Mr. Herb Watt (Winter Club, Ross Brothers, Munyon Island, MacArthur)He,-b Wat t
In 1994, the b:1p -problem in the villa,,re was finances, At that time, delivery
men would not even leave a -package. They would not accept a check from the
village. T �,.. e y wanted cash. The bills were not bein. . : ID -a- i d It was just poor
management. Many un paid bills were found. One ni_..1rht the r� councilmen and the
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villa. Te manager sat in the manacrer's office await in a. rF ply from a. bark as to
whether they would lend the villa.,,Te #,; ". 000 (Sept.. 1964) to meet payroll and
expenses for the remainder of the fiscal y(-z,�ar(No'V'.l) This is just to give an
insight as to the financial difficult of the village at that tim-e.
As Tax Assessor, Mr. Watt could' do very little to 'improve the situation. The
-tax roleswerein deplorable condition. The determination of the assessment
was done by the village 'hut is now done by the County.
.. by state law.
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Fubsequently the bud., -Pet was adjusted Taxes increased two mils, villape could
pay off debt, eliminate necessity of borrowing money and the village would then
have a small contin;;rency fund whicli it .never had before. Therp was qilliite a
furor created when M. Watt made this sug-16estion at the budget meeting, 'T3eople
came to the budget hearing (public) and spoke very strongly in opposition to
the increase in taxg:rs. Mr. W. su--'ested two mil inc-Kease for two years in order
to clear up villa, -..,,e debts. One woman, who later became a staunch sup.porter,
waved her finger under councilman's nose stating "just you wait till next Marchly,
because Mr. W. would then come up for reelection. After thinkin.,�r about the
matter for about two weeks, she came to the realization that Watt 1-3 was right.
Eventually there was a compromise. Millage was increased by one mil. Two
of the councilmen were dead opposed to any tax increase, Harold Beery, Mayor,
called and agreed about the need for a raise, and village was then on its
way to a sound. fiscal base's in a period fo two years time. In those daysmany
of the dedicated councilmen spent day and ni-_rht on the job, Most nigh+s
Watt was up to the wee hours of the morning workin---,% on the budget
One -man came to Watt statin.g tha`- if the taxes were increased by two mils, he
would lose his home. His, home at that time was assessed. for $1?000. Increasing
the tax rate two ?ails meant he, would have to pay $24. per year more for taxes.
Mr. Watt asked haul if village were in financial trouble I,Afould you donate $20 to
het us out of it. Paul readily agreed be would contribute $?0 foi, the welfare of
the villa, --re. What he did xx'Axrxxxi5ixnot understand was that two mi. ls meant such
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a small increase ppr year. The average person does not really put., together
millape. When they hear of a mil1a::..'.7.e increase they become quite �iysterical*
When Ross Bros purchased the. land it included riparian rights clear across the
lake and included Munyon's Island. Twelve Oaks land was at one tY.me annexed to
the Village of,N,--P.B and then the party rquesting annexation, changed his m.i.nd.
because of rules and regulations that were applied to the particul!,!Ar plot of
land, and reouested deannexati.on. (Luke Taylo-r')
The
re was a plan drawn up for developin,�._-- Munyon Island (Bi`_-.). They urere going
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.to build a yacht club complex. With condominium apartment's. It wo1.,,,41,d be sold
to people who would come to the Island by yacht. It posed many.civie. Droblems
such as how would the village police it, fire protection, trash. would have to
be picked i.ip by barge. It became a complicated, expensive project and finally
.*he man droppe(l. 't. - There were other considerations --he did not 'want a bulkhead
and. the State would not approve without one, hater on there was I a p tan
und.prfoot to develop Little Munyon Island and that resulted in a legal hasselo
Luke Taylor anH his brother were the original dev
elopers of Tw(jlvEi opjct,�.
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(res try. e t . ons) . The village was desirous of havin: as it boundpri.es all that
property around to Sin�-7er Island but was howeverlmuch real estate in between
the wwners of which has no desire to annex to the villa,,7e,
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Vatt, stayed on counc-*1 until 1971. Mr. Honeycutt was broup.l..'ht in t-o reassess
the villaz-e. Watt did make some adjustments to make the roles as_! equitabM
as possibly at Board of Equalization meeting* 'The first year at t-he meetinp
in AuFIiist when he "swore"I.-that the. tax assess -rents were equalized, he did
so with tongue in cheek and prayed that he would be too cloc,.3e1y c�i.ecked.
There were inequiti.es, but 1-- the brief period of `Llime that lie was, Tax Assessor
he could. not revolutionize the tax roles. So the Ccti.ncil vot-'ed tr, bri.n# in.
Honeycutt to reassess the entire villai..'re, and they set up a proper tax rate.
reviously, when the vill-age was very young, the. Tax Assesssor on the Council
were originally the developerls own assessor, or possibly an elect;p,J official
NORTH PALM BEACH PUBLIC LIBRARY
'Mr. Herb Watt
Many took the price of the house as a.basis for an,assessment Some took the
documentary stamps from the Clerk's office and used that as a -basis. It was
as hodge podpe of different ways of arrivin:), at what they cons4..d.ered a fair
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asse,--)sment on the property. There were cases where a builder in the vill.ago-
took out a buil,der's mortgage. for $18,000 and built a $47000 home Ti-v e
documentary stamps showed $18000 and the house was assessed at $18,000.
Just an example of an inequitable situation which had to be corrected.
and why documentary stam-ps are not an accurate base for assessments.
Subsequently council assigned Watt the job of Tax Collector in addition to
bein.-.-,x the qLssessor,, Later he was a.ssi:.,-Pned the job of Treasurer and for a
brief period was Acting V111-age Mana e r
Property alon--r U.S. 1 was E..lways a contention to the CounciI.. It was hi--;h:tly
restricted as to what (h������R-rg could put in there. Itwas equitably rezoned
to maintain the type of complexion the council wanted. Many
property owners orlon; J.Ts 1 were angry the Council would not zone it more liberally,
It looked for a while as thou:..,ht they would never be able to sell their property.
However, the more knowledgeable realtors were buyin--r up the property, because they
Could afford to hold it until the proper financial climate for real estate arrived,
In.64 a good part of Anchorage Drive was developed; then 'Ports of Call and shortly
thp-reafter, Old- Fort Cove. Feels '-P.B. Winter Club is an architectural. monstrosity
It has no historic value. A to) a winter club it was a failure. Sir Harry Cakes
needs no conmemoration
a building official in N.P.B. Wally Carver, an excellent man. Knew his job
well. And Watt and Carver went all through the P.-B. Winter Club with a
construction engineer and at that time felt they would not consid.er doinp.
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anything, to the building, T excep-t tearing it down There is nothinp in that
building that is sound. 11.e khole building is a shambles, riddled with
termites and. dry rot. Even if we get a federal loan and spend a half million
dollars or more to revamp the building we will still have �,n old building and
a hu'-,T�De maintenance problem
His fePlin..fr is not to make nostalgia out oxf a 1924 failure
While he was on the Council, several xitizens came to him one day and said' the
bud et time is coming up and they said they would like to have this and that
done if you can include these things in the budget, we wol,.�-,.Td really like to have
these thin-'rs. He said sure and he putl2r-,,000 earmarked for the citizens'
-projects. This money was not available actually, V..it he just put it in there
to pacify the -people. This is what gets .-rovernments on levels (all) into hot
water. Ron.
July 14, 7(; Watt returned to the Council to take Heraty'S-1 pl.a,ce
Nov. 1076 appointed by Council a.,, --rain to take Mery MacKntvre's -Qlace-,
In JuI-.-Y +.h.py were U-lust g-oing, into b.u'-,e+ ses-ion and he had had 7 years of
working on budgets and. he could be helpful. Bupet worked ked o-1,11t well.
MacArthur brou..'r
,-.-.,ht suit againtt Go�l.ncil about Munyon IsIand-
`The Country Club has been a problem., but it is not the 4i..,-,est Droblom,