CCPC Minutes 06/02/2005 R
June 2, 2005
TRANSCRIPT OF THE MEETING OF THE
COLLIER COUNTY PLANNING COMMISSION
NAPLES, FLORIDA
JUNE 2, 2005
LET IT BE REMEMBERED, that the Collier County Planning
Commission in and for the County of Collier, having conducted
business herein, met on this date at 8:30 a.m. in REGULAR SESSION
in Building F of the Government Complex, East Naples, Florida, with
the following members present:
CHAIRMAN: Russell Budd
Kenneth Abernathy
Donna Reed Caron
Lindy Adelstein
Paul Midney
Brad Schiffer
Robert Murray
Mark Strain
Robert Vigliotti
ALSO PRESENT:
Ray Bellows, Zoning & Land Dev. Review
Don Scott, Transportation Planning
Patrick White, Assistant County Attorney
Marjorie Student-Stirling, Assistant County Attorney
George Varnadoe, Esq., Counsel for New Town Development
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June 2, 2005
CHAIRMAN BUDD: I'd like to call this meeting of the Planning
Commission to order. Good morning. We'll call this meeting of the
Planning Commission to order. And first I would ask you to rise with
me for the Pledge of Allegiance.
(Whereupon, the Pledge of Allegiance was united in unison.)
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Good morning. We'll start with our roll
call. Miss Caron.
MS. CARON: Here.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Mr. Vigliotti.
MR. VIGLIOTTI: Here.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Mr. Abernathy.
MR. ABERNATHY: Here.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Mr. Strain.
MR. STRAIN: Here.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Bud is here. Mr. Adelstein.
MR. ADELSTEIN: Here.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Mr. Midney.
MR. MIDNEY: Here.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Mr. Schiffer.
MR. SCHIFFER: Here. Mr. Chairman, if you get tech to -- our
screens are not on over here.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Okay. And Mr.Murray.
MR. MURRAY: Here.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: And if someone from the Information
Technology Department could help Mr. Schiffer's screen, Mr.
Murray's screen. Mr. Schiffer's screen is not on.
MR. STRAIN: Push that button, does that work?
MR. SCHIFFER: Yeah, but it puts you into stuff where you
need passwords.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Okay. Someone from IT will help us out
here.
Moving on to addenda to the agenda. Planning commissioners,
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we are starting in our -- thank you, sir. Our agenda is starting out with
the New Town Development. A development of regional impact that
should be quite extensive and time consuming. I would first like to
suggest that we begin with the end in mind, and we consider that
sometime around 4:30 we look at the next logical break in time and
shoot for a 5:00 p.m. recess, ifnecessary, to be continued at another
time. In other words, I don't want to start this morning expecting that
we're going to be going until 10:00 or midnight, or something foolish
like that. Do we have a consensus with that, that shooting towards a
5 :00 recess and move on at that point, should it become necessary?
MR. ADELSTEIN: So moved.
MR. STRAIN: I'll second that.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Motion by Mr. Adelstein, second by Mr.
Strain. Discussion?
(No response.)
CHAIRMAN BUDD: All those in favor signify by saying aye.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Aye.
MR. STRAIN: Aye.
MR. MURRAY: Aye.
MR. ADELSTEIN: Aye.
MR. ABERNATHY: Aye.
MR. VIGLIOTTI: Aye.
MS. CARON: Aye.
MR. MINDY: Aye.
MR. SCHIFFER: Aye.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Those opposed?
(No response.)
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Thank you. Further, I think that it might
be appropriate to consider items subsequent to the town of Ave Maria,
that is items C, D, E, F and G, that we should consider continuing
those items to our next regularly scheduled agenda. And rather than a
hardship on those petitioners, I'm really proposing that as a favor to
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them, because I really don't think it's very good of us to beat those
people up and make them stay here all day, a day-and-a-half -- who
knows how long -- for some indeterminate amount of time. And then
I would also project that the Planning Commission would not be in its
most alert and congenial state of mind to do justice to those
petitioners. Is there a thought of consideration that that would be the
appropriate thing to ask those petitioners to continue to our next
regularly scheduled meeting?
MR. ABERNATHY: What about tomorrow?
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Well, I think we still will be on Ave
Maria tomorrow.
MR. ABERNATHY: Well, that's a good reason why not.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: So, is there a thought or consideration
that that's something we should do, or do we want those petitioners to
just hang out for a day or two or three until we get to them?
MR. SCHIFFER I thought they were coming in at 12: 00 today,
aren't they?
CHAIRMAN BUDD: And they might be here -- my point is,
they could be here 12:00 tomorrow still. And I think it would be
reasonable for them, if we would give them a time certain, because I
have no idea -- as we all know, the Ave Maria town is the largest most
complex and impactful project, come to my knowledge, in over 10
years before Planning Commission, and it's going to be a big deal. It's
going to take a lot of time. And I don't think we're going to be in a
state of mind to do subsequent petitioners justice.
MR. MURRA Y: Mr. Chairman, I agree with you.
MR. ADELSTEIN: Why don't we wait with the idea of, at noon
we could check in and we find out exactly what the situation is. They
could come back until 1: 00, or whether we want to start sooner. Let's
determine how long it's going to take after we've had a couple of hours
of this.
MR. ABERNATHY: The disadvantage of that is, you have
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people sitting around here waiting for that.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Mr. White.
MR. WHITE: Assistant County Attorney, Patrick White.
Perhaps the commission could consider, since it seems quite likely
that you will be continuing today's efforts until tomorrow, that you
continue all of those subsequent matters to tomorrow at a time certain.
Let's say, for example, 1 :00 p.m. That should give you sufficient time
today and tomorrow morning, if you need it. The only other
alternative, of course, would be to have them be at a time certain, let's
say, for example, 11 :00 a.m. And that way you minimize your down
time, if there would be any. I just think all that we need to have, both
for the staff and the applicants, is some type of certainty as to when
next they'll have their opportunity to be heard.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: I think that's a good point. And my
suggestion would be that that certainty be provided on Thursday, June
16th at 8:30 a.m.
MR. ABERNATHY: I'll second that.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Further discussion. Hold on. I think it
would be appropriate before we take action on that motion, are there
any petitioners here today on Items C, D, E, F and G that have any
objection to their item being continued to time and date certain June
16th, 8:30 a.m, regular Planning Commission meeting?
(No response.)
CHAIRMAN BUDD: I see none. So without objection from
those petitioners, we'll call the question.
MR. STRAIN: Just out of curiosity, if they aren't here because at
our last meeting we told them they wouldn't be heard before 1 :00,
that's the only caveat we may have, is that someone may show up
between now and one. I don't know how that affects the process.
MR. WHITE: You may want to poll all of those petitioners at
this point in time and see if they are present.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Will everybody who is not here please
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stand up. I think it's reasonable. I think it's fair. I'd like to call the
question on the motion. We're doing it to their benefit, and we can
second-guess ourselves forever.
All those in favor of the motion, signify by saying aye.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Aye.
MR. STRAIN: Aye.
MR. MURRAY: Aye.
MR. ADELSTEIN: Aye.
MR. ABERNATHY: Aye.
MR. VIGLIOTTI: Aye.
MS. CARON: Aye.
MR. MINDY: Aye.
MR. SCHIFFER: Aye.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Those opposed?
(N 0 response.)
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Mr. Bellows, could you see that some
notice is posted on the door for those people that may come late and
don't know that their item has been continued to June 16th? Thank
you.
Another suggestion I have for consideration in our agenda this
morning, it is our habit, and not a legal requirement, but it is our habit
to first hear from the petitioner, and the petitioner's team, then
followed by the staff and relevant staff, department presentations,
interspersed with questions, and then after both presentations are
complete, extensive questions. And then before closing the public
hearing, members of the public are asked to speak. I'm expecting that
members of the public won't have their opportunity at the microphone
until late this afternoon or tomorrow, and there's a lot of people from
the public that deserve and need to be heard. And I would suggest that
we move the public speakers portion, which is a habit, not a legal
requirement, but we move that portion up earlier into the agenda.
Perhaps I'm considering after the petitioner's presentation, prior to the
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staff presentation, just to allow those people to have their say and then
to go on about their lives and move on.
MR. ABERNATHY: Mr. Chairman, I think that's well within
your discretion. And rather than having a motion and locking you into
one thing or another, do what you want, when you want.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: That's what I want to do, so thank you.
And then, last item that I wanted to bring up is, I was reminded by the
court reporter at the last Planning Commission meeting, very politely
and professionally, that I needed to do a better job at my job, and that
is recognizing one speaker at a time. And with that in mind, I know --
I feel certain that there will be questions asked by each Planning
Commissioner at great length. Out of respect for one another, rather
than interrupt another questioner, what I'd like to do is recognize, at
that time the Planning Commission starts asking their questions, that
the Planning Commissioner who has the floor, be allowed to complete
their question, and if another Planning Commissioner wants to follow
up, please get the chair's attention. I'll make every attempt. I'm
always looking back and forth. And then at a convenient break in the
conversation, we'll bring you in for a follow-up so that we each
respect one another and everybody has their chance. Not to preclude
any opportunity to ask a question or to limit those questions in any
part, but just to keep ourselves in order.
And then the last thing I would like to do, requesting of the
Planning Commissioners is, as we try to take apart this complex
project, is we try to focus our questions in an area at a time. For
example, transportation as an issue, and try to stay as much as possible
on that topic. And then, for example, the economic model, and try to
work on that, because I think it's quite clear that there's a number of
expert witnesses here, and if we bounce all over the board, it's going to
be a game of Twister out here in the side aisle as people are moving
around and trying to move back and forth. Again, that's -- and I'm not
suggesting we limit that you missed your chance at transportation, you
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can't ask that question. Not at all. Just saying that while we're on that
topic, let's try to stay focused on it and we can exhaust that issue and
move on to the next one. So I'll ask your help in that matter.
Are there any other addenda to the agenda this morning?
(N 0 response.)
CHAIRMAN BUDD: There being none, are there any planned
Planning Commission absences?
MR. ABERNATHY: Mr. Chairman, prior to the events of this
morning, I had planned to be absent on the 16th. It seems like that
was pretty smart, but I didn't realize it at the time, but I won't be here
on the 16th.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Okay. Thank you. Any others? Mr.
Midney.
MR. MIDNEY: I won't be able to come tomorrow.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Okay. And that brings up a good point,
it's not a scheduled meeting, but it's quite possible that we may
continue until tomorrow. Is there any expectations that we will not
have a quorum? Mr. Midney cannot make it. Are there others? So
we should appear to be in no danger ofa quorum for tomorrow.
Approval of minutes. The April 21, 2005 regular meeting. Do
we have a motion to approve those minutes.
MR. ADELSTEIN: So moved.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Motion by Mr. Adelstein. Do we have a
second?
MR. MURRAY: Second.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Second by Mr. Murray. Discussion. All
those in favor say aye.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Aye.
MR. STRAIN: Aye.
MR. MURRAY: Aye.
MR. ADELSTEIN: Aye.
MR. ABERNATHY: Aye.
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MR. VIGLIOTTI: Aye.
MS. CARON: Aye.
MR. MINDY: Aye.
MR. SCHIFFER: Aye.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: And Board of County Commission report
in recaps. Ray, do you have a report for us?
MR. BELLOWS: Yes, I do. The Board's last meeting they heard
the Ross variance. That was the variance with the sea wall and the
screen enclosure encroachment. The first motion for denial failed.
The motion for approval was adopted and the variance was granted.
The other variance was for the landscaping at the Golden Gate
import request, and that was denied by the board. And the Collier
County EOC, part of the Bembridge amendment was also denied by
the board.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: And the EOC, as I understand it, is -- was
asked by a member of the majority to be reconsidered. Is that a date
certain?
MR. BELLOWS: That is correct. And I'm not sure of the date.
MR. ABERNATHY: It's going to be a motion to reconsider.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: At a future County Commission meeting
will be a motion to reconsider at that time, if that's where it stands.
MR. BELLOWS: Yes.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Okay.
MR. STRAIN: Ray, that second one you mentioned, it wasn't a
landscaping issue. It had to do with Don Carlos at Kings Lake and
they wanted to have units up against the water. Is that the one you're
talking about?
MR. BELLOWS: Let's see.
MR. STRAIN: You said Golden Gate Export. That's the
company that I think owned that little piece of property in Kings Lake.
MR. BELLOWS: Yeah, you're correct. My copy is missing a
little print there.
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MR. STRAIN: The rain out there probably washed it out.
MR. BELLOWS: Yeah.
MR. STRAIN: Okay. I'm just curious. So that is the right one.
MR. BELLOWS: Thank you.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Anything else, Ray?
MR. BELLOWS: That's it.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Okay. And before we start on our first
agenda item, going through my notes, I realized the Collier County
Planning Commission meeting on Thursday June 16th will be held in
conference room 609-610 at the Community and Development
Environmental Division on Horseshoe Drive.
And Mr. Bellows, I think you mentioned to me that should this
meeting be continued until tomorrow, it would also be at the
Horseshoe Drive location; is that correct?
MR. BELLOWS: That's correct.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Okay. Thank you. So with that, we will
start with our first petition. That is agenda item 8A, that is
DRI-2004-AR-6293. And I think we should hear at the same time, but
take separate action -- let me see -- on the related petition -- I believe
it's related. Yes. SRA-2004-AR-6896 for the stewardship receiving
area for the town of Ave Maria. All those wishing to present
testimony, please stand and raise your right hand to be sworn in.
Do you swear or affirm the testimony you're about to give on the
matter now in hearing shall be the truth, the whole truth and nothing
but the truth so help you?
(All affirm.)
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Thank you. Disclosures by Planning
Commissioners. On my own part, I met with petitioner's agents, Mr.
Varnadoe and Mr. Reynolds and discussed this project. Other
disclosures? Starting at the end, Mr. Murray.
MR. MURRA Y: Yes, I've often talked with Mr. Blake Gable
because he was in Leadership Collier with me, but we never went into
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any great detail. I also met with Mr. Varnadoe and had a preliminary
discussion regarding papers and questions.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Thank you. Mr. Schiffer.
MR. SCHIFFER: None.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Thank you. Mr. Midney.
MR. MIDNEY: I met with Mr. Gable.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Okay. Mr. Adelstein.
MR. ADELSTEIN: None.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: I mentioned mine. Mr. Strain.
MR. STRAIN: I had quite a few. I met with various members of
various heads of the departments of Collier County Staff, various
employees of Collier County Staff. There are about nine or ten people
in the meeting that occurred Tuesday. Ray Bellows had requested a
meeting and had the people brought to the meeting. We went over a
lot of issues involving the entire packages in front of me here today. I
also met with Anita Jenkins, representative of the applicant. We went
over a lot of issues that were pertaining to a couple of these documents
today. I met with Nicole Ryan of the Conservancy, and there's been--
almost everybody you bump into on the street, that recognizes that I
was on this panel, has talked to me about A ve Maria. I don't even
know their names, but there's been a lot of discussion and I can't recall
everybody.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Okay. Mr. Abernathy.
MR. ABERNATHY: I spoke with Mr. Varnadoe, but we
mutually agreed not to talk about Ave Maria, so --
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Mr. Strain, you've got another disclosure?
MR. STRAIN: Yeah, I've got -- I just noticed Hank and Russ are
in the audience, and I did have a meeting with them to try to
understand better the FlAM and how it works.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Mr. Vigliotti.
MR. VIGLIOTTI: None.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Ms. Caron.
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MS. CARON: None.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Okay. That concludes our disclosures.
We'll move on with the petitioner's presentation.
MR. V ARNADOE: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. George
Varnadoe of the law firm ofCheffy, Passidomo, Wilson & Johnson.
I'm here today representing Ave Maria Development LLP. We're here
today, as you know, requesting stewardship receiving area destination
for the town of Ave Maria and approval of a DRI development order
for the town. I'm pleased and proud to be part of the team as bringing
this to you today. I think it's a very exciting venture, and I think it's
going to make a lot of positive impacts on our county.
I'd also like to take this opportunity to thank your county staff for
their coordination with us on this proj ect. We've had countless
meetings with the staff trying to work out differences and issues, and I
think that has resulted in a very clean staff report that you have before
you today.
As you noted, we have available various experts in the variety of
disciplines to answer your questions in their respective areas of
expertise. However, I'm only going to have two main presenters to lay
out the project for you, and then we'll be responsive to your questions.
Alan Reynolds, the CEO of Wilson, Miller, is going to give you a
brief overview of the rural land stewardship area overlay program as
contained in the growth management plan. Tell you how the
stewardship sending areas and stewardship receiving area for Ave
Maria implement the RLSA overlay, tell you the status of other
approvals, and how the town of Ave Maria meets a specific criteria of
the RLSA overlay specifically relating to destinations of SRAs.
Anita Jenkins, the planning manager of Wilson, Miller will
describe the town plan, including the university. Before they get
started, I have one housekeeping matter. We have records from
providers that I want to put on the record, including Collier County
EMS, the Sheriff, Immokalee Fire Department, Collier County School
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District, Immokalee Disposal, and Ave Maria Utility regarding their
ability to provide services in their respective disciplines to the town.
I'll give a copy to the court reporter, and I'll have a copy that you
might pass around.
MR. STRAIN: Do you have copies that we can keep with our
packages?
MR. V ARNADOE: I'll have some more made.
MR. STRAIN: I appreciate it. Thank you.
MR. V ARNADOE: So I think, what I'd like to do is get Alan
Reynolds up here and get right into the presentation and maybe we
can, hopefully bring this to conclusion today. Thank you.
MR. REYNOLDS: Good morning. My name is Alan Reynolds.
I am the CEO of Wilson, Miller but I'm really speaking to you today
in my capacity as a planning consultant. I've been doing planning
work here in Southwest Florida starting my 27th year. And I can tell
you that, as George has said, this has been an extremely interesting
and exciting process that we've been through over the past five or six
years, going back to the creation of the stewardship plan and now the
culmination of that with this first town that you're going to be
considering today.
I too want to thank staff because we have actually been, over
those five years, been working closely with your staff, both when the
stewardship plan was being first put together. And they have done an
extraordinary job every step of the way of being very diligent about,
not only making sure that the public's interest is being protected, but
that this process would go smoothly and that we would work together
to resolve issues as we went. And as George said, this project is
coming to you today with a staff report that -- I think as you have
gone through it, you will see that we have tried to take every issue and
come up with a solution for that issue so that we could come before
you today with something that is complete and thorough.
I also want to thank the members of this Planning Commission
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because you have received several pounds' worth of documentation on
this project because we're dealing both with a stewardship receiving
area and a development of regional impact application. And that's an
enormous amount of material to try to go through, and you all are
volunteers in doing this for the good of the public. And I just want to
thank you starting out that you have taken the time to serve the public
in this way.
We're going to do our part to maybe try to get us out of here
before 4:00. We'll see how it goes, but we -- we're not going to give
you an hour long presentation, an hour-and-a-half. What we're going
to go do is try to hit the highlights of the project and then really save
the time for addressing specific questions that you might have. But
we did think it was important that we start out with a presentation and
just back up a little bit to 1999, particularly for the benefit of the
Planning Commissioners that weren't, and did not live through the
adoption process for the stewardship program just to make sure that
there's a context for this application. So I'll spend a few minutes doing
that and then talk about how the mechanics of this program work
generically. Okay. And then we'll talk a little bit about how this
particular new town of Ave Maria has used the system as it was set up
in order to bring this petition forward today.
So, we go back to 1999, and for those of you that recall, that was
a fairly contentious time in Collier County history with respect to
planning issues. There were a lot of things that were happening.
There was a whole public dialogue about density reduction. There
were issues of how to deal with natural resource protection. And
without getting into a lot of history, the county found itself having the
comprehensive plan challenged for failing to have lived up to certain
things that it said it was going to do, particularly for natural resource
protection. That, in turn, led to the governor and cabinet issuing a
final order that said that the county would take the time to put together
a long range plan for the eastern part of Collier County.
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That final order set up two planning studies. One that dealt with
the fringe area, the rural fringe, and the second that dealt with the
eastern lands, which is the -- now become the rural land stewardship
area. So when that was set up, then these processes took about
two-and-a-halfyears to create a plan. And the county for the eastern
lands put together a committee of volunteer citizens, a stakeholder
committee, and they spent the better part of two years essentially
meeting and looking at information, data, alternatives and came up
with a -- really a first in the State of Florida -- an innovative new way
of dealing with long range land use issues in the eastern part of the
county. That committee met 33 times, and at the end of the process
they had come up with a consensus, and a unanimous consensus, to
put in place what is now called the rural land stewardship overlay.
There were countless people that were involved in putting this
together, but I think the significant thing about it was that you had --
you have all of the interest groups represented. You had people who
are advocates for the environment. You had advocates for agriculture.
You had property rights advocates. You had people who were
interested in Immokalee's future, economic development. And at the
end of the day, they all came to the County Commission And said, we
all support a rural land stewardship plan because we think that that
does the best job of balancing all of the interests of the Collier County
citizens. And because of that, the Board of County Commission, at
their hearing, adopted that overlay unanimously. It went on to the
Department of Community Affairs. They found it in compliance with
state law. So now the overlay was set up for this some 200,000 acres
of land in the northeast part of Collier County. But, of course, that's
just the starting point because without implementing regulations and
codes, there's no way to utilize that system. So, it took about a year
after that to put in place the land development code section that dealt
with all of the various things that had to be done in order to implement
stewardship.
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Then there was a petition, and it was the first one that was filed
under the program, to initiate the initial phase of this town of Ave
Maria. And many of you were here on the Planning Commission, I
think, last year when we brought that plan forward. And what that
dealt with was the first phase of the university and the first phase of
the town. And so the Planning Commission, and then the Board of
County Commissioners approved a stewardship receiving area, and a
preliminary development agreement was approved to actually allow
this process of creating this town to commence before the full town
and the full DRI would be reviewed. So that has been going on really
for about a year implementing that particular approval.
I also just want to say before we get past this is that Collier
County has now found itself in a -- at least in the eyes of people
around the state -- in an enviable position. Because I will tell you, I've
spent the better part of the last three years traveling around the state
talking to people about the similar kinds of issues that Collier County
faced in dealing with the rural lands. And almost all of these areas
now are looking at Collier County rural land stewardship program as a
potential model to use in their counties. The program has enjoyed
widespread support across the state. The Department of Community
Affairs is fully in support of rural land stewardship. A lot of interest
groups that deal with growth management, environmental advocacy,
all support the concept, because it does some things that other
programs simply can't do with respect to long range planning. So,
Collier County now has become -- looked at candidly as a model that
may be used around the state for dealing with these same kinds of
issues in other parts of the state, and I thought it would be worthwhile
to note that today.
So, let me again go back to the big picture. And the big picture
was that the final order said, and the stewardship plan created the way
to address three big issues. The first was agriculture. Finding a way
that we could support agriculture over the long term and protect areas
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that served an agricultural function. The second was to protect
wetlands and uplands habitat. And Collier County had a -- really the
basis for the challenge was we had a natural resource protection area
program in our plan, but it had never been fully implemented. And so,
the second piece of the puzzle was how do we protect natural
resources going forth. And then the third was how do we deal with
expected growth and do that in a way that is more sustainable, that
provides greater economic diversification and, frankly, creates a better
way of accommodating future growth than what would happen if we
did nothing. And the do nothing scenario was basically to take and
continue the process of carving rural lands into 5-acre, 10-acre
ranchetts, which is happening across the state right now in places that
don't have a stewardship program. And essentially, converting the
rural countryside to very low density scrawl. So that was the task that
needed to be addressed.
And let me talk a little bit about how this overlay program
addresses those three issues.
The first thing to understand is that the stewardship program is an
overlay. And so, it is an opt-in process. Nobody that lives or owns
property in this area is obligated to participate in this program. They
choose to participate, or if they don't choose to participate, they utilize
the existing rights that they have on their property with the existing
regulations. So it's an incentive base process that's opted in.
The second thing is that there are four basic classifications of
land in the rural land stewardship area. The flow way stewardship
areas are areas that are significant because of their wetlands, their
hydrology, their interconnectedness in terms of water flow, and
basically the Camp Keais Strand and the Acalachoochi -- the Camp
Keais as being the blue area on the west and the Acalachoochi on the
east of this slide. Those are the two major flow ways in the rural land
study area.
The second classification are habitat stewardship areas. And
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those are areas that are predominantly native vegetation, and their
function is more from the standpoint of habitat for listed species than
it is wetlands. So you have a mix of wetlands and uplands, but these
are areas that were designated because of their value for
accommodating listed species.
The third classification, which are the light blue areas on the
map, are water retention areas. And water retention areas, that have
been used historically and are used today, to provide storm water
treatment, storm water storage, and conveyance today for agriculture.
And ultimately for both agriculture and to support new towns and new
villages that are created.
The fourth designation is open, which is everything else in the
stewardship area. And the open areas are the pink areas. Those are
areas that had a low score on the natural resource value, to the extent
that they didn't perform any of the functions listed above. They were
predominantly areas of active agriculture, citrus row crops, improved
pastures, things of that type that had very low resource value.
So, those are the basic classifications. We're going to be talking
about those a little bit today, so I thought it was good just to kind of
refresh everybody's memory. And we're dealing with an area of about
195,000 acres of land. It's about 300 square miles.
So, briefly, the mechanics of how this program works. For
anybody that wants to participate, that we start with the sending areas,
which are the flow ways, the habitats, and the water retention areas.
Those were mapped when the overlay was set up based on their
natural resource value. And the -- these are the areas that are going to
address the issue of protecting natural resources. They become
sending areas when a property owner petitions the county to have that
designation formally placed on their property. Right now it's just a
classification on a map. So, the property owner has to come to the
county and petition for a sending area application to have that actually
designated as a sending area. And when they do that, they -- two
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things happen. One, the property owner agrees to eliminate certain
uses that they're otherwise allowed to have on their property. And
secondly, they agree in perpetuity to maintain the property in
whatever condition it's going to be brought down to, if you will. And
in return for doing that, through a mathematical formula that's based
on natural resource values and other factors, they can receive credits,
stewardship credits. And those stewardship credits then can be
transferred, sold, or used by the property owner to entitle areas that
will become new towns or new villages or hamlets, or areas that will
accommodate population growth. The -- there is a whole process for
setting up a sending area. You, as a planning commission, do not see
the sending area portion of this equation because it goes directly to the
Board of County Commissioners because, essentially, it's a matter of
documenting the environmental conditions on the property, and then
the mathematics of it. So it's a -- it's not really a -- what I would call a
discretionary process, and that's since beyond the fact documenting
what's on the ground, but the property owner has the right, if they
need the criteria under the plan, to have their lands designated as
sending areas, and that happens by an action of the Board of County
Commissioners.
When they do that, there is a easement that's put on the property,
a stewardship easement, that dictates the uses that they have retained
on the property, any management things that they will be obligated to
do to keep that property in its condition.
Now, I've talked about sending areas being selected because of
high natural resource value. There's a very involved GIS modeling
that was done. I'm not going to get into that today because it's
probably not really germane to what you all are considering, but I
think it's just important to know that this is a data-driven scientific
process that both classifies and ultimately designates these
stewardship sending areas.
There are about 89,000 acres of flow ways, habitat areas, and
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water retention areas within that 300 square mile area, so it's a little
less than half of the total area.
And this picture at the bottom, that's just a good -- that's a good
picture of showing what is a flow way stewardship area. And you can
see the wetland, vegetative cover and the water and the open pastures.
So that's the -- those are the sending areas. And we'll talk a little
later about the sending areas specific to Ave Maria, but again, I just
want to cover sort of the generic part of the discussion.
The other classification are the stewardship receiving areas. And,
of course, that is one of the two applications that you are all
considering this morning. The receiving areas are where we're going
to have development taking place in the rural lands area. Those
developments can be in the form of towns, villages, hamlets, or there's
a fourth classification called a compact rural development. But
basically the prototypes for each type of community are set forth in
the comprehensive plan.
These receiving area sites have not been predetermined in the
plan. Anything that's colored pink on that overlay map is potentially
eligible to be a receiving area because it's already been determined to
have a very low natural resource value and, therefore, it is a potential
candidate for a receiving area. But there are criteria then that have to
be applied project by project and community by community to make
sure that that particular location does, in fact, meet the criteria under
the plan.
There are also a whole range of characteristics that have been
spelled out in the comprehensive plan and the land development code
that really talks about how these communities are intended to be
planned, designed, and performed. And we've talked about the idea of
trying to create more compact development, mixed used development,
development that is self-sufficient, communities that have the full
range of things that are required to support their population. So, the
characteristics for these communities and Ave Maria is a good
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example of that, is that anything that is necessary for the day-to-day
functions of the people that live in that town, can be provided within
the town. And that's the general concept.
There's also a whole set of design standards. And you probably
noted in the SRA document that there's a big section that deals with
very specific design standards as to how the town is going to be set up.
And the reason for that is because the form of development that we're
dealing with here does not fit within the traditional subdivision type of
approach that is used in other places. Generally speaking, that has
been a way of segregating land uses, of keeping land uses away from
each other, using buffers to separate them, and having essentially an
area for residential, then an area for commercial, and an area for this,
and those things are not interconnected. And when you try to create a
town that in fact mixes uses, you really have to deal with design
issues, and you have to create standards that enable things to be more
interconnected. Streets to be narrower, on street parking, vertical
integration of mixed uses. So those are all the kinds of things that
have to be set forth. The landscaping requirements are all different
when you're dealing with a mixed use town of this type then with
traditional subdivisions.
Receiving areas require credits. In order for anybody to get
approval to build a new town or a new village, they must acquire
credits proportionate to the footprint of development of that town or
village. And through a whole process, the county established, as part
of the comprehensive plan, that eight credits would be required for
every acre of a new town or a village.
Those acres then can have any type of use that's allowed under
the plan. So it's -- it may be an acre of residential, it could be an acre
of open space, it could be an acre of a mixed used town center. It
doesn't change because what you're allowing and entitling under the
system is a footprint of development that can support a mixed use
community.
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Public benefit uses are exempt from consuming credits. And the
reason for that policy was to encourage the inclusion of certain public
benefit uses in towns and villages and essentially to create an
incentive for them to be accommodated as part of the planning
process. Ave Maria is a great example of that because the footprint of
the university does not consume stewardship credits, because it's
deemed to be a public benefit use under your comprehensive plan.
So, I think, you know, the relationship is clear. If there are going
to be new towns and villages out here, they must acquire credits. That
means the property owner is going to have to opt into the program and
designate sending areas. By designating those sending areas, they're
going to protect natural resources, and they're going to be keeping
agriculture uses on that property. So now we've balanced the equation
between the protection natural resources Ag and accommodating
development.
The stewardship sending areas are typically fairly large size
pieces. And you can see on this map -- this is an aerial photo of the
entire 300 square miles. And the areas outlined in red, are the
stewardship sending areas that are being used to generate credits for
the town of Ave Maria.
So, summing up really on how this program works protecting
natural resources, which has been one of the linchpins of this process,
works because, if people use this system, which we believe they will
because it's an incentive based system, we will have protected
approximately 90,000 acres of natural resource areas out in the eastern
part of Collier County. And we will have done that without a public
acquisition cost. And that's a lot of land to protect without having to
buy it and use taxpayer funds to purchase it. And you can do the math
and just kind ofproject what it might cost. But I will tell you, if 140
square miles is probably more than any single county in the State of
Florida has ever protected through any kind of an acquisition program.
So it's a significant thing that's being accomplished.
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So now we'll kind of get back to the Ave Maria and how that
works. Again, the sending areas for Ave Maria -- and now on this
map you can see them in green. There are actually six different
sending areas that are going to be used to generate the credits. Up
here, this is 846, east of Immokalee, and there are three sending areas.
Actually sending area three, four and five are the numbers. And those
comprise a significant part of the Acalachoochi slew. And those were
selected because that's a very intensive area that's used for panther
habitat. And there have been a lot of issues that others can talk about
in terms of panther mortality, and so we're protecting an area that will
provide both a flow way function and a habitat function.
There are two sending areas that are located in the Camp Keais
stands that are immediately west of Ave Maria. They're located here
and here. And those were selected because they are the closest
sending areas under the ownership of the Barron Collier Company to
the town of Ave Maria, and they will start to put together, essentially,
the puzzle of protecting the entire Camp Keais strand. And then the
sixth one is this large green area down at the very south end of the
map. That's about 9,900 acres. That is sending area number six. It
encompasses and shares a common border with the panther preserve
that's immediately to the south. When that stewardship area is put in
place, the effective size of the panther preserve will have increased by
one-third over its existing size today.
This one has not been approved yet. That is going to the County
Commission on June 14th. The other sending areas have been
approved and the credits are available.
Now the receiving area for Ave Maria. 5,000, a little over 5,000
acres located west of Camp Keais Road, which is this road right here.
Oil Well Road to the south. The Camp Keais strand to the west and
south of Immokalee. It's about five miles from the town of Ave Maria
up to the town of Immokalee. This site meets all of the criteria that are
set forth in the comprehensive plan. All of the criteria that is set forth
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June 2, 2005
in the land development code for being suitable to become a receiving
area and a new town. And the SRA document that you have goes
through lots of detail to show how it meets all of those various
requirements. And we don't plan on going back through all that with
you today, unless you have questions. But we'll hit the basic pieces of
it.
The other thing to note here is that in addition to a
comprehensive plan being in place, and a land development code
process being in place, there's actually the zoning overlay is in place.
So, today you're not looking at a rezoning application, you're looking
at a designation of this property. So the zoning was set up as an
overlay at the time that the land development code was put in place.
And there are a lot of reasons for that, but one thing to keep in mind is
that this is a process that if it's going to work, property owners need to
know that if they choose to participate in it, they can have some
expectation that they will get the favorable result that's called for
under the plan. So this is not, what I would call, the pure discretionary
process that sometimes takes place when you're trying to change land
use classifications. There are very specific sets of criteria that are set
up. And if an applicant comes to the county and they can document
that they meet those criteria, and the county staff agrees, and
ultimately the County Commission and the Planning Commission
agree, that designation takes place.
That's very important because, if we don't create a system that
gives property owners some level of comfort that if they enter into
this, they will, in fact, be approved, then I will tell you, the rural land
stewardship program will stop working and we will be back to where
we were before we put this overlay in place.
Now let's talk a little bit about the basis for a receiving area.
There are really four key things that have to be found in order to
approve a receiving area. First is that the plan that is put together is
consistent with the policies of the stewardship overlay. And that's the
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June 2, 2005
same test that virtually every petition that you look at has to meet.
You can't be inconsistent with your comprehensive plan. And the
staff report has done really an outstanding job of going through policy
by policy, the ones that are most applicable and showing how this
particular application has met all of those required policies.
The second is that there's a set of what are called suitability
criteria. And those are more specific things that have to be
documented on each site in order to be able to be approved as a
receiving area. And we'll talk about those in a second.
Compliance with the overlay district in the LDC. There's both a
procedural part of that and a standards part of it. Of Course the
procedure is what we're going through right now, and the standards
are spelled out in some detail. They really mirror what's in the
comprehensive plan but get into a lot more detail about how you deal
with the specific policies in the plan.
And the fourth thing is you have to document that you can
acquire or produce sufficient credits to get your receiving area
entitled. And there is a -- that's all set forth in the code. There is a
period of time after an SRA approval that you can produce the credits.
But essentially as part of the application, you have to show that you
will be able to acquire sufficient credits. And there's a whole section
in the application of credit reconciliation that goes through all of those
numbers.
Let's talk a little bit about the suitability criteria. Again, first is
consistency. That's always the starting point with any kind of an
application. The second criteria is that you have to show that you've
got enough land in order to accommodate the uses that you're
proposing. The reason that's important is because, depending on the
scale of the new community, if it's a town or if it's a village, there are
certain uses that you have to have inside your town. Certain ratios and
square footages and certain amounts of open space. So you have to
prove that you, in fact, have enough land to provide all of the things
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June 2, 2005
that have to be provided to meet that criteria.
The third and the fourth are kind of companions. When the
overlay was put in place, there was this natural resource scoring of the
entire study area. And that scoring is based on a whole series of
natural resource characteristics. So every acre of the stewardship area
has an index score associated with it.
When you come in to do a receiving area, and when you come in
to do a sending area, you have to go back and refine, if you will, the
documentation as to what you are index is. And if you have property
that scores greater than 1.2, it was determined by policy that that has
natural resource value, even if it's not in a sending area that should be
given special treatment. And the special treatment is that those areas
in a receiving area have to be kept as open space, in natural vegetated
conditions. However, if it's 1.2 or less, there is no obligation because
it's been determined under the scoring system and by policy that that
represents land that may have some natural resource value, but it's not
of significance in order to restrict the use of that land.
There's also a requirement that you must have a minimum of 35
percent open space within a receiving area. There are buffering
requirements if your receiving area is adjacent to either a flow way or
a habitat area. And there is a requirement that you either have direct
access to a county arterial or collector, or that you build and provide a
connection to one of those roadways. So those are the key suitability
criteria.
The pieces of the submittal, and now we're again talking about
the receiving area. There really are five sections to that application.
The first is that natural resource index assessment. Basically what that
does is provide documentation as to the NRI scores on the property so
that you can determine whether the 1.2 criteria has been met. The
second is an impact assessment report. The impact assessment goes
through infrastructure. You know, and the requirement here is that the
infrastructure that's needed to support that town is provided by the
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June 2, 2005
community developer or the county and will be in place and able to
support the population that's going to be accommodated.
The third piece is the economic assessment or the physical
impact assessment model. That is based on a requirement in the
comprehensive plan that says that when the county is approving a new
town or a new village, it must be demonstrated that the revenues
generated from that new community will exceed, meet or exceed, the
cost to the local government to provide services. So there's a very
involved modeling that's done in order to demonstrate that test. And
Dr. Hank Fishbein, who is part of our team, actually created the model
as a statewide effort, and it's being used now in this particular
application by Collier County.
The fourth piece is a credit agreement. That goes through the
balancing of the numbers with respect to how many credits are
required for your receiving area, and can they be produced. And then
the fifth piece is the town plan. And the town plan gets into some of
the design details of the town or village.
We've talked about the natural resource index assessment.
Bottom line is that we don't have any land within the boundaries of
this stewardship receiving area that exceed 1.2 on a score. So, that test
has been met and that's been well documented in the application.
Second, the impact assessment report. We have provided
extensive documentation and coordination with public service
providers in the county to show that the infrastructure that's going to
be required to serve this town will be in place, either being provided
by the developer or by the county or by some other service provider.
We will have a private utility system for the water and waste water,
and we have a special district that's going to be in place that will
handle the long term maintenance of the infrastructure along with
property owner associations.
There's been lots and lots of analysis and documentation about
the transportation element of this project. I'm going to talk in a second
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June 2, 2005
about once piece of that, but suffice it to say that all of the folks that
have reviewed both the SRA application and the DRI application have
come to the conclusion that, with certain conditions and with certain
commitments being provided, that we will have adequate
transportation capacity over the long term to support this new town.
And one piece of that is, that the right of way that's going to be
necessary to widen Oil Well Road and Camp Keais Road is being
provided by Ave Maria in places where it joins the property. And
that's being done without an impact fee credit, but even though they
would be entitled to one.
I'm just going to talk a second about something that happened
recently. And there are others that can get into the details of this, if
you'd like, on the team, but there was an agreement entered into
between Collier County and Ave Maria and it was approved just last
month. And that agreement is what I would call a public private
partnership. It basically puts obligations on both Ave Maria and the
County to do certain things to advance the construction of some very
important road improvements in the eastern part of Collier County.
The things that the Ave Maria side are doing is, first of all, donating
the right of way, which we talked before about 13 miles of right of
way. The estimated value of that is about $7.6 million. And I think
your staff would tell you that the cost of right-of-way acquisition now
is becoming the single fastest growing element of producing roads.
You know, road construction costs are going up, but right-of-way
acquisition costs are going up at an extremely fast rate. So that's a
significant contribution.
The second is -- and it relates to that because you have to have
land to support roadways for water management. And A ve Maria has
committed to providing water management infrastructure for the
widening of the roads, Oil Well and Camp Keais Road, and the value
of that is $1.8 million. We'll also be donating fill for 18 miles of road
construction. That's valued at about $11 million. All of those
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June 2, 2005
contributions, although they would be eligible for impact fee credits,
the Ave Maria side is not seeking impact fee credits. We get
something else instead, which I'll talk about in a second.
In addition, Ave Maria is going to pay to advance the design of
permitting for Oil Well Road. And as, I think everybody here knows,
the linkage between the urban area of Collier County and Immokalee
is a huge issue for residents in Naples and residents in Immokalee and
everybody that travels those roadways.
F or some period of time the county has been focused on trying to
widen Immokalee Road. As a result of the stewardship process, the
alternative of looking at Oil Well Road and Camp Keais Road was
considered as a, perhaps a faster and more direct way, to accomplish
the objective near term. It doesn't replace the widening of Immokalee
Road, but it would appear to be a more direct and easier to permit
improvement. So what's happening essentially is that that is going to
be accelerated as part of this developer contribution agreement with
the county, and Ave Maria is going to be paying for the design,
permitting, and construction portion of that $6 million.
They're also committing to pay a certain number of impact fees
in advance to cover the initiation of the construction process, which
will help essentially with the cash flow. And, of course, at the end of
the day when all is said and done, we also have to pay all of our
impact fees. And for this project, it's estimated to be just under one
hundred million dollars worth of impact fees. That produces a lot of
capital to build necessary infrastructure, and, so when people have
questioned well, how can you accommodate growth in the eastern part
of Collier County, because the county has never programmed
significant improvements out there, it's because the county never had a
reliable source of funds through impact fees because there was no
development taking place. So in this case we now have a source of
money that is going to work as the county intends it through its impact
fee process.
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What's the county going to do? The county is going to require
the additional right of way that's needed that's not being contributed
by Ave Maria. They're going to undertake and complete the
construction of the road in a timely fashion. And then they're going to
reserve capacity for the town of Ave Maria for concurrency purposes.
And that way Ave Maria has a reliable way of making the front end
investment and all the infrastructure they're putting in, and they will
be able to have assurance that they can continue to complete their
project, and the county will then be reserving capacity to make sure
that that's taking place. So that's a very overview description of that
agreement. And Jeff Perry and George Varnadoe both can delve into
the details if you have questions.
The economic assessment report, I'm sure there will be some
questions about that because its something new that the county has not
applied previously to projects but applies out in the stewardship area.
We talked about the fact that there is a model that's used to make this
analysis. Bottom line is that we have demonstrated that we meet the
criteria that's set forth in the plan. You look at the physical neutrality
of the community at five year intervals. So, we have to show that in
the fifth year and in the tenth year of this project, and that particular
year the revenues generated exceed the cost to provide services to the
county and government. And it does have to be reanalyzed every five
years. So, even though we have proven with our assessments that we
do meet that test and, frankly, meet them by a fairly wide margin, five
years from now it will have to be reanalyzed to show that it, in fact, it
is performing the way that we intended.
Just to give you some order of magnitudes, in the year 2011, the
excess in that year is somewhere between 5.9 and $8 million,
depending on which assumptions you use in the model. And in 2016,
it's 11.4 to $17.6 million.
Accumulative impact, however, because the project continues to
have positive yearly surpluses that ranges somewhere between 60 and
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June 2, 2005
100 million dollars over that ten-year build out. And so, it's not that
this community is just sort of squeaking by and on a neutrality test,
there is significant excess revenues. And if you think about it, it
makes sense because, if the community is self providing most of its
infrastructure, maintaining its infrastructure, paying its impact fees,
and generating value throughout ad valorem taxes, they are doing so
in greater proportion than the typical home in Collier County would,
because of all those self provided services. So the combination of that
and the values of the real estate that are created, create a positive
impact to the county.
MR. ABERNATHY: Alan?
MR. REYNOLDS: Yes, sir.
MR. ABERNATHY: Can you refresh my memory, if I once
knew it, what the rationale for this requirement is? I mean, Mediterra
doesn't have to do it, and whatever.
MR. REYNOLDS: That's correct. It has been used -- the
philosophy is this, if you have property that's in an urban area, then
there is an expectation of public services being provided to that
property. And that's sort of the essence of each county's plan. So then
it becomes a matter of how do you balance the provision of those
services to the cost. When you get into rural areas, there's a lower
expectation of urban level services. So the theory here is that, if
you're going to create a population in a rural area, that there will have
to be some assurance that the services of that population is going to
demand, can be provided without being to the detriment of the rest of
the county. So I think that's the underlying philosophy behind it.
It's interesting, there's actually been a case in Lee County, the
Brooks community. And Lee County had to go through a physical
analysis similar to this because, even though it was surrounded by
urban land, it was actually a rural destination. So, under a different
program, they had to go through the same kind of analysis. And, in
fact, Dr. Fishbein did that analysis. And that's probably a good model
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June 2, 2005
because that proj ect has proven to have well exceeded its physical
surplus test as well over time.
Let me skip over this. This is just -- all I'll point out to you is,
there have been three different modelings of this town. There was the
modeling that was submitted by the applicant, and that showed that we
met the test. Then the county staff in reviewing this questioned some
of the perimeters that were inputs to the model and suggested some
different perimeters. So those were put into the model and it was
rerun, and it produced a positive impact, albeit different numbers.
And then there was a third analysis that was done, because it was
pointed out that those two were conservative because they did not
include an escalator for impact fees that are built into your ordinance.
So there was a third run. When you put the impact fee inflator in and,
as you would expect, because the other two were conservative, that
also produced a greater positive physical impact. So, it may be
questioned. You know, there may be questions about each perimeter,
but if you can run this model and change the perimeters using
different assumptions and still produce such a significant positive
result, it should give everybody comfort that this community can meet
that test. And frankly, nobody is more concerned about it then the
developers. Because if they make the investment to build this
community, and five years when the analysis is rerun, and if it's not
positive, they're obligated to make up the difference. So, the reason
that the model runs have been very conservatively run is to have
assurance, frankly, on the community developer's side, that they're
going to meet the test. Because nobody wants to be writing, you
know, huge checks halfway through the project that were
unanticipated. So, I will just characterize this as I think a very
conservative analysis. And I think without question looking at it
several different ways, we've met the test.
The last thing I'm going to talk about is the credit agreement.
And without, again, getting into lots and lots of numbers, there -- if
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you recall before, there are incentives built into this program that
allows some uses to not consume credits. The public benefit uses. In
this community, there are basically three big ones. The university as a
public benefit use, there are other schools, public school sites that are
being provided, and then there is open space that's in excess of what's
required, the 35 percent. And when you do all the math on that, you
find that out of our 5,000-acre town, we have a demand for 28,658
credits. And all the details are contained in your applications.
And the six SSAs that are either approved or pending, produce
sufficient credits to cover that 28,658 credit demand for this town.
Your staff has looked at all the numbers, has looked at the policies,
and has agreed that the methodology and the math is correct. So that's
what we're obligated to acquire.
I'm sorry, there was one more thing. I just wanted very briefly to
talk about the DRI process because we've spent most of our time
talking about the SRA. But the rural lands program anticipated that
because of the scale, particularly of towns, they would probably also
have to go through the DRI process. And there are state guidelines
that are established that if you exceed those guidelines, you have to go
through a DRI. And for those of you that may not be real familiar
with the DRI process, it's -- it is a statutory program that involves, not
just the local government, but the Regional Planning Council, and the
State Department of Community Affairs, and a whole bunch of
agencies all start reviewing your proj ect to make sure that you are --
that you have something that's well planned and that is addressing
impacts to citizens of more than one county. So the DRI process is --
covers a lot of ground, but it's narrowly focused on those issues that
could have the potential impact of citizens in more than one county.
And the way that that's determined is, first of all, if you exceed the
statutory threshold it sort of -- you're presumed to create some impact,
and then you actually go through a very detailed analysis, and the
Regional Planning Council looks at it. They identify the things that
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June 2, 2005
they think are regionally significant. They make a recommendation to
the county. The county then adopts the development order for the
DRI, not the regional planning council of the state, but the region and
the state look at that development order to make sure that that has
properly addressed the issues that were raised by the region as part of
their review in the state. So, that's the very kind of short description
of the DRI process.
What's pertinent here is that the DRI and the SRA have been
going simultaneously through this process. So, as your staff has been
looking at the SRA, they've also had this other three-inch document of
all the other DRI related -- and there's -- there are areas that are
overlap, and then there are areas that are different. Because the DRI
process has very specific methodologies that have to be followed in
the document, and they're not the same as your SRA. So if you look
through those carefully, you're going to see that, for example, things
like transportation, the analysis has a different test to meet because
there's a state rule on transportation. They have the state rule on
affordable housing. So, the tests, if you will, are different and,
therefore, sometimes the analysis and the result are different, but at the
end of the day, both of those have to be approved on this project in
order to allow the development to proceed.
We started this process about a year ago with this main DRI
application. And what I want to point out is that there is an agreement
in advance before you file your application as to what methodologies
you're going to use. There's a whole process now that essentially
means that the county, the region, the applicant, all have to agree on
the way in which the proj ect is going to be analyzed before you
actually submit your application. And what that does is cut down on
sort of the second-guessing of well, what if you did it this way, and
what if we change this perimeter. Everybody agrees on that in
advance and that helps, frankly, get everybody on the same page with
respect to the study.
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June 2, 2005
In our case, we have been through the process. The project has
been found sufficient for review by the county and the region. We've
been to the Regional Planning Council. We have gotten their
recommendation of approval. We have gotten things that they think
are important, incorporated them into the development order that will
be executed by the DRI. And then if and when the county
commission approves the DRI, they will look at it again to make sure
that they're comfortable with the result.
So, because of the DRI process, that was the reason why we
actually went through this SRA and PDA process last year and had the
first phase of the application, because we needed to get the university
started. So that PDA was approved. And in March of 2004, The
county approved a receiving area application. And since that time, we
have submitted and been approved for all the site development plans,
all the permits are in place, and we have started construction of the
university. If you go out there today, you can see that there's earth
work being performed, the backbone infrastructure, and the first phase
of the university. So, things are happening out at Ave Maria as a
result of that preliminary development approval that was granted by
everybody that needed to.
So right now I'm going to ask Anita to come up, and she's going
to walk through the town plan very quickly and that will wrap up our
presentation, and then we'll be available for questions from the
Planning Commission I think after the public speakers.
MR. STRAIN: Alan.
MR. REYNOLDS: Yes, sir.
MR. STRAIN: Before you leave, will it be possible for me to get
an electronic version of this presentation you're making, and maybe
you can provide it to Ray Bellows so I can get a copy of it?
MR. REYNOLDS: Yes.
MR. STRAIN: Thank you.
MR. REYNOLDS: Absolutely.
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MS. JENKINS: Good morning. I'm Anita Jenkins. I'm a
planning manager with Wilson, Miller and I'd just like to reiterate
what Al and George have both said, thanking particularly the county
staff. They have been through a thorough review of this application
and in constant contact with us weekly to address issues that have
been raised, develop solutions to make sure that this is the best plan
that we could possibly come up in concert. And also Amy Taylor is
here in the audience today and has went through a significant review
with us as well to make sure that we are planning for and
accommodating the school-related students that will be part of the
town. And we'd just like to recognize our coordination and recognize
Amy's efforts with this project as well.
In talking about the town plan. The town plan is a significant
element of the SRA document. And it sets forth the master plan which
you see before you, the uses that will be included in the town, and also
the development standards. The town plan, as you see, includes this
area here is the university. it includes several town core and several
town centers and several different neighborhood types within the
town. We also have the public school that is located here and a series
of community parks within the town.
First and foremost the university. This is the impetus for Ave
Maria, and the reason and the privilege and the honor that I have to be
here today. With over 15 years of planning experience in the State of
Florida, I can tell you that this is a career project for me. It's a
significant project for Collier County. And my experience in planning
in Florida, I have been involved in many projects. But the majority of
projects and planning in Florida has been done on single use projects.
This project, being a mixed use project and self-sufficient project with
this public benefit of a university, is an honor to be involved with and
very exciting for Collier County.
It is designed to be just over 950 acres and to accommodate 6,000
students. It will provide for both academics, student housing, and
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June 2, 2005
sports and recreation. There is also an ancillary use with the
university to provide for students that will be associated with the
residents of the town, the faculty, and staff of the University and that
will be the K through 12 school which is located in the town, in the
neighborhood, so the students can walk to the school.
Next the town core and town centers. The town core, again,
located right in the center of town. And we have three town centers.
The first here. This is what we referred to as town center two. And
then down here is town center three. These town centers are
specifically designed to be dispersed throughout the town. So you can
keep in close connection with the different types of neighborhoods to
be able to walk, to drive, to bicycle, to get to these town centers in a
variety of ways.
Each town center will be somewhat unique in the services and
goods that relates to it. The town center that is -- this is really what
we refer to as downtown. Those goods and services and entertainment
will be designed to be somewhat different than the goods and services
that will be located in town center two and then in town center three.
But each one of these town centers combine together will provide for
the daily goods and services that are needed to really function as a
town. It will provide employment, shopping, entertainment, the civic
and institutional uses, wellness, as well as residential will also be a
component of each of these town centers.
The neighborhoods. We've. kind of popped out the
neighborhoods for you to see clearly here on this graphic. There is a
variety of neighborhoods, a variety of housing, and a variety of
lifesty les that will be accommodated in this town. And this is also
something that is unique, I think to planning in Florida, that generally
the lifestyles and housing types are somewhat the same in a lot of
neighborhoods and plans that I have worked on before. This
community provides for a variety. To accommodate the different
lifestyles that are needed for a town to function in a proper manner.
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June 2, 2005
They are pedestrian oriented. And we'll look at a pedestrian map later
on. But each one of these neighborhoods is designed to accommodate
specifically the pedestrian through a series of sidewalks and trail
systems.
There are pocket parks that are located in these different
neighborhoods to accommodate, you know, different types of passive
recreation. And there are also opportunities for neighborhood goods
and services to be located. So it would be the small ice cream shop
maybe by the pocket park or things like that so you can -- there's
different opportunities to continue to walk and to be close to the
different goods and services.
The neighborhoods will also contain work force housing. And
this work force housing will be integrated throughout the
neighborhood. It is not going to be concentrated in anyone area, but
integrated in different styles and manners throughout each of the
neighborhoods. The commitments that have been made so far are the
on-site commitments of200 very low income units, 700 low income
units, with half of those being owner occupied, and then 1,000
moderate-priced units.
There has also been an off-site commitment made to Habitat for
Humanity for 28 acres, and that will accommodate up to 150 units as
well. The public schools that we referred to will be located in the
neighborhoods so close to the students so they can walk and bicycle to
school. There has been a donation of over 47 acres to accommodate
both the elementary and the middle school in the town of Ave Maria.
And we are also in negotiations with the school district to find the best
location for a high school that would be preferred to be off site on this,
so it would serve more than just the students of Ave Maria, but the
school district could take advantage of serving a greater area for the
public high school.
Ave Maria has a series of parks and open space contained within
it. There's a wide range of both the pocket parks that we talked about,
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June 2, 2005
and also community parks. There are three different community parks
that are designed to accommodate the residents of Ave Maria, and the
different lifestyles being very active parks and also some passive
parks as well. There is a community trail system that will link these
parks together, and over 1800 acres of open space that's made up of
these parks and lakes and other open spaces. Both of the parks and the
open space exceeds the requirements that are in the land development
code. The binder of all of these different areas, the university, the
town centers, and the neighborhood are bound together to be
pedestrian oriented as required by the plan.
And what you see before you is a pedestrian network map that is
included in the town plan. And the yellow lines indicate all the streets
that will have sidewalks on both sides of the street. And one thing that
is really terrific that the developer has designed into this project is, not
only the sidewalks, but also the street trees. Because we see a lot of
sidewalks that are not very functional because of the design of them.
The pedestrian facility design has a lot of detail worked into it to
accommodate and encourage pedestrian movement. So, the addition of
the street trees and the buffers and the shades will encourage more
pedestrian activity in this town. So you have those sidewalk systems
that are on both sides of these local streets. As well as the green lines
here are a different type of facility on some more collector roads, as
you would categorize them. Those being sidewalks also on both sides,
but a wider sidewalk on both sides of the street to accommodate more
activity. There's also, within the entry road here, a pathway system.
And then the trail system that we spoke about is the orange line that
goes around the community here and links back into the
neighborhoods and also goes all the way up here, and this is where the
public school is so children will be able to use this trail system to get
to the schools, as well as the local streets providing access to all of the
different town centers, the schools, the parks and throughout the
neighborhoods. That's the brief overview of the town plan. And we'll
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June 2, 2005
be here to answer any questions you have about this specific design.
But in summarizing this plan and this new town, for Collier
County, being designed in a self-sustaining manner is unique to
Collier County, and as a professional planner, I can tell you it's unique
to the State of Florida. And it's a lesson learned in planning that we
have to design better, to plan better, to provide the goods and services
necessary to support the residents of the communities that we're
designing, and that's what we're doing with Ave Maria. As well as
stewardship that we're working with in this eastern Collier County
area in protecting natural resources and agriculture. And those three
cornerstones are really new planning in the State of Florida for our
rural areas of protecting natural resources, accommodating agriculture,
and planning in a more self-sustaining manner for these new towns is
something that's very exciting for Collier County and for us to be
involved with. And with that, that's the summary of our presentation
today, and I'd be happy to answer any questions after the public
comment.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Okay. Right now we're going to take a 10
minute break. We'll come back and start with the registered public
speakers.
(Whereupon, a brief recess was taken.)
CHAIRMAN BUDD: We'll call the Planning Commission back
to order and resume with our agenda with the registered public
speakers.
Ray, do we have some registered speakers?
MR. BELLOWS: We have four registered speakers. The first
one is Fred Thomas followed by Nancy Payton.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Okay. Mr. Thomas. Either one.
MR. THOMAS: Good morning. Members of the Planning
Commission. My name is Fred N. Thomas, Jr. I served on this
planning commission for 11 years. Some of you remember me. I also
served on the Eastern Land Development Committee that came up
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June 2, 2005
with the whole program of this stewardship program. I'm presently
serving as the chairman of the Immokalee Master Plan Envisioning
Committee.
When we first saw this project, we had a little bit of a concern,
but working with the developers -- working with the developers, and
they working very closely with the leaders in the community and the
various organizations in Immokalee, they've reoriented their exposure
to the rest of the community. And there's a connectivity that makes it
possible for a lot of great things to happen between Ave Maria and the
town of Immokalee, especially with Immokalee looking to become the
industrial heart of Collier County.
We got the Planning Commission because of all this. We got the
County Commissioners to expand the thrust of the master plan
envisioning committee to look at the four censor tracts so we can, into
the future, begin to look at connectivity to any potential receiving
areas so that there's a -- we serve as a major hub to a very large area.
And this has worked out. And the developers of Ave Maria have
changed their orientation, as I've said, so there's a major connectivity
and major things happening. Some of the good things that have come
out of that, for example is, to the four laning of 858. The need to have
858 expanded -- let me back up and say it another way.
When I came here this morning, I didn't come down 846. And I
wish we changed the name of it from Immokalee Road to just 846.
Most people think because it's Immokalee Road, it helps
Immokaleeans get into town. We come down 29 and get on -- the
reason why I don't come down 846, I don't want to deal with
Immokalee Road between Randal and Wilson. Excuse me. That road
is designed for Orangetree. But by widening 858, it gives us good
access, good access for the folks down Orangetree going east and
west, and then they're going to straighten out Camp Keais Road,
which comes straight into Immokalee. Major nice connector. And
they're donating a lot of money -- land and money to make that
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June 2, 2005
happen. So, we see this as a real model for the rest of the state and
doing this kind of process to get these kinds of projects.
Remember, we made some major mistakes over the years in
various parts of this county, which required the use of automobiles.
You have a new town being developed now, and that's going to be a
walkable community. Not even a walkable community, they've got a
system of bike trails and natural trails that make it a nice place for a
Sunday ride on your bicycle. And they're close enough to Immokalee
where it makes sense to make that kind of a trip if you want to. So,
we need to look at it closely, but understand there's a lot of effort and
time that's going on. A lot of communication with the folks in
Immokalee to make this thing work. And it'll be a major magnet to
help us develop the industrial engine that can be a major source of
income for the whole county.
So anything you can do to speed up this process would be
appreciated by the folks in Immokalee. Thank you.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please.
MR. BELLOWS: Nancy Payton followed by John DePrisco.
MS. PAYTON: Nancy Payton representing the Florida Wildlife
Federation. And I'd like to speak briefly to the significant gains that
A ve Maria brings for nature in that part of Collier County, and
specifically for the critically endangered Florida panther. 846 east of
Immokalee runs through the middle of three stewardship areas. This
is an area that is a segment of road that is the deadliest roads for
panthers in their entire occupied habitat. At least seven panthers have
been killed on this stretch of road. And there was no action that could
be taken to prevent that until lands on either side of the road were in a
conservation or similar type status. And we've achieved that through
the stewardship program in the Ave Maria town.
It's a significant gain for panthers. Very important because the
Old Calloway Caloochisloo is an important north/south corridor
connecting conservation lands.
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June 2, 2005
We also secure an almost 10,000-acre buffer to the Florida
Panther National Wildlife Refuge. And if you recall, it is an II-mile
boundary with the panther refuge. And it is a significant habitat for
panthers. Roy McBride, who is the panther tracker for the Wildlife
Commission talks about the bazillian telemetry hits that are found in
this particular area. So it is a significant gain for panthers and the
restoration that will be happening there to increase the prey base and
also benefit other listed species.
There is a crossing that will be built on Oil Well Road at Camp
Keais strand. Camp Keais is another important north! south corridor
that's being enhanced through this program. And it's far better to have
a safe four or six-lane road than a deadly two-lane road. So we see
that the widening of Oil Well Road is a benefit to wildlife. And the
wildlife crossing will be designed, not just for panthers, but for all
wildlife that needs to cross that road at that particular area.
Many of these lanes in the Camp Keais area that are being
designated stewardship for Ave Maria are on the crew acquisition list
within the boundaries of the crew acquisition area. And these are
areas that for years there has been an effort to have them protected.
We found away, and a successful way, through the stewardship
program.
Lastly, I'd like to inform you that Florida Wildlife Federation has
submitted detailed comments to the Corps of Engineers and the US
Fish & Wildlife Service supporting Ave Maria's application for 404
permitting. Thank you.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
MR. BELLOWS: John DePrisco followed by Tammie Nemecek.
MR. DePRISCO: Good morning. My name is John DePrisco.
I'm president of the Waterways of Naples Homeowners' Association, a
community of over 420 homes situated on Immokalee Road and Oil
Well Road. Weare the beneficiaries of growth, but we are also
concerned with growth. Most importantly --
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June 2, 2005
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Excuse me, Mr. DePrisco.
MR. DePRISCO: Yeah.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Were you sworn in at the beginning of
this program?
MR. DePRISCO: No, sir.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Okay. I thought you had come in late.
And also, for any others in the audience that might have come in late
that intend to speak, if you would please, any others that might want to
make presentations, please stand. If you'd raise your right hand, I'm
going to swear you in so your testimony is appropriate.
Do you swear or affirm the testimony you're about to give is the
truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth so help you?
(All affirm.)
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Thank you.
MR. DePRISCO: We are concerned with growth, especially
traffic and roads. The availability of commercial and retail use, jobs,
and the use of utilities in the area. The way this plan is presented, they
address all of these in a positive way.
Number one, for traffic -- and I fight this traffic every day
coming down Oil Well, Randal and Wilson. We exceed the 80/20
percentage split of traffic going 80 percent one way in the morning, 80
percent coming the other way. We believe this town will reverse that
traffic flow so it's beneficial. Also, they're providing for expansion of
several of the roads, particularly Oil Well, which is very important to
us. Another key part is that they're providing commercial and retail
space, which again means our residents don't have to travel westbound
to get into town to get their essential goods and services.
Another component of that is that jobs will be available down Oil
Well instead of coming into town. And lastly, they're self-sufficient in
terms of utilities, water, sewer, schools, parks. All of those impacts
are occurring in a positive way. They're meeting those needs and these
are things that our residents can enjoy and benefit from.
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June 2, 2005
So, just very briefly, you know, the residents appreciate this type
of plan in the way that it's addressing their needs and what they want
out of district five. Thank you very much.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Thank you, sir. I apologize for having
interrupted your presentation. Next speaker, please.
MR. BELLOWS: Last speaker, registered speaker is Tammie
Nemecek.
MS. NEMECEK: Good morning. Tammie Nemecek, President
of the Economic Development Council of Collier County. I'd like to
express my support for this project and explain to you a little bit about
the economic impact that this proj ect is making on our efforts and
within Collier County and in our efforts to create new jobs within
Collier County.
Within the community itself, the EDC focuses onjob creation
within targeted industries. Aviation manufacturing, technology
companies, biomedical types of companies. And our continuing effort
to find places for these companies to go within the coastal area is
diminishing and diminishing quickly. And our opportunities to open
up this town of Ave Maria with potential job sites and employment
sites for the companies that we're trying to attract here that will help
diversify the economy create a better tax base of businesses within our
community. But not only that, within this geographic region of Ave
Marie, but it brings validity to our efforts to bring businesses out to the
Immokalee community.
Years ago when we tried to bring businesses out to Immokalee,
and specifically the Florida Trade Port, the Immokalee Regional
Airport, the transportation systems, educational institutions, the
opportunity to bring companies there and look at that community as a
valid site for putting their companies, it was hindered a great deal.
The number of leads years ago that we had for that community was
about 10 percent. Since the institutions of Ave Maria and the siting of
the university there, our leads for Immokalee have increased to about
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June 2, 2005
30 percent of our total leads and its growing. Weare actually looking
at -- the leads that we're working on right now that are looking for
sites in Collier County. Over 500,000 square feet are being looked at
for the Immokalee community, specifically in Immokalee. That's
significant. And that's about half right now of the total sites that are
being sought here in Collier County. And that would not have been
that way without this community being there and providing this
improved transportation infrastructure is probably one of the key
components, as well as the education and the importance to have
employees that can work in these companies as well.
So, looking at this project and encouraging you to move forward
with it cannot only help just that rural stewardship area and the
environmental opportunities that we have with that, but really bring
new jobs, not only to the town of Ave Maria, but help us to bring new
jobs out to Immokalee. So I encourage your support for this and thank
you.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Thank you. No other public speakers?
MR. BELLOWS: No other speakers.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Okay. Can we have our staff
presentation, please?
MR. BELLOWS: For the record, Ray Bellows, from the
manager of the Department of Zoning. Due to the presentation made
by the petitioner, I have no additional information to present.
However, I would want to put on the record that the staff has worked
closely with petitioners and their staff in creating this designation
document for the SRA. The staff report, I think, pretty much outlines
our county review staff comments. Our comprehensive planning staff
has reviewed this and their comments have been incorporated in the
staff report, the transportation. And the Zoning Department has
reviewed the development standards proposed for the town. Weare
supporting this proj ect and are recommending approval. I'd be happy
to answer questions and open it up to questions of the --
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June 2, 2005
CHAIRMAN BUDD: I have a question for you, Ray. I couldn't
help but notice in the summary of the staffs position, there was not
one addendum or modification or additional condition to the
recommended staff approval. And we see side yard setbacks that
receive those kinds of amendments or qualifications. Surely, it means
something other than the implication that the staff has no input over
modification. How could such a project of such magnituude have no
comments or modifications by staff?
MR. BELLOWS: Well, the petitioner and staff have been
meeting ongoing throughout this process. And whether there are staff
comments and concerns, petitioner has been willing to meet with us
and resolve those questions and issues. In regards to the development
standards and setbacks, because we're dealing with a rural type of
town, the development standards will not necessarily relate to the
requirements of the land development code for those types of
development standards. And as the petitioner explained the project,
seemed to me that those development standards were important to how
they want the community to be developed, and so staff did not obj ect
to those types of standards, so there no stipulations resulting from that.
Now, there are maybe a few little issues that we're still trying to
work out dealing with landscaping, and I think we're close to getting
those issues resolved, and, therefore, it was not a result in a natural
stipulation at this time.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: So it would be safe to say that there were
stipulations, if you will, but they were incorporated into the
petitioner's presentation?
MR. BELLOWS: That's correct.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Okay. Thank you. Questions. Mr.
Abernathy.
MR. ABERNATHY: Ray, I have yet to see -- and I don't care
how far out in the county it is -- single family detached houses with
5- foot side yard setbacks. That just -- I thought at the very least we
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June 2, 2005
were requiring six, and if I had my druthers, seven-and-a-half, but
there are a number of 5- foot setbacks in here. Did staff notice that?
MR. BELLOWS: Yes. Like I was saying earlier, this is not an
urban community or neighborhood. This is a community that is
revolving around compact design. If you look at all the development
standards contained within this SRA document, it's based on a
compact design. And those type of compatibility issues are not
relating to existing neighborhoods. They're all relating to the planned
proposed development of the community itself, and, therefore, the
5 - foot setback, that has been previously approved in the county for
urban -- type of urban projects, seemed appropriate at this location.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Anything else, Mr. Abernathy?
MR. ABERNATHY: No, I give up.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Any other questions? Mr. Midney.
MR. MIDNEY: Did we get the EAC staff report?
MR. BELLOWS: Yes. The EAC reviewed this petition and I
believe it was in the packet that's contained in the -- either the DRI
document -- I'll check, but that was incorporated in this packet of
information that was sent to you.
MS. CARON: No. It's to be presented here.
MR. BELLOWS: Oh, the results of the hearing?
MS. CARON: Right.
MR. BELLOWS: Excuse me. I thought you were talking about
the staff report. Yes, the EAC did review this petition, and they
unanimously recommended approval.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Okay. Thank you. Other questions? Mr.
Strain.
MR. STRAIN: Mr. Chairman, I have books of questions, but I
was -- out of indifference to the rest of the members, I was going to let
them go first, if they'd like.
MR. SCHIFFER: For Ray or in general?
MR. MURRA Y: Well, get the ground rules established because I
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June 2, 2005
too have a number.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: We'll open the topic and we'll stay on that
topic.
MR. STRAIN: It's okay. I'll just hold mine off because maybe a
lot of yours will answer mine then I don't have to be redundant.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Mr. Schiffer, go ahead.
MR. SCHIFFER: And, George, you can answer this maybe.
Part of the overlay was to preserve agricultural land, yet 91 percent of
this land is agriculture land being disturbed and becoming a
community. Is there a problem with that or -- how does this preserve
agricultural land?
MR. V ARNADOE: In a couple of ways, number one, because in
the SSAs, as Alan went through, out of the 17,000 is about 4,200 acres
of active -- what we call active Ag, or under the program Ag 1, which
are road crops or citrus, that we have taken that -- that down to that
level of land use so that can never be used for anything in excess of
that. So it can't ever be used for a golf course, earth mining. It's going
to be Ag 1 or grazing. And the rest of the land that's in the SSA, with
the exception of about 600 acres, which are conservation. So about
12,000 acres were taken down to an Ag 2 designation, which means
the only uses allowed are unimproved pasture or grazing. So, we are
preserving that land for agriculture.
Second, by clustering the development we will not be impacting
other lands in the area with the sprawl type of development at one per
five -- with unit per five acres or things of that nature, Mr. Schiffer.
MR. SCHIFFER: Do the partners in this venture own land
contiguous to this?
MR. VARNADOE: Yes, sir.
MR. SCHIFFER: And is there a plan to develop that land
included into the town?
MR. V ARNADOE: Right now, sir, it would not be possible
because your growth management plan limits towns to 4,000 acres.
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June 2, 2005
MR. SCHIFFER: Okay. So the agricultural land surrounding
this would probably remain agriculture?
MR. VARNADOE: As far as I know, yes, sir.
MR. SCHIFFER: The other concern is, there's one -- actually
two entry points into this town. I mean, we have traffic problems in
Naples because of gated communities, but is this going to be a limited
access town, or what is -- why is there two access points?
MR. V ARNADOE: Actually, I think, sir, there will be four
when we complete. There's a second -- we showed you I think two
primary access points. One towards the main entry and it's going to be
off of Oil Well Road. The second one off of Camp Keais Road.
There's a secondary access that goes through one of the neighborhoods
to the west off of Oil Well Road, and a secondary access off of Camp
Keais Road to the south of where the other access point is showed.
MR. SCHIFFER: Could you show me that because the drawing
just appears to have two? And would this community at all be gated,
or is this going to be free road?
MR. V ARNADOE: The main access roads will be open and
much like, I guess Wyndemere or Pelican Bay, there may be some
gated communities within -- and there will be some gated
communities within the development -- within the town. Excuse me.
MR. SCHIFFER: I can find two easily. Can you show me the
other two then?
MR. REYNOLDS: Primary access here on Camp Keais Road.
Second access on Camp Keais Road. Primary access on Oil Well
Road, and then there's a second access point that actually is going to
align with and come through a farm field here that provides secondary
access. So these would be the two primaries.
MR. SCHIFFER: The other issue is affordable housing. Will all
of the affordable housing necessary for the workers within the town be
available within the town?
MR. VARNADOE: Let me answer that this way, this town has
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June 2, 2005
gone beyond any other town or project in the state, in my recollection,
as far as meeting our needs for affordable housing. We're going to
have 1,000 units that meet the moderate income level in the town.
We're going to have 700 units that meet the low income level in the
town, and we have submitted that at least half of those, or 350 would
be owner occupied. And we agreed to have 200 very low income
housing units in the town. In addition within the 10-mile radius,
which happens to be the DRI criteria, we're going to have 28 acres
dedicated to Habitat for Humanity for up to 150 units. This has been a
very hot issue with the Regional Planning Council, and throughout our
community, as you're all aware of the need for affordable housing, and
how the price escalations in the last, 18 months in particular, has
exacerbated the problem. And, yes, sir, I think we're providing our
fair share of affordable housing.
MR. SCHIFFER: But in the literature, if I recall, that's a little
over 2,000 units you'll be providing. There's like 10,000 jobs to run
the town, correct? Wasn't that the figure that was given in there. So
that would seem like there's going to be a shortage of affordable
housing within the town proper.
MR. VARNADOE: Well, not everybody that's going to be
working in the town is going to be having to have a work force
housing or affordable housing. Some of them are going to be making
salaries that would allow them to not have to be within those price
range of housing units, sir.
MR. SCHIFFER: I mean, we've heard statistics of like 75
percent of the workers in this town, require affordable housing.
Once the town is developed -- will the town be governed by a
homeowners association? How will it be governed?
MR. VARNADOE: Ave Maria stewardship community district
that will have the responsibility for some of the main road systems and
the water management systems. Each neighborhood will no doubt
have their own property owners association. Whether there will also
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be an umbrella property association over the entire town is yet to be
determined.
MR. SCHIFFER: Okay. Thank you. I'm done.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Okay. Mr. Murray.
MR. MURRA Y: Yes. With regard to the affordable housing.
Going through it, I noted that the dorm rooms will be counted in some
fashion for affordable housing. And that kind of confused me
because, obviously, that changes semester to semester. How does that
k .?
wor , SIr.
MR. V ARNADOE: I don't -- the units I just gave you are in
addition to any housing on the university for students. I think what it
may be referring to is that, at Ave Maria University, approximately 50
percent of the students work part-time an average of 10 hours a week.
So, obviously, those students are going to be fulfilling some of the
low income jobs in the town as it grows. But we're not counting those
dorm rooms as affordable housing. Those units that I just told you
about are totally separate and apart from the university.
MR. MURRA Y: Okay. I can go further. With regard to
transportation, Collier County -- do you have plans to introduce buses
into the community to facilitate movement of workers back and forth
from Immokalee and so forth? Is that part of the program yet?
MR. VARNADOE: We have been talking to Collier County
about running one of their CAT routes through the town, and have
agreed to provide several stops, if you would, for that purpose, yes.
MR. MURRA Y: Mr. Chairman, I have a number of questions,
but I'm going to be comfortable if we could pass it on to someone else
for now.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Okay.
MR. V ARNADOE: Mr. Budd, while I'm here, I'm going to be
just kind of the master of ceremonies until you wear me out then I'll
pass the gavel. But a couple of things I wanted to kind of clarify when
we went through our presentation, if I might at this time.
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CHAIRMAN BUDD: Sure.
MR. V ARNADOE: Alan Reynolds was talking about the
donation of fill for the six laning of Oil Well Road and Camp Keais
Road, and then that part of Immokalee Road north of Camp Keais into
Immokalee. And I wanted just to clarify that we are providing that fill
at our cost of separation. Whatever permitting cost we have, whatever
digging cost we have, whatever loading cost. But it will result in a
significant savings to the county because, obviously, the value of the
land is not in that, nor is any profit. So that's our agreement in the
developer's contribution agreement. I wanted to make sure we were
very clear on that.
The second one had to do with the schools. We're dedicating two
school sites. One for elementary and one for middle school. We will
be receiving impact fee credits for that. I wanted to just make sure
that was clear on the record.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Okay. Thank you. Questions? Mr.
Strain.
MR. STRAIN: Yes, Mr. Chairman, you had asked earlier if we
tried to group our questions. And, unfortunately, the books that were
given to us didn't really group them because they're in different books.
So I'm just going to have to start out, and if I hit a question and
George wants to answer or Ray, or Don Scott or Amy, we'll just have
to -- I mean, that's the only way I can do it.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Okay.
MR. STRAIN: But I think the process I'd like to start with is the
presentation you all just made because those are -- that's pretty fresh in
everybody's mind. I have only a dozen questions as a result of the
presentation.
In the Power Point, one of the frames said that one-fifth of the
stewardship sending areas will be set aside for protection and the long
range plan. I'm not sure -- I wrote it down because you moved the
frames, in some cases, quicker than I could write. And I'm trying to
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June 2, 2005
understand what that meant, one-fifth. And -- well, here comes Alan
because he's the one that gave the presentation. I'd like to know what
that frame meant, Alan, if you can recall which one I was talking
about.
MR. REYNOLDS: Yeah, I do. The one-fifth, if you recall, there
was a slide that said there were approximately 89,000 acres of flow
ways, habitats, and water retention areas in the entire stewardship
area. The stewardship areas associated with Ave Marie are about
17,000 acres. So that's about one-fifth of the total of all of the sending
areas in the stewardship.
MR. STRAIN: Okay. Well, then those sending areas that you're
referring to though including the Ag lands, so they weren't
conservation lands. And the SSAs then in this regard, your reference
to conservation, and it does occur in the D RI, that there was a set aside
of certain numbers of conservation acreage. Really the only
conservation is 651 acres.
MR. REYNOLDS: Well, if you recall that there are two things
trying to be accomplished by sending areas. The sending areas
include essentially all of the acreage that has been deemed important
for natural resource protection, and the sending areas retained
agricultural uses. So they serve both functions.
MR. STRAIN: I understand that. I guess in my mind
conservation meant habitat for species naturally left untouched. And I
guess then for clarification, when you mean conservation, you're
included Ag 1 and Ag 2 that's been set aside as an SSA, you're
considering that conservation?
MR. REYNOLDS: Well, and there's a reason why the specific
instrument is called a stewardship agreement not a conservation
easement, because of that very fact. In this case there are uses that are
retained by the property owner that typically would not be retained if
you're going to a pure conservation easement. And by retaining those
agriculture uses, that creates the ability for the property to remain in
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June 2, 2005
private ownership, and for that property to be maintained long term by
private interest rather than having the government assume that
responsibility. So that's why we call it a stewardship agreement rather
than a conservation easement.
MR. STRAIN: So, out of the 17,050 acres, the natural,
untouched -- let's say, pristine natural vegetation that isn't going to be
remaining as Ag is 651.3 acres, approximately?
MR. REYNOLDS: No, that's not correct. Look at it the other
way. There's about a little over 4,000 acres that is an active Ag. The
balance of the land has either unapproved pasture or is in what you
would call a pristine condition. But all of that land essentially retains
its existing land cover. In other words, when the agreement is put in
place, the land is taken down to its existing land cover. So if it's being
used for grazing cattle, it still has natural resource value. So, the part
that is arguable that doesn't have a significant natural resource value is
the active farm fields, but the rest of it clearly does.
MR. STRAIN: Again, I guess maybe I'm not making myself
clear. The natural, untouched areas that's touched -- that are not going
to be Ag, that are not going to be used for grazing cattle, or any other
use under Ag 2 or Ag 1, for that case, that aren't going to be mowed
for pasture lands, or anything like that, you're down to 651.3 acres?
MR. REYNOLDS: Yeah. Those are the acres -- the 600 acres
that you're talking about are acres that are being designated for
restoration.
MR. STRAIN: Okay. And those will be put into a conservation
easement?
MR. REYNOLDS: No. They're put into a stewardship
easement. And the stewardship easement will describe the uses that
have been retained on the property, or the uses that have been
eliminated from the property and the long term management that's
going to be required to maintain that land.
MR. STRAIN: For the 651 or so acres that will be supposedly
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June 2, 2005
left as conservation and pristine and in a natural format, is that going
to be set aside in a manner that can't be changed in the future, or
would it simply take an GNP amendment in the future to change that
to something else?
MR. REYNOLDS: Once the stewardship agreement and the
easement is in place, that agreement is in perpetuity, and it runs both
in favor of the county and one other independent entity. So there's
two entities, if you will, that govern the perpetuity of that easement.
MR. STRAIN: Who is the other independent entity?
MR. REYNOLDS: There are several that you can select from.
In this case I believe it would be Department of Ag and Consumer
Services, or it could be the DEP, or it could be the Water Management
District, or it could be an established public land trust.
MR. STRAIN: So there's no title or deeded conservation lands
going to the public that are not going to be potentially up to, say,
reconsideration by those parties in the future?
MR. REYNOLDS: George thinks maybe he can answer this one
better than I.
MR. V ARNADOE: I'm lost, Mr. Strain. There's an easement on
all the stewardship sending areas that tell what land use layers have
been removed, what land uses are remaining, and what will be done
with the property. And to say there's only 651 pristine acres that are
going to be under this program is a misnomer. There are
approximately 12,000 some odd acres that will be in the native
vegetation state as they are today, but they will be maintained with
removal of exotics, cutting of underbrush, and things that will make
them better prey base and better for panthers who habitat that are
utilized today. The easement agreements are in place, and the growth
management plan amendment will not affect those, because there's a
professional easement on that property.
MR. STRAIN: Again, I must not be making my point. Maybe
when we get further on today, you'll understand what I'm trying to
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June 2, 2005
say. I'm simply looking for natural habitat that's left.
MR. V ARNADOE: And there's going to be some 12,000 acres
of natural habitat left. I think we just have a disagreement on that, Mr.
Strain.
MR. STRAIN: No, it's not a disagreement. I have a statement
from county staff that says Ag 2 will be 12,173.5 acres. Ag 2 includes
a lot of area that is pristine, but allows passive uses such as grazing
and mowing. That's all I'm asking. So, if you're going to mow it, it's
not going to be left in its natural state. That's all I'm asking, George.
MR. VARNADOE: Well, that's the state it's in today, Mr. Strain.
MR. STRAIN: I understand that. I understand that.
MR. VARNADOE: That's where it is today. And that includes
areas in the Camp Keais strand, it includes areas in the Calloway
Caloochisloo who have been in that state for more than 50 years, and
we have a lot of listed species that utilize those lands today.
MR. STRAIN: Okay. Thank you for that.
I also heard mention in the presentation that the Ave Maria
project was going to be contributing the design permitting and
construction cost of Oil Well Road; is that accurate?
MR. V ARNADOE: No, sir.
MR. STRAIN: Okay. So what is it in regards to Oil Well Road
are they actually committing to do?
MR. V ARNADOE: I know you have a copy of the developer's
contribution agreement. Weare providing 156 acres of right of way
for Oil Well, Camp Keais, and Immokalee Road north of Oil Well for
the future six laning, urban six laning of those roads. Weare
providing approximately 39 acres of land for water management, or
taking the water management runoff from those roads into our existing
systems at our option. Weare providing fill for some 18 miles of road
improvements for six laning urban condition at our cost of removal, if
you would. Weare -- excuse me - doing the design and permitting for
Oil Well Road from Immokalee Road to Camp Keais Road at a cost of
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June 2, 2005
about $6 million for which they'll get future impact fee credits, not
readily usable right now until we have paid in some six-and-a-half
million dollars of impact fees, and then we take them out dollar for
dollar, if you would. For every dollar impact fee we pay, we can use
50 cents of that credit.
MR. STRAIN: Okay. So you aren't doing any construction for
the road then?
MR. V ARNADOE: No, sir.
MR. STRAIN: And in regards to the fill that you're providing,
it's excavation only. Does that include stockpiling, reloading,
transporting and dumping to the location needed, or is that just
excavating?
MR. V ARNADOE: What we're doing is improving the site,
doing the permitting. We'll actually have somebody out there that
digs the fill and stockpiles it, and then it will be loaded on, whoever
the contractors' trucks are that will be constructing the road, Mr.
Strain.
MR. STRAIN: Okay. Is the permitting paid for all by the
applicant?
MR. V ARNADOE: That's going to be part of our cost of
separation.
MR. STRAIN: Is there any split between that and the county?
MR. V ARNADOE: I'm sorry?
MR. STRAIN: Are you splitting any of those costs with the
county for the permitting cost, or is that just on the side of AMU -- or
the applicant?
MR. V ARNADOE: That will be -- I'm not being very clear I
guess. That is part of our costs of separation. That will be built into
what is charged for the fill.
MR. STRAIN: Okay. There's another large special district. I
believe it's to the west of this particular one, Ave Maria. Do you
know if that fronts on Oil Well Road as well?
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June 2, 2005
MR. V ARNADOE: I am informed that it does, but I certainly
don't have any personal knowledge of that.
MR. STRAIN: I just was curious. That's even larger than the
one that you're representing here today, from what I saw on the maps.
Brooks was brought up as an example in regards to this project,
and that they've got an FlAM application, or they were using the
FlAM at their location. How often are their standards used in the
FlAM monitored for performance in regards to --
MR. V ARNADOE: I don't know, sir, but the land development
code is very clear that ours were monitored on a five-year basis.
MR. STRAIN: Right. I was just asking about the Brooks. And
I'm sure when I get to the FlAM, and Hank gets into his, we'll hear
that.
The public schools, the one that is on site is tucked away a little
bit into the site there on the north corner. And maybe, Amy, you
could comment. Is that going to be used for bussing students from
outside the Ave Maria, or is it going to be strictly for the people within
Ave Maria? Is it a public school then or is it a private school? How is
that being set up, if you don't mind.
MS. TAYLOR: Amy Taylor, for the record, Collier County
Public Schools. We anticipate that it will be for the Ave Maria area.
There may be, at the time in which it begins, the Ave Maria
community develops, that the attendance boundary may include other
areas. We have attendance boundaries that don't necessarily -- they
wouldn't necessarily be just for Ave Maria particularly early on, so it's
not specific for Ave Maria, but, just the way the town is configured
and where it's located and access to it, it would likely end up, you
know, as completely Ave Maria at some point as it builds out.
MR. STRAIN: If that school was further to the outside of the
community, accessible by some of the main roads supplied by the
county, would it be any more different in its possible usefulness in
regards to other members of the public, other than the town of AMU?
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June 2, 2005
MS. TAYLOR: Not particularly. I mean, there's access from
Camp Keais and so on that would bring opportunity for students that
are north of A ve Maria. There are schools that we have currently in
our 20 year capital plan that are along Golden Gate and within the
Golden Gate area that, you know, there may be some time in the
beginning of the phases where Ave Maria students will be attending
those schools, and namely Palmetto Ridge, Sabal Palm Estates. So we
have adequate, within our 20 year plan, for what is existing is planned
in the Golden Gate Estates areas and rural areas.
Ave Maria we needed to have a specific -- we needed to address
the needs specific to that town. So the location is fine. We like the
idea and the concept of a totally walking school. It's very, very
difficult within Collier County generally to have that situation. So if
we were outside the community, we would just be sort of mimicking
what we do here at times, and we would like to see something a little
different.
MR. STRAIN: In the old days they used to have this thing called
bussing, and I was just wondering if that's going to be occurring here
to integrate the school in any manner.
MS. TAYLOR: Bussing could -- that certainly may occur. It
just depends. Our policy, and it's actually state policy, is that we will
bus those that are within outside of a two-mile radius. Those within
that two-mile radius are required to walk, unless there is certain
extenuating circumstances or hazardous condition. The way this town
is laid out, there would not be any -- anticipate any hazardous
condition.
So those within a two-mile radius would be bussed. Those
outside -- I mean, outside that two-mile radius would be bussed.
MR. STRAIN: Is anything within the community--
MR. V ARNADOE: Mark, maybe we can amplify on --
MR. STRAIN: Sure.
MR. VARNADOE: This is the site here. So 47.7 acre site, or 46
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June 2, 2005
net of water management. It's one -- it's in one of our neighborhoods,
and this is the neighborhood where we are trying to target young
families and families with children, so it is walkable. It's also located
right next to our active park, which is one of the policies and our SRA
suggested that's a good place for it. Which we tried to locate it where
it would be walkable, but it is on one of our main roads, for those who
are coming in from the outside. This is one of our main loop roads.
And here's the access point to Camp Keais for people coming from the
north, fairly well accessible.
MR. STRAIN: Those main loop roads, are they all going to be
roads paid for by the district?
MR. V ARNADOE: The main -- excuse me -- the main loop
roads will be paid for by the district. Some of the roads internal to the
neighborhoods will not be.
MR. STRAIN: So, accessed to those main loop roads as well as
some of the access -- the main loop roads, if they're paid for by the
district, they're open to the public?
MR. VARNADOE: Yes, sir.
MR. STRAIN: The public will have complete access to that
school?
MR. VARNADOE: Yes, sir. They'll have complete access to
the loop system on the roads.
MR. STRAIN: Amy, you said there was a discussion about a site
location -- at least in the letter that you wrote, the site -- concerning
the high school site. The site location has yet to be determined. And
apparently, it's going to be 60 developable acres, is that --
MS. TAYLOR: Yes. Our school board policy now is the high
school site will be at a minimum 60 acres. It will have to be -- the
school district selected those general areas to anticipate any growth
needs in terms of Ave Maria, but also in the general area to relieve
Palmetto Ridge in the future and Immokalee High School.
MR. STRAIN: Do you see that happening in one of the
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June 2, 2005
stewardship receiving areas? Somewhere within 195,000 acres that
make part of our stewardship area out there? I mean, and if it does,
my next question of maybe staff or George can answer this is, if you
create a high school site, are you going to need any credits or SRA
agreements or anything like that to have happen to make that site
reality?
MS. TAYLOR: It is part of -- our understanding is it's part of the
DRI commitment.
MR. STRAIN: Well, it's not within this community, is it?
MS. TAYLOR: Pardon me?
MR. VARNADOE: No, it's not within the community.
MR. STRAIN: It can't be if it's not within this community.
That's why I wanted to kind of iron out where this was going to go,
how it was going to be established, what kind of process so you have
all that to deal with now instead of in the future, so, maybe you can
elaborate on that, George.
MR. V ARNADOE: I can. The public schools do not require
credits. And they are either an allowed or conditional use under the
baseline condition. And the school board has generally come up with
two or three sections on the north side of Immokalee Road between
Orangetree, if you would, and Immokalee where they think they
would like to locate the site. We've agreed to dedicate 60 acres for that
school.
MR. STRAIN: And they won't have any requirements then to
have any involvement with an SRA application or anything?
MR. V ARNADOE: No, sir.
MS. TAYLOR: Yeah. Oh, I understand your question. It's
outside of the DRI. As we know it, and as is currently zoned
agriculture, and there would be -- I don't think it's within a planned
SRA. Weare allowed in an agriculturally zoned land use zoning
district.
MR. STRAIN: Okay. That's all I have, Amy, so thank you for
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June 2, 2005
that.
MR. MURRA Y: Mr. Chairman?
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Yes, sir.
MR. MURRAY: May I revisit something?
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Yes.
MR. MURRAY: Mr. Varnadoe, may I call your attention to
what here is appendix I, regional issues analysis. And particularly
page IA2 where it speaks, staff assessment associates with affordable
housing. And it speaks to 700 low income units within the town, at
least 50 percent owner occupied, et cetera. However, the basis for my
question earlier was the following, and the second to the last
paragraph there is a statement that says, students are not permitted to
live off campus; thus, the application states that the dorms are counted
towards the affordable housing for people with low income. So, I'm
trying to understand how something is in excess of, if this is the only
number that we were told.
MR. V ARNADOE: I thought I tried to explain it best of my
ability, Mr. Murray.
MR. MURRAY: I apologize.
MR. V ARNADOE: No, no. And we're all trying to work
through this together. What I think it came back from was several
discussions that we had from Regional Planning Council about the fact
that some of these students are going to be working, are going to be
housed on campus, and will fulfill some of those jobs. But as far as
our commitment to provide affordable housing units in the town, our
commitment stands in addition to any dormitory rooms.
MR. MURRAY: I appreciate that. I understand your
commitment is there. I guess where I was thinking in the future, if
you've already given over those homes to those people who need
them, then how can the dormitory -- how could they qualify? How
can -- is AMU willing to extend the numbers so that these youngsters
that are in the dorm can qualify under low income, or do I not have it
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June 2, 2005
yet clear in my mind?
MR. VARNADOE: I don't think so, sir. Undergraduates -- Ave
Maria's policy is, as an undergraduate student, you either live in the
dormitory, or you live with your parents.
MR. MURRA Y: Got it.
MR. V ARNADOE: So, it's not going to be a commuter college,
and they won't be able to go out and buy three or four of them -- buy
or rent an affordable housing unit and live there. And Ave Maria's
University commitment is to provide enough dormitory housing for
their undergraduate students. So they will not be utilizing the
affordable housing units.
MR. MURRAY: Okay. So, that's clear then. I think it was the
way this was phrased here that got me on that. And I just wanted to be
absolutely certain that there's a difference between the two.
MR. VARNADOE: Yes, sir. And I appreciate it.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Thank you. Mr. Strain.
MR. STRAIN: George, I think you answered this, or somebody
did, but I'm not quite clear. Where is the Habitat 28 acres going to be?
Is it off site?
MR. VARNADOE: Yes, sir. It's in the town of Immokalee and,
my recollection, it's adjacent to the Habitat project that's going on
there today.
MR. STRAIN: It would come under standard Collier County
zoning not stewardship area?
MR. V ARNADOE: That's correct.
MR. STRAIN: Okay. In the newspaper years ago it started out
--
MR. V ARNADOE: The reliable source that it is.
MR. STRAIN: Well, actually I think they're quoting you, so--
MR. V ARNADOE: Or misquoting you. Go ahead. Maybe I'll
like it for a change.
MR. STRAIN: No. I'm not sure what they were quoting. I was
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June 2, 2005
just being facetious. There was a talk at one point about a stadium and
they were going to rival like Notre Dame for football games and
things like that. And I know that was in the early stages. Is there still
going to be some central area in here for those kinds of sports
activities?
MR. VARNADOE: Yeah. Tom Monaghan is a visionary, and if
you get to know him, he has these big ideas and he lets others bring
him back to more of a reality. And when he started he had envisioned
Notre Dame of the south. When his academic adviser said, Tom, we
won't be able to keep the high standards of education that you want if
we have enough students to compete in an NCAA one football
program. It readily collapsed back to what we're now -- what we're
now referring to as the Princeton of the south, that is, trying to keep
the high academic status and have student athletes, but yes, there will
be an active sports program at the University.
MR. STRAIN: Okay.
MR. V ARNADOE: Maybe I said more than I should have, but I
was trying to respond to your inquiry.
MR. STRAIN: I didn't see a big stadium site on there, that's why
I brought the question up.
In the letters you passed out to us today from the providers, Don
Hunter's office indicated that -- and I'll read the last paragraph.
Additionally, we understand this facility will eventually be converted
to a permanent facility, yet to be designed as this proj ect evolves.
Is there some commitment somewhere that provides them with
enough land so that this is assured to happen?
MR. VARNADOE: Yes, sir. We're working with them on a joint
EMS fire, sheriff facility that they've all agreed to share and we've
agreed to provide the land for that.
MR. STRAIN: And do you know what the outside number of the
land acreage you're considering? It would be nice to be able to tie it to
something.
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June 2, 2005
MR. V ARNADOE: I think as the day goes on, I will try to get
that number for you, Mr. Strain, if you'd allow me that luxury.
MR. STRAIN: I appreciate it. Those are the questions from the
presentations. I guess if it's okay, Mr. Chairman, I've got the books
we can start working on.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Okay. Oh, excuse me. Ms. Caron.
MS. CARON: Yeah, I have a couple of questions first. In -- let's
go back to the what we've started talking about was in perpetuity.
What legally does that mean, Mr. Varnadoe?
MR. VARNADOE: Well, it's a stored up easement agreement
that runs in favor of Collier County and the State of Florida, and it
means that we have, in this instance, Ms. Caron -- Ms. Caron is it?
MS. CARON: Uh-huh.
MR. V ARNADOE. Thank you. We have removed certain land
use layers which are in that easement agreement, which means, we can
never go in and ask for any of these uses in the future that tells what
uses are remaining. And it also talks about land management
measures that we are required to do to keep the land in the condition it
is today. And that's enforceable by Collier County, or, in this
instance, the one we've done so far, the Department of Agriculture and
Consumer Affairs, forever.
MS. CARON: It's also changeable by those two bodies as well,
correct?
MR. VARNADOE: It would take all three parties to change that
agreement.
MS. CARON: It would take all three parties. How many more
credits do you have to get for the panthers SSA? How many more
will you get? Because that's not included in what we have now,
correct?
MR. V ARNADOE: No, it's not. It hasn't been approved yet.
Maybe about 16,900 credits -- it's actually 16,952.3 credits coming off
of SSA6.
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June 2, 2005
MS. CARON: And the fiscal impact. What happens after the
build out? It's all very well and good to have a model that says this is
going to be neutral or positive to Collier County, but as anybody who
might have been involved in a major development in this county
knows, developers can keep costs down while they're developing, but
once it's turned over to the community, it like changes dramatically.
Is there any continuation of this impact study that has to be done after
you, as the developer, are out of it?
MR. V ARNADOE: There's a requirement -- let me answer that
two ways, if I can. I'll go through what is required, and we can talk
about what we already talked about with the physical assessment.
There's a requirement to have a physical analysis at the end of each
phase, or every five years, whichever comes first. And also in the
horizon year, which is the build out year. But what we're talking
about with the physical analysis, is not the cost to the residents inside
the community, we're talking about the impact of the overall town on
the county's budge.
MS. CARON: Exactly, yeah.
MR. V ARNADOE: But, you know, when you started talking
about turnover, that's typically where the developer turns over the
amenities that he's been subsidizing, then it becomes more of a burden
on the residents of that area, not on the county as a whole.
MS. CARON: Well, but where everything that you're going to
have is supposed to be self-sufficient --
MR. VARNADOE: Yes, ma'am. But it won't -- that physical
analysis won't reveal that because that's going to be borne by the
residents in the town not by the county.
MS. CARON: No matter what.
MR. V ARNADOE: No matter what. Those facilities that we're
going to be responsible for.
MS. CARON: Yup.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Anything else?
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June 2, 2005
MR. V ARNADOE: I think we're back to you, Mark.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Excuse me. Mr. Schiffer?
MR. SCHIFFER: Just -- how are we going to do this today? Are
we going to go topic by topic, transportation, affordable housing?
MR. STRAIN: Well, I was -- the Chairman had requested that.
The problem is, the books we received weren't necessarily all
collected that way. There's issues that overlap from binder to binder.
And I went through trying to tab everything with notations so I could
try to concentrate, without anticipating, that would have been the best
way to go, I just can't do it. And I'm just going to have to go through
and ask the questions as they come up page by page, and I have five
books of pages. I mean, so there's quite a few questions. And I think
as the answers come in, I'll start pulling off the redundant questions
that are in the other books, so hopefully that will lessen it, but I can't
do it that way.
MR. SCHIFFER: Well, one question, you said binders. I've only
received one binder. What are you referring to?
MR. STRAIN: Wow. Well, there's two binders. There's one in
the stewardship receiving area, and one on the DRI that were provided
by the staff. And then there's a third one that if you put it into a binder
so you can see how large it is, it comes up to about this size. And
that's the staff reports and all the backup to that. And we've had
several versions of those and they're all in here. So, that's three. And
then if you were here a long period of time when this first originated,
and you didn't turn your binders back in, like staff asked you to, you'd
have additional resources that you could have pulled from, which I
have here.
MR. WHITE: We wondered where those went.
MR. STRAIN: We don't ever give them back.
MR. SCHIFFER: So, what are we going to do? How are we
going to do this?
MR. STRAIN: We'll just start walking through one of the
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June 2, 2005
binders.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Well, I had what I thought was a good
idea that has no legs, so we're just going to work through this in a
logical process, and if you have questions, fine, otherwise Mr. Strain
is probably going to lead us down this path.
MR. MIDNEY: So, if we have a follow through on what Mark's
dealing with, get your attention?
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Just get my attention and then we'll get
follow-ups to Mark's lead.
MR. SCHIFFER: That's good. Lead on.
MR. STRAIN: I noticed you were talking to Anita, and I was
last week, and I had asked for a couple of things. And I talked to staff
and asked for a couple of things, and so far I haven't gotten them. And
I'm wondering, George, are the pumpage reports for the water use on
this project under the agriculture permit from South Florida, are they
available? I mean, I know the documents you have to submit to South
Florida Water Management District. I have been asking for those. The
actual pumpage reports. It actually tells you how much water was
actually used for the agriculture, not how much was permitted.
MR. V ARNADOE: The problem is, Mr. Strain, that the -- there
are several different permits, existing permits that include this land,
but go beyond this land. And the Ag land that Ave Maria is going to
be located on is leased. And we have looked and tried to find out
accurate pumpage records, extrapolating from various permits and
various reports, but we haven't been able to come up with anything
that's reliable.
MR. STRAIN: Okay. That will play into some questions I have
later on then. And, Ray, I had asked as recently again as yesterday for
copies of the pre-application minutes, and I still haven't got those.
MR. BELLOWS: Yeah, I don't have a copy in the file anymore.
I don't know where it went. I'm trying to recreate it from the -- we
store another copy in records and I'm trying to get that copy.
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June 2, 2005
MR. STRAIN: The County had a pre-application meeting of
which they took records and minutes of involving the largest project
ever to be developed in Collier County, and we don't have a record of
that pre-application minutes meeting?
MR. BELLOWS: It's a standard form and we have a copy, it just
wasn't in the file that normally is -- I mean, there's so many people
coming and looking at the file, things get disheveled. I have another
source where I'm trying to pull it.
MR. STRAIN: Are you sure you have a copy?
MR. BELLOWS: Not at this time.
MR. STRAIN: Is the other source the applicant?
MR. BELLOWS: No.
MR. STRAIN: Okay. So you have another copy possibly
somewhere, but we don't know for sure if it's there?
MR. BELLOWS: Yes.
MR. STRAIN: When that comes in, I don't care if it's after
tomorrow's finishing of this meeting or Saturday's finishing of this
meeting, whatever day it is, can I get a copy of it?
MR. BELLOWS: I'm working on it.
MR. VARNADOE: Mr. Strain, if we have a copy, we'll be glad
to provide you. I'm sure we do.
MR. STRAIN: I appreciate it. Thank you. I'll make sure staff
gets a copy because I think they ought to have one for their permanent
file for years to come.
In the D RI report, and this seems to be consistent in the South
Florida Water Management -- South Florida Regional Planning
Council report as well, the reference to acreage is constantly 4995, not
5027. Is there an explanation why your SRA and the DRI are not
consistent in the acreage?
MR. VARNADOE: Yes, sir. After the Regional Planning
Council staff report, we had been talking with various representatives,
of both some county commissioners and others about affordable
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June 2, 2005
housing and we added some acreage to be able to accommodate more
affordable housing. When we submitted the revised acreage and SRA
plan to the staff, we also copied Regional Planning Council staff, Dan
Presca on that, and we talked to him this week, and he's comfortable
with that addition.
MR. STRAIN: Has DCA been notified there's additional
acreage, or is it --
MR. V ARNADOE: I'll check. I don't know whether we copied
them on it. Yes, we did, as a matter of fact.
MR. STRAIN: Okay. There's been no feedback from them?
MR. VARNADOE: Your previous question on the EMS, fire,
sheriff site --
MR. STRAIN: Yes.
MR. VARNADOE: It will be a minimum of three acres. It
might be larger as design occurs, but the minimum of three acres if
you want something for --
MR. STRAIN: Yeah, I do. Great. Thank you.
MR. VARNADOE: Yes.
MR. STRAIN: In the DRI, I guess we'll get into the maps later
because I'll wait until I get to SRA and we can try to combine those
into one.
There was emergency preparedness elements in the DRI. And
it's under the consistency and comprehensive plan section. And it
talked about the fact the applicant is coordinating with Collier County
EMS to explore opportunities to provide emergency supply storage for
the county and hurricane shelter for coastal residents.
I believe I found in your SRA application a reference to storage
availability, but it wasn't clear on what the hurricane shelter for coastal
residents is going to be and where it's going to be, the quantities and
items like that. Do you have any information on that?
MR. V ARNADOE: I can tell you where we are, Mr. Strain. We
have been having various close coordination with Dan Summers, the
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June 2, 2005
Emergency Manager Director. He had asked, and we had agreed to
provide covered parking in this joint EMS, fire, sheriffs station for
two of his emergency trailers, so that if there's any kind of an
emergency in the area, whether it be in Immokalee, or Ave Maria, or
in the Estates area out there, that he has ready access to those and
they'll be closer than any other location, and we've agreed to do that.
He also requested that we, even though we're not in a hurricane
evacuation zone, that we provide shelter for the university students in
the event of a storm event. We provided Mr. Summers with building
plans for the first 12 buildings at Ave Maria. He found in the math,
tech -- math, technology and science buildings, two areas that he
thought were appropriate for hurricane shelter. We had quite a
conversation. He said it would be good if you could have those on --
you know more about this than I do -- on a separate electrical outlet so
that you can plug those into an emergency generator and have lights
and cooling. We have done that in the design. We have upgraded the
emergency generator to a bigger capacity to serve those areas. In
addition, in the student activity center in the kitchen area, we have
provided another emergency generator to provide cooling for the
refrigeration and have some propane stoves so that basic food service
would be available after the storm event.
Also, there's two public schools that are going to be at the
university at -- in the town -- excuse me -- which we've been talking
about before, which will be for hurricane evacuation purposes. Mr.
Summers tells me that those should be able to house 220 to 250 people
each.
MR. STRAIN: I know that during the previous -- I think it was
the PDA, or -- I know I brought this question up to you before and it
was going to be addressed at the DRI. The hurricane shelter
provisions for coastal residents, people that have to evacuate from
areas, let's say west of Airport Road, or west of 41 in a category two
or three storm, how much space will they have available to them
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June 2, 2005
provided by this town?
MR. VARNADOE: Well, I'm going to answer that two ways. I
just went through that. The public schools are going to provide shelter
for 222 to 250 people each. There will be some excess spaces at the
university. But I don't know that we have -- I know we don't have any
responsibility to provide hurricane sheltering for people outside of our
town. I mean, is that our obligation, our financial obligation?
MR. STRAIN: I'm just reading to you the statement placed on
page 107 under emergency preparedness that's in the DRI package.
And it says that you're going to be exploring opportunity to provide
emergency supply storage for the county and hurricane shelter for
coastal residents. And you're saying the town, the students -- which,
by the way, you prefaced your description of these hurricane shelters
for the students originally, now that you mention --
MR V ARNADOE: The -- I'm sorry. I didn't mean to interrupt.
The science, tech and math building will be the hurricane shelter for
the university. The schools will be available to the general public, so
that would be available for the urban area.
MR. STRAIN: As well as the town residents as well?
MR. VARNADOE: Yeah.
MR. STRAIN: But, I mean, all that being said, 30,000 people in
that town, as well as a quarter million people on the coast, the
provision that indicates there's going to be some cooperative effort to
find hurricane shelter for coastal residents is basically 200 to 400
space area in two schools on site.
MR. VARNADOE: Well, up to 500 people, according to Mr.
Summers.
MR. STRAIN: Okay.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Mr. Schiffer.
MR. SCHIFFER: And the same thing, what is the flood zone
that this is being built in? The elevation.
MR. ABERNATHY: What was the question?
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June 2, 2005
CHAIRMAN BUDD: What's the flood zone elevation?
MR. STRAIN: I believe there is no elevation assigned to it
because it's so far out. I could be mistaken.
MR. VARNADOE: I think we have 13 feet natural elevation.
MR. SCHIFFER: Okay. So it's a flood zone X.
MR. V ARNADOE: It's part of the theme of remapping that's
gOIng on.
MR. STRAIN: I think you're right, Brad. It's a high number
something like that.
MR. SCHIFFER: The reason I ask, I wanted to see if they would
be evacuating into our shelters.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Anything else, Mr. Schiffer?
MR. SCHIFFER: Yeah, that was just one point on what Mark
was saYIng.
MR. STRAIN: Okay. Under page 1010 on the DRI report you
talk about demographics. And you used a number that I have been
trying to figure out a basis for two or three weeks. And I know you
are very much aware of it. Persons per household. The standard in
Collier County, pursuant to David Weeks, and I know David was here
-- data that I received from him, and I've got more data from him on
other different parts of the county, but it's 2.39. And in discussions
with David, he indicated that generally the farther east you go, the
higher the DPH get. There are exceptions. The rural fringe -- we just
had an example, where they used 2.59. In the last TDR discussion
that we had before this panel a couple of weeks ago, and that was used
by somebody and confirmed by a staff member.
Immokalee, I believe, is 3.1. And then Ave Maria in between has
dropped to 2.2. I know you have a different demographic possibly
than the rest of the county. There are different aspects of this town
that will be unique to it. But I was wondering how or what studies
you used to drop the person per household rating from a standard
down to 2.2.
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June 2, 2005
MR. V ARNADOE: First let me say that the FlAM model
analysis that we submitted used the county standards, 2.39 people per
household. But I can answer your question. We have four basic
neighborhoods in A ve Maria. One of those is, what we refer to in the
industry, as age targeted community, which means active retirees is, I
think a better word. So we know from history and other projects what
the demographic of that neighborhood is going to be. One is going to
be a family-oriented neighborhood, and we've used the standard
county 2.39 for that. One is going to be a traditional downtown
neighborhood, and we have other examples where we pull that from.
And the fourth one is an active adult community, and we have
examples of that around the community that we pull those from. So
we went back and looked at the different communities of what we
were trying to target, Mr. Strain, to come up with those numbers.
MR. STRAIN: Well, I asked your consultants, Wilson Miller,
for a copy of the FlAM, and the one I received from their office shows
2.2 being used. The DRI shows 2.21 being used. And I was just
curious as to what statistical basis you used to lower from the 2.39.
And I understand what you just said, but I'm not sure there's any
cultural statistic or demographic. I've searched on the Internet
carefully to try to find such demographics, even from the Census
Bureau, and I couldn't find anything that related the specifics more to
the demographics of your community than to any other, which means
I don't know why you varied from the amount that's standard to the
county. And the concern there is that drives level of service
calculations and so I was wondering how you got there. And basically
it's an in house statistical analysis that you did to get there?
MR. VARNADOE: Yes, sir. But, again, the FlAM that was
submitted to the county used 2.39. Now the county came back and
said we want you to run a model that uses 2.2 because that's what you
had in your DRI. We did that, with the one that was officially
submitted used 2.39 under county standards for people per household.
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June 2, 2005
MR. STRAIN: Who would it have been officially submitted to?
MR. VARNADOE: The county. It was part of our SRA
application. It was the FlAM that we submitted with our application.
MR. STRAIN: Because the one that was submitted to the DRI,
DCA -- through the DRI was 2.2.
MR. VARNADOE: No. We don't do an FlAM for DRI.
MR. STRAIN: No, but the demographic used on the DRI page
1010 is 2.2.
MR. VARNADOE: Yeah.
MR. STRAIN: Okay. That's what I was getting at.
In the DRI application, part four under the impact summary, says
the town is being titled by placing approximately 20,000 acres of
environmentally valuable land under easement restrictions that limit
future land uses to agricultural and conservation activity.
Now, where is this 20,000 coming into play in the discussions
we've seen this morning?
MR. VARNADOE: It's 17,049 acres.
MR. STRAIN: So the DRI application is 3,000 or so acres off.
It's greater than ten percent. Is that going to cause any problem?
MR. V ARNADOE: No problem. When we represented this to
the -- you know, the DRI application was filed over a year ago. We
presented this to the Regional Planning Council, and we went through
much of the same presentation that you heard this morning, and had
the actual acreages at that time. When we started this, we didn't know
how many acres we were going to require to generate the number of
credits to entitle the town. So we estimated.
MR. STRAIN: I know DRIs are sensitive to changes greater than
10 percent of their acreage uses. The basis for the review of this DRI,
if you submitted it a year ago and used the 20,000 that we have in
front of us today, it's changed greater than ten percent. It's down to
17,000 now.
MR. VARNADOE: Yes, sir, it would be true that that was
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June 2, 2005
within the DRI land, you'd be absolutely correct, but it's not within the
DRI land.
MR. STRAIN: But it was the basis for approval of the DRI.
MR. V ARNADOE: No.
MR. STRAIN: Well, why did you mention it in numerous places
throughout the DRI?
MR. V ARNADOE: Because they asked us how we were getting
the credits, Mr. Strain.
MR. STRAIN: Because it must have been concerning to them.
MR. V ARNADOE: I'm sorry?
MR. STRAIN: Maybe they were concerned about how much
was set aside. Usually when you've got 11,000 units going in on
5,000 acres and the basis for the preservation part of that was the SSA
that was created.
MR. V ARNADOE: As you know, a DRI looks at regional
issues, and they do not look at -- this is not an issue they were
concerned with, and we straightened out the acreage and the credits
when we went through the presentation, Mr. Strain, at the Regional
Planning Council.
MR. STRAIN: Okay. Did you make a presentation at DCA?
MR. V ARNADOE: No, sir.
MR. STRAIN: Okay. This is the DRI. I wasn't -- it wasn't a
Regional Planning Council issue I was asking about, but the FlAM -- I
shouldn't say the FlAM. The revenue generation summary that is in
the DRI -- I think now you may have partially answered it -- it was
done about a year before today. The statistics used in that are quite
different than the FlAM that's been used today. At least the one I
received from Wilson Miller's offices. I guess I'm going to be getting
into a whole lengthy discussion on line item by line item on the FlAM
later today. We can bring all this up at that time. It might try to reach
more what you're trying to get to.
Under page 12 to 15 of the DRI, talking about to discuss what
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June 2, 2005
measures are being proposed to be taken to mitigate impacts to state
and federal listed wildlife planned resources. And it's under that
question. I'm just pointing this out because it was part of our previous
discussion. That again, you mentioned that there's 20,000 acres put up
as part of the RLSA development entitlement process. My concern
was, if it had been 17,000 acres, would that have any impact on the
way this was reviewed. I don't know, but I wanted to enter that
statement into the record at least.
Under the general water supply, it's question 17, it has a table of
1 7 and A-I. It talks about the amount of potable water and
non-potable water being used on the project. And in phase one and in
phase two has a current of what's expected as the project builds out.
And I think combined there's a total of 12.2, which does match -- 12.2
million gallons per day, which does match the SRA. What I'm finding
is that the existing amount of existing MGD is 11.07. Do you know
where the 11.07 number came from and how it relates to today's SRA?
MR. V ARNADOE: I want to take you back for a minute to the
official recommendations of the Regional Planning Council staff.
MR. STRAIN: I've got those. I was going to get into those later.
MR. V ARNADOE: Let's just -- because it answers your
question, what you had before.
Habitat -- you're talking about now vegetation and wildlife and
wetlands.
MS. CARON: What page are you on?
MR. VARNADOE: Page 12 of the official Southwest Florida
Regional Planning Council staff report.
MR. SCHIFFER: Okay. Good.
MR. VARNADOE: Item A, habitat protection for listed species
-- listed plants, excuse me, and wildlife species and additional off-site
wetland mitigation will occur on approximately 17,000 acres of land
as part of the rural land stewardship development title process. The
development order shall indicate the specific entities will hold the
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June 2, 2005
stewardship easements to the off-site 17,000 acres of stewardship
sending areas instead of certain recommendations, blah, blah, blah.
MR. STRAIN: I've got that.
MR. VARNADOE: Well, then why are we discussing the
20,000 acres, Mr. Strain?
MR. STRAIN: I'm talking about the DRI application.
MR. V ARNADOE: And this is the DRI official report from the
Regional Planning Council to the county.
MR. STRAIN: But this is the DRI application. That's what I was
using. The South Florida Regional Planning Council reviews it
locally, but the DCA reviews it up in Tallahassee.
MR. V ARNADOE: And they get their official recommendations
from the Regional Planning Council too, sir.
MR. STRAIN: And they're reading this document too. Which
one are they going to believe? I don't understand what's so difficult
about that question, but let's move on to the water question that I have.
How did that existing 11.07 get into this chart, this table 17-Al
under the water supply?
MR. V ARNADOE: I think that's permanent allocation.
MR. STRAIN: Okay. When we get into all of the documents,
and maybe the SRA, I thought the permanent allocation was over 30
MGD. And the basis argument then was that--
MR. V ARNADOE: Let's get an engineer to answer. I'm just
looking quick at that table. Somebody can more readily answer your
question.
MR. STRAIN: Okay. I'll go on until we find someone.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: They're researching that right now, so you
can go on with your question and we can fall back on that one when
they've calculated an answer.
MR. STRAIN: Under the solid waste, hazardous waste, medical
waste, question 20 of the DRI application. Last paragraph on page
20-A1 says, solid waste generation estimates are shown on table
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June 2, 2005
20-Al. These estimates are based on the criteria published in the State
of Florida, Department of Environmental Regulation, solid waste
management, and the resource recovery technical assistance handbook
dated October 1976.
We do not have a newer standard than a 30 year old one to go
by? I know I'm asking questions you probably can't answer.
MR. V ARNADOE: No. Mark, we're just trying to get the right
guy to answer the question. That's all.
MR. GOREY: This is Jason Gorey. For the record, Jason Gorey,
with the engineering firm Camp, Dresser & McKee. We develop the
solid waste aspects of the DRI. You're absolutely correct, that is a
very old document, and it's a very conservative one. Since 1976,
significant efforts have been made at recycling and source reduction to
reduce the amount of solid waste being generated. We have
historically referred to that to build conservancy into the application.
You'll see that document referenced frequently. But you are correct.
The numbers now are much lower than the ones generated in 1976.
MR. STRAIN: Is there a reason we couldn't have used the more
modern numbers.
MR. GOREY: Just as an effort of conservancy, sir. To be
conservative in the amount of solid waste that we are estimating being
generated.
MR. STRAIN: Do you know if Collier County uses the more
modern numbers in their calculations.
MR. GOREY: No, sir, I don't know which numbers they use.
MR. STRAIN: Okay. Whether it's for or against the outcome, I
think the most relevant and most recent numbers ought to be used in
all cases. And I understand your conservancy viewpoint on it, but if
the newer numbers after 30 years are justified, I would imagine it
would be more accurate for the public's understanding of this.
MR. GOREY: Yes, sir, I understand.
MR. STRAIN: But I guess that's all. The other question maybe
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June 2, 2005
you can answer then. On page 20-3 it talks about waste disposable
plan on and off site. It is anticipated, and there's a statement in
response to the question. It says, it is anticipated that the removal of
solid waste from the development will go to the Immokalee solid
waste transfer station which is to be completed by the end of 2004 per
conversations with Collier County solid waste staff.
Did that get completed last year?
MR. GOREY: No. I don't believe the transfer station is in
operation right now. My understanding is it's still in the permitting
phase. Probably another year or so before complete operation of that
transfer station.
MR. STRAIN: How will that interact with the impact of Ave
Maria then, if it was supposed to be done in '04 and it's now not going
to be done until after Ave Maria is under construction and possibly
permitted?
MR. GOREY: Well, it's important to understand how a transfer
station works. A transfer station is really for convenience and ease of
getting the solid waste to the ultimate disposal site. The concept is
that the smaller route trucks which go around and pick up the solid
waste curbside, deliver the waste to a transfer station where it is
simply put into a larger trailer and then transferred to the disposal site.
In the case of the early phases of the development when there's very
little solid waste being generated, it's just as convenient to take those
route trucks directly to the disposal site. Does that answer your
question?
MR. STRAIN: It does. Why don't we just do that without the
transfer station then?
MR. GOREY: Because in the later days of development, it will
be more economical to transfer the waste. To deliver it to a transfer
station and then deliver it to the ultimate disposal site.
MR. STRAIN: So the fact that this was supposed to be done
2004 is still not going to have that much of an impact on the
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operations of the solid waste removal?
MR. GOREY: Very minimal, if at all.
MR. STRAIN: What about the construction debris removal? Is
that going to be handled the same way, direct transfer to the waste
site?
MR. GOREY: Construction debris is delivered to a separate site.
It will not go to the county land fill. It goes to a separate CND
landfill. So that is not typically handled through a transfer operation.
It's just direct haul to the disposal site.
MR. STRAIN: Okay. Thank you. I appreciate your answers.
MR. GOREY: Are there any other solid waste questions while
I'm up here?
MR. STRAIN: Well, I mean, I don't know. But right now--
moving past that one, I don't believe so.
MR. GOREY: Thank you. Understood.
MR. STRAIN: The -- and I know you won't be able to answer
this, but sometime before we're done, if someone could provide me
with an appendix that was not attached to this DRI application. In
particular, they're referring to a transportation methodology section of
the pre-application document, and supplemental pre-application
document dated May 25, 2004 that are included as appendix 21.1. I
didn't have that and I know you got someone out there maybe writing
that down, so, if I could get a copy of it, I'd like to see what it is
because it does reference it in the DRI application, and it would have
been nice to have it.
And the intersection capacity analysis table 21.5 in the DRI, and
that's existing 2004 traffic conditions. It talks about the intersection of
Immokalee Road at Oil Well Road. And its average level of service
existing is stated as A. I thought that was an intersection that's
difficult right now. And I don't know if you would have that
information. Maybe Don Scott would. But I didn't realize that was an
A level of service. Or, Jeff, I'm sorry, I didn't see you there.
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Do you know how A would have been in that table, or is that
correct today?
MR. PERRY: For the record, my name is Jeff Perry. I'm a
transportation planner with Wilson Miller. I reviewed that particular
table. The logical explanation is this a p.m. peak hour analysis. And
using the data that is required for p.m. peak hour analysis, that traffic
condition that you're probably familiar with, and may have read about,
occurs in the morning peak hour where the traffic flow, as someone
mentioned earlier, is dramatic in one particular direction, does not
occur in the same district or the same components in the p.m. when
this particular analysis was required to be done. So what you might
have in the a.m. peak is perhaps, in some movements, slightly
different, or even dramatically different than what you might have in
an a.m. analysis.
MR. STRAIN: So, when these tables are done, if someone picks
the right time of day to do the table, they can come out with a much
better result than what a lot of us experience in reality in today's road
system? Is that --
MR. PERRY: If you pick three o'clock in the morning, I guess
you'd be right, but we're not allowed to do that. We're required to
analyze on a p.m. peak hour condition.
MR. STRAIN: Why wouldn't they require you to do that on the
worst timing conditions so that it's more related to reality?
MR. PERRY: Under normal circumstances, the p.m. peak is the
worst hour of the day.
MR. STRAIN: Okay.
MR. PERRY: It is historically the worst period of time. It may
change which hour. And when we collect traffic data, we collect
traffic over a two hour period, and we pick the worst hour of that two
hours. The worst 60-minute period. It may start at 4:30 in the
afternoon and go to 5:30 or something else like that. It is the same
analysis period that is historically and institutionally analyzed and it's
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June 2, 2005
the same hour of the day that the county analyzes in their level of
service evaluations and their AUIR. It is the hour of choice.
MS. CARON: Excuse me.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Yeah, go ahead.
MS. CARON: Yeah. To follow up on that. I want to talk to Mr.
Scott, because I was under the understanding after our workshop that
we would go to whatever was the most affected hour.
MR. SCOTT: Don Scott, Transportation Planning. Exactly. I
was going to jump in on that. And Mark wasn't at that -- where we did
talk in some areas of the county were a.m. is worst, and this is one of
the things from our concurrency standpoint, but when this analysis
was done, that was previous to any of those discussions.
MS. CARON: That we'll be going--
MR. SCOTT: Yes, we will be going to that. Beyond that A, B,
C, the one part of that is the improvements are at Immokalee Road,
and we're doing improvements on Oil Well at Immokalee Road that
will help the condition that really people are experiencing right now.
Not right now but when school is in session.
MS. CARON: Because we know that it really should be the a.m.
hours, we will change it for this DRI?
MR. SCOTT: Not because -- the analysis they did was quite -- it
started awhile back. The methodology with DCA, with all the
partners that were involved at that time it was p.m. peak, so it will not
change for that purpose, no.
MR. STRAIN: Don, before you go away, there's going to be a
lot of questions throughout the day on transportation.
MR. SCOTT: Oh, I thought that was it.
MR. STRAIN: We haven't even touched the tip of the iceberg on
that. There's a series of tables in the DRI -- the DRI was actually the
simplest document in the grouping -- that talk about a couple of other
things, including impacted roadways needing improvement. And
impacting roadways for both 2011 and 2016. I guess phase one and
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phase two. A statement was made that they'll need to be improved to
accommodate the general growth in the area. And the improvements
are included, and they're listing them. But is your department going to
have them done? Have you looked at these tables and verified that in
your ten-year plan, which is approximately ten years from now, that
these segments of road system will be done? Does anybody look at it
that way?
MR. SCOTT: Well, obviously, our program that we have funded
out is out five years. So, or 2010 essentially at this point. Beyond
that, some of the issues, it looks -- obviously anything that I'm talking
towards the west right now, I have comfort that, you know, they've
identified like Collier Boulevard is impacted. Those are all
programmed within the next couple of years. All of Immoklee,
essentially from 41 out beyond Oil Well Road. Oil Well Road from
Immokalee out to Camp Keais is programmed in the five-year work
program for construction.
Now, the sections that aren't programmed, Camp Keais would be
something we'd probably move on in the next five years essentially.
The section of Immokalee going into Immokalee. And then some of
the roads on the other side like around Immokalee, looking at loop
road right now, PD&E studies on 29. We advanced 82 with Lee
County for a PD&E study. So those are actually at the beginning
stages and we assume to be about seven or eight years out.
MR. STRAIN: Is there -- did you review the DRI application?
MR. SCOTT: Yes.
MR. STRAIN: Okay. Did you, did you review the DRI
application?
MR. SCOTT: Yes.
MR. STRAIN: Did you at the time you reviewed it, go through
the two dozen different roadway segments that are going to be
impacted in phase one and phase two to see if there are any particular
plans on the horizon that you may have coming up?
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June 2, 2005
MR. SCOTT: That's how we got to getting Oil Well. I mean,
obviously, if you go back in time, Immokalee Road -- say, before Ave
Maria -- Immokalee Road was, what was in the long range plan to be
widened out to Immokalee. With Ave Maria coming, and some of the
other issues that came up -- and Fred Thomas touched on this earlier
about people coming down actually Camp Keais and Oil Well anyway
-- and the issues in Orangetree, which weren't being addressed, Oil
Well Road and Camp Keais was added to the long range plan. With
those being added, and moving the programming up based on the
DCA that was signed with them, that was addressed as part of that.
So, at the beginning of this whole process, no, not everything was
addressed. It is being addressed by this process though.
MR. STRAIN: Are you able then to testify today that the 21
road segments that are needing improvements to coincide with the
phasing of this project, will be improved to the best of your
knowledge in regards to the feasibility and financial capabilities based
on income -- impact fee revenues, pursuant to those listed in the DRI?
MR. SCOTT: Yes.
MR. STRAIN: Okay. And then the last one I think might be the
only one for traffic at this point. There's a paragraph here. I'd like
you to explain a little bit more. It says the significant and adverse
impact on the segment of 175 for Immokalee Road to Bonita Beach
Road is due in part to the use of the lost fee standard when considering
that the commitment from the state to improve 175 is not until 2008.
The planned widening to at least six lanes will provide sufficient
service volume to eliminate the sufficiency even at level of service C.
When is 175 now scheduled to be expanded, and to what
expansion is it going to be to?
MR. SCOTT: To six lanes from Golden Gate Parkway to, I
believe, Colonial, maybe Daniels Parkway, in 2008. Now, the
discussions -- a lot of the newspaper articles recently. Not having the
money earmarked in the bill, does not change the fact that that's
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June 2, 2005
programmed in 2008.
N ow what has happened, as part of the growth management bill,
is the thought that the FDOT there at like 30 -- somewhere between 30
and 60 percent design on 175 for six lanes. It might turn that into a
design bill and move it up to next year actually because of the influx
of funding based on the bill. That's not guaranteed, but beyond that,
the guarantee is, it is funded in 2008.
MR. STRAIN: When you say six lanes, is that each direction?
MR. SCOTT: three lanes each direction. Six lanes.
MR. STRAIN: As bad as it is out there, this one lane is going to
make all the difference in the world?
MR. SCOTT: Well, obviously based on the discussion and the
bill to be signed, if it hasn't been signed yet, was the toll authority bill.
Actually, Lee County is talking with their board on Monday. We had
a discussion with our Board the last board meeting about
implementing -- you, know, enacting the toll authority and moving
forward with the fact of trying to get the ten lanes essentially. That's
actively moving forward too. You know, time frame, don't really
know at this point. But, obviously, if you look at, six lanes is going to
be the be all and end all of the interstate, no. I mean, beyond that
some interchange improvements need to happen. Like we're talking
about Immokalee and Golden Gate Parkway opening up and things
like that.
MR. STRAIN: I can't recall right now, maybe you can help me.
The TIS, does the TIS address state roads like 175 and the impacts?
MR. SCOTT: Yes, yes. Do you recall how that was addressed?
I mean, it might be in one of these other books I haven't gotten to yet,
but I just thought maybe you might know.
MR. SCOTT: Well, let's see. It's in here in the list. They're
referring essentially to the fact that the level of service C with six
lanes would meet. Obviously, the growth on the interstate, you're
looking at the model. The new model is being worked on right now.
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That will be done by the end of the year. I think six lanes is not going
to last 20 years, or whatever. That's why we're going after the ten lane
section. But when they first analyzed it with the six lanes it would
meet, but obviously the growth on the interstate has been more than --
MR. STRAIN: I think I know the answer -- I mean, I know the
answer to this next question, but I'd like you to say it for the record. Is
175 a hurricane evacuation route?
MR. SCOTT: Yes, it is. Most of our arterial system is.
MR. STRAIN: I realize that, but knowing that it is, and it's in the
failed level of service right now.
MR. SCOTT: That's correct. But it's not part of our concurrency
system.
MR. STRAIN: I understand. That's--
MR. SCOTT: Though I'd like to widen it.
MR. STRAIN: I have a lot more transportation, but I'll get into
those as we get to them, if that's okay.
MR. SCOTT: Okay.
MR. STRAIN: George, I'm sorry to keep putting you through
this, but I keep having questions, so --
MR. V ARNADOE: No, no, you go right ahead.
MR. STRAIN: There's a discussion in the DRI about your target
market, and then it talks about employment opportunities for residents
within the town and in the vicinity of the town. It talks about
communities where you're planning on drawing employment base
from within a 10 mile, 20 minute commute of the town. Those are
Immokalee, Orangetree and Golden Gate Estates. Has that statement
changed any with your affordable housing component, because at the
time did you this, I don't believe you had that put together?
MR. V ARNADOE: Obviously, the amount of employment we'd
be drawing from those areas would be reduced, Mr. Strain, as a result
of the increase in the affordable housing. We did not have a firm
commitment for that, and not for that amount of affordable housing at
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June 2, 2005
that time.
MR. STRAIN: Okay. We actually got some of these questions
done. Oh, here's one. Historical archeological sites. Apparently, you
hired a consultant called Archeological Consultants, Inc, ACI, to do
your required historical archeological review. They provide an
addendum dated July 20, 2004. I don't have a copy of it. And I
thought it might be copied to the DRI, and I went back and read the
letters from the Division of Historical Resources that were supplied --
and there are actually three of them -- and the most recent one which
was dated April 21, 2004 basically only addressed the area outlined in
our PDA. I don't find any kind of letter from the Division of
Historical Resources giving any kind of recommendations in regards
to historical sites in the property as the DRI application is for. And I
mentioned this to Anita, and I think she was going to try to get
something for me, but I don't have it yet.
MR. V ARNADOE: Did you get the two sufficiency responses to
the DRI that we filed with the county?
MR. STRAIN: I believe I got one late yesterday. I was going --
haven't gone through it completely, but I don't remember -- there's no
attachments to it. So I wouldn't have gotten that with it anyway.
Can I get a copy of this at some point before the meeting is over
today? I can't read it right now so I'd like to read it at lunch time, or
break time, or whatever time chairman let's us breathe around here.
MR. STRAIN: For the DRI package, with the exception of the
economics part of it, which I want to do in conjunction with the SRA,
that's all I have from this one book. And it might be a good time,
unless there's any other break at some point.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Mr. Schiffer.
MR. SCHIFFER: Yeah. I have questions on the DRI regarding
affordable housing, but is that a topic we're going to take en masse
somewhere?
MR. STRAIN: I have it. There's a section in -- it's either
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June 2, 2005
Southwest Regional Planning Council's report, or SRA that starts
breaking down the affordable housing. I was going to get into the
details and the price ranges and Cormack's responses and all that at
that point, but it's subject to you on your questioning.
MR. SCHIFFER: It's in the appendix I think of the DRI, isn't it?
MR. STRAIN: There's pieces of it in here, but they basically
said they were going to work out something with affordable housing.
And it has gotten now worked out, but I don't think it was completely
addressed in the DRI.
MR. SCHIFFER: I think it's a topic longer than we have, so let's
save it then.
MR. STRAIN: We've got days.
MR. SCHIFFER: Well, I mean, before lunch. I'm short term
thinking here.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Are there any follow-up questions by
Planning Commissioners on their current track, because I think Mr.
Strain makes a good point. Before he starts on the next section, 20
until 12 is probably as good a time as any to break for lunch and then
we start clean with the next round. Are there any other follow-up
questions? Yes, sir, Mr. Midney.
MR. MIDNEY: It is kind of hard to decide what's follow-up and
what's not, but I have a question about the stewardship areas one
through six. A lot of it is in agriculture now and is clear, and a lot of it
is infested with exotics. Is there going to be any agreement or
arrangement to maintain these stewardship areas exotic free?
MR. VARNADOE: Yes, sir, but there's not a lot of exotics in the
SSAs. Obviously, we have a few exotics around the dikes, around the
active farm fields. That's cleared as a matter of course, as you know,
once a year when they do their work.
The benefit to keeping the Ag 2 areas in Ag 2 as opposed to
making the conservation, is that you have active management with
those lands. And if you look at the lands in SSA 6, that are Ag 2,
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June 2, 2005
which it's unimproved pastures, what the definition is, I guess, and
you pair that to the panther refuge lands, they will admit that our land
is in better shape because we actively manage it and they don't. They
don't have the money to do it. And that's one of the benefits to
keeping that in private ownership. But the answer to your question --
I didn't mean to go on a sermon, is yes.
MR. MIDNEY: So there is an actual formal agreement to keep
them exotic free?
MR. VARNADOE: Yes.
MR. MIDNEY: And I have another question. The Regional
Planning Council has 25 recommendations, which is in our packet
here of the Collier County Planning Commission. Is the county, Ray,
in conformity with all 25 of those recommendations? They're lettered
A through Y.
MR. BELLOWS: Yeah. In your DRI staffreport, included is a
DRI resolution order. It incorporates those findings.
MR. MIDNEY: So you're in agreement with all of them?
MR. BELLOWS: As staff takes the findings from the Regional
Planning Council and formulates a resolution to incorporate those, and
normally DRIs are associated with PUD, zoning type documents,
where the local recommendations that may have come out of the DRI
process, are then addressed to the rezoning process. In this case we're
dealing with an SRA as we try to address the local issues to the SRA
process. But, in all cases, the SRA doesn't necessarily, or PUD have
to match, because one is dealing with the regional issues, and the other
is dealing with the local issues.
MR. MIDNEY: But in this case, the county is --
MR. BELLOWS: The development resolution fairly well
incorporates all of those recommendations that are attached in that
Regional Planning Council findings.
MR. MIDNEY: I kind of feel guilty about going forward, but I
do have a problem with one in particular of those that are in the DRI
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June 2, 2005
report. I don't know if now is the time to go into it or not.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Let's take a swing at it.
MR. MIDNEY: Okay. I'll take a swing at it. --
MR. VARNADOE: Mr. Midney, where are you, sir? What
page? Can you give me a --
MR. MIDNEY: I have so many documents. This one which
says, staff report, Collier County Planning Commission. Where it is
included in the Southwest Florida Regional Planning Council's
recommendations. On my page -- it's page five, where they go into
the storm water management recommendations. The cover looks like
this. Yeah, that's right. Storm water management section. And I don't
know if you're the one to answer that because you didn't originate
these. We don't have anyone here from the Regional Planning
Council? Anyway. Area Q, they talk about storm water management
system maintenance requirements within the town of Ave Maria shall
include removal of any mosquito productive nuisance plants species
such as water lettuce, water hyacinth, cattails, and primrose willows
from all system nodes, regions and percolation basins as well as from
the lake lateral zones employed in the system.
My problem with that recommendation is that they have two
exotic species, water lettuce and water hyacinth, but then they have
two native species, cattails and primrose willows. If you try to
remove all of those from any lateral zones, what are they trying to do,
and why are they getting to this level of specificity? Doesn't the
developer have the right to remove any species that they want to. I
mean, why is this in such fine detail at this level?
MR. V ARNADOE: Tim? I'll get Mr. Durham up here who is
our environmental expert.
MR. DURHAM: My name is Tim Durham, Director of
Ecological Waste Resource with Wilson, Miller. Taking a second to
try to think of a politically correct answer to the question. Cattails are
native, but they're a nuisance often indicative of excess nutrient levels
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June 2, 2005
in the water, et cetera. So, as a general principle, the Water
Management District will otherwise try to get you to keep cattails out
of systems. They can spin out of control.
It's often associated with wetland systems that have been
degraded or somehow been lowered in quality. So all those are native
species and are typically considered undesirable. The question you
asked, why do they go to such detail? I would imagine there have
been problems in the past in other projects where there may have be a
wetland or some system that they let get dominated with cat trails and
primrose willow and native species, what's the problem with this. So,
my assumption would be --
MR. MIDNEY: Who would be the party that would be
complaining? And, I mean, if Ave Maria town decided that they
wanted to get rid of these plants that were in, you know, their lake
lateral zones, why wouldn't they just have the right to do it? Why do
they have to put it at this level when we're talking about -- why does it
have to be in the development of the DRI development order?
MR. DURHAM: South Florida Water Management District
typically comes up with a list of recommendations for projects.
Sometimes they're very project specific. Often they're general. This
language was recommended by South Florida Water Management
District. I would, without having to go back to the file, I would have
to guess as part of a general block of language they recommend.
MR. MIDNEY: It seems -- what they talk about is any mosquito
productive nuisance plant species, and then they put such as, so really
they've sort of mentioned four species, but they're also very general. I
mean, it could include other plant species. And what I'm wondering
about is, are they trying to get at that the lateral zones and the areas
around them are going to be mowed grass right do~n to the water
level, or.
MR. SCHIFFER: Well, there's the water level.
MR. MIDNEY: No. I mean, why do they have to be so specific
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June 2, 2005
at this level?
MR. DURHAM: You have to understand, South Florida's
perspective is over thousands of permits that they process and issue.
I'm sure they've had run ins with people who have tried to argue that
cattails and primrose are native species, therefore, they shouldn't be
required to reduce those. South Florida Water Management District
permits typically require that you get rid of exotics and keep nuisance
species down below a certain number. I can only guess that their
language and recommendations are specific species that probably
reflect some past problems they've had with people debating that
point. Irrespective of that, we would keep those out no matter what.
That would be a permit condition for South Florida Water
Management District to control native and nuisance species anyway.
MR. MIDNEY: See, if you were to try to do that around Lake
Trafford, you'd have to get rid of hundreds of acres, and included with
that would be a lot of important bird habitat, because those two
species that I mentioned are used by birds for nesting and for forage
areas and for cover. So, I'm a little bit concerned that the way it's
written, it sounds as though you don't want these species at all in there,
and they are important to wildlife.
MR. DURHAM: I suspect long after Ave Maria is around, there
will be lots of willows and cattails still around, but within the
permitted storm water management system of the proj ect, those would
not be allowed by the Water Management District.
MR. MIDNEY: Okay.
MR. VARNADOE: Mr. Midney, and Tim, these are
recommendations from the Regional Planning Council. And if it's
your -- certainly this board can recommend that you take out those
examples and just leave the nuisance species in there, language in
there. It's your development order. As long as we're being responsive
to the issues that are raised by the Regional Planning Council, that's
what we are here to do.
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June 2, 2005
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Mr. Strain, you had a follow-up question?
MR. STRAIN: Well, no. I have a question of Tim since he's up
here. It has to do with something I heard earlier today. There's been
apparently a lot of -- some panther deaths on 846, Immokalee Road.
Are you guys going to be putting a panther crossing so panthers can
move across Immokalee Road without crossing the surface of the
roadway, or is it Camp Keais or Oil Well Road you're putting the
panther crossing on?
MR. DURHAM: First of all, 846 has been the site of a number
of panther deaths. When we looked at the whole rural lands area and
said what areas should we put in stewardship sending area status,
working with Florida Wildlife Federation, for gain commission, that
area up there was identified as really a great opportunity for
stewardship sending area because the main inhibition to a wildlife
crossing being placed there anywhere up to this point has been the fact
that it's been in private ownership. So by putting the lands on both
sides of the road in stewardship sending area status that now allows
the process to move forward for the state to put in a wildlife crossing
there.
MR. STRAIN: Okay. So you're not putting one in there?
MR. DURHAM: Correct.
MR. STRAIN: Yours is down on Oil Well Road or Camp Keais?
MR. DURHAM: As part of the permitting and design and
construction of Oil Well Road between Camp Keais Road and
Immokalee Road, it is anticipated Wildlife crossing will go in at the
Camp Keais strand location. The county is currently working to have
a study done to identify the exact precise location of that. And the
Florida Fish & Wildlife Service is aware of that and coordinating in
that mix as well.
MR. STRAIN: I just wanted for factual information. Thank you.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Mr. Murray.
MR. MURRA Y: Yes, sir. Having to do with the same document
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June 2, 2005
on page 14, and my question has to do with the second paragraph
down. It speaks to waste water. And the last sentence says, there may
be some remote septic tank location that would not be practically
served by the centralized facility. And I recognize, you know, 4995
acres is a fair amount, but I'm just a little surprised that we'd actually
have any septic tanks there when we do intend to have a waste water
treatment system. Can you give me an enlightenment on that
possibly?
MR. V ARNADOE: The only areas that I would know where
that might occur would be typically on golf courses where you have
restrooms that are remotely located from the clubhouse or any
development where it's not economically feasible to run facilities out
to those. That would be, off the top of my head, that's the only thing
that occurs to me, Mr. Murray.
MR. MURRAY: Okay. That makes good sense to me on that
basis.
One other question. On the letters that were given out this
morning, I noted here, having to do with the Ave Maria utility
company, you're talking about applications for 1.0 million gallons per
day water and 75 million gallons per day waste water, that's an
application, I believe. I remember somewhere, and I cannot point to it
immediately, but it seemed to me to be -- that seemed to be rather
small. Is that to be in incremental stages or?
MR. VARNADOE: Exactly, sir. It will grow as the town grows.
MR. MURRAY: That satisfies my curiosity for the moment.
Thank you.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: We're at a break point. We'll certainly
take any other pressing questions, otherwise, it's a good time to break
for lunch. Any summary comment from this morning at this stage?
MR. VARNADOE: No, sir. I think we're making Wonderful
progress.
MR. WHITE: Mr. Chairman.
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June 2, 2005
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Yes, sir.
MR. WHITE: Assuming that we're either going to complete
today, then this won't matter, but we do need to make clear that
although we previously advised that the continued meeting might be
in Community Development, my understanding is from e-mail traffic
this morning is that it would be in these chambers.
CHAIRMAN BUDD: Okay. Give note of clarification, should
this meeting be continued until tomorrow, we'll be here at this same
location. So with that, we'll break for lunch, and we'll resume at 1 :00.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Okay. We'll call the Planning
Commission back to order. And we have had our petitioner
presentation, staff presentation, registered speakers. We'll resume
with our questions. And, Mr. Varnadoe, you had a question or
comment?
MR. V ARNADOE: Two things very quickly, Mr. Budd. The--
Hank Fishkind, our FlAM, physical impact analysis model man, has
got a flight this afternoon. I wondered if we could do his questions
next so we could -- we could get him out of here. And I talked to Mr.
Mark Strain during the break, and he said he thought he could cluster
those together so we could do that, if that's okay with you.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Works for me. I think everyone else
is in agreement. Does Mr. Fishkind have an opening presentation, or
just to be here available for --
MR. V ARNADOE: He'll be available for questions.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Okay.
MR. V ARNADOE: I would like to clarify one thing. I guess
that some -- Mr. Midney asked me about exotic removal, or words to
that effect, in the SSA areas, and I wanted to make sure that what we
-- what we do in our documents is we control exotics. You know, we
-- I'm never going to tell you that they're a hundred percent removed at
any point in time, but we do have a provision for controlling exotics in
those areas.
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June 2, 2005
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Okay. Thank you.Mr. Strain, you
had some questions on the economic model?
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Hundreds. Almost. But there are
quite a few questions. You want -- am I supposed to be directing them
to you or Hank?
MR. V ARNADOE: No, no. I'm getting -- I'm getting out of
here, Mr. Strain.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I don't blame you, George.
MR. VARNADOE: You're not running me off.
MR. FISHKIND: I was hoping you'd stay.
For the record, I'm Hank Fishkind from Fishkind & Associates.
Thank you for your courtesy, appreciate it.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Hank, I've had the benefit of some
time with you to understand how the model was put together. And it
was very beneficial because it really helped me understand the -- how
the cells work, how the formulas track back and forth, all that stuff.
And I was fortunate enough to have an electronic version, which
allowed a lot of understanding of that. But I know the rest of the
members of the panel have not, and I don't know -- first, before I start
my questions, if I just barge into the FlAM, or is there a short preface
you might fill them in on what this document is so they have a better
understanding of why it's such an important document to this new
town?
MR. FISHKIND: Sure. With your permission, I'll be very brief.
The fiscal impact model -- and you're seeing some of the results from
that model -- was developed under contract to the Florida Department
of Community Affairs. In 2002 the department, under mandate from
the governor, let out an RFP to develop a prototype state model that
would assist commissions like this and county commissions in
estimating the costs and revenues associated with land use decisions.
The new growth management law that was passed by the -- by
the legislature this session redefines portions of the statute and makes
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June 2, 2005
it clear that comprehensive plans have to be financially feasible -- and
I'll discuss what that means in a second -- amendments to the plan
cannot render a plan unfeasible, and that levels of service standards,
both for new growth and existing growth, have to be set in a way that
the community can demonstrate that they have the finances to meet
those level of service standards.
In other words, you can't have level of service C for roads and be
delivering F on the ground without a plan to come back to C. And this
fiscal model that we developed is going to be the safe harbor. If a
community uses this model, then the methodology will be accepted,
much the same as the Florida Department of Transportation uses
Fasudamus (phonetic) as the safe harbor model for analyzing
transportation issues. This model is designed to serve that same
function, but for land use decisions.
The department had plans to promulgate and roll out the model
this summer for you, so --
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: That's kind of where it was at with
me. So with that in mind, Hank, first thing I'd like to talk about is
some base information. We received, on April 5th of 2004, an e-mail
from Joe Schmitt to each one of the Planning Commission members
that in it contained financial model information. And it looks like it
was written by your office, dated December 2002.
In that, there was a couple items that I wanted to highlight
because they'll play into today's discussion. One of them is an item
under limitations of the model. There's a paragraph, last paragraph on
that, it says or -- I should say the second paragraph says furthermore,
the projections of the costs and revenues associated with land use
decisions are only accurate to plus or minus 25 percent at best.
So does that mean that the model that we're looking at today and
that we're going to be talking about has a margin of error of 25
percent?
MR. FISHKIND: Over a forecast arising of 20 years, yes, sir, I
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June 2, 2005
think that's fair.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay.
MR. FISHKIND: Makes -- the model makes forecast projections
not only for the current time period, Commissioners, but also out over
a 25 year horizon. So certainly as one extends the forecast horizon,
the precision obviously deteriorates.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. Under your
recommendations for model delivery, there was a
discussion there that seemed to pertain to some of my concerns over
today's model.
MR. FISHKIND: Sure.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: And it says -- and it was -- you
listed three things under those recommendations. Third it says our
research indicates that no customization was required to produce
models that the pilot communities found reliable.
Now, there are some input values in your model and there are
some base values that I believe are established generally by the
counties, maybe, but in what we're going to be finding out in our
discussions today that some of those base numbers have been
modified for the town of Ave Maria. And I am just wondering is that
in -- is that the reference that I was bringing out in this paragraph,
about the fact that no customization is required generally for them to
produce models for that pilot community found reliable. I mean is it
standard that you would allow these variables to change?
MR. FISHKIND: Yes. In terms of customization, what I mean
by that is that we have one model structure. One basic Excel
workbook that one populates with local data for each specific
jurisdiction. In other words, the budget structure of Collier County's
different than the budget structure of Orange County or Sarasota
County. You're much more reliant upon ad valorem taxes, for
example, than is Sarasota County, which is more fee based in its
revenue structure.
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June 2, 2005
The revenue structure of the City of Naples is different than
Collier County. The cost structures are also different. But the basic
model parameters are driven off of the adopted budgets, as required to
be reported to the Florida Department of Banking. So that structure
doesn't change.
The model uses population. Population numbers, the official
numbers come from the Bureau of Economic and Business Research
at the University of Florida, so we use those. Employment numbers
come from the employment section of the state government of
Department of Labor. So -- so those parameters don't change.
What does change, though, is if one is making an application to a
specific project. For example, if we wanted to apply the model that is
calibrated for Collier County to Ave Maria, which is the exercise
today, one could either, for the sake of discussion, to pick a parameter,
household size. One could use the average household size for the
county, if one didn't have better information. Or if one thinks one has
better information, superior to populating with the default or the
average values, then it is standard practice to use whatever the best
estimate might be.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: You have a disclosure section in
the same document, and in it, it describes things that the analyst
should have done. Were you the analyst for this FIAM?
MR. FISHKIND: We were in terms of the submission, yes.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. The sentence reads, in
addition, since the FIAM is calibrated for each community and
contains numerous default parameters that are reasonable for average
conditions in each jurisdiction, the analyst should clearly describe any
deviations from the FIAM norms.
Did you produce any document that told us and listed for us all
the deviations in this particular document from the norms?
MR. FISHKIND: In the initial submission for the DR!, there
were no deviations. As we began to progress and work with the
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June 2, 2005
county and the staff, county staff had inputs for us, which I find
appropriate. And I believe that we transmitted a set of detailed
discussion about what the county staff had asked and some sensitivity
analyses that we had conducted. The end result is that there's no
difference in the ultimate conclusion, which is on a spective basis. I
think under any reasonable set of circumstance and assumptions that
this project would have a positive fiscal impact.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: So the deviations that were in
here, I mean we -- there was no separate sheet listing every deviation
that you know of?
MR. FISHKIND: No. I don't think that they're material, for the
reason I just described. If they were material, then I think that would
be appropriate.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: The initial FIAM for the town of
Ave Maria had obvious input deficiencies that required modifications
to the analysis. That's in a memo from Ray Bellows, to Randy Cohen.
Since we received the final copy, what were those input deficiencies?
MR. FISHKIND: I think that Mr. Bellows is referring to some
suggestions the staff had with respect to household size, inflation on
the -- on a prospective basis for the real estate. There were
extensive discussions about internal capture rate for the transportation
component. I think that was the main sources of the county's concern.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Well, we'll-- I've got those
itemized on line items in the model. I'm going through some literature
I had on this to kind of work into the model itself, and I'll have --
MR. FISHKIND: Sure.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- probably some questions of that.
The input tab changes, there were several. One was to reduce the
persons per household from 2.39 to 2.20. The 2.20 or 2.21, I think it
is, is what's in the -- 2.21 is in the DR!. The 2.20 came out in the
version that we have.
MR. FISHKIND: Right.
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June 2, 2005
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: The 2.39 was in your FlAM 3.0
that came out with the original submittal that staff reviewed back in
end of '03.
MR. FISHKIND: Yes, sir.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: What is your understanding of
why it was lowered from 2.39 to 2.2?
MR. FISHKIND: The mix of having a heavy retirement
component, as George Vamadoe described to you earlier,
suggests that the average overall household size in the project, if it is
marketed and sold as planned, would be closer to the 2.20 estimate
than 2.39.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: It's a educational town, university
town.
MR. FISHKIND: Yes, it is.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: They attract more retirees than
they do young families?
MR. FISHKIND: That's their market plan for the rest of the
town. The residential components are designed and will be marketed
to empty nesters in particular. That's their target market. So assuming
that's the case, then it would be appropriate to make some adjustment
to the standard average value for -- it wouldn't be average for the
community.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: If the students have to live in the
campus on the dorm or in the town or in the residence within the
community, how are they factored in if they live in the dorm to the
persons per household?
MR. FISHKIND: They are typically treated on a -- as a -- each
dorm room and what the bedrooms are.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: So there's --
MR. FISHKIND: And we assume that some equivalent of two
would be approximately one household.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: So each student is looked at as a
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June 2, 2005
household --
MR. FISHKIND: No.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- or every two students?
MR. FISHKIND: Two to make a full-time equivalent. Because
the household size is approximately two. So for driving, some of the
parameters on the cost side with the number of people, then would be
appropriate to group them in some reasonable fashion or weight them.
Either alternative would work.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Do you know of any demographic
study that shows the demographics of a town of this cultural nature
that would indicate it would have a lower persons per household than
was typical to the county?
MR. FISHKIND: Yes. I would cite the Villages, probably, as a
good example, or Sola Vida (phonetic). Both are marketed as active
adult communities. The Villages has age restrictions in some parts of
the community, but doesn't have age restrictions in other parts. So if
one believes that the marketing would be successful and oriented to
empty nesters, then it's reasonable to think that the household size
would be a bit smaller for there wouldn't be children, typically, in
those household.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Further in the report, there is a
percentage breakdown of empty nesters. It isn't a great percentage.
There is a percentage of them listed, and we'll get to it. It's in one of
these books.
MR. FISHKIND: As I said, also, the results really aren't very
different. If one uses 2.2, 2.39, 2.4, 2.5, the conclusion doesn't
change.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: And I agree with you, but --
MR. FISHKIND: Uh-huh.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- if you take the 2.39 and you
adjust it to 2.2, it may affect the FlAM in one way, but there are other
level of service calculations throughout the other documents that are --
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June 2, 2005
that have another impact in establishing persons that affect the level of
service across Collier County. But my more -- more of a concern to
me is that this FlAM is a -- doesn't react to just one change that
significantly, but a lot of little changes it does react to. I found that
out when I started making a lot of little changes to it.
I would go into the cells that you created and go back and change
numbers to see how they were -- affected the bottom line. None of
them brought it immediately down to a negative, but some of them
collectively together did. And that's what I -- that's where I'm going to
be going with my questioning today, is try to find out how much of
those numbers are realistically changed and how much should be
changed to look at it a different way, if need be. And so --
MR. FISHKIND: Well, we certainly went through that exercise.
F or the benefit of the commission, Mark asked would we make a
series of changes, and, yes, of course the model is -- gets different
results. If it didn't, something would be wrong with the model.
And one can create sets of scenarios or assumptions that would
produce a negative fiscal result. I don't find that set of assumptions to
be realistic, personally. And, ultimately, that's why we have strongly
urged -- and it is in the current regulations -- to monitor. The fact is
that we're making forecasts.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: How often is the Brooks
monitored?
MR. FISHKIND: The Brooks monitors every year.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Every year?
MR. FISHKIND: Yes, sir.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: There are things in here, variables
that I have -- certainly am concerned about. One is the persons per
household, one is the capture rate, one is the land prices and the unit
sales price. Another big one is the absorptions and also the possible
trip distances.
MR. FISHKIND: Sure.
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June 2, 2005
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: As we get in today's meeting, get
into it further, there's issues in transportation about counters and things
like that that are going to have -- provide valuable information.
MR. FISHKIND: Absolutely.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: So I know the impacts to the road
will be monitored. On a yearly basis, how hard would it be to monitor
any of these other things? Aren't they things --like when you have a
unit sale in a closing, that is closed with the Collier County, it's
recorded, the value of it's closed.
MR. FISHKIND: Sure.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Is there -- is it difficult to tabulate
that stuff on a yearly basis?
MR. FISHKIND: No, not at all.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Brooks is doing that.
MR. FISHKIND: Correct.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: And that way they verify their
model isn't too far askew before they go too far with it.
MR. FISHKIND: Well, they monitor annually because Lee
County required it.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Right. Okay. That's another
thing.
MR. FISHKIND: We do what we gotta do to get the data.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Right. That's where I'm going is
the data.
MR. FISHKIND: Sure.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: The price of this land -- it's raw
land, it's got some entitlements.
MR. FISHKIND: Right.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Fourteen months ago or whenever
the last version 3.0 came out and was used, the value of the land in
that model was 25 thousand per acre.
MR. FISHKIND: Right.
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June 2, 2005
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I think if I have -- the DR! didn't
have it, but the original FlAM that the county used was 50 thousand
an acre.
MR. FISHKIND: Right.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: And according to Ray Bellows'
memo, it was raised from 50 to 75 thousand an acre.
MR. FISHKIND: That's correct.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Do you know what the
justification would have been? Is there an appraisal present that we
haven't seen that gives the value of that land?
MR. FISHKIND: No, I don't think there was an appraisal.
County staff said we'd like to see it run with 75 thousand. We believe
that the sales that we're familiar with out in Orange Tree and other
places would support a higher value, and we'd like to see that put into
the -- put into the model.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Do you know why then they
would -- the county would credit the developer with right-of-way in
their development agreement on April 26th at 50 thousand an acre,
when obviously the developer could have benefited from a higher
rate?
MR. FISHKIND: I couldn't tell you. I didn't negotiate the
agreement.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. The property inflation went
from two percent to three percent. And --
MR. FISHKIND: That's right.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- I kept hearing the reference that
the three percent's conservative. Yet when I looked in your inflation
factors in your FlAM, the median over a period of time in Collier
County has only been 3.2 percent. So--
MR. FISHKIND: Yes.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- I'm not sure three percent is that
conservative. It seems to be pretty close to what the median is. Is that
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June 2, 2005
a fair statement?
MR. FISHKIND: Over a lengthy period of time, that's true.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Cost per lane mile. In the 03 -- the
3.0 version of the FlAM, cost per lane mile used was -- started out to
be 3,151,198. Now that doesn't show up in the model. It shows up
when you click on the electronic version in the cell.
MR. FISHKIND: Correct.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: And it has a minus 1
million, so that the model ended up with 2,151,198, which is exactly 1
million less than what the model today is being used.
MR. FISHKIND: Uh-huh.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: What was the justification for that
reduction of the 1 million? Do you know?
MR. FISHKIND: My recollection of that is that the cost of
right-of-way is estimated to be less out in this more rural area than
would the cost of right-of-way would be for the average right-of-way
acquisition in the county, which tends to be, of course, west of 75. So
land is more expensive in that area.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: So then we bump the price back
up a million in this current version of the FIAM. And why did we
pick a million now instead of215,198 (sic), it's exactly 311,511,988
(sic) .
MR. FISHKIND: Well, as I just explained, the model's
populated with data that on average should be reflective of average
conditions in the county. If we're in an area that for whatever reason is
believed not to be average -- it's in the east and land is less expensive,
it's on the coast, land is more expensive -- you would want to make
appropriate adjustments for those site specific conditions that might
vary from the average in some material fashion.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: The concern of it going up to three
one is not as much of a concern as why it was three six, as Jeff Perry
had indicated in his analysis dated November of 2004 as the cost per
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June 2, 2005
lane mile. That again is found in a note on the electronic version of
the FlAM as what the number for lane miles cost at that time.
MR. FISHKIND: Correct. That's the average.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: And it was --
MR. FISHKIND: That's the average.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: It was reduced down to 3.1, which
is one million more than it was 14 months before.
MR. FISHKIND: Uh-huh.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: It seems like the value for the
reduction and increasing it, pretty arbitrary at this point. I don't see
any technical analysis to follow it.
MR. FISHKIND: Oh, I'm sorry. The reduction of a million
dollars was in the DR! application; is that correct, Mark?
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: The 03 version?
MR. FISHKIND: That was the -- I believe that was the DR!
application. At that point in time, we didn't have the developer
agreement, wherein they donated the fill and the right-of-way and the
other issues. So in order to accurately account for the net cost to the
county for the roadways, we needed to make an adjustment.
As it has turned out, that was probably a reasonable adjustment at
that point in time, in light of the ultimate developers agreement that
was crafted, which, as George has shown you, is total value
somewhere on the order of $20 million.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: The difference is that we're a year
and a half, about, later --
MR. FISHKIND: No.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Instead of a million dollars a lane
mile credit for the right-of-way, it's now about a half million, and I'm
just wondering how anyone balances these out. Where is the -- where
is the -- where is the authority that exists to make these changes likes
this? And why is one change different than the other? If it's
consistently a cost of right-of-way and right-of-way gets more
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June 2, 2005
expensive in time, why aren't we seeing a greater gap between the real
number today and the bottom number, versus what we saw 14, 15
months ago?
MR. FISHKIND: Well, as I said, I think you're comparing
apples to oranges, with all due respect. The analysis made for the DR!
did not have the benefit of knowledge about what the development
agreement was going to be or what the donations of right-of-way or
roadway costs or fill or the other items that are in the development
agreement today, we didn't have the benefit of that.
But we did know that there was going to be some type of
donations, some type of -- of value provided in dollars or in kind. So
since we didn't have the PDA to take credits elsewhere, we needed to
adjust that cost per lane mile. Now, today the costs are back up, as
you correctly represent, because then we can also have the benefit of
knowing what the development agreement is with some certainty and
provide that on the developer's credit line that's in the model.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: And I -- all I have with the DR!
are these sheets that were in the DR!.
MR. FISHKIND: Uh-huh.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: The FlAM version I have that I am
comparing to is not --
MR. FISHKIND: Sure, sure.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- the sheets that are in the DR!.
MR. FISHKIND: I'm just --
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I can't tell you ifit is the DR!
version or not.
Another big issue that I found different between the version of
the FIAM used as version 3.0 or -- yeah, 3.0 on the one today,
involves the absorptions.
MR. FISHKIND: Uh-huh.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Originally they were -- had
absorptions going from 06 to 021. And they started out at 305 a year,
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June 2, 2005
and second year they went a little less, then they started progressively
trying to move upward from there.
It wasn't until well into the project, like 2014, that they would
even crest a thousand units a year. Today's version condenses
everything down to completing in 016, and the units, the first year are
760 for sale, the second year 940, and in the third year they're well
over a thousand and they're continuing that pace until towards the end.
Now, it's great if they can have those kind of sales. It would be
different than I think what I understand to be normal in Collier
County. But I wonder, this is a -- this document is driven by value,
and the sales, this value of those sales, the rate of those sales, all drive
to the bottom line of ad valorem income, people on the road, receipts
for sales tax, gas tax, and all the other stuff that this FlAM works off
of.
How valid -- who did the absorption analysis that changed so
much from the 3.0 version of your FlAM to this one?
MR. FISHKIND: That's the applicant's estimates of what their
absorption will be, Mark.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. Do you know of any
studies that support that, other than just their assumptions?
MR. FISHKIND: I -- I don't have any market studies they did,
Mark. They didn't ask me to do them, so I couldn't -- I couldn't tell
you. But that's what their representations are.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Well, the way the model is set up,
that's a -- that's a big driving force in the model. If they had put 2,000
units a year in there and wanted to have this thing completed and
opened by 2011, they could have done that as well, based on what
you're saying, because the model doesn't seem to prohibit that.
MR. FISHKIND: No, there's no prohibition. The model is an
Excel work book.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: There is a couple things, line items
I would like to go over in the model --
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June 2, 2005
MR. FISHKIND: Sure.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- just to get your thoughts on.
MR. FISHKIND: Uh-huh.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: There's a provision that we'll get
into later today in the SRA involving -- I don't know if they're called
guest houses. They're accessory dwelling units, let's say, attached to
the principal structure.
MR. FISHKIND: Uh-huh.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: They're not supposedly counted as
part of the density. Even if they were, they wouldn't still break the
four units per acre or whatever it is that they're required to have, but
that's not an issue.
MR. FISHKIND: Uh-huh.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I'm wondering how you -- how
those were factored into the FlAM because I don't see them in there. I
see the principal structure sale, but I don't see the guest house sale.
And I was -- do you know of anywhere -- anyhow that might have
gotten into the FlAM?
MR. FISHKIND: There's no separate unit count for the guest
houses in our analysis. And it also looks to -- I believe that they
would be part of the estimate of the total value, though, of each of the
units, the price.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: But as far as persons per
household, since you're -- since the 2.2 used in here, it wouldn't have
taken into factor anybody living in a guest house or an accessory
house.
MR. FISHKIND: Correct. If they're in a guest house, in theory
they wouldn't be there permanently. Same with an accessory house,
that would be a seasonal use.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: You don't think--
MR. FISHKIND: There is a seasonal--
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: You don't think those guest houses
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June 2, 2005
would be used to rent out for long-term basis?
MR. FISHKIND: I don't know, Mark. They're -- the
representatives guest houses -- the way the model treats them is as
seasonal residents. So the model does have a seasonality factor that
comes from the normal seasonal ebb and flow of population in the
county. So that the total demand for services on the -- it affects
demand for services. The total demand for services increases based
upon the seasonal factor. So the model now is treating those as if
they're for seasonal use.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Nonexistent.
MR. FISHKIND: Pardon?
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Nonexistent. The accessory
dwelling unit that was -- it's not acknowledged in the model.
MR. FISHKIND: No.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay.
MR. FISHKIND: But -- but as I said, because the model has the
seasonal factors, if there are seasonal guests then of course their
expenses would be -- would be counted.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: In the model you had a multipliers
for a taxable assessment ratio.
MR. FISHKIND: Yes, uh-huh.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: In the DR! it was 85 percent and
the 03 -- or 3.0 version of the FIAM it was 92, and in this one it's 92.
How significant of a difference is that in your impacts? I mean what
-- why would that have changed or how do you see it changing
between --
MR. FISHKIND: It changes every year. The Florida
Department of Revenue attempts to enforce high ratios of -- of value
to what gets on the tax roll, and it's not a fixed number. It will vary
each year.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: In the DR!, the percent of
single- family with a household was reported at 70 percent; the percent
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June 2, 2005
of multifamily with household was 55 percent. And the --
MR. FISHKIND: This is homestead exemption I believe we're
talking about.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Yes, sir.
MR. FISHKIND: Uh-huh.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: In the 3.0 version of the FIAM, the
single- family was at 85 percent and the multifamily was at 65 percent.
MR. FISHKIND: Sure.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: In the version we have today, a
single-family is at 58 percent and the multifamily is at 17 percent.
Now, that's a -- quite a difference in percentages between the various
versions that are less than two years old. Any explanation for that?
MR. FISHKIND: Absolutely. The housing mix has been refined
over time as the project has evolved. The change in the multifamily
category that Mark was referring to comes about when one shifts from
more condominiums and townhouses, which are ownership, to more
rental or more seasonal units. Seasonal units or rental units can't
obtain the homestead exemption. So as the product mix began to
change, we changed the estimates for those units that would be
expected to get the homestead exemption, reducing them on that basis.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: The -- you and I had talked about
a Florida population study value that was in 3.0 FlAM.
MR. FISHKIND: Yes, uh-huh.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: And it was stated that it's the study
from 2002 Florida population studies. The same value appears in the
one we received this time, but it says it's from the Florida population
studies for 2003. And I question why it wouldn't have changed over a
year's time. Did you ever look into that?
MR. FISHKIND: Yes. We didn't get it updated properly.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. So there is a new update
needed for that number?
MR. FISHKIND: Well, yes. The impact would be to increase
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June 2, 2005
the number of people, and thereby reduce the cost per person.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Right.
MR. FISHKIND: So that would be the effect. But we'll certainly
get it updated.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: The employment assumptions, in
the DR! they were considerably different on a square foot basis --
MR. FISHKIND: Yes.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- to generate employees than they
were in this model.
MR. FISHKIND: Yeah.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Any idea why, how those changes
would have come about?
MR. FISHKIND: Yes, sir. We have better estimates of what that
nonresidential is going to look like and better staffing as to the
university component. Again, when we did the DR!, some of that
information was rather preliminary, so we made the best estimates that
we could.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: When you have a lower square
foot per employee, you actually indicate then, from an economic
value, you're generating more employment.
MR. FISHKIND: That's correct.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: So the higher you go, the
less employment you'll supposedly generate.
MR. FISHKIND: That's correct.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Your basis then for whatever is --
whatever multiplies off of that employment basis will be -- will be
less, as well.
MR. FISHKIND: Yes, that would be correct. And, again, for
those very reasons, that's why we encourage monitoring, for these are,
exactly as you pointed out, estimates. And those estimates have
evolved as the project design has evolved. And as the project gets
built out -- as this Planning Commission well knows, what one plans
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June 2, 2005
at one point in time sometimes varies as the project evolves and is -- is
finally developed.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: There were some changes in the --
from the default values to the sales values, and I'm assuming you're
going to tell me it's because of more refined marking information and
sales abilities since the time that the first FlAM and DR! was created
until now.
MR. FISHKIND: Well, they had no market at all, so of course
we would rely on the default values when there is no better
information. But as the specific home building partners who are
identified, they had their own particular ideas as to where they
thought they would be pricing the product for sale. So I believe
it's appropriate to adjust from the default when better information is
available.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: The calls for service of sheriffs
department,renaenaber--
MR. FISHKIND: Yes.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- we talked about that? Did you
check into that number? It went from 36 thousand to 400 thousand.
MR. FISHKIND: Yeah. The basis was different from the
Sheriffs Department. The estimate was from them, and -- so the
calculations are still accurate, but the whole base had changed from
how they reported and what they reported. We're going to go back to
the normal incidents report.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: So the -- does that mean the 400
thousand would stay?
MR. FISHKIND: Well, the 400 thousand is okay in the context
of calculating on that basis. Ifwe changed the denominator, which is
where I want to go in the future, then the cost per call would also
change. But the volume calls changed, so the two in essence offset
each other.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Under the capital cost, location
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factor --
MR. FISHKIND: Yes.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- that you used--
MR. FISHKIND: Uh-huh.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- there was quite a difference in
the trip length and trip rates in some of the land use element references
in the 03 --
MR. FISHKIND: Sure.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- version versus -- or the 3.0
versus the one that we use today.
MR. FISHKIND: Yes.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: In looking at those and when those
numbers are plugged in, I notice they do have an impact on the bottom
line --
MR. FISHKIND: Yes.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- as far as fiscal neutrality goes.
MR. FISHKIND: Sure.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: How was the trip length
established?
MR. FISHKIND: The -- in the 3.0 model, we had the standard
default values for trip length and trip rate that were taken from the
impact studies by Tindale and Oliver. Those have subsequently been
updated. And the 50 model, as default values, would have the new
average trip length, trip rates. The specific ones for the proj ect reflect
the fact that the project is designed as a -- as a town, and it is to have
the functions of a self-contained town. Therefore, it has much higher
capture rates than would be expected county wide and shorter trip
lengths as a result.
So, those changes are made to try to reflect those things. In our
model, it measures on an average daily basis, as compared to the DR!,
which is peak hour basis. So in working with Jeff Perry, we tried to
get figures that would be consistent with the DR! application but
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June 2, 2005
converted to the average daily rate method.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: How does the work force distance
travel factor into that, into this -- anywhere in those equations?
MR. FISHKIND: Yeah. It should be in the average trip length.
In other words, that average should be the average for all the trips on
an average daily basis.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: That includes the dwelling unit
occupants, as well as any service people they'd have working with
them?
MR. FISHKIND: Yes absolutely. And -- and deliveries that
would come to the site, as well, Mark.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay.
MR. FISHKIND: It should be truly averaged, just as it is
averaged in the impact fee methodology. The number of trips include
the delivery trips and other things, and the trip length should be
congruent with that.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: If the work force is generally
going to be ten miles away, would these numbers have to reflect that
in some manner? How would they reflect that -- that length, when
they're all smaller than that?
MR. FISHKIND: Well, I -- I don't know that all the work force
is ten miles away, but let me just grant the assumption for the sake of
discussion here and not have too many moving parts. The average trip
length should reflect the average for all the trips, including the journey
to work and journey home.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. And then the reason I'm
asking, Hank, is there was a statement, I read it earlier, in the DR! that
indicated that the work force -- some of the work force would be
coming from Immokalee --
MR. FISHKIND: Sure.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- Golden Gate Estates, with an
average trip of ten miles and an average length of 20 minutes. And
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June 2, 2005
when I read this, I couldn't figure out how that was factored into the
cost --
MR. FISHKIND: Yeah.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- analysis.
MR. FISHKIND: That reflects the affordable housing. You
have to have -- when you're measuring affordable housing, it's the
ten-mile, 20 minute length, but that doesn't imply that all of the
workers live at the periphery. Certainly some of them will, and that
average trip length should accommodate all of that.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: When you, in your model, talk
about the state roadway network --
MR. FISHKIND: Yes.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- what is it you're talking about?
Give me an example of a road you're talking about.
MR. FISHKIND: Any state road, as opposed to a county road or
a city road. And we have that classification in Florida.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Any state road. 951, portions of it
is state; 175 -- MR. FISHKIND: State road.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: State road. The--
MR. FISHKIND: So there are impacts then on roadways that are
county roadways that the county pays for, and impacts on state
roadways that typically the county does not pay for. And it's
important to articulate the two.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: You had a section of your FlAM
dedicated to revenue and costing on impact on state roadway --
MR. FISHKIND: Sure.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- network.
MR. FISHKIND: Sure.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: And it's substantially negative to
the tune of seven, six, seven -- $7 million a year, just about.
MR. FISHKIND: Absolutely.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: What does that mean?
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June 2, 2005
MR. FISHKIND: It means that the State of Florida lacks impact
fees and other direct revenues to pay for roads. So it's not unusual that
projects generate negative impacts on the state roadway network, for
we have, in my opinion, a faulty system for supporting the funding for
our state roads.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: This could be a hot
subject for you, couldn't it?
MR. FISHKIND: Not at all. The DOT participated in the
development of this model and specifically helped us with the
calculations relative to cost per lane mile and percentage of trips on
various kinds of roadways, and the state is very concerned about these
Issues.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Well, if some of these roadways
that are having this negative revenue impact are roadways that we --
we travel as part of our county road system, like 951 --
MR. FISHKIND: Uh-huh.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- how does -- what does this mean
-- how does the impact then of Ave Maria, in regards to fiscal
neutrality, apply to 951 in those segments of it that are state, which are
quite a bit of it?
MR. FISHKIND: Well, in terms of the fiscal impacts -- which is
what we're measuring, we're measuring fiscal impacts on the county --
county is not responsible for that roadway. Or unless and until it
decides it wants to be. And so that's outside the ambit of a direct
fiscal impact of a land-use decision on the county. Is it relevant to
fiscal impact on the state? Yes. I would also point out that it is
separate from the DR! analysis that relates to proportionate share,
which does include impacts on all roads, including the county road
and the State Road 951 in this example and requires in that DR!
review to make a proportionate cost analysis. Personally, I think it
would be helpful if we did that for PUDs and small projects, but we
have yet to -- so -- do that, a more general review. But each unit of
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June 2, 2005
government has to have its own fiscal impact assessment.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. So any impact that Ave
Maria creates on 951, in regards to the portions owned by the state,
really is not part of this analysis?
MR. FISHKIND: Well, it's reflected in the model, but it's not
part of the fiscal calculus for the county.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay.
MR. FISHKIND: Just as impacts on the school board are
separate from the county, for those are separate units of local
government. Each must be articulated individually, and they're not
fungible across the different units of government.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: But if there was a negative impact
as a result of this university on a portion of 951, it wouldn't -- on a
state road portion, it wouldn't show up as a -- it wouldn't affect the
fiscal neutrality, bottom line, in this model?
MR. FISHKIND: For the county, no.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay.
MR. FISHKIND: And, again -- but it would affect the
calculations for the transportation mitigation requirements under the
DR!, for that is a separate methodology.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. But as far as the model
goes, the model showing fiscal neutrality, it wouldn't show up on this
model?
MR. FISHKIND: Correct. It would be inappropriate if it did, for
the focus is on the county. I mean what if it has a positive impact on
the school board? We don't want to roll that as a credit back to the
county's balance, for the county couldn't use that money. That's why
it's very important to keep each government separated.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I'm trying to cross offmy
questions here, Hank.
MR. FISHKIND: Sure, no problem, take your time.
While Mark's doing that, I expect that the commission will see
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the results of fiscal models more in the future and maybe, Chairman, if
ever, you would like to have a short workshop. We'd be happy to
come and talk about the model more in a non -- in a fashion not
related to any specific project.
COMMISSIONER MURRA Y: That would be nice.
MR. FISHKIND: Sure. I'd be happy to do a little workshop at
an appropriate time.
COMMISSIONER MURRA Y: That would be wonderful.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Hotel occupancy--
MR. FISHKIND: Yeah.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- in the FI -- in the DR! had--
was it 42.5?
MR. FISHKIND: Correct.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: In your current model it's 85. I
guess for the same reasons you told me earlier, that's why justifiable.
MR. FISHKIND: Yeah. I mean the original is what the average
was for the 2003 calibration. Wasn't the greatest year in the hotel
industry. They believe they'll do better out at their hotel. Actually --
the impact of that actually is to raise the cost estimate for -- what that
means is there's more people in the hotel room. The revenue doesn't
change, just more people to provide services to, the higher the
occupancy.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Hank, I appreciate your time. I
think --
MR. FISHKIND: Sure.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- I have a few questions of the
applicant in regards to --
MR. FISHKIND: Okay.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- what they could do to respond to
some of the things you told us here today.
MR. FISHKIND: Sure.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: But I don't have anymore FlAM
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June 2, 2005
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Do we have financial impact model
questions for Dr. Fishkind?
COMMISSIONER MURRA Y: He's covered it.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: No more at this time.
MR. FISHKIND: Okay. I'll stay as long as I can. And my
colleague Russ Wire will be here, as well, so if you have any
questions, we'll be happy to cover them.
MR. V ARNADOE: Hank -- I have a couple things that I'd like
to inquire of Hank.
MR. FISHKIND: Cross examined from my own side now.
What a day.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Recross.
MR. V ARNADOE: I just -- no, I just want to clarify a couple
things.
Your organization ran the -- when we looked at the absorption,
you ran it out to 2020 or 15 years. And was that still positive at that
point in time, as far as fiscal neutrality is concerned?
MR. FISHKIND: Yes, it is.
MR. VARNADOE: And I think just to sum up, tell us what your
reaction is as -- your judgment is as the progenitor of this model as to
any rational assumptions as to whether this project will be positive in
the -- at the end of five years in the end of -- and at the build out or
horizon year.
MR. FISHKIND: Sure. I think, based on everything I know, that
under most any reasonable set of assumptions, this will generate
substantial positive fiscal benefits for the county. And as I think either
you or Al said in your opening comments, it's not a surprise in the
sense that it's designed to be somewhat of a town. If it operates as a
town, then it will take care of many of its own requirements. And,
therefore, it's cost should be, on average, a bit lower; it's values, on
average, are the same a bit higher. So it would be reasonable to
believe that it would have a positive benefit.
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MR. V ARNADOE: Thank you.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: That's assuming that the input
values are met.
MR. FISHKIND: Sure. And that -- that's part of what the
monitoring is all about.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: And that's also -- that does not
reflect impacts on state roads.
MR. FISHKIND: Correct.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. Thanks again.
MR. FISHKIND: Sure. Thank you. Oh, Donna's got --
COMMISSIONER CARON: I just have one question.
MR. FISHKIND: Certainly.
COMMISSIONER CARON: Would you actually feel more
comfortable if this model was analyzed every year, as opposed to
every five years?
MR. FISHKIND: Well, I -- I think because this is a town, that it
needs to have some ability to sort of generate enough mass and
enough rooftops in order to be able to let the retail operate before
you're going to really know is it going to operate as a town. So I think
the first threshold out at five years is something I'm very comfortable
with. Subsequently, if you wanted to monitor more often, I mean it's
not difficult to do that. I think it's a -- somewhat a policy decision and
somewhat a -- you know, a decision about what you want -- what you
want to direct staff to do. But I do think that it needs -- the town needs
at least a little time to be able to stabilize.
When we were doing the Brooks, it was primarily high end
residential, so, you know, it really wasn't -- wasn't the same kind of
thing. So to monitor right away was -- was fine. It didn't distort
anything, in my opinion.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Okay. Thank you, sir.
MR. FISHKIND: Thank you.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I don't know who's going to --
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there you are. George, you're hiding behind there. I didn't see you.
MR. V ARNADOE: Never hiding, Mr. Strain. At your disposal.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Based on the questions and
answers from Hank, do you have any problem setting up monitoring
for -- on a yearly basis for the persons per household?
MR. VARNADOE: Yes, sir. The LDC requires us to monitor at
five years and at build out.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: LDC is a minimum standard. So
I'm just asking do you have any problem, since it's not that much of an
effort to do, to monitor on a yearly basis?
MR. VARNADOE: Your staff has the model, they can monitor
however often they want or on a continuous basis. Our requirement is
to follow the Land Development Code, which is every five years and
at build out.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Or as stipulated. Do you have any
--
MR. VARNADOE: Let me ask that. Patrick?
MR. WHITE: At your disposal.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: He's asking, not me, Pat.
MR. V ARNADOE: Can they require us to do something that's
not -- that's beyond what's called for in the Land Development Code?
MR. WHITE: Let me give you a simple answer. Yes.
MR. V ARNADOE: Okay.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Do you have any problem
monitoring the capture rate? That's how many people come and go
from the property on a yearly basis.
MR. VARNADOE: We'll monitor what we're required to do,
Mr. Strain, at the end -- as required by the Land Development Code.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Or as stipulated. Do you have any
problem monitoring the unit sales prices and the absorption rates?
MR. VARNADOE: We'll monitor what we're required in the
monitor as required in the Land Development Code.
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June 2, 2005
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Or as stipulated. And -- okay.
That -- those are the last questions I have on the FlAM.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Other questions from other
commissioners at this point?
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I'm just curious, if -- if your
numbers are doable and you feel they're viable, and the monitoring, by
Hank's own testimony, is not that difficult, what is your reluctance to
even -- to offer that up? I don't understand why you're --
MR. V ARNADOE: I don't think --
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- against it.
MR. V ARNADOE: I think we've got a Land Development Code
that says we monitor the end of five years, and if it's negative we're
required to make a financial commitment to straighten that out.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: It may be so negative--
the number could be huge. Why would we want to wait that long to
find that out?
MR. VARNADOE: Because that's what the code calls for, sir.
A code that you voted on and approved, by the way.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: As a -- as a minimum basis. That
doesn't mean it couldn't be better. And I just was curious if you really
feel strongly that this proj ect is going to work like the FlAM shows,
which is arbitrary, to say the least, in regards that things can be put in
here, I don't know why you're reluctant to -- to do this when it's -- it's
not a difficult matter. So--
MR. V ARNADOE: Do you have another question, Mr. Strain,
or --
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Oh, I've got--
MR. VARNADOE: -- are you just going to give me opinions?
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Mr. Murray?
COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Mr. Varnadoe, I would like to
ask it -- ask that question in another way, perhaps. Because I -- I
understand, I think, what Mr. Strain is getting at, and I'm sure you do,
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June 2, 2005
as well.
It's obviously to the advantage of Ave Maria, the town thereof
and the university, to succeed and therefore to be concerned for its
negative -- conditions of negativity, should they manifest. What --
what means have you that you would use to determine where you are
going, given that the model that we have, the data are -- turn out not to
be quite so correct?
I know you're required in five years, I understand that. And
Mark's point is very good. If you wait a long time, it's going to be a
sizeable chunk and so forth. But are there other means by which
anybody can determine that you're off to a wrong start on something,
that there is an -- indicators that can show that changes must be made?
Because the concern, obviously, is the -- the county should not be
burdened with excess cost. And I guess we -- we'd be very much
concerned to see that you wouldn't go into the negative, wouldn't find
yourself in a situation. And I know my question isn't as concise as I'd
like it to be because it's a big gorilla here but -- you don't understand
my question, do you?
MR. V ARNADOE: I'm not sure that I do. I think that -- that we
are very confident with the parameters that were utilized in the model
as we submitted it. There were changes requested by staff to run
another version, if you would, to see what would happen under
different scenarios. That is not --
COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Okay.
MR. V ARNADOE: That is not what we have submitted, that is
not what we're relying on. And what we -- we tried to use some very
conservative estimates for our home benefit because we say we're the
ones that are going to suffer if this thing is negative. But I think that
to monitor every year -- the first year, I don't know what -- as you get
started, what it's going to be.
Five years out, I think we get a really good snapshot in time as to
whether it's going to be positive or negative. And if that snapshot year
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-- if it's negative, we've got to either allow assessment to be put on our
land to make up the differences, or pay the present value of the
negativity. So I don't know what we're going to gain by trying to
monitor every year or at a -- at a lesser interval.
COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Well, I'm not sure that I would
have advocated every year because I understood the professor's
statement, I believe. And I just was talking about that period where
the concern might be for neutrality and that the county, in some way,
didn't get burdened because of something being not considered.
MR. V ARNADOE: And the safeguard is --
COMMISSIONER MURRAY: That's what I'm looking for, the
safeguard.
MR. FISHKIND: And the safeguard is in both your -- your
Growth Management Plan and Land Development Code that the
burden is on us to either have an assessment placed on the land to
make up the difference or to pay the present value of the -- of the
negative impact on the county at that point in time.
COMMISSIONER MURRA Y: And that would be at the five
year interval.
MR. FISHKIND: And at build out -- or the -- the horizon year--
COMMISSIONER MURRA Y: There's only two.
MR. FISHKIND: -- which is build out.
COMMISSIONER MURRAY: There's only two. Yeah. Okay.
Thank you, sir.
MR. FISHKIND: Unless it went longer, and then you have it
every five years and then at build out.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Mr. Adelstein?
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: Well, I would like to talk to
someone about the traffic. Not for him.
COMMISSIONER MURRA Y: Could you talk into the mike sir?
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: No. I'd rather talk to the
traffic department because the issue is from them, not -- wouldn't want
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to burden you with it. If Don could make that long trip.
It's my understanding that the County waived, for Ave Maria, the
checkbook concurrency for traffic; is that correct?
MR. SCOTT: The -- by the developer's contribution agreement,
they are -- we are reserving trips for them out into the future.
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: My question comes down to
the fact that there are other -- other developments in that area that
really had prior affect to get these -- their road consistency. What is
their position now, and is there anything they're going to be able to do
about it?
MR. SCOTT: If you're asking is there somebody out there that
might have some zoning that doesn't have approval for, you know --
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: There--
MR. SCOTT: -- for units at a certain point that might get
stopped later on in some of these links, that's possible.
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: Then my question comes out
to what I'm trying to find out is they were given the obligation of
living under the checkbook concurrency, they accepted it. Now all of
the sudden they are not being given that particular privilege. Do they
have a legal right to sue for this?
MR. SCOTT: Well, it depends on -- I mean the status of each of
the developments depends on it. I mean obviously there's other vested
developments, too, that have agreements, like Heritage Bay, let's -- for
instance, at the corner of951 and Immokalee. There's other -- if you
have zoning doesn't mean you necessarily have a right to develop
anyway, so it's still subj ect to concurrency. This --
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: But you've taken the
concurrency value out, as far as they were concerned. In other words,
they may have had this done two years ago, and they're waiting for
their opportunity to actually develop it. Now all of the sudden, this
comes along, and it's not going to be in the next six months or a year
because now, with Ave Maria, it may be another five years.
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June 2, 2005
Now, when they came to the county with what they wanted, the
county told them that they had this way to do it and that when their
opportunity came up, they would get the shot to get on to the public
transportation. N ow all of the sudden those people that waited, now
we've got a situation where it may be five to ten years before they get
an opportunity to get what they thought they were going to get within
two or three years. Is there anything going to be done to protect that,
or is there going to end up in a legal battle?
MR. SCOTT: Well, I mean that's possible from any standpoint
that we might stop somebody and they say, hey, here you -- I mean
they can -- throw them out for a second. Anybody can point to a
vested community from the past that we've included within our
concurrency system as --
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: No. That happened before
this concurrency system. N ow this is happening after the concurrency
system went into effect. That's the difference.
MR. SCOTT: Okay. I see where you're going. I -- we were
reserving trips for them but, you know -- obviously, you know, one of
the questions we have would be based on the new growth
management bill is -- is everybody gets stopped after a hundred ten
percent. And that's one issue that I'm still weighing. So that would
affect every development, not just vested or not vested.
Is it -- obviously this development there -- for our standpoint,
there are a lot of transportation improvements to deliver. Over time --
essentially, the way I'm reserving their trips is over the time that
they're building. You know, if it's -- if we're looking at a zoning in an
area, then I'll be looking at essentially five years worth of
development.
There are other improvements that we'll be doing in the future,
like Vanderbilt Beach Road Extension, that would be, you know, a
parallel improvement for Immokalee Road. I can't say that -- I mean
obviously if nothing else happens and I don't do any other -- any other
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improvements out there, then, yeah, somebody might get stopped, but
that's -- that's anybody out there. I don't -- you know, I don't care if
it's Ave Maria or anybody else that's developing.
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: Well, the point I'm making is
you've taken somebody today --
MR. SCOTT: It's a -- it's a preference thing.
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: A preference. And I was
wondering --
MR. SCOTT: Someone's further along in line than somebody
else.
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: The answer -- question is
whether or not this is going to be good for the county. Because I feel
that --
MR. SCOTT: Well--
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: -- it's very likely--
MR. SCOTT: And--
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: -- that a lawsuit will be filed.
MR. SCOTT: And I've weighed this on both sides. One issue
with not providing reservation is that I can't allow them to build like --
essentially, if they built like three years worth of projects and then we
shut them down and then -- and then looked back and go, hey, you
didn't meet your internal capture rate. Well, it's because -- you can't
build a portion of this town and then say, oh, you didn't meet your
internal capture rate.
If I really want to get to the point where I want to get to, where
their internal capture rate's high, less impact on the road, I have to
allow them to build through.
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: Okay. Thank you.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Other questions?
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Yes. Along the same lines that
Commissioner Adelstein just started. Talked about the --
MR. SCOTT: Can I address one of the issues that came up
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during the financial model?
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Certainly.
MR. SCOTT: About the state roads. Is -- over time, we have,
you know, tried to use the state funding to widen state roads, but
obviously, as you can tell with Davis Boulevard, which was the
highest priority for five years and it's still, what, four years away?
That took nine years to get to that project. Weare using our funding
now in certain parts of this county, impact fees, whatever, to widen
state roads. And I believe that will be more so in the future.
If you look at something like State Road 951 and Marco Island
Bridge, one of the -- one of the proposals is possibly tolling that to pay
for it. Again, that would be taxing ourselves, essentially, to build that,
versus state money. 175, the toll authority we talked about earlier,
beyond six lanes, which is programmed by the state and federal
money, that again would be money that would come from us.
Over time, we will be using impact fees, other things, to widen
the state roads as the needs come up. Because, you know, based on
concurrency, unless -- normally we'd like to do this, but that's not
going to happen, unless you take those state roads out of our
concurrency system. Because the state's argument the back -- you
know, the back way is to say we don't approve development, so have
at it.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Mr. Strain?
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Don, you had mentioned that -- I
think it was Heritage Bay had a developer's agreement?
MR. SCOTT: Yes.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: When was that approved, about
how long ago?
MR. SCOTT: It was 2003.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Was it after the DR! and PUD
were approved for that proj ect, as well?
MR. SCOTT: No. It was about the same time, I believe.
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June 2, 2005
MR. BELLOWS: Same time.
MR. SCOTT: Yeah.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay.
MR. SCOTT: It's strictly by -- at least the time frame of
comparison, it was before the -- it was not before the concurrency
system was a vision and we were following some things, but it was the
-- before the official start date.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: The GMP indicates that the SR--
at the time of the SRA designation, the road system, transportation
element will be subj ect to the concurrency management system in
effect at that time. Is this project subject to the concurrency
management system in effect today?
MR. SCOTT: In the sense of what I -- the way I'm addressing it,
I say yes because I -- I know the opposite side of it is that -- can you
say we're going to stop them? I don't know that part. All I know is
I'm taking their trips into account, putting them in with the
concurrency management system.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: In your concurrency management
system and the adopted AUIR table that you gave us -- I didn't attend,
but I got a copy of all the proceedings.
MR. SCOTT: Right.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Oil Well Road is not slated even
on that five year plan as a -- MR. SCOTT: It was --
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- extended road.
MR. SCOTT: As of nine months ago, it wasn't even in the
long-rage plan.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: So how does -- if it's not on there,
how does it meet the concurrency management system?
MR. SCOTT: We've -- it's not on that because of the time frame
that we were looking at it -- that roadway, but it will be on your future
ones. It's Oil Well within -- you know, the highest level right now is
about 50 percent capacity, though their -- their time frame, what was
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June 2, 2005
raised earlier, their a.m. peak is terrible with the school and the three
schools in that quotation.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Well, the concurrency map that's
in effect today, does it have Oil Well on it?
MR. SCOTT: No.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. How is it that we're moving
forward with this -- finding it consistent then?
MR. SCOTT: Because we've analyzed it. I mean beyond that, I
know what the trips are on it, I know what they're adding to it. Camp
Keais, any of the other roadways, Randall-- Randall's not on there.
We've included Randall, looked at analysis of that. That was
not adopted by the Board at that time, but we have looked at the traffic
capacity issues like that.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Why did you move Oil Well up
from the agenda? I mean how do you do that financially when -- since
the county is not --
MR. SCOTT: Because we were already starting to -- we had
already gone through the process of doing some preliminary stages for
Immokalee Road, and it was essentially a switch to the Oil Well Road.
Now, that was earlier phases, so we were -- we were looking at doing
this project ten years out. The developer contribution agreement has
moved that up to '07 and '09 time frame.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: If you didn't have that developer
contribution agreement, would it make any difference to your analysis
in regard to the concurrent -- to consistency with the GMP?
MR. SCOTT: Ifwe weren't addressing Oil Well Road, then the
answer would be no. I mean it wouldn't -- it would make a difference
in the fact that if I wasn't addressing Oil Well Road.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Mr. White, the developer
contribution agreement in the interlocal agreement with Ave Maria
basically it's only effective when the DR! and the SRA are approved
and the corps of engineer's permit. I know the county has no control
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over the corps of engineer's permit, but the DR! and the SRA is
something that county reviews. And if this developer's agreement is
contingent upon zoning and zoning contingent upon the developer's
agreement for the benefits received by the county, how does that not
qualify as contract zoning?
MR. WHITE: Well, contract zoning is something that exists in
terms of uses that are approved by a particular board essentially
outside the terms of their processes that allow for it, and it is a
contractual obligation between these parties. And it offends the
court's notions of fair play because it binds subsequent boards. That's
the evil that the court's are looking to cure.
This isn't contract zoning, in my opinion, because first you have
agreements that are external to the process, that being this developer
contribution agreement and interlocal agreement. I don't know that
any of those documents create the types of uses that are only going to
arise from the SRA designation resolution.
The RLSA zoning overlay district creates a kind of Chinese
menus of uses, but none of those uses are actualized or real on the
ground until, as Mr. Reynolds had indicated at the beginning of his
presentation, when an applicant opts in. They're doing that through
the SRA designation process.
So, I don't see contract zoning in any of the combination of
instruments or actions that are likely to be taken by the Board of
County Commissioners. You -- I may not have given you as precise
an answer as you'd like, but --
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I wanted your clarification for the
record, and that's basically the county attorney's -- since they created
the document, the county attorney did, I would assume then that that's
the county attorney's opinion on this, on this contract, in regards to
contract zoning.
MR. WHITE: I can tell you that it is this Assistant County
Attorney's position. I have not discussed it with Mr. Weigel, but I
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June 2, 2005
think it's consistent with the law.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: How about conditional zoning,
would it be considered conditional zoning?
MR. WHITE: Well, I'm not sure I know what that is these days.
But I think the point you're attempting to drive is that somehow there
are impermissible conditions that might be added that are external to
what otherwise would be the normal and routine process that's
authorized by law. I, again, don't see that occurring in this
circumstance.
It, on the other hand, would be somewhat inappropriate or wrong
headed for me to say that there aren't conditions being added in as part
of this SRA designation that, in effect, implements the zoning that
comes by way of the RLSA zoning overlay district. But, again, I don't
think that -- in the sense that the courts consider it to be an evil to be
cured is what we have in this circumstance, either through the DR!
DO that's before you or the SRA designation.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Well, I'm -- what I'm concerned
about is the timing of everything. Because the effective date of the
developer's agreement and the interlocal agreement that were signed
by the county commission and the applicant -- and it says in the
paragraph -- towards the end of each one. This agreement
commitments herein shall become effective by the DR! Development
Order, SRA designation for the town of Ave Maria, and Army
Corps of permit engineers for the town of Ave Maria becomes
final and effective. And if they don't become effective by December
31 -- excuse me. This is -- reading in a bit here to get to the end of it.
They have a deadline of December 31 st, 2006. And if that doesn't
happen, then the agreement and all obligations hereunder shall be null
and void.
MR. WHITE: Let me -- let me come at an answer to your
question in a step-wise fashion. Starting with the last piece of that
first. Assuming that nothing happens prior to that date in '06, then we
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June 2, 2005
default to the concurrency management system and its rules of
operation that are applicable across the board to all developments.
Okay? So we kind of just go back to the rules of the game.
Assuming that there's some concern about what the effective date
of that agreement is, the DCA, it's a legally correct statement to opine
that that document has been executed and approved by the Board of
County Commissioners in a lawful manner, and thus it is operative.
And the question as to whether some of the terms of that agreement
are yet effective or not is, in my mind, somewhat secondary to
whether we consider the agreement to be in effect. I
understand your point about what it -- what it says in black and white,
but I think that if you were to attempt to apply it, for example, to
enforce it, you would quite likely be able to convince a court that in
fact because the Board had approved it and executed it through its
chair, that it was binding on the county. And thus, I think it is
operative in that sense.
And maybe it's a stretch to say that it's, quote, effective in the
same sense that the word effective is used in the provision you read,
but I think that they're legally equivalent. Enough so, at least in my
mind, that I don't think it creates a circumstance that you ignore the
existence of the DCA because it is not yet, quote, effective, end quote.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. I have one more question
about that document. At least for right now. The GMP is written as
kind of like the master plan for Collier County. There's a section of
Florida Statute, 163.3194, that talks about the legal status of
comprehensive plans.
Our comprehensive plan goes through a series of public meetings
and eventually the DCA comes back and then goes for an adoption,
approval, final approval. How -- how can a Development Order or
interlocal agreement, if it can, take precedent over the requirements of
the GMP when they don't go through the same processes that the GMP
amendments go through?
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MR. WHITE: I think I understand your concern. I--
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: It's to do with traffic concurrency,
to be honest with you.
MR. WHITE: I know what the statute says in terms of
consistency. I think I had -- I would have to agree with your
assumptions in -- in your question in order to reach the same type of
conclusion that you're reaching about it being inconsistent. I don't
know that there's competent substantial evidence in the record that
doesn't support an opposite conclusion that it is consistent.
So I'm not sure how much I can help address your concern
without getting into an even more theoretical discussion. Not only
about the provisions we're talking about, the statute, the interlocal, to
some extent the DCA, but I -- I don't come to the same conclusion as
-- as a finding of inconsistency, based on the evidence so far.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I didn't come to that conclusion,
Mr. Scott did. In his last statement before I started on this track, he
indicated that if Oil Well Road was not part of this developer's
agreement, then it would not be consistent with the GMP. So based
on that, that's --
MR. WHITE: That's a factual distinction. And I think the
premise of your argument is much broader than that. And I can see in
a specific fact circumstance, such as Mr. Scott indicated, where there
might be a circumstance that it would be inconsistent. So I'm not
getting to the same place you are in the analysis.
I tend to think that the evidence we've heard thus far reaches the
conclusion that when all of those documents are considered together,
that you still have consistency with the comprehensive plan.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Well, at this point the record has
on it what I needed it to have it, so I'll end my part of that
conversation. I'm sure others may have comments.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Mr. Adelstein?
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: But that developer who's been
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June 2, 2005
waiting now for a year or two in that area to get his time to build units
is going to now have to wait because this has come up and this new
contract has been signed after the fact, not before the fact. Does he
have a legal basis to go to court to get the right to put his -- build his
buildings, as he -- as he was told he could when that time came up?
MR. SCOTT: What developer is that, though, in this area?
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: In that area. We're talking
about developers in that area.
MR. SCOTT: But there's nobody else with standing that's
waiting there at this moment.
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: There's none?
MR. SCOTT: Not in this area, no.
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: Off of Immokalee Road?
MR. SCOTT: No. 951 south of 41, yeah, but not in this area
right now.
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: Okay.
MR. WHITE: And this illustrates the point between a specific
factual circumstance and a more general concern, in terms of
evaluating consistency or inconsistency. I think to answer your
question, without doing a disservice to my client, is to say it is
possible that some factual circumstance might arise where a suit could
be filed. I don't know what the outcome would be, whether those
folks would even have standing or not.
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: We never do.
MR. WHITE: But suffice it to say that it is, of course, the most
grave concern that all local governments have, not seeking to replicate
the experience of the east coast with respect to the management of
concurrency.
And the question I guess that you-all have to consider in the
aggregate is, is this an approach that in the long run achieves the
goals, obj ectives, and policies of the comprehensive plan with respect
to concurrency?
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June 2, 2005
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Further questions?
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Yes.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Yes, sir, Mr. Schiffer.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Don, has there been any study
as to what impact the construction proj ect itself will have on the
roads?
MR. SCOTT: Well, one of the -- one of the things -- obviously
getting fill right there was one of the issues. One of the issues is not
only the cost of trucking it very far, but also having the trucks on the
road. So that's one of the issues that we addressed as part of this.
The -- you know, at the time frame that we're doing it at -- and I
say this because if we had it scheduled the way we had it scheduled
previously, I would be a lot more concerned, but the demand is -- or
the impact is not going to be there right away. And once you got
beyond the Orange Tree portion, it's not -- you know, there's not that
much traffic on it right now.
Orange Tree itself we're trying to address not only with the
Immokalee Road widening but also that intersection itself on Oil Well
Road to address that in the immediate term and then hook that up to
the project itself.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: But I don't see -- the workers
aren't going to be coming from this area. They'll all be driving in. Do
you have any studies as to where they're coming from?
MR. SCOTT: And I guess I'm -- I was looking at it a little
differently. I believe a lot of the workers are going to come out of the
Immokalee area, not as much coming from the urban area. Now, I
understand the -- the reverse commute, and that's what I hope for the
long-term, but I hope with that, with, you know, economic
development in Immokalee itself surrounding this project, too. To
start with, though, I would think there are a lot of workers that would
be coming out of the Immokalee area, Lehigh Acres, areas like that.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Okay. And one other thing. In
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June 2, 2005
the standards for the thing, there is a length of cul-de-sac that's pretty
long. It's like 2700 feet. Is that something you agreed to or--
MR. SCOTT: And I don't -- I think you -- this goes back like
two and a half years, when we first were in original conversations on
some of the issues, and there were some issues about typical sections.
That might have been added at that time. There was a lot of
discussion. I wasn't actually doing this job at that time, so I don't have
the --
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: But has that been reviewed with
the fire department? I mean there's fire prevention code standards.
MR. SCOTT: All the reviewers were involved. Obviously
during site development plan if there's other issues that come up, too --
I mean there's still reviews of things going forward. There were some
issues at the beginning of this, how wide a road an alley should be,
things like that, for the things that you raised. Not only fire but also
getting garbage trucks in and out.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: But -- let me ask Patrick, I
guess. Patrick, if we okay this with a cul-de-sac length that exceeds --
first of all, exceeds our code, it exceeds state fire codes, does that
mean they can do it that long?
MR. WHITE: Well, it certainly means that Collier County's
given them the authority to do so. It does not necessarily mean that
there isn't some point in time where some other agency may find that
their regulations haven't been complied with.
The question you asked kind of, in my mind, expands into just
what are the deviations from the existing LDC, either in terms of
what's in section 4.08, which is the RLSA provisions, or otherwise.
And I think what you'll find here is, is that there's some need to have a
statement on the record, perhaps either from the staff or the applicant's
agents, indicating that there are no such types of deviations, other than
those that are stated in the SRA designation, the application.
What I'm looking to make sure, in terms of closing the door on, is
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that there are not any other unknown deviations that have not been
sought consistent with what the Land Development Code says you are
supposed to ask for if you're going to deviate from either the base
LDC or what 4.08 itself says, if you're going to deviate from 4.08 as
the RLSA.
So I would encourage you to have that put on the record by either
the staff or the applicant's agent kind of as a further example of what
you're suggesting could be a problem in the future, in terms of
different agencies and the application of their roles. We don't enforce,
necessarily, the fire code, per se. That's the fire marshal's
responsibility .
And my belief is that if you have something in the record or
testimony today that indicates that that agency has given it's ascent,
then I think that the county's well within its purview to go forward,
and your recommendation could include that -- that particular
circumstance.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: All right.
MR. SCOTT: From recollection, there were a lot of people
involved with the typical sections way back. I believe they were
involved in, you know, fire and utilities, as regards to trash, in the
review of those.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Yeah. I'm not worried about
the width of the road, I'm worried about the length of the road.
MR. SCOTT: You know, what they look like, I mean
essentially.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Anything else?
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I'm done. Thank you.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Other questions? Ms. Caron?
COMMISSIONER CARON: I just have -- I have one quick one.
One of the recommendations by the Regional Planning Commission
was that the developer could help -- contribute to Collier County
constructing permanent count stations.
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June 2, 2005
MR. SCOTT: Uh-huh.
COMMISSIONER CARON: The last line in that, though, says
that in the event such data reveals a potential deficiency, any further
data collection and analysis would be the responsibility of the
developer. Isn't that sort of like turning the hen house over to the fox
at that point? If you find a problem and --
MR. SCOTT: We -- we are actually -- the permanent count
stations that we're putting out --
COMMISSIONER CARON: Right.
MR. SCOTT: -- the data comes back to us. So we will be -- it's
kind of funny from the monitoring stand --
COMMISSIONER CARON: So this will not happen, it will not
get turned back over to the developer?
MR. SCOTT: No. I mean, sure, they're going to ask for the data
--
COMMISSIONER CARON: Well--
MR. SCOTT: -- and things like that, but we will be getting the
data.
COMMISSIONER CARON: So you'll be doing the analysis of
the data?
MR. SCOTT: Right. And we're doing it for more than just the
purpose of how's everything operating in the system, but also later on
in the future, if someone says, hey, this is what it's going to look like
or this is how our internal capture's going to look like, we can say,
well, this is what reality's shown us.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Other questions? Mr. Strain?
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. I guess instead of going to
the SRA application first, maybe we'll go -- since there's been a lot of
questions concerning the Southwest Regional Planning Council
paperwork, why don't we jump into that one next, if that's okay.
But I would like to get an issue on record. Ray, it's my
understanding that no other commissioner in this table received the
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DR! binder that we're voting on today; is that correct?
MR. BELLOWS: It's my understanding that they did not receive
the packets that were put together in that regards, but we are in the
process of getting those to you today.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: So they can read them and vote on
them?
MR. BELLOWS: Well, the gist of the information is contained
in the Southwest Florida Regional Planning Council findings that were
included that you do have, so --
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Well, I did receive it, and so
luckily you're not having to deal with me on an issue but I would
certainly have had a problem if I hadn't. Also, I noticed that there are
some rather large appendices that were missing from that. I mentioned
it earlier. I now know the size of them. They're substantial, so I
certainly would like a copy of those.
MR. BELLOWS: Yeah. And we're getting those today, also.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Let me -- Mark, so when
you said to me you got two binders --
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I got --
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I didn't get two binders.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I got this binder you-all got, plus I
got this binder here.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: That's new to us.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: This is all the information that I
started asking about for the first couple of hours today. I understand
now why you-all didn't have so many questions.
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: Didn't have any.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Well, Ray, why wouldn't we all
get the same stuff?
MR. BELLOWS: They were put together, Mark came and
picked his up. I think maybe the error came during the mailing of the
rest of them to the planning commission. The packets were put
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together, Commissioner Strain came and picked up his and got it.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: But you didn't notify us that
there was anything to pick up.
MR. BELLOWS: I didn't do the mailing, and I didn't know that
you didn't get the packets.
COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Now I know why I didn't
get the EAC staff report.
MR. BELLOWS: You should have the EAC staffreport. That's
in the actual staff report. If you have the staff report, you should have
the EAC.
COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I don't.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I guess then with that being said,
though, at least you-all can decide what you want to do with that as
we go on or whatever you want. I -- want me to start asking questions
again?
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Go right ahead.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Out of the thing we're missing,
is that what --
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: No. I'm done with the thing we're
missing. That's what we started out with today.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Can I look at it?
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: No, no.
COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I really want to see the EAC staff
report.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Mr. White, my copy has notes
made in it. Is that something I can share with --
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Never mind it's not -- I'm not
going to look at it.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Well, I don't mind you--
but I don't know if that breaks any rules. I--
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I'll read it out loud.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: That's okay with me.
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June 2, 2005
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: For the next four hours.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Forget it, Pat. Forget it. I'm not
going to --
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. Forget it then.
MR. V ARNADOE: Excuse me.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Yes, sir.
MR. V ARNADOE: No, just a couple -- couple comments on the
discussions we were having earlier. Let's don't forget that we have a
biannual report that we send to the RPC and the county and that Mr.
Strain will have the number of external trips and by reference the
internal capture that goes with -- that is a requirement of the DR! law,
that goes out every two years. What it won't have on it is -- is number
of people per household, obviously.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: It will have the absorptions and
the sales prices?
MR. V ARNADOE: It will have absorptions, it will not have the
sales price. It tells you what's been built and what your impact on the
roads are.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Sales prices are recorded
at the tax assessor's office.
MR. VARNADOE: Yes.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay.
MR. V ARNADOE: The other comment I'd like to make is that
the developer's contribution agreement by and of itself is a public
private partnership to accelerate the -- the road. Especially Oil Well
Road, a road on which the county has a problem now at the west end.
The level of service on that road is A or B but the -- at that intersection
we know we have a problem. And this is an attempt for -- by the
developer and the county to accelerate those improvements from
2012, 2015, to 2007, nine time frame.
The -- Mark was asking about the -- there is a requirement that in
the Growth Management Plan RLSA policies I think he was referring
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to that -- that you should not approve an SRA unless the roads that are
served; that is, the roads on which it has access -- direct access, are an
acceptable level of service under the concurrency management
system. I guess to say the other way, if there's a problem, you
shouldn't do it. I think you heard Mr. Perry testify that that road is at
A or B at the present time, and so I think we meet that policy.
But go ahead. I'm ready to go with questions now, wherever
we want to go.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: The question I had asked Mr.
Perry, for the record, was not the road, it was the intersection. So -- as
far as the Regional Planning Council sheets that were provided to us --
and I'm starting in the staff report, and it begins with a staff
assessment under B, which is affordable housing. And I wanted to
understand from -- is Cormac still here? Oh, good.
From your side of it, you're going to put up a series of different
values of affordable housing. Do you know what price ranges you're
going to be using to meet those values?
MR. V ARNADOE: Under today's dollars, I do.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay.
MR. V ARNADOE: The -- it's all the -- the state rule, 9J2.048
Florida Administrative Code, says you use the Collier County median
household income and then -- which is -- for 2004, 2005 was $63,300.
And so the very low you -- would be those who make less than 50
percent of that median income. And then for rental housing -- and I'm
going from memory now -- it would be monthly payments that do not
exceed 30 percent of their income. And you have to subtract utilities
from that so that that's -- that would be the -- the standard.
For the low, it runs from 50 to 80 percent of the median
household income, same standards. As far as for sale housing in the
low or in the moderate, it is -- you go through a machination where
they're not paying more than 30 percent for the monthly mortgage
payment, including taxes and utilities. And if you'll give me a minute,
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I'll see what else is in there.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Well, I just -- what I want to make
sure is, are you intending to meet the county's definition for those
categories as it evolves whether -- starting today forward? Meaning I
know we're talking about today's dollars now, but as that definition
changes and the ranges change consistent with the county's policies
for affordable -- we don't even call it that. We call it workforce
housing now. Will you be meeting those standards?
MR. VARNADOE: We'll be meeting the state standards. And I
assume the county uses the same standards, and if they do, yes.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: That's what -- I was going to ask
Cormac that.
MR. V ARNADOE: So what happens, of course, is if the median
income goes up, what they can afford goes up; if mortgage rates go
down, what they can afford goes up; if mortgage rates go up, what
they can afford goes down. So it's a -- it's kind of an evolving -- and
then moderate income, to finish, Mr. Strain, is from 80 to 120 percent
of the median household income.
So if you took the $63,300 and start, you know, multiplying that
out, you can see in each of those categories what the price ranges
would be or the rental amounts they could afford each month.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: You -- I think Anita said that these
will be scattered throughout the town. Do you have -- from what I
could see in the FlAM, three builders in there that apparently you're
selling -- somehow buildings blocks to or Del Webb, Pulte, and
DiV osta. And I'm familiar with their products, they're not generally
affordable housing. How are you enforcing this rule on them?
I mean since they're going to be building it, you guys aren't doing
the construction, you've got builders involved, so how are the builders
-- how is this being set up?
MR. VARNADOE: This will be a requirement of the DR!. The
-- the very low and low -- most -- half of the low is going to be rental
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June 2, 2005
housing, which is obviously very easy to control, as you -- if you have
-- you have control with that over a period of time.
The other housing will be of -- be required to price enough of that
housing initially so that it will meet the standards of the -- of the state.
We -- there's actually four neighborhoods in there, Mr. Strain. TND
neighborhood downtown, and then obviously as you can see a walk
community and then there's a Del Webb community and then there's
more of a traditional single-family community.
So that's -- that's -- one of the ways we get that absorption is it's
not just one entity, it's -- it's basically four separate neighborhoods
being developed at the same time.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: The restrictions on resale that have
to go with affordable housing in order to retain the affordableness over
a certain period of time, were those being imposed on your builders or
your buyers in those particular units?
MR. VARNADOE: Weare looking into it. We don't have the
same ability to restrain the resale because we are into a density bonus
situation or having public funds used in the housing. Weare looking
at several alternatives to try to keep investors and speculators out of
that and to get them into the right hands, but there is -- there are some
legal constraints on restraining alienation over some lengthy period of
time.
Plus the fact practically -- with regard to moderate housing, if
you get somebody in that house that qualifies, I have some personal
problems, I think we have some legal problems with telling that
person that it's -- after some reasonable point in time, they can't
capitalize on probably the biggest investment they got and move up to
a higher priced house.
But how we're kind of handling that is that we're bringing
affordable housing on at least proportionately to the nonresidential
development. So that if ten percent of -- are retail office, then we'll
have to have at least ten percent or more of our affordable housing
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June 2, 2005
units in place. So there will always be -- should always be some
affordable housing units coming -- coming on the pipeline.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: But at this point you're only telling
us that you're going to meet the aspect, so you can more or less
guarantee you'll meet the aspects of the affordable housing price
ranges for the quantities that you're talking about, the initial sale.
MR. V ARNADOE: That's correct.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Is that a fair statement?
MR. V ARNADOE: That's correct.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: So that means as a speculator -- I
know you don't want speculators, but as legal as you can't control
things, you can't control someone speculating either.
MR. V ARNADOE: No, sir.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: If I went out there and wanted to
buy one and I happen to qualify for the moderate but the next year I
wanted to sell it for the value of that -- if this thing hits and is -- like
every other development in Collier County, is a big success, I could
double or triple my money and walk out of there and there's no
affordable housing.
MR. VARNADOE: Weare -- as I told you, we are looking at
different aspects of how to address that issue, Mr. Strain. And
whether they are -- there is some time component on their ability to
resale that is controlling the price for one or two years to keep the
Mark Strain investor speculator out of there or -- that's the one we're
really looking at hard for the moderate housing.
And low income we probably have a greater ability to put deed
restrictions for a longer period of time because we're probably selling,
frankly, at below market values, so that gives us some necessary
nexus, if you would, to put some restrictions on it.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I know that I -- you could
probably answer some other things, but if you don't mind, I was
wondering if Cormac could comment on some way that would help
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regulate the resale so that we can assure that there's going to be some
afford housing there more than just the first day that it's sold.
MR. GIBLIN: Sure. For the record Cormac Giblin, Housing and
Grants Manager, Collier County.
I've had several meetings with the applicant on this -- in this
regard, and I've shared with them the models that the county uses
when we put deed restrictions on affordability requirements --
affordability requirements on the affordable units that we approve
through our affordable housing density bonus program. I've also
shared with them some of our second mortgage paperwork, that we
can put a second mortgage on the home that would discourage the
flipping or the cashing out of houses over time.
It -- as Mr. Varnadoe said, though, it is problem -- problematic.
It's easy to do those things and legal to do those things when the home
is being sold at a -- at a loss or at a benefit. And so those are easy to
implement over the very low income and the low income units. It's
this thousand units of moderate priced housing that we may need -- we
need to get a little bit more creative with on how to maintain its
affordability over time.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Cormac, my concern is that while
the applicant here today may have good intentions on providing
affordable housing the way it needs to be provided, it's also going to
be sold, various parts of this project, to other people where the
controls may not be as concise as they are being talked about here
today.
I think the -- from what I could understand, the intent of
affordable housing is it's maintained as affordable housing over a
period of time for the benefit of the county. I would certainly like,
some time before this meeting is over, to get input from you on
something that can be worded so that we could be assured that the
chain of events, more or less, falls down to the fact that there's some
control on this initial affordable housing so that it stays affordable
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housing over whatever period of time is normally afforded to such
thing. Is that something that you could probably think about today?
MR. GIBLIN: Well, it's something we've been trying to work on
for the past several weeks and months. One of the ideas I -- I
suggested earlier was even a community land trust could own the
parcels of land that the affordable homes, the moderate priced homes
are built on. That would maintain its affordability over time. But
these are things that really the developer needs to research and decide
which one fits his development model the best.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: But, Cormac, by the time
everybody leaves here today I'd like -- this needs -- this should be
resolved and be part of a recommendation so that the BCC can
consider it. And I'm not hearing any recommendation from you, other
than the fact you've been talking about it for two months and have
accomplished nothing. So maybe we can help you accomplish
something if you could help us with some ideas.
MR. GIBLIN: My recommendation would be that at least for the
low income and the very low income, we place a deed restriction on
them, similar to the one that we use currently. As far as the upper
income ones, I would have to defer to someone with a better legal
training than I as to the legality and exactly how that can be
accomplished.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I know just the person for that.
Mr. White, do you have a suggestion?
MR. WHITE: I can't tell you how to draw a conclusion about a
set of facts and reach a legally sufficient outcome, other than your --
this commission to take a vote on it, and if a majority sees it one way,
then I guess that's legally sufficient for purposes we're talking about.
But I don't know if George has anything he wants to add to it or not.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Well, I wasn't looking at you to
tell us -- what Cormac I think alluded to, he didn't know how to
practically place a restriction on a moderate income affordable
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housing, make sure it retains that moderate income level through a
period of time.
MR. WHITE: We do it all the time in different agreements that
we implement through his department. Sometimes they're done with
annual monitoring and reporting by the folks who are the occupants or
renters. And -- and I'm not sure exactly what the facts are going to be
in this case, but --
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. I appreciate what you aren't
able to help us with. Thank you.
MR. WHITE: Glad to be of no assistance.
MR. V ARNADOE: And, Mark, I think that you -- you heard
from Cormac, and he's absolutely right. I think the extent that you
have county money or some public money in it or you're selling below
market, like a low and a very low, we can -- in a rental, we can
control.
The problem I'm having is a very real one, and that is the legal
aspects of how we're going to do it. And as I told you, we have a
couple -- we have two or three options that we're looking at. One is a
-- an option to buy back or to have -- for a one year period or to have
the profit be payable to the seller or maybe to this Collier County
Housing Authority that the -- that they just set up here in the last
couple of weeks, couple months.
The other one is -- is, you know, for a short period of time --
which I think that's as far as we can go, a couple years -- is just to try
to control the -- or have a restriction that controls the amount that the
person can sell it for, which will take us out of the investor speculator
situation. Because if you say for two years you can only get a five
percent -- probably the wrong word -- inflation factor each year in
your sales price, plus any improvements you make, I don't think you're
going to have people that are speculating in the real estate market
getting into that. I think you're going to be selling those units to
people that you want to have in them.
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But beyond that time period, legally, when it's a marketplace, a
market priced product, it -- I don't know any legal way to restrict it, to
be honest with you.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Mr. Schiffer?
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Yeah. One way to do it is make
some more of them low. But I want to share with Mark this was a
really important point. And I think to come here with no way to
guarantee that the affordable housing units will stay affordable
housing could be a problem.
MR. VARNADOE: Well, let me tell you -- you know, we are
mandated by -- you know, the state law is to have affordable housing.
You guarantee them 15 years of affordability on rental income, on
rental properties, and the state law on for sale property is that it only
be affordable at the time you sell it. I mean that's -- that's the rule.
MR. WHITE: And to embellish the answers before, what you're
dealing with is a circumstance where you're trying to assure, by
potentially agreement, a circumstance that a court would review later
in time and not find that there had been a restraint on alienation. Kind
of a preclusion of sale.
And what you'd be looking to do and why I think Mr. Varnadoe
and I, as well, and other attorneys who've kind of walked across this
ground find it difficult is because you're attempting to balance,
essentially, what are two very important and competing public policy
issues. The idea that you provide affordable housing is, of course,
imperative.
But on the other hand, the notion that somehow you preclude or
restrain people from selling property that they otherwise were entitled
to purchase and have a right to sell it -- at whatever price, subj ecting
that to an agreement that constrains it where you don't have some
other good public policy reason to do so is -- is a difficult future to
envision. So, we start the process by getting this commission to make
a recommendation to our Board indicating that they believe that the
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balancing of those public policy issues is one that ought be struck in
favor of affordable housing, even in a circumstance where it may be
possible that someone could down the road challenge, i.e. we cannot
today guarantee, that there wouldn't be a judge in a court that'd find in
fact what we had done was an impermissible restraint on alienation.
Now, that's probably more legalese and analysis than -- than most
of you care to have to consider as part of your recommendation today,
but since we've gone down this ground this far, I thought it was
important to share with you for -- for the interests of those and the
record that will flow from today's hearing. I hope it helps.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I have one question of Cormac.
COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Thank you.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Cormac, you've got a program that
seems to handle affordable housing really well. What would it take to
bring these 1900 units into your program?
MR. GIBLIN: By program, you mean--
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Your management of affordable
housing. You seem to have ways to keep affordable housing alive,
keep it going for as long as it's supposed to go for. How do you do
that? And if you -- whatever way you do it, why don't you just take
these 1900 into your program, if that's possible?
MR. GIBLIN: Sure. We record a deed restriction against each
unit that is built as affordable housing, guaranteeing its affordability,
capping its appreciation rate, and instituting a penalty if you sell it
before the end of that affordability period.
That's -- that's permissible -- I think what we're hearing is that's
permissible when there is a -- some kind of subsidy through the way
of a density bonus or some other monetary subsidy to the buyer, in --
which can be implemented on these low and very low income units in
Ave Maria.
It's those thousand moderate income units that really don't have
the -- the benefit applied to them that is cumbersome in trying to
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impose that type of restriction.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Unless there was something added
to delay impact fees on those moderate income units --
MR. GIBLIN: Of course.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- then all of the sudden you've
created a nexus to allow them to be brought into your program.
MR. GIBLIN: Of course.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Ms. Caron?
COMMISSIONER CARON: Because half of the low income
houses are going to be owner oc -- owned, not just rental units, so why
is it easier to do it on the low and not the moderate? I'm not getting --
MR. V ARNADOE: Because with the low, Ms. Caron, the --
there will be -- we'll be selling those at below market value, so we
have a rational nexus for -- for restraining the -- the amount of
appreciation that can -- but with the moderate we just don't have the
that. They are going to be selling at market rates.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Mr. Adelstein?
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: Why, under those
circumstance, where you are actually selling the homes at less than the
actual value, can't you put a statement on the deed where the home
must be owned by that owner for a period of say three years or five
years or whatever figure that would operate, because you are giving
them something actually that they cannot buy, except for their status
in society? I would think that would be perfectly legal.
MR. V ARNADOE: I think you can do that. I think the better
approach really is rather than tell the guy he can't get move if he gets
transferred or loses his job or does something else is to simply cap for
five years what the -- what the appreciation -- and that's not -- that's
not a problem with the low.
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: The problem is ifhe sells it,
you lose the prospective of what the next buyer can do. My point
would be that if we went into this situation and we said you couldn't
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June 2, 2005
sell it for five years, however, we can pay you the difference in what it
is worth now against what you bought it but you will transfer the deed
-- the deed will stay in your name rather than in the name of a buyer.
MR. V ARNADOE: Tell him what your experience is.
MR. GIBLIN: I'll tell that the program that we operate now
actually operates in the reverse of that.
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: Okay. What's that?
MR. GIBLIN: If he sells it before the affordability period is
over, for an amount greater than the capped appreciation rate, that
money -- half that money comes back to the county as a penalty. And
we then use that money to assist in the creation of a new affordable
unit.
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: But the answer is that home is
gone.
MR. GIBLIN: That home is gone, but we've gotten the -- the
input of money to try to create a new one.
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: The idea in this area was to
keep those affordable housing in the hands of affordable people --
people who need affordable housing. And I would think that to just
give them their profit and maintain the deed in your name or in Ave
Maria's name to sell to another person who is in the affordable
housing need, would make it much better than worrying about the few
thousand bucks you're going to gain over what you can do by
maintaining the house in the hands of the right people.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Other questions on the affordable
housing issue?
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I do, on the issue.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Mr. Schiffer?
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Cormac, have you analyzed this
as to -- of the workers that will be working in this place, how many
affordable housing units would be needed and how many would be
provided? Is that an equal match? In other words, my point is that the
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workers are going to be paid wages that would essentially make them
need affordable housing. Is there enough affordable housing in the
town to provide them housing?
MR. GIBLIN: I can tell you I haven't done the analysis, but on a
comparative basis, this development has -- has done much more than
any other DRI we've reviewed in the past. The state -- the state
requires them to go through the methodology, southwest Florida
Regional Planning Council, basically, throughout the methodology for
any DRI's reviewed in this area and is -- is happy, as is our
department, with what they have come up with.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: But my question really is, is
there going to be -- this is going to put a demand on affordable
housing. Because 10,000 jobs, plus 10,000 -- there's 2,000 units, that's
about five -- I mean if the ratio is 80 percent, then there's four -- four
people living in each of those units. Which means this could be a -- a
big need for affordable housing that this town could cause. I mean I'm
sure they're doing more than everybody else, but this is a whole new
town, a whole new strata of jobs. Is this going to cause a problem?
MR. GIBLIN: I really can't answer that question specifically.
But we're looking at a new town where at least -- about 20 percent of
all the units will be affordable in some way, and I -- and I still believe
that that is a significant commitment. Are they going to have a house
for everyone who needs it? I can't answer that.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: All right. Thanks.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Cormac, the only thing you don't
know is that if these are bought and sold, turned around, turned over
pretty quickly, you don't have the affordability there. And that's the
only puzzle I think we've been trying to understand. Thank you.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: We're heading toward our afternoon
break, and I don't want to open up any new topics. Before break, is
there any further question on affordable housing? There are none,
there's no time like the present. We'll break and reconvene at 3:00.
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(A brief recess was taken.)
COMMISSIONER BUDD: We'll call the Planning Commission
back to order.
And before we resume our questions, I just wanted to follow up
on an issue that came to light about 40 minutes ago. And it's taken the
past 40 minutes for me to calm down so I can respond somewhat
calmly and rationally. And that is the realization that eight out of the
nine of the Planning Commissioners don't have this binder that Mr.
Strain had.
I can say honestly that right now I'm just extremely irritated,
having overcome the state of mind a few minutes ago where I was just
flat pissed off. I can't imagine the insult to our integrity as Volunteer
Planning Commissioners that we're involved in a process where we
volunteer our time and try to convey, try to articulate an opinion on
behalf of the community, and we're kept in the dark and covered with
crap.
This is the largest, most complicated DR! ever to come through
Collier County. And if there was ever a proj ect that needs to be done
right, this is it, and we're just not even given a whole substantial
section. Now, on the flip side, I don't think there's anything in there
that I would have found that Mr. Strain, in his incredibly meticulous
fashion hasn't already found. So I don't think there was any oversight
or any lack of due diligence. But in all the time I've served on the
Planning Commission, I'm glad this happened in the last few months
of my term and not in the first few, or I would have quit a long time
ago.
I'm not in a state of mind to reverse my opinion or to not render
an opinion on this thing, but I just wanted to express my extreme
disappointment and what I think is an insult and really a question to
our integrity that in some point in the future, it's not going to be
offered as blatant evidence of a rubber stamp opinion by this Board.
And I hope we can overcome that appearance. I don't think it's true.
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So now that I've had my say, are there any other questions?
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Let me just say something about
that. Ray, are we going to get the book or something today? I mean I
wouldn't -- Mark is right, I really shouldn't review his marked up
book. Is there an unmarked up book that we could pass around?
Before we assume that it is no problem, I wouldn't mind seeing what
is there.
MR. BELLOWS: For the record, Ray Bellows. The --
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Anybody in the room?
MR. BELLOWS: The omission of the ADA document to you
was not a purposeful act. It was -- there were packets put together, for
some reason mailing didn't get done right. Mr. Strain picked up his
packet and got all the information. My staff is working on putting
together or finding copies that weren't dropped off to you, and we'll --
should have some, if not all, today.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: But is there a copy in the room
that hasn't been written on or --
MR. WHITE: May I address that point, Mr. Chairman?
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Yes, sir.
MR. WHITE: I don't believe there's any real concern with one or
more of the planning commissioners reviewing Commissioner Strain's
book, even with the markups in it. The problem comes if you were to
review those things outside this room, for example, and have a
discussion about them. This is no different than being at a meeting
somewhere else when two or more of the planning commissioners are
present and one of them makes a statement. So long as whatever the
results of hearing that statement are debated in an open forum such as
this, then there is no Sunshine violation.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Thank you.
COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: My problem is that the EAC staff
report had some recommendations, and we're supposedly going to be
forwarding those recommendations, and I don't know what they are.
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MR. BELLOWS: We'll get you a copy of that.
MR. V ARNADOE: Mr. Midney, the EAC staff
recommendations were the same recommendations that were in the
wetlands section of the Regional Planning Council staff report, from
best of my recollection. I'll get somebody to check that right now.
COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: You mean they just adopted
everything without any changes?
MR. BELLOWS: This is the staffreport.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Thank you. Mr. Strain, are you
prepared to move forward in your questions?
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Well, a couple sentences, maybe.
George, this isn't really about affordable housing, but it is. In the
Southwest Regional Planning Council report, on page IA2 and IA4,
and it talks about applicant -- applicant's commitments, and then the
staff assessment. And in both cases it says students are not permitted
to live off campus. Thus, the applicant states that the dorms are
counted towards the affordable housing for people with low income.
Now, I thought I heard previously that is not true, and I think this
is probably why the question came up originally. Is it -- are you -- I
mean is this wrong, what was written in the Southwest Regional
Planning Council report?
MR. V ARNADOE: Students are required to live in the dorms,
unless they live with their parents, but those are not -- those dorm
rooms we are not counting towards the 1900 affordable housing units
that we've been discussing.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. Just so you -- for the record
then, because that -- that does say just the opposite in this report, so --
the next question I have is for Mr. Scott, ifhe's available.
Don, the Southwest Regional Planning Council report had a
couple references to future conditions with the project that are found
on page ID 16 and ID 17. And, basically -- it's a short paragraph and it
reads, in a memo dated February 9th, 2005, FDOT offered final
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comments regarding the Ave Maria RI. In the memo, FDO states --
FDOT states the documentation submitted by the applicant for
question one, 20 -- transportation. In the town of A ve Maria
development of regional impact does not provide sufficient
information or quantify the impact with project traffic on the state
highway system. The two most significant points of deficiency are the
estimentation of project generated traffic -- traffic volumes on SHS
roadway segments impacted by this project -- I'm sorry -- and the level
of service analysis documentation provided is not adequate to estimate
the anticipated impacts of the project on the SHS to a reasonable
degree of accuracy. And therefore, they recommended approval
conditional on actual traffic impacts of the town of Ave Maria and
monitoring.
Are you familiar with what they're referring to when they're
talking about the state highway system in the impacts?
MR. SCOTT: If it's referring to I75, maybe, but not the rest of
the system.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: The reason I'm asking is
because in previous discussions with Hank Fishkind, we found out
that the impacts on the state system is not factored into the fiscal
neutrality of the economic model.
MR. SCOTT: But it is from analysis that we do, you know,
throughout the system. Besides the interstate system.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. Well, these two things that
the state asks for, the two most significant points of deficiency, have
you addressed those or have you researched these? Have you
responded to those in any manner whatsoever, or do you -- I mean can
you recall doing anything about them?
MR. SCOTT: Well, I -- I know that we had raised some issues
previously. I guess they might have had correspondence with the
applicant. I did go to the RPC meeting, and they didn't -- they -- they
didn't raise any issues at that point. I believe, at that point they were
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satisfied with what they got.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. Well, there are going to be
-- they did request monitoring of the SHS at 50, 75, and 100 percent
build out levels. How is that implemented? Or has it been
implemented? Are you doing that or are they doing that?
MR. SCOTT: I do that on everything besides the interstate
system.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. Back to their point then.
How does that get done?
MR. SCOTT: Well, I would assume that they would be doing it
on the interstate system. I guess if -- if they don't, then maybe I
should be doing it, but -- I don't have control on setting the level of
service on the interstate system. That's why we do everything besides
the interstate system, but --
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Well, Don, since this is a request
during this review and it's in this document and it was a
recommendation or it was a statement, I can't even say -- well, it did
say recommendation. How -- how does this get to a point where
someone now says, okay, we're going to do that recommendation? Do
you tell the state, does the state tell the applicant, do we tell the
applicant, how does that happen?
MR. SCOTT: I think that we can -- when we talk about, you
know, what we're doing for monitoring and -- and the time frames that
we're looking at, we can get that data from them and pass that on to
the state. Besides what we can provide ourselves.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: So, if we -- if we were to bring
that up as a stipulation, it's something that can be monitored and done?
MR. SCOTT: Yeah.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. That was my question.
COMMISSIONER MURRAY: I have a question, if I can.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Mr. Murray.
COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Mr. Scott, I guess similarly on
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page ten, on item G, the last sentence there, it -- therefore, in the event
the external trips counted entering and exiting the DRA (sic) exceeds
the predicted number by ten percent or more at the end of phase one, a
reanalysis of the DR! shall be conducted, using most up-to-date
transportation model. That would be something that would fall under
your purview again?
MR. SCOTT: I don't believe that's a stipulation that -- and
correct me if I'm wrong -- that ended up in the final recommendation
by the RPC. But obviously I'm going to have that data if we exceed
that. I mean essentially going to have year by year data or even could
have daily, if we wanted to get to that level. I think that was a
recommendation, but I don't believe that was a stipulation that was
provided at the end.
COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Okay. But they do -- you do
take note of it, in any event.
MR. SCOTT: Yeah, yes, I do.
COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Okay. Thank you.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Don, I'm trying to -- while you're
standing there, I wanted to catch a few things that -- so you don't have
to keep popping back up and down.
Under the transportation department review, which was your
department, you stated that all significantly impacted road segments
will experience an acceptable level of service by 2008 with the traffic
added by the proposed town of Ave Maria.
So in the next, approximately, two years, three maybe, Oil Well
Road's going to be acceptable in all those intersections that they're
having significant impact on, you feel they're going to be improved?
MR. SCOTT: Well, they're not -- I mean their impact starts,
what, next year sometime? It's not going to be at the level that Oil
Well will be failing. And also we're doing -- you know, obviously I
assume Immokalee Road improvements, because it's under
construction right now, the intersection improvements with that.
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Essentially, the road all the way back to 175.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. And that's -- how
contingent are those improvements on the generation of impact fee
revenues from the absorptions and sales proj ected by Ave Maria?
MR. SCOTT: Okay. Besides Oil Well Road itself, the
intersection and everything else, that's all funded, doesn't -- I don't
care about their impact fees at that point. Oil Well Road widening is
contingent probably -- let's say beyond the Orange Tree area on the
impact fees and -- but obviously their impact on that section that--
which is low traffic right now, by 2008 we're okay, obviously is more
towards the future.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Got a few more to go.
MR. SCOTT: Okay.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Oil Well has -- before you get to
Ave Maria, if you're traveling east, I believe, you're going to hit this
Big Cypress receiving -- this Big Cypress --
MR. SCOTT: Big Cypress is the one you were referring to
earlier.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Yes.
MR. SCOTT: Yes.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: That's larger than Ave Maria in
land mass, from what I understand.
MR. SCOTT: It's very large and remains to be seen what it will
be developed out to, but --
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: But it's developable?
MR. SCOTT: Yeah.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: And what I understand from a
comment I heard from staff -- I don't remember who, one of the
engineers -- was that it could be developed from anywhere between 20
thousand to 60 thousand homes.
MR. SCOTT: That was a reference that was made previously. I
don't know what was assumed in the build out study for that, for that
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level of growth, but --
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: That's two to six times Ave Maria.
MR. SCOTT: Uh-huh.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: How is it -- I mean what's the
capacity of Oil Well Road? If they think it's bad now, and Fred
Thomas thinks he's going to drive down Oil Well Road to get here
quicker, he may not want to do that in the future.
MR. SCOTT: Obviously I'm concerned by those numbers, too.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Wow.
MR. SCOTT: It hasn't been approved, let's put it that way. You
know, we're planning on four laning at this point, but I -- but by the
end of the year, I'll have the new model and can change the design to
six lane, if necessary, to six lane. You know, I deal with it as it
comes, but that's -- that's what we're trying to -- you know, we're -- I'm
not only modeling for 2030 now, but also modeling the build out to try
to address some of those future things that you're talking about, too.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: You had said at one time that the
standard for the county now is to six lane, not four lane. Is that still
the standard?
MR. SCOTT: It is. But -- and I won't say that it won't change by
the end of -- by the end of the year, it might change. When I look at
the numbers, I mean I -- I want -- you have to have some justification
back towards it, too. I don't want to say, hey, it's six lane lanes
because, you know -- I think it's going to grow, too, but I'm going to
need the numbers that go with it.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: What's the cost of Immokalee
Road? I mean -- not -- Oil Well Road, what's the total cost?
MR. SCOTT: It's around 56 million.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Where are the funds -- I mean the
-- the applicant's only paying impact fees as it moves along, and we're
going to have to bond the rest. But how are you paying -- where are
the funds -- are other parts of the county being reduced in their, say,
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immediate need of road expansion to put money out here to get this
done?
MR. SCOTT: Well, you can -- you can only -- most of our
funding comes from impact fees, so I'll just specifically talk about
impact fees. You can only go in that -- take money from that district
or an adjacent district. So you're not talking about south Naples being
able to use impact fees out in that area. So you can only talk about
that, you know, specific area for those impact fees.
Obviously there's other roads in there that are also in the
program. We're starting the phase of Everglades, things like that. The
-- proj ecting out, based on what we're getting in impact fees, based on
our gas taxes, based on everything else, we have funding to do that
within the five years, and other -- other projects, too.
One of the other things that we will be going after out here is
grant funding to try to offset some of it. But that's not guaranteed, but
that is another area of funding that will be -- because the Growth
Management Bill provides some more funding that we can go after,
compete with other counties to get, and we will try to do that.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. That's what I've got for a
minute or two.
COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I have a question, Don.
MR. SCOTT: Okay.
COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: If Ave Maria town grows to be a
population of 50 thousand people instead of the 25 thousand we're
thinking now, and since it will have invested for transportation, will
that preclude other developments in that area?
MR. SCOTT: Well, it's hard to answer everything around the
area developable-wise. At some point will some development get
stopped or have to wait for other improvements? That would probably
happen at some point. Say all the way on Immokalee towards 41.
The internal-- I mean -- there's assumptions built into the whole
thing. You know, internal capture rate, things like that. As long as
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they -- as -- is built as planned, we're -- you know, we're looking at it
as okay.
Now, we did model lower internal capture rate, trying to look at
some worst case scenarios, conservative look at things. Some of the
things we were talking about in the financial model, why certain
numbers were used, it was more conservative than using what we
really -- you know, what -- we don't speculate that might happen,
versus using, you know, some numbers that might be built over time
that are -- we don't really know about yet.
COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I can even see a situation where
traffic -- traffic going from Immokalee to the coast could be strangled
even more if there's such a bottleneck because of all of the cars that
are entering from Ave Maria Town that we won't be able to get around
it at all to go to Naples.
MR. SCOTT: Well, in some of the -- you know, my big picture
of this is if -- if you take all the developable land east of 951 and we
made it all residential housing, our network isn't going to handle it. So
the -- the one positive aspect of -- of this community is having internal
capture, having commercial, having services out there that not
everybody has to come into urban area. Immokalee area itself is a rule
of economic -- area of economic concern. I believe that even with the
announcement it's helped in that area, but beyond that -- you know,
like the airport area, some of those things, commercial jobs, trying to
get more of a hub so you really do get to a split commute is where
we're trying to get to.
Obviously, when Big Cypress comes, if they built just 60
thousand units and didn't have some of the other things we're talking
about now, that is -- that's a very big concern that -- if they just built
housing. That's what I'm looking at from -- trying to really get to
attraction areas that everybody that's out there doesn't have to come to
the coast for services or jobs.
I mean as much as all the other things, you know, I'm sure people
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out there don't appreciate they have to drive all the way into town for
pharmacy, but that's not really a road aspect thing unless they're going
during the p.m. or the a.m. peak. Our problem right now is everybody
coming in this area to work. Try to get jobs out in that area, split the
commute, that's what I'm trying go embrace, trying to move towards.
COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Thank you very much.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Don, I have one more question.
Soon -- I think maybe the middle of June or if not, the next meeting --
the Orange Tree PUD, I believe, is coming in for an amendment. Not
too long ago, we approved -- I think it's called the Orange Blossom
PUD, which was kind of part of Orange Tree.
MR. SCOTT: Yeah.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: It was, I think, 940 units, with
some commercial. That one was right on Oil Well Road.
MR. SCOTT: Right.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: The Orange Tree PUD straddles
Oil Well Road. Orange Blossom hasn't been built yet. Now that
we've reserved the right on Oil Well for Ave Maria, how will that
affect the project life of Orange Blossom in -- say they were to come
out a year from now or -- it's going to take a while to get their
permitting, but say about the same time A ve Maria got going with its
first couple years of sales now and this Orange Blossom starts coming
out to come in for building permits and things, would they be given
permits on Oil Well Road.
MR. SCOTT: Orange Blossom Ranch, in at least the area we're
talking about Oil Well being widened, some of the other things, I
believe, is probably -- you know, I -- when you're talking about later
phases of it, I think that's okay. Increase in density in Orange Tree, I
don't know at this point. It's -- you know, obviously take them as it
comes in and looks at the -- the levels of concurrency. I believe the
Orange Tree actually is being delayed a little bit longer but -- I know
it was on a previous board agenda.
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COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Yeah. It's--
MR. SCOTT: It's not ready.
MR. BELLOWS: Well, there's -- for the record, Ray Bellows.
There's two Orange Tree amendments. One is for the Collier
County Utilities Department, that's on track coming up.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay.
MR. SCOTT: But, yeah, the other one --
MR. BELLOWS: The other one is going probably after October
or later.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Thank you, Don. That's all I have
of Don.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Okay. Moving on.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: My next question gets into a
couple water questions. This one is under the wastewater treatment,
and it's about South Florida Water Management District. And it says
-- it's in the south -- south -- Southwest Regional Planning Council
report. One of the district's main concerns relates to their concern that
there may not be sufficient water available in the lower Tamiami
aquifer to meet the proj ect demands. The district states that the
applicant may need to evaluate other water supply sources as the
project approaches build out.
How have you responded to that, George? Do you know? I
mean I've read your report, but I wasn't sure what you're planning to
do, besides draw water from the aquifer.
MR. V ARNADOE: I'm not being nonresponsive, I'm trying to
get somebody that can respond.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I understand.
MR. PAGER: My name is Craig Pager with Wilson Miller. I am
a Senior Project Manager with a specialty in water and wastewater
.
englneenng.
In response to your question, the requirements in permitting the
consumptive use of water for the water treatment plants require the
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modeling of the aquifers from which the water's withdrawn. And in
the process of permitting the consumptive use, the applicant is
required to prove that the water is available and that it has no
detrimental impact on surrounding areas.
That has been done for the first phase of the water treatment
plant. And as additional expansions occur, that same modeling will
occur as additional requests for additional water consumption is
requested.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: But as far as alternatives go, you
haven't come up with any?
MR. PAGER: Well, should -- should it be inadequate, the
alternative would be to go to deeper saline aquifers where, instead of
having freshwater as the source, the water would be brackish in nature
and a reverse osmosis method of treatment would be utilized for
producing the potable water demands.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: How would you get rid of the
grime?
MR. PAGER: With deep injection wells.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Down deeper, I would suppose?
MR. PAGER: Yes.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Three thousand feet, something--
MR. PAGER: Typically, in that process -- and this is a -- the
same process that Collier County uses for their reverse osmosis water
treatment plants is that the concentrated or the reject water is disposed
through deep injection wells into deeper aquifers in the Boulder Zone,
where the water quality is such that it's really of little value because
it's so brackish. And so that's a -- an accepted method of concentrate
disposal for reverse osmosis technology. And, again, that's the same
thing that con -- Collier County is doing in both their north and south
water treatment plants.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: You said you did modeling?
MR. PAGER: We did not do that. CH2M Hill is the engineering
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consultant that did that work.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Are they here today?
MR. PAGER: They're not here today, no, they're not.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Do you know anybody in your
company that was involved in dealing with them on the water model?
MR. PAGER: I was the coordinator with them as a consultant.
And I did not personally do the modeling, but that was a requirement
that they had in order to get the treatment plant permitted. I'm
familiar with the process and what they needed to go through.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Do you know what they used for
data to understand the historical modeling?
MR. PAGER: No, I don't.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Do you know ifpump package
data was available to them?
MR. PAGER: I know that there are some existing wells that--
that were in existence. I don't know if they used that information or
not.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. That's all I've got on the
water question so far. Thank you.
MR. PAGER: Okay. Welcome.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Miss Caron?
COMMISSIONER CARON: Yeah. Let's go back to this whole
general water issue. Please tell me and explain to me that there is a
reason we shouldn't expect the same problems out of the Ave Maria
utility company as we're getting now with the Orange Tree utility.
MR. V ARNADOE: The -- I think the -- the difference is that
you have is -- I want to say the people involved, and that's very true.
The companies that are involved. But this is a, you know, a utility
company that's going to have to produce in order for the town to grow.
If it doesn't have the capacity and it doesn't have the water and
wastewater treatment facilities that -- that are needed, then we're not
going to be able to grow. And, therefore, it's going to be in -- in the
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June 2, 2005
owner's best interest to make sure that the utility is -- is functioning
properly and is providing the facilities as needed.
COMMISSIONER CARON: In here it talks about special best
management practices as it relates to the water management system.
What are special about --
MR. V ARNADOE: Ms. Caron, where are you, please?
COMMISSIONER CARON: Let me try to find it for you,
George.
MR. V ARNADOE: Are you in the Regional Planning Council
report?
COMMISSIONER CARON: Yeah.
MR. V ARNADOE: Under water management?
COMMISSIONER CARON: Yeah. But I'm not sure whether it's
under potable water or -- I shouldn't have written it down on a separate
sheet of paper.
MR. VARNADOE: Maybe we can go on, and if you find it, we
can come back to that.
COMMISSIONER CARON: Yeah, thanks.
MR. V ARNADOE: I don't want to -- I'm not trying to pressure
you, I'm just trying to get the -- some reference so I can answer the
question.
COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Well, Mr. Varnadoe, while she's
looking for that, perhaps I could ask a question relating to it. If the
utility, the water utility, is a separate entity and it appears that there's
no plan to introduce a desalinization plant at this point, which would
be a significant capital outlay, what means is there -- that should that
be determined, that there is a degradation of the water at the lower
Tamiami, what means is there of the capitalization, the funding to be
able to bring that on line? As you said, it's the hinge pin for the whole
thing, isn't it?
MR. V ARNADOE: It is. And when you've got $350 million
going into the first phase of A ve Maria, I think you can be assured that
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June 2, 2005
since the same owner's a utility company, they're going to find a way
to have water and wastewater service out there to cap -- recoup their
capital investment in the -- in the project, Mr. Murray.
COMMISSIONER MURRA Y: Yeah, but there's no -- there's no
actual plan at the moment, but I appreciate that, that that investment
would.
MR. VARNADOE: No. We think because of the -- the amount
of -- the permeated water withdrawal that we have now and the fact
that -- for irrigation and the fact that we're going to be using less water
than is authorized now in the development that we're going to have
sufficient water supplies in the area.
And don't forget that this owner has amazing other land --
amount of other land that's in proximity to this from which water
could be withdrawn, if we have a problem. So -- I just don't see that
as a real problem, I guess, is my point.
COMMISSIONER MURRA Y: I wanted to get that on the
record.
MR. V ARNADOE: Thank you.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: You just said something,
unfortunately, that forces me to ask another question. You said that
they'll be withdrawing less water. I earlier thought --
MR. V ARNADOE: No, no. Mark, let me -- I hope I was very
clear.
COMMISSIONER MURRA Y: At the inception.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. Let me hear it again then.
MR. VARNADOE: Okay. We have permits for X million
gallons of water per day.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Right.
MR. V ARNADOE: That's how much we can legally withdraw
today. Our utilization in the development will be less than that
amount. But I -- what I did not say was it's less than the amount we're
withdrawing on an average basis today, because I don't have that data.
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COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. That's more along what I
thought we had talked about earlier. And I think that pumpage data is
critical. And I do remember reviewing this week -- and I will --
tonight I will try to find it -- some documents provided to me that
isolated the South Florida Water Management consumptive use permit
to the farmlands in question for Ave Maria, and it was about -- that
one said about 30 million gallons.
What brought my question up was that in the other document, it
showed the existing pumpage was about 11 and that the proposed was
going to be 12.2 I was wondering how all those numbers fit together.
MR. V ARNADOE: I think we can answer. Alan can you
answer this? 11 million gallons per day and --
MR. REYNOLDS: Go back to your previous
question.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: In the DR!.
MR. REYNOLDS: George needed a break anyway, so it's time
for me to get up.
The 11 million gallons that are referenced in the DR! is that
portion of the overall permitted withdrawal that would apply to the
footprint of this town. There's a larger permit in place, I think that -- if
you'll recall, that I think is about 30.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: One I had found.
MR. REYNOLDS: Right.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Yeah.
MR. REYNOLDS: So 11 of that is the allocation that would be
proportionate to the footprint of Ave Maria. So what -- what George
is saying about the difference between what we're permitted to
withdraw and what we will actually consume is less than half of what
that allocation is.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: But if the 30 million applies to
areas outside the town of Ave Maria, then how do you know you're
not going to be using irrigation water outside the town for the other
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farmlands that would be permitted for that consumptive use?
MR. REYNOLDS: When we -- when we permit the
consumptive use for the town, there will be a new permit from the
water management district that will deal with the consumptive use for
the town.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: And how much will it reduce the
consumptive use and the balance of the farm fields that the permit for
the whole thing is for? Meaning the three million one.
MR. REYNOLDS: Well, again, if -- if the portion that has been
allocated to the footprint of the town is 11 million gallons, the actual
demand that we're projecting is about 42 percent of that at build out.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Your actual demand is 12.2,
including --
MR. REYNOLDS: Yeah.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- potable and irrigation.
MR. REYNOLDS: But we withdraw the water once, we use it
for potable, then we treat it, and then we use it for irrigation. So the
reduction is because we're reusing the water for irrigation purposes, as
opposed to withdrawing it for both potable and irrigation.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I will reread it. I didn't have a
question about it, but I guess by tomorrow I will. I thought that the
irrigation value that you purported at 5.8, I think it was, included the
use of effluent. So if it does, then the net is 5.8 and you add the 6.2 or
three, then you're at 12.2, which is your gross volume you intend to
use, which is more than what you're withdrawing now.
MR. REYNOLDS: You withdraw the water for potable purposes
and then you reuse it for irrigation. So it's withdrawn once.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: You're not going to use a hundred
percent of your irrigation water being effluent.
MR. REYNOLDS: We believe that it will be close to 100
percent, yes.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: So you won't need any more
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irrigation water, other than what you refined as effluent?
MR. REYNOLDS: That's -- that's what we believe will be the
case, maybe with a small supplement from the lakes.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Then your occupancy rate is going
to be a lot higher during off season to generate the effluent needed to
keep everything irrigated.
MR. REYNOLDS: I'm--
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: You've got a lower occupancy rate
on this project based on the off season. You have seasonal residents.
They're not there; they're not generating the effluent that you need to
irrigate, where are you going to get the irritation water from?
MR. REYNOLDS: Well, your irrigation demand goes down in
the summer when it rains.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Well, people leave about April or
March here.
MR. REYNOLDS: Mr. Strain, the point is this, is that under any
set of assessment, the -- the water that will actually be consumed by
this project is going to be a magnitude less than what is allowed to be
withdrawn today for the agricultural purposes. I'm not sure where--
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I -- I--
MR. REYNOLDS: -- where you're trying to go.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I haven't seen -- I'm trying to find
out where that -- where it says -- where your analysis shows that. I
understand what you're saying.
MR. REYNOLDS: Okay.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: But that's the
documentation I'm reading, and I will refine this question for
tomorrow.
MR. REYNOLDS: Okay.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Because we could spend the next
hour on it, and we're probably going to go back and forth.
MR. REYNOLDS: I think you'll find it in the section under
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June 2, 2005
water supply, where there is a table I think that you referred to earlier
that said here is the existing allocation of 11 million gallons. And then
over time, what will happen is that agricultural consumption will be
replaced by the consumption to provide the potable water as the
agriculture is phased out.
So then at the end of that period of time, the actual consumption
that you're going to have is going to be approximately half or give or
take some percentage of what you started with. That's -- that's why
we're saying that the -- the consumption is reduced.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay.
MR. REYNOLDS: And that's because we're able to -- we're
using a dual water system, and we're going to use the treated effluent
for irrigation.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. I'll certainly look at it.
Thank you.
COMMISSIONER MURRA Y: Mr. Reynolds? The phasing out
that you're referring to is on the land that is going to be trans --
changed to the town --
MR. REYNOLDS: Yes, sir.
COMMISSIONER MURRA Y: -- not the surrounding land?
MR. REYNOLDS: That's correct.
COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Okay. So the total consumption
-- because on your presentation this morning, one of the first things
you had on there is to maintain agricultural lands?
MR. REYNOLDS: Correct.
COMMISSIONER MURRAY: And then the town?
MR. REYNOLDS: Right.
COMMISSIONER MURRA Y: And so you do have the
responsibility overall to make sure both work. I do understand by
using the water twice it -- it does preserve what you have available,
and it appears it is enough.
MR. REYNOLDS: Yeah. The equation that we're balancing
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there was just we only use the allocation that would be attributable to
the footprint of development. Because the balance of the permitted
allegation -- allocation, which is another 20 --
approximately 20 million gallons, is still available to continue to serve
agriculture under that permit.
COMMISSIONER MURRA Y: I thought I understood that.
MR. REYNOLDS: Yeah. It -- I guess while I got up, if I --
could I just backtrack to one question or one point that Mr. Midney
made about the transportation? Because I think it was --
COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Please.
MR. REYNOLDS: I didn't hear it said, but I think the concern
was that if this proj ect goes forward and we have, through our
contributions and the things we've done, gotten a reservation of
capacity and the next project comes along, what happens to them?
Well, anybody that comes along and tries to do something similar
under this program is going to have to go through this same process
that we went through, including meeting the test of providing the
infrastructure, making a proportionate share contribution to
infrastructure, and making sure that there is going to be capacity. So,
really, it -- it's, I think to a certain extent, safeguarded in that fashion.
So --
COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I guess my concern was
the arterial roads, because they can only be expanded up to a certain
point. You have Immokalee Road and you have Oil Well and Camp
Keais roads. I don't see any other big arterial roads coming through
there. And if you have a town of 50 thousand people in the way, so to
speak, between Immokalee and Naples, I can foresee a situation where
it would become very difficult -- even if they six laned Immokalee
Road and Oil Well and Camp Keais, I just don't see the capacity on
the arterials there to handle all that.
MR. REYNOLDS: Understood.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Yes, sir, Mr. Abernathy?
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COMMISSIONER ABERNATHY: Alan, at several places in
these documents the point is made that water for fighting fire should
always be potable water. Why would you fight a brush fire with
potable water?
MR. REYNOLDS: That's a good question. I'm not sure I have
an answer for that. I think the reason that the potable is used for fire
fighting is that to the extent that it's going to be introduced into
buildings, I think was the intent there, that you're using potable water
in the buildings and in the hydrants and in that system. But if you have
a brush fire, I would presume that the fire district would probably do
what they do in most rural cases and pump out of pumper trucks and
lakes and other kinds of things. So I don't think that that statement
precludes them from using whatever available source would be
available.
COMMISSIONER ABERNATHY: Well, what is the degree to
which you clean up the water before -- when it becomes gray water? I
mean is it really a worry to spray a building with it that's on fire?
MR. REYNOLDS: I'll tell you to the limit of my knowledge,
because I'm -- I'm not an expert on that. But -- but the quality of the
water is -- is what they refer to as an advanced secondary treatment.
Which means that it is of a quality that it's put into the lake system and
then basically able to be blended --
COMMISSIONER ABERNATHY: Okay.
MR. REYNOLDS: -- with lake water and then withdrawn for
irrigation purposes. So it's a -- it is a high quality of water.
COMMISSIONER ABERNATHY: It's not to that point where
people would -- could drink it, if they would drink it, it's not that --
MR. REYNOLDS: I've heard stories of people
actually showing their comfort with it by drinking it, but I never have.
Can you answer the question on the fire?
MR. PAGER: My name is Craig Pager with Wilson Miller.
The quality of the effluent from the waste water treatment plant
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June 2, 2005
is such that bacteria is removed and killed with disinfectant chlorine in
this case, and also the viruses are removed through a filtration process.
So that effluent is free of bacteria and viruses so that it's safe for
public access.
For example, if you irrigate on a golf course, there will not be
viruses, bacteria on the golf course that would contaminate golf balls
or golf clubs or whatever would be on there, but it's -- from a health
perspective, it's safe.
COMMISSIONER ABERNATHY: Well, then if the golf course
clubhouse caught fire, you couldn't use it on that?
MR. PAGER: You could use anything -- it isn't unsafe to use
effluent to fight a fire, but normally it's cost effective to have the
potable system provide the fire protection because that system's
always going to be under pressure.
COMMISSIONER ABERNATHY: Okay.
MR. PAGER: It has backup generators, in case power goes out,
so that the water pressure's always available from a health standpoint,
and it is also then always available for a fire fighting need. And that's
why the systems are usually the same. If they were separate systems,
you'd have to have those redundant backup systems for both, and in
the interest of safety it's usually one system.
COMMISSIONER ABERNATHY: I see. That's a salient
difference, so I'll accept that. Alan, now we both know.
MR. REYNOLDS: Learn something every day.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Alan, on the -- I have a package
that was provided to me with staff that includes Environmental
Advisory Council staff report meeting of May 4th, 2005. And in
there, they have a site description. I know this has been brought up
before, but they keep referring back to the 4,995 acres. Did the AEC
-- EAC review the 5,027 acres or the 4,995 acre package? Do we
know?
MR. BELLOWS: For the record, Ray Bellows.
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They did review the revised plans. The staff report was
generated early on and -- and didn't get updated. Those early figures
didn't get updated the way they should, but during the presentation it
was clear to them that we're dealing with the 5 thousand.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay.
MR. REYNOLDS: By the way, that 32 acres that was added
consists of a farm field that has no natural vegetation on it.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. In the same staffreport,
they're talking about site description, and the applicant has provided
an analysis of potential water quality impact for the project. The
summary of the results shows that the post-development load rate
summary is less than the predevelopment. However, the supporting
documentation contained in this report does not appear to support the
summary information.
Now, I don't have the supporting documentation with my
package, so I'm wondering what it is they were talking about and if it
has gotten resolved. I mean does anybody know?
MR. ENGLISH: Yeah, it's resolved. For the record, John
English with --licensed professional engineering with Wilson Miller.
The water quality issue -- upon review, we -- we were requested
to look at the water quality analysis that was required that we provide
to the South Florida Water Management District for review with the
RP. We provided that.
Upon review, the county found one error in routing of lakes,
interconnects between lakes. That was the -- the item in question. We
met with them determined -- we -- that came to our -- we became
aware of that, we revised the calculations, resubmitted the new model
results, which the numbers changed but the results were the same, net
reduction pollutant loading, and we all agreed that was acceptable.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. And, Ray, was there a
second report issued acknowledging this, or is this just something that
went in -- that occurred during the meeting, is on record?
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MR. BELLOWS: We have Bill Lorenz.
MR. LORENZ: For the record, Bill Lorenz, Environmental
Services Director.
Yes, Wilson Miller presented a -- developed a -- a supplemental
report. We passed that report out to EAC. I placed it on the record
that that analysis, that additional analysis conformed -- conformed
with the requirement that the post loading be less than the preloading.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Bill, while you're up there -- your
timing is just great. In the GMP and in the LDC, there are references
a WRAs. In both documents, WRA is such as -- permitted as a
retention area by South Florida Water management District. Now, I
have asked over the past week or two for copies of the South Florida
permit that shows that these were permitted retention areas, because
the SRA uses the WRAs for outflow. I haven't got a copy of that
permit yet. And I've asked your department, and to my knowledge
you haven't got it yet. What is the situation?
And the reason this is so important is Ave Maria, on the north
side, is -- supposedly that's a WRA. It appears as any other natural,
untouched area. But if it's a WRA, there's no setback distance.
Whereas if it's ever classified in the future as an HSA, it's going to be
setback of 300 feet. That will radically affect this plan. So how is
anybody classifying this WRA as a WRA at this point if they haven't
seen the permit?
MR. LORENZ: As we discussed earlier, staff is accepting the
WRA designation through the Growth Management Plan. Those--
those areas were designated in the Growth Management Plan within
the rural stewardship lands overlay as WRAs. We did not -- we did
not verify that those WRAs, as adopted by the Growth Management
Plan, do indeed have those agricultural use permits, that -- that
essentially have made them a WRA. So we -- we have provided that
information to Wilson Miller. I'm not sure whether they've got
information to present to you today or not on that.
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COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Well, we can shortchange this
whole thing by asking them. Do we have a South Florida permit
showing those WRAs as water retention areas?
MR. REYNOLDS: Yes.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. Can we get a copy of it for
the record?
MR. REYNOLDS: Yep.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Can I have it before I go home
tonight, so I can read it as well?
MR. REYNOLDS: Ifwe let you have it, can we get it back?
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I will make a copy and I'll bring it
back to you in the morning, if I could, but I -- I think you need to
submit one for the record, too, to keep it on file. At least I would
think so.
MR. V ARNADOE: Let me jump back. Mr. Midney asked us
about the EAC recommendations. And they are -- I do have the
official recommendations. They are the same as the Regional
Planning Council. I just wanted to clarify that for the record. Do you
have those now, Mr. Midney?
COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I have it now.
MR. V ARNADOE: Thank you.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Well, if you're going to provide
that to me, then I'll just read it and I won't carry on a conversation on
that matter until -- but I do need to talk to Bill Lorenz, as he walks
away.
Bill, we got into a discussion -- and I know that we disagree on
this point, but I want to walk through it for the record. I'm going to
need the county attorney's help, and he just loves to help with these
things. And it's the definition of listed species habitat indices.
In this entire 5 thousand acres, there apparently is no indices -- or
no total indices above 1.2. To be above 1.2 means they can't develop
it, and they have to put buffers around it and it's open space or
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June 2, 2005
something like that. So it's nice not to have one above that.
There are at least plenty of aerials in the two documents that I
have that indicate what the flux codes are, what the water management
areas are, what the types of soils are, and what the listed species are.
By the way, the listed species surveys in the DR! differ from the listed
species survey that's in the SRA. Which one did your department
review?
MR. LORENZ: I would have to ask Susan Mason to --
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. Because they do have -- I
don't know why they're different, but they're different. So that's
something -- they have different species found in different areas,
which is different. I'm surprised, there should have been overlay.
Flux code group one has a certain indices value. And generally
the wet material, the depressions, the gator sands are in that higher
classification. Listed species have a certain value, if coupled with
panther, preferred or tolerated habitat. And then you've got your soils
for the flux code, and then there's -- there was three of them in the
water management areas. But what you've got in this listed species
indices definition is the following. It says one of the indices
comprising the natural resource index value with the values assigned,
based upon the habitat value of the land for listed species, index
values are based upon documentation of occupied habitat as
established by the intersect of documented and verifiable observations
of listed species with land cover identified as preferred or tolerated
habitat for that species.
Now, let's start with that sentence and that definition, because
there's two more that are pretty weighty. That particular sentence to
me reads that if you've got a species, ibis or birds or whatever you got
out there that are in a certain area, it could be classified as habitat for
that bird and would receive a certain gradient in the indices. Is that a
fair assumption of that sentence? I'm not to the telemetry yet. I know
that's where you want to go, but we're not there yet. I want to walk
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June 2, 2005
into this, if you don't mind.
MR. LORENZ: The -- I have to look at the -- the calculation
matrix or the -- but the matrix indicates that --
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: It's right here.
MR. LORENZ: -- if you have a -- if you have a habitat with a
observation, then that's how you get the score for that subcomponent
of the natural resource index.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. Now, there's two -- and,
you know -- is that thing working? That overhead?
MR. BELLOWS: Sure.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Ifwe could put this over there so
that we get these over the overhead. Ray, if you could raise it up,
because it's the bottom three that I think we're going to be focusing on
here. Bottom four. Oh, well. We need to go down a little bit. One
more, one more, keep going, right there. Can you make it smaller so
we can fit more on the screen? There.
MR. BELLOWS: Too small?
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: That's fine for me.
It says -- and this is the one that has the rating. If it's got other
documented listed species habitat, it's .4. If it's panther occupied
habitat parentheses, preferred or tolerated, .5 and then panther
occupied habitat, parentheses, preferred or tolerated, plus other listed
species, .8.
Now, I just wanted to establish that the listed species presence
has -- establishes some format of a rating. If it's going to habitat that
that species frequents and there's a habitat -- there's a listing of
habitats for each species found on site in the DR! application. So let's
just move on to the next one. I'm just going to make some statements,
and then I'll let you, if you wanted to --
MR. LORENZ: Well, the--
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I'm trying to think what's the
easiest way.
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June 2, 2005
MR. LORENZ: I think it -- this becomes some -- I mean this is
-- starts to get a little bit technical in terms of how you apply it. When
you have a listed species observation, I mean you're looking at that
listed species observation within a particular habitat type. So you
need to have -- when you're -- when you're looking at -- let's call it
two layers of information.
The listed species document -- documented point, whether it's a
panther point, a telemetry point, or some other documentation of
another listed species, you overlay that with -- with a particular habitat
code, the flux code.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Right.
MR. LORENZ: And those -- that combination, that and
combination, has to exist to call that occupied habitat.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. And then at the next level of--
next sentence in here, it says land mapping using flux codes as 310,
321 -- and it goes through a series of about a dozen flux codes. And
after it finishes those numerics, it says is deemed to be preferred or
tolerated habitat for panthers for the purpose of assigning a value for
these indices. Now, it's not saying that you have to show the panther's
there. You just have to have one of those habitats in its preferred or
tolerated habitat. Is that what it says?
MR. LORENZ: Well, to get -- to get that score where you've got
panther occupied habitat, you have to have both conditions.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: What are the both?
MR. LORENZ: The panther telemetry point that exists within
one of those habitat codes.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Where does it say that?
MR. LORENZ: It talks about -- the last sentence.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Which I was getting to.
MR. LORENZ: An intersection of at least one data point
establishing the presence of a listed species within the GIS polygon of
preferred or tolerated habitat. Where it says within, look at
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within as being and.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Wait a minute. Back up. Where--
where -- okay. Let's start -- the last sentence in my book reads an
intersection of at least one data point establishing the presence of a
listed species within a geographic information system polygon, a
preferred or tolerated habitat for that species shall result in the entire
polygon being scored as an occupied habitat. Is that the same one you
have?
MR. LORENZ: Correct.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. And, Bill, what I -- my
concern here is that that sentence follows the one that already deems
the habitat as preferred or tolerated based on its flux code. So now
you're saying it's -- that it's in addition to, but that's not the way the
definition reads.
MR. LORENZ: That's how we --
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: It reads --
MR. LORENZ: That's how we've always understood it.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Always?
MR. LORENZ: That's how -- that's how the index score has
been mapped through the whole process, beginning with the Growth
Management Plan, the overlay.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: So you have assumed that it's
referred to in this definition to mean panther telemetry right from the
beginning, and that's just the way it is?
MR. LORENZ: Correct. It has -- it's an and condition. It's -- it's
-- in the case of panther, it's the telemetry point within those preferred
habitat types. Both conditions have to exist. If you just have -- if you
just have a telemetry point without any of those preferred habitats, it
does not get an occupied habitat rating, either. If it just has a preferred
habitat without the telemetry point, it's not the -- it's not the occupied
habitat rating. You have to have both conditions.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: So but if it's deemed to be
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preferred or tolerated, it's not really deemed to be preferred or
tolerated unless it's matched up with the telemetry point.
MR. LORENZ: That's correct.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay.
MR. LORENZ: Because you could have those habitat types all
over the county and have nothing to do with -- with -- with -- with the
area that the panthers are occupying.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: But wasn't there a value established to
saving habitat that could be preferred or tolerated by panthers? And if
so, why would --
MR. LORENZ: The land cover --
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- we need--
MR. LORENZ: The land -- the land cover index, it's the last--
where my pen is pointing towards the kinds of land cover that existed
within those groups have a -- a value, a natural resource value,
according to that scoring system. And those cover conditions are also
existing in the Land Development Code because that specifies that.
So -- so you do get a score for different kinds of natural
vegetative communities within the scoring system. To those, you add
the listed species component that again talks about the -- a point, a
listed species observation, in those preferred habitats, which is the and
condition. So that's when you add that scoring to the land cover sub-
index.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: And then the difference in this
whole discussion is simply that if the telemetry issue that is not
mentioned in this definition did not apply as you say it did, from
what I understand and from Mac Hatcher in discussion, it would
certainly change the land plan that we have here today.
MR. LORENZ: That's correct. If you -- if you -- if you didn't
apply that and condition, then you would be adding some additional
scoring to those -- to those index values.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Why wouldn't have we included--
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June 2, 2005
if this is so important -- and it obviously is because it affects
everything. I mean it affects that entire land plan. Why wouldn't it
have been more clear in that definition? It's the same people that
wrote the definition, I believe, here making this presentation today.
MR. LORENZ: Well, I think from staffs perspective it is, it is
clear. Weare using that and condition, that combination of the
telemetry point plus the -- the habitat types that are listed there, at
least for panthers, as what the preferred or tolerated habitat type is for
panthers. And as a -- I mean the first sentence talks about both
conditions, the last sentence talks about both conditions.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Well, Bill, I heard what you said,
so I appreciate that. Thank you. And I will move on to some more
questions. I'm not sure they're yours, Bill, so don't go home yet. I
think this is for actually -- well, actually, Bill, I hate to do that. I have
one more question for you.
The LDC has a section 40807 that says concerning the natural
resource index assessment, which is what we were just talking about,
the verification -- verify that the index value scores assigned during
the RLSA study are still valid through recent aerial photography or
satellite imagery or agency approved mapping or other
documentation, as verified by field inspections.
Did you do any field inspections, or did any of your people do
field --
MR. LORENZ: Yes.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- inspections for this project?
MR. LORENZ: Yes. I think Mac Hatcher, Susan Mason,
possibly Barbara Burgeson did some inspections. Mac Hatcher was
also our GIS analyst, so he matched up those kinds of verification --
field inspections with -- with the data that was presented, as well. So
he was spot checking everything.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. Well, that's the last time I
think I'll bother you for a little while here, Bill.
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June 2, 2005
Ray -- oh, I'm sorry, do you have to get --
MR. BELLOWS: I was trying to figure out what that--
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: You did a good job, Ray.
There's a section in the LDC, 40807, that references that any vary
-- proposed variations or deviations from the requirements of the LDC
are supposed to be including -- you're supposed to list them, basically.
They're supposed to be -- the document -- supposed to provide a
document identifying, locating, and quantifying the full range uses and
shall include, as applicable, the following. All proposed variations
and deviations to the LDC.
Now, I've read the documents. And I didn't go back and turn
every page to make sure there weren't any. And I heard Mr. White's
comment earlier that we need to stipulate or get the applicant to
stipulate that their documents have no deviations from the LDC, and
so that's kind of where I'm at next. Because otherwise I believe by
this language somehow we were supposed to be highlighted or
notified, like we are in every PUD, that there are
deviations involved. I know this isn't a PUD, but it's the same --
MR. BELLOWS: Well, that's the difference, this isn't a PUD.
And the SRA document serves as a design book, is my understanding
and how I approached the review of the -- of this project, and we did
not review it under the criteria for PUD.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I understand that. But did you
review it to notice -- review it in contrast to the LDC?
MR. BELLOWS: Yeah. All of our review staff --
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Right.
MR. BELLOWS: -- from environmental to landscaping,
architecture, they all reviewed it, consistency with the LDC, plus the
SRA design documents, and comments by staffwere worked out with
the applicant.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Are there any deviations or
variations from the LDC in the SRA document?
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MR. BELLOWS: I believe there are deviations, but the exact
may vary from architecture review to the landscape review.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Well--
MR. BELLOWS: Probably the best to have the petitioner outline
those.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. Because we -- we -- there
is another section of the LDC that talks about request for deviations
from the LDC. The SRA development document may provide for
non-procedural deviations from the LDC. I'm just wondering what are
your deviations? If Ray feels there are some there, I don't know how
to sort those out.
MR. VARNADOE: Well, I think we can -- there are not many, I
think we can sort through those very quickly for you, Mr. Strain.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay.
MR. V ARNADOE: While I'm up here, I do have the South
Florida Water Management District permits for the WRAs that
surround Ave Maria. And I'll put one in the record, and I'll give one
to you for your review tonight.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I appreciate it. Thank you.
MS. JENKINS: For the record, Anita Jenkins with Wilson
Miller.
Mr. Strain, we do have a few minor deviations, and I'll just list
them for you. We have some deviations in a sidewalk width in the
town centers, and that would happen just narrowing it at some point
where you may have a column or something, the
pedestrian width would be narrowed. We have some deviations on
block perimeters, on maximum setbacks.
The LDC requires a maximum setback in town centers often
feet, and we deviated from that specifically to provide more areas for
public plazas. The oratory plaza would be an example of that. There
are some requirements in there for street scape areas of a -- five-foot
minimum. We have -- do have three-foot minimums in some
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situations, and we do specify that street tree barriers are required or
that those are only for shrub areas.
We deviated in some areas from the maximum heights of three
and a half stories to four stories for multifamily. We also deviated in
the front setbacks for multifamily. The code requires that -- a
minimum ten-foot setback, we provided for a zero-foot setback on
multifamily to create the pedestrian environment in some situations, to
allow for that. And we also allow for some parking and front setbacks
in town centers two and three because of the uses that are anticipated
to be there.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Is that all the deviations that you--
MS. JENKINS: Yes.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- want on record?
MS. JENKINS: Yes.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I can think of one more but --
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Well, we haven't got to that book
yet, but, yeah, go ahead.
MS. JENKINS: Go ahead.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Well the cul-de-sac's longer
than --
MS. JENKINS: There's no -- in the LDC for the stewardship
receiving areas for a town, there are no specifications for the length of
a cul-de-sac. You may be referring to the length of a cul-de-sac in the
-- the urban area Land Development Code, but in the -- in the town
design standards, there are no specific lengths for a cul-de-sac. And
so, therefore, it's -- we're not deviating from the town design standards
that Mr. Strain is referring to.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I'm not worried about it because
the fire prevention code will get them so --
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: And I wasn't referring to the town
design standards. I was referring to the entire Land Development
Code.
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MS. JENKINS: Uh-huh.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I know that there are specifics
when you hit the RLSA area, but then if they're failed to be described
under the standards for the RLSA, then you'd revert back to the
balance of the LDC for those pieces that aren't addressed in the RLSA.
So at least if you think that's wrong, tell me. Because what standard
then are you applying for?
MS. JENKINS: No. We are -- I was specifically going through
the standards that are deviated from the town center design standards
for the town of Ave Maria.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. In those areas where the
town center design standards do not address particular criteria and its
addressed somewhere else in the LDC, are any of those standards
being deviated from?
MS. JENKINS: Let me note that and get back to you on that,
Mark. I think that there is a specific paragraph in the design
standards, in the rural lands that addresses that issue. And if you'll
give me just a minute, I'll come back to that and -- and see if we can --
we can find it.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: You can -- you can have a whole
evening, how's that?
MS. JENKINS: I don't think I'll need that long.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: We can address it tomorrow.
Okay.
COMMISSIONER MURRA Y: Mark, could I just --
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Yeah, go ahead.
COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Anita, I would just ask you, in
these deviations, are they -- will they be applicable across the board?
In other words, have we reassigned design standards, or are there
going to be deviations in certain cases?
MS. JENKINS: No. These deviations are specific. When you
say across the board, across the board for the rural lands?
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COMMISSIONER MURRAY: For the height, for instance, you
went to four stories instead of three and a half. Is that --
MS. JENKINS: Yeah. That's -- that is in neighbor -- in the
neighborhoods for multifamily.
COMMISSIONER MURRA Y: So, in other words whatever had
been essentially established earlier is gone now and -- so the new
standards would be the four, if it's accepted as the deviation?
MS. JENKINS: Well, the standard for Ave Maria, yes, sir. Not
the standard for all of the rural lands, but the standard for Ave Maria.
And --
COMMISSIONER MURRAY: I'm only talking about Ave
Maria.
MS. JENKINS: Yes, sir.
COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Okay. Would that -- I guess that
will remain a deviation but probably should be an adjustment at some
point to the -- to the code itself. Wouldn't that make sense?
MS. JENKINS: Well, I don't know that it--
COMMISSIONER MURRAY: If you determined you need new
standards.
MS. JENKINS: Well, I think what is difficult is trying to apply a
generalized set of design standards that is anticipated to be for every
single project. And that's why the Land Development Code and -- and
the rural land stewardship allows for deviations. Because certainly
there's going to be unique situations in every project that comes before
you.
To create the character that you're trying to create in any town or
village, there's going to be certain need for flexibility there. And so
where one village may not need a deviation, another mayor a town
may. So I wouldn't say that it would be a need to go back and change
the LDC, it's just a recognition of a unique circumstances or a unique
condition and it -- in a town or village that is needed to create that
particular town or village.
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COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Thank you. That's a good
qualification for me. Appreciate it.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Ray, now that there are deviations
and the review by staff doesn't seem to be avail -- there. How would
staff -- is staff going to look at these deviations, or where are we going
to be with this now?
MR. BELLOWS: The staff has reviewed the deviations as part
of the SRA document. When they review the SRA document, the
design standards, the deviations that are in the code are discussed and
the differences. Like I said, this is not a typical process where PUD
document's submitted. This has been an ongoing mutual design effort
between staff and -- and the petitioner, explaining concerns about
where they are different from the LDC and -- and an agreement is
reached on the document that's before you today, and all of the review
staff has signed off on -- on the PUD -- or the SRA document. So the
deviations are -- have been discussed by the individual professionals
reviewing the document.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: There was a sufficiency review
done on September 10th, 2003. And in that review there was some
criteria. And I was able to figure out that most of them are addressed
or have been addressed, but there's a few that I still have a question
on. And I -- maybe you can enlighten me on some of these. I think
we talked about this, but at one point -- and I'll read the paragraph.
County Manager Requirements. Furthermore, of special interest
to the Collier County Public Utilities Division is the consideration by
Ave Maria University of several key issues related to solid waste and
recycling. As documented on May 27th, 2003 letter, County Manager
Jim Mudd to Nicholas Healy, president of Ave Maria University.
County public utilities is requesting assessment of the following issues
in the SRA's impact assessment report and in the planned unit
development.
Now, I'm not sure what they meant by planned unit development
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because this isn't a PUD, but at the time it may have been assumed to
be similar to a PUD. So they're asking for an on site transfer station to
avoid double handling of solid waste.
Now, we talked about this earlier, and the answer was that we
wouldn't want an on site transfer station because it would require the
double handling of waste because they wanted to truck it directly to
the landfill. What is the situation there? Are we having an on site
transfer station as requested in the sufficiency report, or is one not
being provided now? And if it's not being provided now, who knows
the right answer as to why it's not? A volunteer.
MR. BELLOWS: It's my understanding that there is not a
transfer station.
MR. V ARNADOE: There is not a transfer station proposed, Mr.
Strain. What we did was in the -- agreed to look at it in the DR!, and
we did. For example, the Immokalee transfer station's going to be
approximately 150-ton capability, which is a small to medium size
transfer station. The solid waste at Ave Maria is going to be in --
approximate 26 tons per day. So you wouldn't -- you don't even have
enough to -- to go from small trucks to big truck, so it's -- it's just -- it's
going to go to the -- to the Immokalee transfer station. All that
information was provided to the utilities department, and you've got
their sign off in your staff report.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. Well, I still-- I'm going to
be asking -- I just need -- I understand what you said if it -- I got their
sign off, but I want to know how these things were addressed.
An integrated biocycle program, including the possible use of a
county contracted compost facility. Has that been --
MR. VARNADOE: We agreed to do that, Mr. Strain.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Thank you.
MR. VARNADOE: I'm sorry, I just lost my--
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I'm assuming you addressed these,
I just couldn't recognize -- and all I wanted to do was confirm for the
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June 2, 2005
record they were addressed.
The creation of an ongoing maintenance of an integrated solid
waste reduction and recycling program.
MR. V ARNADOE: For Ave Maria University.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Yes.
MR. V ARNADOE: That has been drafted by CDM, and it's
ready for distribution and review by the appropriate staff.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: So it's not completed?
MR. V ARNADOE: No, sir.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Is a copy available to read to
MR. V ARNADOE: I think I do have one.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I'd appreciate, when we leave, if I
could grab a copy.
Incorporation of a hazardous waste management plant as part of
the solid waste plant, including the recycling of electronic products.
MR. GOREY: Again, Jason Gorey with CDM.
As I recall, that letter was addressed specifically to the university,
and the university is in the process of developing those documents.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: It was -- it was sufficiency review
comments, it wasn't -- it said the Ave Maria stewardship receiving
area, AR4578, sufficiency review comments dated September 10th,
2003. I just want to make sure that somebody followed up,
acknowledged it was met, sufficiency is there, and it's been checked
off.
MR. GOREY: There -- there was indeed a letter. I don't have the
date with me. I believe I have a copy, if you'd like it, addressing each
of those issues back to Collier County.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Then the only last -- the last
comment on this paper that I have is the -- they asked for some
specific language to be included. They said the PUD, I'm not sure if
they meant SRA because there was no PUD.
It says all educational and support facilities shall provide
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June 2, 2005
opportunities for and accommodate collection and recycling of office
paper, cardboard, newspapers, electronics, aluminum, and plastic food
and drink containers, as well as encourage the collection and recycling
of other recyclable materials. Ave Maria University shall provide
educational materials to be utilized in the creation and continuation of
facility-wide recycling.
That language was requested to be in the planned unit
development document. If it isn't in the SRA, do you have a problem
including that in the SRA? Is it a program, for example, that you're
going to implement?
MR. GOREY: That is the document that's being created right
now and is under review that the university is creating directly.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Could we get a record -- could we
get a copy of it -- and you can stamp it draft -- of that document to
enter into the record so that we have it by tomorrow at the closure of
this meeting?
MR. GOREY: Certainly.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: And it's a draft
document, so it's subject to change, but at least it shows that there's
been some movement forward to reach these conclusions.
MR. GOREY: Certainly.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Thank you. That's all I have on
that issue, I think.
COMMISSIONER MURRA Y: I would just like to ask for a
clarification of Mr. Bellows. In a PUD situation, of which this is not,
we would have staff report, and it would make its recommendations
and call attention to deviations and the like. That is not in this packet;
am I right? You basically -- this is a petitioner activity and the staff is
deemed to have agreed to all of the things that are contained therein?
MR. BELLOWS: The process is not that of a PUD document,
that's correct. The staff review has comments and stipulations for
changes to the SRA which the petitioner has made, and therefore there
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June 2, 2005
was no need to reference in the staff report those items that are in
disagreement because there is no disagreement.
COMMISSIONER MURRAY: So all of the items that Mr.
Strain is calling attention to are deemed acceptable and --
MR. BELLOWS: That's correct.
COMMISSIONER MURRA Y: -- okay by the county?
MR. BELLOWS: (Nodding head.)
COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Thank you.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: That's all the solid waste I have.
Does anybody else have any? No. Okay. Mr. Budd left for a few
minutes.
Mr. Scott, I hate to make you walk all the way back up here
again, but I have another. One of the traffic operations comments
made in a prior document -- and I haven't found where this is
addressed, but I think you started talking about it earlier today -- is
based on unique characteristics of the town and proximity to Naples.
Transportation staff recommends the installation of two
permanent traffic counters. One at the main roadway entrance of the
town, AMU Boulevard, and the other, Oil Well Road, just east of the
entry -- entry -- entranceway to separate background traffic.
Are those being done by the applicant? I mean you made this
recommendation, have they accept it?
MR. SCOTT: Yes, they are.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. Let me see if I've got any
more then. Sorry to get you up here just for that one, but that's it.
MR. SCOTT: That's okay.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Thank you.
Anita, in an older report for the -- from the utilities department,
you supplied a memorandum on December 9th of 2003. And in it -- it
was response to the county SRA review items. The applicant
expressed the intent to apply for deviations to the minimum
dimensions for maneuvering solid waste collection vehicles. It is not
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June 2, 2005
only the county and waste management staff who need to be involved
in reviewing these deviations, but staff from the Immokalee
Disposable District must also be involved.
They want an affirmation that this is going to be accomplished.
Was that all done?
MS. JENKINS: Yes, sir.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. Well, we're getting through
the books. For the rest of you, the document that you did get, I --
we've got right here. This is the SRA document, so we all should have
that. We can start on this document now, or we could break, come
back in the morning.
COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Go until 5:00.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: That's fine. I just didn't know
what you-all wanted to do. Because we had previously talked about a
break point. Some of these may be answered anyway, so we just --
COMMISSIONER MURRA Y: Are you looking at the exhibits?
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: While you're looking that up --
Ray, this is the copy of the book we didn't get, correct?
MR. BELLOWS: No. He's reading from the one that you did
get.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: This is the one you did get.
MR. BELLOWS: It's called SRA. The one you have there is
DR! ADA.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Is there something else coming
or --
MR. BELLOWS: No. That's -- you should have already
received --
COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: No. He's asking about this one
that we just got.
MR. BELLOWS: Mark went through that earlier today.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Right. But the one you just got is
the one I started with today.
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June 2, 2005
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: But it doesn't have all the --
COMMISSIONER MURRA Y: That's the one we -- that's -- the
rest of us not -- did not receive.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Right.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: So the point is --
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: It doesn't have the cover on it.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: And it also doesn't have all the
maps.
MR. BELLOWS: The maps take longer to reproduce, and those
.
are comIng.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Some of the basic on the maps are
in the one you got, though, so --
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I think so.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: My questions on the SRA, quite a
few of them have been responded to already. I've just got some
architectural comments. Brad, I'm not sure if you reviewed that area
or not so--
,
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I did.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I haven't got into that too much
because I had assumed you would.
I had one question, Anita, that I asked you during our meeting
involving the sidewalk distance, the setback of 15 foot in the front
yard of the single-family townhouses. And we normally look at 23
feet and those are 15 feet. You were going to take a look at that.
MS. JENKINS: Yes, sir.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: What was the result?
MS. JENKINS: I did. The result is -- is you have to look at a
combination between the residential product sheets and the
cross-sections. And the combination of those two things together will
result in a setback of 23 feet from the back of the sidewalk to the front
of the garage.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. So when it says 15-foot
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June 2, 2005.
minimum front yard setback, it's not 15 feet then?
MS. JENKINS: It's not 15 -- it's 15 feet front yard setback, but it
does not say that it's -- it's not 23 feet from the back of the -- the
sidewalk. Because in some of those cross-sections there's room in
back of the sidewalk greater than that property line.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. I'm not sure -- I'm sorry if
it's -- if I don't seem to understand, but -- the detail I'm looking at is on
page 47.
MS. JENKINS: I understand. And -- and, again, you have to--
you have to look at the -- the residential detail with the street
cross-section of the particular neighborhood to understand that
there -- there is a distance of 23 feet from the back of the sidewalk
to the front of the garage. We do meet that criteria.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: And some of it then is off
property?
MS. JENKINS: Yes, sir.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. So in all cases you--
MS. JENKINS: In the right of way.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- will you have 23 feet--
MS. JENKINS: Yes, sir.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: -- sidewalks?
MS. JENKINS: Yes, sir.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: That's where I was trying to get.
Brad, if you want to go forward, I'm --
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I mean I actually looked, and I
didn't really find a whole lot of problems. I mean the concern I had
most of anything is in the town center, is the parking. You reduced it
quite a bit. And I understand the logic of -- you know, you're blending
a lot of parking in. As a matter of fact, the -- if it becomes a parking
problem, people tend to walk to it. Do you think there will be a lot of
outside people? That was my concern, that there will be a lot of -- you
know, if it comes out as nice as you expect it, won't there be a lot of
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June 2, 2005
people coming to the site as an attraction?
MS. JENKINS: We hope so.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: And I'm not sure -- then I think
you might start to have a parking problem in the downtown center.
MS. JENKINS: And that's why it is important to design the
pedestrian networks to a very high detail, to make sure that the
residents that live inside the town have the ability to walk and to
bicycle rather than having to park.
And at the time that it does become a problem for parking, there
is standards in the town plan in the town centers to allow for parking
structures where the -- the surface parking is now. So as -- as the
parking needs may grow, the town can accommodate that in the
future.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: And, Mark, I did look through
it. I mean I think the person that put it together is actually smart.
They have a three-foot one setback, ten-foot between structures. If
they left it at three, there would be a fire code issue that they wouldn't
want. So whoever put that one inch in there knew what he was doing.
So that gave me great trust in the rest of the documents.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Boy, if that's not a hint for
anybody else who comes in here for a PUD.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Yeah, well, it only works once.
The other problem I do have is the cul-de-sac on page 158. I do
think you have to be careful of the length of that. And the problem
with that is that's in case an emergency vehicle goes down the wrong
trail, it doesn't want to have to go half a mile to come back.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: The last question I have is, Anita
-- and I think I mentioned this to you. Maybe, again, Mr. Scott could
unfortunately respond to it for me. Your statement in the
transportation network says that MUMS, which is, I understand, a
Florida green book, deals primarily with design of public streets and
highways, not private developments. For that reason, there's a chapter
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June 2, 2005
in MUMS related specifically to private land development. And as we
discussed, since you are a special district, the loop roads and the main
roads that are being financed by that district are public
roads. The MUMS design then would apply, I would assume, to those
roads.
And that's kind of my question to Don Scott is in the design of
those roads, what dominates -- if it's a -- since they are public roads,
Don, in the sense that they're a special district, does the green book
prevail in the -- as for public roadway, or does it go to -- fall back to a
private land development?
MR. SCOTT: Well, I don't have an easy answer to that one.
Because I know there are certain standards that we have and that --
that -- or the green book has that roadways get built that don't meet
those standards at certain times.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Well, I mean, how did you review
it?
MR. SCOTT: Well, I didn't -- internal -- CDS staff actually
reviews internal to the project.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: So none of those loop roads were
reviewed by your department.
MR. SCOTT: No. I mean we had some --
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay.
MR. SCOTT: -- statements regarding, like, pathways along the
main road inside of it, but not -- not specifically.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: When you approved the town core
design standards and the graphics under the GMP, did you review
those in your department?
MR. SCOTT: We did. And when we go back to the typical
sections, back to what I was talking about earlier, those were reviewed
by staff at that time.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Testimony we heard today from
the applicant was that the only deviations they have are those six
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June 2, 2005
listed, and they didn't list any deviations from those graphics, other
than any of those that might apply. So as long as those graphics
apply, they're going to be consistent with what you reviewed with the
GMP.
MR. SCOTT: Yes.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Would that be a fair statement?
MR. SCOTT: Yeah, that's fair.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. Well, then I don't have any
questions. Thank you.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Further questions, Mr. Strain?
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: No, I'm -- I'm there.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Any other questions by other
planning commissioners?
Any summary comments by the petitioner?
MR. V ARNADOE: I wouldn't know where to begin, but I do
want to thank you for your time and the efforts you've put into
reviewing this petition. Or these petitions, I should say.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: George, to wrap up, so that if we
get into a discussion, everything doesn't get all bent out of shape as we
discuss, I have a list of stipulations that I've been writing down since
this meeting started. And out of fairness, I would like to just run them
by you, you let me know where you stand on them.
MR. VARNADOE: Certainly.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: First of all, typical ones,
recommendations that pursuant to the Southwest Regional Planning
Council recommendations. Pursuant--
MR. SCHMITT: Excuse me. This is for the DR!?
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: For the DR!, yes. Well, these will
be for both. You can sort out and pick and choose you as you want,
but I mean it's the same -- same project, two documents. And also the
recommendations of the EAC. And then the school sites will be
provided, per the letter dated 6/1/05 from the school board to you, that
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June 2, 2005
a permanent SO facility will be provided to a minimum size of
three acres, a site for a fire, sheriffs facility, and EMS, minimum
acreage of three. And then--
MR. SCHMITT: Three acres? Three acres?
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Yes, minimum three. As far as the
school sites go, it will be a 60-acre site acceptable to the school board.
MR. VARNADOE: That's off site, isn't it?
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Right, that's off site.
MR. V ARNADOE: Just so we're clear.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I'll write it down as off site. That
you'll agree to yearly monitoring of the persons per household, the
capture rate, unit sales prices, and the absorptions.
MR. VARNADOE: We won't agree to that, but your stipulation
may -- may be what it is, Mr. Strain.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I'm sorry?
MR. V ARNADOE: I said your stipulation can be what it is -- I
mean your motion -- but that's not agreeable to the petitioner.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: That means when it gets to the
next level up, you're going to recommend -- you're going to request
that not be enforced or empowered or whatever you want to call it.
MR. VARNADOE: (Nodding head.)
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: There will be a
mechanism, in the form of something that's agreeable to our affordable
housing department, to retain the low and very low units over a period
of time to be determined by the Board of County Commissioners.
MR. VARNADOE: I'm happy, Mr. Strain, if you want to make
it a little more specific, that the rental housing will be retained for the
life of the Development Order, which is 15 years. I'm also very happy
with the very low -- excuse me, the low owner occupied with a deed
restriction that restricts the amount of sales -- sales price for a five
year period with a five percent per annum increase --
COMMISSIONER ABERNATHY: Appreciation.
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June 2, 2005
MR. VARNADOE: -- appreciation, plus any improvements.
And I think that's consistent with -- that's consistent with what the
county does, Mr. Strain.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. So as far as low and very
low goes and the rental goes, you're going to be consistent with the
county processes.
MR. V ARNADOE: (Nodding head.)
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Between now and the time of the
BCC, something needs to be worked out on the middle income. I
don't know what, but I think we need to recommend to them that they
-- something --
MR. V ARNADOE: I'm -- as I told you, I'm very happy to work
with Cormac. We've discussed at least two potentials that I think
would -- would keep speculators and investors out and -- and have the
units remain in a moderate position for some period of time, and I'm
happy to work with him between -- on that between now and the
board.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Also, that the student dorms will
not be counted towards the volume or quantity of affordable housing
on site.
MR. V ARNADOE: That's fine.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: That there will be monitoring of
the state highway system pursuant to the recommendation of the
Southwest Regional Planning Council. That's a discussion--
MR. V ARNADOE: That's -- yes, sir, that's in our final report.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: You requested only six deviations
from the Land Development Code, and they are involving the
following elements. The sidewalk width in the town center, deviation
on block perimeters and maximum setbacks, street -- street scape
areas, the maximum height of 3.5 to four story for multifamily, the
front setbacks of multifamily will have a zero setback or can have a
zero setback, and the parking in front setbacks in town center two and
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three, there's some deviations requested there. I'm assuming they're all
documented as such in the SRA, and so those are the only ones that
you have on record.
MR. VARNADOE: Yes, sir. Those are -- those are -- they're
documented in the sense that those are written into the SRA
development document as the standard for town of Ave Maria.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Okay. And that included with the
package that goes to the Board of County Commissioners, will be a
draft recycling document that you're working on, and that there -- will
retain a 23- foot setback to the garage from the back of the sidewalks.
MR. V ARNADOE: That's -- yes, sir.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: That's the list of stipulations that I
had made notes on since we started the meeting today.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Mr. Adelstein.
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: Question. In the discussion
this morning, there were two schools, an elementary school and a high
school; is that correct?
MR. V ARNADOE: No, sir. There are three schools.
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: Three.
MR. V ARNADOE: On -- on site there's an elementary and a
middle school, and they're side by side on a 47-point something acre
parcel.
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: Okay. Now there was also a
parochial school; was there not?
MR. VARNADOE: Yes. Parochial is part of the university, yes,
SIr.
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: I -- I didn't hear it mentioned
during the --
MR. V ARNADOE: And that may have been our -- it was
mentioned, but just skipped over in the presentation. There's a --
university's goings to have a school that's -- will start offK through
eight and finally go through K through 12. And the projected
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June 2, 2005
enrollment at build out is 900 students.
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: I just wanted to make sure
you got that in because I didn't hear it today.
MR. V ARNADOE: It's in the development document, yes, sir.
And so the other -- the school-- with respect to the school, there's --
there's site for two public schools, elementary and middle school on
site. There's a commitment to provide a 60-acre site in a location to be
mutually determined between the school board and us off site. Mr.
Strain --
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: And the parochial school will
be there, too?
MR. VARNADOE: Yes.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Further questions? Any further
summary comments?
MR. V ARNADOE: No, sir.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: There being none, we'll close the
public hearing.
We're going to be looking for two separate motions, taking first
item 8A, that is Development of Regional Impact. Do we have a
motion on that item, please?
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I'll make the motion. I make a
motion to forward to the commission with the conditions that Mark
said for approval.
COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I'll second.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Motion by Schiffer, a second by Mr.
Midney. Discussion? For my own part, I think the yearly monitoring
is in excess of the LDC requirements and not necessary, but I'm going
to vote for the petition, even with those restrictions that I think are not
necessary .
And, second, I just wanted to point out that the Development of
Regional Impact information that I got so angry about has been
provided to us, and on a break I had a separate conversation with
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June 2, 2005
County Commissioner Henning regarding this item. And I am
confident in the diligence that has always been exhibited by Mr.
Strain, and I am going to go with -- on his research on that document
and support the motion, even though I didn't have a chance to review
it prior to this hearing.
Further discussion. Miss Caron?
COMMISSIONER CARON: Yeah. This whole business of the
monitoring, Mr. Fishkind suggested that we perhaps go with five years
to begin with and then every year after that. Is that something that
would be a compromise here between petitioner and the Board?
COMMISSIONER BUDD: That's to the motion maker.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: George, let me ask you. The
concern -- I mean every -- at the fifth year is the year in which, you
know, if there's a deficit, the developer would be required to pay. Is
the intention, Mark, that every year that would be the condition, or is
it only at the fifth year that --
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I--
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Is it data for four years and then
the fifth year is the --
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Brad, I'm skeptical of the financial
impact analysis and whether those conditions can be met. And when I
asked Hank, he said that in Lee County, they're having the Brooks do
-- do what -- do the one year reporting. At least that's what I believe
he said. And if it can be done there and it didn't seem like it was a big
deal, I didn't see the reason for the resistance to it. And when I see
that kind of resistance, it concerns me.
So I mean my suggestion is -- I don't -- you guys can change it
any way you want. I have serious concerns with the fiscal impact
model, the concurrency issues related to that, because the roads are
basically responsive to the fiscal impact model, and the listed species
indices discussion that 1 had with Mr. Lorenz. So my situation on this
is maybe different than yours.
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June 2, 2005
COMMISSIONER CARON: And I think that we have to be
cautious. Because if there are any negative impacts, it's not
necessarily the developer who will pay for it. It can be assessed to the
people who have bought into this community. So I think we have to
be --
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: But they're not going to be there
in the first couple years.
COMMISSIONER CARON: Well, that's -- that's why I suggest
what I had suggested. I don't know that --
COMMISSIONER BUDD: So on the topic, does the motion
maker, Mr. Schiffer, want to modify or stick with your current
motion?
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Let me hear what George --
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Okay.
MR. V ARNADOE: I don't mean to get involved in your
deliberations, I just -- I do have a suggestion. What I would suggest is
-- I like Mrs. Caron's idea with one -- one maybe suggestion. Ifwe do
it at the -- five years I think is rational for a town to get established
and have these -- this synergism. The Brooks is a residential proj ect,
it's quite different. If we do it five years and it's negative, I have no
objection to doing it yearly thereafter. I mean absolutely none. It's
going to be in our best interest to do that if -- if it's negative so that we
don't get too far behind the --
COMMISSIONER MURRAY: I think that's a good idea.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I'd accept that. But what --
could you provide data every year, and then at the fifth year the
responsibility of payment would -- would kick in?
MR. V ARNADOE: We will be providing data -- excuse me --
every -- every -- the DR! requires us to do a DR! monitoring report
every two years that we -- that has the transportation impacts, has the
number of units sold. I think probably what it doesn't have that we --
that would -- we'd have to supplement would be the -- the price per
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June 2, 2005
unit mark, and that -- that would not be in -- in that report.
But -- but certainly we could supplement that report to include
that if that's the -- the direction. What I just don't want to do is -- is --
I'm very confident -- or we wouldn't be doing this -- at the end of five
years we're going to be positive. What I don't want to do is do it one
year we're negative, we have to pay, then we have to come back to the
county to get our money back, at the end of the fifth year, when we're
so positive that we've recouped --
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I agree with that. I'll accept the
amendment.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Okay. We have a motion for
approval with stipulations. The motion maker modifies the fiscal
reporting to be done at the fifth year, and if it is fiscally negative,
every year on to the tenth year. Is the second in agreement?
COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I agree.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Motion is seconded. Further
discussion? Any further comments? Call the question. All those in
favor of the motion, signify by saying aye. Aye.
COMMISSIONER VIGLIOTTI: Aye.
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: Aye.
COMMISSIONER ABERNATHY: Aye.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Aye.
COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Aye.
COMMISSIONER CARON: Aye.
COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Aye.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Those opposed?
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Opposed.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Motion carries, eight to one.
Moving on to the next item, which is 8B, that is the stewardship
receiving area. Do we have a motion on that?
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I'll make the same motion.
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: Second.
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COMMISSIONER BUDD: Motion for approval by Mr. Schiffer,
second by Mr. Adelstein. With the same--
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Stipulations.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: -- stipulations that were accepted in
the first motion. And it's clarified by the second as being acceptable,
Mr. Adelstein? Discussion?
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: Yeah. In the -- on the last
page of that document, there was a statement that said regardless
CCCP (sic) should recommend the use of the Fishkind model by BCC
approval as part of the SRA development review process. And it was
asked that that be made as an amendment. We didn't discuss it. I'm
bringing it up as whether or not we should insert that, but the
paperwork said it would be a good idea to do so.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Okay. Is that something the motion
maker wants to add in?
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Say it again.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Reference where that came from.
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: Yeah. It's the last page, it's
the memorandum Bellows -- the -- Bellows gave us this. The CCCP
should recommend the use of the Fishkind model and the BCC
approve its use as part of the SRA development review process.
MR. V ARNADOE: Again, let me jump in when I probably
shouldn't be, but I think if you're going to do that, that ought to be a
separate item. That really has nothing to do with the approval of our
SRA.
COMMISSIONER ABERNATHY: It's just a commercial, isn't
't?
I .
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: I don't know.
MR. V ARNADOE: I don't know whether Hank wrote that for
the staff or not.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: When I read that in the review,
it appeared to me that that was a suggestion to make that the model of
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June 2, 2005
choice for the county.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Mr. White, do you think that's a
candidate for a separate action and best not included in this SRA?
MR. WHITE: Yes. And you may desire to await the workshop
that was extended to you today until such time as making that further
recommendation.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Okay. So with that in
mind, the motion maker does not include that, and the second is in
agreement?
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: Right, yes.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Further discussion on the motion?
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Yes. I will be--
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Mr. Strain.
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: I will be disagreeing for the
motion for the previously stated reasons.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Okay. Any further discussion.
We'll call the question. All those in favor of the motion, signify by
saying aye. Aye.
COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: Aye.
COMMISSIONER ABERNATHY: Aye.
COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Aye.
COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Aye.
COMMISSIONER CARON: Aye.
COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Aye.
COMMISSIONER VIGLIOTTI: Aye.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Those opposed? I assume that was
in opposition, Mr. Strain?
COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Oh, I'm sorry. Opposed.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: Motion carries, eight to one. And
with time to spare, our business this evening is concluded.
MR. V ARNADOE: Once again, I really appreciate your attention.
And, Mark, I appreciate your review. It was very thorough.
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COMMISSIONER STRAIN: Thank you.
COMMISSIONER BUDD: That's it, we're adjourned.
*****
There being no further business for the good of the County, the
meeting was adjourned by order of the chair at 4:43 p.m.
COLLIER COUNTY PLANNING COMMISSION
Russell A. Budd, Chairman
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