🎓 Exclusive: Vanderbilt calling
Welcome spring! And election day! Vanderbilt explores a West Palm Beach campus, the county ramps up climate change plans, early voters flood the annexation zone and construction delay in Jupiter.
Vanderbilt makes play for downtown site
Where the University of Florida failed, enter Vanderbilt University.
The chancellor of the small, private Nashville, Tenn., school has scheduled meetings April 1 with Palm Beach County commissioners to talk about bringing a university satellite campus to downtown West Palm Beach.
The campus would be built on seven of the 12 acres offered in the aborted 2021 effort to woo a University of Florida graduate campus— minus the land owned by billionaire developer Jeff Greene.
Vanderbilt Chancellor Daniel Diermeier will be accompanied by lawyer and lobbyist Harvey Oyer in private meetings with commissioners.
The proposal is hush-hush. No details have been released. Oyer didn’t return phone calls.
County Mayor Maria Sachs has it on her calendar. She said she didn’t know specifics but welcomed the university’s attention.
“You can see how good we are if a top-notch university wants to come here,” she said. “If we have the land and what they need, we’ll continue the conversation.
“They can choose to go anywhere. They chose to be in the conversation with us to come here. It’s impressive. We should be proud of that.”
A Vanderbilt spokesman said: “We don’t have any information to share, but we’re always exploring new opportunities to expand our impact and further our mission.”
Of note: Vanderbilt is named for shipping and railroad magnate Cornelius Vanderbilt, who endowed the school with $1 million in 1873 to help heal the wounds of the nation’s Civil War. It is known for selective admissions. Its alumni, faculty and staff include six Nobel Prize laureates.
One detail that seems set: Vanderbilt is contemplating only the land owned by the county, about 5 acres, and the city, 2 acres.
Greene, who is building twin 30-story towers nearby, said he had heard rumblings but hadn’t been approached.
He welcomed Vanderbilt: “Any university as prestigious as Vanderbilt would be great for our community,” he told Stet News.
Oyer often represents developer Stephen Ross, the Miami Dolphins owner who pledged $50 million to bring UF. The mostly vacant proposed site is next to The Square, where Ross’ Related Co. is tearing down stores and restaurants to build high-rises.
A little background: Related is downtown’s biggest builder and would benefit from the increased prestige and educational opportunities a high-ranking university would bring. Greene is downtown’s second-largest builder and often competes with Related for market share and tenants.
The UF deal called for Greene to contribute 5 acres he owns along Sapodilla Avenue from Datura to Fern streets for a business-oriented graduate school. The city and county agreed to contribute land west of Greene’s property, stretching to Tamarind Avenue. The result would have been a campus on two square blocks in an area dubbed Government Hill that had long been held for county expansion.
The deal unraveled in February 2023 after UF and Greene couldn't agree to terms, including naming rights, for Greene's donation, The Palm Beach Post reported. Around that same time, newly installed UF President Ben Sasse announced plans to build a graduate school in Jacksonville.
🌡️ County is setting a course for climate change
Palm Beach County is deep in a multiyear project to identify 25 hot spots and recommend practical solutions to manage climate change risks in them.
The hot spots are scattered near Boca Raton and Boynton Beach to Pahokee, Belle Glade and Westgate.
What’s happening: By the end of 2025, county Chief Resilience Officer Megan Houston expects to deliver a climate risk assessment and resilience action plan.
The report will assess the expected everyday challenges that include coastal erosion, drought, extreme heat, flooding, severe storms, high wind and wildfires.
It will use climate, transportation and scientific data and an inventory of key buildings and services in the target areas to identify the most critical threats to daily life.
The county would then seek grants for up to 30 projects designed to help minimize climate threats and disruption, Houston said.
Houston’s team is hosting neighborhood meetings to explain the program and gather ideas from residents. About 40 people participated in person and online at a meeting last month in Westgate.
The county has also launched a survey to help guide its plans.
Among the potential projects: Making buildings waterproof, elevating electrical equipment, restoring natural areas, installing artificial reefs, creating cooling stations, community outreach and education, accelerated emergency response and adapting land use codes.
What’s at stake: Millions of dollars in federal climate change grants.
Of note: The county recently received a $1 million grant from an EPA environmental justice program to plant shade trees in the Glades communities near Lake Okeechobee.
What they’re saying: “When we are thinking about infrastructure and long-term investments, we need to be figuring out where we need to invest capital and how we should be investing our capital more strategically,” Houston says. “This risk assessment is helping us understand those nuances.”
— Hannah Spence and Carolyn DiPaolo
🇺🇸 Election day: High early turnout in annexation zone
Since Palm Beach Gardens announced its proposal for a massive annexation of Cabana Colony and dozens of other long-established communities in September, opposition has been intense.
Gardens officials said they would leave it up to voters.
Going into election day today, opponents are upbeat.
Early voting and vote-by-mail turnout is high, they say, driven by voters who simply do not want to live in the city.
Voting figures published by Supervisor of Elections Wendy Link back them up.
In 13 precincts in which all voters faced the annexation question, turnout stood at about 30 percent Sunday after early voting ended, Stet News calculated.
In Juno Beach, which has a hotly contested mayoral race, turnout hovered at 23 percent.
In North Palm Beach, which has just one contested council race and the Republican presidential primary, turnout stood at 12 percent.
And in Palm Beach Gardens, with just the Republican primary and no local races, turnout came in at 6 percent. Democrats and no-party residents make up more than 60 percent of the city’s 43,000 voters. They had no question on the ballot at all.
Elsewhere: Aside from hotly contested council races countywide, voters will decide if Riviera Beach can borrow $115 million for civic improvements and if West Palm Beach can toughen requirements to run for office.
In court: A lawsuit filed by four Hidden Key residents to stop the Gardens annexation inched forward. The city filed its response March 4, dismissing Hidden Key’s claims that the city failed to follow Florida law and did not follow due process.
“Ultimately, petitioners can find no support in the record, nor any pertinent legal authority for their assertions; therefore, they rely on misstatements of the controlling law and inapplicable legal citations in an attempt to make a case,” City Attorney Max Lohman wrote. “As respondent has shown, however, petitioners have failed to meet their burden.”
Of note: Lohman appeared to accept Hidden Key’s argument that its guard gate is not part of the city. But he argued Hidden Key is still an enclave because it is only accessible by crossing through Palm Beach Gardens. That’s because the westbound lanes of State Road A1A outside the guard gate are part of the city, Lohman wrote, meaning anyone entering Hidden Key would have to cross city territory.
What’s next: Hidden Key residents have until the end of the month to respond to the city’s arguments. But if voters defeat the annexation proposal, they could drop the suit entirely.
By the way: In Hidden Key, a community of 70 homes east of U.S. 1, turnout stood at 58 percent Sunday.
🌼 The juice
⚖️ The Florida Supreme Court declined to hear Julie Botel’s final appeal Friday, meaning votes in the Riviera Beach City Council election for her will not count and her opponent, Glen Spiritis, will take office. Palm Beach County Circuit Judge Scott Kerner had ruled that Botel could run but the Fourth District Court of Appeal reversed him. (The Palm Beach Post $$$; the Supreme Court ruling)
🚂 Brightline's revenue went up more than 174% year-over-year in 2023, but that wasn't enough to avoid a multimillion-dollar net loss, according to its latest financial report. (South Florida Business Journal $$$)
💡 The Federal Election Commission has deadlocked on a complaint that Florida Power & Light used a consultant’s network of obscure dark money nonprofits to conceal its political spending. (Florida Bulldog)
🛥️ A look at some of the most highly anticipated yachts at this week’s Palm Beach International Boat Show. (Superyacht Times)
💰 Palm Beach billionaire Nelson Peltz’s battle for a seat on Disney’s board. (New York Times - gift link/no paywall)
⚾️ 561 insider: Spring training construction delay
A new construction schedule delays work by a year on the spring training home of the Miami Marlins and St. Louis Cardinals in Jupiter.
But it avoids uprooting the teams next year or moving the summer-league Class A ball clubs that play at Roger Dean Chevrolet Stadium in Jupiter’s Abacoa community.
The big change revealed March 5 by local news website ByJoeCapozzi.com calls for new buildings to house strength and conditioning, athletic training and other functions. Instead of tearing down each team’s clubhouses, those buildings will be renovated, as part of the $108 million project.
“It's a reduction of the disruption of baseball with the teams. It keeps the teams here in Jupiter,’’ Kirk Bauer, director of sports for Fawley Bryant Architecture, told the Jupiter Town Council on March 5.
The original plan “would have potentially required the Cardinals and Marlins to temporarily relocate spring training out of Jupiter for a minimum of one, potentially two seasons” unless they used massive temporary structures, 2GHO Inc., the teams’ planning agent, said in a report to the town. Those temporary options turned out to be too costly.
Preliminary work will start in October, with the bulk happening after spring training next year. Bauer said there should be no interruptions to Florida State League minor league baseball in 2025.
Of note: Aside from the major leagues from mid-February through March, the stadium hosts the Florida State League’s Jupiter Hammerheads and Palm Beach Cardinals from April to September.
There’s still time to take in a game. Major-leaguers play every day through March 24.
For the full story, click here.
🍎 The new Peacock series starring Annette Bening, “Apples Never Fall,” is set in Palm Beach but was made in Australia. (Palm Beach Daily News)
Town leaders turned down a request to shoot the mystery on location, but viewers are treated to scenes that include the north and middle bridges. (A review)
In other news about television programs set in Palm Beach but not shot on the island, Apple TV’s “Palm Royale” premiers Wednesday.
Kristen Wiig, Laura Dern and Carol Burnett star in the satire. (CNN)
🌱 Please help us grow by sharing this newsletter.
🧳 Do you represent an organization or business that wants to sponsor our newsletter? Reply to this email or contact us at stetmediagroup@gmail.com.
🔍 Have a story idea or a news tip? Reply to this email or write to stetmediagroup@gmail.com, and tell us.