Less than one month after leaving office,Donald Trump’s presidential helipad at Mar-a-Lago, his members-only club in Palm Beach, Florida, isofficially no more.
On Tuesday,demolition crews were spottedat the private club removing the 50-foot wide, concrete structure, which was erected during Trump’s presidency in order to accommodate the 25,000-lb. Marine One helicopter.
In January 2017, Palm Beach’s town council unanimously approved a permit for Mar-a-Lago to construct the helipad on which Marine One could land.
The permit was granted on a contingency basis, according to a senior permit coordinator at the Town of Palm Beach, who told PEOPLE in November that it specified the helipad couldonly be usedfor business related to the presidency and that it could no longer be used once Trump was out of office.
Donald Trump waves to the members of the media after his final flight on Air Force One at Palm Beach International Airport in West Palm Beach, Florida, on Jan. 20.Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP/Shutterstock
Crews demolish the helipad a Mar-a-Lago Club.Meghan McCarthy via Imagn Content Services, LLC
Though the helipad is gone, Trump’s conflicts with his neighbors may not be behind him.
A group of locals have taken issue with the former president’s plans to live at Mar-a-Lago,pointingto an agreement Trump signed in 1993, after he converted Mar-a-Lago from a private residence to a business.
That contract stated that no member would stay at Mar-a-Lago for longer than seven days at a time (and even then, only three times per year).
John C. Randolph, an attorney for the city of Palm Beach, said in a recent town council meeting that the town’s zoning code allows that “a private club may provide living quarters for bona fide employees.”
Randolph said that an employee of a private club is defined as “any person generally working on site for the establishment … and includes sole proprietors [and other owners].”
“I have been advised that former President Trump is indeed an employee under this definition,” said Randolph, who nonetheless noted that a previous Trump attorney had promised city officials he would not live at Mar-a-Lago.
Trump’s attorney John Marion called the debate over the ‘93 agreement “silly,” agreeing with Randolph that the town’s zoning code “allows for [Trump] to live there.”
Since leaving the White House, Marion said that Trump was back to serving as the president of Mar-a-Lago and was therefore an employee in the legal sense.
“He’s very active on the property,” Marion said. “This guy — as he wanders the property — is like the owner of the town of Mar-a-Lago. He’s ever-present and he loves it there.”
source: people.com
