By: Jeff Lipton
The on-going battle between the Village of Atlantic Beach and the owners of Plaza Beach Club over lifeguards continued last week, with the village accusing the club of refusing to hire them again this summer and leaving beach club members unprotected.
But the club said it has hired lifeguards to patrol the ocean in front of the club after the village mayor and trustees criticized the club for not having them.
The village has been critical of the club since last year when Plaza went the whole summer without supplying any lifeguards and thought the same would hold true this summer. Village trustee Sam Mevorach said he spoke with a Nassau County Health Department inspector on Monday, June 25 and said the inspector was surprised that no lifeguard was patrolling the oceanfront at Plaza Beach Club.
Village officials said they were disturbed that the club seems to be relying on them to cover the Plaza beach with lifeguards since the lifeguards patrol the nearby village-owned beaches of Putnam and Montgomery Boulevards. A health department inspection was completed and a sign was in place on Plaza Beach Club property early last week stating that lifeguards were not on duty and swimming was prohibited. By putting up the sign, Plaza was in compliance with the code requirements, according to health department spokesperson Cynthia Brown. "This was an easy one," Brown said. "They have met code requirements by posting the sign."
But Jeff Greenfield, part owner of the club, said the club has signed a contract to supply lifeguards for this summer and they started working Tuesday, June 26.
The issue of lifeguards at the Plaza Beach Club has been a sticky one. It was even part of an $8 million lawsuit filed by the club in January against the village, its mayor and a former deputy mayor. In the civil rights lawsuit, the club owners stated that the village refuses to share village lifeguards with the Plaza, as it has done in the past and has done with all other beach clubs in the area. Greenfield and village officials have had a stormy relationship over the past several years and have not seen eye-to-eye on a number of issues. Village officials said the acrimonious relationship could be traced to the mid-1990s when Plaza owners wanted to use their property to build townhouses, a plan opposed by village officials.
"These guys are fooling around with lifeguards," Mevorach said. "Last summer until now they never hired lifeguards. Even after they posted the sign 'no lifeguards on duty,' people were still swimming in the ocean.
"They know we're a good neighbor and they get away with free lifeguard service."
Village officials said when the village lifeguards see someone who is in trouble in the Plaza water, they can't ignore swimmers' pleas for help. Last summer, the village lifeguards made a number of water rescues on Plaza grounds, Mevorach said.
Mevorach said it's all about economics and the club had refused to pay for lifeguard service. Lifeguards get about $9 an hour and require a minimum of three to patrol the beach. That amounts to about $6,000 a month. The village has 24 lifeguards on duty during the summer days to cover its eight beaches.
"I don't think the Nassau County Department of Health takes the matter seriously enough," said Mayor Stephen Mahler. "The Plaza Beach Club says that we're picking on them, which is ridiculous. I think this is very dangerous. Let's assume, God forbid, someone drowns there. Then there will be an investigation from top to bottom, from the governor on down.
"For a beach club not to provide lifeguards, I never heard of such a thing. People pay thousands of dollars to stay at the club for the summer. We have not done this to single him out . We have not had any similar trouble with any other club," he said.
Greenfield said the one day last week when the beach was without a lifeguard, the village "pounced on us."
"The lifeguards are on the beach as we speak," Greenfield said last Friday. "The signs are down and the lifeguards are in there."
Greenfield said that last month a federal court judge threw out a motion made by the village in March to shut down the club because of the lack of lifeguards.
He added that the village didn't post lifeguards on its own beaches until Saturday, June 23, which is well after the Memorial Day weekend when the clubs open officially. The contract Plaza has with lifeguards is to provide coverage from 10:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. on the weekdays and 10:30 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. on the weekends. Greenfield said the club will shell out about $40,000 to provide lifeguard coverage for the summer season.
He called the mayor "a vindictive, mean-spirited guy who is just out to hurt us."
Attorney for Plaza Beach Club, Ron Burke, said last year there was a shortage of experienced lifeguards all over the state, which is why the Plaza went without any. He called it "grandstanding" on the part of the mayor and the village to make the lifeguard issue a public one.
