Three years after the development group LXR Luxury Resorts & Hotels drew up a $500 million proposal to redevelop the shopworn and underused Bahia Mar property on the Intracoastal Waterway, it appears likely the enormous project, called Bahia Mar Park, will happen.

“We’re going to get it built,” LXR Vice President Peter Henn told a crowd of about 40 people at a Central Beach Alliance meeting in Fort Lauderdale recently.

Henn said the project is ready to go forward for another appearance before the City Commission, which would likely have to wait until February, seeking approval that would bring the project closer to breaking ground. Although the city owns the Bahia Mar land, LXR has a lease on the property.

“It’s a matter of how much more money the city can get,” Henn said.

The original proposal included a Waldorf-Astoria hotel, two luxury condos, a parking garage and upscale shops and restaurants.

Since then, after some local opposition, LXR has offered to lower the height on some of the buildings. Advocates have said the project would be good for the city, increasing tax revenues and creating jobs while attracting events and tourists.

After a year of redesigning and negotiating, the project appears more likely to go forward. Last May, the Central Beach Alliance voted in favor of Bahia Mar Park, while approval from the city’s Marine Advisory Board and the Beach Redevelopment Advisory Board followed.

A major victory came in September, when the Planning and Zoning Board approved LXR’s request for a zoning change that would permit taller buildings than current law allows.

The only snag came in July when the City Commission withheld approval over financial negotiations. Commissioners urged city officials to continue negotiations with the developer.

“The financials need work,” Mayor Jack Seiler said at the time.

During last week’s Central Beach Alliance meeting, CBA vice president Fred Carlson said he still found much of the financials murky.

But Carlson also said it is good that city officials are working on the numbers, and that citizens will be able to look over their shoulder.

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In order to develop the area, Lake Ridge residents are going to have to come up with some money.

Members of the Fort Lauderdale neighborhood’s civic association have been looking to develop the area near Northeast 13th Street, which is considered a major thoroughfare for the city going east and west.

“We’d love to see [it] developed,” said association president Rixon Rafter.

The association has already applied for a $70,000 National Capital Improvement Grant from the city, board member Andrew Van Heden said. But the neighborhood would have to raise half the money.

If the money comes through entryway signs would likely be placed on Northeast 13th Street, with two more going on Sunrise Boulevard, Van Heden said.

Crime has declined moderately in the Lake Ridge neighborhood, with the highest concentration shifting from the area near Northeast 11th Street to Northeast 13th, said board member Wayne Gilbert.

“The intersection at 13th Street and Fourth Avenue is the worst I’ve ever seen,” he said.

But crime is lower, Gilbert said, thanks in part to crime walks and other neighborhood efforts.

Rafter also said he would like to see more single-family homes built in the neighborhood rather than watching the streets fill up with apartment complexes and motels.

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An apartment complex planned for Fort Lauderdale’s Middle River Terrace neighborhood that would cater to low-income families has not gone over well with residents.

“We need to know more,” said Doug Sterner, president of the Council of Fort Lauderdale Civic Associations.

Sterner and other area residents are asking for more details about the planned complex that is one of several properties around the county supplied by the Broward County Housing Authority.

Sterner said he worries that the “affordable housing” term is just a government designation for properties that could house troubled people, such as halfway houses, rehabilitation centers and other group homes.

“When we say we’re skeptical of low-income housing projects, we’re asked: ‘Don’t you want to help people?’” said Marge Anderson, a Middle River Terrace resident and secretary of the community association.

The project would be a new complex on the southeast corner of Dixie Highway and Northeast 17th Terrace. Apartments would be rented to people on the basis of their income, said Kevin Cregan, chief executive officer of the Broward Housing Authority.

Cregan also said the complex will not be a social services facility, a halfway house, a drug rehabilitation center or any kind of group home.

The project is the latest in a series of properties the Housing Authority has built during the past four years, including Crystal Lake Apartments in Hollywood and Highland Gardens and Tallman Pines in Deerfield Beach. To qualify for the new apartments planned for Middle River terrace, renters must have a yearly income below $72,000.

Cregan said the Housing Authority — at the civic association’s urging — has submitted written assurance to the city that the project will not offer social services to its tenants.

“It’s up to us now to monitor the promise,” said Tim Smith, president of the community association. “We’re fed up with it, and planning on taking action.”

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The long battle over field lights at Cardinal Gibbons High School will continue even with a mediated agreement on the table.

Last month, the scales tipped in favor of keeping the field lights when city commissioners approved, by a 4-1 vote, a settlement agreement that allows the lights to stay in place while the school seeks zoning exceptions from the Fort Lauderdale Planning and Zoning Board.

For almost two years, neighbors have battled the school over the lights, which exceed the 35-foot zoning height limitation. Neighbors have protested that the lights and eventual night football games will cause traffic and security problems in the neighborhood, while shining light into nearby homes.

Under the new agreement, planning and zoning staff must submit an amendment to zoning requirements that would allow light poles to exceed the height limit. The Planning and Zoning Board would then have to approve a new application for the lights. The school would also have to address the residents’ issues concerning traffic, parking, security, limitations on the number of events and other requirements. Finally, the issue would once again go before the City Commission.

“A quite vocal neighborhood group opposes the lights. We were all there [at mediation meetings] with our lawyers and we came up with a list of compromises,” said Paul Ott, principal of Cardinal Gibbons.

The school promises to provide parking, a police presence during night games, landscaping and postgame cleanup, Ott said. Using the lights for anything but interscholastic events will be prohibited, he said.

The field lights were installed in January 2008 but have yet to illuminate a single game. After the installation permit was issued to the school, a final inspection revealed that the permit never should have been issued because of the poles’ height.

In May 2008, the school went before the city’s Board of Adjustment to request a variance that would allow the lights to be used but was denied permission. The school’s lawsuit appealing the decision eventually led to the mediation.

Even with an agreement approved, many neighbors plan to protest the lights as the issue moves forward.

“The poles are a visual blight,” said Edward Deeb, a neighbor and president of the Coral Ridge Preservation Association, a group that opposes the lights. “We’re well-organized and we’re going to fight this, because we feel the neighborhood will be changed forever by allowing stadium-style night games.”

“We’ll be there when the matter finally appears in front of Planning and Zoning,” added neighbor and association member Robert Prager. “Our goal is to prove their request does not meet neighborhood compatibility criteria. This has cost both sides thousands of dollars in legal fees, and it’s nowhere near over.”

Opponents of the lights say they are fighting to preserve the area’s character.

“This is not an anti-Gibbons matter,” Deeb said. “Many of our members have sent their kids to this school. It’s anti-encroachment on the neighborhood.”

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