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Pigs fly! Okay, but developer denied!

By HOWARD TROXLER
Published October 7, 2007

I went to a St. Petersburg City Council meeting the other day, and the darnedest thing happened. A big developer practically got booted out of City Hall.

Holy condo tower, Batman! I swear it's true. The developers fumed. They blustered. They insulted. They threatened. In short, they did what usually works.

But the City Council voted 7-0 not to allow a 257-foot-tall, 23-story, 154-room hotel and condo project on the border between the downtown and the Old Northeast neighborhood.

It was the right call, if you ask me. Otherwise we'd have this Great Wall of Monstrosity lining the south side of Fifth Avenue N, towering over the neighborhoods to the north.

The tricky part of the decision was that the proposed Westin hotel met the technical requirements under the city's rules in effect at the time of application. The city's staff had recommended approval.

The developers made a big deal of that, saying that they had been "lured" to the city by the old rules, and that if the city ignored the staff recommendation, then they would See You In Court.

(Having spent the past 25 years watching developers' lawyers argue that staff recommendations aren't the last word and should be overruled, I thought that part was sort of funny.)

The developers also said:

• The neighbors shouldn't complain about the building's shadow, because they already sit beneath a lot of shade trees.
• The opponents (who had a pretty good lawyer who was making an effective argument) were just "emotional."
• The hotel wouldn't allow workers or patrons to park on the streets of the neighborhood, which is already jam-packed. (As to how to enforce that, maybe they had a magic parking wand.)

You could tell, however, the hotel guys were not playing on their home court.

Their lawyer, Ron Weaver, first tried a classic public hearing technique, asking for extra time to make his case. (How many "public hearings" I've sat through where the public had to wait!)

But the chairman of the City Council, James Bennett, said no. After that, the hotel folks seemed a little rushed and off their game.

In the end, the City Council said it had the discretion to say no. Council member Earnest Williams said he thought the developers had a point, but he voted no anyway. (He helpfully gave 'em some good quotes to use in their lawsuit, though.)

The city of Tampa recently lost a land-use case; the test will be how much discretion the City Council really has.

Afterward, two thoughts occurred to me:

The first was that I would be curious to see how the City Council would have voted if the developer had been named Sembler and the neighborhood wasn't the Old Northeast, but, let's say hypothetically, heck, I dunno, Ninth Avenue N and 66th Street.

Oh, wait. That happened. The council said yes. 'Scuse me.

The second afterthought was that opponents of Hometown Democracy should be cheered, because this shows that a local government is capable of saying no. The citizens rallied, organized, made a good argument, and won (unless the court says otherwise).

As to whether this constitutes a New Day in St. Petersburg or just an exception that illustrates the rule, beats me.

It was, at least, different.

[Last modified October 7, 2007, 04:04:20]