Bradenton Beach officials seek up to $30,000 for floating day dock fix

Bradenton Beach Mayor William Shearon and Bradenton Beach Police Chief Sam Speciale will seek up to $30,000 in emergency funding to repair a floating day dock damaged after boats crashed into it during Tropical Storm Colin.

Speciale submitted an agenda request Friday for emergency funding not to exceed $30,000 for Sarasota-based Duncan Seawall, Dock and Boat Lift LLC to perform emergency repairs on the dock, which runs parallel to the Historic Bridge Street Pier. Duncan Seawall was the original contractor on the reconstruction of the pier, which reopened in 2015 after Hurricane Sandy caused most of the structure to be shuttered in 2012.

Speciale and Shearon will formally request funding from the Bradenton Beach Commission at a regular city commission meeting at noon Thursday at Bradenton Beach City Hall, 107 Gulf Drive N., Bradenton Beach.

According to the police chief, Steve Porter of Duncan Seawall inspected the pier and day dock after the tropical storm and told Speciale the pier damages are cosmetic. Damages to the day dock, however, is more severe.

“Basically the day dock needs to be either removed or replaced,” Speciale told the Herald on Friday. “He (Porter) told us there was a section of the day dock that’s broken away from the rest of the dock structure and is a safety issue. What this request is, is that Mr. Porter gave us a price of $50,000 to remove the entire dock or, if we wanted to make it so that it was safe enough to reopen, he gave us a ballpark of $24,000 to remove the broken section that would allow us at least to reopen the day dock to the public.”

The extra thousands in the request is to leave some wiggle room before receiving a formal quote from Duncan Seawall, according to Shearon.

Speciale said Friday the emergency repair would enable the city to reopen the day dock temporarily to traffic until officials can come up with an option to replace it.

“The day dock is unsafe as it is,” Shearon said. “Once that (broken) piece is removed, the dock is safe for people to use but, if we have another weather event or something happens, that day dock could break up and tear up our pier.”

Shearon said the broken piece is just to the left of the ramp leading up to the floating day dock, which is made up of sections.

The mayor said he and Speciale also plan on bringing up the expansion of the city’s submerged land lease with the Florida Department of Environmental Protection, which covers the area a few feet outside the pier, the day dock and the Anna Maria Oyster Bar. They hope to discuss obtaining more control over the water by the pier where multiple boats are moored.

If the day dock is fixed but officials don’t address the mooring field, Shearon said, the same situation can arise during another weather event.

“That’s what caused it (damages), was the boats broke loose,” the mayor said. “If they were properly secured and that anchorage was controlled, then we can control it and this wouldn’t happen.”

This story was originally published June 10, 2016 at 6:53 PM with the headline "Bradenton Beach officials seek up to $30,000 for floating day dock fix."