Back in 2012, I met with then-Lauderdale-By-The-Sea Mayor Rose Ann Minnet and the town commission, urging the establishment of lifeguards.
My appearance was in response to the fatal drowning of Olga Gainer’s young son. Despite what I believed was a reasonable plan, it was politely rejected.
Then, 12 years later and following several other drownings and the recent horrific suffocation death of a little girl, Town Manager Linda Connors requested me to submit another proposal for lifeguards. So far, there has not been a thank you, nor even an acknowledgement from her.
In a publication by the CDC that I co-authored, “Lifeguard Effectiveness: A Report of the Working Group,” there can be no argument whether lifeguards prevent drowning and serious accidents. LBTS is the only municipality in South Florida with a public beach that does not provide lifeguard protection.
With the decision not to place lifeguards on the beach, there will likely be more drownings, a possible shark attack, and even the possibility of another little girl being suffocated in the sand.
My life has been devoted to drowning prevention, and for good reason, I consider the LBTS beach to be one of the most dangerous beaches in Florida. I continue to hope that town decision-makers will reconsider.
Lifeguards save lives. To tell people they must swim at their own risk is a bad decision.
John Fletemeyer, Fort Lauderdale
The writer is executive director of the Aquatic Law and Safety Institute and former chairman of the International Swimming Hall of Fame.
An epic failure in LBTS
Your front-page article showed an epic failure on the part of the new Lauderdale-By-The-Sea Town Commission and town manager.
For the manager to say that a paltry 300 or so survey responses is representative of the town is sad. It was done in a truncated amount of time and after the tourist season ended.
How many survey respondents were from the north annexed part of town, which drastically differs from the center of LBTS with its beaches and tourism economy? The north is comprised of condos and private homes and is not at all comparable to the downtown and hotel areas where lifeguards are needed.
The town’s replacement plan is a ruse at best, in my opinion. There could be a happy medium. Go back to Pompano Beach and bring back for a vote that city’s February 2023 proposed contract addition of two lifeguards for eight hours a day, seven days a week, for $200,000 a year and install them at the El Prado and Commercial Boulevard areas, with designated signs.
Bring this issue back. This bad press certainly outweighs the town’s “family friendly” P.R. image used for tourism, and it offers the safety required for visitors and residents alike.
Barbara Cole, Lauderdale-By-The-Sea
A costly burden to taxpayers
After foolishly deciding to build a new Fort Lauderdale police headquarters on the same prime real estate as the old facility, then learning that our police department couldn’t be bothered with the operational inconvenience of onsite construction activities, then having to pay to lease another building to relocate operations there, we find out there’s a significant design error resulting in cracking throughout the new concrete structure.
I fear that we’ll have to pay millions more to indefinitely extend that lease and who-knows-what in potential litigation costs.
First the Broward County Courthouse concrete beams cracked due to missing reinforcing steel. Then our city resiliency planners failed to anticipate the vulnerability of the City Hall basement to flooding.
Then the city’s Las Olas Boulevard parking garage’s lavishly expensive lighting facade failed after a few years because it wasn’t built with sufficiently corrosion-resistant materials. Lastly, let’s not talk about the county School Board’s gross mismanagement of an $800 million construction bond program.
As a city, county and schools taxpayer, I am not amused.
George Mulhorn, Fort Lauderdale