On the night of Saturday, December 12, the judges for the 35th Annual Lighted Boat Parade will sit at Schooner Wharf Bar & Galley. Crowds will watch the boats from the Harbor Walk around the Key West Bight. The bar has held that stand for years. This year, the business running the bar is in the middle of being sold.
Schooner Wharf is changing ownership after four decades with Paul and Evalena Worthington, KeysNews reported. At most addresses in Key West, selling a bar is a private matter between buyer and seller. At the Historic Seaport, it goes through a public agenda, because the City of Key West owns the ground under the bar.
The Landlord Is City Hall
The Bight is city-owned waterfront. A business there doesn't own its spot. It holds a lease with the city, so selling the business means handing that lease to someone new. Two public bodies sign off on the handoff. The Key West Bight Management District Board makes a recommendation. Final approval of the lease assignment comes from the Caroline Street Corridor and Bahama Village Community Redevelopment Agency, known as the CRA.
On Wednesday, October 14, the Bight Board voted unanimously to recommend moving Schooner Wharf's lease to Tidal Shift Ventures LLC. Jeff Sorg and Mike Croce formed that company. They are the managing partners of two other long-running Key West spots, the Green Parrot Bar and Half Shell Raw Bar. The CRA put the final step on its agenda for November 5 at 5 p.m. as item 26-5967. That item approves the Assignment and Assumption of Lease between Key West Seaport, LLC, doing business as Schooner Wharf Bar, Tidal Shift Ventures, and the City of Key West as landlord, for 202R William Street. The full agenda and its supporting documents are on the city's public meeting page.
Because the city is the landlord, the terms of the deal are on the public record. According to KeysNews, the bar will keep operating as Schooner Wharf Bar, and the terms of its recently renewed 10-year lease stay the same. The meeting documents did not list a purchase price or closing date. The buyers run more than the two Key West bars. Through Seacliff Management LLC, doing business as Pat Croce and Company, they operate three restaurants and bars in St. Augustine, eight in Pennsylvania, and a boutique hotel.
The city's own staff memo, quoted in the same KeysNews story, shows how a landlord weighs a deal like this. Senior Property Manager Gary Moreira recommended approval. He pointed to the buyers' restaurant experience and to the current tenant's record of meeting its lease obligations:
"The proposed assignees are extremely well qualified."
The memo also says Key West Seaport LLC has met all of its financial and non-monetary obligations under its current and earlier leases. Capt. Kelly George spoke before the board's vote and called the sale "a win/win for both parties." He also recognized the Worthingtons for their decades with the bar and for the yearly events they helped start.
The Same Agenda, a Second Waterfront Building
Schooner Wharf was item 3 on the CRA's November 5 agenda. Item 2 involved another city-owned building on the Bight, Flagler Station at 901 Caroline Street. It covers a different kind of lease change.
Item 26-5966 would let Conch Tour Train, Inc., the building's current leaseholder, sublet part of Flagler Station to Shrimp Boat Sound Key West, LLC. Conch Tour Train keeps its lease. The city's role here is to consent to a new subtenant moving in under it. The Bight Board had already approved the team's use of the building, which once housed the Sails to Rails Museum, as a support facility for the recording studio.
The tenant would be the Shrimp Boat Sound Collective, from the team reviving the studio Jimmy Buffett founded in 1986 in a former waterfront shrimp icehouse. KeysNews described the plan as part museum, part shop, and part small performance venue. Here is what the team's news release lays out:
- A permanent museum built around a timeline of recording sessions, photographs, albums and memorabilia, with rotating exhibits on artists tied to the studio and to Key West
- A shop selling Shrimp Boat Sound merchandise, Buffett-related artwork and artist collaborations
- Small live performances, podcasts, streamed events, artist conversations and listening sessions
- A look at the ongoing restoration of the original studio
The original studio on Lazy Way is also city property. In August, the CRA approved a 10-year lease of that property to David Bernsen and Robert Spottswood Jr. HARC approved renovation and partial-demolition plans for the building, with conditions. Under that arrangement, the city handles repairs including a new roof and tie beam, stucco, air conditioning and accessibility work, KeysNews reported. Bernsen is leading the project with Mac McAnally, the longtime Buffett collaborator. Kelly Norman, Shrimp Boat Sound's managing director, runs daily operations. If the Flagler Station arrangement goes ahead, the team expects the Collective to open in late 2026 or early 2027.
Both items went before the same public body on the same evening, and each one involves a building that has been on the Bight's waterfront for years.
What the Lease Carries Forward
When a lease moves with its terms unchanged, the bar's place in the Bight's calendar moves with it. Schooner Wharf hosts or anchors much of the waterfront season, and the dates are already published through January 2027.
| Date | Event | Where on the Bight |
|---|---|---|
| Sat., Nov. 14 | Key West Oyster Fest 2026 | Historic Seaport |
| Wed., Nov. 25 | 21st Harbor Walk of Lights lighting | Greene and Elizabeth St. plaza, then Margaret St. plaza |
| Thu., Dec. 3 | Pet Pictures with Santa, hosted by All Animal Clinic | William Street tree on the Harbor Walk |
| Sun., Dec. 6 | Tree Trimming Party and Toy Drive, 6 p.m. | Schooner Wharf Bar |
| Sat., Dec. 12 | 35th Annual Lighted Boat Parade | Harbor Walk, judges' stand at Schooner Wharf |
| Sun., Dec. 20 | Holiday Classic Car Show and toy drive, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. | Conch Republic Seafood Company lot |
| Thu., Dec. 31 | New Year's Eve and the Pirate Wench lowering at midnight | Schooner Wharf, Harbor Walk |
| Jan. 20–22, 2027 | Knot & Shot Competition | Schooner Wharf |
| Jan. 31, 2027 | Wreckers Cup race and awards ceremony | Schooner Wharf |
The 2027 entries are already on Schooner Wharf's own event calendar, including the Wreckers Cup captains' meeting on January 30, the night before the race. The full holiday schedule is on the Key West Christmas calendar.
Three Blocks of Lights, Two Trees
Thanksgiving Eve is the night the Bight's season starts in earnest. The lighting of the 21st annual Harbor Walk of Lights happens in two steps on November 25. Holiday music starts at 5 p.m. at the Greene and Elizabeth Street plaza, and the Fishing Buoy Christmas Tree lights at 6 p.m. An hour later, the Lobster Trap Christmas Tree lights at the Margaret Street plaza in Old Lands End Village, with music from 6 p.m. and holiday cookies and candy canes for kids.
The displays cover three blocks around the Key West Bight Marina and Historic Seaport, with a theme honoring Key West's maritime history. The lights stay on every night from Thanksgiving Eve through New Year's Eve. The lighting also kicks off the Cheryl Cates Toy Drive. Bring a toy, or buy one to donate at the Imagination Station table.
Schooner Wharf's December 6 party carries the toy-drive theme forward. Local artists and authors sign and sell original work for holiday gifts. Anyone who donates an unwrapped gift gets a free holiday drink from the bar. Six days later, the bar hosts the judges' stand for the 35th Lighted Boat Parade, presented by Schooner Wharf Bar & Galley and Absolut Vodka, with viewing all along the Harbor Walk. Fittingly for the season, the Florida Keys Southernmost Car Club's December 20 show at the Conch Republic Seafood Company lot is also a toy drive.
The year ends on the Harbor Walk on December 31, when the Pirate Wench comes down the schooner mast at Schooner Wharf at midnight. A month later comes the Wreckers Cup on January 31, the season's last date at the bar on this calendar. The lease assignment on the CRA's agenda leaves the terms of the bar's 10-year lease unchanged.
At Halley Haack, we follow how the Lower Keys waterfront changes hands. If you're curious how city-owned land and lease terms shape what happens along Key West's waterfront, talk to a Lower Keys real estate expert today.
