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Letter to the editor

Deja vu as beach city land use regulation battle rages

By JADE JACKSON LLOYD
Published May 4, 2005

ST. PETE BEACH - For the second time in three years, changes in land development regulations have divided a beach city.

Residents are mobilizing on both sides of the issue, convinced theirs is the best vision for how the city should redevelop.

A growing antagonism between some residents and city commissioners haunts public workshops, creating a hostile undercurrent beneath most questions and comments.

In the past two weeks, residents on either side in St. Pete Beach have been forming political action committees to support their particular positions.

Sound familiar? That's because the same thing happened three years ago, just a few miles up Gulf Boulevard on the streets of Treasure Island.

In 2002, an effort to bring new luxury hotels to the city created two factions: those in favor of tall buildings, and those against them.

City officials wrote rules allowing up to 10 stories. Residents rallied, gathering 2,000 petition signatures pushing for a referendum to let voters decide future height and density increases. Two weeks before the vote, commissioners passed the new land development regulations, or LDRs.

A lawsuit followed, resulting in a permanent injunction on the changes. The residents flocked to the polls, passing their initiative by 66 percent.

Fast forward to 2005.

Some here, in this city of nearly 10,000, fear a plan that would allow up to 20-story buildings, higher densities in some areas and would represent a sea change for the city landscape. Others see it as the city's only salvation.

City commissioners and staff have held years of public workshops and meetings, soliciting residents' feedback. Recently, those exchanges have turned vicious at times, with commissioners claiming higher buildings are needed to preserve the city's tourism and residents expressing fears it will descend into a concrete jungle.

One group, the Citizens for Responsible Growth, reached out to Treasure Island activists for help with its fight. Started April 21, the group's mission is to bring the Community Redevelopment Plan, which will be implemented by new LDRs, to a vote in a citywide referendum.

Calls for comment from several of the group's leaders were not returned Tuesday.

It's something Ray Green and attorney Ken Weiss know a lot about.

Green is one of the residents who sued the city of Treasure Island back then. Weiss represented the residents in the lawsuit and is representing Citizens for Responsible Growth in its fight.

Green sees parallels between the two situations.

"The commission was developing new LDRs and they were listening to the people who would make the most money," he said during a recent phone interview. "We were asleep to what was going on."

His advice? Get residents involved and don't listen to scare tactics "of people interested in making money," he said.

"That is, "if we don't have 20-story buildings, we can't make money,' " he said. "If we don't allow hotels, we'll lose our tourist base. If we lose our tourist base, our taxes will go up. It scares residents to death."

"It all comes down to one thing: what do the residents and businesses together want?" Green added. "This has to be for the good of the whole, not just for the developers who come, develop and leave."

Weiss said his work so far has been pro bono on this project, the same as in Treasure Island. Though he hopes to be paid for it, he said it's more important the people have their say.

"If the commission really believes it is in the best interest of the community, they should convey that to the community and let them vote on it," he said. "It's very simple."

He has put together four petitions for charter amendments, asking residents to vote on specific issues in referendum.

Residents on the other side say Treasure Island residents should stay out of St. Pete Beach business.

Another prospective PAC, Support Your City's Future, hadn't filed papers with City Hall as of Tuesday afternoon. However, a leader of the group says they want to let residents know about the Community Redevelopment Plan and "encourage their active support" for its passage.

Despite this language in the mission statement, self-professed leader of the PAC Mike Cohen said in a Monday phone interview that the group advocates supporting the commission more than the LDRs. He said the PAC is trying to be positive.

"We favor the LDRs going through, but our group is not going to go out there and kick people in the butt saying, "You've got to vote on this, you've got to vote on this,' " Cohen said. "We feel the commission is being attacked, their characters assassinated. These people are being plain brutal. They're being rude."

When asked how many people have rallied to his side of the argument, Cohen said though the only names that will appear on the application for the PAC are his and his wife, Arlene's - she's the treasurer - nearly two dozen people have expressed their support.

"We believe the majority of the residents of this beach support their commissioners," he said. "We want the commissioners to know this is true, and what they're hearing right now is a vocal minority."

Cohen's argument echoes that of the city manager and commission.

"We realize if we don't redevelop, we'll lose the tourism," he said.

Ralph Lickton, a vocal opponent of the plan and a member of the proreferendum group, said there has been no hard evidence proving that. Despite requests by residents in open meetings and letters written requesting these things from city staff, he said questions about the proposed changes' effects on infrastructure, in particular, have gone unanswered.

"We're going to keep asking," he said. "At the end of the day, you're going to find the citizens of St. Pete Beach are going to be formidable adversaries."

Commissioner Deborah Martohue has publicly expressed her frustration many times with residents' insinuation that the commission is in the pockets of developers and doesn't have residents in mind.

"When you're an elected official, you have to look at the whole city, not one small group," she said recently. "It's not a perfect plan. There is no perfect plan, but we've tried to create a holistic plan."

[Last modified May 4, 2005, 00:57:19]