Hurricane Sandy Leaves Her Footprint on Cape Charles

Photos by CAPE CHARLES WAVE

October 30, 2012

“Can New Breakwaters Save Sea Breeze Apartments?” read a Wave headline on August 28.

Exactly two months later, Hurricane Sandy answered the question with an emphatic NO.

The only question remaining is how much worse the damage might have been without the new breakwaters.

Next door to Sea Breeze on Washington Avenue, the Historic District’s newest home (c. 2011) boasts on homeaway.com that it’s only 150 feet from the beach.

As of yesterday, that is an understatement.

[Read more…]

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CANDIDATE FORUM
Burke Urges Openness, Bennett Pushes Development

By DORIE SOUTHERN
Cape Charles Wave

October 30, 2012

About 70 residents turned out last Thursday for a Candidate Forum at the Palace Theatre, where Steve Bennett and Dan Burke answered written questions submitted from the audience.

Northampton County Supervisor Willie Randall moderated the event.

In introductory statements, Steve Bennett cited his four years’ experience on Town Council.  Bennett was defeated for re-election, but is getting a second chance to run due to the death of councilman-elect Don Clarke in May.

Bennett is a project manager with the architecture and engineering firm Clark Nexsen in Norfolk. Previously he was employed by Baymark Construction Corp., the developer of Bay Creek, where Bennett and his wife, Nan, live.

Bennett served on Town Council from 2008 until June 2012. During the forum he lamented both the previous lack of residents’ interest in town government as well as the current degree of contentiousness over the pending sale and use of the old school at Central Park. Bennett admitted that the sale of the old school “could have been handled better.”

Candidate Dan Burke emphasized his professional career at Schlumberger, the world’s largest oil exploration company, where he was manager of engineering, director of security, and an environmental affairs officer.  Burke said he believed his career experience would serve him well when called on to make decisions as a councilman.

Now retired, Burke has lived in Cape Charles 14 months, although he and his wife, Linda, have vacationed here for years. Burke said they chose to live in Cape Charles after falling in love with its small town charm. They reside on Madison Avenue in the Historic District.

Burke is running on a platform of accountability, accessibility, and openness in government. He criticized Town Council for holding numerous closed session meetings resulting in decisions of major importance without input from town residents. [Read more…]

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NORTHAMPTON SCHOOL BOARD
Kiptopeke Elementary Hopes for Provisional Accreditation

By SARAH BARBAN
Cape Charles Wave

October 26, 2012

Northampton County Schools have been facing their fair share of troubles — from accreditation, to staffing, to test scores. The county school board even had to call in an outside company, Edison Learning, to try and help sort out the issues.

At the Northampton County School Board meeting October 24, it appeared that rough seas are still ahead.

Due to last year’s unsatisfactory math scores at Kiptopeke Elementary, the school cannot be deemed fully accredited.

The three classifications for accreditation are: fully accredited, accredited with a warning, and seeking additional accreditation.

Kiptopeke falls under the latter.

“We have to make a request to the [state] Board of Education for their consideration to see if they will give Kiptopeke that rating of additional accreditation,” reported Superintendent Walter Clemons.

With the exception of math, Kiptopeke’s scores went up in all other areas, including reading, language arts, science, and social studies.

The State Board of Education met October 25 to decide whether to grant Kiptopeke a status of additional accreditation needed. The school awaits the decision.

Clemens lamented that in these difficult times, Northampton County schools, along with the entire United States, face federal budget cuts under the Budget Control Act of 2011, known as sequestration.

The cuts could affect Federal programs such as Title One, Head Start, English Language Acquisition, IDEA, and Career and Technical Education. [Read more…]

SHORE THING: Where’s Cape Charles’ Nude Beach?

By GEORGE SOUTHERN
Cape Charles Wave

October 24, 2012

Yesterday was the reason I moved to Cape Charles.

Walking out on the fishing pier, feeling the not-too-hot sun and the not-too-strong breeze on my face, gazing at the beach at low tide, smelling the sea air, hearing the gentle ripples of the waves — it was just perfect.

And almost no one was around. But rather than luxuriate in the solitude, I felt a sudden sadness that more people were not out at the beach to appreciate the perfect day.

Perhaps it was the decades of office confinement tugging at my conscience — I wanted to share the ecstasy of freedom to enjoy nature.

Actually, I was not alone. As I had walked up the boardwalk toward the pier I had noticed a car with Pennsylvania plates slowing down to parallel park.

And as I walked out on the pier I passed two elderly women. The older woman looked vaguely familiar. Perhaps I had met her before. I couldn’t remember. With a sudden pang I realized that very old women often look very much alike.

I leaned over the railing, gazing at the sand flats at low tide. From a distance, walking in the shallows, came two spectacular specimens of youthful beauty.

There I stood, leaning over the railing. I was invisible to the blonde Venuses below me, which I have become used to. Age is often invisible to youth. But I also seemed to be invisible to the old women on the pier, whose conversation was loud enough to overhear but spoken as if I was not there.

Youth and Age — and I stood between the two. The girls approaching me might be nearly 40 years’ my junior, while one of the women on the pier, I soon learned, was nearly 40 years’ my senior. [Read more…]

COMMENTARY: Expert Warns Eastern Shore –
Special Trade Status Slipping Away

By MICHAEL W. O’BEIRNE

October 23, 2012

Earlier this month I attended the American Wind Energy Association Offshore Windpower conference in Virginia Beach. Coastal Virginia wind-related project sites are in various stages of development.  Investors have amassed, and logistics are being refined in hopes that offshore leases will head towards steel in the water.

Yet, as corporate forces are gearing up, the Virginia Port Authority is changing the Eastern Shore’s most vital investment and trade incentive — how they allocate Foreign Trade Zone designations and to whom.

Politics and competing economic interests from Hampton Roads may leave the Eastern Shore high, dry, and out of the game.

A little background: In July 2009 I toured sites along the Delmarva coast in a project development visit for wind energy companies and manufacturers.

Since then, several domestic and foreign interests have proposed, built, and still have site agreements for future wind developments — both onshore and offshore on the Eastern Shore and in the Atlantic Ocean.

But much more work needs to be done.

My business centers on U.S. incentives to attract foreign investment. That’s why I came to Northampton and Accomack counties — to see U.S. Foreign Trade Zone sites firsthand at Wallops Island, Accomack Airport Industrial Park, and the Cape Charles Sustainable Technologies Industrial Park (part of the Southport development).

There is also a tiny sliver of land in Cape Charles used to dump dredged materials designated as a Foreign Trade Zone.

Cape Charles Mayor Dora Sullivan raised FTZs in a 2011 letter to Governor McDonnell urging focus upon her town in the offshore wind energy game. [Read more…]

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Battle of the Yard Signs: Democrats on Top in Historic District

By CAPE CHARLES WAVE STAFF

October 22, 2012

Yard signs tell a story — whether or not it’s an accurate one.

In observance of the political silly season, Wave staff drove 15 miles up and down each street in the Cape Charles Historic District yesterday, recording every single yard sign they saw — almost 300 in all.

That includes political signs, For Sale signs, and various community advocacy signs. Permanent signs such as for vacation rentals were not counted.

The biggest surprise was that the Blue candidates (Obama, Kaine, Herschbiel) trounced the Red ones.

That doesn’t mean Cape Charles has more Democrats than Republicans — it just means more Democrats put up yard signs.

At the local Town Council level, Steve Bennett racked up 43 signs to Dan Burke’s 31. Town Council candidates do not register by political party, so no correlation can be established between the local and national races.

One interesting phenomenon: all five Cape Charles bed & breakfasts are displaying Steve Bennett signs. Bennett thus wins the “George Washington slept here” award.

Community Center/Old School Cape Charles, with many variations, recorded 31 signs.

Worthy of mention: “Prayer: America’s Only Hope” was seen 8 times. [Read more…]

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Old School Group Protests Tax Credits to Remove Parkland

By GEORGE SOUTHERN
Cape Charles Wave

October 19, 2012

Old School Cape Charles, LLC, the group fighting to save the school in Central Park from becoming an apartment building, has launched a new frontal attack: tax credits.

The would-be apartment developers, Echelon Resources, Inc., have always maintained they will not take ownership of the school until the Virginia Department of Historic Resources approves their application for tax credits.

Echelon hopes to receive a 45 percent rebate of its expenses to remodel the school into apartments — 20 percent from the federal government and 25 percent from the state of Virginia.

That rebate would come from tax credits “syndicated” with investors operating other profitable enterprises. Investors in the Echelon project could use the credits to pay taxes on their other businesses.

Both the federal and state tax credit approval process is managed by the Virginia Department of Historic Resources in Richmond.

Historic Resources Department Director Kathleen Kilpatrick informed the Old School group October 5 that
“. . . neither the Department nor the National Park Service have authority to deny credits if a legal applicant fully meets the requirements of the program as set forth in law and regulations.”

So Old School has set out to document why Echelon Resources fails to meet the “requirements of the program.” [Read more…]

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LETTER: Let Voters Choose Northampton School Board

October 18, 2012

DEAR EDITOR,

Many years ago our founding fathers were faced with the choice of acceding to the demands of those persons who insisted that they knew better who should govern them and therefore be appointed to positions of power as opposed to making those decisions themselves through elections.

I’m certain they were somewhat fearful themselves of their decision to make a revolution against those powers and create the first nation on Earth in which the people would be given the opportunity to choose for themselves their representatives.

This year the people of Northampton County will be faced with a similar decision as to whether we will have some control of those persons who will represent us, the citizens, as well as our children on the Northampton County School Board.

Will we leave the appointment of those persons to our Board of Supervisors or will we decide for ourselves through elections, who will represent us?

People have asked why this change should be made, which is indeed a legitimate question. For a myriad of reasons I believe this change will create a better situation for our county, but two in particular stand out.

First — although mistakes by voters can indeed elect someone to the school board who simply should not be entrusted to this important position, there is a remedy: Four years later, that person can be defeated in the next election.

In other words, unlike the present situation, a bad choice can be removed through the election of a better candidate.

In today’s world, members of the school board have little reason or inclination to maintain a close connection to the people, as they simply are not our representatives, but rather the representatives of those people who appointed them.

Second — people who are appointed in today’s world may or may not have an agenda in which the children are their primary concern and focus as opposed to the desires of those to whom they owe the debt of their appointment.

Does anyone truly believe that today’s members will push a policy which is better for our children and community but is not in line with the desires of the members of the Board of Supervisors? [Read more…]

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NO ROOM IN THE INN
Fig Street Bed & Breakfast Gets Permission to Expand

By DORIE SOUTHERN
Cape Charles Wave

October 17, 2012

Cape Charles Historic District Review Board yesterday approved a request from the Fig Street Inn to convert an accessory building behind the main house into a guest room.

Owners Donna and Greg Kohler said their bed and breakfast business is booming since they relocated from Rhode Island and opened the Fig Street Inn in May 2011.

The inn has four guest rooms inside the house but is licensed for six rooms.

Behind the house is an out building once used as a pool house for an above-ground swimming pool since removed.

The pool house will become guest room #5.

The pool house is connected to the main house by a breezeway but is not visible from the street. The house and accessory buildings sit on seven lots. [Read more…]

No Mention of Hotel Cape Charles on Historic Board Agenda

By GEORGE SOUTHERN
Cape Charles Wave

October 16, 2012

“Back to the Drawing Board for Hotel Cape Charles,” read the Wave’s headline for September 19. The story reported hotel developer David Gammino’s efforts to persuade the Cape Charles Historic District Review Board to approve already completed renovations and allow the hotel to receive a permanent occupancy permit.

With over 1,000 reads to date, the story is the most popular in the Wave’s short history.

In a nutshell, Gammino pled guilty to changing the hotel design after the Board approved his earlier plan. He had originally planned to spend $500,000 renovating the old hotel, but later decided the result would be nothing special. Only a unique property would make the hotel a “destination,” Gammino told the Board in September.

And so he ended up spending nearly three times as much to create a building that has received rave reviews in the Washington Post and USA Today. Now, the hotel needs $30,000 monthly revenue to survive.

Board chairman Russ Dunton told Gammino that adding wrought iron railings to the hotel balcony’s glass walls would help the hotel blend in with the rest of Mason Avenue.

Gammino responded that he could not convince his partner to replace $60,000 worth of glass with wrought iron to create an “illusion” that the hotel was historic.

Gammino noted that when he bought the hotel it had vinyl windows and plastic doors — all grandfathered in and requiring no approval from the Board. [Read more…]

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TOWN COUNCIL: Meal Tax Receipts Are Shot in Arm

By DORIE SOUTHERN
Cape Charles Wave

October 15, 2012

Meal tax receipts in Cape Charles increased by 35 percent in the past three-month period compared to a year earlier, generating an extra $22,000 for Town coffers.

Total meal tax revenue for the July-September first fiscal quarter was nearly $86,000. The same period last year drew less than $64,000.

Although Town Treasurer Kim Coates didn’t provide Town Council a reason for the big jump in tax proceeds, Council members should be able to figure it out. Following Council meetings they have been seen congregating at The Shanty, Cape Charles’ newest restaurant.

Treasurer Coats announced at the October 11 meeting that property tax bills would be mailed out soon. Property tax is due the first week of December.

TRAFFIC STUDY

In other Town Council business, Vice Mayor Chris Bannon was the only member voting against a resolution to request VDOT studies for peak season and off season traffic flow through the intersection of Randolph Avenue and Fig Street. “It’s a waste of time and money, and we could end up with a traffic circle,” Bannon said.

Councilman Frank Wendell expressed concern that kids, bikes, electric wheel chairs, and golf carts all had to navigate the intersection without aid of a stop sign.

Mayor Dora Sullivan was worried about the new fence at New Roots Youth Garden, which she said blocks people’s line of sight while crossing Randolph on Fig. [Read more…]

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