Print

Email story

Comment

Email editor

Column

Despite rejection of plan, housing worries remain

By DIANE STEINLE
Published September 11, 2005

Last week, Pinellas County commissioners again refused to approve expansion of a Clearwater-Largo Road redevelopment district considered central to Largo's plan to improve that troubled corridor.

The city would not concede to the county's request for one last change in its redevelopment plan for the corridor. After the 4-3 vote against the plan at Tuesday's County Commission meeting, Largo officials packed up their papers and indicated they would not come back any time soon.

Left in limbo are hundreds of low-income residents who would be displaced by redevelopment of their mobile home parks into condominiums and offices under the plan. Some of their parks are under contract to developers.

Many turf tussles between Largo and Pinellas County preceded this latest battle. Largo often accuses the county of being heavy-handed and arrogant, while Pinellas County calls Largo stubborn. They are always kicking dirt on each other.

Casual observers might think the Clearwater-Largo Road skirmish is just another clash of two government personalities and the county's denial just another way of settling the score.

There is more to it than that.

At the same time Largo brought its plan to the county for approval this summer, the county was getting requests from developers to demolish mobile home parks in unincorporated territory and was hearing discomfiting pleas from residents of those parks to save their homes.

County commissioners were spooked by the Largo plan's displacement of residents from more than 800 mobile homes along Clearwater-Largo Road. Commissioners agreed with Largo that the crime-ridden corridor needed to be redeveloped. But four of the seven commissioners couldn't get past the specter of all those low-income residents put out on the streets, many without sufficient income to afford other housing in Pinellas. The county's inventory of decent low-cost housing is too small, especially now that investors are snatching up mobile home parks and low-rent apartment complexes to build high-end condominiums.

For its part, Largo kept tweaking its redevelopment plan and allayed most of the county's fears. Only one issue divided them Tuesday. As currently written, the plan would give developers the right to build 15 units per acre on mobile home parks where the current allowable density is 7.5 units. If developers wanted more units, they could get density bonuses by agreeing to make a certain percentage of their units affordable housing.

County commissioners feared that at 15 units, developers would get all the profit they needed and no affordable housing would get built. They wanted the base density to be 7.5 units instead, and beyond that, developers would have to build affordable housing to get more density.

That's the point on which Largo dug in its heels last week. Largo officials had argued throughout the weeks of negotiation with the county that their city government and their redevelopment plan already were sensitive to the needs of displaced residents. Largo City Attorney Alan Zimmet told commissioners that if developers were told they could get only 7.5 units per acre in the redevelopment district and after that would have to provide affordable units, those developers would go outside the district to build their projects.

County Administrator Steve Spratt said he was surprised when Largo walked away Tuesday. Even when County Commissioner Ronnie Duncan suggested that the county and developers might be satisfied with a base density of 10 units per acre, Largo didn't compromise.

"I don't really think the request was unreasonable," Spratt said Friday. "It's the toe in the water; it's not guaranteeing everyone a house or an apartment ... We've got a public policy dilemma here."

Largo officials don't want their redevelopment district to be the only place in the county subject to tough requirements for affordable housing. They don't want to be the guinea pigs for a county government searching for solutions to a countywide crisis. They say there should be a countywide policy about providing affordable housing in new projects that displace low-income people.

A county committee is working on just such a policy and will report its recommendations to the commission Oct. 18. Spratt said the County Commission could have a policy in place by December. That seems like a wildly optimistic timetable, given the complex economic and social issues involved, as well as the need to get input from the cities.

Largo officials said they might bring their plan back to the commission after the countywide policy is approved, but they might not. Developers already have their hands on some of those old mobile home parks along Clearwater-Largo Road. They could build at the current density without the redevelopment district being approved by the county.

If that happens, those new projects likely will have no units for low-income people. Clearwater-Largo Road, long a place where the needy of Largo could find a home, will be closed to them.

Diane Steinle can be reached at steinle@sptimes.com To write a letter to the editor, follow the instructions in Your Voice Counts.

[Last modified September 11, 2005, 01:12:29]