A HALLOWEEN FOR THE KIDS

   We had a Halloween party in our new neighborhood park yesterday. Over 80 kids and their parents, along with "kids at heart",

dunked for apples,

 

 
played Wrap A Mummy,

 
 Monster Mouth Toss, 

carved pumpkins,











 





and explored Charlie's Haunted Woods.

Music was provided by DJ Death,



and Hillary made a brief stop on her book tour.

The former presidential candidate with her body guard, DJ Kool
     Davey manned the grill for our pot-luck dinner and when it got dark we paraded over to Irvington Avenue.                                    There we ate 

at Janice and Alyn's Road Kill Cafe 





and watched Julia and her daughter enact the dinner scene from "Eraserhead".  It was a glorious Halloween and I hope yours went well too.

    It's November now and they say there may be a big dinner coming up. Let's hope it is more appetizing then the ones Julia and the "Road Kill" put out last night. 
            ____________________________

 Oh yeah, Blue the dog came as a peacock

THE CITY IS SCREWING COCONUT GROVE

  Last Saturday I attended the second of two workshops put on by the City of Miami planning department. They had nine people wearing blue uniforms telling us what developers want to hear, 'We need less trees and more people".  
    I learned why the trees are coming down and the big white boxes are spreading like cancer. One city planner told us the City now allows developers to build on 77% of a residential lot so it looks like this,

Concrete covers 77%. The thin green perimeter is the other 23%, probably a ficus hedge.  Two small token trees sit out front.  Allowing this kind of density insures that,
 1) developers will make the most money and that
 2) Coconut Grove is screwed.

In the past, houses have taken up about 40% a residential lot.  This ratio allowed our tree canopy to flourish.

That's what the city allows and at the meeting they made it clear that they want to make it worse allowing bigger buildings  (increase the density further) and add more commercial space to our village.  This is great for developers and bad for Grove residents.  
    95% of the people attending were residents who said "No"  to this and the vocal five percent,  developer's reps, were all smiles. It is a shame that our Grove commissioner, Ken Russell, will not stand up for the community he lives in.  Now that he's running for Congress who knows where his head will be.
   Grove 2030's Dave Villano summed up the meeting very nicely in his Grapevine opinion piece yesterday:

A DEVELOPER'S DREAM
 
     Will taller condo towers, more commercial building sites, and  increasing residential density help preserve the unique character of Coconut Grove? 
    As puzzling as it sounds, that’s the recommendation of the City of Miami’s Planning Department .  That's their reaction  to the growing concerns over lot splitting, mega-home construction, destruction of the tree canopy, and the loss of the Grove’s historic character.
“This will be an uncomfortable conversation,” warned City Planner Sue Trone, as she welcomed a hundred or so village residents and others to the second of two community zoning workshops last Saturday. She was right.

    Trone and a team of other City planners are charged with revising Coconut Grove’s Neighborhood Conservation District (NCD) zoning overlay. The code is an extra layer of protection approved years ago as a legislative buffer from the development pressures that threatened the village. The document’s intent is clear: “to preserve the historic, heavily landscaped character of Coconut Grove’s residential areas.” 

 But on Saturday Trone offered a revised interpretation of the code’s statement of intent. Preservation is out; affordability is in. That, she believes, is the overwhelming concern of Grove residents. (Protecting tree canopy is number two). And the best policy solution to the affordable housing crunch is to add more housing units. With that, workshop participants were handed red pencils and asked to mark up large maps of Coconut Grove where they believed residential and commercial densities should and could be increased. “A developer’s wet dream,” whispered one miffed participant.

With that, the focus by City planners is now on revisions to the NCD zoning code that likely will bring more people to Coconut Grove, rather than on simple measures to protect our lush, historic character, such as a reduction in the size and scale of the mega-homes that are overwhelming our single-family neighborhoods.

There is no question that affordable housing remains one of our intractable challenges, especially in Village West where multi-million-dollar homes are now common. And increased densities, to be sure, should be among the policy tools we consider to help residents remain in their community. But promoting up zoning and other increased density measures as the guiding legislative remedy for protecting single-family neighborhoods from the onslaught of development is, at best, misguided. And at worst, such suggestions – intentionally or otherwise -- derail any reasonable efforts for other meaningful zoning reform.
           
Commissioner Ken Russell’s role is unclear. Upon election to office two years ago Russell seized on the NCD zoning code as a legislative vehicle for promoting the populist, grassroots agenda he promised, and he has repeatedly assured community groups that it remains a key priority. But in recent months he’s been silent on the issue, noting that City staff had a process that needed to play out. Russell did not attend the Workshop on Saturday. Exactly what he would have drawn with his red pencil remains anyone’s guess.

Davie Villano
Coconut Grove

WE HAVE GHOSTS IN OUR PALM TREES

   There is no need to shop for Halloween decorations in South Florida. They are already falling off our palm trees.
    All you need to do is pick up a fallen palm frond, cut off it's wide base, and get creative with paint. Suddenly you have 7-foot ghosts and little goblins greeting your trick o' treeters. 

    Here are some we made to decorate part of our neighborhood's new park, Charlie's Woods.

Come visit these tropical creatures at the corner of Palmetto Avenue and Plaza Street in the South Grove and
                    Have a Happy Halloween.
                        _________________

______________

BE AN ART BASEL ARTIST!

     In 1982 hundreds of Miamians pitched in to help Christo create his Biscayne Bay sculpture, "Surrounded Islands". Thirty-five years later, you can volunteer to help the stick-bending sculptor, Patrick Dougherty, create something special for Art Basel.

    Doughterty has been built over 250 site specific sculptures on four continents over three decades.  His team is looking for fifty volunteers to help him bend and weave sticks into art at Pinecrest Gardens.  The work begins November 2 and continues for two weeks.  You can volunteer for a day or more.
   If you'd like to be a part of the team call the project coordinator, Alana Perez, at 305-588-5585.  
   See more of Doughterty's work at www.stickwork.net .

                                                         ++++++++++++++++++++++

AT HOME WITH MONSTERS

      There is art, beauty, and power in the primal images of fantasy.   -Guillermo del Toro

     Twelve was my Monster Year. I worshiped Hollywood's movie creatures, subscribed to "Famous Monsters of Filmland", and even created my own makeup kit. That all ended one October afternoon when I turned myself into a five-foot Frankenstein.  
   Walking unsteadily up a sidewalk I encountered my neighbor, four-year-old Lanny Caesar, and gave chase. He thought I was the real thing and may still be having nightmares.  I was that good (or at least it seemed that way) but it was time to move on.

     Mexican film director Guillermo del Toro had the same boyhood bug  but he never stopped "chasing Lanny".  He found great success in pushing the monster envelope directing films which include fantastic, primal creatures.


   The director of "Pan's Labyrinth"  and many other successful movies has filled not just his films with monsters but his California home, "Bleak House", as well.

One room of Del Toro's house recreated in his museum exhibit. 

      Last year he agreed to share his fantasy art collection with the world.  It is now a traveling museum exhibition, "At Home With Monsters". It opened in Toronto earlier this month (the show runs through January). It originated at the Los Angeles' County Art Museum last year and my son and I were there see it.

    The show includes sculptures, books, prints, and film artifacts.  In addition, del Toro commissioned artists to create full-size scenes from classic movies

"The Bride of Frankenstein"

And characters from movies.    " Freaks"

and below, "Pan's Labyrinth".

 He also had artists create life-like sculptures of his heroes like animator Ray Harryhousen

 and author, H.P. Lovecraft.

      If you need some cheering up, you can visit a replica of the director's Rain Room. Special effects on its windows make it seem as if there is a perpetual thunderstorm outside.

   I suppose Bleak House is not for everyone. How would you like living with

 

or

    






   It might make me, like Lanny,  run away.

   




      Del Torro comes out with his next film in December, "The Shape of Water".  Unlike "Hellboy" and his other mega-monster hits, this one may have more adult appeal.

  Check out the trailer, https://youtu.be/XFYWazblaUA   It look like an enticing Creature From the Black Lagoon love story. 
     The museum exhibit is just a part of del Toro's Bleak House collection.  Maybe you can see the rest of it if you stop by his Los Angeles home on Halloween night.  If you do, be kind,
don't bring Lanny.
              ____________________________

Happy Halloween from the Grove Guy and his lovely wife, Francesca.

                                      ______________________________________________

Nov. 7th Voting Recommendations

Dear Friends,

  Some of you have asked me for recommendations on the upcoming Nov. 7th vote.  Early voting has started.

I don't pretend to know about all of the issues but here's what I've gathered:

1. Miami Forever $400 million bond issue.  YES. 

   They say most of the money will be used to prepare our city for sea level rise.  Miami is already flooding during certain times of the year.

  Maybe these funds will be used to turn us into another Venice (a fabulous city!)  Also,  $100 million will go towards affordable housing.  
   I'm being optimistic here. This being the City of Miami, the funds could be diverted elsewhere.  Already Mayor Regalado is talking about using ten million to help build his mega-version of a Grove Playhouse.

2. Monty's, extending its lease, NO.  

Why did Ken Russell propose extending Monty's lease another 52 years (last July) without public input?

Why are the developer's campaign ads so deceptive? 

Like it or not, its on the ballot.  The lease holder already has another 29 years remaining on his existing lease. Extending it for more than a half century will allow him to get better financing on future improvements.

When the current lease finally ends in 2046, let's make it an underwater park! 

3. Coconut Grove Village Council Candidates:  15 people are running for 9 positions.  Here are my recommendations.

At least three of them represent the West Grove:

 

Johannah Brown ,   Rachel Cardello   Steve Dloogoff  
  
Marcelo Ferdnandes    Courtney Omega        S. Larissa Ozols 
   
Hank Sanchez-Resnik   Thaddeus Scott   Linda Williams

4.  Two Miami City Commission seats are up for grabs. Vote for the ones who have never been abducted by aliens.

5. Mayor of Miami?  Golly, it seems like there's only one guy running.  He's the one smiling with the very slick hair on all the bus stop signs.

6. Charter amendments?  There's not much at stake other than something about a independent auditor which, I had assumed, we already had.

That's what I know, friends.  Now make your own decisions when you get out there and VOTE in the next two weeks. 

Positive change starts at the ballot box.

CREATING A PEOPLE'S PARK

         Miami needs more parks. One way to make this happen is to turn existing parcels of public land into park space.
     There is a great opportunity to do this on four adjoining lots in the South Grove. They meet at the corner of Palmetto Ave. and Plaza Street, two blocks west of Plymouth Church.  The Miami Herald wrote about this park possibility last month: 
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/community/miami-dade/coconut-grove/article169901057.html


     One of the four lots is mini-forest, thick with trees and vegetation.  We call it "Charlie's Woods" as the late theater legend, Charlie Cinnamon, lived next to it for fifty years. 
    I met with city officials six months ago to ask them to designate this land as a public park.
Even though it seems simple (the city already maintains it), they told me this proposed transition would be very difficult and expensive. 
    I then asked them of we -the neighbors- could turn it into a park ourselves by cleaning it up and adding a few benches and a picnic table.  They told me it would probably be acceptable.

     Neighbors recently spent Saturday mornings cleaning "the woods" up. 
   
   We collected mounds of hurricane debris and began the beautification process. Now it has lovely path and a meditation garden. 

      This forgotten public land is becoming what every Miami resident should have, a functioning park a short walk from their house. It is where we can gather and it'll create a greater sense of community.
     This land is your land. Stop by and see the progress we're making on Charlie's Woods and the rest of our new people's park.
                _________________________