Originally Published: Wednesday, August 26, 2009

The Ledger.com

 

BARTOW -- Depending on whom you believe, a proposed state constitutional amendment affecting local growth decisions will either put regular citizens on an equal footing with developers or lead to an unnecessarily cumbersome system that will stifle economic development and cost jobs.

 

That was how the arguments over the proposed Florida Hometown Democracy Amendment were framed Wednesday before a crowd of 125 at a Polk County Tiger Bay Club forum in the Bartow Civic Center.

Debating the amendment were Lesley Blackner, president of Florida Hometown Democracy, and Ryan Houck, executive director of Floridians For Smarter Growth, a business group opposed to the amendment.

It was the second in what will probably be a series of debates around the state. The first was July 30 at the Capital Tiger Bay Club in Tallahassee.

The Florida Hometown Democracy Amendment, which will be Amendment 4 on the Nov. 2, 2010, ballot, would require voters to ratify any changes to local growth plans that are approved by city or county commissions.

Under the current system, approval of the changes requires nothing more than a majority vote by commissioners.

Much of the debate and the answers to questions from the audience involved charges and countercharges about what the proposed amendment would or would not accomplish and require.

"Florida Hometown Democracy does only one thing," said Blackner. "It gives voters veto power over city and county growth plan amendments."

But Houck countered that the amendment is not about giving the voters a say in local growth decisions, but instead is about "stopping growth at any cost."

He called amendment a "stimulus package for trial lawyers."

Houck cited events in St. Pete Beach, where, even after residents approved a controversial growth plan amendment under what he characterized as a local version of Blackner's process, members of the losing side sued to overturn the vote.

But Blackner, who is a lawyer, said the lawsuits were an attempt to thwart St. Pete Beach developers' efforts to make an end run around the state growth law by bypassing local review.

The Florida Hometown Democracy Amendment wouldn't do that, she said.

Houck said another troubling aspect of the amendment could be to delay economic development projects because of the time it would take to wait for a referendum to know whether a growth plan amendment needed for, say, a new factory, would be approved.

But Blackner denied the amendment is about stopping growth in Florida, but about the integrity of local growth plans.

She said economic development is not in danger, either. She said that a 1999 study documented that, even if no further changes were made in local growth plans, they contain enough development entitlements to allow Florida's population to grow to 100 million. Florida's current population is about 18 million.

Some members of the audience asked how the amendment would protect private property rights to develop property.

Blackner said people have a right to develop their properties now under the rules of local growth plans.

"If you don't want to play by the rules (and request a growth plan change), it becomes a political decision," she said.

"Property rights don't mean you can do anything you want with your land," ignoring the people around you, she said. "You're never legally entitled to a change in the first place."

But Houck said the problem is that, under the amendment, people who will never visit the property and may not even know where it is will be voting on amendments affecting it, and once the voters have made their decision, there is no appeal.

He said Florida Hometown Democracy will replace current growth law with a political process.

Blackner said the current process is already highly political, but is controlled by developers.

She said that otherwise, it would be hard to understand why local officials oppose the amendment.

"If you're doing your job, you have nothing to fear from a growth plan vote," she said.

[ Tom Palmer can be reached at tom.palmer@theledger.com or 863-802-7535. ]