West Palm Beach Redevelopment Projects Win State Award

Oct 27, 2011 - CRA

WEST PALM BEACH REDEVELOPMENT PROJECTS WIN STATE AWARD 

West Palm Beach, Fla. — The West Palm Beach Community Redevelopment Agency (CRA) received two awards out of 12 throughout the state recognized by the Florida Redevelopment Association (FRA). The awards are given to projects that exhibit the best practices in Florida redevelopment over the past year.  The winners were honored during the 2011 Annual Conference awards dinner held on October 20 at the Hilton Orlando.

This year, the West Palm Beach CRA has earned the award in the category “Out of the Box” for its project Pleasant City: A Community Inspired, a grassroots effort to empower a neighborhood, by creating relationships, partnerships and programs designed for the specific needs of the Pleasant City Community.  They also walked away with the award in the category Cultural Enhancement for their work with the Cuillo Theatre which stood vacant and abandoned for almost a year before the West Palm Beach CRA purchased the property after negotiating a lease with option to purchase agreement with a local theater company that was looking to expand to a larger facility.  The project will bring a much needed cultural attraction to the downtown.

“Winning one award is fantastic, but to be recognized for two outstanding projects is simply an honor and one that we are extremely excited about.” said CRA Chair and City of West Palm Beach Mayor Jeri Muoio.   “We are proud of the progress we make every year and look forward to another year of innovative projects that enhance our community.”

The FRA awards committee carefully selects the winners from over 60 entries.  All of the entries embody the spirit of successful community redevelopment and revitalization. “Through a lot of hard work, successful partnerships and local support, these projects are completed and have helped to rebuild that community in some way,” said Kurt Easton, FRA president.

For more information about the West Palm Beach CRA or any of their projects, contact Kate Volman at (561) 822-1551 or visit www.wpbcra.com.

 

Free Gigapxl Photo Exhibit in Celebration of Art & Humanities Month

Oct 07, 2011 - Art, Waterfront

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (October 6, 2011) – The Boca Raton Museum of Art will feature part of its Permanent Collection of the Graham Flint Portrait of America: Images from the Gigapxl™ Project at the Lake Pavilion (101 South Flagler Drive, West Palm Beach, FL) on the West Palm Beach Waterfront to celebrate National Arts and Humanities Month in October.

The dynamic exhibit, which is free and open to the public, will be open Thursdays to Sundays for three weeks, beginning October 13. Guests can tour the exhibit on Thursdays and Fridays from 5:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m. and on Saturdays and Sundays from 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Those interested are invited to a public reception on Oct. 14 from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. that celebrates the exhibition’s return. It has not been shown locally in four years.

The exhibit highlights cutting-edge photography, as images are featured using digital cameras that take high-resolution images measured in ‘gigapixels.’ This means that photographs are so detailed you in zoom in to 1/10,000th of the original image and still retain high-quality information.

The inventor of that technology is physicist-turned-photographer Graham Flint, designer of high-powered cameras for uses ranging from Cold War espionage to the Hubble Space Telescope. Since 2000, he has been producing ultra-high-resolution Gigapxl™ photographs (more than one billion pixels). With cutting edge optics, film technology, and digital processing, Flint has been able to create photographs with unprecedented amounts of detail.

This exhibition presents Flint’s images from his “Portrait of America” project which was subsequently integrated into the massive Google Earth Project. Flint’s awe-inspiring photographs documenting landscape and imagery are printed at maximum resolution, resulting in images that render the finest detail (even numbers on license plates).

The event is sponsored by the City of West Palm Beach Art in Public Places (AIPP) committee. For more information about the City of West Palm Beach and its waterfront events, visit www.wpb.org/waterfront. For more information about the City of West Palm Beach’s Arts in Public Places, visit www.wpb.org/AIPP.

City of West Palm Beach Police Chief Announces Retirement

Oct 01, 2011 - Mayor's Office, Police/Crime Prevention

City of West Palm Beach Police Chief Delsa Bush submitted a letter today notifying Mayor Jeri Muoio that she would retire effective January 1, 2012.  Chief Bush recently announced that she intended to retire and that she would finalize her plans and present them to the Mayor in October.

The letter thanks Mayor Muoio for her support and praises the officers under her command, “Please know that the West Palm Beach Police department is one of the most highly regarded in the nation. This fact can only be attributed to the fine men and women who work within the organization, both sworn and civilian.”

Mayor Muoio accepted the letter saying, “Chief Bush has served this community for many years.  Her dedication to the people of West Palm Beach and to her officers has earned the admiration and respect from those she serves. I thank her for her many years of hard work.”

Chief Bush is a 28 year veteran of the force working her way up from officer to the position she currently holds. During her tenure she oversaw a double digit drop in crime and the establishment of many innovative policing programs.