🌎 Giants revisited

☀️Good morning. Let's jump in: We've got one giant boatyard denied and two giants in their fields escaping their pasts. Plus, bad movies made by good people.

Today’s newsletter is a 5-minute read.

⛵ No Safe Harbor

Safe Harbor Rybovich superyachts viewed from the Lakeview Park neighborhood in Riviera Beach. (Photo: Joel Engelhardt/Stet)

A giant fell Wednesday in Riviera Beach. 

Whether its fall will prove fatal or fleeting remains to be seen.

The Riviera Beach City Council rejected on second reading a zoning change that would have allowed the expansion of the Safe Harbor Rybovich superyacht repair yard. 

More than 50 Safe Harbor employees packed the council chambers and many spoke, pushing the issue so late into the evening that the council agreed to postpone hearing five more Safe Harbor-related items.

What it means: Without the rezoning, Safe Harbor can’t use at least 8 percent of its 23-acre property south of Blue Heron Boulevard and east of Broadway because that portion is zoned residential. 

Safe Harbor, the world’s largest marina owner and operator, takes advantage of the site’s access to deep water to repair some of the world’s biggest and most expensive yachts, bringing skilled workers to Riviera Beach, sometimes for years.

Safe Harbor officials expressed shock that Lakeview Park neighbors had collected enough signatures to invoke a city rule calling for a supermajority vote to pass the zoning change, first reported by Stet on Aug. 30. 

The neighbors worry about fumes, traffic, lighting, stormwater runoff and loss of property values as they become walled off by a boatyard and a proposed five-story parking garage.

• Yes, but. The rezoning wouldn’t have passed even with a simple majority as three council members voted no: Tradrick McCoy, KaShamba Miller-Anderson and Douglas Lawson. 

Lawson’s objection was a surprise but voting on the prevailing side allows the council chairperson to bring the matter back for reconsideration at the next meeting, if he desires. The five remaining matters return Sept. 27. Four of the six items passed Aug. 16 on first reading.

Of note: After everyone left, the council voted 3-2 with McCoy and Lawson dissenting to place a $55 million bond issue on the March ballot to rebuild athletic fields. That means city voters will be asked to pay for projects worth $115 million in March. 

---

💸 Opioid maker targeted Florida, now walking away from paying $1 billion

(Image: cagkansayin)

The overseas pharma giant that flooded Florida with addictive oxycodone at the height of the pill mill crisis is walking away from roughly $1 billion of a $1.7 billion settlement.

Urged on by lenders, Ireland-based Mallinckrodt plc has refiled for bankruptcy, wiping out all but $700 million of the 2020 agreement.

Even the $1.7 billion represented a fraction of damages sought in a tidal wave of  litigation filed by more than 3,000 claimants. 

• Florida and other states, as well as counties and towns, sought the money in part to treat addiction. But there were also personal injury claims for babies born addicted, hospitals that bore costs of opioid treatment and surviving families of users who overdosed.

Palm Beach and Broward counties bore the brunt. At one point, it was estimated that roughly six of every 10 prescription oxycodone tablets sold in Florida came from Mallinckrodt, and the epicenter of the pill mill crisis was here.

“Just like Doritos,” wrote a Mallinckrodt manager at the height of the company’s oxycodone sales. “Keep eating, we’ll make more.”

Still, Florida was “tricky,” wrote a Mallinckrodt executive in 2014, because pill mills were closing and “We have had more (Florida) physician arrests than I can count.” He encouraged sales reps to sell more pills in Florida anyway.

• Mallinckrodt did not respond to a request for comment. 

Back in June, when Mallinckrodt first signaled it might seek to toss the settlement with a second bankruptcy court filing, Pat wrote about the impact of the company’s pill sales in Palm Beach County, here.

---

🌺 NextEra’s close call with Hawaiian Electric

Connie Lau, then-Hawaiian Electric Industries president, and Jim Robo, then-NextEra CEO, at the deal announcement. (Screenshot: KHON2)

Hawaiian Electric Industries is in the news after the catastrophic wildfires that killed at least 115 people last month in Lahaina. It faces multiple lawsuits over its powerline management.

Flashback: Local business followers will recall that FPL’s parent NextEra Energy almost bought the 131-year-old island company.

Details: NextEra announced in 2014 that it had a deal to acquire Hawaiian Electric for $4.3 billion.

• Company leaders hosted 13 community meetings across Hawaii to build support for the takeover.

•  But Hawaii utility regulators rejected the plan, and it cost the Juno Beach-based company dearly.

•  NextEra paid $90 million to exit the agreement. 

Of note: Burdened by the cost of imported oil to run its power plants, Hawaiians pay the highest electric rates in the United States. The state has an ambitious goal to rely on 100 percent renewable energy by 2045.

What’s happening: Last month, President Joe Biden pledged $95 million to help rebuild Hawaiian Electric’s power grid.

• The next day, Congress launched an investigation into the utility’s role in the deadly fires.

• Hawaiian Electric said it was not responsible for the devastation in West Maui and that power lines had been shut for hours before the fires started in the area.

After the failed merger, NextEra pulled out of some related projects in the islands including assessing the viability of an undersea cable between Oahu and Maui and a proposed wind farm on the island of Lana’i.

The latest: Last year, Hawaiian Electric selected NextEra to build and run a solar project. On Lana’i.

---

🦩 The juice

Fresh-squeezed news from all over

(State Archives of Florida/Umatilla Citrus Growers Association)

Gov. Ron DeSantis appointed Moms for Liberty co-founder Tina Descovich and Coral Gables attorney Luis Fuste to the Florida Commission on Ethics after the forced resignation of Chairperson Glen Gilzean Jr. and the term expiration of Jim Waldman. That leaves on the nine-member board just two who voted in the still-ongoing 2020 inquiry into West Palm Beach Mayor Keith James’ no-bid security contract. One voted for dropping the case against James, the other voted to keep investigating. There’s still no timetable for the case’s return. (Florida Bulldog)

The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, which made a fortune through land sales that shaped northern Palm Beach County, announced Thursday that it would lead a $500 million effort to inject money into local newsrooms. (Nieman Lab)

A beach celebration for Jimmy Buffett is planned for 8 am Sept. 24. Friends and fans will gather outside the Lake Worth Beach Casino for a “paddle out ceremony” to honor the late singer-songwriter and Palm Beach icon. (ByJoeCapozzi.com)

---

🐢 Quiz: Invasion of the baby sea turtles!

Nesting season won’t wind up for a bit longer, but already, the number of sea turtle nests tracked by Juno Beach’s Loggerhead Marinelife Center has shattered its all-time record.

---

🇸🇪 561 insider: Bad movies made by good people

"Stand by Me: Hurricane Edition" cast members (clockwise from left) Danielle Provencher, Rebecca Matte, Matt Ransom, Jonathan Tack, Heidi Rabinowitz and Helen Silver in a scene directed by Provencher for this year’s Swede Fest. (Photo: Courtesy of Danielle Provencher)

The 9th annual Swede Fest next week at the Lake Worth Playhouse is the modern-day version of the old-school community talent show.

What is a swede? It is a very short film inspired by the 2008 motion picture “Be Kind Rewind.” In it, a video store worker played by Jack Black accidentally erases videotapes, and employees scramble to film themselves re-enacting the plots — very badly. 

• To buy time to produce the movies, Black’s character tells customers the tapes are being shipped from Sweden.

What they’re saying: Danielle Provencher has been making swedes since she attended a fest in 2014. Her awful acting and directing credits include light-heartedly terrible versions of “Aliens,” “Mary Poppins,” “Ghostbusters,” “The Breakfast Club” and “Dodgeball.” 

Why swede? Provencher said Adults don’t have many opportunities to be silly. Swedes provide that chance — not only making them but watching them.

Details: The film festival is directed by PR maven Elizabeth Dashiell. Photographer and local actress Mary Stucchi returns as emcee. 

What we’re watching: This year, Provencher is looking forward to “Mystic River” because creepy movies often make good swedes.

If you go: Swede Fest is Friday, Sept. 22, at the Lake Worth Playhouse. The event often sells out. General admission tickets for $9 plus a service fee are still available.

---

🐬 How about them Dolphins? They didn’t just win in their first game Sunday, they won with more free-wheeling excitement on offense than any Dolphins team since the days of Dan Marino. That’s 1990s, folks.

---

NOTE: A figure in the Mallinckrodt story was corrected from $700,000 to $700 million after initial publication.

---

Thank you to our paid and free subscribers. Please help us grow by sharing this newsletter.

Do you have a story idea or a news tip? Reply to this email or write to stetmediagroup@gmail.com, and tell us.