Future development belongs in our hands

By JOHN HEDRICK
Editorial 17 July 2007
Tallahassee.com

Why is everyone so scared of the Florida Hometown Democracy Petition?
    
The Florida Chamber of Commerce has just put out a competing petition that sounds very nice, but makes it impossible for citizens to control future growth.  Why? The Chamber’s main objective is to kill the Florida Hometown Democracy petition.  
    
With Hometown Democracy you and your family would control Florida’s future growth.  Here is how it would work.
    
Every community has a growth management plan.  The problem in the past has been that the developers give lots of money to the politicians and then the politicians allow developers to go hog wild — allowing them to make constant changes to growth management plan. Just look around.  You can see what went wrong.   The growth management plans don’t need to be changed – they are reviewed every 5 years. 

To fix the problem of developers gone wild, Hometown Democracy requires that future plan changes should be granted by the people, not the politicians.  It is a simple concept and one that would put a stop to all these infernal, needless changes.   It wouldn’t cost you more money because developers would know voters would not approve these constant changes. Developers would learn to live with the plans.  So, don’t let the Chamber machine dupe you into believing that it will be expensive to hold elections.  It will not.  There won’t be any.  The developers will have to live with the plans.
    
With Hometown Democracy YOU would automatically have the right to vote on plan changes in your community. 

The Chamber’s petition sounds swell. However, it is tricky and sneaky. Hometown Democracy President Lesley Blackner rightly says of the trick petition: “The devil is in the details.” And the details of the Chamber petition are highly un-democratic.  Blackner observes, “Actual application of this proposal would result in the likely failure of every attempt to invoke the referendum process.  The proposal would require proponents of a referendum to gather petitions from 10% of registered voters.  Incredibly, these voters may only sign a petition ‘at the office of the appropriate County Supervisor of Elections or City Clerk.’  This draconian petition-signing requirement is unprecedented.”
      
Who would actually get to the supervisor’s to sign? What about people who work and can’t get to the supervisor’s office during business hours?  What about people who are house-bound or don’t have a car or a ride to the supervisor’s office? Why can’t their petitions be circulated freely the way they always have been?   If the Chamber was serious about letting people vote on growth, they wouldn’t make it so hard to get a petition signed, and the Chamber would back Hometown Democracy.  

How serious is the Chamber at enacting their Anti-Hometown Democracy Petition?  Very serious!!! As of July 1st their members, thanks to a new enacted law that went into effect July 1st, can keep us off their property to get signatures for the Hometown Democracy petition as they collect signatures for the Chamber petition. So, in theory a supermarket can authorize collectors to gather signatures for whatever they please and have us arrested for trying to get signatures for the Hometown Democracy Petition!
    
What is the Chamber so afraid of?  I will tell you.  It is us!  You and me, average Americans who are sick of endless growth being shoved down our throats. They do not want the people gumming up their development deals.  They don’t want the people on the turf of the politicians, whom they control.
    
How can you tell the difference between the Hometown Democracy petition and the Trojan horse? Next, their petition title is Florida Growth Management – which is exactly what it it won’t do. Look for Florida Hometown Democracy on the bottom of the petition. This is the real thing: We have DEMOCRACY in our name!

For more information, visit www.floridahometowndemocracy.com or call 866-779-5513 for the real Hometown Democracy petition.

John Hedrick is chairman of the Growth Management/Sprawl Committee of the Florida Chapter of the Sierra Club. Contact him at johnhedrick13@yahoo.com or (850) 339-5462.