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The city slipped up when it tried to rush a new land development ordinance into law, the court says. Now, the law is idle for 180 days.
By AMY WIMMER, Times Staff Writer
© St. Petersburg Times, published December 11, 2002
ST. PETERSBURG -- Treasure Island cannot use its new ordinance that allows hotels to build as high as 10 stories, a circuit judge ruled Tuesday.
The beach city erred when it tried to rush a new land development ordinance into law before residents could vote on a related issue, said Pinellas-Pasco Circuit Judge Thomas Penick, who granted a temporary injunction for six months. A future hearing will determine whether the ordinance should be invalidated altogether.
Two residents, Ray Green and Mike Daughtry, who were both instrumental in a petition drive that launched a record-setting referendum in November in Treasure Island, sued the city. They alleged that Treasure Island commissioners violated their own rules by trying to pass a new law before residents could vote to give themselves more power over future changes in development law.
Commissioners "materially and substantially" altered their ordinance between the time they publicly advertised public hearings for it and the time they voted on it, Penick ruled. Those changes should have led commissioners to re-advertise their public hearings.
Commissioners essentially removed recommendations proposed by the Planning and Zoning Board, which had suggested making the rules apply only to properties north of 104th Avenue. Commissioners rejected that recommendation because they learned it would be illegal to arbitrarily select an area.
"These requirements are there for a reason," said Ken Weiss, a lawyer for Green and Daughtry, "and it's to prevent exactly what happened in this case."
City Attorney Jim Denhardt argued in the three-hour court hearing Tuesday morning that the city followed the law, even though some residents didn't like the outcome.
"The plaintiffs are just disgruntled, I guess, because the ordinance was enacted before the referendum, but the city followed all rules and procedures in enacting this ordinance," Denhardt said.
Treasure Island officials have said repeatedly that no developers are knocking on the city's door with plans to take advantage of the new allowances for 10-story hotels, and that any such plans would take at least six or eight months to navigate the process for approval.
Now the court has stepped in, prohibiting the city from using its new ordinance for 180 days.
In recent weeks, city commissioners have considered creating their own moratorium to temporarily restrict themselves from using the new ordinance. But the residents leading the lawsuit said the moratorium wasn't enough because commissioners could lift it at will.
Treasure Island began looking at its land development regulations more than a year ago. City officials were concerned that small motels were being redeveloped as condominiums, effectively diminishing the commercial properties in Treasure Island.
They devised the land development ordinance as a way to encourage new hotels instead of condos by allowing hotel developers to build as high as 10 stories when they had at least one acre of land to work with. But many residents, particularly in the Sunset Beach neighborhood, were upset that the city would consider allowing buildings that high anywhere on the island.
The residents launched a petition drive to get a referendum question on the ballot to ask voters if they wanted authority to approve all future height and density increases. City commissioners said the referendum was worded too strictly and would make it virtually impossible to increase height and density in the future.
Commissioners approved their ordinance in late October, then residents voted overwhelmingly Nov. 5 that all future height and density increases should come before them.