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LHIA Special Update continued

As it turns out, the black squares painted on the tree were
done by the City Parks & Recreation department as one step
toward addressing the vandalism. A lot of the graffiti had
offensive images and language and the City did their best to
address it immediately. However, upon further investigation, I
saw the entire inside of the tree, along with the entire lake-
facing side of the tree, was covered in pink and green graffiti.
Please see the Facebook page: HELP CLIFF LAKE TREE to see all
of the disgusting graffiti that was painted onto the tree. Use
#CliffLakeTree to spread awareness on social media.
A couple of days later, I emailed Superintendent of Parks,
Mark Almy, to see if we could address the inside and lake-
side damage. Mark called me back in five minutes. He was
all over it! I couldn’t believe it. This guy has over 100 parks in
Fort Lauderdale under his purview. He was on the case. He
informed me that, in the days that had passed, the city had
been back to the tree and addressed not only the areas that
were covered in black paint but also the interior and lake side
of the tree. He expressed how concerned he was about the
recent rise in graffiti on city parks property. He shared that
our tree at Cliff lake is not the only one that has fallen victim
to this horrible trend.
What I’ve been impressed by throughout this process, as
evidenced not only by my interaction with Mark Almy, butwith
many others as well, is the unbelievably quick response from
our city officials on this matter, which in the grand scheme of
things is a smaller issue on the larger agenda. But I can truly
say that Mark Almy, City Commissioner Ben Sorenson, the
Fort Lauderdale Police Department and the City Parks and
Recreation Department have been incredible in their
compassion and concern for our Cliff Lake Tree.
In order to raise awareness in the community and try to turn a
negative into a positive, I used the Facebook page to schedule
a get together for concerned residents who wanted to get
more information not only about the vandalism that occurred,
but also about the tree itself, its environment, and how
important it is to the wildlife that makes Cliff Lake their home.
We had a great turnout with approximately 25 people
showing up. I think the Dunkin’ Donuts & Coffee I had set up
on my golf cart certainly helped attract a crowd. So many
concerned residents were literally appalled by what
happened and wanted to be a part of the process of healing,
education and prevention to ensure that this never happens
again in our neighborhood.
We welcomed Park Ranger Eugene Beatle, who kindly took
time out of his Sunday morning to speak to all of us about
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