DSAC Minutes 05/02/2001 RMay 2, 2001
TRANSCRIPT OF THE MEETING OF THE
DEVELOPMENT SERVICES ADVISORY COMMITTEE
Naples, Florida, May 2, 2001
LET IT BE REMEMBERED, that the Development Services
Advisory Committee, In and for the County of Collier, having
conducted business herein, met on this date at 2:30 p.m. in
REGULAR SESSION at Conference Room G, 2800 North
Horseshoe Drive, Naples, Florida, with the following members
present:
CHAIRMAN:
Thomas Masters, P.E.
Charles M. Abbott
R. Bruce Anderson, Esq.
Dalas D. Disney, AIA
Robert L. Duane, AICP
Marco Espinar
Blair Foley, P.E.
Brian E. Jones
Dino J. Longo
Bryan Milk
Thomas R. Peek, P.E.
C. Perry Peeples~ Esq.
Herbert R. Savage, AIA
Peter H. Van Arsdale
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May 2, 2001
ABSENT: David Correa
ALSO PRESENT:
Patrick White, Assistant County Attorney
Aaron Blair, Planning Services
Maura Kraus, Natural Resources
Ron Nino, Planning Services
Don Blalock, Planning Services
Fred Reischl, Planning Services
Susan Murray, Current Planning Manager
John Dunnuck, Community Development
Administrator
Michelle Arnold, Code Enforcement Director
Ross Gochenaur, Planning Services
Tom Kuck, Interim Planning Director
Denny Baker
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DEVELOPMENT SERVICES ADVISORY COMMITTEE
AGENDA
May 02, 2001
,~:30 p.m.
II.
III.
Approval of Agenda
Approval of Minutes - April 4, 2001 Meeting
Staff Announcements
A. Summary of Ordinance Amendments
B Update of Planning/Building Review LOS
C Report on additions/funding with building expansion
D. Administrator Selection Committee
E. Miscellaneous
IV. Old Business 1. Subcommittee Members
2. LDC Cycle
Subcommittee Reports A. Land Development Regulation (Bob Duane)
B. Construction Code (Dino Longo)
C. Utility Code (Tom Peek)
D. Ad Hoc Committee on Fees
VI. New Business
VII. Committee Member Comments
May 2, 2001
(Proceedings commenced, Mr. Disney not present.)
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Okay. Let's go ahead and call the
meeting to order. Also we had a request, which makes good
sense, if we could send the signup sheet around the outside of
the room, too, so we can get everybody to sign it, give the
reporter a record of who's here. We've already gone through and
-- and looked at the agenda, and we've made -- unanimously
approved an amendment to move the LDC cycle item up to
directly behind approval of the minutes. And with that we were
just getting to comments on the minutes. Does anybody have
any comments on the minutes from the last meeting?
MR. PEEK: I have one. Tom Peek. Page No. 6, the fourth
line down, Mr. Van Arsdale is speaking on the fourth line down.
It says, "Will there be a -- a production of permit fees," and I
think production should be reduction. MR. ABBOTT: Or reduction.
MR. PEEK: Or reduction of permit fees.
MR. VAN ARSDALE: Thank you.
MR. SAVAGE: Mr. Chairman.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Mr. Savage.
MR. SAVAGE: Herb Savage. Did you already introduce
everybody around the room? I know there are a lot of people that
-- that haven't had a chance to meet me yet. And I just want to
make sure that they know.
MR. ABBOTT: Your face was in the paper. Isn't that
sufficient?
MR. SAVAGE: I just wondered if everyone has been
introduced that has -- we may not know.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Yeah. We could quickly go around
the room, I guess --
MR. SAVAGE: Yeah.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS:
-- if everybody will introduce
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May 2, 2001
themselves.
MR. STATZ: Eric Statz (phonetic), Nal~les Daily News.
MS. KRAUS: Maura Kraus, Collier County natural resources.
MR. MULHERE: Bob Mulhere, RWA, Inc.
MR. STAROS: Ed Staros, managing director of the Ritz-
Carlton Naples Hotel.
MR. GRABINSKI: Matt Grabinski, attorney with Garlick,
Stetler & Peeples.
MS. BARNETT: Eileen Barnett, Coastal Engineering
Consultants. MR. BLAIR:
MR. BAKER:
Erin Blair, planning services, Collier County.
Denny Baker, business manager, CDDS.
MR. BLALOCK: Don Blalock, planning services.
MR. GOCHENAUR: Ross Gochenaur, planning services, G-o-
c-h-e-n-a-u-r.
MR. KUCK: Tom Kuck, planning services.
MR. REISCHL: Fred Reischl, planning services.
MR. WHITE: Patrick White, county attorney's office.
MS. ARNOLD: Michelle Arnold, code enforcement.
MS. MURRAY: Susan Murray, planning services.
MR. NINO: Ron Nino, planning services.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Okay.
MR. SAVAGE: Thank you.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Any further comments on the
minutes?
MR. PEEK: I move the minutes --
MR. LONG: Tom, I apologize. We didn't discuss your fence
issue.
MR. PEEK: Well, we'll get it next time. Is that all?
MR. LONGO: That's it.
MR. PEEK: Mr. Chairman, I'll move that the minutes be
approved as amended.
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May 2, 2001
MR. FOLEY: Second.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Second by Blair Foley. All in favor?
(Unanimous response.)
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Opposed?
(No response.)
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Hearing none, the motion carries
unanimously.
Okay. Let's lump right into the LDC cycle. Ron?
MR. NINO: Yes, Ron Nino. If you take a great leap of faith in
your land use subcommittee, you might be able to get through a
fairly significant part of this agenda so that you have time to
discuss the issue of hearing examiner and the latest and best on
turtles on the beach.
If you would let me go through the summary that you have in
your packet, I'm going to tell you what the land use
subcommittee did. One, on the first item, they said they had no
problem with that. On the second item, agriculture district, you
recommended a denial. On the third item, you didn't have a
problem with that, but you wanted some clarification. The fourth
item, after discussing with Mr. Dunnuck, we wish to remove from
the table any discussion or -- or re -- revisiting the issue of
hotels and floor area ratios, so we would ask you to delete that
on the -- the next item, the C-4 --
MR. DUNNUCK: And let me qualify that. We may bring
something back at the first DSAC meeting in June before we
have take -- go to the hearing, but at this time there's really no
news to bring to you.
MR. NINO: With respect to the following item, that was the
addition
district.
wanted
MR. SAVAGE:
-- addition of -- of mini storage warehouses to the C-4
You didn't have a problem with that. However, you
-- you wanted the requirement --
May I interrupt, Mr. Chairman? Would you tell
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May 2, 2001
us where
not all of us know where you are.
MR. NINO: On page I of the summary.
MR. SAVAGE: Of the summary?
MR.
MR.
MR.
MR.
MR.
MR.
MR. NINO:
packet?
MR. PEEK:
page of last --
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: You got it, the last page.
MR. PEEK: Last meeting, came out last meeting.
how many of you people need copies?
MR. SAVAGE: I don't have a copy.
MR.
MR.
MR.
MR.
you are in this book? You know you're going fast, and
NINO: Yes.
WHITE: It's the table.
NINO: The table.
ABBOTT: This thing.
NINO: No, this thing. I'm sorry.
SAVAGE: Well, who has that?
This thing here.
It's all in your packet, the beginning of your
Well, what you are reading from, Ron, is the first
Who
VAN ARSDALE: I don't know if it's here or not.
SAVAGE: I'm not that old that I can't --
NINO: Perry found it.
PEEPLES: The last meeting.
MR. NINO: Perhaps I could simply discuss, rather than say
it's the next item, describe what the issue is. We -- staff had
intended to propose to allow mini warehouses, and your
subcommittee said they didn't have a problem with that.
However, one of the conditions precedent to that was that the
mini warehouse would have to have air conditioning, and no one
building could be longer than 100 lineal feet. You fellows didn't
like that.
The next item is -- is the -- then the business park district,
we also then wanted to allow mini warehouses in the business
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May 2, 2001
park district with the same conditions per -- prerequisite, and
you took the same action as you did on the C-4. You didn't think
that the air conditioning and the limitation on the lineal feet of
the mini warehouse was that important.
Then you discussed the Immokalee overlay district. That
was the -- had to do with requiring communication tower for the
conditional uses. You didn't have a problem with that. Then you
discussed --
MR. PEEK: Ron, excuse me. I still don't think Herb's caught
up. On page I in your left hand -- you were looking at it. Open it
up. Right there on the left side, page 1.
MR. SAVAGE: That's right. I heard him say page 4 awhile
ago.
MR. NINO: We're on page 2 of the summary. And at the top
of the page we're dealing with Bayshore mixed use overlay
district. You -- your land use subcommittee did not have any
objections to the fine tuning. Do you remember that was
introduced in the last amendment cycle and there was some
minor amendments to that? It kind of tightened it up, I think, by
and large. And you-all -- your committee recommended approval
of that.
The Goodland overlay district, that is, again, to -- to allow a
more relaxed form of development in Goodland, and you-all didn't
have a problem with that. However, you said if they have -- if --
if -- if a fence is -- is good enough for Bayshore in terms of
masking the area where you store your boats and motors and
cars, it ought to be good enough for Goodland as well. So you
asked that the fencing requirements similar to the fencing
requirements that are required in the Bayshore area be required
of the Goodland overlay district.
The next item was -- had to do with fences, and staff had
indicated to you that we wanted to delete that item entirely from
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May 2, 2001
the consideration.
The next item has to do with dock facilities. And, here
again, we were revisiting the dock issue which would give us a
more liberal construct on where the waterway begins in terms of
measuring the protrusion of the dock; where there was receding,
we would measure receding from the seawall. We would actually
measure it from the receded line. And that would allow a little
more flexibility and in -- in addition to that, we were revisiting
the conditions precedent. You'll all recall that in a -- an appeal
situation we had on docks in the Vanderbilt lagoon area, we were
taken to task because the conditions, the criteria that we
measured against, weren't all that clear. And one had a lot of
emphasis on blocking sights. And, as a matter of fact, in our
revisiting we're taking the site issue out because inherent in a
boat dock is blockage of sight. So we've refined those
conditions. And your committee agreed with that.
The next issue -- issue is ex -- excavations. No one ever
talked about that, and that will be discussed at the end of the --
later on with this meeting.
Vehicles on the beach, that thing has been shifting like sand
in the ocean --
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Ron, hang on.
MR. PEEK: We're out of -- we're out of -- out of phase here.
MR. MULHERE: You skipped a page.
MR. WHITE: He's doing the gray stuff.
MR. ABBOTT: Yeah. The stuff highlighted in gray.
MR. NINO: In any event --
MR. FOLEY: He skipped.
MR. MULHERE: Building permits, certificate of occupancy.
MR. NINO: That's correct. Building permits, certificate of
occupancy. You didn't have a problem with that except where
we asked that the time frame be 12 days or -- was it 12 days?
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May 2, 2001
Two weeks? You asked that it be 30 days. MR. PEEK: Right.
MR. NINO: The landscaping ones, increased size of trees,
you-all didn't have a problem with that. Subdivision
improvements, which is electronic formatting, you didn't have a
problem with that. Subdivision improvements, you didn't have a
problem with that. Again, subdivision improvements, again,
electronic formatting, you didn't have a problem with that. Site
development plans, again, that's -- has to do with our
development module system, electronic recording. You didn't
have a problem with that.
(Mr. Disney entered the room.}
MR. NINO: The next item is a new one in your plate; the
subcommittee did not review that. So you will be dealing with
that today. And, again, vehicles on the beach, that thing has
gone through a number of reiterations, and it will get an
extensive discussion later on today. However, it's important to
note that the land use subcommittee did review the first draft of
that that immediately followed the results of the advisory
committee that consisted of environmental -- the environmental
representatives and industry representatives. And we brought
that to you, and you said, you know, you like that. However, staff
at that time said, yeah, but we changed our mind. We don't want
to change, and we don't want to make any more changes.
Well, since that discussion, a lot of things have happened.
And -- and it's back in your plate.
The next item has to do with definition; again, we said we
took the hotel issue off the table. The next item is the PSI. I
think that definition would stand irrespective of what you do on
the vehicles on the beach.
And, lastly, the -- the hearing examiner process is all new.
So if this committee would reapprove all of the things that your
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land use subcommittee recommended as your land use
subcommittee, we can cut through a large part of the agenda.
MR. SAVAGE: Mr. Chairman, question, Ron -- Herb Savage --
on the dock facilities. MR. NINO: Yes.
MR. SAVAGE: I heard you say the subcommittee, and there's
been so much problem in measuring how wide a dock is and
where it's measured from and so forth. Is that -- is that all taken
care of in our code?
MR. NINO: Yes.
MR. SAVAGE: It isn't the nail on the dock on the bulkhead?
MR. NINO: We think it's better defined today than it was
yesterday.
MR. SAVAGE: Okay.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Okay? Any other comments? Go
ahead.
MR. ANDERSON: I have a conflict --
MR. NINO: I -- I -- there's one other issue. Your land use
subcommittee recommended -- even though it wasn't in your
package recommended that another amendment be included in
this cycle, which would allow churches in the C-1 district. MR. SAVAGE: Yes.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Go ahead, Bruce.
MR. ANDERSON: I need to disclose that I have a conflict on
several of the matters that are contained within this Land
Development Code amendment for clients that I represent,
specifically the vehicle-on-the-beach discussion, business park
PUD regulations, and churches as a permitted use in commercial-
zoned districts. I also had on this form the Florida area ratio and
definition for hotels. But since that's not going to be discussed,
I'll just leave it on the form anyway. And I'm going to hand this to
the court reporter.
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May 2, 2001
MR. PEEPLES: I also have a conflict of interest regarding
the vehicles on the beach. And I have my form with me that I'm
going to give to the court reporter, a copy of it -- CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Go ahead, Blair.
MR. FOLEY: Blair Foley for the record. I, too, have a conflict
with the business park PUD and the vehicles on the beach, and
I'll be completing that within the allotted time frame and
submitting the conflict form.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Okay. Anyone else? Anybody care
to make a motion at this point?
MR. DUANE: I'll move the amendment for the -- on the -- I'll
move the amendments that are on the table for approval unless
there are objections from someone here. MR. PEEK: I'll second the motion.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Okay. Any further discussion on any
particular item?
All right. Let's call it to a vote. All those in favor approving
the amendments that we just discussed with Ron, please note so
by saying aye.
(Unanimous response.)
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: And opposed?
(No response.)
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Hearing none, the motion carries
unanimously.
MR. ANDERSON: With one abstention.
MR. FOLEY: Two.
MR. PEEPLES: Three.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: With abstentions as noted. All right.
MR. NINO: I suggest we now go to the matter of hearing
examiner. To that extent, I believe, Fred, are you going to -- MR. REISCHL: -- give an intro. Fred Reischl, planning
services. I'll give you a brief overview of the hearing examiner,
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May 2, 2001
which I think most of you are familiar with. This was directed by
the Board of County Commissioners last year. Based on several
benefits, including allowing the Board of County Commissioners,
the planning commission, and the EAC to concentrate on policy --
MR. DUNNUCK: Fred, can I hold you right there ?
MR. REISCHL: Yes.
MR. DUNNUCK'. It may be more beneficial if we address the
vehicles on the beach first. They're our guests here. It's mostly
staff making the presentation on the hearing examiner. Would
you mind if we all do that?
MR. SAVAGE: If necessary, I'll make a motion to that effect.
MR. DUNNUCK.' Okay. Let's get to that issue first. I'm
going to take it off because conceptually we've been back and
forth all over this issue. And I want -- and I want to keep it on
the conceptual level. Ron will pass out the latest and greatest
version, but I will be honest with you. It will probably change
before -- you know, before this time. And we may be bringing
something back to you the 1st of June with some final
amendments.
The issue -- the Environmental Advisory Committee this
morning, the issue of vehicles on the beach, and it has to do with
beach raking and special events, some of the amendments that
we were proposing. Right now, you know, we've had full
discussion. Our intent as county staff is to make sure that there
are significant penalties when they violate codes that will harm
turtles on the beach. And when we crafted this language, we
looked at making stiff penalties and the crime fit -- you know,
the punishment finish -- you know, fitting the crime.
For example, ATVs on the beach, we have said as a staff
that we will allow ATVs on the beach or we're proposing to allow
ATVs on the beach. However, you know, we want to control that
risk of it occurring. When the vehicles go down -- we want to
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May 2, 2001
make it a corridor where you go down, they tend to the business
that they need to. It's after we've had a chance to get down to
monitor the beach and then inspect it each day and -- you know,
and they come back.
There's been some discussion, you know, with the hoteliers
about wanting to be able to go and pick up beach towels during
the day after we've done inspections and creating a similar
corridor going down there. As staff, we agree to that, and that's
some stuff that were brought up in the Environmental Advisory
Committee today, you know, going back and forth. But what we
have said on the penalty side of it is is if you violate these major
penalties because, you know, if they come down before we've
had a chance to inspect, I consider that a ma]or penalty where
they can run over eggs or do something, you know, that's the
type of penalty we want to make sure there's a -- what I would
call a hammer with the hotels. And that is your suspensions of
uses. And that's what we propose, you know. The first time is a
fine, the second time maybe a seven-day suspension, and the
third time maybe a longer suspension. And -- and I don't know,
and I'll let you-all talk about what you think about those specific
suspensions when it -- when it agrees with the ATVs.
The other issue has to do with chairs on the beach. Our
opinion is, as an overall philosophy, we would much rather see
those chairs get off the beach by nine o'clock each evening
because it creates false crawls when you leave chairs on the
beach where the turtles come up and they bump against them
and then they run back. And we have said as a philosophy, you
know, that is our number one objective.
So regarding that, we're working with them saying this ATV
issue is a mechanism to help the hotels get those chairs off the
beach on a daily manner. And as long as they do that, you know,
we will allow the chairs on the beach because that is actually by
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May 2, 2001
state statute people have to have their chairs off the beach. This
is just more of an enforcement mechanism. And there -- there
again, we have a -- stiff penalties. If you do not get your chairs
off the beach, it's kind of three you're out and you're out for that
season. And we concur on that.
The final issue and probably the one that's going to bear the
most discussion is how do we handle special events. The Ritz-
Carlton has a great deal -- and I'm sorry to single you out, Ed.
MR. STAROS: That's fine.
MR. DUNNUCK: They have a bunch of special events out
there. And -- well, the concern on staff's part is, okay, we know
we need to get these -- the furniture and everything else that
they have off the beach. And currently we have said nine o'clock
as a rule. Well, you know, from a reasonable standpoint, you get
in the middle of summer, you get a June 21st, the longest day of
the year, that's within ten minutes of sunset and the hotels have
said, you know, we want to negotiate that at all.
Right now I don't know if we're in a position to say we can
negotiate because statute says you have to have these things
done by nine o'clock. So we have to bear through those issues.
You know, I look at it from a practical standpoint saying, okay,
you get in the end of October and you have sunsets at 7:30 at
night. Well, according to what we're saying, you have an hour
and a half until nine o'clock that they can continue to have an
event which is after sunset. If we're making the argument saying
we -- the turtles are possibly going to come up to the beach right
after sunset, that's a conflict right there. That's the kind of stuff
we need to work with them on regarding this issue.
And I think from their standpoint -- and rightfully so -- they
don't want to have the three and you're out penalties for special
events because they -- you know, they have these ma]or events
that they're booking in advance. And if by chance they have a
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May 2, 2001
new hotel worker come in and violate those agreements
basically, they're concerned probably obviously; they're trying to
protect their interests on the special events side of it, which is a
point where we're going to probably, you know, come together --
we're going to come to some final discussion, probably bring
something back to you the 1st of June. I don't know if we can
actually resolve that today because we still continue to have
discussion on that issue.
But -- but that's kind of where we are in a nutshell with this
issue. We're -- where we're trying to go is make sure we have
penalties and provisions that if we're going to allow ATVs in
these type of events that we want to be able to say enough's
enough. It's easy for a big hotel to say we'll pay our $500 fine;
it's a cost of doing business. We think, though, protecting our
endangered species is an issue of being much broader than that,
and that's kind of where we've -- we've stood on the penalty side.
Withstanding that, we also want to work with the Ritz-
Carlton. One of the things that we're going to be implimenting
from Michelle's office and our natural resource staff is an
educational element to this where we come in and we train their
staff people and we talk to them.
You know, past history before Ed was there has been a little
bit of contentiousness between the Ritz and our code
enforcement staff because we've tried to go out there and
penalize them or they've had lots of code violations previously,
and it's been a cost of doing business, and we haven't had the
hammers in there to stop them. And it's frustrating from
Michelle's standpoint because she can't do much about it. This
adds the penalities in, but at the same time, to me, a more
practical solution is let's get them involved up front. Let's get
Michelle and Ed working together. Let's see if we can't get some
of these things resolved so the Ritz -- there's no -- you know,
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May 2, 2001
they can't say we don't know what the codes are, you know, we
don't know why this is important and at the same time Michelle
builds those relationships with the hoteliers so that we can --
you know, we don't have these penalties to begin with and then
it becomes a moot point on violations. But that's where we are
right now. Ed, I don't know if you want to comment on it --
MR. STAROS: I may in one minute.
MR. DUNNUCK: -- add to that.
MR. STAROS: One -- one or two things. One of the hallmarks
of our hotel is -- is to sell the beautiful beach, and we book our
beach parties sometimes years in advance.
The issue I have with three strikes and you're out is -- I'll
just use one example. Oldsmobile and Cadillac just had back-to-
back groups at the hotel. They just spent 1.3 million dollars.
That was booked 3 1/2 years ago with a beach party, a welcome
party for Oldsmobile and then, when they checked out, a
welcome party for Cadillac. If, hypothetically because I have
done something inappropriate where you say three strikes and
you're out to a contract that I signed 3 1/2 years ago and
hypothetically the week before Oldsmobile and Cadillac shows
up you say you can't have any more beach parties, now I'm liable
for a 1.3-million-dollar piece of business, you know. The food
chain keeps going as far as the liability is con -- is concerned. I
can't stop something that is already in motion for the last 3 1/2
years.
I'll be the first one to agree with you that I agree with stiff
penalties because I am an environmentalist, and I consider
myself one, and I believe that we should -- we should save our
environment and we should save the sea turtles. However, when
you start putting a caveat on penalties that dictates contracts
that have been signed for two and three years in advance, I don't
know how we can do this without litigation, end of subject.
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May 2, 200t
However, I'm the first one to work with you as far as working out
some kind of a stiff penalty or whatever with reference to
violations. That's one -- one issue.
The second issue is that you used the word "statute" at nine
o'clock. We have always used ten o'clock as our cutoff time. It
was this season and this season for the first time that the nine
o'clock issue came up, and I asked and part of our review is
saying, look, it works at ten o'clock. It's going to be very difficult
to work at nine o'clock because the sun sets at nine o'clock on
June 21st, etc. All I wanted was a one-hour to go back to what
we've done in the past and have a -- have a -- have a ten o'clock,
have the beach cleaned and -- and all the equipment off the
beach and so forth.
So those two aspects of what you just recapped, I think, are
the hottest items. There's other little nuances, but those two
things are -- are the part that makes it very, very difficult to
operate a -- a five-star facility.
MR. SAVAGE: May I ask --
MR. STAROS: By the way, we just got our fifth star again for
the 13th year, and yesterday we got our fifth diamond for the
14th year. There's only 25 hotels -- there's only two hotels in the
United States that have that distinction, actually.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: First, let me say to John that after
our Land Development Code subcommittee meeting, that's
exactly the path I believe we were on in agreeing basically with
-- with the regulations that were trying to be enacted but that
there needed to be stiff penalties, as long as folks could live with
that. So I commend you guys on that direction. Herb has --
MR. SAVAGE: Herb Savage. Ed, is it?
MR. STAROS: Ed Staros.
MR. SAVAGE: If they decide not to work with you on this
Cadillac-Oldsmobile situation, then you would not be able to
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May 2, 2001
establish a contract, say, for three years from now, is that
correct?
MR. STAROS: That's what I'm getting at. It ties my hand.
MR. SAVAGE: Absolutely. How much money would you say
-- I think we all have heard this. How much money would you say
that the hotel industry has brought to the Collier County area in
the last -- MR. STAROS: I can tell you the Ritz-Carlton Naples will
bring a hundred million dollars this year. MR. SAVAGE: Is that all?
MR. STAROS: The Ritz-Carlton Naples alone. A hundred
million dollars this calendar year.
MR. SAVAGE: You heard my question. Is that all?
what would you call that? Facetiousness on my part?
That's --
Listen to
that one hundred million dollars. And I don't care who's here, a
newspaper man, TV person, or whatever. I'm sick and tired of
hearing some of these old people that walk on the beach. Do you
know how fast a turtle work -- walks? Example: Have you ever
seen a turtle walk on the beach, any of you? The other day at
the Marriott I saw a turtle walking. Do you know how fast he was
going or maybe she? One mile, maybe, an hour, huh? And it
butted up against a board, you know. And what happened? It
sort of moved over the other -- and went on around the board,
you see. We're insulting the damned turtle by its intelligence and
saying it can't find its way around.
Did you see in the paper the other day somebody drilling in
the sand to make sure that it was dense enough so that the
turtle could dig its nest? Do you know how long turtles have
been around? You know, I don't know where we get these ideas.
I'm an environmentalist. I'm an architect. And I'm getting sick
and tired of hearing every time we have government establish a
new regulation that we're going to be able to move nowhere
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May 2, 2001
without the help of some -- with all my due respect of the young
lady, what do you call it? Enforcement, code enforcement
person following us. What's wrong with us? Excuse me. I didn't
mean to get excited.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Dawn, does staff have anything to
say?
MR. DUNNUCK'. Not after that.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Can staff support -- can staff support
the ordinance the way it's currently written?
MR. DUNNUCK: Well, I think the point I was trying to make
is that we need to discuss that. That issue came up in the EAC
this morning. You-all have one more meeting before -- prior to we
actually bring the land development code to the board. I would
feel more comfortable is if we ironed out, similar to what we
decided with the EAC, you know, Matt wants to talk about it,
bring back -- bring back your finalized version where we can
officially say staff made some revisions approximately a half
hour before this meeting, and I'm not comfortable saying this is
officially staff's position at this time because I think we would
just be back in June saying, well, we thought of one more thing.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: I have one more question. Are you
under the impression that you can't adhere to the three strikes
you're out? I mean, are you anticipating that that's inevitable
that you're going to go beyond that?
MR. STAROS: No. We had two last year. During turtle
season we had two offenses, both human error. A new employee
raked the beach before it was check -- checked in the morning.
We admit to that, and we know that was wrong. But we have
done things to prevent that from happening again.
The second time there was a -- we -- because of that
incident we decided on having a logbook where every morning
that the person who checks the beach can log the date and the
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May 2, 2001
time that he checks the beach so we don't misunderstand that
he -- he or she has not been there as yet. The logbook said --
what's -- what's today's date? It's May 2. It's a Wednesday. The
logbook hypothetically said May 2, Thursday. And so it was the
date and the dock -- the date and the day of the week were
incorrect, and it was misread, and we had cleaned the beach on
that day. So we had two offenses during the turtle season last
year as far as raking the beach prior to being -- prior to it being
certified and so forth.
I think that was -- that's a lot. My issue is that there is a
possibility that there would be somebody that runs over a sea oat
and says -- and that's one of my offenses, etc., not that I'm trying
to put light to that. I'm just saying that it is possible to have 3
offenses in any one 180-day calendar year, and to say that you're
-- we're -- we're going to prevent a -- a group that's been booked
for three years from having a beach event because I violated or
drove the ATV outside of the zone or raked the beach in --
improperly or whatever, I think, is -- is -- is over and above a
strict enforcement. We're talking millions of dollars here. We're
not talking about a $5,000 fine or a $500 fine. We're talking
about millions of dollars worth of business. If I can't guarantee
that years in advance, I don't book the business. MR. SAVAGE: Absolutely.
MR. STAROS: And I'm a good citizen. I've been here -- I just
want you to know, I got here late October 1999. The first thing I
did, because the previous general manager leaving told me that
this was a very sensitive issue -- I grew up in Pensacola, Florida,
so I am a Floridian. The first thing I did was hire Tom Garlic and
Matt Grabinski for the sole purpose of them to explain to me and
all of us at the hotel all of the attributes with reference to
following the guidelines. That's -- it's a proactive approach, not a
reactive approach with reference to having a team of -- a team
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May 2, 2001
of Garlic and Grabinski to -- to help us out. So -- but, you know,
I -- I find it inappropriate to -- to tie the two things together, to
say that you can't book future business into Collier County. I'm -
- I'm the largest employer. I -- I have a $22 million payroll here
at the hotel, and the lives of our -- of -- of the 1,061 employees
that I employ depend upon that -- that business.
MR. DUNNUCK: And, Tom, just to clarify something there,
too, in his example, the way we have written it right now is he
used the example of raking. If he would have done three of
those, he would have lost his raking. He would not have lost his
special events. And I think that's something we have cleaned up
from the last time around where the crime -- you know, the
punishment fits the crime on that side. Now, if he violates three
major things of the special events side of it, right now the
current language as written has that three strikes and you're out.
That's the one that's causing him the most heartburn are the
special events because that doesn't allow them to book. And,
you know, if we come to some, whether it's financial or
something, stiff penalty or something that still makes it so it
wakes up, you know, the hoteliers, make them not doing that and
not necessarily suspend, we may be working on that. I -- I'm not
ready to make that decision one way or the another, and that's
what we need further discussion based upon the meetings we've
been having.
MR. STAROS: Let us plant sea oats on the weekends or let
us do something positive for the environment if we do something
offensive. But let's not cut -- let's not cut off the revenue stream
to Collier County and the Ritz-Carlton Hotel company and the $22
million payroll that I support.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Go ahead. Marco.
MR. ESPINAR: Mr. Chairman. John, I've got a quick
question. You mentioned about training, staff training some of
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May 2, 2001
the Ritz-Carlton staff members. Who's going to pay for that?
MR. DUNNUCK: Well, I think we do that. It's educational,
and our mission at -- at code enforcement is to educate people
first and be punitive second. And, I think -- you know, Michelle
will tell you we want to go out and educate people as much as
possible. That is our mission. So we would not charge them for
educating them. I think that's a win-win situation all the way
around, and I'd be more than happy to have Maura and -- and
Michelle get together and even bring in The Conservancy or
somebody along those lines and make it even a private-public
partnership so that we can get something, you know, so we're
moving forward and we're doing some good. I've even made
suggestions as far as -- and they do this already. They put little
bulletins in their hotel rooms explaining sea turtle nesting and all
those type of issues but to maybe put a kiosk out there so we
have that educational element even down at the beach, you
know, and that stuff that we're all working -- you know, my goal
is to work together and get those things, you know, resolved.
MR. ESPINAR: Espinar. I also have one more quick
question. Ed?
MR. STAROS: Yes.
MR. ESPINAR: With all due respect, if you booked something
3 1/2 years ago, you booked something, a beach event, out there
before this ordinance was ever even thought of. So why are we -
- why is that beach event going to be prohibit -- or stopped
because of this? You know what I'm saying? Whether this
approve -- whether this amendment goes forward or not, you
already booked these events 3 1/2 years ago. MR. STAROS: That's my point.
MR. ESPINAR: And you still have them going forward. The
only difference -- correct me if I'm wrong -- is the ability to
utilize ATVs to --
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May 2, 2001
MR. STAROS: That's not -- no.
MR. DUNNUCK: Yeah. See, there's three --
MR. STAROS: You're out of doing business.
MR. DUNNUCK: This is -- there's three parts to this.
MR. STAROS: Cancel that $1.3 million. Say good-bye.
MR. ESPINAR: Okay. I think if you -- try to get this in my
head.
MR. STAROS: There's three parts to this on the penalty side
of it. There's the part of the beach raking. There's -- and then
actually you may even consider four. There's a part about
leaving chairs on the beach. There's a part about ATVs, and they
all have their separate sets of penalties. And then the fourth one
is special events, and then the penalties go along with that.
And really what we're discussing right now is the special
events. If -- if they violate the three chairs on the beach, they
lose their chairs. They don't lose their special events, you know,
for those type of things, and that's where we have to
differentiate because previously we had brought something that
says if you violate any of these you lose your special events. And
now we're -- we're just down to this final issue, I think, really
about the special events side what the penalties are going to be
because there are violations to special events that can harm
potentialy sea turtles.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Okay. Dino.
MR. LONGO: I have a question on the statutory regulations.
You can't change that; correct?
MR. DUNNUCK: No, we can't. We could ask the next
legislative cycle.
MR. LONGO: Right. Right now if it says nine o'clock, it's
nine o'clock.
MR. DUNNUCK: Well, that's what we have to verify.
MR. GRABINSKI: There is no statute -- where is the statute
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May 2, 2001
cite on that? I'm not aware.
MR. STAROS: The nine o'clock came up about a week ago.
MS. KRAUS: Maura Krause, Collier County Natural
Resource Department. The nine o'clock was in the very first --
the original sea turtle ordinance back in nineteen -- MR. LONGO: Sea turtle ordinance?
MS. KRAUS: Yeah, the original sea turtle ordinance was
before the Collier County ordinance -- before the land
development code --
MR. LONGO: But my question, is that county ordinance or
state statute?
MS. KRAUS: That's county.
MR. LONGO: Okay. That's a big difference. The state
statute can't be changed except by legislative session.
Ordinances can be changed. MS. KRAUS: Right.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Go ahead, Charlie.
MR. ABBOTT: I'm sorry. No, no, Dalas.
MR. DISNEY: Dallas Disney. I just had a couple of issues,
one maybe a question and then a comment -- a comment first.
This came before us late last year. It wasn't ironed out. We
were sitting here, and everybody was trying to negotiate and
finalize things, just wasting our time. It appears as though the
same thing is happening again. I'm going to suggest the same
thing I did last time, and that is go fix it; whatever the problem is,
go fix it. Get it done, and then bring it to us. Let us read it
before we sit down here at this table. This is a constant problem
that we have. It's dropped on us. We haven't had an opportunity
to read it; we don't know what it is; and you're expecting us to
respond to it. I'm -- I'm all for all sides of this. Really, I mean, I
can -- I can see the landowner rights. I have sympathy for your -
- your million three and a -- a -- in a deal that you cooked up
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May 2, 2001
three years ago, but I also think that it's a business thing, and if
you violate things, too bad. I just think that we're wasting our
time trying to iron it out sitting here in a group like this. We're
going to come up with a giraffe. This doesn't make a lot of
sense, and I'd suggest that, fine, as an update, but let's not try to
cook it while we're -- while we're sitting here at the table. Thank
you.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Thank you. Tom Peek.
MR. PEEK: Well, my comments were going along the same
line as Dallas, although I do think John started this by
introducing and saying that he did not expect us to take an
action on this today, that they were going to do some further
revisions and bring it back I presume to the subcommittee and
then to this full committee. And my comments at this time were
to suggest that we curtail any further discussion today about this
and let the staff do whatever changes they want to do and
schedule it for our subcommittee meeting in two weeks,
whenever -- whenever it's regularly scheduled. MR. NINO: Third Thursday.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: That seems like the correct -- I think
we've asked the general questions that we probably could ask
today, and let's go ahead.
MR. ESPINAR: Is that a motion?
MR. DUANE: Is there anyone from the public?
MS. KOELSCH: Well, I'm just here.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Right. I mean, as -- as we discussed,
I mean, we're kind of speaking towards issues that we don't even
know.
MS. KOELSCH: Right. No. That's --
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: We just got this today, so we haven't
had a chance to read it, so we won't get specific.
MS. KOELSCH: What I was going to say -- I'm Jessica
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May 2, 200'1
Koelsch. I'm with the Center for Marine Conservation. We're
base -- we're headquartered in Washington, D .C., but we have an
office in St. Petersburg. And I drove down, so I just, you know,
want to make sure I get on the record.
I was at the meeting this morning, and there was a heck of a
lot of conversation back and forth. I was not anticipating
sticking around this afternoon for this meeting because I figured
it would be more of the same. But I did take the time to prepare
some comments based on the version of the amendments that
we saw this morning, and I wanted to submit those for the
record. I just had a quick look at the version that you-all are
looking at, and staff recommendations incorporated -- addressed
a lot of my concerns. So I'm feeling much better about what you
folks have in front of you now than what we had this morning, but
I just wanted you to know that I had some comments that I
wanted to turn in for the record.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Perhaps, John -- or -- or we can get
copies of that when we have the LDC meeting when we review
the proposed final version of this ordinance. Any other
comments?
MR. SAVAGE: Mr. Chairman. I'd like to have you tell me
who you are and where you're from and what do you represent. I
cannot hear what you said.
MS. KOELSCH: I'm so sorry.
I -- my name is Jessica Koelsch
MR. SAVAGE: Yes.
MS. KOELSCH: -- with the Center for Marine Conservation.
MR. SAVAGE: Marine conservation. Is that a natural
organization?
MS. KOELSCH: We're a national organization. We do
advocacy for marine issues that we support science-based con
conservation of our oceans and the marine life that it supports.
Page 26
May 2~ 200'1
Like I said, we're headquartered in Washington, D.C. We have
120,000 members nationally and about 10,000 here in Florida. In
fact, many of you probably know our new vice president is David
Guggenheim formally with The Conservancy. So if you're
wondering where he went, we stole him.
MR. SAVAGE: Do you have anyone in Florida that represents
your group --
MS. KOELSCH: Yes.
MR. SAVAGE: -- that could be here?
MS. KOELSCH: That's--that's me. We're --
MR. SAVAGE: Oh, you are from here.
MS. KOELSCH: We have an office in St. Petersburg.
MR. SAVAGE: I heard you say you were from Washington.
MS. KOELSCH: No, no.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Herb, Herb, Herb. She's giving us
some information. Why don't you go ahead and look at that.
Okay. She's already addressed a lot of the things you're asking
her right now previously during her discussion.
MR. SAVAGE: I'm looking for people who are looking at
turtles on this beach in Florida, not from somewhere else. MS. KOELSCH: No. That's right.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Thank you, Herb. All right. Anybody
else from the public have any other things that they'd like to
bring up during this discussion ?
MR. GRABINSKI: Are you going to vote on this at all right
now?
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: No. We just received this.
MR. GRABINSKh I haven't seen it either.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: We will take action on it at the next
LDC subcommittee meeting when I hope that you-all have had a
chance to get back together and iron out your last couple of
issues. Then we'll be looking at something that we won't be
Page 27
May 2, 2001
changing every two minutes.
MR. GRABINSKI: All right. We just want to reiterate that we
are not here arguing for or against sea turtles. We're here
arguing for some common sense and some reasonableness. We
also favor science and scientifically based conservation. What
we're asking for is the limited right to use vehicles on the beach,
vehicles that will compact the beach no more than a human
being, and we just don't see why if a human carrying the towels
can pass the same 12 PSI why it would matter that an ATV with
10 PSI would compact the sand any more.
With respect to the beach events issue and the penalties
issue, I just want to remind you-all when you're thinking about
this that prior to the beach events permit being created, arguably
Collier County had no right or did not have the authority at that
point to regulate beach events and require these hotel property
owners to obtain a permit. They -- we -- we had a group hug last
fall and created what we felt was in a reasonable process and a
reasonable permit and a fee, but there were not penalties
attached to it that would result in revoking that beach events
permit and, consequently, result in Collier County trying to shut
down beach events from occurring on the upland property
owner's property.
And we feel that these pen -- these penalties, if adopted, if
they would have the effect of possibly taking away that beach
events permit, then you're flirting with taking away a invested
property right that would inordinately burden the upland property
owner.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Okay. Go ahead.
MS. BARNETT: Eileen Barnett, Coastal Engineering. I'm
representing The Registry. We've been -- I've been involved in
these workshops and all, and I know we're going back to the
table. I just would like to bring something to your attention and
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May 2, 2001
ask for your consideration. Division 313, the CCSL variance, I
believe a proposed LDC amendment -- this just came up very
recently, I believe, where an exemption that was already in place
regarding beach furniture during sea turtle nesting season was --
we have a proposed amendment with clarifying language which
adds, after the sentence, "unless the structures are removed
daily from the beach," in other words, you can put certain
structures on the beach during the day during nesting season,
get them off the beach at night, clarifying language was added,
"prior to 9 p.m. And not to be put forth back on the beach until
after the sea turtle monitoring takes place the next day." and
then the three strikes you're out language was added into this.
The first fine is 500; the second is a thousand, plus a suspension
of this exemption for 7 days; and then the third violation would
be $5,000 and no more beach furniture for 60 days or until the
end of sea turtle season. This has nothing to do with ATVs or
beach events. This has to do with people wanting to have a
chair on the beach.
So the -- The Registry intends to comply and intends to pay
these fines or do anything else, but they cannot imagine that if
somebody comes down there at eight o'clock in the morning and
puts a chair on the beach and it happens three times they might
not be able to put any more chairs on the beach for the rest of
the season. This is new. This wasn't something that we had
been going back and forth with prior to all of this. And I'm just
asking for consideration to relook at this LDC amendment.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: If it's still in there when we look at
the final version of it, we'll certainly take that into consideration.
MS. BARNETT: Thank you.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Okay.
MR. VAN ARSDALE: Question. When this comes back, could
there be a clearer definition of the problem or at least -- in other
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May 2, 2001
words, there's comments.
MR. DUNNUCK: Write up a problem statement, the issue --
MR. VAN ARSDALE: And there's comments about findings,
but there's no reference to the findings. And, I mean, it would be
nice to know what the historical record has been of these events
and what's happened.
MR. DUNNUCK: Absolutely.
MR. SAVAGE: That's a very good point, Mr. Chairman. What
is the historical -- how many times has this happened? Six?
We're spending all this money and discussions for six or seven
times? Excellent question.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Okay. Have we finished?
MR. ANDERSON: One last comment on what Miss Barnett
brought up is it would seem to me that unless we are going to
enforce such a law to everyone, meaning if you or I go down to
the beach at 8 in the morning and put a chair down there, then it
sounds to me like that's a violation of the equal protection law.
MS. ARNOLD: The language is not exclusive -- I mean,
inclusive only to the Ritz or the hotels. It applies to everybody.
MR. ABBOTT: But it's not enforced to everybody.
MS. ARNOLD: We are doing that now so --
MR. MILK: Could you clarify that? I'm sorry. Michelle, how
does that work with -- with the enforcement of the beach chairs?
MS. ARNOLD: Yeah. We get complaints from the condos
association and those types of things, and we address those
complaints. So this is not only limited to the hotels.
MR. LONGO: But, Michelle, you only inspect the hotels, or
do you inspect all the beaches?
MS. ARNOLD:
MR. LONGO:
MS. ARNOLD:
MR. LONGO:
The whole beach.
Okay.
All the beaches.
This also applies to the sheriff's department
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May 2, 2001
and the city of Naples with their ATVs?
MS. ARNOLD: With the exception of the city. We do not
have jurisdiction over the city.
MR. GRABINSKI: So you monitor the county beaches, and if
someone has a chair too early in the morning or if an individual is
at a county beach after sunset or are out there fishing, how do
you enforce that? How do you enforce that against the general
public?
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Well, let -- let's find out where this
ordinance actually lands up before we have any more discussion
on it. I think that's a good point. I'd like to go ahead and close
the discussion on the ordinance for the moment, and let's move
along for the hearing officer.
MR. ABBOTT: Let's interrupt Fred one more time.
MR. REISCHL: I'm Fred Reischl, planning services. As I
said, this amendment for the hearing examiner was directed by
the board last year. Some of the benefits that were considered
by the board as -- as this hearing examiner would be that it
would allow the board, the planning commission, and the
Environmental Advisory Council to concentrate more on policy
issues, such as these LDC amendments and growth management
plan amendments, would regulate ex parte communication. The
idea behind that is to create a more level playing field or the
impression of a more level playing field, the impression that
lobbyists have, commissioners here. Whether true or not, that --
that may be an impression; also, the possibility of reduction of
the likelihood of appeals knowing that it's not just easy enough
to appeal something from the hearing examiner to the board.
That appeal would go to the circuit court. Some people may
think twice before they want the hearing examiner to -- hearing
examiner's decision to be reconsidered.
The fiscal impact yearly is approximately $212,000 with a
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May 2, 2001
start-up of 42,000 the first year. And I don't have the visualizer
here in this room, but you got a table that summarizes the
changes, and I'll basically tell you that the major petitions that
still will wind up going to the Board of County Commissioners will
be rezones and conditional uses. There are other petitions that
are listed on there that -- oh, Patrick White from the county
attorney's office is here, too. He can elaborate on that a little bit
more.
But we had conversation this morning. For example, we had
excavation permits also going to the board because excavation
permits usually track conditional uses. We figured they could
hear them in tandem. Pat informed me that there's another way
he could word this that would allow the hearing officer to hear
nonconditional use associated excavation permits, and then an
excavation permit that's associated with the conditional use
would then track a different way and wind up going to the board.
So there's another way that we can simplify this a little farther.
But if you need any more policy information, I'll be able to help
you with the legal stuff. Pat will be able to help with you any
questions.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Pat, do you have anything to add?
MR. WHITE: Patrick White, assistant county attorney. You'll
note that there were two handouts today available, one of them a
summary table that goes through section by section in increasing
section number for all of the current provisions that are going to
be changed. We understand there may be more of them out there
based upon the discussions that will be held today or at
subsequent committee meetings.
The other thing that you should have is the short series of
pages that look like LDC code -- yeah, the one Perry has. That is
the changes based upon the meeting from your subcommittee
last week and the input received there. It's only provided again
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May 2, 2001
today for the purposes of keeping you up to speed with where we
are, which, in order to do that completely, I have to tell you we're
looking to meet next Monday with a group of fellows and
whoever else that wants to come to further review each of those
specific items in there that do not fall clearly within provisions
for rezoning, a conditional use, or a variance.
There are provisions in there that, for example, pertain to
the siting of automobile service stations and are somewhat of a
hybrid, if you will, between a variance and a conditional use. So
what we need to do is go through a group of individuals that are
interested in this process, sort those things out, decide which
way they're going to go in this process.
Once we've done all of that, with each of the ones that don't
fit into the major categories, we're then going to adjust the
overall provisions in Article 5 that deal with the administration
and list each of the types of entities from the Board of County
Commissioners, the CCPC, the new provisions for the hearing
examiner, and adjust those so that they fit with what the specific
changes made to the individual provisions will be.
I encourage you-all to ask questions today about something
you may have a concern or not understand. We're -- we're
recognizing this as a process where we're looking for input. We
aren't saying that this is the final version etched in stone. We're
at the beginning of the committee review process today, and
we're looking for input. So if there aren't any specific questions,
I'll address them. Maybe it might be helpful to just wrap up by
telling you that this whole series of provisions will be a separate
subsection in the actual ordinance that the board would consider
finally on June 20th.
MR. SAVAGE: Good.
MR. WHITE: And that whole separate subsection will itself
have an increasing LDC number, the provisions that you have
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May 2, 2001
before you in whatever final form they may end up. But
regardless of how they end up, the thing at the very end of that
packet sets forth the Section 6 provision. That's actual
ordinance text that would -- that tells you that the point in time
that these provisions would come into effect and how petitions
that were in the pipeline would be treated on that date.
Generally the effective date will be set some point in time in
the future when the board by resolution establishes that date.
Division would be sometime perhaps November, December. The
board would set that date, perhaps, January I of '02 where you'd
actually start having cases heard by a hearing examiner. We
envision it's going to take that long once these provisions go
through. There would be some subsequent administrative code
provisions for the actual mechanical operation. There will be
some time period to establish the criteria for a hearing examiner,
develop a contract, develop a committee of people to go out and
find the hearing examiner, evaluate those candidates, hire
somebody, get that person in-house, set up the process, get
assistance on board, get the person who is the hearing examiner
familiar enough with all the county codes and regulations, have
them attend some CCPAs, EACs, whatever the case may be, so
that they understand the process while they actually sit down in
a hearing maybe by January 1, '02, and being able to go to work.
So there's -- there's a lot to be done. This is kind of the
second step in the process. The first one is actually hopefully
this week concluding, and that is to amend the special act in the
state legislature. It's in the senate. The house approved it last
week that amends Collier County special act relating to zoning
and planning to allow for the establishment of a hearing
examiner program. So I -- I think that's the -- the overview. I'll
be happy to address anything from that perspective all the way
down to specifics.
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May 2, 2001
MR. DISNEY: I have a question, if I may.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Go ahead.
MR. DISNEY: I haven't gotten all the way through this yet.
Just generally, Patrick, if you could, the results or findings of the
hearing examiner, are those by this ordinance intended to be
binding, or is it a recommendation back to the county
commission?
MR. WHITE: Depending upon the type of matter that's being
considered, it will either be final or a recommendation. Either
way, it will be in written form with a series of conclusions of law,
if you will, and findings of fact and ultimately a recommendation
or decision. It will be a recommendation or anything that's a
conditional use or a rezoning, which would include DRI 80 A's,
things of that nature.
Variances -- variances from bulk requirements, setbacks,
etc., those are all going to be final at the hearing examiner.
There are those other things out there. There's a half a dozen or
so of them that have identified that are kind of hybrids between
one or more of those things that I just enumerated on, the
unconditional uses and rezonings, that we need to fine tune
based upon the broad direction received by the board to
generally let the rezonings and conditional use come through to
them for final form with a recommendation in writing from the
hearing examiner. And the other part of the general direction
was to let the hearing examiner make a final decision on
variances. MR. DISNEY:
MR. WHITE:
So this sets up a judicial or a quasi --
Quasi]udicial.
MR. DISNEY: -- program that is, if I understand it correctly,
intended to take some of the load off of the county commission
and -- and give some finality to -- to issues?
MR. WHITE: I'm not sure how to characterize what the
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May 2, 2001
policy rationale of the board was, but I think those things may
actually flow from the process. The nature of quasijudicial
proceedings is that you have a thorough fact sifting, an
evaluation of those facts against the existing code or laws and
some resulting determinations, either in the form of a
recommendation or a decision.
MR. DISNEY: Thank you.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Tom Peek.
MR. PEEK: Mr. Chairman, I have a series of questions based
on the document that was distributed to us last week, Patrick, at
our subcommittee meeting. I have not had opportunity to
correlate the revisions that you gave us today. So I'll just walk
through my questions, and if it's covered some way, tell me what
your answer is.
Starting on page No. 5 of 60, middle of the page, end of the
paragraph numbered 2.2.25.33, the last sentence, I think it's just
sentence structure. It doesn't make sense as it reads to me.
"the preservation board shall be provided the opportunity to
present its recommendations to the for consideration by the.".
MR. WHITE: Identified a place where the words hearing
examiner should be inserted to replace planning commissions.
MR. PEEK: Okay.
MR. WHITE: Thank you. There were a couple of those I
found myself.
MR. PEEK: The next one, page 7 of 60 near the top of the
page, sub Item F. The middle of the page where you are
connecting two sentences, the connection doesn't seem to flow.
"title height of structure may be increased to a maximum height
of 50 feet. Upon approval of a variance petition addition to the
finding of Section 2.7 "--
MR. WHITE: It is very difficult to see, but there is a capital I
for the word, "in addition." .
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May 2, 2001
MR. PEEK: Okay.
MR. PEEPLES: It's two sentences.
MR. WHITE: That provision, again, is being amended in the
round already under the stuff for dock facilities. So our -- I'm
sorry, for marinas. So we're going to have to make sure --
there's three of these actually where it's being amended both by
the hearing examiner process and elsewhere for other reasons in
this supplement cycle.
MR. PEEK: Okay. Page 9 of 60, just below the table at the
top.
MR. WHITE: Uh-huh.
MR. PEEK: There's a change of located closer than 10 feet,
changing from 15 to 10 feet. Seems to have nothing to do with
the hearing examiner, but it's changing the structure of the rule.
MR. WHITE: That was extraneous text that has been
deleted. You're referring to that three lines that stick -- MR. PEEK: Yeah, three lines.
MR. WHITE: That was extraneous text, and it was from a
prior ordinance that I believe has now been adopted already in
supplement 11 which just for your information was delivered
yesterday.
MR. PEEK: Okay. Thank you. Page 19 of 60, it's talking
about no application for zoning amendments shall be heard by
the planning commission or the hearing examiner until fees are
paid. As I read through this, zoning amendments themselves are
only going to be heard by the hearing examiner, are they not?
MR. WHITE: This section or, more correctly I think maybe
this division -- I'm not sure -- has a take-it-as-you-find-it series of
provisions that, for better or worse, combine zoning amendments
to mean two things: Both zoning amendments as changes to
districts as rezonings and zoning amendments to Article 2, quote,
unquote, the zoning code, meaning those types of amendments
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May 2, 200'1
such as this very set of provisions we're considering today. MR. PEEK: Okay. I was thinking --
MR. WHITE: So there's a difficult dividing line to follow
through that, but I think we've tracked it consistently.
MR. PEEK: Thank you. Page 20 of 60, paragraph No. 8
where it talks about you added the sentence, "The decision of
the Board of County Commissioners on any such adopted zoning
ordinance or resolution is final.". MR. WHITE: Uh-huh.
MR. PEEK: That always seemed kind of, you know, implied.
I mean, legally is there some requirement that you state it?
MR. WHITE: I believe that was intended to help distinguish
between the two things I was alluding to before: One, the zoning
amendments of the LDC and the zoning ordinances that would
then have finality as a decision so that persons who were
involved in the process would know that their appellate rights, if
you would, began at that point in time. MR. PEEK: Okay. Thank you.
MR. WHITE: It was a final decision. They were entitled to
seek relief judicially.
MR. PEEK: Okay. Page 21 of 60, near the bottom in the
large paragraph 27234.
MR. WHITE: Uh-huh.
MR. PEEK: And the one, two, three, four -- seventh line
down, we're talking about ten contiguous areas. Are you --
MR. WHITE: Oop, sorry.
MR. PEEK: Are you meaning ten contiguous acres?
MR. WHITE: I caught the misspelling of been corrected to
ten, but apparently acres did not, and I will catch it, and you've
got a great eye.
MR. SAVAGE: He has that.
MR. PEEK: I didn't mean to proofread it, but if that's what it
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May 2, 2001
turns into -- on page 24 of 60 near the top, paragraph 272101, the
second public hearing, last phrase added to the last sentence,
"except that only participants at the hearing before the hearing
examiner will be afforded the opportunity to present testimony
where newly discovered evidence before the board as set forth in
Section 512.".
Now, as you go further in this document, you find by
definition, I think, that participants are anyone that appear,
including any member of the general public that wants to appear.
But what you're saying is that in order for you to be able to speak
before the planning commission or -- or the Board of County
Commissioners, you've got to be a participant at the hearing
officer level; is that right?
MR. WHITE: That is correct. That is the intended effect.
MR. PEEK: Okay. I just wanted to make sure we were clear
MR. WHITE: That's consistent with the direction from the
board that essentially the hearing examiner perform that
quasijudicial function in detail of determining the facts that are
relevant and applying those facts to the appropriate law.
MR. PEEK: Thank you. Page 31 of 60, the large paragraph at
the top of the page, subparagraph 1, zoning action on building
and land alteration permits, that is one tremendous sentence.
You start in the middle of -- of that paragraph, about the last, 2,
4, 6, 8, 10, 12, 14, 15 lines are all one sentence, I believe,
beginning with no building or structure. And, frankly, I just had a
hard time following the thing and figuring out what it was saying.
I got lost in there a number of times.
MR. WHITE: Can I infer from your statement that you're an
advocate of short powerful sentences and clarity in the code?
MR. PEEK: A little better than this. Apostle Paul wrote
some great ones in the Bible. And they're difficult to read too,
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May 2, 2001
and I hope it doesn't take us 2000 years to figure this out after
we have that.
MR. ABBOTT: My sixth grade teacher put a big RO on that
for run-on.
MR. PEEK: So all I'm, you know -- well, I'm saying we need
to clean that up some way so we can understand what it says.
MR. SAVAGE: Did you take a breath in the middle of that
sentence?
MR. PEEK: Did not.
MR. ABBOTT: He's not an architect; he's an engineer.
MR. PEEK: We think in --
The direction then would be to simplify and
MR. WHITE:
clarify?
MR. PEEK: Please. Page 33 of 60, the last paragraph.
MR. MULHERE: Thirty-three?
MR. PEEK: Thirty-three. Excavation permits,
recommendations of approval, then it's got two A's, but the site
development review director and the hearing examiner, I think --
and then to the Board of County Commissioners. Why are we
inserting the hearing examiner between the staff and the Board
of County Commissioners?
MR. REISCHL: That -- that's what I was trying to say before
that if they -- if an excavation permit tracks with a conditional
use, then since the board hears conditional uses, we're going to
reword it so that an excavation permit will follow that conditional
use petition. If an excavation permit doesn't need a conditional
use, it's a permitted use by right, then it won't have to go to the
board. It will stop the hearing examiner whose decision will be
final. So that -- that wording will change.
MR. PEEK: Okay. Thank you. Page 37 of 60--
MR. MULHERE: I'm sorry. I just had one other correction on
that page, I didn't mean to interrupt. As long as you're there, the
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May 2, 2001
word development services director. MR. REISCHL: Planning.
MR. MULHERE: Yeah. There is no development services.
MR. PEEK: Page 37 of 60. The last paragraph, Section 512,
public participation, I think I've answered my question. I had a --
a big question there was does the public get to speak? Again, I
think further on near the end of this you defined participant
which does identify the participant as the general public. That
question has been answered.
MR. WHITE: I'm not sure to amplify the answer to your
concern, but there is a change to that provision in the white page
handout on page 37 of 60 that reflects it also includes
conditional use petition.
MR. PEEK: Right. But, again, this is participation before the
Board of County Commissioners. MR. WHITE: Uh-huh.
MR. PEEK: If you did not appear before the hearing officer
and speak, then you will be precluded from speaking at the Board
of County Commissioners.
MR. WHITE: Correct. You need to put your evidence on
consistent with the applicants and/or the staff if you're a member
of the public.
MR. PEEK: Okay. Next item--
MR. VAN ARSDALE: Let me ask a question. Is there a
reason for that? Excuse me.
MR. WHITE: Would you like me to answer?
MR. VAN ARSDALE: Yeah. Excuse me. Do you mind me
interrupting, Tom? I mean, is there a reason why it has to be
that way?
MR. WHITE: As I had alluded to earlier, the intent is to have
all of the, quote, unquote, evidence, whether it's in the form of
testimony, documents, whatever the case may be, put into the
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May 2, 2001
pot and have it boil and have the hearing examiner distill it in the
form of a written recommendation so that if you did not
participate in the process of that fact finding and conclusions of
law and all of that analysis, your evidence, if you will, will be
outside of and later in time than the actual process for
considering the case. You -- you have to be there at that point of
entry in the process; otherwise folks would, quote, unquote,
sandbag the project, never show up for the hearing examiner,
only show up at the board with all new issues after the county
had invested the time, the applicants invested in the time,
whatever the case may be, the process had been ongoing for ex-
number of months all the way back from the time the petition
was filed, and at the last 11 1/2 hour you'd have issues injected
where folks have not reasonably been given an opportunity to
consider them or respond to them.
So it's intended not to close people out but, rather, to tell
people this is the place to be included. This is where you bring
your concerns, because then if you bring in competent and
substantial evidence, that is what the hearing examiner will
consider as part of the recommendation for a conditional use or a
particular rezoning or for a particular variance, if that's what the
case is.
MR. PEEK: Page 47 of 60.
MR. LONGO: Patrick, can you do that legally in a public
hearing format?
MR. WHITE: Certainly.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS:
Continue, Tom.
MR. PEEK: Page 47 of 60. Patrick, page 47 of 60, Section
5.5.5, functions and authority, subparagraph A talks about
actions on administrative applications, and I know you've
rewritten that, and that is in the package. But I still question the
rewriting of it because it still appears to me, because all
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May 2, 2001
administrative applications, which I believe are -- is everything
that's approved in this building from a building permit to a fence
permit to a site development plan, and we're now causing all of
those to go to the hearing examiner for another 30-day delay.
MR. WHITE: You -- you can --
MR. PEEK: I hope that's not the intent.
MR. WHITE: You can take it on faith and my word that Bruce
and I have talked about this, Bob and I have talked about this.
We know that this is the place where I had mentioned earlier we
have to do some adjustment to. In particular, this is the place
where all of those half a dozen or so things that I had mentioned
were sorts of hybrids, the conditional uses or variances or some
administrative process. And they have to be analyzed
individually, determinations made about them specifically, and
then we'll look at what happens after that analysis and see how
to adjust this text to fit. MR. PEEK: Okay.
MR. WHITE: We -- we probably have to add some stuff and
definitely have to take some stuff out because, as you alluded to,
it's way too broad.
MR. PEEK: Page 48 of 60, middle of the page, subparagraph
4, authority, sub, subparagrah D of that one and Section 5,
judicial review, my question is is the hearing examiners -- it's a
recommendation to the Board of County Commissioners on this
item. Why is there a judicial review for his recommendation?
MR. WHITE: This one is for B which, I believe, pertains up
above to variances only. And the variances are final with the
hearing examiner. So B-5 is correct in stating that judicial
review would then proceed to circuit court according to 556.
Does that make sense?
MR. PEEK: It does, but I'm lost then. Why do I have
subparagraph D under 4 above, under authority?
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May 2, 2001
MR. MULHERE: Patrick, is that the one where variances are
accompanied by a rezone? MR. PEEPLES: Yes.
MR. MULHERE: And, therefore, they'll go to the board?
MR. WHITE: Yes.
MR. MULHERE: And so a petition that's accompanied by a
petition that has to go to the board will also go to the board.
MR. WHITE: Similar to the excavation permit or conditional
use that travels in conjunction with a rezoning request, it always
gets the due process, if you will, of the highest thing in the
petition.
MR. PEEK: Page 49. Just turn the page.
MR. VAN ARSDALE: What page was that on, Tom?
MR. PEEK: The last discussion was on page 48.
MR. VAN ARSDALE: What was the one on the variances,
because I think we talked about -- didn't we at an earlier
meeting talk about the variance issue in terms of oftentimes
variance decisions are political and sort of deserve that kind of
consideration as opposed to going right from the hearing exam --
through the hearing -- hearing examiner process and to court?
MR. WHITE: I -- I can respond to that two ways. And,
additionally, in that Mr. Anderson will probably confirm that as
areas of the law go, variances in cases relating to variances,
there's a breadth of cases out there as to what the appropriate
standard is and how it's applied to certain facts. But foremost, I
think what the board itself is looking for is to have not so much a
political process but a fact finding, conclusion of law, decision
process.
And the other side of my answer is that as a practical
consideration, up north in Lee County they have the hearing
examiner process which I observed for six years plus and can tell
you that, there again, is that similar breadth of cases where, if
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May 2, 2001
you will, the facts and the equities are with the applicant. I've
seen hearing examiners grant something that you may say may
not have been the most strict application of the law, but because
of the peculiarity of the facts and the circumstances, there was
relief afforded.
One of the things that I think is true about the board here is
that they take a very strict toe to the line with variances in
Collier County. They are not freely given. So I -- I don't know
that there's as much of a problem with the hearing examiner
process for that to be a final decision. But, again, it's going to
reflect upon the -- the tenor of the individual and -- and how they
see the equities of the case.
MR. VAN ARSDALE: Yeah, but I guess, you know, from, a --
like the real-life issue would be someone looking to obtain a
variance of -- of 3 inches into a setback to obtain a clear title to
a property, that I think legally the -- I mean, you may have an
examiner that says too bad, you're never going to see it. Then
he -- then the petitioner has to go where? Through the --
through the courts and then to the -- MR. WHITE: That's correct.
MR. REISCHL: Your example of :3 inches
MR. WHITE: Administrative.
MR. REISCHL: Right. We have an administrative variance
process for, in some cases, 6 inches, in some cases up to 2 feet,
depending on whether the CO has been issued. So that would be
covered under that.
MR. VAN ARSDALE: Okay. I'm not -- I mean, that just -- if
you covered all the examples that -- you know, common-sense
examples that you are commonly confronted with with regard to
variances, then I hope -- it just seems that, you know, oftentimes
a decision is a political one as opposed to a legal one. If you get
a hearing examiner that is strictly by the book, so to speak, I
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May 2, 2001
don't -- I think it will be ill-served under those circumstances ·
MR. REISCHL: Except that our book was changed a few
years ago when we added the word "ameliorating factors," so it's
not strictly land-related hardship. But we do have the
ameliorating factors. That would give something that the
hearing examiner could consider if this proposed or whatever
encroachment is not visible from any of the surrounding property
owners because of water or other physical features. That's
something that the hearing examiner can consider. And right
now the board considers those. So I think that gives them
enough leeway.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Let's continue on with Tom's list.
MR. PEEK: Page 49. At the top of the page, item's A through
J, they are considered -- they are the considerations identified
that the examiner will use for conditional uses.
My question is, is there not already a list of considerations
that -- that are to be followed for conditional uses, and why are
we generating additional criteria to be used?
MR. WHITE: I'll take a look at it. I know that we've cited to
what those were back in division 22, but let me double-check it.
MR. PEEK: Okay. Page 50 of 60, middle of the page, you
may have already caught this. Item B relates to the Lee plan
instead of to the Collier plan.
MR. WHITE: Oh, did that get in there? How did that happen?
MR. PEEK: It happens to the best of us.
MR. WHITE: It's been deleted.
MR. PEEK: Item -- page 53 of 60, this -- this is a discussion
under the unauthorized communications with the hearing
examiner. In the middle near the center of the page, the
paragraph says "unauthorized communication means any direct
or indirect communication in any form with the hearing examiner,
examiner's staff, county commission" --
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May 2, 2001
MR. WHITE: If I can interrupt you, we've struck the following
text: "the county commissioner or executive assistants to any
county commissioner'' and inserted the war -- word "or" after
hearing examiner. That's in the handout that was given out
today in the gray bar text.
MR. PEEK: I apologize for not having --
MR. WHITE: Well, that's quite all right. There's a lot of
detail.
MR. PEEK: Page 50 -- 54 of 60, the first paragraph that's
discussing the hearing examiner being able to bring in expert
opinion.
MR. WHITE: And there were significant changes made,
including setting that whole series of provisions out as a
separate paragraph and affording greater, if you will, procedural
due process for the participants to respond to whatever
materials may be received by the hearing examiner and
identifying that those materials had to be in written form. MR. PEEK: Good. That goes to my --
MR. WHITE: And there is also an opportunity to request a
hearing specifically related to that topic. MR. PEEK: Thank you.
MR. ESPINAR: Tom -- while we're on that subject on that
page 54, Item No. 5, it's asking for expert testimony. It's like the
fifth column down, concerning a matter of law, planning or zoning
applicable to a proceeding beforehand. Should we not insert
engineering and environmental in there so if he's seeking expert
testimony everything is covered?
MR. WHITE: The concept is, if I may respond to that, that to
the extent that anything that comes in, quote, unquote, is part of
a petition and is reviewed by planning services, all of those other
areas and professions that are topics for discussion and ripe for
considerations, part of planning function, are appropriate for the
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May 2, 2001
hearing examiner to seek that type of additional expert input. So
it -- it's meant to be inclusive, not exclusive.
MR. PEEK: Okay. Page 56 of 60. The top portion of the
page, sub 4, may already be altered because my comment was
that the process as originally written just seems backwards of
going to the -- all the way through the process to the Board of
Commissioners and then sending it back to the EAC. They
should be plugged in just somewhere during the process.
MR. WHITE: This is an area that, as you've indicated, has
been contracted to some degree. There have been further
discussions that it may not be far enough yet, but that's, again,
something that I think we need to go through the specific sorting
of each of those six or so provisions in Article 2 and make some
determination about. It may be more appropriate in my third
draft that I've already kind of indicated that the word "specific"
would be deleted and the words just before the second bunch of
gray bar or the gray bar the board or so that perhaps only the
provisions of the code, depending upon what may be out there
remaining after the third round of discussions on Monday.
MR. PEEK: Okay. Page 58 of 60, at the top of the page, that
may, likewise, be in that same discussion. It's talking about the
EAC's.
MR. WHITE: The entire section has been stricken.
MR. PEEK: And on page 59, I think you've already identified
that the participant definition does identify that any citizen that
wishes to speak and appear before the hearing examiner and
speak during the public hearing process.
MR. WHITE: Any person.
MR. PEEK: Yeah.
MR. WHITE: Also you'll note in the gray bar section of the
handout today that the concern, Mr. Anderson, with regards to
status as -- and standing has been added. And certainly, you
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May 2, 2001
know, that's subject to review and consideration today and any
further input folks may have.
MR. PEEK: Mr. Chairman, those are all of my questions.
Thank you for the time.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Thank you for your thorough review.
MR. VAN ARSDALE: Mr. Chairman, I think we owe a debt of
gratitude to that young man, Thomas Peek, and Patrick over here
for the thoroughness that they have both looked into this. And I -
- I couldn't do better myself.
MR. PEEK: I like the young man part of it better than --
MR. ABBOTT: Well, we've said other things facetiously.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: I know Bruce also had several
comments in our first preview of this. I take it you've gotten
together with --
MR. SAVAGE: Tremendous.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: -- Patrick and made most of your
comments already to him as well?
MR. ANDERSON: (Nodded head}.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Very good. You're feeling more
comfortable with the progress of the ordinance at this point than
you were at the LDC, Because I know you were concerned that
we were going to come with a half-baked version of it? You're
reserving comment.
MR. ANDERSON: (Nodded head).
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Go ahead, Peter.
MR. VAN ARSDALE: Just a question on the -- the funding of
the program. Where is that coming from?
MR. WHITE: I'll have to defer to staff, including, perhaps,
former Mr. Bob Mulhere.
MR. MULHERE: User fees.
MR. VAN ARSDALE: So there will be -- will there be a
budget that comes forth on this with appropriate --
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May 2, 2001
MR. DUNNUCK: Absolutely.
MR. REISCHL: A hearing -- the hearing examiner will have a
staff and a budget.
MR. WHITE: It is my understanding it has been allocated for
this year's budget as it --
MR. VAN ARSDALE: Oh, new fees? Not out of the existing,
right, but from planning?
MR. DUNNUCK: It's an expanded position based upon the
board's direction.
MR. VAN ARSDALE: And I guess my point -- there's no -- I
mean, the planning department's already running in a deficit. So
I would assume that they're not going to be paying for this or --
or building permit fees.
MR. DUNNUCK: Well, right now, that's where we're in our
budget process, and we're determining all those issues. The
board's hearings on the budget are in June. I've got my
expanded list, the wish list from our department directors on
additional positions and so forth, and some reflects of the other
committees that we've been working on as far as customer
service and level of service standards. But for right now, we
can't tell you -- I will tell you one thing: The -- the budgets I
have reviewed have been actually below what they were last
year from the existing current service, that we have cut -- cut
back on some of the things. Now, when we add back in those
expanded, you're probably going to talk about being pretty close
to what we were last year. Now you also have to look at where
we are at trend-wise revenues, and we are down revenue-wise
over here. We've had a trend that we're down about 8 percent
from where we were last year, and where we are in the budget,
we're a little bit below. So we have to mix all those two things in
before we actually have a finalized budget, and we're not there
yet. We meet with the county manger's office next week.
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May 2, 2001
MR. VAN ARSDALE: Do we get to review that budget?
MR. DUNNUCK: Typically. I couldn't answer that, but I
assume that we're going to bring something back as soon as it's
finalized which would be before your next meeting in June.
MR. SAVAGE: Mr. Chairman, I would like to ask John.
Would you venture to say that we have a planning board now that
considers these things for which they get very little money, I
mean, very little, if none, in their deliberations? How many cases
are coming up to the point that this is all worthwhile? In other
words, this is a phenomenally large task that we're going to have
to -- how many examiners are we going to end up with, just as
Peter is talking about here, you know, like Dallas one time
brought up something, we only had two instances of some
problem that we're making a great, big deal of. And I just
wonder, is this all so worthwhile?
Now, you're the director, and I'm asking anybody else who
would like to offer something, but I'd like to know, is it all
worthwhile?
MR. DUNNUCK: I believe it is. I believe, for one thing, it
puts it back on a person who can legally look at the issues
outside the Board of County Commissioners. If you're looking at
it from a revenue standpoint and -- and strictly, you know, how
much time we spend in the board meetings discussing these
issues which could be held by a hearing, Bob probably can
answer that because he was on the -- you know, he did the initial
analysis, better than I can.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Bob has a couple comments in
closing.
MR. MULHERE: Well, first of all, I would like to thank
Patrick, too, for a lot of the -- MR. SAVAGE: Yes.
MR. MULHERE: -- great -- great -- work --
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May 2, 2001
MR. SAVAGE: Absolutely.
MR. MULHERE: -- and also Tom Peek for going through that
line item by line item, which was very helpful. And I'm also
appreciative of the fact that there are some outstanding issues
that have to get resolved relative to certain items that are
reflected as needing to go to the board for the hearing examiner
that are administrative.
When we brought this issue to the Board of County
Commissioners, we basically told them that that -- that this
process -- which, by the way, was highly recommended by the
governor's growth management study commission for
quasijudicial land use petition. So it's not something we just
dreamed up here. It's been working well for ten years in -- in Lee
County and was highly recommended by the governor's growth
management study commission. We were already working on it
at that point in time.
There are a couple of benefits, but the biggest benefit, I
think, is that we have these situations that arise as you alluded
to from time to time that are highly controversial, highly public,
highly addressed in the press that deal with land use petitions.
But when those issues arise, it is too late to deal with the
policies that allow for that situation to arise. And the concept
was and the board's reason for supporting this was that this
would allow an opportunity, a great opportunity, for the board
and its advisory committees, the EAC and the planning
commission, to look at the underlying policies that can regulate
and control these quasijudicial land use petitions, development,
variances, whatever they might be, so that they do reflect what
the community wants rather than spending their time looking at
an individual's specific petition and trying to deal with
inconsistencies in those policies that result in things that they
don't want to see.
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May 2, 2001
When you couple that with the fact that, look, the laws have
changed -- the supreme court -- court of the State of Florida has
said that these are now quasijudicial and not legislate --
legislative in nature, it makes sense to bring in a hearing
examiner to look at land use petitions.
And the third reason was there has been a -- I think a broad
public perception that the process has not been leveled, that
some people have greater access in the process than others. I'm
not going to say who. I'm just saying there is that perception out
there. And this would largely eliminate that perception. The
process would be very level and very equal for all under these
provisions. So that was the rationale behind the board directing
the staff to go forward with the hearing examiner. And I think
there are some little minor details that have to be worked out,
and I guess it would be up to this committee. Obviously we're
going to try to get those things hammered out and you meet one
more time before the board has a final LDC hearing. You may
want to look at some of these issues that remain outstanding
before that point in time.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Are we expected to hear any action
now or kind of carry forward --
MR. MILK: Mr. Chairman, could I ask Patrick a question?
MR. WHITE: Certainly.
MR. MILK: Patrick, on the public participation under Section
512 --
MR. WHITE: Okay.
MR. MILK: -- I guess I have a concern when the public has to
address the hearing examiner first, only because this is a very
transient-type community and most of the community doesn't live
here annually. By the time they're notified for that public
hearing, A, they may not have received the notice timely or lost it
or been on vacation. So when you use the term "sandbagging," a
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May 2, 2001
lot of those folks aren't available for that first hearing and show
up during the, quote, board hearing. I just see that -- MR. SAVAGE: Good point.
MR. MILK: -- as a point of conflict. If I'm a property owner
and I'm out of town and I can't make it, how -- how do they
attest to trying to resolve their issue not showing up?
MR. WHITE: An appearance can be made in the form of an
agent certainly, including a neighbor who all you need is
basically a letter authorizing you to show up, and if it's done
under a sworn statement, that probably alone would be
sufficient. But regardless --
MR. MILK: I'm -- I'm just looking at the time element.
MR. DUNNUCK: Yeah. I think -- I think the bigger picture
issue, too -- and I think we discussed it with the board previously
in concept -- was we're bringing back some amendments to back
out that process of -- of the advertising and public notification,
getting it in our computer systems quicker, you know, having it
on the internet sites, those type of issues, extending the
broadening and the scope of who gets -- who gets the
notification and -- and the time basis of when they do that. I
think the board has been consistent in repeatedly saying what
we're doing right now is not good enough. We brought to them
through a workshop, a plan a couple of weeks ago about what
we're going to do and this is where we're headed. As a matter of
fact, understanding that we couldn't make this land development
code cycle, one of the elements here is approval of a 4/5 majority
vote to have a special -- you know, special hearings, and I will
probably be proposing that we have one of those as early as
September, October of this year so that we can incorporate all
those issues in, work on them over the summer, get them to you-
all and bring it back to the board so -- so we can address that
issue.
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May 2, 2001
MR. MILK: Thank you.
MR. WHITE: If I may embellish that a little bit, there already
is a series of proposed text that Bob Mulhere's prepared relative
to public participation that the board has heard. And I'm
anticipating that this process goes forward, and there's the --
the separate trigger date for the hearing examiner at the end of
the year. That will also be well timed to consider those
additional public participation provisions that you-all would see
again as the -- what would then be the supplement 13 round of
LDC amendments.
And, lastly, although you can appear by an agent, you still
have the opportunity to have your comments submitted in
writing. It does not constitute the same thing as an appearance
in the sense that it gives you the opportunity to address the
board. But at least whatever your concerns are will be evaluated
by the hearing examiner. But because they're not subject to
cross-examination, you don't have a live person there that you
can ask questions of, either the applicant or staff, it doesn't get
as much weight typically. But I understand what the concern is,
-- and hopefully with the things we've offered, it will address
and
it.
MR. MILK: Thank you.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Bob Duane.
MR. DUANE: Patrick, a PUD that's gone through reviews by
ordinance every five years, they go before the board to get
reinstated. If the comp. Plan changes or conditions change, then
that could be a basis to make changes to the zoning. Is that an
item that the hearing examiner would be involved in?
MR. WHITE: It's not presently contemplated to be so, but it
certainly is on my list for discussion on Monday, and that would
be Section 2.7.3.4, time limits for approved PUD master plans.
MR. DUANE: I'd be of the view that -- that having the
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May 2, 2001
hearing examiner review those might be beneficial, you know, as
opposed to, on the other hand, having a political decision made
as to whether conditions have or haven't changed. I think
setting up some factual basis from the hearing examiner and
then going on to the board I could see some benefit. Or are there
any other members of this board that would -- that would look at
that from a different vein? Bruce, do you have any thoughts on
that?
MR. ANDERSON: I think it makes sense.
MR. DUANE: Okay. Put it on the list then.
MR. WHITE: It's on the list. I'm envisioning that ultimately
what will happen at the next May meeting is we'll have these
things sorted the way that there's a consensus about. If there's
no consensus, we'll give you the alternatives, and you will be
able to give us your recommendations as to whatever is
presented so that we can carry that forward to the board.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Okay.
MR. WHITE: Thank you for your close attention.
MR. SAVAGE: Mr. Chair--Mr. Chairman.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Yes, sir.
MR. SAVAGE: Is the bar association in favor of this?
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: No. I haven't --
MR. SAVAGE: Secondly, who are the examiners? Are they
professional lawyers? Are they architects, engineers, or whom?
What are the qualification and so forth?
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: They're lawyers. It says in here;
right?
MR. WHITE: That -- that is correct. That is what was
presented to the board back in October and what they
conditionally approved.
MR. SAVAGE: You mean you have to be a registered Florida
attorney at law in order to be an examiner? No one else is
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May 2, 2001
capable of doing that?
MR. WHITE: Based upon my experience, I would think not.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Okay. Do we need to move on to the
fire under the LDC amendments, or is that an addition?
MR. DUNNUCK: That, I think, will probably come up through
one of your subcommittee reports. Dino.
MR. LONGO: I can report on it briefly if you'd like me to.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Well, let's just jump over to staff
announcements, then quickly get through our agenda the way it
is.
MR. DUNNUCK: Okay. A couple things, cleanup items.
Well, first of all, summary ordinance amendments. The only one
that's changed since last time was we brought the weed and
litter ordinance to the board, and they approved it unanimously,
about a ten-second presentation.
MR. PEEPLES: After all that fighting.
MR. DUNNUCK: I think they were worn out by the time it got
to them, frankly.
Update of the planning, building review level service, Peter, I
think you had asked me to bring back kind of a verbal report of
where we were with those level-of-service standards knowing
that we're working through the budget cycle, and I've asked
Johnnie to be here, and I've also got Denny who is sitting in the
back there, my business manager, give you a report on both
sides of it, the building review side of it, and I can answer any
questions too. Johnnie, why don't you bring them up to speed on
where we are and what we're trying to do.
MS. GEBHARDT: Johnnie Gebhardt. I think the bottom line
for the subcommittee is that they'd like to see us have a 10- to
12-day turnaround time; that's working days. I think that's where
we're going with that. In order to do that, they've asked for
several different alternatives, and we're going to be looking at
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May 2, 2001
doing one of those, and we don't know which one yet. One of the
things they suggested was that we have enough sets of plans so
that they can go to every discipline at one time, which would
mean probably six sets of plans. Logistically that's going to be a
nightmare because storage problems, obviously. We may not
have the space to store those. But that would certainly get
things turned around faster than what they are now. We'd have
to come up with some other method where you guys are used to
seeing a set of plans that has every plan review or signature on
it. Rather than having them coming out and signing one set of
plans, we'd probably have a universal stamp that says, you know,
approved set of plans for the Collier County building department.
That's one of the things we're working on. We've obviously
been working short-staffed because we -- Jaime Ceron resigned.
We've replaced him. However, due to the illness of our senior
family plan reviewer, we're having to use the guy who's
scheduled for commercial plan review to be single -family plan
reviewer. Jim Dix is scheduled to be back next week, and at that
time we'll move Gary over to commercial, and hopefully we'll be
back on track. We've been using two guys part time who are
certified plan reviewers to try to catch up with the slack in the
meantime, so we haven't been falling too far behind.
We've asked for three additional staff in customer service in
the next fiscal year, and this, again, is to try to accomplish the
goal of getting the permits out faster than what we are now.
We're looking at doing some reconfiguration in the front lobby.
We don't have those plans yet, and when we do, we will come
back to the subcommittee with those plans, also with a
suggestion for how we're going to process permits, get their
blessing, and then bring it back to you guys for the full
committee to consider.
Some of their suggestions were that we either set a staff
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May 2, 2001
person up to answer telephones and simply answer questions,
which is a big problem out there. Everybody's busy. Another
suggestion was that we have designated staff work with permit
writers because there are days when we have six permit agents
who are out there and they've got six agents tied up at one time.
Another suggestion was to put in a -- a couple of people
who process commercial permits; maybe the rest can do single
family or vice versa. Those are all alternatives that we're looking
at. We're going to look at the best-case scenario and come back
to you guys with that proposal after we've presented it to the
subcommittee. We'd like to put a plan in place, get their blessing
on it, and then bring it back to you guys for you to look at. We
are working on a bunch of things out there. Hopefully it's going
to make things get out faster, but the only way we can do it is
with additional staff. We've asked for two additional customer
service agents and a couple of additional reps in order to address
those things.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Johnnie, you mentioned that you're
shooting for a 10- to 12-day turnaround. Where are we now?
MR. GEBHARDT: Probably an average of 15 to 20 --
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Okay.
MR. GEBHARDT: -- I would say. I tried to run a report
because I wanted to give you an up-to-date account; however,
we've got a glitch in the P.D. Plus software that every time we do
a revision now it changes the issue date for permits, and it's just
a nightmare to try to go through and run a report then have to go
back through 15 pages on the computer to find out when it was
really issued. So I wasn't able to do that, and I apologize.
MR. DUNNUCK: And we -- you know, I think some of the
things that Johnnie touched upon are pretty key issues. One is
we want to get a policy-level decision by the development
services advisory committee. We mentioned 10 to 12 where --
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May 2, 2001
where you-all set that as a standard, you know. And we -- we
have come back in our budget and said this is what we think it's
going to take us to get there as far as people goes. You know,
we look at efficiency first.
Another thing that Johnnie talked about, separating out that
kind of express-level permit when you have these smaller
permits, not getting behind the big jumbo condo that's coming in,
you know, that type of thing so that we can keep the process
moving. I think those are all real important stuff, and we should
be bringing that back for final policy level discussion at the June
workshop, taking it through at this subcommittee this month and
then coming back for finalization for June so that we can make
sure everything is incorporated in the budget for the upcoming
year.
MR. GEBHARDT: John, another thing that we're looking at
doing -- and Denny and Don Blalock are working on this -- are
setting up computer kiosks in the front lobby like for reroofs and
AC changeoffs, simple permits that don't really require -- there
are no plans to be reviewed. So it's a simple matter of, you
know, somehow the computer would have to check their
contractor license to make sure it's active and can spit their
permit out right there. Hopefully they can also do that in terms
of these convenience books. Maybe it can issue a block of ten
permit numbers so that the people who are actually picking up
convenience books now would be able to use the kiosk to do that
so it would involve no waiting time basically.
MR. BAKER: And, Johnnie, those could be purchased with a
credit card?
MR. GEBHARDT: Oh, yes. That's right. I'm sorry. That's the
other thing. They will be able to use credit cards to do that.
Thanks, Denny.
MR. FOLEY: Mr. Chairman, I have a comment not related to
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May 2, 2001
the building part of it but the planning part.
MR. DUNNUCK: That will be Denny to bring you up to speed
over there.
MR. FOLEY: I'll -- I'll reserve comment until he speaks.
MR. SAVAGE: Related to Mrs. Gebhart, I didn't recognize
you. You look like Miss America.
MR. GEBHARDT: You never come to see me anymore.
MR. SAVAGE: I know.
MR. GEBHARDT: What can I say?
MR. SAVAGE: I tell you what, I compliment you very much
for your presentation and -- .
MR. ABBOTT: You should have heard the comments earlier
about other people.
MR. GEBHARDT: Now I find out what he's going to want
later; right?
MR. DUNNUCK: On a side note, I don't know if you all know
this, but Ed has been laid out for the last week with walking
pneumonia. He was back in the office stubbornly today for a
little bit, but, you know, he's got a little bit of recovery time
ahead of him.
MR. ABBOTT: I have a quick comment, what Johnnie was
saying. I have a letter here. I'm doing a permit on a thing called
a modular home that has state engineering. This is totally done
through DCA. And I had a rejection over how my electric service
goes into the building mere -- this is merely I can Xerox it out of
a code book, but that was done the 24th, and it came in today's
mail. And one of my suggestions would be that we can do better
than this on a timeliness basis. I don't need a letter finally
mailed the 26th to finally get to me today to tell me today so
another week has gone, another week on a permit on a real
constructive issue.
MR. GEBHARDT: Would you like that faxed?
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May 2, 2001
MR. ABBOTT: Faxed or -- faxed or a phone call, any old
thing. You can just straighten things up. I just happened along
on Monday and found it. CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Okay.
MR. LONGO: Real quick. Johnnie
very small tenant buildout that went at
-. and I've been tracking a
-- when I went back to
plan review, it was 11 days from front desk to get into plan
review.
MR. GEBHARDT: I -- I heard about that, Dino. And I can't tell
you where it was. I've tried to find the answer to that.
MR. LONGO: We're still having problems between plans --
between dropoff and getting back to the desk, whether it's
getting logged in on time or physically not getting back there.
MR. GEBHARDT: Was it done as a drop-off or --
MR. LONGO: No, it was actually a drop-off for a permit
application went through the whole review or your whole drop-off
process or application process, but it took 11 days to get back to
the first -- to planning before starting the whole process.
MR. DUNNUCK: Well, and that's -- that's where -- when we
set that standard, that's the standard we will live by and -- and
when we get into those issues of 11 days between getting from
one area to the next and pushing that paper along, that's the
type of stuff we need to correct internally, and that's the type of
stuff that we've established that level of service, and that's
where I hold the people accountable to make sure that that
happens.
MR. LONGO: And that's what we've been working on. It's --
it's a good process. The new computerized process was allowing
me to read the screen as -- as we were looking at it, and I could
see when the submittal date was in and actually when it went to
the first apartment so she -- she, of course, could not tell me
how -- why it took so long, but those are the type of things we're
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May 2, 2001
working on.
MR. DUNNUCK'. With that, we'll shift over to the planning
side. You know, Denny, I don't know if you can bring everybody
up to speed kind of where we are. You know, we have a little
transition obviously on the planning side with the main person
driving it was Bob. As I said, since he left. But he briefed Bob --
or briefed Denny ahead of time. If you can give him an update.
MR. BAKER: Bob put a lot of work into standards he thought
was appropriate. And I think the subcommittees saw those
standards in the last -- or two times ago that they met. And I
didn't attend the last meeting, but I don't really have a lot -- a lot
to add to what Johnnie said, but we have a lot of work to do to
date stamp those as they go through the system and meet the
standards that the group here wants to put out for us to follow. I
really don't have a lot to add to that at this point, but we have a
lot of work to do.
MR. LONGO: If I may comment, we really did identify, for the
most part, that the weak areas were in archi -- MR. BAKER: Landscape.
MR. LONGO: Landscape planning and those type of areas.
MR. BAKER: And landscaping.
MR. LONGO: And landscaping where it was taking a
tremendous amount of time, so those -- those type of things.
Bob, in all fairness, did a very good ]ob in giving us a list of
trackings and -- and to his amazement found out where he was
weak in his department as far as thinking they were doing a good
]ob and finding out they weren't and then also helped us
establish what we thought would be better times, more
acceptable to the industry as to turnarounds. That's where we
are with that.
MR. FOLEY: Blair Foley. I would like to attend that
subcommittee meeting. I don't know what kind of input you have
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May 2, 2001
from this committee as well, but I'd like to have some -- some
when your next meeting would be, I would like to attend it.
MR. LONGO:
MR. FOLEY:
MR. LONGO:
MR. FOLEY:
That will be next Wednesday.
Okay.
At three o'clock.
Just as far as the land use petitions and the
engineering review goes, I'd like to make just a quick comment
on it that the timing is really unacceptable currently the way the
reviews are going. There was a time not long ago when site
development plans of 14 day or a 2-week time frame was pretty
standard and we would get comments back. Now it can be six
weeks. It can -- and that's just an example. I'm not going to
belabor the point. I think the point's been well taken, is being
addressed. But we really need to get to some standards that are
acceptable to the community and try to adhere to those.
MR. DUNNUCK: Well, if I could address that, one of the
things I asked for about two weeks ago, I want to find out all the
projects that are in the hopper right now to get a reality check on
of what is going on out there. You know, I -- personally, yeah, I
took a lot of heat because of the move with Ron and then Bob
leaving at the same time. We were already making excuses for
that. Well, a lot of this was already happening before that all
occurred. You know, I -- I have to fight the perception as well as
the reality. And there is the reality out there that we have
slowed down in certain areas. Obviously with -- with some of the
changes over on the transportation side of the element and their
review times and -- and Bob I'm sure will testify to that, but they
haven't hired that new position yet, haven't found a good
candidate to fill in to be that on-site reviewer that you-all
approved four, five months ago. You know, we still haven't hired
that position yet. And there's some issues on our side too, going
back to the landscape side where we've been a little slow. We're
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May 2, 2001
trying to invest some of those areas through the budget because
we are short on the landscape side of it, and -- and we're looking
at those issues, but I'm keeping a regular tracking of that, and --
and my new business manager, Denny, will be very much
involved in that process as well.
MR. FOLEY: Just in closing real quick, a couple of
departments you do need to look at, in addition to the
transportion, I -- I'm familiar with what Bob's probably going up
against, and it's simply a matter of communication to begin with.
Even the reviews are way down the line but return phone calls,
return e-mails, those sorts of things. Also utilities is another
area that seems to be backlogged. With that I'll close. You can
address those to the subcommittee.
MR. DUNNUCK: And that's secondary that I've asked for
help with.
MR. DUANE: I just -- not to belabor the point, but I'm finding
-- I'm finding some of the same problems that Blair is outlining. I
know that one of your senior staff told me that substantial --
insubstantial changes to the DP in 2 or 3 days are taking 30 days
or longer. I can attest to the fact that I've had two that have
been four to eight weeks, one for a storage shed at the
fairgrounds -- anyway, I'm glad that you are alert to that.
MR. DUNNUCK.' Yeah. And I -- and just, you know,
internally, I pulled together an entire staff meeting of the entire
planning department a couple of weeks ago to talk to them about
some of those issues and some of my concerns and how we can't
allow some of the things that occurred over here to affect the
way that we perform as customers -- you know, to our
customers. I think the message, hopefully we're going to catch
up on those things, but I'm keeping an eye on that.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: My latest insubstantial change to the
DHSDP also took 30 days to approve, minor parking changes and
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May 2, 2001
whatnot. So it seems to get hung up in certain places, and
disbursement was the first problem. It took a week to even get
on anybody's desk, so I appreciate the progress. We'll see. MR. DUNNUCK: We'll see.
MR. VAN ARSDALE: Well, let's understand that if we don't
get it, then we get our rate reduction in the building permit fees.
That was all conditional upon getting this great service in the
next budget year, so we're counting on it.
MR. JONES: I take your-all's, I put mine on top, and I get
mine real quick.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Okay, John. Let's move on to the
addition.
MR. DUNNUCK'- Yeah. This is a report you-all asked me to
come back, and I told you we had a $2 million savings or
estimated $2 million savings on the building next door that we're
building because we're only going to do 20,000 square feet
instead of 40, and you-all asked me to come back because of the
discussion that you had last September when you were
approving the money for this. You asked us to come back and --
and report on what my recommendations would be to do with
that $2 million, I guess. And -- and I'm going to let Denny take
the lead on this issue and explain it to you a little bit. But, you
know, I think we need to clarify, you know, where exactly that
money has come from to begin with.
MR. BAKER: I don't know if I have enough copies or not but
-- this is a summary of the budget -- this is a summary of the
budget for fiscal year '01 showing operating revenues of 2.2
million, operating expenses, including -- this is including
expanded services of twelve five, giving us a short fall of
$200,000 in the budget year.
The expansion that John is talking about is included in 9.7
million, which gave us a total shortfall, including capital, of 9.9
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May 2, 2001
million for the fiscal year. That shortfall is covered by a loan of
3 1/2 million and reserve funding or funds taken from the reserve
funding of 6.4 billion balancing out the total expenditures for the
budget year. So what the message here is that the expansion
that's being talked about was covered outside the operating
revenues and the operating expenses, and those -- and that
expansion, that shortfall, was covered by a loan in reserve
funding. John disappeared on me.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: So basically we're not taking a loan
out or as large a loan?
MR. BAKER: Exactly.
MR. LONGO: Well, what's that leave us in the reserves?
MR. BAKER: There's plenty of reserves. I don't have a --
John asked me the same question. There's several million
dollars that doesn't -- there's several million dollars still up in
reserves after -- after -- after this -- this scenario.
MR. LONGO: Well, let me think about this real quick. We
went to a 15 percent permit fee increase to gain $2 million to
subsidize the planning side of development services. We just
reduced the building by $2 million. MR. BAKER: Right.
MR. LONGO: That was based on all the figures that were
given to us by previous administrator or director. To me that's a
$4 million difference. We just cut it back to -- we gave 2 at the
beginning of last year with the permit fee increase; you only took
2 off the building. That was $4 million. We were supposed to hit
budget with that $2 million increase.
MR. BAKER: I can't speak to that. This -- this scenario does
not include a reduction in the spending on the garage.
Presumably if that reduction, as it follows through, as the
gentleman said, there would be less funding from the loan side of
the transaction.
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May 2, 2001
MR. LONGO: Yeah. But if I recall, we were never going to
borrow $8 million.
MR. DISNEY: No. We were not going to do that. And, in
addition to that, the numbers being used for the cost of have
building never came back to us in a real form. They were highly
inflated. They were -- they were not justifiable by any stretch of
any imagination, and we just really haven't gotten back to
understanding what that real cost is going to be so we can see
what those -- what those dollar amounts are, how much is
coming out of contingency that we have -- that we had, the
surplus that we had.
MR. LONGO: Dallas, if I might, we can -- we can bring this
before a subcommittee next week if you can give us a better
report.
MR. BAKER: Okay.
MR. LONGO: Show us a much better detailed breakdown of
what we were supposed to spend and what we are going to
spend, you know, just a better breakdown.
MR. BAKER: I'll do that, and I'll sit in on the meeting on
Wednesday and do that for you. MR. LONGO: Okay.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: That brings us to the administrative
section.
MR. DUNNUCK: Yeah. Tomorrow we're going to start
advertising for the division administrator, for the permanent role.
My suggestion to the county manager -- and he concurred -- was
that we set up who was going to be on the interview panel to
make a recommendation to the county manager and then
ultimately the Board of County Commissioners. My
recommendation was that we have a member of the development
services advisory committee on that recommendation committee
to review and interview candidates.
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May 2, 2001
And I wanted to float it out today, not necessarily, unless
you-all wanted to, make a recommendation but just kind of give
you the FYI that we're -- you know, that we'd like to bring that
back for official discussion and so you can appoint a member to
serve on that committee for next month. Conceptually who we
have on that committee is somebody from the development
services advisory committee, somebody from the environmental
advisory committee, myself, and the human resources director
and have a four-person committee making the recommendation -
- recommendations to Tom ranking them and then Tom making a
decision whether he wants to do a second set of interviews or go
with that.
MR. LONGO: You're not going to ask for any public input at
all or anybody from the public being on that committee?
MR. DUNNUCK: I -- I -- I hesitate because I don't know
where you begin and where you end.
MR. LONGO: Well, I would say with a representative at least
from the building industry.
MR. SAVAGE: Mr. Chairman, is someone going to nominate
somebody from this development services advisory board to be a
member of that committee? If they are, I'm going to be willing to
suggest that we select Tom Peek to be our representative of this
committee, if that's what you're going to have.
MR. DUNNUCK: Well, and that's a decision you-all can either
make today or next month. You have some time to think about it.
But, you know, because we're going to start advertising, we
probably won't start doing interviews until July realistically
because we're doing national advertisements. And we'll go from
this.
MR. PEEK: When -- when will the actual interviews be?
MR. DUNNUCK: I would guess July.
MR. PEEK: If they're after July the 10th, I won't be available.
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May 2, 2001
MR. LONGO: In that case, I'll volunteer. I mean, I think it's
appropriate since I'm president of the Collier Building Industry
Association.
MR. SAVAGE: And you're vice-chairman of this board, so
that's a good idea, right.
MR. DISNEY: John, why would you have someone from the
EAC and not from the planning commission?
MR. DUNNUCK: I think we wanted to have it fair and --
MR. DISNEY: And the planning commission can't do that.
MR. DUNNUCK: From the public perception standpoint if you
start tilting that and say we're going to have somebody from the
planning commission, then you start going outside, you know
what, I appreciate what you said, Dino, we talked about it, you
know, okay, then who do I put on the other side to balance it out
from there. And then you start picking and choosing. You may
have The Conservancy, fish and wild -- you get into a whole slew
of issues. I think this is a way where we said we're taking a
selection of people who the board has appointed on committees,
granted the planning commission would qualify in that regard,
but I think this kind of balances it out, frankly.
MR. SAVAGE: Would you repeat again the different
members, the ones from the development services division?
MR. DUNNUCK: Yes, ones from the environmental advisory
committee, myself, and the director of human resources.
MR. FOLEY: Has that position been filled?
MR. DUNNUCK: Yes. Yup.
MR. FOLEY: Because I know there was another gentleman
filling on an interim basis; right?
MR. DUNNUCK: We've had the new director in human
resources for about five or six months now.
MR. SAVAGE: John, you had mentioned four positions, and it
seems to me a committee ought to have three, five, or seven, you
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May 2, 2001
know. It's just a matter of --
MR. DUNNUCK: And that's where it's going to come down to
a matter of ranking. We have a specific way that we go about
doing it. It will probably be a two-phase interview and also
qualify them on paper. And then ultimately it's, you know, Tom's
decision. That's why we do it as a ranking, but we'll come to
some consensus.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Okay. Is there any opposition to Dino
representing us? Then let's go ahead and place him on that
committee.
MR. DUNNUCK.' Okay.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: And that takes us to miscellaneous.
MR. DUNNUCK: I passed out just kind of a little update
sheet, you know, kind of issues on the horizon. And some of it's
a little bit of follow-up items in what we had discussed previously
and some ideas you-all had. I just wanted to tell you where they
were.
There was an issue that came about, I think, last month
regarding landscape standard review and maybe having
committees go back and look at those, putting a full committee
together. We're in the process of doing that where we get
representatives from, you know, landscape community,
construction all over, putting it together and -- and bringing an
item to the Board of County Commissioners.
One of the questions I want to ask here regarding this issue
is did you-all want to see who we're recommending on these
committees first? It's being put together by Nancy Siemion of
our planning staff. Or would you like to -- because she has like a
pseudo committee right now, and this would be making it more
official by resolution, or would you like me to wait and bring it
back as an agenda item next month so you-all can at least have a
chance to review it first?
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May 2, 2001
MR. DISNEY: John, is this the issue regarding the plant
sizes and inconsistencies?
MR. DUNNUCK'- Absolutely, yup.
MR. DISNEY: That really is -- I brought that to attention at
the urging of some of the industry folks, and that really is just a
cleanup item of the -- of an LDC, and that could go through as a
cycle, a normal cycle-type issue.
MR. DUNNUCK: And I think --
MR. DISNEY: I didn't see it as that big of a -- that big of a
function. We may want to look at that.
MR. DUNNUCK: Well, I think it's just a matter of choosing
who would be on the committee and getting a board blessing. I
heard from the industry as well that they would like to see that
and -- and, you know, I didn't know if it was necessary to
actually bring that to development services. I look at it the same
way. You will look at what they propose but want you to know
that we're working on that and acting on that fairly soon.
Other thing was, you know, permitting and building review
level of service, and we already talked about that. Another item
that was touched upon today was credit card use for permits.
I'm going to bring that back as a full item at next month's
meeting because there's impacts when you use credit cards. We
have to pay a percentage to the Visa and Mastercard. And
looking at it from the big picture, we've had a lot of requests
from Joe Public who comes in and wants a $50 fence permit and
wants to be able to use their debit or credit card to do it and we
don't have that as a customer service item. I'm looking at it from
the bigger picture of either we have to look at it from one of two
ways. We can either raise permit fees of I percent or something
like that so that we can cover and pay for the Visa; we could eat
the costs. Or the only other way is for those types of services to
do it off site. We can't -- Visa won't allow us to pick and choose
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May 2, 2001
like a maximum amount of what we can allow to be charged like
we can't say a cap of a hundred dollars or $200. So technically,
a developer has a line of credit on a credit card of some sort can
come in and do a $10,000 permit and save, you know, 3 percent
or we will lose 3 percent because we're using Visa or
Mastercard.
However, the benefit to that side of that is if they can spend
that money or be investing their actual cash for that period of
time in something else at a higher rate than what we would be
raising the permit fee, there would be a benefit to the
development community. I personally think this is something
that, you know, is a wave of a future. It's either -- it comes now
or if it comes in a year, it's probably going to come, but I wanted
to discuss that with you-all and get your thoughts.
MR. ABBOTT: At one time in Florida -- and it might -- might
have changed by now -- they had that you could not charge more
for a credit card purchase than you could for cash.
MR. DUNNUCK: That's --
MR. ABBOTT: I mean, it used to be something like that.
MR. DUNNUCK: That's why we have to raise the permit fees
across the board to do it. We just can't say if you want to use a
credit card it's going to cost you another percent. We can't
single a person out. That is a law, and that's why it's the bigger
issue.
MR. LONGO: It's also the bigger issue. I can't see you
charging the whole industry for service that not everybody is
going to take.
MR. ABBOTT: Just so somebody can fly to Hawaii.
MR. DUNNUCK: That's part of where -- you're right. But
that's -- you know, that's kind of what you do now because
anyplace that offers a Visa or Mastercard in your personal life,
you're paying that percentage to Visa. So anything you buy, it's
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May 2, 2001
being charged to everybody. But what you have to look at from a
serious standpoint is, okay, if we have 25 percent of the people,
you know, using credit cards and it's a 4-percent charge, let's
just say hypothetically, for a number of purposes, maybe we'd
only have to raise the permits I percent to pay for that entire fee,
you know, for those 25 percent who are using it. Yes, it is a cost
that's absorbed by everybody, but you don't necessarily have to
raise everything 4 percent because that's what Visa requires.
MR. ABBOTT: You should be able to do it for 1.76 percent
because they'll do that for a small remodeler. I know that's what
they do for big money.
MR. DUNNUCK: And then that comes back to, you know,
what -- you know, what that percentage will be. And you-all are
willing to look at that. I'm just kind of giving you a heads up
that's something we will be bringing forward.
Internet impact fee calculator -- I think this was brought up
at some point in time -- to be able to plug in what type of
building you have and get an estimate of what your impact fees
are going to be. We're going to be putting that on the internet
web site within the next month or so so it will be posted. It's just
kind of a convenience-type thing where you can go through the
menu and exactly see what your impact fees may cost. I think
that was brought up, and this is just a cleanup item that we're
working on.
Hiring permit division administrator, I think we discussed
that already.
Affordable housing workshop, I wanted to let you-all know
that we have one coming up May 15th with the Board of County
Commissioners. It's a major issue, and I know, David, you've
been -- you participated in a lot of those discussions, but I just
wanted to let you know some of the other things that are going
on in the division. And the community character workshop, this
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May 2, 2001
is where the board has asked staff to come back and take the
elements out of what was proposed by Dover, Kohl and say
what's the reality check on this, what can we do in the short
term, what can we do in the long term. That's June 5th.
And then the final thing is the land development code
hearings are June 6th and June 20th.
MR. LONGO: Real quick question, John. We -- we haven't
seen anything on FEMA. And are we going to do anything about
having our own county flood plans management coordinator of
some sort that deals with FEMA issues?
MR. DUNNUCK: As opposed to splitting it?
MR. LONGO: Well, we don't split it anymore, do we, or do we
still?
MR. DUNNUCK: Well, we still want that person back.
MR. LONGO: Oh, yeah. Okay.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Have you?
MR. DUNNUCK: Yeah.
MR. ABBOTT: When?
MR. DUNNUCK: Johnnie, you can comment on that. Haven't
we -- don't we have a FEMA person?
MS. GEBHARDT: That's what Gene Chartrand does. He's a
permanent part-time employee who does the FEMA -- MR. ABBOTT: Okay.
MR. GEBHARDT: -- certificates and reviews.
MR. LONGO: Can we --
MR. GEBHARDT: And he started last October or November, I
think in November.
MR. ABBOTT: But he was doing plans reviews; right?
Wasn't he doing something like that?
MR. GEBHARDT: No.
MR. ABBOTT: Okay.
MR. GEBHARDT: He started out as the FEMA coordinator.
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May 2, 2001
We have been using him for plan review lately -- MR. ABBOTT: Okay.
MR. GEBHARDT: -- as, you know, another four hours a day.
But he is the FEMA coordinator.
MR. LONGO: My concern is that since Bob has left that we
really haven't gotten any updates and we really don't know
where we stand on that. We still have three outstanding
ordinances pending.
MR. ABBOTT: This is Bob Devlin from the city.
MR. LONGO: And we put a lot of work into it at the very
beginning and probably a year and a half into it, and I have a gut
feeling that something is going to come down the -- the pike
here and we don't know about it.
MR. DUNNUCK: Okay. We can -- we'll provide a full update
for you-all on that. We can arrange that, can't we, Johnnie?
MR. GEBHARDT: Are we talking about, Dino, the update for
the maps or the --
MR. LONGO: Yeah. What we have, Johnnie, is we worked
for a long period of time on -- on challenging the -- the proposed
flood elevation changes.
MR. GEBHARDT: Right.
MR. LONGO: It was supposed to go to a hearing examiner at
some point in time, and it was going back and forth between the
flood plains management coordinator, which was Bob Devlin at
the time, who was working for both the county and the city, and I
really don't know where we are in the public process and the
public comment process and whether they've issued their final
edict. We've just not been brought up to snuff.
MR. GEBHARDT: He is still handling it on both our behalfs,
but I haven't seen an update on it lately, but I will check with
Bob.
MR. LONGO: Thank you.
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May 2, 2001
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Let's move on to old business.
Subcommittee members, anybody find it in their conscience to
volunteer for some subcommittees?
MR. JONES: I will for the utilities subcommittee. On April
26th, of significance, the commission has --
MR. PEEK: This was not a committee report, so I just was
just trying to call him off of doing a committee report.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Yeah. I think we are still looking for
some volunteers to loin the committees under old business.
MR. JONES: Oh.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Always need some new blood.
MR. FOLEY: Blair Foley. I'm a member of the LDC
subcommittee, and I'll try to attend the utility subcommittee, but
my schedule doesn't warrant that I can make it to both every
month, especially when the LDC committees, we've been
meeting so often, every week, every other week.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: And on the same day as the utilities.
MR. FOLEY: At the same time in some cases. I'll try to
attend some of those because I noticed in minutes of that
meeting that we -- Brian, you were the only one that attended,
and I think it's important for us to have input on that -- on that.
It shows the public at large has a big interest in it, and I think
we -- we would be prudent to have a representative there.
MR. SAVAGE: Mr. Chairman, it might be noted -- Herb
Savage -- that the meeting of the utilities and the LDC were the
same day and the same hour, you know, last time. And I happen
to be on both, and I shouldn't be. But nevertheless, I was going
to plan to be on the utility, but they all look like they're all in
here. Have ten people in here for this LDC.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: I would hope that the members that
we currently have on the subcommittees will probably have a
little clearer scheduling. It's been the previous two months that
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May 2, 2001
we've had that conflict with the utility code, so we'll look for
better participation. Now we've got our subcommittee reports
under land development regulation. We had our last meeting --
we had our update, basically was Ron's report, so cross that one
off. Utility -- I mean, I'm sorry, construction code. Dino?
MR. LONGO: You have before you an executive summary
and a package called "consideration" prepared by the fire
districts, three of five independent fire districts. What this is is
an ongoing process that three or four members of our
construction code subcommittee has a meeting with the fire
districts themselves and industry, a proposed fee increase for
inspection fees. They have done a hugely tremendous ]ob of
explaining the reasons behind a proposed fee increase for
inspections.
Bottom line is they've been using ad valorem monies to do
inspections, for the large part. And we don't think that's right as
industry. You're going to see some huge percentages of
increases in your packet, but it is well backed up. I'm going to
ask the committee to -- full committee to take a look at it. We're
going to shove this back to subcommittee as an agenda item for
next week to double, triple review it as a final draft. I will note
on the executive summary on the very first sentences or
sentence that says "access," and it should be "assessed" on
building permits, so we'll change that on the summary. This is
prepared by the fire districts in con]unction with the Collier
Building Industry Association and your subcommittee. And that's
what we're going to do with it. We're going to send it back to
subcommittee, come back for a full recommendation to the full
committee next month. If anybody has comments or want to
attend a meeting next week to make input, they are more than
welcome. Again, that's at three o'clock next Wednesday.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Thank you, Dino. Utility code. Now
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May 2, 2001
you can make your report. MR. ABBOTT: Brian, go.
MR. JONES: Okay. Of significance for utilities, the -- the
county meter reader man will be able to -- will start to be reading
the meters without leaving the van. They increased the fees of
water and sewer fees accordingly, and they're starting that
process. The detail for -- there's going to be a -- basically a
transmitter. I think Tom mentioned that a few weeks ago.
That's underway.
Also of signifi -- of significance with fire back-flows, there
will be -- it is likely that the committee will -- will vote in favor of
double check valves, so anybody that -- that is involved in
designing of back-flow assemblies or for projects, many
designers are -- are voluntarily using that -- using that method,
and it appears that it will become a requirement after -- or be
supported by the utility committee and become -- become
enforced.
MR. RILEY: Ed Riley, Collier County fire code official. Can I
clarify that? The reason for that is -- and the only place that will
take place is where you have fire systems that are connected to
in -- a line inside of the master meter away from the county's
main water mains. Currently if you attach directly to the
county's water main, you'll have to use an RPZ device, but once
you get inside a project, there are no requirements other than a
single check valve. So the discussion is to make that all
sprinklers systems are connected to go to a double check valve
assembly. It's been noted that probably 70 percent or 80 percent
of the check valves that are in excess of five years old probably
leak some, so you have stagnant water in these sprinkler
systems that can drain back into the potable water supply that
are in development communities that are on the system side or
their own side of that RPZ, so they're not afforded the same
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May 2, 2001
protection as the main lines are, so there's a question as to
whether or not we pay more attention to transmission lines to
actually potable water the people are drinking.
So that was the -- the basis for possibly going to double
check valve assemblies for those. It's highly unlikely you'll have
both check valves fail at the same time, and there are
requirements for maintenance of those check valves periodically,
so that's a much better situation for protection of the potable
water supply.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Thank you.
MR. JONES: And the last issue is several fire marshals are
interpreting the minimum fire main size contained in the NF --
NFPA there -- as opposed to the -- the flow rate at the hydrant.
And there was discussion on which matters most, the size that
the ordinance calls for or the flow rate. And you -- are you
prepared to comment on that?
MR. RILEY: Yeah. Basically, the line size had to do with
NFPA 1141 -- it's a pamphlet -- specifically specifies diameter of
mains that supply fire hydrants. The interpretation by the fire
marshals have been that -- if it says you have to have an 8-inch
minimum line, we should not have a 6- or a 4-inch RPZ in that line
somewhere, in other words, come by 8 with a smaller RPZ and
then upsizing your line again. They're questioning whether or not
that is in strict conformance with NFPA. So that is in ongoing
discussions as to whether that's appropriate to downsize those
and how much of a problem it does, in fact, provide.
So we are talking with the engineers in that particular
meeting and talking on Kentucky pipe modeling, other issues
there, too, on water supply and how it's being calculated and
verified as it relates to new construction requirements. We're
getting all this up front, this information up front, to rely on, and
we just had one project, five buildings, that didn't have adequate
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May 2, 2001
water supply on flow test, so we're trying to determine what
happened in the process, where did it break down, if any things
have to be altered in that process. That's -- that's all on that.
MR. JONES: The -- the significance with that is that you
could have a project not get a CO because the fire department
says that the -- the fire line is not to size that it should be. The
engineers in the meeting were pretty unanimous that the size of
the line wasn't important; it was the fire flow. So that was the --
the -- the -- the issue.
MR. FOLEY: Tom, I have one comment, if I could, to
elaborate a little bit on your No. 7, the required downstream
hydraulics that the reviewer, engineering reviewer, was asking
for, and I know there wasn't any discussion on this at your
meeting. Are they leaning towards applying that on a case-by-
case basis as opposed to globally requiring that on any size
project? I'm hoping that's what the discussion is -- is about. Are
you familiar with that -- with that -- MR. JONES: No, I'm not.
MR. FOLEY: Okay. That's not important.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Okay. Let's move on to the ad hoc
committee on fees.
MR. LONGO: You heard the report basically from Johnnie
what we're trying to do. We're monitoring on the planning size.
Bob Mulhere before he left did a great ]ob of bringing us up to
snuff on the different departments and where they are in the
tracking of their terminal times, identify some weak areas.
We've set some standards as to where we think they should be
for customer level of service. We are currently doing the same
thing on the building permitting side, working with Johnnie and
on staff and Ed, and as you heard Johnnie present earlier, we
have a number of -- of options and -- and things we're going to
try and look at and to try to implement as to bringing up that
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May 2, 2001
level of service. So that's where we are with the ad hoc. And
the agenda is next -- again, next Thursday at three o'clock.
There will be -- excuse me, next Wednesday -- thank you, Tom --
a discussion that is an agenda item.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Okay. Thank you. As we have no
new business. Anybody have any last parting comments they'd
like to make? Dallas.
MR. DISNEY: Just a comment for John or a question. Some
time ago brought forward and I think that we -- we made a
recommendation from this committee level, if memory serves me
right, to look again at 2.8 of the LDC and the architectural
requirements. I didn't hear that on your list, and I wondered
where that is.
MR. DUNNUCK: Okay. I -- I apologize. I -- I assumed it was
with the landscape architectural requirements. You're talking
about architectural requirements.
MR. DISNEY: There are two separate items. And if that's
where the confusion was there, then perhaps it's -- it's just that
we do need to come back and revisit, and it seems like there's a
-- there's a large need to re-review divisions 2.8 of -- of the LDC.
It is a tremendous -- there's -- there's tremendous consternation
in a number of areas of the design community with not only the
reviews but the time it takes and the lack of consistent
interpretation on those areas. If -- if that could come forward in
that issue and that's what that is, then great.
MR. DUNNUCK: Okay.
MR. DISNEY: Thank you.
that
CHAIRMAN MASTERS:
-- oh.
MR. SAVAGE: I yield.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS:
MR. ELLIS:
Okay. Anyone else? Okay. With
Before Herb jumps in.
Just real quick, I'm thinking -- I'm sorry. I'm
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May 2, 2001
David Ellis. And I try to come every month to give you a quick
update on the building codes. Of course, as many of you know,
this is the last week of session meeting. They have yet to make
a final determination of the codes and when they will become
effective. There's been a glitch bill going on session. It -- it's
now in the quagmire that happens the last few days of session. I
called about two o'clock, and it had yet to move today. It is on
the special agenda that they've got going.
The recommendation, as it was last amended, will be for the
code to be effective January 1st of 2002. Again, it's still up in
the air, but I will -- I will keep you as posted as we possibly can.
There should be resolution by Friday when they strike the gavel.
If they don't, we're in a -- somewhat of a mess because the last
termination by the legislature was July 1st. And if you make the
call like I do quite often, they still can't send you a copy of the
code, so it remains an ongoing challenge. We're still set up and
prepared to do the training sessions, but we just don't have the
documentation yet. So we -- we do feel like it will come out in
January 1st, but we'll keep you posted as soon as we know.
The other thing, we're working on putting together a
program, seminar, whatever you want to call it, with the new
person who came down from Fort Myers with DEP who is now
housed here. Is it Mya, Mia? MR. DUNNUCK: Mia.
MR. ELLIS: Working to try to get Mia with particularly the
affected folks out in Golden Gate who are going to be often
working with Mia in terms of interpretation of what can happen
on lots, some other things. They're several Golden Gate type
issues, and we're going to try to put together a program in the
next two or three weeks. We can get the affected parties
altogether to kind of hear where we're going with some of those
things, and maybe through the staff we can alert you on the
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May 2, 2001
committee that might be interested in that. I've talked to several
of them in the last several days. It's something we're looking to
do, and I think we've talked about that, so I'll keep you posted.
MR. ESPINAR: On that same note, real quickly, there's going
to be a meeting on July 18th with a lot of the regulatory
agencies, The Conservancy, stuff like that, to look at Golden
Gate single-family homes, the potential of setting up a ROMA, a
regional off-site mitigation area. There's going to be a big
powwow July 18th at the Golden Gate Community Center.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Okay. Herb.
MR. SAVAGE: Just in light of all these building permits, I
had a chap bring me a house plan that an architect from another
state prepared for him for Fort Myers Beach. And I have never in
my life seen so much picayune-ish, I guess, you'd -- is that a good
word? Attitude--
MR. ABBOTT: For Herb it's a good word.
MR. SAVAGE: For Herb it's a good word. Yeah. Are they
still doing this same picky, picky, picky on the building permit
processes in this county? I thought we found out that that was
all in this area only and they were going to correct that.
MR. ABBOTT: One -- a quick example. I had to come in
here and draw the plywood detail that's going to allow the
handicap ramp to go in a sliding glass door only because it's a
model home. So I had to draw a little square on there and write
"elevation here is this; elevation here is that." that could have so
been picked up on a final. Who would have cared? But, no, it
took an extra day out of my time plus an extra couple of days
around the people here, a total and absolute waste of resource of
creative people.
MR. SAVAGE: And as you might well know that the
legislators were meeting locally here and found out this was the
only area here in the State of Florida, was it correct, Riley --
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May 2, 2001
MR. ELLIS: David, I'm -- I'm not sure.
MR. SAVAGE: You weren't listening.
MR. ELLIS: You said, "The only place in the State of Florida
that" and you pointed at me.
MR. SAVAGE: The only place in the State of Florida that this
picayune-ish character aspect is going on in the reference to
building permitting. No place in Florida are they doing it that
way.
MR. ELLIS: Oh, and I don't know about that. I don't know
about that. MR. ABBOTT:
MR. SAVAGE:
MR. ABBOTT:
It's a lot easier than St. John's County.
Pardon?
A lot easier than St. John's.
CHAIRMAN MASTERS: Okay. With that, we can call the
meeting adjourned. I'd like to thank our court reporter for not
taking a break during an extended meeting.
There being no further business for the good of the County,
the meeting was adjourned by order of the Chair at 5:25 p.m.
DEVELOPMENT SERVICES ADVISORY COMMITTEE
THOMAS MASTERS, CHAIRMAN
Page 85
May 2, 2001
TRANSCRIPT PREPARED ON BEHALF OF DONOVAN COURT
REPORTING, INC., BY BARBARA A. DONOVAN, RMR, CRR
Page 86
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