By Mike Lednovich
After more than a year since taking over the lease of the Atlantic Seafood building, new owners Atlantic Seafood LLC have submitted revised concept plans for a new seafood store/restaurant building for approval by the Fernandina Beach City Commission next Tuesday.
Atlantic Seafood LLC is also seeking to negotiate a new lease with the city that would extend the agreement another 30 years.
The resolution being considered by the commission states that because plans for the city’s floodwall protection project cause a conflict at the existing site, the new building will be located on a city owned parcel just south of the existing building location.
Michael Stauffer, architect for the project, submitted a downsized proposal from plans that were submitted to the commission on Dec. 20, 2022.
The two-story building will have a seating capacity for 102 people on the first floor and 49 people on the second floor — a reduction of 15 seats from the original plan.
The building footprint size has been reduced from 4,815 square feet to 4,330 square feet and the building itself is reduced from 3,685 square feet to 3,040 square feet.
The current building is 1,200 square feet and is in such poor condition that it does not meet the standards to have insurance coverage. The prior city commission in 2022 denied plans to expand the size of the building and said a request for proposal should be put out in order to have competitive proposals submitted for a bigger project to avoid the appearance of a “sweetheart deal” to the current leaseholder. Then-Commissioner Bradley Bean opposed that plan.
Bean is now mayor and greenlighted the submission of new plans for a bigger replacement building to the leaseholder.
The submitted drawings are shown above.
The city has a bad track record of building facilities and then leasing them out. The devil is in the details.
Here are just a few questions:
How many parking spots will the city lose?
Who will pay for the ALL the construction costs and then the maintenance?
What is the anticipated revenue the city will receive?
Will the contract be triple net?
What will be the reserve requirements if any?
How can the city put out an RFP if they don’t even know what they want or will even allow on the property?
A lot of questions not many answers in this write up.
Hard to make a decision without additional information.
This is early days. Too soon to answer most of your excellent questions. However, parking numbers will not change, as we reported. –editor