For several years now, groups that use the Community Center facilities, especially high-use groups, have been talking about making improvements:  The Historical Society needs more space; Royal Palm Players needs a better back stage; Friends would like more comfortable seating and high-tech equipment in the auditorium; Boca Bargains needs more space; the duplicate bridge group needs space; The Island School needs a little more space and a dedicated room for lunch and after-school programs; all groups could benefit from a dedicated meeting room. This list goes on and on.

What would be needed is to restore and renovate all that is wonderful (that includes leaving the exterior of our buildings as they are), and modernizing the guts of the entire facility, addressing issues such as ADA compliance, HVAC shortcomings, technology challenges and opportunities, and general needs for more and better space. After all, some 34 island organizations use the Community Center at one time or another during a season.

This week island resident Gary Martin was out in his boat going around the island, looking for gunk. It’s not an activity that a lot of people partake in, but he is very concerned about the vast amount of floating organic matter in our harbor and backcountry water. Gary had already seen it in the water in front of his island home – patches of what appears to be sludge mixed with collard greens, followed by a disturbing absence of seagrass in the shallow waters right outside of his home. But he wanted to see how far it went and how much there was.

He took Boca Beacon Publisher Dusty Hopkins with him to take photographs. Gary thought they would have to go down to Redfish Pass to see large amounts of the gunk, but they didn’t get that far. They had already seen three huge fields of it before they got anywhere close. They also saw more bald spots in the harbor and Intracoastal where the seagrass was gone.