Mr. Eubanks and Ms. Brookens:
Attached is my analysis (in a shorter version and a longer one) of the latest round of amendments to the Sarasota 2050 Plan.
Please note in particular the complete elimination of the timing constraints in the amendment set for adoption hearing on October 22, which would open up the eastern county to massive urban growth all at one time, overwhelming infrastructure, including roads of critical state concern.
It might also be noted that the adoption version differs from the transmittal version in that the County is now dropping the proposed requirement for an adjustment of the developer’s fiscal neutrality report in the instance that the developer changes the mix of what is being actually developed. Although staff contends that this would require a rezoning and therefore a new report, the Sarasota 2050 Zoning Code has been amended to allow changes in what is being developed, administratively to a point and with Board approval beyond that, without any stated requirement for an adjustment of fiscal neutrality.
This is to request a copy of your ORC or other DEO comments on this amendment.
Thank you very much for your considerations.
Daniel J. Lobeck, Esq.
Personally and as President of Control Growth Now, Inc.
Tuesday, October 14, 2014
Lobeck: Gutting and Repealing Controls - Letter to the DEO
Monday, October 13, 2014
Andre Mele: The Trouble with the 2050 Amendments
By the terms of Sarasota 2050, all new development is required to be “fiscally-neutral.” But the landowner / developers have concluded that fiscal neutrality, in which all infrastructure and community services are paid for by the development project, must be eliminated. Citing unwieldiness and unpredictability, making little or no effort to find a work-around, the developers have fallen back on the time-honored tradition of back-room deals that force surrounding communities to share the bill.
On October 22, after a pro forma public hearing with zero prospect of making substantive changes to the amendments, Sarasota County’s Commissioners will be voting on whether to subsidize profiteering developers and big landowners looking for a payday at taxpayer expense. The subsidies won’t just be in the form of dollars. They will include our willingness to tolerate dramatic increases in traffic, significant loss of important wildlife habitat, impaired water quality in the County’s streams and bays, and to say a final good-bye to the remarkable rural character of eastern Sarasota County. Farm fields, ranch pastures, greenbelts, greenways, wetlands and wildlife corridors will be lost, and the patchy, fragmented habitat that remains will rapidly degrade.
Let one thing be clear: there is absolutely no demand for all this proposed housing. There are at least 50,000 sites available for development and redevelopment west of I-75 – inside the Urban Services Boundary. The most recent and credible population projections call for 16,000 new units in the county over the next decade: tapping just one-third of the capacity that already exists inside the Urban Services Boundary.
New development in the east will not only destroy the rural character of the region, it will siphon investment dollars away from the existing urban coast, leaving blight untouched and redevelopment opportunities wasted. It is a lose-lose proposition. Urban development built to current standards, however, would be much kinder to the bays and other coastal waters than the existing mashup of decaying, runoff-inducing impermeable surface. The miles urban residents walk, bike, and ride aboard public transportation benefit everyone, reducing traffic and lowering Sarasota County’s carbon footprint.
If the County Commissioners vote for these amendments, they will be on the wrong side of history, and will be voting for a de facto tax increase for their constituents. They will be responsible for the degradation or destruction of habitat that is home to endangered and threatened species such as the Bald Eagle, Wood Stork and Florida Panther, leaving the county open to potential litigation from environmental groups, and possible EPA injunctions. They will also be degrading a threatened species called Old Florida.
If you would like your voice to be heard, the Commissioners’ email addresses are here.
Attend the October 22 hearing, at 1:30 in the Commission Chamber, 1660 Ringling Blvd, and sign in to speak. For more information, go to sarasotavision2050.blogspot.com.
Andy Mele is the SunCoast Waterkeeper, an affiliate of the Waterkeeper Alliance, with 220 bay, river and sound Keepers worldwide. Visit www.suncoastwaterkeeper.org or www.waterkeeper.org.
Sunday, October 12, 2014
MEET the CANDIDATES - Tues OCT 14th 6:30pm
MEET THE Sarasota County Commissioner CANDIDATES
Tues. OCTOBER 14th at 6:30-7:45 pm
Fruitville 210 Community Alliance - Meeting
Held at Sabal Palm Bank at 5101 Fruitville Road
- a MAP is on our F210 website: www.Fruitville210.org
7 of the Sarasota County Commissioner Candidates will be present.
This will be a highly attended meeting!
Held at Sabal Palm Bank at 5101 Fruitville Road
- a MAP is on our F210 website: www.Fruitville210.org
7 of the Sarasota County Commissioner Candidates will be present.
This will be a highly attended meeting!
MEET THE Sarasota County Commissioner CANDIDATES
Tues. OCTOBER 14th at 6:30-7:45 pm
Sarasota County District 2: Paul Caragiulo, Alexandra Coe, Steve McAllister, Pete Theisen
Sarasota County District 4: Alan Maio, John C. Minder, Ray Porter
This will not be a Debate ...but a civil & respectful gathering where Candidates can give their answers to Sarasota County issues.... specific questions will be asked of each Candidate (not the same question to every candidate).
We have presented all the candidates with a list of Questions they "may be asked". Our goal is not to play "gotcha" at our F210 Meetings but to have a "civil discussion in the public square"
WHEN you enter the meeting room . . . Please see get an F210 Candidate index card to write your question on.
Friday, October 10, 2014
Opposing 2050: Letters and Emails
It is important to create a written record of public opposition to proposed 2050 changes and the inconsistent and absent elements of the process which brought these changes forward.
Cathy Antunes:
All who care about the next half century of Sarasota development are asked to write to the County Commission and to the state Department of Economic Opportunity (DEO) to protest 2050 changes. Please send your personal comments to:
Ray Eubanks ray.eubanks@deo.myflorida.com
Valerie Brookens valerie.brookens@deo.myflorida.com
Sarasota County BCC commissioners@scgov.net
(Letters we receive will be republished on the blog unless authors request otherwise.)
 |
| East Sarasota County, FL |
Cathy Antunes:
Dear Mr. Eubanks and Ms. Brookens,I am writing regarding my concern and opposition to the Sarasota County amendments submitted to change Sarasota 2050. . . .
Time for Action: Stop the Changes to 2050
Who's in charge here? The people of Sarasota, or a handful of developers?
 |
| East Sarasota County |
Changes to the 2050 Plan
County Commission Vote
Wednesday, October 22nd
Expected start time for 2050 hearing, 1:30 pm
County Commission Vote
County Commission Chambers
1660 Ringling Boulevard
Sarasota FL 34236 (across from Post Office)
It's important to create a public record of opposition to changes. Please plan to attend and give input on October 22nd. Our quality of life, environment, prosperity, & tax burden will be impacted by 2050 changes.
Write to the County Commission and the state Department of Economic Opportunity to protest 2050 changes.
Please send your personal comments to:
Ray Eubanks ray.eubanks@deo.myflorida.com
Valerie Brookens valerie.brookens@deo.myflorida.com
Sarasota County BCC commissioners@scgov.net
Sarasota's Urban Service Boundary & Fiscal Neutrality are protected policies in the County Charter. Many believe the County Commission may be violating these and other protections by compromising the Urban Service Boundary (USB) through the "gutting" or indiscriminate, excessive amendment of 2050 . To learn more about 2050 & the Urban Service Boundary, click here
Our neighborhoods, taxes & quality of life are at risk due to proposed changes to 2050 which benefit a handful of landowners. 2050's fiscal neutrality policy requires development outside our Urban Service Boundary to pay for the infrastructure (urban services) it requires - both the upfront and long term infrastructure costs. Existing housing capacity within Sarasota's USB is enough to meet projected housing demand for decades. Facilitating surplus development outside the USB by compromising 2050 standards undermines our community prosperity.
Your input is critical. Please share this information with others.
For further information on the problems with changing 2050's fiscal neutrality policy, go to:
For Snail mail:
Ray Eubanks, Valerie Brookens
Department of Economic Opportunity
107 East Madison Street
Caldwell Building
Tallahassee, Florida 32399-4120
Sarasota County Commissioners
1660 Ringling Blvd.
Sarasota, FL 34236
Sarasota Council of Neighborhood Associations
CONA
PO Box 15788
Sarasota, Florida 34277
Questions, contact: conasarasota@hotmail.com
Sarasota Council of Neighborhood Associations
CONA
Lourdes Ramirez, President
PO Box 15788
Sarasota, Florida 34277
The 2050 Action Network
Wednesday, October 8, 2014
Not in Vermont
Except in Vermont. Have a look at Vermont's guidelines on highway signage to find out why. It's in our White Papers folder. We'll be adding to it -- if you know of rigorous work in the areas of concern for the 2050 Plan Amendments (uncivil planning, urban sprawl, developer dominance, fiscal neutrality, etc) please share!
Meet the Candidates Monday at CONA
| ||
|
Tuesday, October 7, 2014
Not developers, but business owners, should be thanked
Developers should thank the business owners
In a recent guest column for the Sarasota Herald Tribune Rod Thomson would like the citizens of Sarasota County to thank developers for the buildings we work in, the restaurants we eat in, and the stores we shop in. In his vision of the world, it is the developers who are owed thanks for the success of our community but I believe it is the businesses, restaurants and shop owners who are actually owed our gratitude. For if it were not for their entrepreneurship, the developer would not have an opportunity to build for them. Developers are suppliers of structures but the economy's success depends on the businesses that occupy those buildings. While developers provide temporary jobs and then move on, it is the businesses that actually provide jobs for the long term. Without businesses, commercial construction would cease to exist. In reality, businesses supply the needs of the community and developers provide a service to the businesses.
Mr. Thomson wants us to believe that developers are the largest employers in our community. In Sarasota County, the top five employers are:
The top three employers depend on our taxes to survive. Even if the developers were allowed to double the number of houses in our county, this mix of top five employers will not change. There may be more government employees needed with each new housing development but the opportunities will be the same: low paying or government jobs.
How does that help our future economy? The current county commissioner's economic policy focusing largely on housing developments is flawed since it does not provide the community with the higher paying long term job opportunities we need for families to succeed in the future.
What about growth?
Growth is usually measured by government officials as the number of residential houses built. If we count housing units created between 2000-2010, Sarasota County grew faster than Manatee. There were 46,480 new houses built in Sarasota County between 2000 and 2010 while Manatee grew by 36,973 new homes. Sarasota County outpaced Manatee County's growth by almost 10,000 housing units from 2000 - 2010. The comments made by Mr. Thomson and others in the construction industry that Manatee is better than Sarasota is just not true. (See comparison chart below on Sarasota, Manatee and Charlotte county population, housing and millage rates)
Mr. Thomson also cherry picked information from Sarasota's recent citizen's survey to point out a rosy picture of the attitude of citizens. But if we read the survey carefully, citizens are now more concerned about growth and development (21%) than the economy (7%).
The citizen's rating of our quality of life as 'excellent' fell from 55% in 2012 to 43% in 2014. According to the survey, the concerns about growth and development are the reasons for the 'slippage' of the ratings from 'excellent' to 'good' in the past two years.
Mr. Thomson also neglected to address the cost of development on our community. With low impact fees and changes to the Sarasota 2050 plan, the tax burden is shifting from developers to the current Sarasota County taxpayers. Sarasota County's focus on sprawl will lead to higher taxes to pay for the new infrastructure and government services to support the development. If we have to pay for new development growth, how does the new housing benefit the existing Sarasota County taxpayer?
It is the local concerned citizens and activists that have shaped Sarasota County to what it is today. We voted to tax ourselves to buy environmentally sensitive lands and new parks. The citizens also voted to avoid sprawl by protecting our urban service boundary, which is supposed to control increases in density in the rural areas. It is the activists and citizens that work together to demand a high quality of life from our government.
Rod Thomson wants us to thank the developers but it is the developers who owe Sarasota's citizens and businesses a world of thanks for the opportunities to serve them.
|
Important Meetings!
CONA
Monday, October 13
6:30 pm social
7:00 Meeting
Meet the Candidates for
County Commission
Districts 2 & 4
and
Charter Review Board
Location: Sarasota Garden Club
1131 Blvd of the Arts
Sarasota
****************** County Commission hearing on 2050
Tentative Date:
October 22
possibly after 1:30 pm
Location: 1660 Ringling Blvd
Sarasota
|
Lourdes Ramirez
PO Box 35231
Sarasota, FL 34242
Office: 941-346-2830
|
Saturday, October 4, 2014
Understanding sprawl
Looking for resources on Urban and Suburban Sprawl? We've created a Page with links to several of them. Have a look.
Thanks to The Preservation Institute for its work and resource list.
 |
| Suburban sprawl, Scottsdale |
Thanks to The Preservation Institute for its work and resource list.
Wednesday, October 1, 2014
Changing Demands in Form-Based Codes
Reposted from SRQ
"You talk to millennials or to aging boomers and what they are looking for in places is the ability to get to activities they want to go to in the shortest time possible, whether that is parks, museums or coffee houses," he said. "They want to be close to things, and time has become much more important."
Development
BY JACOB OGLES | SRQ DAILY FRESHLY SQUEEZED CONTENT EVERY MORNING | WEDNESDAY OCT 1, 2014
Whether helping pull together celebrated redevelopment efforts in Orlando or contributing to a major revitalization of Nashville, Rick Bernhardt has been in the background helping make sure legal aspects of key projects come together. During a visit to Sarasota as a guest of the Downtown Sarasota Alliance, he stressed good planning can make sure developments aren't stalled, largely by getting the entire community on board with the same vision.
"We had situations in Nashville of 30 years of conflict with neighbors and developers and nothing ever got built," Bernhardt, executive director of the Metropolitan Nashville-Davidson County Planning Department told SRQ in advance of a Tuesday night event at The Francis. "But the system was set up to bring a proposal to neighborhoods and have them respond. We never opened up the process to say what was important to neighborhoods and what they actually would want. The system was set up to be contentious."
Bernhardt more recently has won accolades for work turning that pattern around, notably through the adoption of more than 30 form-based codes aimed at establishing a shared vision for growth and bringing it to fruition. The codes were developed through a process that involved the community, and that has led to developers being able to move on projects with less opposition.
Of course, form-based codes are not new to Sarasota, and Bernhardt had some role in bringing them here as well. He was one of the consultants working with Duany Plater-Zyberk and Company more than a decade ago on the Downtown Sarasota Master Plan. It has been between eight and ten years since Bernhardt was last in Sarasota, but at first blush he likes what he sees. "It looks like a lot of the plan has been implemented," he said. "The streets look nice and the scale is good."
Tensions between neighborhoods and developers, though, have not disappeared. The conflict remains central to the city politic, and also has been the greatest source of discord in an update to the Sarasota County 2050 Plan.
Even when a community vision is put forth, Bernhardt said, it needs routine updates. Modern demands for more dense urban cores are a perfect demonstration of why, he said.
"If you look at the plans in the early 2000s, even up to 2005, things were very different from today," he said. "Nobody actively anticipated the change in millennials—the change in household size, household make-up and demand for an urban community." While people a decade ago still tended not to buy homes until they started families, a shift in mindset has younger buyers getting units now. Combined with the retiree population that lives an active lifestyle for longer, Bernhardt noted, the highest demand in the housing market is not for one-person homes.
Beyond housing, there is also a change in demand for centralized amenities, which means dense, mixed-use development. "You talk to millennials or to aging boomers and what they are looking for in places is the ability to get to activities they want to go to in the shortest time possible, whether that is parks, museums or coffee houses," he said. "They want to be close to things, and time has become much more important."
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)