Palm Beach officials are concerned about the long-term impact of The Breakers’ recently installed beachfront breakwater project and hope a state environmental agency will help craft a measure to require the resort to indefinitely monitor and mitigate its rock mounds.
At issue is how the breakwater will affect the town’s ongoing efforts to keep its public beach just south of the breakwater in good condition with plenty of sand.
The latest initiative came after the Florida Department of Environmental Protection told Palm Beach officials the resort no longer needed a “perpetual easement” from the town to complete the breakwater project, town Coastal Manager Sara Gutekunst told the Shore Protection Board during its Nov. 20 meeting.
“I would certainly hate to have us in the position … (where) this project has such an impact that the sand that we put in the system starting in January is gone by the summer,” board Chair Melissa Ceriale said.
A representative of The Breakers did not immediately provide a response to a Palm Beach Daily News request for comment on Nov. 24.
The Breakers’ Midtown Headland Area Erosion Control Project saw the resort update its coastal rock mounds, or breakwaters, and add three new ones that extend south, across the private property of Judith Lauder at 126 S. Ocean Blvd., to the northern edge of the public beach east of Clarke Avenue, known as Clarke Beach.
About a year ago, state environmental officials told the resort that it needed the town to sign a perpetual easement to greenlight the construction of the breakwater at Clarke Beach, since the southernmost rock mound would be placed on state land.
The resort’s efforts to have that easement granted by the town were met with pushback from Palm Beach officials. The issue arose about the time the resort refused to sign a perpetual easement needed to allow Town Hall to continue pursuing its 50-year Midtown sand-renourishment agreement with the U.S Army Corps of Engineers.
The Breakers’ refusal concerned town staff, who had argued that the plans for the resorts’ breakwater revolved around the continuation of the town’s Midtown sand-renourishment agreement.
But the state environmental agency recently announced that the resort didn’t need the town’s easement, Gutekunst told the board. That’s because the town already voiced its support for the project in a 2023 letter from the Town Council to state environment officials.
Currently, the plan does require the resort to monitor Clarke Beach’s condition and fix any problems, but only until the next Midtown Beach nourishment project, which will follow on scheduled to begin in January, Gutekunst said.
That timeframe translates to around eight years of monitoring, the town’s coastal consultant, Mike Jenkins of Applied Technology & Management, said during the Town Council’s August meeting.
But to ensure that the condition of Clarke Beach remains closely monitored, Town Hall staff and officials of the environmental agency are discussing an alteration to the resort’s breakwater permit, one that would extend the monitoring and mitigation requirements indefinitely, Gutekunst said during the Nov. 20 meeting.
Board Member James McKelvy wondered how the permit could be changed, considering it was already issued.
“It seems a little unusual to go back, especially considering the contentious nature of the project,” he said.
But Town Engineer Patricia Strayer said the state enivornmental agency is also seeking to make those changes. That’s because the breakwater project was planned around expectations that the town would continue its federally backed Midtown Beach renourishment efforts.
But the conditions that justified the permit for The Breakers’ breakwater have changed, she told the board.
“If there are negative impacts, I will hope that The Breakers … (does) what’s right considering what they have been given as guidance,” Ceriale said.
Diego Diaz Lasa is a journalist at the Palm Beach Daily News, part of the USA TODAY Florida Network. You can reach him at dlasa@pbdailynews.com.
This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Daily News: Palm Beach vies for greater monitoring for Breakers’ rock mounds
Reporting by Diego Diaz Lasa, Palm Beach Daily News / Palm Beach Daily News
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
