Laying it Out

The St. Joe Company has to intervene in the case of the ARC & Gulf Transportation morass, the most family-oriented adjective at this time.

Maybe we have been beating around the bush a little too much, because of press time this week still no action.

As the developer of the commercial park of which the ARC & Gulf Transportation building sits, they have the power as spelled out in ink and paper within the park association's covenant to "unilaterally" change the document at any time.

The company, in simpler words, can do what they want when they want as they want at any time when it comes to that commercial park.

Now the city did a nice thing a few years ago when they deeded over a parcel it owned in the commercial park, a scrubby little spit of land that sat near the water plant and across Industrial Road from the wastewater treatment plant.

The ARC & Gulf Transportation provide mostly unseen services, but invaluable services to any community wishing to maintain a claim to the label, particularly now when times are so tight and the economic waters roil so.

The two organizations had long sought new digs, making do with the buildings of businesses previously closed and making do rather well, though new space had long been a goal for which grants had been applied for and received.

This is a good thing considering both not-for-profits are not exactly flush with money.

In a time of hardship, when finding work can be a trial, how do you sustain a work crew for folks with challenges in life for which the ARC represents lifeblood, activity, interaction and the satisfaction of hard effort?

And in the case of Gulf Transportation, consider gas prices, the cost of drivers and the clients whose only mode of getting around to do the simple things like going to the doctor, filling prescriptions or paying bills and you get the picture of an organization that somehow makes the improbable possible.

So the city did a good thing when it deeded the land over to ARC & Gulf Transportation.

Might have been nice to alert the organizations to that pesky little clause about dues being owed for things like landscaping and general upkeep of the building and surrounding areas, might have saved the entire current fiasco which has come about because the dues have built up to a nifty little $7,000 or so.

In addition, before threatening a lien on the building for unpaid taxes, it might have been nice if someone in some well-appointed office would have taken a step back and consider the factors involved.

The ARC & Gulf Transportation building is among the nicest and cleanest one could find. The landscape is near impeccable as it should be given the hard-working crews the ARC puts out in the community each day.

No dues are needed to ensure the upkeep of this parcel and given its surroundings - dirt roads and empty lots across the street, a wastewater plant across the road - no need to hold these organizations to payments due for work they have performed, beyond any possible measurement, themselves.

Yet here the association is saying pay us our money down.

The answer that has so far been forthcoming is that there is nothing to be done, that the covenants are the covenants and that is that. Pay up.

The ARC & Gulf Transportation Board of Directors has been trying to schedule a face-to-face with the association board, but has thus far met with silence.

ARC & Gulf Transportation even have support of a fair number of current tenants of the commerce park, so what the issue could possibly be other than, as was stated in this office by a visitor several weeks ago, extracting "blood money" just because there is power there to do so.

Meanwhile the attorneys involved in the case insist that the dues are owed and ARC & Gulf Transportation should pay the so-called "debt."

Nonsense.

As stated above the developer of this commercial park, over which the association governs, has the ability to unilaterally - it states it right on page 17 of the covenants - change any aspect of the governing bylaws or the rules by which the entire operation is run.

Therefore it is long past time for The St. Joe Company to demonstrate some community partnership here and allow the association, if that is the correct term for it, to wipe the slate clean and allow ARC & Gulf Transportation to continue to operate on their available shoestrings.

A lien on their building would be catastrophic as far as receiving grants and other sources of funding.

There is such a thing as community stewardship, a certain level of responsibility that any business in any community must have.

Time is long past for ARC & Gulf Transportation to have a bit of that stewardship thrown their way.