Submitted by Anne H. Oman
Reporter-At-Large
December 27, 2014 1:00 p.m.
Editor’s Note: With local commissions and boards taking a break during the holiday season, and when our readers are focusing on family and friends, we will take a look back during the days ahead and post some of our previous upbeat articles for your reading pleasure. We hope you enjoy!
Photo courtesy of the Amelia Island Museum of History
www.ameliamuseum.org
On January 31, 1935, officers of the Afro-American Life Insurance Company, led by chairman Abraham Lincoln Lewis, purchased a 33-acre tract of oceanfront land near the south end of Amelia Island and christened it American Beach. Dr. Lewis, though a wealthy man, had not found a welcome for his family at other beach resorts, and the new community was to be a haven where African Americans could build vacation homes and enjoy the beach, the ocean, the dunes and the fresh sea air. Lots sold for $100 to $150, and the first owners were officers of the insurance company, physicians, attorneys, dentists, funeral directors and other black professionals – many of them residents of Sugar Hill, an elite African-American neighborhood in Jacksonville later obliterated by freeway construction.
On January 25, 2014, several dozen current residents – some of them descendants of the original families — plus a smattering of guests gathered at the American Beach Community Center on Julia Street to celebrate and swap stories and memories of the community’s 79-year history.
Michael D. Stewart, the keynote speaker at Saturday’s celebration, who is now Director of External Affairs for the Jacksonville Aviation Authority, recalled golden summers spent at the house his grandparents built in 1941: “My first memory is the great enjoyment of staying at my grandparents’ home in a closed community where I could go to friends’ houses and walk home and still be safe.”
He spoke of 4th of July fireworks on the beach, of the Afro-American Insurance Company’s annual picnic, and of a weekend-long group birthday party he hosted here when he was in college. The party, popularly known as the Virgo bash, “wasn’t as wild as people think,” he insisted with a broad smile.
On a more serious note, he talked about the winds of change that have buffeted the community: Hurricane Dora, which ripped through American Beach in 1964, reducing thriving businesses and homes to derelicts, and the civil rights movement, which he called “a double-edged sword” for American Beach since African-Americans could now focus their resources elsewhere.
“What had been a closed community began to change,” he recalled. “When I came home from college, I could go to other beaches. I enjoyed it for a summer, then came back to American Beach.”
“But my greatest reflection,” he said, “is that when my grandchildren come they’re the fifth generation to stay in the house and to swim in the waters of American Beach.“
It wasn’t all nostalgia, however.
“We have our challenges,” said one longtime resident who declined to be identified in print.
The greatest challenge, the elephant in the room Saturday, was the water issue. Should the two hundred current owners of property in American Beach pay to have their homes connected to Nassau County’s water and sewer systems?
At present, only a few residents, on the south end of the community near Burney Park, are connected to the county’s water and sewer lines. The rest rely on septic tanks for sewage disposal and get their water either from their own wells or from the American Beach Water System, owned and operated by Bobby Dollison, who also runs American Beach Villas, a residential motel. The spark that put the issue on the front burner was a letter sent by Mr. Dollison to his customers last February informing them that, as of July 1, 2013, he could no longer provide water because expensive repairs to the system were needed. Then, in October, he reversed himself, informing customers that the company “will continue to provide potable water to existing customers and any new customers desiring to receive this service.”
The continuation would, however be contingent on two things: the water system being granted non-profit designation by the Internal Revenue Service and “pending receipt of a grant that is being pursued during these difficult times of receiving public dollars,” according to Mr. Dollison’s October 11 letter. The overall cost, he estimated, would be under $150,000.
It could not be learned whether either the tax exempt status or the grant has been obtained. Mr. Dollison did not return repeated phone requests for information.
Meanwhile, the American Beach Property Owners’Association began an effort to obtain county water and sewer services for the community, hiring an attorney, Michael S. Mullin, and sponsoring community-wide forums to inform property owners of the findings of an engineering study, by GAI Consultants of Jacksonville, on the feasibility of providing water and sewer service.
“We held two meetings and invited all the property owners – not just members of the association,” said association president Sherald Wilson. He estimated that about forty percent of the property owners belong to the association.
The matter was taken up by the Board of County Commissioners on October 28 and November 4. At those meetings, several members of the property owners’ group affirmed the need for a county hook-up.
Federal Judge Henry Adams, a former president of the property owners’ association who built a home in American Beach in 1983, warned of the inherent danger of septic tanks near the ocean on a barrier island and of septic tanks and wells coexisting on small lots.
“What if there’s another Sandy?” asked Rev. Carlton Jones, vice president of the property owners’ group. “Some septic tanks were put in before permits were required. They could be just steel drums.”
The county commissioners agreed to fund another study, for approximately $10,000, to determine the cost of the water and sewer connection per lot. The findings are expected in the next two or three weeks, according to Sherald Wilson. After that, a fact sheet and a ballot will be sent to every property owner. If 51 percent vote to go ahead with the plan, the county will hold public hearings and sponsor a bond issue to be supported by assessments to American Beach properties, spread out over twenty or thirty years. And the majority will rule: if 51 percent vote “yes,” all property owners will be required to connect to the system and share in the cost. According to County Engineer Scott Herring, if residents give the go ahead, the design and permitting phase of the project would take about 6 months and the construction would take another 12 to 24 months.
Mr. Wilson acknowledged that assessments could pose financial difficulties for some but added that the association is “actively searching to identify grant sources.” As of Saturday, no grants had been obtained, he said, but attempts were continuing.
A letter to Nassau County Manager Ted Selby dated October 25 and signed only “Concerned Property Owners of American Beach” stated that “Commissioners should also consider a majority of developed properties on American Beach have their own private wells and septic systems. Others are served by the American Beach Water System; so there is no major water service challenge at this time. The majority of these property owners do not desire an assessment to help pay for the Association’s proposal of a community-wide system.”
No names were attached to the letter, and the letterhead and type font were strikingly similar to those of Mr. Dollison’s American Beach Water System.
At Saturday’s gathering, Bill and Linda Price expressed their willingness to share in the assessment, even though their home near Burney Park already has county water and sewer.
“It’s good for the community,” said Mr. Price. “The community needs a better infrastructure – some of the septic tanks are unsafe.”
Mr. Price, the president and CEO of CSIGeo, a Jacksonville engineering firm, is a member of the property owners’ association and its water committee.
“Since I’m an engineer, they put me on the water committee,” he said. “I first came down here for the Virgo Bash with Michael Stewart when we were both at Howard University. Later I bought a house here because I wanted to be part of black history.”
He acknowledged that American Beach is more diverse now and will become more so in the future.
“But the world is diverse,” he added. “It will always be American Beach.”
Another couple, Calvin and Regina Fenn, from New Jersey, said they own a lot on Lewis Street, with an ocean view, but haven’t built on it yet.
“We’re waiting to see what’s going to happen,” said Mr. Fenn.
As the property owners pondered the issue that could profoundly affect the future of this small historic enclave wedged between two large and wealthy gated communities – Summer Beach and Amelia Island Plantation – Mr. Stewart, the keynote speaker, called for harmony.
“We have to make a tough decision, but when we do, let’s agree that’s the decision,” he urged. “Let’s do it and go on to the next big challenge.”
Editor’s Note: Anne H. Oman moved to Fernandina Beach from Washington, D.C. Her articles have appeared in The Washington Post, The Washington Star, The Washington Times, Family Circle and other publications. We thank Anne for her contributions to the Fernandina Observer.