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After annexing several large business properties, Largo is now focusing on subdivisions along its boundaries.
By ERIC STIRGUS
© St. Petersburg Times, published May 31, 2001
LARGO -- The city's march to the bay will soon turn inland.
For nearly four years, the city has focused its annexation efforts on large businesses east of U.S. 19. But now City Manager Steven Stanton said he wants the city to annex land that contains about 3,000 homes in some of the unincorporated subdivisions contiguous to the city's boundaries.
Stanton is eyeing two areas in particular: homes near Allen's Creek and a group of homes near the Keene Park subdivision.
If the city's campaign is successful, Largo would add hundreds of thousands of dollars to its tax rolls.
The push comes as some city commissioners have wondered during the past year why Largo has not sought to annex more residential properties.
"We accomplished more than we expected to, but now we can concentrate more on residential," said Commissioner Pat Burke. "They're right next to us. They're right there."
With just one person handling Largo's annexation program, city staffers have been unable to aggressively pursue residential annexations, Stanton explained. That one employee, Jim Madden, is resigning next month. City officials plan to hire two employees to replace Madden, and the new employees will concentrate on residential as well as commercial annexations.
The city has annexation agreements with just a fraction of the homes in each area that Stanton mentioned. Most of the homes are contiguous to properties already within city boundaries, the primary qualification for annexation. Stanton is confident that most homeowners in the two neighborhoods are willing to join the city. He said the city may schedule referendums in the neighborhoods on the question.
"People have been willing to annex," Stanton said. "It's just a matter of communication."
Carol Cook, who lives on Long Bow Lane, a street with some homeowners who live in the city and some who live in the county, said she would be receptive to the city's proposal for practical reasons. Cook recalled how authorities had trouble determining which agency should respond to the home of a neighbor who had two family members with diabetes.
"For practicality, it would probably be better to have our whole street in Largo," said Cook, who is not a city resident.
The city's sales pitch will focus on two themes: lower taxes and better services than the Pinellas County government's.
"We do things they don't, and we do it significantly cheaper," Stanton suggested.
Stanton knows there are certain neighborhoods where the city's effort would be met with either stony silence or angry yelling. There will not be any efforts to pursue annexation in those areas, which include the Newport subdivision and High Point.
The city manager thinks that as Pinellas County's tax base shrinks through cities' annexations of unincorporated land, those living in unincorporated areas will pay more in property taxes. Eventually, Stanton thinks, those residents will become fed up with the higher taxes and want to be annexed into Largo.
"It's going to be a hardship on those folks," he said.
The city also will stay away from the Greater Ridgecrest area. Pinellas County is spending millions of dollars on infrastructure improvements in that neighborhood, and Stanton said he has been told by county officials not to pursue any annexation agreements there.
"They don't want us interrupting the capital projects," he said.