Oct 27, 2009 5:28 pm US/Eastern
Cafe Hon's Flamingo Will Return To Its Nest
BALTIMORE (WJZ) ―
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The huge pink flamingo above Cafe Hon will be back.
CBS
The mayor and a prominent city businesswoman came to an agreement about the future of a Baltimore icon.
As
Mike Schuh reports, the flamingo on the side of Cafe Hon was taken down, but now a resolution has been reached.
Momentum has been building for weeks, but not until the mayor and the owner appeared together Tuesday morning on a radio show was the bird invited back to its perch.
The flamingo was a Christmas decoration that never flew the coop. Along the way, it gained international recognition for Hampden.
But then Denise Whiting, the owner of Cafe Hon, got a letter from the city. A permit was needed. There was a $1,300 fee up front and then $800 a year. Whiting directed the artist to remove the bird, so last week it came down.
But Tuesday, the glasses at Cafe Hon were all the way full.
"We walked to the table together and we communicated. I think that's important," Whiting said.
On City Hall's lawn, a radio station held a flamingo fundraiser for a local charity and invited the mayor and the owner to come to an agreement about the flamingo.
"Mayor Dixon believes that it's part of what makes Baltimore unique, unusual and interesting," Whiting said.
It was interesting enough that the city look a hard look at what it already charges the cafe and a look at the size of the bird.
"They just recalculated it so they're not double taxing me," she said.
So instead of $800, she'll pay $400 a year. Mayor Sheila Dixon agreed to a sign on 83 pointing to Hampden's business district.
"If it took a pink flamingo to create an opportunity to have a voice, then that's what happened today and I think that's really important in the city of Baltimore," Whiting said.
"I think the Hampden sign is more important than the flamingo and Ms. Whiting got that done, so that's good," said Theo Cavacos.
"It's really kind of a relief," Whiting said.
The bird is in storage. The artist is on his way back from Ohio to make a mold from the original. Then he's going to fabricate a new flamingo out of lightweight fiberglass and it should be up by Christmas.
Whiting did not know how much it would cost to have the bird rebuilt, nor when the expressway sign pointing to Hampden would be added.
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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