\u201cRobin understood that preserving history is not simply about protecting buildings or landscapes,\u201d City Council Chair Lisett Hanewicz said at the meeting. \u201cIt is about protecting identity, memory, and the character of a place that we call home.\u201d <\/p>\n
Reed was born in Lakeland but her father\u2019s career in the Air Force took her all across the country. She spent nearly two decades in Summit, N.J., where she helped get a local 19th century estate added to the national register of historic places.<\/p>\n
In the 1990s, she and Joe Reed, her husband of nearly 60 years, moved to St. Petersburg to enjoy retirement. They settled into a 1930s mediterranean revival home in the Old Northeast where Reed planted a show-stopping garden. <\/p>\n
Everywhere she turned, Reed saw charming homes like theirs being torn down. So she joined the neighborhood association and led a campaign to designate the Old Northeast as a \u201cLocal Historic District,\u201d a title that provides more protections for older buildings.<\/p>\n
In 2006, Reed spearheaded a campaign to put restrictions on building and demolition within the Old Northeast in order to preserve the neighborhood’s character. [\u00a0CERRI, LARA | St. Petersburg Times\u00a0]<\/p>\n
That effort failed. <\/p>\n
But Reed was undeterred. She successfully rallied against a high-rise at Fifth Avenue N and First Street N that she argued threatened the character of her neighborhood. She fought the destruction of grand trees<\/a> and launched a program offering free trees to any Old Northeast homeowner willing to plant one.<\/p>\n Her advocacy extended to other neighborhoods too. As past president of Preserve the Burg, she organized homeowners in Mirror Lake, helping them establish their own Local Historic District.<\/p>\n \u201cShe could conjure up a committee to do just about anything,\u201d said fellow local preservationist and Old Northeast resident, Maureen Stafford. <\/p>\n By 2015, Sunken Gardens\u2019 flock of flamingoes had dwindled down to just two aging birds.<\/a> When the city refused to pay for new ones, Reed stepped up, creating the Sunken Gardens Forever Foundation. Under her leadership, the foundation raised over $50,000, enough to bring in 20 flamingoes.<\/a><\/p>\n Reed was not your typical activist. Friends and family described her as modest and reserved.<\/p>\n She was never the loudest person in the room. But when she spoke, everyone listened, said Mary Anna Matthews, another founding member of the Sunken Gardens Forever Foundation.<\/p>\n That\u2019s what made her an effective leader.<\/p>\n \u201cShe was able to persuade you to do things without you even realizing you were being persuaded,\u201d Matthews said. <\/p>\n Reed\u2019s goal was not to just oppose anything new. She wanted to help others see the beauty in the old. <\/p>\n