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Lealman rejects city's proposal

It doesn't agree with St. Petersburg over pay for fire service in the wake of annexation.

By ANNE LINDBERG, Times Staff Writer
Published October 24, 2007

PINELLAS PARK

Saying the city was not offering enough money, Lealman fire officials Monday flatly rejected a St. Petersburg proposal to partly reimburse the district for providing first-response fire service to annexed properties.

Lealman's snub of St. Petersburg's offer likely means a tentative settlement with Pinellas Park will also fall through. Pinellas Park Mayor Bill Mischler had said there would be no deal with that city if Lealman and St. Petersburg were unable to reach an agreement.

The sticking point is the amount of reimbursement. St. Petersburg wants to pay about 1.74 mills per parcel because that's what officials there say it costs them to provide fire service to the city.

Although it costs Lealman much more - about 3.6927 mills - the district said it will settle for less. It wants St. Petersburg to pay at least the same thing Pinellas Park has offered - 2.1752 mills.

St. Petersburg officials refuse to increase the amount they're offering because they say they cannot justify spending more than it costs them to provide the service.

St. Petersburg's taxpayers, they say, would be upset if the city were to pay someone else more for service than it would cost the city to provide.

Lealman officials, on the other hand, say their taxpayers will be upset if they have to come up with money to make up the gap caused by St. Petersburg's paying too little.

Lealman's decision to reject St. Petersburg's offer was announced Monday during a meeting of a task force appointed by the Legislature to try to solve the financial hardships caused by annexation of properties in the Lealman fire district.

Voting members of the group are the Lealman Fire Commission, the cities of St. Petersburg and Pinellas Park, and Pinellas County. Nonvoting members are Kenneth City and Seminole, which has cut a separate deal with Lealman and has not had representatives at the past few meetings.

The task force has a Nov. 1 deadline to give the Pinellas legislative delegation a report of its activities and recommendations.

Although task force members had hoped to present the delegation with a deal that would finally solve the decade-long dispute, it does not appear that will happen. A draft of the report merely summarizes areas of agreement and disagreement.

Although unlikely, a last-minute deal could still be reached. The task force is scheduled to meet at 3 p.m. today in Room 202, Park Station, 5851 Park Blvd., Pinellas Park. The meeting is open to the public.

In an effort to protect the district's financial base while keeping negotiations open, fire commission chairwoman Becky Harriman suggested the task force agree to extend the "Farkas bill." Named after former state Rep. Frank Farkas, who sponsored it while he was in the House, the bill applies only to the Lealman fire district.

The bill requires annexing cities to pay Lealman for five years after the annexation at the tax rate Lealman would have gotten had those properties not been annexed. The bill is scheduled to sunset July 1.

Harriman said extending the bill for two more years would give the parties time to negotiate a permanent agreement.

"We haven't taken anything off the table. We're still negotiating, but we have to listen to our taxpayers (who said to the cities) if you don't pay what we pay, leave us alone," Harriman said. "At the end of the day, it's not going to kill either of these cities to extend the Farkas bill for two years."

Both St. Petersburg and Pinellas Park nixed the idea.

"I'm extremely frustrated. I think we've come in good faith," Tish Elston, deputy mayor of St. Petersburg, said. "What am I supposed to tell my constituents they are getting out of this? I don't think we're interested in extending the Farkas bill. ... I don't see we'regetting anywhere."

Mischler said he was disappointed at the turn of events. The idea of extending the Farkas bill was dismissed at the very first meeting of the task force in July, he said.

"I am totally against extending it for another couple of years," Mischler said.

He warned Lealman that, with no agreement, annexation could proceed and the fire district would get no reimbursement for continuing to supply first-response fire service to annexed properties. Mischler called Lealman's positiona "gamble."

Others at the table also cautioned Lealman about the possible downside of its decision to refuse St. Petersburg's offer.

"If the Farkas bill expires, they're going to go hog wild with annexation," Kenneth City Mayor Muriel Whitman said.

Pinellas County Commissioner Ken Welch said, "I'm disappointed as well. I thought we were making good progress."

St. Petersburg attorney Jon Kieffer, the task force mediator, asked, "Where do we go from here?"

Then he answered his own question: "Into a huge sea of uncertainty."

[Last modified October 23, 2007, 23:49:47]