Cape Coral Rowing Club | Council nay votes were not based on facts
To the editor:
My son rows for the Cape Coral Rowing Club. The public deserves to know what is actually happening — and to have several inaccurate public statements corrected.
In 2020, the City Council approved Tropicana Park as the club’s permanent home. The club planned around that for six years. Then, driven by pressure from the Northwest Neighborhood Association, a coordinated opposition campaign produced a sequence of escalating obstacles designed to make the club’s situation untenable.
First: Safety. Cape Coral Police confirmed zero incidents in the club’s 18-year history. That argument didn’t hold.
Next: Aesthetics. The city demanded a concrete perimeter wall — up to 12 feet high — around the club’s boat storage. Estimated cost: $150,000. A nonprofit youth program cannot absorb that.
The club didn’t quit. All parties agreed on a compromise — a chain-link fence with a natural hedge row, paid for and maintained entirely by the rowing club. The city accepted those terms. Then the mayor moved them anyway. No new safety concern. No failed compromise. The Northwest Neighborhood Association wanted them gone — and that was enough.
Now the mayor says volunteers can simply move the club’s existing dock to Crystal Lake at no cost. That is not accurate. The club’s current dock is a smaller-in-length, privately-owned structure built for a temporary location on the Seven Islands — not suitable for a permanent facility. Crystal Lake would require professional grading and a purpose-built docking system comparable to the $400,000 floating dock the city installed at Tropicana Park specifically for this type of boat launching. Volunteers hastily moving a privately-owned temporary dock onto city property with out bonding or insurance (both of which cost money) is not a solution. It is a liability.
The mayor also says Crystal Lake has adequate parking. The count: Seven standard spaces, two handicapped spaces, nine boat trailer spaces, and one handicapped trailer space. That is a boat ramp’s parking lot — not an athletic facility’s.
The safety concern at Crystal Lake is not rowing near boats — the club has done that for 18 years without incident. The problem is geometry: motorboats launching from an active ramp directly alongside where rowing shells are carried to the water. Two incompatible activities at the exact same point, then throw in the already relocated Dragon Boat team to the mix, and you have chaos.
For context on how this city treats other sports: Cape Coral has spent $60 million in GO Bond funds on parks, $11.2 million on the Lake Kennedy Racquet Center, $17 million on Festival Park, $12 million on the Oasis Sports Complex, $6 million per year on Coral Oaks Golf Course, and is now planning a $225 million Yacht Club rebuild. The Parks and Recreation personnel budget alone is $16.8 million annually.
The Cape Coral Rowing Club has received $0. In 19 years, it has never asked for a dollar. It moved when asked, funded its own compromise, and still got shown the door.
If Crystal Lake is truly the right location, prove it. Fund the dock. Solve the parking. Fix the boat ramp conflict. And give these kids a respectable boathouse for proper training and storage. Do for rowing what this city does for every other sport — without years of obstacle courses and moving goalposts.
Otherwise, keep the promise made six years ago and leave these kids alone at Tropicana Park.
Tim Uzar
Parent, Cape Coral Rowing Club