LWB neighbors divided over proposal to curb illicit activity on public waterfront land
- May 30
- 7 min read
WHEN RICHARD GLADSTONE and Tim and Lorrie LaRose describe the prostitutes, drug users and homeless people they see outside their homes, they evoke images of a seedy downtown street or a busy highway underpass.
Gladstone and the LaRoses live next door to each other in million-dollar homes on the Intracoastal Waterway in Lake Worth Beach. But their backyard views are not limited to pelicans, boats and kayakers.
For more than three years, they’ve been pleading with the city to clean up the illicit activity they see almost every day in a thin strip of public land between their homes in the city’s south end.
But a solution city leaders will consider this summer — forfeiting the land to Gladstone and the LaRoses — is dividing South Palm Park neighbors, pitting residents seeking safety against those wanting to keep the waterfront land open to the public.
“I'm not looking for something for nothing. I just want safety,’’ said Gladstone, who said his teen step daughter saw a prostitute turning a trick on the beach where his property abuts the easement. “I've never owned a gun before but I am looking at what kind of gun to buy because I can't take it anymore. It’s a nightmare.’’
“It's no secret that Lake Worth Beach has a problem with homelessness and prostitution. That needs to be addressed citywide,’’ said Christine Cardoso, who lives a block south of Gladstone on the west side of Lakeside. “But that doesn't mean you give up public access to beaches. That's absolutely crazy.’’
The land is 40 feet wide and roughly 300 feet long, extending east to the Lake Worth Lagoon from the eastern terminus of 13th Avenue South at South Lakeside Drive. It’s referred to in city documents as a right-of-way or easement.
With massive banyan trees shading the grass, it looks and feels like a passive public park. Many residents say they have used it to walk dogs, cast fishing lines and launch kayaks and paddleboards.
But others say the grass often becomes overgrown, inviting homeless people, drug users, and prostitutes and their johns — activity that has increased since the pandemic.
A sign at the entrance says: “Park Hours Sunrise to Sunset.” It was erected a year ago in an unsuccessful effort to discourage visitors from going in after dark, neighbors say.
On the front line are Gladstone and the LaRoses, both of whom have wood and chain link fences covered with hedges where their properties border the thin stretch of public land.
They collectively have called PBSO more than 30 times over the past 18 months, records show. They say deputies are responsive but never make arrests, emboldening bad actors to return.
“This little strip here is not properly maintained like a park, it doesn't have the lighting like a park and doesn't have patrols like a park. All this is is a beehive for criminality after dark,’’ said Gladstone.
Tim LaRose, 74, said there were three attempted break-ins at his home in 2023. He said the perpetrators accessed his property from the beach at the end of the right-of-way.
He said he and his wife have watched, from their second-floor balcony or on security cameras, as prostitutes turn tricks, people take drugs and others defecate in the right-of-way.
And when they can’t see them, they can hear them.
“On a Sunday afternoon or on a Tuesday afternoon, you are sitting out back and you hear — pardon my French — ‘What the (curse word)! (Curse word) you! You (curse word)!’ That's not my language, but that is what you hear,’’ LaRose said.
“What has happened over the last couple of years has become untenable,” he said. “It’s a bad scene.’’
It’s not just Gladstone and the LaRoses sounding an alarm.
“It's been a pain in the butt and it's getting worse and worse,’’ said Cheryl Rashkin, who lives near the right-of-way.
She said she often collects discarded condoms, “dirty underwear and needles” in her own trash bags because the city doesn’t maintain it enough. Other neighbors occasionally mow the grass when it gets too high.
Greg Richter, who lives a block north of Gladstone, said he knows of local fishermen who have stopped using the park because they were being harassed by people in homeless encampments.
“I like to refer to that as a park of commerce because a lot of drug dealing goes on there and a lot of prostitutes use it,’’ said Richter, past president of the South Palm Park Neighborhood Association.
“About three years ago we started finding needles on the ground. So we stopped taking our dogs down there,’’ he said.
Some residents say blocking public access to the water is the only way to keep their homes safe. And they point out that residents still have access to a larger public park that gave the neighborhood its name — South Palm Park — at 11th Avenue South, just two blocks north of the easement at 13th Avenue South.
On June 17, the City Commission will consider scheduling a public hearing on a request by Gladstone and the LaRoses for the city to abandon the strip of land. The hearing and land vote would be held later this summer.
If the commission approves the request, under state law the land would be deeded to Gladstone and the LaRoses.
The June 17 agenda item — a request to schedule the public hearing — was postponed from two earlier meetings this year, most recently May 20. It has prompted residents to launch a petition and social media campaigns to preserve the land for public use.
Abandoning it “will deprive all residents of some of the few remaining glimpses of our waterway,’’ South Palm Park resident Chip Guthrie wrote May 13 on a community Facebook post that has generated more than 130 comments. (Guthrie declined an interview request for this story.)
“The last thing we should be doing is giving away waterfront property that belongs to the city,’’ said Joanne Perry, who lives a block west of the right-of-way and successfully fought a previous effort to close the land about 20 years ago.
It’s one of 10 waterfront rights-of-ways in Lake Worth Beach, from Wellesley Drive on the city’s north end to 15th Avenue South. Some are hard to see and look as if they’re part of adjacent private properties.
Others are visible and easily accessible, like the ones at 13th Avenue South and Wellesley Drive, where College Park residents in 1994 successfully fought an abandonment request.
As deputies clean out encampments in Bryant Park and other parts of downtown, homeless people search for other public spaces. Many end up in at the 13th Avenue South easement.
“All the wrong people know the place. There must be a billboard somewhere,’’ LaRose said.
But many of his neighbors are worried that abandoning the one at 13th Avenue South will set a precedent for the city to eventually close the other nine.
“I understand they have a problem and I sympathize with the problem but let's fix the problem. Let's not give the land away,’’ Perry said. “Let's clean up the area to make it more visible so more eyes can be focused on it, not only enjoy the view but to watch out for criminal activity.’’
Lorrie LaRose said she mailed letters to about 30 neighbors, seeking their support for the abandonment request. But she and her husband said they are disappointed by the reaction, including comments on social media.
“We're nice people. We have grandkids. I'm not some rich guy coming in trying to take public land,’’ LaRose said. “I am holding my hands up: Please help me. There has got to be something you can do.’’
The LaRoses and Gladstone said they would be open to paying for the land, either a direct transaction, if allowed by law, or some kind of arrangement in which they would make a donation to the city or to a city charity in the amount of the land’s value.
City Commissioner Anthony Segrich, whose district includes South Palm Park, has been helpful in getting PBSO to increase patrols in the area, neighbors say.
Segrich, elected in March, said he is exploring options to resolve the safety concerns without the city abandoning the public right-of-way.
“It's a tough one because these people have been suffering for years,’’ he said. “If we have a little tenacity, we should be able to have this problem corrected and not have it resurface.’
Richter, who lost to Segrich in a runoff, said Segrich deserves credit for trying to fix a problem that could have been avoided years ago with regular city maintenance and increased law-enforcement patrols.
“The police and the city need to step up if we want to keep it open. That to me is how you resolve this,’’ Richter said.
Tim LaRose said he moved to Lake Worth from Fort Lauderdale 14 years ago to be closer to his ailing parents in Jupiter.
For a long time he and his wife were content to spend the rest of their lives in South Palm Park, hosting grandchildren in a backyard pool looking out to the sparkling waters of the Lake Worth Lagoon.
Lately, they’ve been having second thoughts.
“When I moved in, we never had problems,’’ he said. “I’d like to stay here, but I can’t stay for this.’’
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About the author
Joe Capozzi is an award-winning reporter based in Lake Worth Beach. He spent more than 30 years writing for newspapers, mostly at The Palm Beach Post, where he wrote about the opioid scourge, invasive pythons, the birth of the Ballpark of the Palm Beaches and Palm Beach County government. For 15 years, he covered the Miami Marlins baseball team. Joe left The Post in December 2020. View all posts by Joe Capozzi.
