HACKED BY CYBER-ATTACK - ALPERENBTN

[Johnny French]

Will write one or two LTTEs myself today, so won't add my usual lengthy commentary to the already long editorial and 3 LTTEs in the Jan. 29 C-T. Besides this bit, see if you can anticipate my additional response to the editorial. No, the TOBA and resorts cannot co-exist, because what was meant to be an exemption has become the rule. In the end, there can be only one.

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Caller.com

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Open Beach Act, resorts can and should co-exist
Passions run high regarding area's beloved beaches. Job One now should be to stop screeching and start communicating.

January 29, 2006



Corpus Christi has a chance to learn from the mistakes made by the coastal cities recently reported on by Caller-Times writer Nick Nelson. Galveston, South Padre Island and Destin, Fla., each have had differing levels of success in trying to balance public access to beaches even as they enjoy the benefits of major coastal development. We can get ahead of the game if Corpus Christi commits itself now to living up to the requirements of the state's Open Beaches Act while major developments, such as the $1.5 billion resort planned for North Padre Island, are still on the drawing board.

We make a mistake if we allow the issues of preserving public access to the beaches and welcoming major development to degenerate into an either/or issue. They are not. Opponents of a contemplated pedestrian beach on the island just south of Packery Channel and adjacent to the planned resort would simply sacrifice a potential major economic boost for the sake of driving motor vehicles along the water's edge. That would be an expensive ride for a resource-strapped city.

Neither should the public be forced, as it is in Galveston, to try to find parking alongside roads and on neighborhood streets so they can enjoy what is guaranteed them by state law, ready access to the Gulf beach. Destin, Fla., while enjoying spectacular growth, let the balance go too far to the development side and now finds itself trying to recoup public access to its beach by requiring new development to dedicate public facilities. Or by buying public access at inflated land prices.

After-the-fact corrective action is never as good as getting it right from the start. That's why Corpus Christi can, and must, commit itself to a public access plan built around a pedestrian Gulf beach that both meets the letter of the Open Beaches Act and its spirit. That law requires a public access point every half-mile to beaches from which vehicular traffic has been prohibited, with one public parking space for every 15 feet of beach under the restriction. Such a parking lot is already built. And it should mean no cutting corners to discourage the public, like Galveston's beach parking lots that are disguised as private condo parking.

Corpus Christi has an obligation to all of its citizens to encourage development on an island on which so much public investment has been made.

That investment - the dredging of Packery Channel, the raising of the John F. Kennedy Causeway - envisioned just such a tax-revenue enhancement as the proposed development. Creating a pedestrian beach, which will return to the City Council's agenda soon, is part of that plan.

A recommitment to the Open Beaches Act should be as well.

Caller.com

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Letters to the Editor: 01.29.06

January 29, 2006

School at risk

Seashore Learning Center had great hopes of passing their high standards on to middle school students in the area with Seashore Middle Academy, and also providing the island with a much needed community center. However, due to politics and land speculation, the Academy and community center may never become a reality.

After working for over a year to acquire land on Padre Island for the school, the board may have reached the end. They have worked with land owners, the city, and Nueces County, and yet have come up dry. Most land owners and developers on Padre Island are speculating on huge gains as the island continues to develop and are not willing to sell at this time.

Hopes for the school to be located on undeveloped acreage owned by the city on Commodore Drive were dashed because the Flour Bluff Independent School District opposes the project. The city has no planned use for 6.27 acres of these 16 undeveloped acres, but has said it will not lease the land without the support of FBISD.

And so, the organization that brought school choice to Corpus Christi elementary students may have to continue to say farewell to its students as they complete the sixth grade.

Colleen McIntyre

Just greed

The Jan. 21 edition of the Caller-Times has several letters on both sides of the beach issue.

It is extremely odd that people still write letters concerned about "safety" on the beach to "protect us" from that "awful traffic that is nearly running us over."

The issue is greed, plain and simple. The supporters of the status quo want to preserve a way of life and some degree of a natural beach without turning it in to another Miami Beach.

In the same issue, on the front page is a sidebar proclaiming "Lessons" in beach building. "Galveston, South Padre Island and Destin, Fla., have blocked car traffic on their beaches and built 'world-class' resorts. A four-day series examines how they did it." "Lessons!" Indeed. How condescending can you get?

This is further proof, as if any was needed, that the Caller-Times is now the official propagandist/mouthpiece for the local developers who want to ruin what is left of our beaches.

To call Galveston and South Padre Island a "world class" beach is a gross misrepresentation of that term. Wall to wall development, wild bacchanalia, theft from parked cars, long walks over hot sand or concrete or seawall steps to reach the beach, over-population, continuous restaurant and bar trade and crass commercialism are the hallmarks of these so called "world-class" beaches.

It is going to take a major effort from the grass roots public to stop this beach grab being orchestrated by our civic leaders, developers and local media.

Dicky Neely

Hands off beach

Why do we have to be the same? I am proud to be associated with the nickname for our local beach, "Redneck Riviera." Yes, there are people who abuse our beaches. These are some of the same people who leave dirty diapers in parking lots.

I lived in the Washington, D.C., area. It was only about 50 miles to the Eastern Shore (Rehoboth Beach/Ocean City).

At that time, my husband had a bad back. You had to walk blocks to get to the boardwalk (T-shirts, candy, vendors of all sorts) just to see the water. If you went to Atlantic City, N.J., again it was the boardwalk or nothing, and all the time the men peddling the bicycle-powered rickshaws were shouting, "Watch your back." If you did not, they would run over you.

After I retired, I moved home to Texas (originally from San Antonio) and settled in Corpus Christi. My 87-year-old mother lives with me, and she loves the beach.

We are able to drive out to the water, wade in the surf, enjoy the fresh air, watch the fishermen, and an hour later return to our home. Once or twice a month we take our small dogs and let them enjoy the beach.

Do all the people who currently enjoy our peaceful way of life have to give it up for the greed of a few? If they want to build big resorts, boardwalks, etc., let them go to North Beach. Leave our Redneck Riviera alone.

Eleanor Holder