Wooten may cast a pivotal vote

The commissioner hopes a controversial condo project does not overshadow his accomplishments in his first year in office.

By BRIDGET HALL GRUMET
© St. Petersburg Times,
published December 2, 2001

INVERNESS -- The analogy was one of Josh Wooten's favorites last year along the campaign trail, his way of describing a growing county at the crossroads.

"I look at Citrus County as a big canvas, and we have the paintbrush and can make it anything we want," said Wooten, then a candidate for the vacant County Commission seat he would go on to win last November. "With the growth we're going to have, four years from now could be too late."

Would Citrus County develop, or overdevelop, like its sprawling sisters to the south? Or would it retain its Old Florida charm amid limited but inevitable growth?

Wooten's slogan suggested that the people would decide, and he would be their voice.

As the new commissioner passes his one-year mark in office, the county's growth remains one of his most pressing issues.

Wooten is shaping up to be the pivotal vote on the proposal for four-story condominiums on the banks of the Halls River, a controversial project that is winding its way through the public hearing process.

Thousands of residents have signed petitions, hundreds have sent letters to the commission and dozens have spoken at public hearings against the plans for Halls River Retreat, a project recently downsized to 54 "shared ownership" condos and a manager's apartment.

They don't want high-rise time shares painted onto Citrus County's canvas.

But Wooten says he cannot only consider residents' pleas. He has to measure the condo plan against the standards in the county's Comprehensive Plan, a thick document that Wooten also promised during the campaign to uphold as a commissioner.

As revised by developer F. Blake Longacre, the condo plans now appear to meet the Land Development Code, the regulations stemming from the Comprehensive Plan principles. Longacre removed three buildings that would have affected a quarter-acre of riverine wetlands, and he scaled back his boat slip request from 20 to 18, the number allowed for a site with 1,860 feet of shoreline.

"If you're going to draw a line in the sand, this is where we draw the line," Wooten said. "My line was, we're not going to affect riverine wetlands on an Outstanding Florida Waterway, and we're not going to change the rules on the amount of dock space on an Outstanding Florida Waterway."

Wooten said he has tried to take a moderate position on the project. While Commissioners Roger Batchelor and Jim Fowler have indicated clear support of the project, Wooten conditioned his backing on the protection of the river and opposed one design with five-story buildings.

Commissioners Gary Bartell and Vicki Phillips, however, have drawn another line in the sand: the project's compatibility with the neighborhood. Compatibility may be a subjective test, but the Comprehensive Plan still cites it as one of the standards that drives sound development decisions.

Wooten said the condo could pass the compatibility test, as far as he is concerned.

"You have to look at the surrounding area," he said. "There's many buildings there on stilts that are at least two stories with parking underneath. This (condo project) is three stories with parking underneath."

Last week the County Commission sent the revised condo plans back to the Planning and Development Review Board, launching another round of public hearings. With a County Commission vote on it a couple of months away, and with other accomplishments under his belt, Wooten hopes the controversial project does not overshadow his first year in office.

"I hope this is not my first year's legacy," Wooten said, "this thing we have not yet passed on."

On the inside

Wooten believes his first year as a commissioner has been a successful one.

He organized Keep Citrus Beautiful, a litter prevention group that received its incorporation papers this month.

He lobbied for adding a second roadside litter patrol crew, which a majority of his fellow commissioners agreed to put in this year's budget.

Along with several other commissioners, he pressed county staff to start widening County Road 486 in January 2003, six months earlier than previously scheduled.

All were fulfillments of campaign promises, Wooten said, and "we were able to do all these things with keeping the millage the same, which I said I would try to do."

There have been some lessons along the way, such as the so-called garbage tax, the landfill assessment on homes and businesses.

Candidate Wooten vowed to eliminate it. Commissioner Wooten voted in June to reduce, but not repeal, the assessment after learning that the landfill still needed some revenue to pay off its remaining $378,000 debt.

"It's easy as a candidate to say we need to repeal this unfair tax," Wooten said. "Then you get into office and you understand the responsible thing is to continue on with some of these programs.

"When you're on the inside, you understand the reasoning for certain things that you didn't necessarily understand on the outside," he said.

Meeting standards

Perhaps Wooten's greatest challenge has been balancing his campaign promise of "reasonable growth" with the rights of developers who have come before the County Commission.

Candidate Wooten told the crowd at the League of Women Voters/St. Petersburg Times forum last October: "You deserve a commissioner who will see to it that we're not gobbled up by New Port Richey-type sprawl."

Commissioner Wooten voted in July for a developer's master plan that included a row of shops and 120 apartments on 9 acres in Beverly Hills.

Randum Corp. officials said they would only build the 12,800-square-foot commercial strip and promised to scrap the proposed three-story apartment buildings that had prompted outcries from the neighbors.

But the developer kept the 120 residential units in its master plan so it could sell the rest of the land for another housing project, such as condominiums or an assisted living facility.

Leaving those 120 apartments in the master plan, however, could have allowed a future developer to build exactly that.

Wooten was in the losing minority on that vote, and commissioners crafted a compromise that allowed Randum Corp. to build only the commercial strip. Any plans for the rest of the property, commissioners said, would have to come back for approval.

As with the Halls River condominium project, Wooten said, the problem with the proposed apartments in Beverly Hills was the site's zoning for mixed use, a broad land use designation that allows intense development.

Whether it was 120 apartments on 9 acres in Beverly Hills, or 63 or 54 condominiums on 11 acres half-filled with wetlands in Homosassa, critics have complained that the projects were too dense. But in both cases, the number of units fell within the 20 residential units per acre allowed on mixed use properties.

And while opponents have complained about the height of proposed three-story apartments in Beverly Hills or four-story condominiums along the Halls River, both are allowed under the county's Land Development Code. Buildings at least 5 feet from the property line can be up to 50 feet tall, regardless of the property's zoning, and they can go 10 feet higher for each additional 2 feet between the building and the property line.

"I ran trying to uphold the integrity of the Comprehensive Plan, but when you get into these mixed use properties and you get developers who want to maximize the use of their property, I don't know any way to handle it other than negotiate it down to something that meets our community standards," Wooten said.

Wooten said the county needs to revisit its height restrictions and the rules for mixed use properties, because the regulations now allow for the kinds of projects that many residents do not want to see.

"That's what gets us here to this point," he said, referring to the condo project. "The most controversial project that has come to me starts with mixed use zoning."

'I vote my conscience'

There is another similarity between the proposed Beverly Hills apartments and the Halls River condos, although it is one that Wooten says is irrelevant.

The Realtor for both projects was Kevin Cunningham, a friend and campaign contributor to Wooten.

The two are social -- they attend the same church, live near each other in Citrus Hills and worked together on the Hernando Community Enhancement Council -- but Wooten said Cunningham does not talk to him about any projects coming before the County Commission.

"He can't and he wouldn't, and I wouldn't allow him to," Wooten said.

Campaign finance reports show Cunningham and his wife, Karen, each gave $100 to Wooten. Attorney Jim Neal gave $200, and Burrell Engineering gave $1,000, the maximum $500 contribution allowed for both the primary and general election.

Those donors often represent development interests that come before the County Commission, and they all work for the developer of Halls River Retreat, a project they have all advocated at public hearings.

(Campaign finance reports show no contributions from those donors to Commissioners Phillips, Batchelor or Bartell, although Fowler received $500 from Burrell Engineering and $150 from Neal during his 1998 bid for re-election.)

Wooten said the $1,400 from those donors is a fraction of the $30,373 he raised during the campaign, and those dollars in no way influence his vote.

He has voted against Neal's clients before, such as a street vacation request in Cherokee Trace on which Wooten cast the lone dissenting vote in February.

He has voted against projects from other donors. Attorney Clark Stillwell, who gave $200 to Wooten's campaign, represented the proposed Heritage Development Co. shopping center on U.S. 19, just north of Scotty's and across from Crystal River Airport, which Wooten voted down Nov. 13.

"I don't know how the argument is that I do what the people who gave me contributions say," Wooten said. "I just do the best that I can and vote my conscience."

Keeping the canvas

Cindy Cino, a state committeewoman for the Democratic Party, said the commission's only Democrat has lived up to his campaign promises. The roadways are cleaner, Wooten is "totally accessible" to his constituents, and he is taking the right stand on the tough condo issue, she said.

"If people comply with the law, the law says they can build," Cino said. "I think (Wooten is) following the law, and he has to, whether we like it or not."

Others believe Wooten's support of the Halls River condos, among other projects, is inconsistent with his campaign mantra of "reasonable growth."

"People say a lot of things to get elected, or they feel they have to say certain things to get elected," said Patricia Cowen, president of the Citrus County Council, a coalition of 22 local civic groups. "It doesn't necessarily mean they'll follow through."

"He's a salesman," Cowen added, referring to Wooten's used car dealership in Hernando. "He'll sell more cars if there's more people here, so he's certainly not going to take an antigrowth position."

But Wooten says he has followed through on his promises for smart growth.

He voted for the so-called "big box ordinance," a set of design standards that require architectural features and extra landscaping to soften the boxy look of large stores.

He voted to update the impact fees, making sure new homes and businesses pay for more of the increased demand for county services.

"A lot has been accomplished this year as far as trying to adhere to what I said," Wooten said. "This project (Halls River Retreat), as controversial as it is, (the developer) didn't get a rubber stamp. It still hasn't gotten passed."

Even with the fate of the condo project in the air, Wooten added: "Don't give up on my canvas."

"Because I haven't."

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