INDIAN RIVER COUNTY – A north county boat club should be able to renew its lease with the state after Indian River County commissioners approved the club’s request the county release its rights to the property.
The Wauregan Boat Club asked commissioners to abandon the county’s right of way to a piece of 133rd Place in the Roseland area earlier this week. The state is requiring the club to prove ownership of the non-submerged lands connected to the water property where the club’s docking facility is located. “Everyone can remain where they are,” said Stan Boling, the county’s planning director, if the request were approved.
Boling said that the property, which was never developed as a road, serves in a limited capacity as informal parking, an access point for an adjacent landowner, and as pedestrian access to the St. Sebastian River.
The land, if released to the boat club, would retain the same uses. The only difference, however, would be that the county would not – sometime in the future – be able to pave the property as a road.
Attorney Bruce Barkett, who represents the Wauregan Boat Club, told commissioners that the club has been in operation at that site with its docks for about four decades.
In the event that the club were to dissolve, he said, the ownership of the property would revert to the adjacent property owners.
Commissioners unanimously supported the club’s request with a 5-0 vote.
