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the old school square story
The termination of the lease for Old School Square may have started long ago—as city factions squared off
BY RANDY SCHULTZ
LAST MAY, OLD SCHOOL SQUARE BROUGHT DELRAY BEACH one of the city’s greatest moments. More than a year into the COVID-19 pandemic, with the public starved for live music, Jimmy Buffett played four sellout concerts at Old School Square—his first in 18 months. The shows brought the city worldwide publicity. People from England called about tickets.
From left, Mayor Shelly Petrolia, Commissioners Juli Casale and Shirley Johnson
It happened in large part because Old School Square Chief Operating Officer Holland Ryan designed a seating system of four-person pods, to allow social distancing. Buffett cracked, “It reminds me of when I worked the state penitentiary in Tallahassee.” The mood was jubilant.
Three months later, Mayor Shelly Petrolia and city commissioners Juli Casale and Shirley Johnson voted to evict Old School Square for the Arts from what has been the nonprofit’s home since 1989. Unless a judge intervenes, the group must get out by Feb. 9.
What happened?
The story of Old School Square is a story about the factions in Delray Beach politics. It’s a story of certain personalities aligning at a particular moment. It’s a story that was years, not weeks or months, in the making.
Based on interviews and the lawsuit Old School Square filed in November, however, the turning point came last April.
That’s when Joy Howell resigned as Old School Square’s board chairman. As she left, Howell wrote a six-page memo to the board outlining what she considered the group’s deficiencies. Howell suggested that she had tried to fix those problems but had met “continued resistance” from top board members and staff.
Old School Square Founder/Chairman Emeritus Frances Bourque, however, says Howell misinterpreted her role as chairman. “Joy was going [to Old School Square] every day. She wanted an office where the staff was.” Bourque says Howell even wanted a key.
“I said, ‘This is not going to happen.’ Howell’s style as chairman,” Bourque says, “was to divide and conquer. That is not our style. We had [board members] resigning.”
In a statement, Howell said, “On the road to retirement as a small business owner, I became a local artist and volunteered on the board of Old School Square. I was invited and ultimately elected as chair and served for three months until I resigned in April along with the vice chair, and I’m dismayed
that the organization has sued one of its own volunteers.”
Howell is an ally of Petrolia and Casale, who appointed Howell to the planning and zoning board. Howell also is a longtime Democratic campaign consultant and operative. In 2020, she was communications director of the Florida Democratic Party. A testimonial on the website of her company, Cambridge Strategic Partners, refers to Howell as “strategic, efficient, tenacious, connected, smart and fearless.” According to the lawsuit, Howell used those traits to harm the organization she had left.
The story of Old School Square is a story about the factions in Delray Beach. It’s a story of certain personalities aligning at a particular moment. It’s a story that was years—not weeks or months—in the making. Based on interviews and the lawsuit Old School Square filed in November, however, the turning point came in April.
Former Old School Square board chairman Joy Howell
DAMON HIGGINS/THE PALM BEACH POST VIA ZUMA WIRE
On June 14, Howell emailed Shannon Eadon, who resigned last December as Old School Square’s executive director. Howell wanted to know whether Johnson had received “OSS bullets”— talking points—presumably to review for an upcoming commission meeting. At the Aug. 10 meeting, Johnson led the discussion and made the motion to terminate the lease.
The lawsuit alleges, “OSS was informed that Petrolia and Howell were behind the decision to terminate the lease.” While the lawsuit seeks damages from the city, it also names Petrolia, Casale, Johnson, Howell and Eadon as individual defendants and alleges that they “conspired with each other” to replace Old School Square “with an organization that was closely aligned to them and which they could control.”
In addition, the lawsuit names City Attorney Lynn Gelin as a defendant. Petrolia, Casale and Johnson did not respond to requests for comment. A spokeswoman said the city does not comment on litigation. As of mid-November, the city had not filed its response.
Ironically, Old School Square once saw Eadon and Howell as potentially helpful. Elise Johnson Nail, a former board chairman, says the group was “terrible at fundraising. That’s why we hired Shannon” in August 2019. Olivia Coldwell was Eadon’s administrative assistant. In an email to Nail, Coldwell said she had been “excited” when Eadon arrived. But then Eadon “began to breed a culture of mistrust” between the staff and the board. Eadon did not respond to requests for comment. In January, after Eadon resigned, Howell became chairman. “I approved that,” Bourque says. Nail says, “Joy and Shelly have always been friends. We thought that might help.” Ryan, who has been with Old School Square for two decades, was running things. Given the pandemic, the board did not want to look for a permanent CEO.
During the pandemic, the staff had shrunk from 19 fulltime and 10 parttime employees to just four full-timers. Still, by last March, Bourque recalls, “I thought we were moving on.”
Current board member Jim Chard, though, says Howell had begun “pitting one board member against the other. She tried to divide the board into camps.” Coldwell said that even if some of Howell’s criticisms were correct,
AARON BRISTOL
Old School Square board member Jim Chard
“[Old School Square] is where the Marjory Stoneman Douglas students came in their grief... It’s where we gathered after 9/11...It’s where the Olympic torch came in 1996.” —Frances Bourque
Old School Square Founder/Chairman Emeritus Frances Bourque “Any legitimacy was lost” because Howell was “misleading or inaccurate.”
According to the lawsuit, however, Howell found a more receptive audience in Petrolia. Which is where the factional politics comes in.
Old School Square board members tend be part of Delray Beach’s longtime but loosely held establishment. Many also are involved with the Historical Society. Several have served on the chamber of commerce board. Former Mayor Jeff Perlman is on the Old School Square board.
Some would call members of these interlocking connections a clique. They see their service as promoting the city and attracting businesses. Since her first campaign in 2013, Petrolia generally has run against candidates linked to this establishment. Old School Square board members mostly have supported and donated to
her opponents. Chard ran unsuccessfully against Petrolia three years ago.
Also on the Old School Square board is Cynthia Ridley. Her husband, Chuck Ridley, and his West Atlantic Redevelopment Coalition have sparred often with Petrolia—and with Casale and Johnson—over how to revive the minority-heavy northwest and southwest neighborhoods. Old School Square board member Paul Zacks served on the independent community redevelopment agency board that Petrolia led the push to abolish.
Indeed, as the lawsuit alleges, Old School Square believes that Petrolia targeted the group once she became mayor in March 2018.
At the first meeting she ran—and without public notice—Petrolia moved to put the commission in charge of the annual CRA grant that supplies roughly 20 percent of Old School Square’s operating budget. As of deadline for this article, the CRA had withheld $562,500 that Old School Square says it should have received.
Seven months later, Petrolia forced the resignation of City Attorney Max Lohman. She claimed that Lohman had “blindsided” the commission on developments in a lawsuit against the Match Point tennis promoter and a property-rights case. Petrolia brought up Lohman at the end of the meeting. Discussion of the city attorney was not on the agenda. One commissioner was absent.
With little dissent, Petrolia trashed Lohman. He responded, “You have made accusations of me that aren’t true.” Gelin, one of the city’s lawyers, got the top job.
The Aug. 10 meeting unfolded the same way. Old School Square’s lease was not on the agenda. Petrolia allowed no public comment. Petrolia, Johnson and Casale turned a report from the city’s internal auditor, Julia Davidyan, into what they called grounds for evicting Old School Square. Petrolia, John-
Former Executive Director Shannon Eadon
son and Casale listed reasons for their decision, but they voted to terminate the lease without cause. Gelin offered no pushback.
Old School Square sees a pattern. Petrolia couldn’t control the CRA, so she took it over. Petrolia couldn’t control the city attorney, so she ran him off. Petrolia couldn’t control Old School Square, so she got rid of it.
In its lawsuit, Old School Square notes that Petrolia, Gelin and Davidyan combined previously to fire former City Manager George Gretsas. That also happened without the item being on the agenda.
Lohman and Gretsas had strong professional reputations. Nail sees Old School Square as the latest victim.
“All I see are evil actions,” Nail says. “They should not be allowed to destroy people.” Old School Square filed the lawsuit in part so that “they won’t be able to get away any more with this kind of behavior.”
Even some Old School Square board members agree that the organization can improve. After Joe Gillie, the longtime executive director, retired in 2015, Old School Square quickly went through two CEOs—Rob Steele and Eadon. Financial issues caused Old School Square to shift to a more conservative accounting system based on cash on hand, not pledges.
Yet Old School Square rejects the accusation that the group failed to file documents after the city requested them. An email from Ryan to the commission 10 minutes before the Aug. 10 meeting said Old School Square had provided financial information along with its diversity policy.
Critics also have accused Old School Square of being clubby and insular. Board members end their terms and then return. In a diverse city, 20 percent of the current board’s 21 members are minorities.
Board member Bill Branning’s company, BSA Construction, got the Crest Theatre renovation contract. Though donor Margaret Blume requested Branning, and the board unanimously voted to give Branning the contract, to outsiders it looked like an inside deal.
Patty Jones is Old School Square’s current chairwoman. Of the recycled board members, she says, “That’s a positive, too. It’s good that people are committed enough to keep volunteering their time. And we always have new blood on the board.”
Of the contract, Jones says refusing Blume’s request could have jeopardized the $1.5 million donation. “That would be ridiculous.” The work, Jones says, was essential, noting that the bathrooms did not comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act.
Old School Square maintains that Petrolia, Casale and Johnson ignored more than three decades of accomplishments. In 1989, the buildings that became Old School Square were in disrepair and fenced off. By raising $15 million in private donations and grants and by recruiting untold numbers of volunteers, Old School Square for the Arts created the complex that in 2016 drew more
Former board chairman Elise Johnson Nail
—Elise Johnson Nail
Old School Square board member Scott Porten visitors than any cultural facility in Palm Beach County.
Old School Square’s transformation drove the transformation of downtown Delray Beach. But there was more. Old School Square became the city’s version of Central Park. It made Delray Beach special.
“It’s where the Marjory Stoneman Douglas students came in their grief,” Bourque says. “It’s where the Corey Jones musicians came” after a police officer murdered the former city employee who has many relatives in Delray Beach. “It’s where we gathered after 9/11. It’s where the Olympic torch came in 1996.”
Petrolia, Casale and Johnson speak fondly of Old School Square the institution. But they accuse the board members and staff of arrogance and mismanagement. “We are righting the ship,” Petrolia says.
Many factors explain the breakdown in the relationship between Old School Square and the city. But one stands out.
Bob Barcinski, the assistant city manager who had acted as liaison with Old School Square, retired in 2014. After that, as Delray Beach went through eight permanent and temporary city managers, the liaison role also bounced from employee to employee. Barcinski had been able to resolve most issues. That important connection was lost.
The timing was especially bad because the city wrote a new, 46-page lease in 2016 when Cary Glickstein was mayor. In the lawsuit, Old School Square alleges that the city forced the more restrictive lease onto the organization.
“That lease was a huge deal,” says current board member Scott Porten. “We didn’t want to sign it. Cary changed the relationship between us and the city.”
Notably, the new lease allowed Delray Beach to terminate the lease without cause. Absent that provision, Petrolia, Casale and Johnson would have had to specify a cause, and the city would have had to give Old School Square a chance to fix the problems. Glickstein defends the change, noting that the city also reworked leases with the library and Arts Garage—nonprofits that lease city property—“so that we could manage expectations.” Residents, he recalls, had complained about the number of events at Old School Square, many of them fenced off.
But the city added that provision, Glickstein says, only to protect against the unimaginable, such as Old School Square itself shutting down. Petrolia, Casale and Johnson, he says, acted in “bad faith. Never in my wildest thinking did I contemplate that the occupant would not be the lessee,” meaning Old School Square.
Yet it happened.
The July 13 meeting ended with the commission allowing the Crest Theatre work to continue. Documents seem to support Old School Square’s claim that the permit it obtained amounted to city approval, without the commission having to get involved. Gelin, though, said she had found a technical violation in the permit. In the lawsuit, Old School Square accuses Gelin of working with Petrolia, Casale and Johnson to “fabricate the storyline” that Old School Square was renovating city property without the city’s approval.
In fact, on July 13 Petrolia spoke favorably of the Crest Theatre project. Adding an industrial kitchen, she said, could allow Old School Square to train residents for hospitality jobs.
“She is two-faced,” Nail says of Petrolia. “I don’t understand how she can sleep at night.”
As for the financial reporting, the sense in July was that the commission soon would invite Old School Square to a workshop meeting to sort out everything. Both sides agreed that the lease needed updating.
Instead, the city stopped work at the Crest Theatre. Then Petrolia, Casale and Johnson fired Old School Square. They stood by their decision a week later, even after a petition urging them to reconsider got 10,000 signatures. On Aug. 17, former Mayor David Schmidt, the chamber chairman, asked for that workshop meeting. Johnson, who had spoken favorably of such a meeting in July, responded that a meeting was unnecessary. City Manager Terrence Moore, on the job for less than two weeks, suddenly had to seek a replacement for Old School Square. The mandatory bid conference on Nov. 5 drew nothing like the volunteer-driven organization that created Old School Square, which provides support to roughly 70 other nonprofits.
“I think the city wants to take it over,” Bourque says. “That would be the biggest mistake that ever could be. Nail says, “Who could they get who would donate their time, soul and money like we have?”
Entering high season, Old School Square had no certainty beyond early February. Yet before the eviction, in terms of finances and events booked, Porten says, “We were in the best shape we’ve been in years.”
Because the city stopped the work, the Crest renovations remain unfinished. Blume has withdrawn the balance of her donation, so the cost of finishing the project could fall to the city. Even trying to re-create Old School Square without private support could require much more city money, for equipment and operating expenses.
“For all its flaws,” Glickstein says, “Old School Square has done a lot for Delray Beach. Ending the lease “was a colossal exercise in poor judgment.”
AARON BRISTOL
After deadline for this article, Old School Square filed for early mediation of its lawsuit. In addition, eight former Delray Beach mayors wrote an open letter in which they asked the city to resolve differences with Old School Square before the lease termination takes effect in February.
Current Old School Square Board Chairman Patty Jones
