Palm Beach Gardens’ massive annexation of 1,350 acres east of Interstate 95 has spawned a fierce competition with neighboring North Palm Beach over a single, critical spit of land called Hidden Key.
Hidden Key holds another key, the key to the greatest annexation prize of them all, the gated, uber-private, golf course community, Lost Tree Village.
Possessing the 70-home waterfront community of Hidden Key brings Lost Tree Village into reach.
To get there, an obscure entry road into Hidden Key could play a pivotal role.
The entry road lies between two condo buildings that, even though they are east of U.S. 1, have been part of Palm Beach Gardens since the 1970s. The road is not in Palm Beach Gardens, according to Palm Beach County property records.
But the city says it is.
The city shows the entry road as part of Palm Beach Gardens on maps depicting its annexation of five areas, including the massive Zone 1 that includes Hidden Key.
“The only way to get to Hidden Key is through Palm Beach Gardens and that makes it an enclave and that’s why it was included in our annexation area,” Gardens City Attorney Max Lohman told the Palm Beach County Commission on Nov. 21.
North Palm Beach, however, is making its own play for Hidden Key, which is off Jack Nicklaus Drive (State Road A1A) just north of the village.
Hidden Key residents and residents of two other areas pursued by both Gardens and North Palm Beach can expect competing questions on their March 19 presidential primary ballot: One question inviting them into Palm Beach Gardens, the other into North Palm Beach. Elected officials will sign off on ballot wording in December.
To reach Hidden Key, North Palm is not relying on the entry road. But, under state law, the village must find a way to be contiguous to Hidden Key.
To get there, North Palm is proposing to annex the tiny communities of Portage Landing South and North and reach Hidden Key across waterways.
“If we don’t get Portage Landing we can’t get Hidden Key,” North Palm Council Member Mark Mullinix told Portage Landing residents Nov. 15, as the Village Council voted to put its annexation referendum on the March 19 ballot.
No matter the outcome at the ballot box, the stewardship of Hidden Key ultimately may be decided in court. Hidden Key residents have hired a lawyer and are preparing to sue to block Palm Beach Gardens. They have expressed support for North Palm Beach’s overtures.
The ‘Holy Grail’ of annexation: Lost Tree Village
But why would both municipalities be so insistent on landing Hidden Key? Sure, it’s a valuable community, worth $107 million for tax purposes — 6 percent of Palm Beach Gardens’ entire annexation area.
But there’s a much bigger prize: The city that annexes Hidden Key would be within reach of Lost Tree Village.
One resident addressing the North Palm Beach Village Council on Nov. 15 called Lost Tree Village the “Holy Grail” of annexation.
The oceanfront gated community with 618 properties is perhaps the most valuable single community in all of north county with more than $2.5 billion in taxable property value.
That’s $1 billion more than Gardens entire Zone 1, which stretches from Cabana Colony to Prosperity Farms Road to Ellison Wilson Road to U.S. 1 and includes 40 communities with 7,600 residents.
Taxable value is important because it determines how much money a city can raise through property taxes. Palm Beach Gardens has the fourth-highest taxable value of any city in Palm Beach County, at nearly $18 billion. Only West Palm Beach, Palm Beach and Boca Raton are worth more.
Lost Tree is home to more than 500 million-dollar homes. Among owners are hedge fund billionaire Stanley Druckenmiller (home’s taxable value $19.7 million); Home Depot co-founder Ken Langone ($20.9 million); builder Otto “Buz” DiVosta ($6.5 million); and golf great Jack Nicklaus and family (four homes, $18 million).
The Lost Tree property with the highest taxable value, $44.5 million, is owned through a company by Jeffrey A. Blomberg, a manager at investment firm WorldQuant Ventures.
No single-family home in Lost Tree is valued at less than $460,000, property records show. The average taxable value is $4.2 million.
Neither Gardens nor North Palm are making a move on Lost Tree — for now. Lost Tree has made it known for years that it has no interest in being in anyone’s town, Mullinix said.
“We don’t have any intention right now of doing that,” he said. “They’re not interested in going anywhere.”
The winner of the Hidden Key sweepstakes, however, positions itself to pounce if the law changes.
Hidden Key faces Lost Tree across Little Lake Worth. Meaning if Hidden Key is part of a town, state law allows that town to reach across the water and annex Lost Tree — if a majority of the residents approve.
North Palm Beach approach under attack
Lohman told county commissioners if North Palm Beach proceeds with its annexations of Portage Landing and Hidden Key, it would make an inexcusable enclave out of Lost Tree Village — “basically a North Palm Beach blockade across the northern portion of A1A.”
That could foreclose on Gardens reaching Lost Tree Village in the future.
But, he argued, the issue is grounds to block North Palm Beach’s annexation of Hidden Key.
Because John D. MacArthur Beach State Park already is part of North Palm, he said, the village’s Hidden Key annexation would violate state law by turning Lost Tree into an enclave “bounded by a single municipality and a natural man-made obstacle that allows the passage of vehicular traffic to that unincorporated area only through a municipality.”
“It would make that annexation legally insufficient,” Lohman said.
One solution would have been to include Lost Tree in North Palm Beach’s annexation referendum but the village did not.
If Gardens is correct that it already has annexed the entry road to Hidden Key, the same enclave creation would have been in place in 1967 when Gardens annexed the condos outside Hidden Key.
Sometime later, the city took in the neighboring Oakbrook Square (now the Shoppes of Oakbrook), giving it a toehold along the commercial strip of U.S. 1.
Those properties remain to this day the city’s easternmost point.
North Palm fights back
North Palm Beach Village Attorney Len Rubin, also addressing the County Commission on Nov. 21, disputed Lohman’s conclusion that the village would be creating an enclave.
He also took issue with a comment Lohman made that Gardens has worked with North Palm “as far back as at least since 1989” on annexation and “It’s just been to no avail.”
Even though Lohman said the city had been working on its annexation plan for six months, Rubin said the village reached out to Gardens earlier this year to discuss annexation and Gardens “had no interest to meet with us.”
Under state law, the County Commission has no power to stop this type of annexation but it must review studies presented by both municipalities. On Nov. 21, county commissioners said they had concerns about county-owned property that would fall within Palm Beach Gardens’ new borders but did not object to the city’s plans for a referendum.
However, county staff, in a Nov. 15 letter, took issue with North Palm Beach’s annexation of Hidden Key.
The county questioned whether the village could legally rely on water bodies to establish a connection with Hidden Key. That could be viewed as blocking village residents from “fully associating and trading” with Hidden Key residents, a standard established in a 1986 Florida Attorney General’s Opinion, county Planning Director Kevin Fischer wrote.
North Palm Beach officials say they don’t buy the argument and are preparing a response.
North Palm Beach’s referendum also would compete with Palm Beach Gardens at two other points: Pirate’s Cove south of the Waterway Cafe restaurant and 32 homes and condos along Ellison Wilson Road south of the ongoing Ritz-Carlton development.
Another area of overlap: Juno Beach has submitted signatures to the county from all the property owners in the 25-home Captain’s Key asking that they be admitted into Juno Beach voluntarily, even though they, too, are on the ballot to be annexed into Gardens.
Captain’s Key also is contiguous with Lost Tree Village.
If the Gardens annexation of all five zones is successful, it would make Gardens the fourth most populous city in Palm Beach County, surpassing Jupiter, Wellington and Delray Beach. Only West Palm Beach, Boca Raton and Boynton Beach would have more people.
Adding all five zones also would add an estimated $1.7 billion to Palm Beach Gardens’ taxable value.
Joel@OnGardens.org
© 2023 Joel Engelhardt. All rights reserved.
Thanks for keeping us updated on this important proposed annexation. If annexation must be I just hope the municipalities use common sense that does not lead to a patchwork conclusion. palm Beach Gardens needs to stay west of the intercoastal and NPB to the east.
I haved lived in Hidden Key since 1968, raised a family here, and value the neighbors in this community. I find it almost immoral that the Gardens wishes to steal us away for their revenue enhancement. Perhaps to fix their own revenue shortfall.
Annexation is of no benefit to Hidden Key. Gardens will not manage the roads or our gate (erected to combat crime). We pay Northern Imrovement district for those services. When I asked directly about their offer to fix roads etc. I was told directly, that we would continue to pay Northern for that and that Gardens would NOT. When asked what value they offered, they said it was quicker response times for emergency services. We would continue to use what we now have on this side of the intracoastal bridge on PGA.
So, we citizens of Palm Beach County and the USA are being railroaded into a decision process tainted by the size of the proposed areas west of US1 and the intracoastal. By clever gerreymandering PBG wishes to steal from us, and raise the already absurdly high property taxes for not just us but all in the area proposed.
Why then would the Palm Beach County government not demand that each community be able to vote their own destiny. Do they plan to tax us our of our homes? Sure looks like it.
Stephen Marinak
Stephen, Thank you for sharing your heartfelt comments. Joel
Thank you for going into detail and not just grabbing the headline. PBG has absolutely structured the zones in a way that gives no voice to Hidden Key. Gerrymandering for the purpose of annexation is not the way the law was intended to be used. How can we trust a process in which we are not represented? They have been dismissive and arrogant in their approach. No one likes a bully. We will see them (and beat them) in court.