Print

Email story

Comment

Letter to the editor

No answer is found in Lealman fiscal firefight

By ANNE LINDBERG, Times Staff Writer
Published October 28, 2007

Tired and frustrated negotiators agreed that they could not agree despite four months of intense bargaining over ways to lessen the financial impact of annexation into the Lealman Fire District.

The main sticking point was the failure of St. Petersburg and the Lealman Fire Commission to settle on the amount the city would pay the fire district to continue providing first-response fire service to each property annexed from the district.

St. Petersburg wants to pay 1.74 mills per parcel, far less than the 3.6927 mills per parcel that it costs Lealman to provide fire service.

Because there was no deal with St. Petersburg, the agreement between Pinellas Park and the fire district collapsed. Pinellas Park Mayor Bill Mischler had said his city would not sign unless all members of the negotiating team could come to some sort of agreement.

And Pinellas County refused to sign if the agreement contained any reference to annexation boundaries. The county plans to deal with that issue on a countywide basis in the next few months.

"You folks are at an impasse," Kenneth City attorney Paul Marino observed.

The negotiators, appointed by the Legislature to suggest ways to permanently settle the fire issue, agreed. Task force head County Commissioner Ken Welch said that unless there was a "miracle" over the weekend, the group would not be able to present the delegation with a solution to the problem.

Task force members spent the remainder of last Wednesday's meeting hashing out details of a report that must go to the Pinellas legislative delegation by Thursday. The task force will meet again at 3 p.m. Monday in Room 202, Park Station, 5851 Park Blvd., Pinellas Park, to finalize details and to see if a miracle occurred over the weekend. The meeting is open to the public.

Although the miracle is unlikely, fire board members met Thursday to discuss their next step.

They agreed to make a counteroffer to St. Petersburg. The city would pay Lealman at its millage rate for the first three or four years after a property was annexed, and then the rate would drop for the remainder of the contract.

It is unclear when that offer will be presented to St. Petersburg.

But fire board members were also frustrated by the progress of the negotiations. St. Petersburg, they said, wants to annex the tax-lucrative Joe's Creek area, which makes up 13 to 25 percent of the district's overall budget.

If St. Petersburg does not have to pay the district anything, Lealman property taxes will have to go up 13 to 25 percent to make up for the loss. If St. Petersburg pays only a little, Lealman taxes will still have to increase to make up the difference. Either way, the burden falls on Lealman property owners, who end up subsidizing St. Petersburg.

"It's something about this that isn't fair," fire board member Linda Campbell said.

Other board members agreed, noting that the loss of that much tax revenue could kill the district because it would become financially unfeasible to keep it going. They also acknowledged that a low settlement could merely postpone the inevitable slide into oblivion.

"Annexation is coming. We're sitting ducks," board member Kathleen Litton said.

The best solution, they said, would have been to continue the Farkas Bill, which provides that annexing cities must pay Lealman at its tax rate for four or five years after annexation. Although the bill does not forbid annexation, cities have been reluctant to annex because they do not want to pay Lealman's rate.

But St. Petersburg and Pinellas Park are against extending the bill, which is scheduled to sunset July 1. They have heavily and successfully lobbied legislators to allow it to end. Although Pinellas County would support the bill's extension, it is clear that will not happen, so the county voted with the cities to recommend that the best solution to the problem would be an agreement between the cities and Lealman.

The Lealman board also discussed the possibility of halting negotiations and simply continuing with lawsuits against Pinellas Park and St. Petersburg. The suits, which are on hold while negotiations continue, rely on a state law that requires annexing cities to pay special districts for four years after the annexation. The rate would be whatever the special district, like Lealman, charges for the service.

Lealman's attorneys warned that the lawsuits are a gamble. Lealman is the first to try to enforce its rights under that statute, so it is unclear how a judge in a lower or appellate court would interpret the law.

Board member Vivian Campbell said she wanted to press the suit: "If we sign an agreement, they're going to come in and take so much we won't be viable in a year, two years, max. I'd rather go down fighting."

The task force

The state Legislature created a task force to study the effect of annexation on the budget of the Lealman Fire District and report on possible ways to solve the problem to members of the Pinellas County legislative delegation by Nov. 1. In particular, the members were expected to make a recommendation concerning the possible extension of the "Farkas Bill." Although the task force was not required to come up with a solution, all parties (including the legislative delegation) hoped that would happen. Voting members of the task force were Pinellas County Commissioner Ken Welch, Pinellas Park Mayor Bill Mischler, St. Petersburg Deputy Mayor Tish Elston and fire commission chairwoman Becky Harriman. Nonvoting members were Kenneth City Mayor Muriel Whitman and Seminole Mayor Jimmy Johnson. No Seminole representative attended the last few task force meetings. The task force began meeting July 9 and will meet at 3 p.m. Monday at Park Station, 5851 Park Blvd., Pinellas Park, to finalize its report.

[Last modified October 27, 2007, 23:25:17]