- September 8, 2026
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Residents of the north end of Longboat Key in Manatee County are most likely familiar with the glass building that neighbors Whitney’s restaurant near Broadway Street.
If plans submitted by the new owners of the building are approved, the 5,400-square-foot former bank building will soon be demolished to make way for an ambitious expansion by Whitney’s. An entity connected to the restaurant, Whitney LBK LLC, bought the property in October for $1.2 million, Manatee County property records show. The Longboat Key Planning and Zoning board is scheduled to consider Whitney’s plans at its Sept. 15 meeting.
If the building is demolished, that will be its last step in a storied history.
Built in 1976, the first era of the building was that of a bank. In the early 2000s, it was home to the Longboat Key Chamber of Commerce and the Historical Society. It has sat empty since 2008 — save for a brief period where it was owned by a convicted conman who faked his own death and became a drug dealer with fake IDs.
Prominent Longboat real estate broker Andrew Vac bought the bank building in 2004 for $775,000 and leased it to the chamber. That was the building's last tenant.
“That was probably one of the most perfect office spaces that we ever had,” former chamber President Gail Loefgren says.
Converted from a bank, Loefgren remembers the layout exactly. She sat in the corner office. In the office next door was the assistant’s office. The chamber’s tourism specialist was at the teller's desk to greet those who stopped in on their way onto the island from the north. The Longboat Key Historical Society also shared the space.
“Since we had so many tourists come through the building, (we thought) it would be a good opportunity for them to showcase all their pictures and newspaper articles and all the history of Longboat Key,” Loefgren says.
Most of the office was empty space, perfect for events.
“We had breakfasts once a month. We would do our business after hours (events) where people would bring in refreshments, appetizers,” Loefgren remembers. “Our board meetings were held there. A lot of our social events were held off property, but some of our members would use the facility for some of the events they might hold.”
The chamber’s brochures, visitor’s guides, maps and event supplies were kept in the old bank vault.
“We used to joke if a hurricane ever came, we’d head in there,” Vac says.
As Vac describes, the 2008 financial crisis marked the beginning of the end of the building.
“When 2008 came, the chamber moved out and I tried to sell it and I couldn’t sell it,” Vac says. “I couldn’t rent it. Nobody wanted to rent it. I called every bank in the state to see if someone wanted to rent it. I even had Goodwill look at it.”
Goodwill eventually did find a Longboat Key home at the Brista Commons outparcel at 3150 Gulf of Mexico Drive.
With 25-foot-tall ceilings and lots of natural light, he also marketed the space as an art gallery.
Since 2008, the building has changed hands multiple times.
Anthony Marterie bought it in 2015 for $549,000, property records show. An effort to develop the building, the gas station (now Whitney’s) and other neighboring land into a 120-room hotel by Floridays Development Co. into the North End Hotel & Beach Club failed at the ballot box, with 78% of residents denying the rezoning request.
And then there's the convicted fraudster serving 30 years in federal prison.
Aubrey Lee Price was a Georgia pastor-turned-financial adviser who admitted to bank, wire and securities fraud using funds from more than 100 investors that led to a loss of more than $70 million, according to a 2014 FBI news release. He admitted his crimes in a suicide letter he wrote before he faked his own death in Key West. He was arrested on New Years Eve 2013 and sentenced to 30 years in federal prison after a guilty plea.
Price purchased the glass office building in 2010 for $533,900 with the stated hopes of turning the building back into a bank, according to a 2012 article in the Longboat Observer, sister paper of the Business Observer. Upon his arrest, Price’s assets were seized, including the north-end’s largest office building.
Today, a peer inside the glass doors of the building reveals a disco ball propped against the entrance, a stray leaf blower and printer and boxes scattered in the spacious lobby that makes up most of the building. No tenant has moved back in since the chamber moved out.
Loefgren points to a changing character of the north end of the Key as part f the reason the building has sat idle.
“Whitney Plaza is probably the best example of businesses on the north end, and most of them are businesses that serve people, not office space,” Loefgren says. “I think the office space has migrated to the center of the island.”
Similarly, the Harbor Square office building at the Manatee-Sarasota County Line also sits empty with plans for a restaurant to take its place: the Buccaneer Restaurant.
A version of this article originally appeared on sister site YourObserver.com.
