Commission approves former Klauber property purchase

The Longboat Key Town Commission voted unanimously to approve the $452,500 purchase of the property at 4110 Gulf of Mexico Drive located between Bayfront Park Recreation Center and Pattigeorge’s. The purchase price was below the values estimated in two separate appraisals of the property, the lower of which was for $680,000, Mayor Jim Brown said at the commission’s Nov. 7 regular meeting.

Former Longboat Key Commissioner Gene Jaleski urged the commission not to buy the land next to the park. He said the money would be better spent on a piece of land on Longboat Drive South that could be enjoyed by hundreds of Longbeach Village residents or for other purchases such as employee raises and training or new equipment. He also said that the purchase could hurt efforts to develop a community center in a redeveloped Avenue of the Flowers.

“Listen to the rabbi (Jonathan Katz), who said we should aggregate our resources in one spot to attract tourists and residents to one area,” Jaleski said. “Tourists aren’t going to go to Bayfront Park, and residents probably aren’t going to go to the Publix except to shop. We need to find some way of aggregating everything to attract a core of people into a social cluster.”

But Brown disagreed.

“Gene, you made a lot of statements there that I just don’t understand,” he said. “It’s a good buy because it’s providing space in this park that we need.”

The money used for the purchase was designated for open-space land and could not be used for other purchases, Brown said.

But after voting for the project, Commissioner Lynn Larson said that the commission should clarify the reason for the purchase.

“The reason the town wanted the piece of property is for expansion of the land area of Bayfront Park, which we are working on plans for rebuilding and redeveloping a new park and new community center,” Brown said. “In earlier studies of this we found that we were short of land to do what the town wanted to do, and this is going to make it even more possible than the piece of land that the county purchased for our use three or for years ago.”

The property was owned by longtime Colony Beach & Tennis Resort owner Dr. Murray “Murf” Klauber’s Two Huts Inc. until September, when First Federal Bank of Florida received the certificate of title following a foreclosure judgment. The Sarasota County Property Appraiser’s website sarasotaproperty.net, states that a 1,332-square-foot residence with three bedrooms and three bathrooms is located on the property, which last sold for $329,000 in January 1998.

“I think we probably got a good buy,” Brown said.