Dark Money, / Alex Coe / Red Tide

SCAN is about planning methodology as practiced in Sarasota County. Part of that "practice" involves the enormous sums of money that flow into our campaigns - especially during County Commission races, as that Board has the final say over land use and rezone decisions.

Cathy Antunes

Listening to Cathy Antunes' exploration of PACs the other evening at Fruitville Library was like following trails of money into a labyrinth of PAC managers, campaign coordinators and creators of nasty mailers. 

The mystery PACs - which are supposed to be totally separate from the candidates - show funds coming in from other PACs, which got them from yet others. At some point, though we're talking hundreds of thousands of dollars, the trail can simply vanish. Cathy's pertinacity in tracing the funds, the managers and the connections inside Florida and across state boundaries has yielded some astonishing results. One result I was unprepared for: certain candidates in our local elections are managing their own PACs, in direct contradiction to the lawful purpose of this funding method!

There are at least two recordings of her talk - one is on Facebook, done by Mark Warriner of WSLR - if you have a FB account, it's here, and starts around the 9-minute mark:

Dark Money at Fruitville - Cathy Antunes for SCAN

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Alex Coe

Meanwhile, there are two other items I wanted to share with you: The first, again, is Cathy - this time interviewing District 1 Candidate for the County Commission Alex Coe. Alex has a varied background and has served on the Charter Review Board, and has insights into what is going on with a fake voter guide, a closed District 1 primary, and local flooding among other things. Coe has experience with the planning process and is worth listening to on that as well, which you can do here:

Alex Coe talks with Cathy Antunes

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And last for now, a paper about Red Tide in our waters has been published that we should all be aware of. The research was done by local investigators including Dave Tomasko and Steve Suau, and it offers strong evidence that Red Tide at Siesta Key correlates with the flushing of highly nitrogenated water from Okeechobee, which the Army Corps releases periodically into the Gulf of Mexico.

 

Not only do these releases provide the nutrients to feed Red Tide -- they affect the duration if and when the Red Tide makes to the shoreline. In brief, the duration of our Red Tide events appears to correlate closely with deliberate releases from the lake. 

Recentl the Army Corps of Engineers, which organized the releases, reportedly stopped sending Okeechobee waters to the Atlantic Ocean. Releases to the Gulf are ongoing.

An evaluation of the relationships between the duration of red tide (Karenia brevis) blooms and watershed nitrogen loads in southwest Florida (USA)

As Steve Suau said to me, this biological link between Lake Okeechobee and Siesta key shows how interconnected are the ecosystems in which we live - far more than we imagined them to be. 

This is Nature, complex and co-involved - the plans of our developers never dream of thinking in this way. They do not seek knowledge or resilience in scraping and building on our land - the end game is to prosper.

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A Countywide Clean Campaign Pledge for 2024

This Clean Campaign Pledge was formulated during last year's Venice City Council election, and it led to the change of two seats.

This year, why not invite candidates for all electoral offices to sign it?

In fact, this is now underway. As of July 7, 2024, an invitation to sign a copy of the Countywide Clean Campaign Pledge has been shared with all candidates in contested elections countywide, including the County Commission, Hospital Board, School Board and Charter Review Board. If a candidate did not provide an email address, the invitation was sent to them via Facebook and to their homes via postal mail, as well as to their campaign managers. The invitation is below, with hyperlinks added.

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July 7, 2024 

Dear Candidate for Elected Office, 

Citizens for Sarasota County, a grassroots citizen group, is sponsoring a County-wide effort to  encourage election campaigns that focus on issues of concern to Sarasota County voters and to  discourage negative campaigning. This County effort is based on a successful program for City of  Venice City Council elections sponsored by Venice Thrives. The County Clean Campaign Pledge  is on the next page. 

Citizens for Sarasota County (“CSC”) is asking all candidates running in a contested election for a  County Commission, School Board, Hospital Board or Charter Review Board position in Sarasota  County to sign the attached Sarasota County Clean Campaign Pledge – Election 2024. By signing  this Pledge, you will help keep our local elections clean and focused on issues – not negative  attacks or false information. 

Citizens for Sarasota County will not endorse candidates but instead will focus on the Clean  Campaign Pledge as our contribution to local County elections. As you may know, voters in the  City of Venice made clear their support for the clean campaign pledge sponsored by Venice  Thrives in 2023. All 2024 candidates for the Venice City Council have signed the Venice Clean  Campaign Pledge. CSC believes that voters across the County will also support clean campaigns  that focus on County issues. 

Will you sign the Sarasota County Clean Campaign Pledge?  

You can sign the Pledge electronically on the next page (return email to CSC automatically sent)  or print, sign, scan and email it to PublicGoodSarasota@gmail.com 

We hope to hear from you by July 11th. Starting on July 12th, CSC will post and regularly update information indicating the candidates that have signed the Pledge online at Citizens for Sarasota County and Citizens for Sarasota County | Facebook.  

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to contact us at PublicGoodSarasota@gmail.com. We look forward to working with you and other candidates for clean elections in Sarasota County. 

Thank you, 

Citizens for Sarasota County Steering Committee

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Tallahassee is about to destroy our right to protect Florida

1000 Friends of Florida says: 

SB 540, “Local Government Comprehensive Plans,” and its counterpart in the Florida House of Representatives, HB 359, have moved rapidly through the legislative process, with only one committee stop left in the Senate. Join us in calling for Senate leadership to stop SB 540 from being placed on the Rules Committee agenda and shut down this bad bill. More here.

Why is this crucial? Let's remember:

Rick Scott

'RedTideRick' defanged Florida's Regional Planning Councils, depriving them of enforcement power over large scale developments. This power had kept DRI's (Developments of Regional Impact) from their worst excesses.

 Scott also extinguished the Dept of Community Affairs (DCA). 

Without those regional and state regulatory layers, the only thing standing between Carlos, Pat, Randy, Rex and their unlimited ambitions was local government. So Carlos, Pat, Randy and Rex bought the Sarasota and Manatee Boards. 

That left only We the People to oppose developments with bad impacts. 

When (if) SB 540 and House Bill 359 pass, if we file suit to oppose a terrible project, like building right alongside wetlands, the state and DeSantis will make us liable for huge attorney fees. 

The Florida Chapter of the American Planning Association says 

"HELP US STOP SB 540"

Click here to oppose SB 540 and HB 359

Call to Action - Sarasota’s Grand Tree Protections Are Not Enough

To: Sarasota County Stakeholders

    Email cc: County Commissioners Moran, Smith, Detert, Neunder and Cutsinger, County Administrator Lewis

Call to Action - Sarasota’s Grand Tree Protections

Are Not Enough

Date:   1/21/2023

Dear Friends, Business Associates, Acquaintances, Sarasota Institutions,

What more will it take to open our eyes to the destruction of Sarasota County’s natural beauty?

Despite certain protections for twelve species of Grand Trees, our County Commission will meet on January 31, 2023 to discuss further relaxing current rules to allow the “Grand” developers of Sarasota the right to determine whether a grand tree should remain or be cut down for housing.

Pictured below: Example of current Grand Tree ” preservation” in north Sarasota County.
Surrounding forest of tall pines was cleared to complete a townhouse complex.  

Despite certain protections that are lawful such as existing land planning codes, future land use designations or county preserved lands, time and time again our elected county commissioners have sought “input from stakeholders” and bowed to the recommendations of developers, the “One Percenters” of our beloved Sarasota County. 

For the past twenty years, our commissioners have greenlighted development to occur by use of mitigation. 

As reported by the Sarasota News Leader, Benderson Development recently clear-cut every Grand Tree on the 24-acre Siesta Promenade site. Despite the county identifying grand trees on the property, every tree on the parcel at U.S.41 and Stickney Point Road was removed, including nine maples, 26 oaks, 55 palms, 16 pines (two Grand Trees) and 17 trees of other species.

Sarasota County conceded to Benderson Development to mitigate the removal of these mature trees with the promise of planting 509 new trees. This mitigation occurred without public input and without transparency. This deal was done via emails with tweaks to the original approved site plan.

Mitigation, if you are not familiar, is when a small swath of useless land held by either the county or developer is traded for a desirable piece of land deemed buildable by the developer and the county. It doesn’t matter if the desired property is a bog or home to a bald eagle.Those trees and other natural assets are going to be paved over. It’s a sham of a land trade, and we, Sarasota’s stakeholders, are also getting paved over in a different sense.  It’s all smoke and mirrors. Mitigation ain’t saving a thing.

Turn the page to 2023 and now, in lieu of mitigation, the County Commissioners claim that Sarasota stakeholders are demanding that protections for Sarasota’s Grand Trees must be diminished. Last fall, Commissioner Maio even claimed that Grand Trees are “perishable items.” Apparently he is now a certified arborist.

On January 31, 2023, our Commission will vote to approve an ordinance which loosens protections for “grand trees,” including live oaks. I have read Sarasota Municode in relation to trees and grand trees. It appears that the rules applied to most trees in this county are lax and clearly from the picture above, illustrate that Sarasota County trees need MORE protections, not less.  Those protections must occur today. 

Please email our Commissioners and tell them to vote No on January 31st.

Email to: bcc@scgov.net or commissioners@scgov.net
Individual Commissioners: mmoran@scgov.net, mhsmith@scgov.net, ncdetert@scgov.net, jneunder@scgov.net, rcutsinger@scgov.net
County Administrator: countyadministrator@scgov.net,

Please share this message with friends and neighbors who care about quality of life in Sarasota County. We are running out of time, each day, swaths of trees in Sarasota County are being chopped down.

We, the majority stakeholders, of Sarasota County demand the following regarding Grand Trees:

• The county must retain all current and existing protection for Grand Trees. 

• The county must implement preservation protections designating grand trees as the following:

• Economic value provided by Grand trees are a financial eco-bonus to the county budget.

• Home values remain higher in established old growth-maintained trees.

• Decrease impact of heavy rain and flooding through tree canopies which slow heavy rain and decrease flooding impact.

• Decrease utility costs and overuse of energy resources for tree canopy cooling to most homes and roads, reducing use of air conditioning and watering needs. 

• The county must implement and strengthen Tree Code. Grand Trees must be used as centerpieces of beauty, history and preservation. 

• The county and developers must share and advertise Sarasota County as a destination where Grand Trees are as much of Sarasota culture and heritage as our abundant arts, science, charities, beaches, and natural habitat. 

• It is proven that engineers and planners know how to work and design around grand trees with more than a hundred years of life. 

• Mitigation for Grand Trees is not an option unless:

• Every option to save the tree or trees has been exhausted, reviewed by the stakeholders (Sarasota citizens) and allowed public input to prevent further scraping of trees whether deemed Grand Tree or a someday “Grand Tree” that is growing to adulthood. 

• Fatal rotting, blight, etc. has been verified and documented by a certified and accredited environmental expert/arborist with no connection to the county or land developer.   

Thank you for your consideration of our comments and request. 

Respectfully,

Adrien Lucas

Sarasota County resident

Source: Sarasota County Grand Trees published 2015

Sarasota News Leader published 1/15/2023

Kumbaya? Or abject public sycophancy?

SNL: Two of our largest developers have offered to write their own piece of the 2050 Comprehensive Plan (Sarasota News Leader story) to accommodate their unslakable desire to build every available open area of Sarasota County. 

Rex Jensen: Lakewood Ranch has about 2,000 home sales a year. 

    “We’re the second-fastest selling community in the United bloody States,” he added. 

[Commissioner Mike] Moran: “You’re such a visionary.” 

Jensen: “We haven’t developed much in Sarasota, though that will change.” 

    Note: Rex Jensen's Waterside at Lakewood Ranch is a 5,144-home, 5,500-acre development in Sarasota County set around a series of seven large borrow pits left over from mining operations. It stretches from I-75 to Lorraine Road:

Moran noted of Waterside Place, “That project is fabulous.” 

Jensen: “We’re going to be out of land shortly, and we have about 4,000 acres” that Shroeder-Manatee Ranch would like to develop.

“What really grates on us,” Jensen said during his presentation, “is the numerous prescriptive requirements [of 2050] — “the ‘Thou shalt’s’ and the ‘Thou shalt not’s.’”

So, Jensen and Pat Neal offered to write their own Shalts and Shalt Nots:

  Comprehensive Planning -- The Developer Version

“What’s wrong with what you see at Lakewood Ranch?” Neal asked. Jensen is just seeking “to dispense with the prescriptive requirements that you have in the 2050 [Plan].”

 “I think this is a great process,” Chair Alan Maio said

Commissioner Christian Ziegler concurred on the latter point.

And so, as the Sarasota News Leader reports, ". . . the County Commission has given Rex Jensen, the developer of Lakewood Ranch, the go-ahead to work with county staff on a new residential density category within the county’s 2050 Plan, which has guidelines for communities created east of Interstate 75."

 

Some background on Hi Hat and Old Miakka

Some history behind the Miakka Community Club and its opposition to Hi Hat Ranch's proposal to change Hamlet to Village overlay on its 10,000-acre property in Northeast Sarasota - from a resident, Jane Best Grandbouche:

The Miakka Community Club incorporated in 1945.  This is the same year the Turner family purchased Hi Hat Ranch.

The motto of the Club is “Conservation and Preservation of the Rural Area.” During the intervening years, the Club has worked to ensure that ranchers like Hi Hat had the opportunity to ranch. Hi Hat Ranch’s ability to be stewards of the land was supported by the Miakka Community’s continued vigilance in conserving and preserving the rural areas.

The Miakka Community Club (MCC) participated in ALL of the various meetings with the Urban Land Institute (ULI) including as a member of ULI’s Focus Group.

The Miakka Community Club also participated with written and oral testimony during both the transmittal stage and the final adoption stage.

As explained in all of these meetings and hearings, the Resource Management Areas (RMAs) define how the County would develop until the year 2050.  It is now 2021.  We are not half way there.  

You will not find in either the Comprehensive Plan or the Unified Development Code any reference to having Hamlets changing to Villages.  This idea wasn’t even contemplated or discussed.  Just as there was no reason to contemplate changing Hamlets to Villages then, there is no reason now.

If the Board wants there to be that opportunity, then that idea should be given public debate and due process.

The 1,200 acres Hi Hat is seeking to urbanize by changing the Hamlet overlay to Village overlay is productive agricultural land.  Since the Hamlet is a voluntary overlay, it is not necessitated that a Hamlet be developed there. Hi Hat Ranch could sell that productive agricultural land to someone else who wants to be in agriculture.  As farm land in the west and east dwindle, our produce needs to be grown somewhere.

The County recognizes the importance of agriculture as noted in FLU2.2.1 and FLU Policy 2.2.2 (a).

The County has a program to purchase agricultural development rights (DR Policy 1), so the Turners would get money for the development rights and then they could sell the land for agriculture production.

There is no valid reason to change the Hamlet overlay to Village overlay.

Please call and/or write the County Commissioners on this most important proposal. And please show up for the meeting September 8th. Once they paved over our rural area, it is gone forever. 

DENY CPA-2019-D

Moran and Maio: County must step up Concierge Services

People might not matter, but DEVELOPERS MATTER:

The county must not brook delay when a massive development with an extremely complex and rather impenetrable master plan needs rapid approval 

On March 23, a scheduled hearing pertaining to the proposed development of new homes on Hi Hat Ranch, in the eastern part of the county, had to be postponed because of what [Commissioner Al] Maio described as “a technical situation.”

Sarasota News Leader Plan amendment related to timeline for County Commission to consider specific type of amendments

Why bother with cumbersome review by staff? Just fire them and say "YES" to all

Sarasota Commissioner Mike Moran

developers.

The commissioners should explore the idea of allowing permits to be approved when staff fails to meet county timelines, [Commissioner Mike] Moran said, characterizing that stance as “healthy pressure” on employees to adhere to what Moran called a “hard, hard deadline …”

Shall planning heads drub painstaking staff into rapid negligent approvals?

Moran said, an employee who delays a project should “be written up."

Sarasota News Leader With streamlining county’s permitting process a top County Commission goal this year, staff creates ombudsman position to help facilitate timely approval of construction applications

Wetlands near you may be in trouble.

More than 1,000 permits to change wetlands have been submitted to a state agency since it took over Clean Water Act powers from the federal government in December.

“There’s a heck of a lot of demand for new development. You need an efficient permitting program so the projects can go forward.”   Herald Tribune

Citizens pleading with the Sarasota County commissioners and waving signs on street corners, aimed at stopping developers from building hotels on Siesta Key and halting the devastation that the Benderson project at Stickney Point Road promises, all seem for naught.

LTE in HT May 3, 2021: Don’t let Sarasota be buried in concrete

Nothing so far has stopped our county commissioners from burying Sarasota and Siesta Key in concrete and massive traffic lines everywhere. Pleasing the monied interests is their only criterion.

With deaf and development-friendly commissioners, there are only two avenues left to preserve our town and stop this headlong rush to pour concrete everywhere.

Get rid of these Republican business types on the commission and vote for environmentalists. Or, sadly, the last resort, the First Amendment: Stand in the streets, peacefully, by the thousands.

It is a pity that just a couple of people on the County Commission can cause so much damage to our town and the environment.

Mike Burns, Sarasota

Tumultuous Growth - Sarasota News Leader

In an April 20 memo to the County Commission , , , the overall number of county permits issued grew to more than 41,000 in the 2020 fiscal year, which ended on Sept. 30, 2020. The county has sustained such a high level “for more than three years,” the memo pointed out.

• The total number of permits the county issued through March, since the 2021 fiscal year began on Oct. 1, 2020, is up 8% — to more than 21,000 — compared to the same period during the 2019 fiscal year. A bar graph listed the exact figure as 21,310, compared to 19,741 from Oct. 1, 2019 through March 2020.
• The number of permits for construction of single-family homes has increased 54% for the fiscal year to-date; through March, that figure was 1,538, compared to 996 for the same portion of the 2020 fiscal year. “We’re running the highest we’ve had” over the past five years, Osterhoudt emphasized. 
• The number of permits for applications filed online is up 42% for the fiscal year to-date — more than 17,750.
• The number of building plan reviews has increased 17% for the fiscal year to-date — more than 18,000.
• The number of inspections performed by the Building Department’s Inspections unit staff has climbed 5% for the fiscal year to-date — more than 76,500.

A cosy world of money, growth, power, and greed

Sarasota is a tight little world of big money flowing from developers who are transforming our environment, our open lands, our air, waters and beaches -- into hard cash in their own pockets.

Some of that cash flows to candidates they groom to vote for their many projects.

What track is Mike Moran on?

Moran . . .

- voted for Benderson.

- voted for Pat Neal.

- persuaded the Planning Commission to approve Carlos Beruff's houses near a possibly toxic dump.

- voted for Gabbert's giant open air debris demolition plant next to the Celery Fields.

Moran even voted against protecting a small rural area in East County that wanted to "Keep the Country . . . Country."

His "Florida Country" PAC keeps growing - it's now at $185,000.

Is this the track we want Sarasota County to be on?

When the 170-year-old East Sarasota rural area called Old Miakka came up with that slogan, Moran's backers created a new Political Action Committee - a slush fund they call "Florida Country."

The aim is to confuse voters. Mike Hutchinson, a Republican from Old Miakka, ran against Moran because he actually wants to keep the Country . . . Country. Hutchinson lost the primary by a few hundred votes.

The Florida Country PAC's treasurer is Eric Robinson. Robinson is called "PAC-MAN" because he manages scores of PACs that move hefty bushels of anonymous money into the campaigns of those candidates developers desperately want to win.

Eric Robinson

Just a few of the developers dumping money into Robinson's PACs:

PACs are supposed to remain at arm's length from candidates and their campaigns.

However, while managing the Florida Country PAC, Robinson happens also to be the treasurer of gun-loving Mike Moran's campaign for re-election to the Board of Sarasota County Commissioners.

Robinson also manages the campaign for another Commissioner running for re-election, Nancy Detert:

Detert has several developers and PACs to thank as well:

Here are the PACs listed in Commissioner Detert's campaign finance report:

Ludicrously wealthy Sarasota seems to have only one available accountant . . . making for a cosy little world of developers, candidates, pitch men, ad buyers, power brokers and the voters they target.

For some reason, the local press hasn't bothered scrutinizing this tight little world. Maybe it should.

This close-knit syndicate controls what happens in Sarasota County -- what gets built, what lands get rezoned, who gets rich, who gets dumped on.

As we citizens found when we almost lost the Celery Fields to a dump.

When more than 65 citizens came to the Board to plead for the protection of the Celery Fields bird habitat, this was Mr. MORAN's response: