After years of repairs, Boys & Girls Club plans to rebuild

Three years after securing unanimous approval of the Sarasota Planning Board of a street vacation for a renovation project, representatives of the Roy McBean Boys & Girls Club in Newtown were back before the panel on Dec. 10.

Land that had been acquired by the organization included a street that straddled the line between the property owned by the club and the neighboring Sarasota Housing Authority, where the latter is currently developing the final two phases of its Cypress Square apartments.

This time, though, the Boys & Girls Clubs of Sarasota and Desoto Counties is seeking to rezone a portion of the property plus secure site plan approval to build a new facility as an overall expansion of its facilities. The entire site is to be conveyed to the SHA, which will lease it to the organization. 

The Boys & Girls Club plans to replace the existing 21,197-square-foot multipurpose structure with a slightly larger 21,760-square-foot building. Because it will not be built on the same footprint, the existing building will remain in use until its replacement is completed.

According to plans, the current building will then be replaced with an approximately 3,600-square-foot covered outdoor play area and a multipurpose athletic field.

The original renovation plan from three years ago would have reoriented the existing building to flip the main entrance away from 21st Street, primarily for safety concerns. Instead, while undergoing the renovation plan, Boys & Girls Clubs leadership decided to rebuild entirely.

“We figured out that the building was just not salvageable,” said Michael Beaumier, president of Osprey Consulting and chairman of the club's building committee. “It’s 30-plus years old. It leaks. We spent a quarter of a million dollars trying to fix the roof. Finally we said enough is enough. Let's figure out what we can do here, because we have all these kids that we don't want to uproot and send them someplace else and tear this club down while we build a new club.”

With the Planning Board’s unanimous recommendation of approval of both the site plan and the rezoning, the Boys & Girls Club will go before the City Commission seeking a two-part approval. In addition to the site plan, an approximately 1.01-acre portion of the property must be rezoned from a Residential Multiple Family Zone District to the Governmental (G) Zone.

Its proximity to the under-development second and third phases of the SHA’s Cypress Square apartments makes it an ideal location for the organization to serve a targeted portion of its clientele.

“We are one of the few Boys & Girls Clubs that’s actually in a public housing project in the country,” Beaumier said. “This is our commitment to continue to be there long term.”

Rezoning the portion of the site to Government will also bring it into the Housing Authority Overlay District, which will match the rest of the SHA property. The SHA leases the club's current site to the organization, and the club will convey the recently acquired expansion site to the housing authority.

“It’s being rezoned G so that we can give it to the housing authority, and it'll be all one big piece of property,” said project consultant Joel Freedman. “So I guess someday when maybe I'm not in front of you guys anymore and this building decides to go away, it'll all be one big piece of property, G zoned for the Housing Authority. But I don't see the Boys & Girls Club going anywhere.”

In addition to providing safe recreation space for young children and teens in separate areas, which includes a full-size indoor basketball court, the facility is designed to also serve as a once-weekly food pantry. The teen center is open until midnight on Friday nights in an effort to keep teens off the street and in the club.

“I’m a Boys & Girls Clubs rat,” said Beaumier. “At 4 years old I was at the Boys & Girls Club. Both parents worked. I come from a blue-collar neighborhood in Connecticut. Boys & Girls Club was the first organization I got on the board of directors in Sarasota County when I moved here. 

“They do good work.”