BUSINESS
little better,” Reller said. “We would also like a better relationship
with the city, because they really are our business
partners.”
CITY’S IDEA
He credits Patricia Roebling, head of the city’s Engineering
and Public Works department and former interim city manager,
with getting the group started.
“She really led the parade on this,” he said. “She organized it,
she got several of us together to start a nonprofit association.”
Patti Tobin, the city’s longtime planning and zoning director,
says the business area sprang up in the 1980s, when
workers building houses in new neighborhoods needed a
place to store heavy equipment. Officials formalized it as a
commercial zone in the mostly residential city when they
wrote the first comprehensive plan in the mid-1980s.
“It’s a diverse area of businesses and services now, with
plumbers, air-conditioning people, restaurants, bakeries,
dentists,” Tobin said. ”It’s a place where the small guy can go
to buy a business or buy land.”
She said the city has done some road and drainage work in
the area and plans to do more. Reller applauds her approach
to challenges.
“Patti Tobin can definitely drive the bus,” Reller said. “Her
mindset is pragmatic and also creative, which allows changes
to occur.”
He said Mayor Greg Oravec and City Manager Jeffrey
Bremer have also been proactive and receptive, but he concedes
that the city has much larger problems to deal with.
“As far as problems go, from one to 10, we’re one, in my
opinion,” he said. “But the city is trying. They’re reaching out.”>>
Port St. Lucie Magazine 25
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Chuck Reller, an officer
in the nonprofit
organization that
wants to spruce up
the area, has owned
a storage business
at the same location
for nearly 30 years.
ED DRONDOSKI
/www.pgavillage.com
/www.pgavillage.com