bronc, bareback, bull riding, calf roping, steer wrestling and barrel racing events. Daniel took second place in the rodeo world championship in Las Vegas, Nevada, last month and is one of the top five rodeo cowboys in current standings. "I'm excited about going to the Olympics," Daniel said.

"I've been practicing every day, when I'm not on the road." At his home in Okeechobee, Daniel practices in a specially built rodeo pen. "I try to tie 50 calves a day," he said. Daniel said his goal is to wrest the title of world champion from Lewis Field of Elkridge, Utah. Whittle said the idea of featuring a rodeo during the winter Olympics came up two years ago when Winston Bruce, manager for the Stampede, thought it would be a way to make more people aware of the sport. "Our dream is to see the Russians against the United States in a rodeo," Whittle said.

v'l In addition to the medals and prize money, Whit-tlefcaid all individual winners will receive a championship buckle. The five-day show, from Feb. 22 through Feb. 27, will be at the Stampede Corral next to the Saddledome arena. i ft Dolphin illness reaches area; 1 found dead V7V 4 coast since July, nearly 70 of them along Florida shores since Thanksgiving, Odell said.

Last week, the head of an international task foree investigating the deaths came wto Florida to monitor the situation firsthand. "We know the cause of death, a bacterial infection, but we doi't know what causes the bacteria' to take over," Odell said. The dead dolphins are believed to have migrated from the nortfi, and it is not known whether local populations have been affected. The rash of dolphin deaths plaguing the upper Eastern Seaboard now appears to have reached the Treasure Coast, scientists said Thursday. A dead Atlantic bottlenose dolphin was found Tuesday south of Vero Beach, said Daniel Odell, a scientist at Sea World, near Orlando.

He said a carcass found last week at Hobe Sound was too decomposed to determine whether it was a dolphin. More than 500 dolphins have been found dead along the Atlantic MILT PUTNAMStaff Photographer Cowboy D.R. Daniel practices roping a calf for his participation in a rodeo championship during the Winter Olympics in February. Renewed parties at Double Roads rile residents Indiantown Rd Atlantic Ocean 7 Jupiter OcMnJQA By STEPHEN POUNDS Palm Beach Post Staff Writer JUPITER Residents of The Corinthians condominiums have begun a campaign to get rid of parking by partygoers and stamp out illegal drinking and "bathroom smells" at the beach across the street. "Help us enjoy the roar of the ocean, not the sound of illegal revelry," says a letter sent this month to the town by The Corinthians Condominium Association.

In the letter, the residents asked for no-parking signs in front of the condominiums and enforcement of a drinking ban passed last year to break up rowdy parties at the popular beach spot called Double Roads. Jupiter Public Service Director Jim Davis said it's not illegal to park in front of The Corinthians. "The council has always taken the position of providing beach access to the public," he said. But residents aren't just worried about the parking. The partying across State Road A1A has gotten out of hand, they say.

"In addition to the piles of beer cans, we are subjected to bathroom smells as we walk to the beach in front of our condo. "Our boardwalk is being dismantled piece by piece and being used for fires for these beach parties," the letter says. E. Hale Hamilton, secretary-treasurer of the condo association, said the letter was spurred by a huge beach party one day between Christmas and New Year's. More than 100 youths joined in the festivities.

Now, Hamilton wonders what will happen during spring break for college students. "They use the whole area as a bathroom. It smells like a toilet," Hamilton said. "They park all over the place, spin their tires and rip up sod." Parking was banned last year by the council along a portion of Double Roads on both sides of A1A. Davis said the party problem would diminish if the county would develop its 150 acres south of The Corinthians.

The county isn't planning any park development there for at least five years. Until then, the town's Police Department will be hard-pressed to stop the partying, Town Manager Griff Roberts said in a letter this week to residents. "Unfortunately, it would take more manpower and equipment than the town currently has," Roberts said. The Corinthians 10 12 Scientists track tagged manatee in harbor at Lantana Boatyard I i By ELIOT KLEINBERG Farms should share in water risks, wildlife official say By MARY McLACHLIN Palm Beach Post Staff Writer GAINESVILLE If South Florida's farmers want to share the wealth of Lake Okeechobee water with fish and wildlife, they should share its adversities, even unto losing a crop every now and then, a state wildlife official said Thursday. Disasters such as droughts and floods occasionally mean the loss of an entire yearly "crop" of wildlife, said Brad Hartman, environmental services director for the state Game and Fresh Water Fish Commission.

Sugar cane and vegetable growers who compete with wildlife for water ought to be subject to the sanie risks, Hartman told 300 people attending the University of Florida's annual water quality conference. Under South Florida's tightly structured water supply system, a certain amount of water is guaranteed at certain times of the year to irrigate crops in the Everglades Agricultural Area. At other times, water is drained from the area to keep canals specified levels to protect crops. The guarantees are contained in a series of agreements among various state and federal agencies, and changing the system in the way Hartman suggested would require changes in the agreements. Wildlife officials and environmentalists have protested increasingly that the system is managed for the benefit of agriculture to the detriment of Everglades wildlife.

"There's always going to be pressure to put as much (water) in there as possible, just so you'll nave, a bigger reservoir, a fuller reservoir when the dry season starts," Hartman said. "That's the pressure that' I think is in conflict with fish and wildlife interests," Hartman's "shared adversity" proposal did not go over well with a fellow panelist who represents agriculture. 1 "Having a bad year in farming means bankers will decide who the survivors are," said Jack Maloy, former director of the South Florida Water Management District and now an official with a large farming corporation. "The Everglades Agricultural Area represents more money invested, more economic benefit to the state and has more national signficance than does Disney World," Maloy said. Town of Orchid ready to bloom; The Associated Press ORCHID A population boom is in store for this tiny coastal community of eight people, which is beihg sold to a Connecticut-based developer with plans to turn it into an upscale residential area.

The 450-acre company town along Indian Rivjer County's Atlantic coast, owned by Deerfield St. Lucie County, has mostly birds, manicured grapefruit trees, virgin woods and dirt roads. Richard Roberts Group of Avon, complete the town's purchase in April and convert the groves into a high-priced residential community with an 18-hole golf course and beach and tennis clubs, spokesman Darrell McQueen Vero Beach saH. rv, The purchase price was not released. How To Help If you see a manatee with a radio transmitter, authorities ask that you do the following: CALL 1-800-342-1821.

DESCRIBE the color and pattern of the transmitter's bands. DO NOT touch the tracked from space by weather satellites. The seven were tagged at Kennedy Space Center, home of about 300 manatees, early in the migration season, which began Nov. 15. Scientists have used airplanes and boats to tune in the frequencies and follow the mammals for more than 500 miles up and down the coast, as the sea cows search for warmer water.

Here in South Florida, it might be as much as 10 degrees warmer. One animal, Diane, made five round trips between the Cape and Georgia in three days. On Thursday, she was 20 miles north of Lantana. The scientists began looking for Jerome when they noticed him missing from the Cape colony, Reid said. An aerial survey found him last Friday near Stuart, then lost him.

The tracking device, which has a range of 10 miles and is tuned to frequency 688 the one assigned to Jerome's transmitter found him in the Lake Worth area Saturday. This morning, the team will pursue another manatee in the Pompa-no Beach area. For now, it is comforting to know Jerome is doing fine. "It's satisfying," Reid said. "Here's a manatee in this urban madness and it's actually surviving." Palm Beach Post Staff Writer LANTANA Their skiff rocking Sn the choppy waters of Lake Worth Thursday evening, Jim Reid and Terry Plantier twisted an antenna and listened carefully to the beeps emanating from what looked like a Geiger counter.

They were looking for Jerome. They found him. Jerome, a 9-foot adult manatee, pushed his snout just above the surface at the Lantana Boatyard, surrounded by barges and giant yachts in a small harbor bordered by a mobile-home park. The two scientists Reid from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and Plantier from the Florida Department of Natural Resources didn't see much of Jerome in the dusk.

What they did see was a firecrackerlike striped device bobbing in the water. The floating transmitter, attached to Jerome through a loop around his tail, is one of seven that the two services use to track manatees along the Atlantic coast. They map the mammals' migratory patterns, learn where they spend the winter and determine their range of movement. Scientists still are learning about the manatees' tracking ability, which enables them to travel hundreds of miles and find warm water "anals around power plants or quiet tributaries sheltered from cold wind. Reid compared that with traveling hundreds of miles down a series of country roads "in the dark, without headlights." The scientists hope that what they learn also will help officials teach boaters how to watch for the gentle endangered mammals and perhaps lead to the marking of areas as refuges or slow speed zones.

The giant sea cows need all the help they can get. In 1987, 113 were found dead in Florida waters. Of those deaths, 39 were blamed on boats or barges. Three of the transmitter-tagged manatees are in the Cape Canaveral area. Four, including Jerome, are in South Florida.

Two of the four also are tagged with special devices that can be J' SCOTT WISEMANStaff Photographer Jim Reid (left) and Terry Plantier direct an antenna toward a signal from a jnanatee's tracking device during the search on Lake Worth..

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