Cities deal with the growth next door

By CHASE SQUIRES

© St. Petersburg Times, published February 16, 2000

When they got together last fall, mayors, commissioners and managers from Pasco's six municipalities found they had a common problem: city boundaries.

On U.S. 19 in New Port Richey, City Manager Gerald Seeber said, areas where city and unincorporated land are interspersed along the busy route make the boundary look like "a zipper undone."

South of Dade City, planner Doug Currier said, he can do nothing about billboards erected on county land surrounded by city boundaries, even though city laws prohibit them.

In Zephyrhills, a city of 9,000, year-round residents have to cope with a surrounding area that swells to 70,000 in the winter, with most living outside the city but using the municipality's roads and shopping areas.

Even Saint Leo, with a population measured in hundreds instead of thousands, is seeing the effect of unincorporated growth with a luxury golf course community that has most of its planned 900 homes on county land just across the town line.

Pasco County is growing, but the growth doesn't conform to city limit signs.

"A lot of times, the impacts are minor," Zephyrhills City Manager Steve Spina said. "People will call and complain about something, and we have to say "That's not in our jurisdiction,' and they'll have to call the county. But there are times when it can be a real problem."

Preparing for the future is one of the toughest tasks brought on by growth just across the city line, Spina said.

"When it comes to road construction, we have to think about all the use. We're not doing it just for our population. We're not isolated," he said.

Residents who don't live inside city limits and don't pay city taxes still drive. They still get in car wrecks. They still expect safe streets and adequate police and fire protection when they come into town, Spina said.

The problems of rapid growth outside the lines sparked a move last fall at a meeting of the Municipal Association of Pasco to consider using state laws that allow cities to annex commercial property that's surroundedby city limits.

It's a first step.

Seeber said the problem is especially tough in his west Pasco city where officials have to plan roads in heavily commercialized areas. Much of the region's shopping is inside city limits, even if the homes aren't.

Dee Carper, a specialist in growth and governmental relations at the Florida League of Cities, said the problems are unique to small cities in the state's growing metropolitan areas.

"In North Florida, there are no cities having this problem," she said. "But you have the same characteristics of what is occurring in South Florida. These are cities that are small in population but in a region that is highly populated."

Carper said the league isn't looking for the state to step in and fix anything, but members are expecting the state to get out of the way.

The Department of Community Affairs, she said, is studying its growth and boundary regulations to see what state roadblocks could be removed to let the cities and counties work together to solve their problems.

"So far, the laws have been one size fits all," Carper said. "I think it needs a local solution. The city officials, these are the people who live there, they know the problems and what should be done better than anyone."

Cities do have things to offer to lure annexations, when appropriate, and elected officials throughout the county aren't shy about highlighting the benefits.

In San Antonio, Mayor Roy Pierce and commissioners have been able to influence a developer to conform a shopping and residential project to meet city standards because the project is just inside city lines.

But, the mayor pointed out, the developer also got something by virtue of being in the city.

San Antonio has no impact fees that the developer would otherwise have had to pay the county, the mayor pointed out.

The city got what it wanted, with commissioners having final say over the look of the project and the developer changing from a proposed townhouse project to single family homes and shops that met the city's approval. The developer will pay no impact fees.

In Dade City, annexation means lower sewer and water rates.

In Zephyrhills, Spina points out how much easier it is to deal with a government that's just down the street instead of miles away.

"You want to talk with us? We're right here," he said. "On a county level, you might have a harder time getting through levels of bureaucracy. Here, you want to come in and talk to the city manager, you just come on in."

© St. Petersburg Times. All rights reserved.