Florida's top planner tells legislators: Tackle sprawl or voters will

The Orlando Sentinel

TALLAHASSEE - With a public fuming over congestion and sprawl, state planners and legislative leaders are again seeking ways to better manage Florida's growth.

But unlike years past -- when politicians and planners passed tough growth laws only to water them down afterward -- they're up against a possible public uprising.

Florida Department of Community Affairs Secretary Tom Pelham asked lawmakers Wednesday to consider sweeping changes to the state-review process that decides what gets built and where -- aimed squarely at the slow-growth Florida Hometown Democracy amendment that could go before voters next year.

That amendment, if approved by voters, would require public votes on any significant change to a community's comprehensive plan, its so-called "blueprint for growth." Developers have warned it would destroy their business.

Pelham called the Hometown amendment "draconian" but said its growing support showed a broad public discontent over growth that won't go away even if the amendment doesn't make the 2008 ballot.

He said his so-called Citizens' Planning Bill of Rights would include requiring supermajority votes before cities and counties can sign off on changes to local comprehensive plans, and cutting down on how often the growth maps can be changed each year.

Citizens "watch this process. They lose confidence," Pelham told the Senate Community Affairs Committee on Wednesday. "They think the plans are changed willy-nilly. They think the commissions are in the pockets of the developers."

Pelham said he also wants to significantly reduce state regulation of developments that offer "affordable housing," encourage urban development and discourage sprawl in rural areas. He told the committee, though, that final details are still being drafted.

It's part of a major effort to regain control over a growth-management process that many agree has become confounding -- and infuriating.

Though communities' comprehensive plans are supposed to provide a big-picture blueprint for how to grow, Florida governments amend those plans 12,000 times each year. In 2005, an all-time high of 208,000 permits for single-family, detached homes were issued, though that total fell to 146,000 last year and will likely drop again this year.

Places such as St. Pete Beach and Sarasota County already have made changes to mandate supermajority votes or referendums on big development projects.

"I think this is deep-seated and widespread," said Linda Chapin, the former Orange County mayor who heads the University of Central Florida's Metropolitan Center for Regional Studies and has talked to Pelham about his plans. "We have a lot of people talking about the things he is talking about."

Pelham was heralded by anti-sprawl groups when he accepted Gov. Charlie Crist's appointment last year to be Florida's top growth planner.

Considered one of the founding fathers of Florida's much-maligned growth-management law, Pelham helped implement the original act when he held the same job in the late 1980s. A development lawyer, he has earned acclaim through the years for criticizing the way lawmakers have gradually scaled back the act.

Last spring, he went toe-to-toe with Rep. Dean Cannon, R-Winter Park, over a bill Cannon pushed that waives some road-building requirements for urban areas. Crist signed the bill despite requests from environmental groups for a veto.

Now, Pelham is using his own clout -- and the threat of a constitutional amendment developers hate -- to prevail.

"He is using the threat of Hometown Democracy to motivate the Legislature to put citizens back in the process," said Eric Draper, with Audubon of Florida.

Even if the amendment's backers don't meet the Feb. 1 deadline to place it on the 2008 ballot, "this movement is likely to continue at the local level all over our state," Pelham told lawmakers.

"What this movement indicates is growing citizen dissatisfaction with the way we're dealing with growth-and-development issues."

Ross Burnaman, a Tallahassee lawyer who worked at DCA under Pelham in the 1980s, co-founded the Hometown Democracy movement and said he has little faith lawmakers will listen to Pelham.

"I don't trust the Legislature," he said. "Since 1985, the Legislature's done nothing but butcher a good piece of legislation."

Many veterans of Tallahassee's past growth fights agree -- and they also don't know whether any legislation will appease the public's anger over what they see is unregulated growth.

"There's a general frustration by people who come down to the county-commission meeting to speak about something they think is important, then get three minutes at midnight," said Wade Hopping, a longtime Tallahassee lobbyist for developers.

"They end up feeling like it's not a fair deal. That's going to be a hard thing to fix."

Aaron Deslatte can be reached at adeslatte@orlandosentinel.com