Should Mercy be denied amendment of MUSP?

Patrick Goggins spoke at the end of a long discussion on the proposed Mercy Hospital project at the Village Council last Thursday night. Patrick is on the Planning and Zoning Appeals Board, but he was just speaking as a concerned neighbor.

He explained that Mercy is trying to get an amendment through on an old Major Use Special Permit (MUSP) from 1973, when in all reality he said, "I would recommend a denial of this." He feels that the City should do a comprehensive plan of the whole Mercy campus, which includes that sticky 7 acres just sitting there at the southeast end. That was the property the Related Group tried to build on a few years back.

Patrick and most in the room feel that that needs to be dealt with. Another concern are the neighbors all backstabbing each other for the almighty buck. While the hospital says they have met with all concerned neighborhood boards, they haven't and the ones who were consulted, probably one or two, are ready to throw the rest of the neighborhoods under the bus as long as they are paid off themselves.

The ironic part about all this is that once it hits the City Commission, it only takes three votes to make it all happen the way Mercy wants. So all these meetings may mean nothing in the end.

The main issue seems to be traffic, although traffic is there already and if the Mercy plan is to just upgrade and not add more offices or beds, then the footprint is basically the same. Someone suggested the Museum of Science across the street as a parking site. They are moving to a new place downtown and this land will be available. What if the hospital employees parked there and were shuttled across the street to the hospital?

What about a water taxi to get people to and from the hospital. The hospital is right there on bayfront property. This could work, too.

Lynn Lewis, attorney for Vizcaya says that all concerns are alleviated from Vizcaya's point of view, literally, since they don't want to see the new buildings at all. The height planned for the new hospital building is 191 feet, which is inhabitable and the total would be 213 feet in total.

People all agree that the hospital needs an upgrade. They just don't want it to add to the existing traffic problem. Some neighbors are concerned with years of construction traffic, noise and dirt, too. More to come. As of now the Village Council is asking for more info, but they seem to be siding with the Planning Board who voted 6 to 2 against the current plans.