One thing is irrefutable: It is on the ballot. Why? Recently at Stetson University there was a round-table discussion on growth. A quote in The Daytona Beach News-Journal caught my attention: “the system is broken.” Perhaps therein rests part of the answer.

 

For many, Amendment 4 is on the ballot because enough individuals recognize the system has been and continues to be broken. This frustration is born from the following conspicuous contradiction: While for decades, Florida has had the most stringent growth-management laws in the country, growth has run rampant over our land and over those laws with no end in sight.

Moreover, state and local jurisdictions are doing their best to strip even these evidently impotent growth laws that are regularly violated, even though they are on the books as a check to irresponsible growth. It gives new meaning to circular reasoning.

Amendment 4 is a referendum on elected officials, past and present, who have been unable or unwilling (but probably both) to say “no” to growth, to negotiate growth, or even to lawfully and appropriately approve growth so that it is at least remotely consistent and concurrent with the Comprehensive Plan and state statutes -- in effect, to carry out the oaths they swore upon entering office.

The system is broken. Whether Amendment 4 is the cure remains to be seen, and that is what is most interesting and distressing. People may not care whether Amendment 4 works -- they just want something other than what they know is not working.

Conditions have deteriorated over the years to get us where we are today. To speak frankly, the people are tired of it, and that disappointment and dissatisfaction will lead them to vote for something else and anything else, regardless of the pros and cons.