This story was originally published in the Biscayne Times.
Bob Domlesky is a tall, blue-eyed 77-year-old retired engineer who has lived in Miami Shores for about 25 years. He, along with dozens of other locals, crowded into the village’s aging country club last month to hear plans for a massive reconstruction and replumbing of the landmark golf course on Biscayne Boulevard.
Domlesky’s dad, Leonard, who worked for the U.S Army Corps of Engineers, spent a career cleaning the mess left by coal mines in central Pennsylvania. Bob is worried something similar will happen in the Shores if the planned $200 million project, which will take years to complete and includes a three-story high structure and a pump, comes to fruition. So he typed out a list of toxic chemicals in street runoff that he says could be pumped into the bay; they include lead, zinc, nitrogen, and phosphorus. He handed out dozens of copies before the meeting started at 6 p.m. Thursday, Aug.14.
Authorities led by South Florida Water Management District (SFWMD) Resiliency Officer Carolina Maran said the project would be safe and beneficial to scores of people in the South Florida watershed. Water levels are rising, and hurricanes could cause catastrophic damage, as they did during recent storms on Florida’s west coast or Hurricane Andrew, if aging water systems aren’t upgraded.
“We are reducing significant flood risk to 130,000 residents, upstream,” said Maran.
Miami Shores, like many other South Florida communities, was built decades ago on land filled with creeks and swamps. As homes and septic tanks were constructed, polluted water sometimes flowed into canals and then the bay. When storms hit, houses as far west as Miami Lakes were flooded.
A spillway on the Miami Shores golf course was built 70 years ago to block saltwater from inundating the land and pushing upstream during storms or king tides. These concerns have only worsened in recent years.
So back in 2019, authorities began assessing vulnerabilities and planning to update the facilities.
The early stages involved the SFWMD, Miami-Dade County, and the Army Corps of Engineers. By 2023, they had hosted events for public comment and finalized mitigation strategies. In 2024, they received a grant from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). This year, they plan to continue hosting public workshops while design elements are being tweaked and implementation strategies are developed.
The most striking element of the plan is a 35-foot-high industrial structure that authorities say will take 3.5 acres of the golf course land and require seven acres during construction. The structure will require a localized widening of the canal, a fuel farm of three 10,000-gallon tanks, and a parking lot large enough to fit incoming sizable equipment. They aim to begin construction in 2026 and continue for four years.
Maran, the SFWMD resiliency officer, says real estate negotiations are ongoing. As with all the canals her agency runs, easements grant the district access to operate the system on the golf course, she adds.
“We have been focusing on modeling every significant aspect of future conditions and understanding any related risk to those,” she says. “We take that very seriously. It’s part of our mission.”
Residents, who were given the chance to share their thoughts during the Aug. 14 meeting, expressed fears about the effect discharge of water from the forward pump would have downstream.
“If you don’t do it right, then you are going to drown my children,” said a speaker who gave her name only as Aubrey and said she lives on the canal. “The wrong release of water could be ‘Armageddon’ for the neighborhood,” she added.
Maran says this project will not threaten people who live on the canal.
“We have no increase in total discharge,” she said. “So what we are talking about here is flexibility.”
Jesse Valinsky, a Miami Shores Village council member, questioned the plan, particularly the three-story-high pump structure.
“That would be maybe the tallest structure in Miami Shores,” he said. “I mean, we don’t let residents build that high for commercial use.”
Greg Kutylo and his family have lived in Miami Shores for six years and enjoy golfing. Before the meeting, he had only briefly read about the initiatives to change the village’s flood control system. When he saw the pump structure’s scale and design, he felt he needed to voice his opinion.
“It’s frankly ugly,” said Kutylo. “They really have not taken into account that this is a residential neighborhood. It’s an unspoiled green space that all the people in the village, whether they golf or not, value. Adding this industrial site would ruin it, in my opinion.”
The structure design, authorities said, is still in the initial phase and may be reworked.
Norman Powell, a 59-year-old attorney who has lived in Miami Shores for almost 30 years, was confused about the department’s authority over the golf course and asked to see documents that grant rights to use the land.
“The state plans to gobble up land like Pac-Man for this project,” said Powell. “I think it’s incumbent upon the [SFWMD] to at least look at other alternatives. There are other areas along that canal system that are more suitable for it, and they won’t adversely affect or change the character of another location.”
The tentative plan presented at the August meeting, now being reviewed, does not include a tennis center. It would include a golf fairway and green where the tennis center and a storage yard are now located to make up for the land that would be used to support the pump station.
Willie Skelly, 60, has spent a lifetime using both the tennis center and the golf course. He grew up in Miami Shores and has made scores of friends at both facilities. He’s extremely worried about the plan to use the space where the tennis center now stands for golf. He says there is really no other place on the property appropriate for tennis.
“People have formed bonds at that tennis center,” he said. “It’s part of the community, and it has been a lifesaver to me, especially in tough times.”
Almost as bad is the plan to reconfigure the golf course and close it for a significant amount of time. “It is horrendous, too,” Skelly said.
Maran said the plan could still be updated. She added that both wildlife and people would remain unaffected. Lakes on the course could be deepened to hold excess water, potentially reducing pollution.
“We see no additional water quality impacts compared to the existing conditions,” said Maran. “The components that we are proposing here do not impact water quality in the bay.”
But to resident Domlesky, if they build the pump station, sea life will not stand a chance. He has faith that the people of Miami Shores will not allow it.
“I do have a suspicion that Miami Shores is really gonna start to raise a ruckus,” said Domlesky. “I am merely asking the South Florida Water Management District to not go mindlessly ahead with a 70-year-old flawed canal strategy that pumps toxic street runoff into the bay, but to stop and think.”
