STORY TOOLS

• E-mail story
• iPod friendly
• Printer friendly

Tell us about it

• What would you add to this story? Tell us what we missed.
• Do you have photos from this event? Documents we need to see? Share with us.
• Upload photos & videos
• More ways to get your stuff online and in the paper.

More All

• Talkin’ Turkey: the turkey, the pilgrims and the noble bird of Collier County
• Turkey trivia test your wish bone
• How chefs celebrate Thanksgiving

Share and Enjoy [?]

Editor's note: Through the end of the year, the Daily News will update some of the stories that were in the news during the past year.

With prime real estate on Marco Island going quickly, talk of the possible sale of 11.6 acres deeded to the Collier County School District by the Deltona Corp. in 1964 took city residents by surprise in April.

Situated on the west side of Tigertail Court between Somerset and Century drives, the parcel known as Tract K originally was intended to be used as a future school site on the island. Many hoped it would be home to a charter high school.

The Collier County School Board had voted to sell the property to pay for construction of a permanent home for the Marco Island Charter Middle School.

"It was at that point that all the hurricanes had hit Florida," School Board member Pat Carroll said. "Construction costs had tripled and the estimate to build the school was way beyond what we had budgeted."

However, this didn't sit well with islanders and city officials who complained en masse.

"We started getting the word out to the residents," Councilwoman Terri DiSciullo said. "They knew that Deltona had deeded that land to the School Board for a school and that it was deeded in good faith."

Considering the amount of tax money Marco Island sends to the School Board — an estimated $71.6 million in fiscal 2006-07 — there shouldn't have been a need to sell the property to get an additional $7 million, DiSciullo said.

After the outcry, board members voted to take the land off the market and agreed to develop a plan with the Marco Island City Council about what should be done with the property.

Carroll said she stood by the board's decision to pull the property off the market, but that the residents' outcry wasn't the reason she voted to do so.

"When we were able to secure funds for the building with our capital dollars, I supported pulling the property off the market," Carroll said. "I believe it's important to hang onto that property for future use. When land is used and developed you can't get any more vacant land."

So the hope of soon getting a school built remains.

"They certainly made the right decision by taking it off the market," said resident Everett Van Hoesen, chairman of the city's planning board. "Marco needs to have that tract preserved if we're ever going to have a charter high school. I feel that within the next two years, that the matter of having a charter high school on the island will be on the table and that it will have a positive outcome."