Loading...
CCPC Minutes 04/19/2021April 19, 2021 Page 1 of 73 TRANSCRIPT OF THE MEETING OF THE COLLIER COUNTY PLANNING COMMISSION Naples, Florida Monday, April 19, 2021 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 1:00 p.m., in SPECIAL SESSION in Building "F" of the Government Complex, East Naples, Florida, with the following members present: Karen Homiak, Acting Chairman Karl Fry Joe Schmitt Paul Shea Christopher T. Vernon (appearing remotely when indicated) Tom Eastman, Collier County School Board Representative ABSENT: Edwin Fryer, Chairman Robert L. Klucik, Jr. ALSO PRESENT: Raymond V. Bellows, Zoning Manager Jeffrey Klatzkow, County Attorney April 19, 2021 Page 2 of 73 P R O C E E D I N G S CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Good afternoon. This is the April 19th meeting of the Collier County Planning Commission, an afternoon meeting where we tabled the items from April 15th, so the agenda will be the same. Would you all please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance. (The Pledge of Allegiance was recited in unison, and the proceedings continued as follows:) CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. Could I have roll call, please. COMMISSIONER FRY: Thank you, Madam Chairman. Mr. Eastman? MR. EASTMAN: Here. COMMISSIONER FRY: Mr. Shea? COMMISSIONER SHEA: Here. COMMISSIONER FRY: Going a little bit out of order. I'm here. Chairman Fryer? (No response.) COMMISSIONER FRY: Chairman Homiak? CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Here. COMMISSIONER FRY: Mr. Schmitt? COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Here. COMMISSIONER FRY: Mr. Vernon? (No response.) COMMISSIONER FRY: Mr. Klucik? (No response.) COMMISSIONER FRY: Madam Chair, we have a quorum of four. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. Thank you. Addenda to the agenda. We have two -- the last two items will be -- we need a motion to continue them to the May 6th meeting. The Item 9A4, which is the -- I'll just read the numbers -- PL20190002292, the RLSA Overlay Growth Management Plan amendment, and 95A [sic], PL20200002234. That's the RFMUD. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: I make a motion to approve. COMMISSIONER SHEA: Second. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: All those in favor, signify by saying aye. COMMISSIONER SHEA: Aye. COMMISSIONER FRY: Aye. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Aye. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Aye. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Opposed, like sign? (No response.) CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. COMMISSIONER FRY: Madam Chair, how were we notified that these were continued? CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Well, there was an email that the RLSA overlay was continued to May. COMMISSIONER FRY: Was it late yesterday or -- CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: No, it was last week. COMMISSIONER FRY: Oh, prior to the 15th meeting? CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Yes. COMMISSIONER FRY: Oh, okay. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. Planning Commission absences. Is there -- is everybody going to be here on May 6th? April 19, 2021 Page 3 of 73 COMMISSIONER SHEA: Yes. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Well, let me look. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: All these people in the room, anyway. How about you? Yeah? COMMISSIONER FRY: (Nods head.) CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: So at least we'll have a quorum? I guess, Joe, are you -- COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: I'll be here. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: -- shaking your head yes or no? COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Yes. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. And there's no minutes. BCC recaps? MR. BELLOWS: Yes. On April 13th, the Board of County Commissioners heard and approved a street name change from Lord's Way to Hacienda Lakes Parkway, and then on the summary agenda, they approved SSA 14, the amendment, and they approved SSA 17. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. Thank you. Okay. Chairman's report, I have none. Consent agenda, there's nothing. ***So we're going to get right on to the first 9A1 which is still Bellmar from what we continued from our last meeting. So it's PL20190001837, Bellmar Village SRA. And I believe we are -- oh, we're just at public speakers still or just had one? MR. BELLOWS: For the record, Ray Bellows. I believe we still have some public speakers left. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Madam Chair, before we proceed, can I ask a procedural question? I did receive an email regarding the Rural Lands Stewardship amendment overlay. It had to do with, basically, stating that what was being proposed was illegal. It was a letter sent to Mr. Klatzkow, Attorney Klatzkow. And I believe that, just for clarity, I already asked -- I believe that letter is somewhat moot since the -- it had to do with a scrivener's error and it's already being corrected, so pretty much the letter is moot; is that correct, Jeff? MR. KLATZKOW: No, I would not call it moot. I've asked Anita and Heidi Ashton to go through the entire ordinance to see whether or not there were other issues with it. They're doing that, and that work's ongoing. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Okay. Would you -- could you, then, advise us prior to the hearing date for the Rural Lands Stewardship on your assessment of that letter. Can you send us information on that or -- MR. KLATZKOW: Oh, absolutely, absolutely. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Okay. MR. KLATZKOW: I just -- we're trying to assess what the -- what the extent of the issue is first, and then we'll -- COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: For those who reference, it was a letter from Arnold and Porter dated April 8th, 2021, and that was enclosed, a letter, and I believe it was in the same email that the Conservancy sent a letter, their latest presentation. So just for clarity, it was that letter. And so we have your assessment prior to the hearing date of the amendments. MR. KLATZKOW: We're doing our due diligence now. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Okay, thanks. Thank you. Thank you for allowing me to interrupt on that, because that was a point I wanted to clear. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay this time. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Okay. Okay. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Anybody wishing to speak on the item that is before us right April 19, 2021 Page 4 of 73 now, would you please rise and be sworn in by the court reporter. (The speakers were duly sworn and indicated in the affirmative.) MR. YOVANOVICH: Madam Chairman, Mr. Schmitt, the letter you're referring to, was that about the RLSA program, or was it regarding the Bellmar petition? CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: RLSA. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: It was RLSA, but also in that same email was a presentation for today's Bellmar. It was an attachment -- attachment of that letter plus the attachment of the presentation. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: That was a separate -- those are separate ones. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: I thought it was in the same email. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: No, no, no. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Okay. I'm sorry. MR. YOVANOVICH: I don't know that we've seen either document. If someone can just give me a copy while I'm listening to the public, I'd appreciate it. MR. KLATZKOW: Sure. Heidi will forward you a copy of it. (Commissioner Vernon is present remotely.) COMMISSIONER VERNON: Madam Chair? CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Yes. Who's that? COMMISSIONER VERNON: It's Commissioner Vernon. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Oh. COMMISSIONER VERNON: Sorry to interrupt. Just wanted to let you know I'm here. I'm going to try to put it on mute. I'm driving, but I'm listening in. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Oh, okay. Do we need a motion to allow him to -- COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Make a motion to allow Commissioner Vernon to participate and when he can, if he can, ask questions and vote. COMMISSIONER SHEA: Second. COMMISSIONER FRY: May I ask a question? Chris, are you able to be a part of the proceedings the entire time? COMMISSIONER VERNON: Yes, sir. COMMISSIONER FRY: Fantastic. COMMISSIONER VERNON: Yes. I'm on a long drive, and I'll stay on the line throughout the meeting. I'm going to mute it, so it may take me a second to jump in if somebody asks me a question. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay, thanks. All those in favor, signify by saying aye. COMMISSIONER SHEA: Aye. COMMISSIONER FRY: Aye. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Aye. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Aye. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Opposed, like sign. (No response.) CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. Disclosures. Anything -- COMMISSIONER SHEA: Staff materials only. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Tom. MR. EASTMAN: Many meetings, correspondence with developer representatives regarding future school site agreement in exchange for impact fees. COMMISSIONER SHEA: Staff materials. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. Nothing since last time. April 19, 2021 Page 5 of 73 COMMISSIONER FRY: Nothing new since last time. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Joe. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Only discussions briefly with the petitioner prior to the meeting just briefly, casually discussing some of the points, but also, in receipt of this presentation dated April 15th, 2021, Bellmar hearing that was submitted by the Conservancy. And I guess for the purposes -- can I get a clarification from staff? Had -- has this presentation -- has that -- a copy of this presentation been provided to the applicant prior to today's meeting? Is the staff aware of this presentation? MR. BELLOWS: We're not aware of it. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: I have to ask again. We went through this probably two-and-a-half months ago when we first dealt with information coming into the commissioners. I got this probably Friday or -- Friday or Saturday in an email. I'd have to go back and look. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: It was before the last meeting. MR. BELLOWS: But I don't know if this is something staff sent. The applicant may have just -- or somebody may have just sent it directly to you. We can't control that. We do have a rule that we don't accept for the Planning Commission agenda packets information that comes with seven days or within or -- as a matter of fact, we even hold the 10-day. So if they don't make the 10-day, then they don't make the agenda packet. So you don't have to -- MS. OLSON: This is just the same presentation that I'm going to give to you today, just as a courtesy in advance, but it's the same thing I'm going to give today. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Well, I have to ask again, why not give it to staff and why not to the applicant? We've been -- April, we went through this two-and-a-half months ago when you first provided information. MS. OLSON: It's not additional information. It's just that what I'm giving today here at the presentation and -- you know, a lot of times we don't even give it in advance. It was just as a courtesy. But it's the same exact presentation you're going to see today. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Well, I disagree. It's not the exact presentation. It's a new presentation. It may be some of the same information, but it's not the exact presentation. And you're representing it as such. It is not. MS. OLSON: It's -- it's the same. It's -- you'll see it today. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: It's the same information. MS. OLSON: Yeah. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Not the same presentation. MS. OLSON: It's one -- like, two words on it are different. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Oh, okay, I got it now. I understand. COMMISSIONER FRY: Just a clarification. MS. OLSON: I can point it out if you'd like on there when I get to -- COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: I just don't think it's right. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. This is -- MS. OLSON: It's a minor change. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: This is not time for this now. I agree the last time the Longwater and Bellmar was -- we were told that was just going to be that one presentation, and now it's not, so... COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: I mean, it gives -- it gives the applicant no time to prepare any type of rebuttal. It's just not -- it's not proper. We've been through this before with -- and chastised staff over this. Yes, it was sent to us directly, to us on our county email. And then certainly the applicant has every -- or anybody has any -- the right to do that, and that's fine, but I think it's also out of nothing more than sheer courtesy to provide the applicant the same presentation. But we'll listen. April 19, 2021 Page 6 of 73 CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: I agree. COMMISSIONER FRY: In way of a clarification. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. Well, let's just get to the public speakers. We're not going to do this. What's the -- who is the first public speaker that we have? MR. YOUNGBLOOD: Madam Chair, we have three public speakers here in person, and we also have two online. Our first -- our speaker is Jeanne Jain Perry followed by Dennis DuBois. MS. PERRY: Can I take my mask off? MR. KLATZKOW: Try not to sneeze. MS. PERRY: Good afternoon, and thank you for the opportunity to speak. It has been said here that Longwater and Bellmar Villages will not take away land that Florida panthers use regularly. Bellmar Village will take away another 1,000 acres of panther habitat or, at the very least, 1,000 acres of lands frequented by panthers and black bears, not to mention other listed species. One only has to peruse FWC's panther telemetry map to dispute that claim. In addition, more cars and traffic mean more panther and black bear deaths by vehicle collision. We purchased property adjacent to Florida Panther National Wildlife Refuge, as we were sure no development would take place that close to the Refuge. How sadly mistaken we were. The county informed us it was not possible for us to make a path on our partial wetlands property to install trail cameras to photograph wildlife, as no native vegetation can be removed, yet the county is considering developing another thousand acres of former wetlands in one fell swoop. The U.S. Department of Interior has advised the Planning Commission that the Longwater and Bellmar projects, quote, will encroach upon several current conservation areas such as the Florida Panther National Wildlife Refuge, unquote. The department believes, quote, the Planning Commission should take a pause in considering developments within the RLSA on an individual project approach and implement a more comprehensive planning approach, unquote. This is a decision that cannot be reversed. It will mean higher taxes for all of us in the long run. As a property owner and taxpayer, I implore you to please reject the proposal for additional development in the RLSA known as Bellmar Village. Thank you. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Thank you. MR. YOUNGBLOOD: Madam Chairman, our next speaker is Dennis DuBois, followed by April Olson. MR. DuBOIS: Thank you for the opportunity. My name is Dennis DuBois, and I live at Sixth Avenue Southeast, east of DeSoto. So I'm right on the borderline of this proposed Bellmar development. So I want to take a different approach than what all the other speakers are going to take with you against Bellmar, because I am speaking in opposition to Bellmar. I drive to Golden Gate Boulevard. It's only three streets away. That's the main entrance proposed for Bellmar. Traffic is horrible even though the road has been expanded recently to two lanes each way. If you get behind a school bus, you just sit there and wait until you can pass the school bus. So the traffic is very bad. One other observation as a homeowner there is that I drive down the side streets, and I see all of these new homes being built. I don't know if you've considered the extent to which building permits have been issued for single-family homes in Golden Gate Estates, but it's only going to get -- traffic is only going to get worse. The other reason I'm speaking against this is because I also moved out to the country at a dead-end street that I thought would always be a dead-end street, and now there's a proposal to add a second access point to Bellmar at Sixth Avenue Southeast. And if there's going to be a April 19, 2021 Page 7 of 73 north/south road called Big Cypress Parkway, it will be very easy for the Bellmar residents to get to Golden Gate and go west. I would like the Board to consider that if they approve Bellmar to make the access point at Sixth Avenue for emergency vehicles only -- and I speak for all of the residents on Sixth Avenue Southeast that live east of DeSoto. They're all opposed to Bellmar. That concludes my remarks, and thank you for listening. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Thank you. MR. YOUNGBLOOD: Madam Chair, our next speaker is April Olson. April has had time ceded to her by seven other speakers. MS. OLSON: Good afternoon. April Olson here on behalf of the Conservancy of Southwest Florida and our over 6,400 supporting families. We thank you for the opportunity to speak today on the application for Bellmar Village SRA. We stated at a previous meeting that our experts, Norm Marshall of Smart Mobility and Joe Minicozzi of Urban3, would not repeat the same presentation they gave at Longwater for Bellmar's hearing. This was as a courtesy to this board. But because their presentation and many of our comments and materials address both Longwater and Bellmar, we ask that all materials submitted for Longwater be incorporated into the record for Bellmar. We were very concerned at the April 1st Bellmar hearing when the applicant's attorney asked to eliminate the public comment portion of the hearing. This is a democratic public forum. The RLSA is a community plan, and the proposed thousand-acre Bellmar project will impact numerous property owners and taxpayers of Collier County. The rights of other property owners and citizens of Collier County must be considered, not just the applicant's rights. Three or four hours of testimony at both the March 18th and the April 1st Longwater hearing was dedicated to countering the Conservancy's argument, but we provided our comments at a previous meeting, so we were unable to respond to the many attacks against us, nor were we able to provide you with additional information that we feel you need to make an informed decision. This is our opportunity to provide you with information you did not receive for Longwater so that you can make a more informed decision for Bellmar. It is important to note that nothing that was stated at a previous meeting changed the Conservancy and our experts' views of both Bellmar and Longwater. Both projects are not fiscally neutral, and they do not even come close to meeting the requirements of Collier County's Growth Management Plan. Before we explain the many ways in which Bellmar is illegal and why the County's fiscal neutrality arguments do not add up, we would like to address some of your reasons for approving Longwater, as we are concerned you may consider those same reasons for approving Bellmar. First we heard Commissioner Fry state that while other environmental groups were willing to work with the developer and provide compromises, the Conservancy engaged in a zero-sum game. While we do agree that bear-proof cans, wider wildlife crossings, and smoke easements are important, these concessions do nothing to fix the real issues that stem from the project's poor designs and improper locations. How could we possibly compromise when we know that Longwater and Bellmar are illegal, as they do not come close to meeting the overlay's requirements? How could we compromise when we know that the projects will destroy large chunks of the last remaining habitat of the extremely endangered Florida panther? How can we compromise when we know that the projects are not fiscally neutral and will pass millions of dollars of costs onto the taxpayers? How can we compromise when our experts have shown us that the village will cause severe traffic congestion? These projects are illegal, so a compromise is not appropriate. April 19, 2021 Page 8 of 73 You even heard environmental speakers state that they believe Bellmar is not the best spot for development because of its close proximity to the panther refuge; however, they still will not oppose the project. Their reasons provided to support Bellmar is because other lands will be set aside as SSAs or preserves. And, quite frankly, they're only looking at half of the equation. The compromise struck with the RLSA wasn't that developers could have a free pass to develop whatever they please if they set aside SSA lands. The compromise was that in exchange for SSA lands, developers would be permitted to build innovative smart growth developments constrained by a number of requirements, including fiscal neutrality and avoidance of wetland and uplands habitats. If a project is not designed properly, like Longwater and Bellmar, what happens in the development areas will have an impact on the quality of preserves. And this map on the left is from Dr. Frakes. He's a leading panther scientist and author of a study that models the probability or presence of adult panther breeding habitat pre- and post-development. The Conservancy hired Dr. Frakes to apply his model to assess any loss of adult breeding habitat from construction of the applicant's villages, including Bellmar. And the red, orange, and yellow areas represent a significant loss of adult breeding habitat value. His map demonstrates that not only will the projects destroy adult breeding habitat within the SRA sites, but they will also destroy adult breeding panther habitat within the very lands that are set aside as preserves. And you can see that on the outside of Bellmar. This is due to light, noise, people, pets, and traffic coming from the developments. So, again, you can't protect the environment by simply looking at half of the equation. The Conservancy is not antigrowth. Where compromise is appropriate, we make every attempt to assure a win-win outcome. We base our reviews on science with analyses from professional staff and technical experts, as you have seen. However, if the bottom-line position for a landowner is not sufficiently protective of the environment and our quality of life, we must walk away from the negotiation table and stand up for our principles. On a few occasions during the Longwater hearing, we heard Commissioner Klucik state that he cannot recommend denial of an application simply because the project is not desirable, and we agree with him. That is why our review of development projects in our comment letters are always rooted in whether the project is consistent with the GMP and LDC. The bottom line is that Bellmar's design is nowhere near consistent, as the proposed project is merely a typical suburban gated-style community. But don't just take our word for it. Collier County's certified planning staff also concluded in their May 27th, 2020, review that Bellmar is not a village. Here's what they stated: Quote, the Bellmar Village SRA still does not fully meet the intent of the policies in the RLSAO pertaining to innovative design, compactness, housing diversity, walkability, mix of uses, use, density, intensity, continuum of gradient, interconnectedness, et cetera. In staff's view, this SRA is, with some exceptions, a suburban development plan typical of that in the coastal urban area placed in the RLSA and is contrary to what is intended in the RLSAO, end quote. And, by the way, this statement was found -- a nearly identical statement in all of the villages by staff in their reviews. In that same review of Bellmar, staff also stated, quote, if the village center were more centrally located, it would facilitate a more compact development pattern, a use intensity/density gradient or continuum from the village center to the SRA edge, and a more walkable community, end quote. So in order for the applicant to resolve that laundry list of issues that I just quoted by staff, the project would need to be completely redesigned. But was it? Let's compare Submittal 2 master plan that staff stated is contrary to what is intended in the RLSA to the -- on the left to the finer -- final master plan on the right. You can see that the two versions are nearly identical. Despite staff's concerns, the village center is still located on the edge, nothing is done to increase April 19, 2021 Page 9 of 73 compactness, and the street pattern is essentially the same. So why did staff end up of recommending approval when the plan still resembles a typical suburban planned development? Was staff asked to change their professional assessment to recommend approval? We may never know. At the April 1st meeting you were presented with an extremely one-sided view regarding the RLSA's design requirements, and it is beyond disappointing that Collier County planning staff changed their position to state that villages do not have to be innovative. Is it really the stance of Collier County's planning professionals that they're totally fine with having 45,000 acres worth of standard sprawling low-density type development in the RLSA? Here are the policies that you asked to see at the last hearing which proves that SRAs themselves, such as Bellmar Village, are required to be designed based on innovative and creative land planning techniques. But what sets apart a village from a PUD is that villages are required to have certain characteristics per these policies. You can see definitive words like "shall" and "will" in these policies. Unlike SRA villages, these characteristics are not required of a PUD. Furthermore, unlike villages, PUDs don't even have to be fiscally neutral or show that they are self-sufficient. Again, a village must be designed with all of these characteristics to earn the right to be called a village. Bellmar has not earned that right. And at the last Bellmar meeting, the applicant's attorney even went so far as to tell you that it's totally fine to have PUDs in the RLSA. It is not fine. Let me give you just one more example of how Bellmar's design is inconsistent with the GMP. In every review of all three of Collier Enterprises' villages, including Bellmar, staff expressed concerns regarding the lack of housing diversity. They explained that the developer only commits to providing 10 percent multifamily homes, which is a far lower standard than the county's average of 45 to 50 percent. Staff stated they would like Bellmar to include a more meaningful mix, closer to 42 percent of multifamily, that was provided in Bellmar's economic assessment. But, ultimately, the applicant is committing to only 10 percent multi-families, not the 42 percent. Again, the question needs to be asked: Are Collier County's planning professionals being required to recommend approval against their professional opinion? Again, we may never know. At the April 1st hearing, staff spent a lot of time attempting to deconstruct our arguments regarding fiscal neutrality. We were not at all surprised by their arguments. In fact, their statements confirmed what we already knew to be true; that the county's inappropriately treating Stewardship Receiving Areas, including Bellmar, as typical developments not subject to the fiscal neutrality requirements in the RLSA. But what staff has forgotten is that SRAs must be held to higher fiscal standards. So they shouldn't be using the same old business-as-usual approach. When staff walked you through the process of an economic assessment, and show you how they determined fiscal neutrality, they explained to you that they use an existing framework for determining SRAs fair share of cost. They further explained they pull from a basket of funding sources. As example, they used the example of fuel taxes and the infrastructure sales tax to insure that SRAs costs are covered and that the county maintains a balanced budget. However, the LDC explicitly states, quote, each SRA must demonstrate that its development as a whole will be fiscally neutral or positive to the Collier County tax base, end quote. Therefore, it is inappropriate to take from a basket of funds consisting of other tax revenue sources unless an analysis is done to demonstrate that the SRA is contributing the same amount of funds in that basket it has taken out of the basket, and this was never done. Staff also mentioned that the county must agree to the applicant's chosen methodology, but April 19, 2021 Page 10 of 73 if the methodology is flawed right from the start, then all reviews using that methodology are also flawed, including the third-party review. So let me give you an example. An analysis of fiscal neutrality pertaining to water and wastewater is required under Policy 4.18 and the LDC; however, the applicant failed to provide this analysis in Bellmar and Longwater's assessment. They simply provided the anticipated water and wastewater demand created by the developments and then just showed you the dollar amounts of the anticipated impact fees, but they did not analyze whether the impact fees would actually cover the costs. But since the county accepted their methodology -- I'm sorry -- which excluded this important analysis, the third-party reviewer did not even assess whether Longwater and Bellmar were paying their fair share for water and wastewater impacts. In fact, the first time we ever saw a fiscal impact analysis for water and wastewater was April 1st, 2021, during the Longwater hearing. While we appreciate this analysis was provided, it should have been provided by the applicant during the application process for the public to review as the law requires. And we still have yet to see this analysis for Bellmar. So why didn't the applicant include a fiscal impact analysis for water and wastewater? DPFG claimed that they didn't need to because utilities are funded through self-supporting funds or user fees through the Collier County Water/Sewer District. County staff also mentioned this on April 1st when they said that the water/sewer subdistrict is a separate district from the county. But is it so separate? While the water/sewer district is governed by the Board of County Commissioners, the Board of County Commissioners approves the water/sewer district budget. The water/sewer district's planning is in the AUIR, and, most importantly, most of the water/sewer district users are also taxpayers. So the applicant is simply splitting hairs in an attempt to get out of an important requirement of a water/wastewater fiscal impact analysis. Let me be perfectly clear; they are trying to get out of the assessment by complain -- by claiming that water/sewer district users are not taxpayers. Because the applicant did not provide this legally required analysis for Longwater and Bellmar, we analyzed the cost using data provided by numerous county sources. Our analysis was criticized by staff and this board because our analysis did not consider that the new northeast facility would be built in phases. While this is true, after receiving additional information from staff, we are still confident in our assessment that Longwater and Bellmar are not fiscally neutral for the water and wastewater impacts, and we will show you why. We based our analysis on a figure of 106 million for the cost of a new wastewater plant found in a staff report. This number, 106 million, is actually lower than the $108 million cost in the 2020 AUIR attributed to just Phase 1 of the wastewater treatment plant, which involves a four-million-gallon-a-day plant and is scheduled to begin in 2026. Mr. Bellone's analysis at the Longwater hearing noted and anticipated 105 million spent on the wastewater plant in Fiscal Year '25. But as you see here, the most recent AUIR represents that this is associated with building just Phase 1, 4 MGD plant, not all three phases of a 12 MGD plant. In addition, documents recently provided to us by the county demonstrate that the county has approved $77 million in costs for an interim wastewater plant being built to provide utility services to the northeast growing service area. In an attempt to be conservative, we allocated none of the $77 million to Collier Enterprises developments. In reality, their developments will likely consume the bulk of the interim capacity built by the county. Even when we reviewed staff's newly available analysis presented to you on April 1st, it is clear that the county is not assessing the fair share of costs for the villages. The county's analysis used an average daily flow to determine Longwater's fair share instead of a maximum three-day demand. Staff even mentioned to you on April 1st that Florida law requires that all new facilities are built per maximum three-day demand. April 19, 2021 Page 11 of 73 If Longwater's maximum three-day demand share is applied to the total cost presented by the county, the development is no longer fiscally neutral. Longwater would result in a $5.89 million deficit to Collier County Water and Sewer District. Furthermore, we have seen no such analysis, again, provided for Bellmar nor from the applicant. You also heard the County Attorney explain that it is a policy decision by the BCC that they do not collect the legally available impact fees, but the bottom line is since impact fees that are to be collected will not result in fiscal neutrality, and no supplemental payments are to be paid, Bellmar must be denied. On March 18th, staff spent a considerable time arguing that our experts' analysis of Bellmar and Longwater's fair share of traffic impacts was inaccurate. Staff argued at the Longwater hearing that transportation improvements are already being -- I'm sorry -- being planned and committed through the LRTP and AUIR process. Commissioner Shea then asked a very important question: He asked staff if the village traffic is the background traffic causing the need for some of the road improvements that the county commits to in the LRTP. Staff replied by stating that the background traffic is defined, quote, as existing committed and vested trips plus projected background trips from any other source than the development, end quote. Staff explained that they're simply planning for general population growth rather than growth attributed to the villages. But when you review the 2040 LRTP amendment and 2045 LRTP, a very different story emerges. It is crystal clear that the county has been planning for population increases in the RLSA because of Collier Enterprises' development, including Bellmar. So the traffic from the villages is the reason why some of the roads will become deficient and why the county is planning and paying for improvements as identified in the LRTP. It all started with Collier Enterprises' application for the Town of Rural Lands West in the general location of the three villages, which would have provided 10,000 homes, about 2,000 homes more than the three villages combined. And here is a quote from the 2040 LRTP amendment that shows that the MPO was contemplating amending the LRTP based on increases in population and employment from Rural Lands West. Here's another statement from the 2040 LRTP amendment showing that the county was planning for population increases and additional traffic for 8,000 of Rural Lands West's 10,000 homes. Here's yet another statement from the 2045 LRTP which shows that the county planned for road improvements due to population increases from Collier County Enterprises villages after the applicant replaced their town plan with plans for villages, including Bellmar. Bottom line, the village traffic is the reason why the county's planning for some of the roadway improvements. And staff's refusal to charge Collier Enterprises for any road improvements that are already committed in the LRTP is flawed, and it leaves the county paying for the vast majority of road impacts caused by these developments. As shown by our expert Norm Marshall, the applicant will leave a $125 million deficit to the county by not covering all costs for these road improvements necessitated by the villages. Bellmar's portion of that shortfall is $43.8 million; thus, Bellmar must be denied. Staff's solution to cover some of the costs for road improvements is to, again, tap into that basket of funding sources, and in this case it's fuel taxes. But this is not an option to achieve fiscal neutrality because, again, the projects have to be fiscally neutral to the county's tax base, and there is no analysis showing that fuel taxes resulting from this development will be sufficient to cover these costs. Furthermore, the county's ongoing reliance on fuel taxes needs to be reevaluated. Several auto manufacturers have already committed to building all electric vehicles in the near future. As an example, GM will do so by 2035, Volvo by 2030, and we all already know that Tesla's already April 19, 2021 Page 12 of 73 achieved this. So what will the county do when the fuel tax revenues dry up? We also cannot ignore the fact that Collier County is one of the most vulnerable places in the United States to sea level rise and flooding. The notion that residents will abandon their homes and immediately retreat inland is totally illogical. Step one is going to be enhanced resiliency, and the cost for making our coastal communities resilient by raising roads and improving infrastructure will be astronomical. We cannot allow SRAs to funnel the county's limited tax revenues to build, widen, and perpetually maintain roads out east when we will need those funds to protect the safety and property of existing populations. Now, we heard the argument from members of this board and other speakers who said that they support the villages simply because this is a voluntary program and it will result in thousands of acres of preservation. But just because a program is voluntary does not mean that the county should settle for subpar development plans that do not meet the rules of the program. Developers benefit hugely from the program. Just to mention one of the many benefits, they get a 20-fold increase in density. Instead of one home per five acres, they get to build up to four homes per acre. It is a privilege for them to be able to use the program, thus we must hold Collier Enterprises accountable to build SRAs that actually meet the rules of the program. For decades landowners have had the opportunity to build at the baseline zoning, and no one has stopped them. To our knowledge, they haven't even built one such development in the RLSA. Excluding all the benefits that they get, the -- another reason why they haven't built at the base density is because the road network needed for five-acre development simply does not exist. The cost to build such a road network would be astronomical. Yes, people are building homes in Golden Gate Estates, but that is only because the road network exists. And according to the 2017 white paper for the Golden Gate Area Master Plan restudy, the Estates, which is a far smaller area than the RLSA, is comprised of 813 miles of roads. Collier Enterprises won't even agree to pay for Big Cypress Parkway, the main arterial road for the villages, nor have they agreed to pay for Bellmar and Longwater's internal spine roads, which I remind you will be inside the gates. Since Collier Enterprises is trying to get out of paying for roads essential to their projects, it is highly improbable that they and other landowners would agree to pay to build hundreds of miles of new roads to accommodate five-acre ranchette development or even a Twin Eagle style development. It makes zero economic sense. This statement is from the landowners' very own representative, Al Reynolds, who's now with Stantec, and he wrote this during the RLSA Amendment Oversight Committee in 2002. And he says, quote, I am convinced that if you adopt an incentive-based policy that is properly designed and gives enough incentive to do the right thing, it will be the only choice because what person in the right mind would go out there and try to develop this stuff at one unit per five acres and eventually platted subdivisions knowing they're facing years and years of permitting and virtually no market for it as compared to being able to get some credit for protecting that and going and taking these rights and clustering them into a development pattern that's proven to add value, be more cost effective, be more economically sound? Who's going to do that? If you do this right, nobody's going to do the baseline conditions. That's my point. I couldn't have said it any better. In conclusion, please do not be lulled into thinking that if you recommend denial of Bellmar Village that landowners will have no choice but to cover the entire 300-square-mile area of the RLSA with five-acre development. It's a preposterous idea, and it cannot happen. In fact, Group 5 policies, which are for landowners who choose not to participate, include policies that protect flowways from development. All projects must meet the rules of the RLSA no matter what, and Bellmar does not. Please help our community ensure fiscally neutral smart growth development for the RLSA by recommending denial of Bellmar Village. April 19, 2021 Page 13 of 73 And I'm happy to answer some questions, and my colleague, Julie Ann Thomas, is here via Zoom to answer -- or to go over just a few minutes of the listed-species issues. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Joe? COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Yeah, I have several questions. MS. OLSON: Sure. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: And, certainly, I think we've given you more than ample time to respond. You made a statement about not being able to make public comment. I have no idea where that came from. That was a debate up here at the Board when we were talking about hearing the same information for both petitions. I certainly recall voting that -- and identifying that this was a public process and anybody would be allowed to speak again. So I thought that was a bit disingenuous. But with that, I don't need your comment. You made several comments. Despite this being a poor location -- and I'm not going to argue it, I mean, it is probably not the best location. But isn't and hasn't it been always identified as a receiving area? And what part of receiving area do I not understand? MS. OLSON: It is a receiving area, but it's also not meeting the goal of the RLSA, which is to direct incompatible uses away from wetlands -- COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Okay. MS. OLSON: -- and upland habitat. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: That's your opinion, professional opinion -- MS. OLSON: That's the fact. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: -- professional assessment, or a legal opinion? Because you also state that this is illegal. And that's a pretty strong statement. You're not an attorney, correct? MS. OLSON: I'm not an attorney, but attorneys have reviewed this, my statement. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: And their legal opinion is this is illegal? MS. OLSON: Yes, for the many reasons that I mentioned -- COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: And that's in writing? MS. OLSON: Well, I will give you a copy of this afterward. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: I have a copy. But "illegal" is a pretty strong statement. MS. OLSON: Yes, we do believe that this project is illegal. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: It may be not consistent with the Comp Plan, but I guess your extrapolation is then is it's illegal? MS. OLSON: If it wasn't approved, it would be illegally approved because it does not meet the requirements of the Growth Management Plan for all the reasons that I just went over. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: You also state that it was not designed properly. Again, is that -- that's a professional opinion based on your -- the consultants that you have hired to analyze this design. And so basically what I've heard through your entire presentation is this is what staff has said, and staff is wrong, and we're right. MS. OLSON: It is based on my professional opinion. It's based on our experts' opinion. It's based on the fact that the project does not meet the goals and objectives and policies within the Growth Management Plan and LDC, and I provided you with some of those policies -- COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Oh, I have them. MS. OLSON: -- early on, a whole list of them. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Staff is -- MS. OLSON: Unfortunately, I don't know why staff came to the conclusion because early on I -- they said that they believed it did not meet the intent of the policy. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Well, in conclusion, then, you're basically saying everything that staff said is wrong, and all your statements are, in fact, correct. April 19, 2021 Page 14 of 73 MS. OLSON: I'm saying -- COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: We heard from staff, and staff has pretty much stated that it's consistent with the Comp Plan. MS. OLSON: Based on our review of this and the policies that are within the RLSA overlay, this project does not meet the goals and objectives of the RLSA for numerous reasons. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: And staff says otherwise. MS. OLSON: They obviously say otherwise. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Okay. MS. OLSON: I'm not denying that. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: This says -- let me talk about a village, because you brought up about a village, and then can you go back -- can you go to the slide. MS. OLSON: Sure. This one? COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Go to Slide 11. MS. OLSON: Okay. I don't know which one this is. I don't have them numbered up here. What is the slide? COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: It says, basically, LDC 4.08.07. Next one. Next one. MS. OLSON: Oh, that was on the bottom here. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: No, keep on going, keep on going. I'll tell you when. Next one. Next one. This one. MS. OLSON: Okay. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Let's just -- you show a picture here. And on, I guess -- I'm looking at -- when I look at this on the right side of it, is that your interpretation of what a village should be, multifamily, multistory buildings, almost like a -- I would call it a European village look? Because somehow that connotes to me much more density and probably more significant impact population-wise than what's being offered. Is this your interpretation of what the village should look like? MS. OLSON: So this picture is from our community character plan. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: I'm very familiar with that, yes. MS. OLSON: And, yeah, if they had -- if the design had followed the rules of the program, it would be more compact. They would have definitely more multi-families residences. As I mentioned, the county averages 45 to 50 percent. The economic assessment provides 42 percent multifamily so -- and to have more of a continuum as required by the RLSA. So, yeah, you're going to have a little bit more -- you're going to have more density near the village center, and then as the continuum goes out, the density would lessen. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: This sort of implies, then -- it's a receiving area. And what did receiving area mean in the RLSA? MS. OLSON: Well, there's different receiving areas. Different types. There's villages, towns, hamlets, compact rural development. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Did it indicate that that's where growth would be allowed? MS. OLSON: Under the RLSA program, that's where the receiving areas are, but they also have to -- COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: So I can take -- MS. OLSON: -- meet the goal. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: -- I could take Bellmar and create an entire village that looks like this, which would probably be four times the amount of density then what currently is shown. Is that a better design? MS. OLSON: If they meet the rules of the program, yes, it is a better design, yes. You create more walkability. You have more buffers around. You know, the density gets lessened. April 19, 2021 Page 15 of 73 It's better for the panther. If you remember that slide that I showed you how the SRA -- development in the SRA, because the road network is so spread out, that it's impacting the preserves as well. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Would this not mean that it would be greater density throughout the entire RLSA -- MS. OLSON: The applicant -- COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: -- SRA? MS. OLSON: -- is leaving density on the table. They're only about, what, 2.6, somewhere in there, 2.5. I haven't calculated it. But they're allowed to build up to four units per acre. And if you make it more compact, you would have greater density near the village center, and then you'd have a more walkable community. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: But, logically, then, you would have more density, more people, more population, more impact, more -- significantly more impact on water and sewer and other infrastructure needs. MS. OLSON: Well, they would collect more in impact fees then. I mean, the program allows up to four units per acre. But it can be designed so it is more compact. And so you do have a more walkable village center, and that's one of the proponents of the program that we are trying to make sure the applicant -- well, the applicant is not meeting, unfortunately. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: All right. I mean, I won't debate it, but I clearly don't understand, because what they're offering is less dense and less impact than what is shown here, what you seem to imply. Let me talk about diversity. You disagree with Mr. Giblin's assessment of diversity and housing and his acceptance of the affordable housing type requirements. Is that the issue about density and diversity? MS. OLSON: Well, I didn't make comments on the affordable housing, just on the requirement that they provide housing diversity and, yeah, I disagree that 10 percent is adequate when the county is 45 to 50 percent, and their economic assessment shows that they're going to have 20 -- I'm sorry -- 42 percent multifamily, but they're not committing to that. So we would prefer that they commit to what they're stating in the economic assessment. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: So -- and the bottom line, I'm on Slide 11 again. Your statement was pretty strong in regards to the fiscal impact of water and sewer, not a -- not providing or assessing their fair share contribution, and then, of course, the funding for transportation, all of which you have pretty much refuted everything that was stated by staff in regards to -- because we -- during the Longwater presentation, we had staff kind of cover the funding for both water and sewer for both Bellmar and Longwater. And your statement now is that whatever Joe Bellone said, whatever Amy Patterson said is irrelevant or not -- not factual, I guess, because your statements are correct and theirs are false in their presentation. MS. OLSON: Well, what I'm saying is that the applicant is required to do a fiscal impact analysis on water and wastewater. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Yes. MS. OLSON: And this was never done. It was never done for Longwater or for Bellmar. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: But that was based on a policy decision by the Board to expand the water/sewer district. MS. OLSON: But they have to show -- they have to provide this fiscal impact analysis for water and sewer that was never provided by the applicant. Now, staff did that for Longwater, and we reviewed it but, unfortunately, they did not conduct their analysis on the max three-day demand, which is what the DEP requires. You build a structure that can accommodate three-day max demand. But for Bellmar we've seen no such analysis for -- from the applicant or from staff, and it is April 19, 2021 Page 16 of 73 a requirement that they do that. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: I believe that's what staff testified to that they did, but -- I can -- we can probably -- MS. OLSON: The applicant has not, and DPFG did not in that statement that I read to you that they felt they didn't need to because it's impacting users and not the taxpayer. But, again, we disagree. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Just the one last comment, because you kind of threw everything against the wall. It's kind of like throwing Jell-o against the wall. I had to figure out which point to kind of lend a value and credence. But then we got into talking about sea rise and the amount of money that it would cost for the county to take measures in raising roads and elevating roads. I mean, that's sort of an absurd argument. Do you believe that the county is going to spend that kind of money rather than -- I mean, we can discuss the merits of whether it's existing or not, but to throw that out as we should not spend money because we're going to need money to spend in the urban area is well beyond anything involved in regards to evaluating the consistency of this as a petition, but I just thought that was sort of an absurd argument. MS. OLSON: We need to be very fiscally conservative with our funds because, yes, we are one of the top places in the nation for sea level rise and flooding. And I know you probably know the ACUNE results are going to be coming out as well. So, yeah, we do believe in fiscal responsibility and that we should be a little bit more conservative. There already are roads that are under water during high tide. So it's -- it's a fact that our seas are rising here in Collier County. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Okay. You said that, but how many centimeters has it risen in 25 years? MS. OLSON: I don't -- I don't know the answer, but I can find out. Off the top of my head -- COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: It's -- I don't need to explore anymore. Thanks. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Karl. COMMISSIONER FRY: April, you brought up a variety of points, as Joe said. MS. OLSON: Sure. COMMISSIONER FRY: And some of which -- some of which are things that occurred to me also in review and some of the things we talked about. I feel like we vetted most of those issues with staff during the last meeting with the -- with an outcome where they seemed to address those concerns, at least to the extent that Longwater was approved. So I just want to clarify a couple points and tell you -- gating is one of the things you mentioned as one of my initial concerns, and one of my major surprises was I thought that the term "interconnected" meant we needed public roads, multiple ways in and out of these developments, and that that was keeping the traffic distributed, and not just on the main roads. But I asked that question directly of Trinity Scott and was surprised to learn that the county's preference was to not have the responsibility -- if they don't gate it -- my understanding is if they gate it, they are responsible for maintenance and building of the spine road. It is not the county's responsibility. And I'm bringing this up in case I'm incorrect. I do plan to ask staff just to clarify and, I guess, rebut some of the points that you've made. But I was told, really, I think the county didn't want the financial responsibility to maintain the spine roads inside, and they would prefer a gated development. You could have bowled me over with a feather when I heard that because of my implied definition of interconnected. But you're actually -- are you saying -- you seem to be saying that even if it's gated, they are not taking responsibility for the spine roads. MS. OLSON: Well, at one of the hearings we heard the applicant's attorney say that they were not -- they had not agreed to pay to build the spine road behind the gate. Now -- April 19, 2021 Page 17 of 73 COMMISSIONER FRY: And I don't know if -- CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: That's not even -- that's not how it works anyway. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: They have to pay. It's their road. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: The developer builds the roads. Even if they turn them over -- (Simultaneous crosstalk.) MS. OLSON: I may be wrong on that point. Maybe it was maintenance. I went back and listened to it, and Mr. Yovanovich -- COMMISSIONER FRY: I don't want to offend procedure, but are we able to have Rich chime in? MR. YOVANOVICH: That's okay. You don't need to. I'm writing down all of the things that she said I said, and I'm going to ask her to point out in the record where I actually said those things. So I have some cross of her when it's my turn. COMMISSIONER FRY: Okay. I'd just point out that my understanding was that they would have to pay for the spine roads as part of the gating, and that was something the county preferred to my surprise -- maybe not to my satisfaction or joy. Is it your statement that the village center -- we talked about it as a context zone. The staff defined a village center as a context zone, not necessarily a geographic or physical location. Is it your statement that the village center must be geographically central to the development? MS. OLSON: Yeah. It should be more central, similar to Ave Maria, where you have the core and it radiates out. You have the gradient. Just like staff had said in that statement, it would be more of a village center if it was actually in the center. And it would create, you know, a more walkable neighborhood. You have it on Big Cypress Parkway. You're supposed to have a continuum of gradient. There is no development on the west side of it. And -- in fact, let me just pull up the -- so you don't have walkability on half of the property. COMMISSIONER FRY: While you're looking, I think what you've brought up are a number of issues where, sitting up here -- and I imagine some others agree with me -- we wish some of the terms were more -- were defined in a more concrete manner. "Innovative," you know, "diversity of housing," "continuum of density." They -- in our discussion with staff, they came to the assessment they had met all those criteria. Continuum, because they had the multifamily closer to the core and then less density outside. It wasn't like there was five layers of density. There were only about three: Village center, multifamily and then -- twin homes and then single-family. But a lot of these things are things that, in our role, I think you put us -- we're in a rock -- between a rock and a hard place in addressing your points, because you're asking us to say this is illegal and to deny it based on things that I believe are open to interpretation that we have vetted very well and, I think, come to the conclusion it's different from what you're stating. MS. OLSON: Yeah. I'm glad you brought this up, Commissioner, because these two slides, this one and the next one, were really for you, because I heard a lot of your questions. And for example -- because I heard the discussion about innovation and, unfortunately, staff said they don't need to be innovative, but that is not our take at all. Here are a couple policies right here. And they also have to be creative, right? So SRA characteristics shall be based on innovative planning and development as referenced in the statute, but also let's look at the bottom, the LDC. SRA developments are a compact form of development which accommodates and promotes uses that utilize creative land-use planning. Now, look at this; SRAs shall be used to facilitate the implementation of innovative planning. So they have to be creative and innovative. And then -- COMMISSIONER FRY: What is the definition of that? That is where -- MS. OLSON: Well, there are 430 PUDs in Collier County; we counted recently. And the applicant's attorney said at the last meeting, it's okay to have another PUD in the RLSA. It's April 19, 2021 Page 18 of 73 not okay. In order to be innovative and creative, they have to meet these characteristics right in front of you. To basically make them distinct from a PUD, they have to be compact. They have to be walkable, continuum, housing diversity, self-sufficient, fiscal neutrality. These are what make an SRA an SRA, what make a village a village. And that's why we said you have to earn the right to be a village. It can't be just another PUD. And the reason why is because these villages, these SRAs are 20 miles from the coast, 10 to 11 miles from 951. That's just the beginning of the RLSA. Then you've got another 10 miles out. So they have to be self-sufficient. They have to be walkable so we don't have traffic pouring out to the east. And so they have to be held to a higher standard. COMMISSIONER FRY: I'll make one final point and let this move on. MS. OLSON: Sure. COMMISSIONER FRY: It really has to do with the whole characteristic of the SRA, and I think Joe's alluded to it, something we dug into last time, the NRI values and, you know, why is 1.2 important and how really different are the receiving lands from the sending areas. And, you know, we arrived at the conclusion that there was a lot of forethought put into this and that when they had a value of less than 1.2, that was the less environmentally sensitive lands and, in that respect, better to build on than the more environmentally sensitive lands and that the Bellmar Village falls into the less environmentally sensitive lands; therefore, it is a receiving area. I pointed out that there -- the lands that are 1.2 and above, which are in sending areas, are much more environmentally valuable. So you have other environmental groups that also care about panthers, and I have assumed that we all care about panthers, too. But you showed us telemetry data and, literally, there was nowhere where there was not telemetry data showing the panthers were there. So the question is: What is the best area for the panther habitat weighing in all the other factors, and the plan arrives at the conclusion that it is the sending areas -- MR. KLATZKOW: Just as -- COMMISSIONER FRY: -- overall. MR. KLATZKOW: Just as a point. These SSAs and these SRAs, they all went to the Board of County Commissioners as part of a public hearing. If anyone at that point in time thought that it was inappropriate to designate them as an SSA or an SRA, that was their time to object. To my knowledge, that never happened. MS. OLSON: Well, the program was -- I wasn't around back in two thousand -- MR. KLATZKOW: Well, let me finish, all right. So what we have here is 20 years ago we agreed upon this method to build out this portion of the county. Over the course of a number of years, we set aside lands, some for environmental protection, some to be built on. And now that we're getting into the very end game on this after 20 years, okay, we're talking about, well, this land really isn't appropriate because there's panthers. That decision was made. And, quite frankly, the time to object has long passed on this, all right. We can't unscramble this egg at this point in time. So if the objection was to be made that this area was too environmentally sensitive, we shouldn't build on it, well, shame on you for not bringing this up years ago. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Yeah, that was my point. It's an SRA. At the time when this was passed and went through numerous public hearings, if there was a dispute, they could file. That's how we ended up with neutral lands, if you remember. And they were -- then we had the Hussey agreement. We had other type of agreements that adjudicated whether they were sending or receiving. This has long been identified as receiving lands and that it was eventually going to be a buildout. But I want to make sure we clarify this term "PUD." PUD is a zoning term, Planned Unit Development. It's a specific zoning. This area is already zoned. It's already zoned RLSA. This April 19, 2021 Page 19 of 73 is not a PUD. It looks to you like a PUD, but this is nothing more than an overlay proposal consistent with the RLSA zoning. It is not a PUD. I know, Karl, we talked about PUD because it looked like a PUD because we all think of PUDs as gated communities. But a PUD is a specific zoning ordinance designed to allow for site specific rules where they wanted to apply a development. It could be commercial. It could be residential. So we throw this term "PUD" around. It is not a PUD. And I don't know where you may have heard the applicant -- I don't recall -- and we'll wait to hear what Mr. Yovanovich says, but I don't hear him -- I don't hear anybody ever saying that, well, the SRA was a place for a PUD because it is -- it's inconsistent. It's not a PUD. The RLSA is already zoned. It is a zoning classification for land use. This is nothing more than the approval of an overlay to be allowed as a Stewardship Receiving Area within the RLSA. That's what it is. COMMISSIONER FRY: Thank you for that clarification, Joe. I just, I think the -- when I say rock and a hard place, it does seem -- and to Attorney Klatzkow's point, you're asking us to change the rules that were set, and I don't think that's within our purview. MS. OLSON: I'm not asking you to change the rules. We're asking that these projects are designed to be a village, to be an SRA, to have all those qualities on that list that I just showed you. And according to staff, they say it's just a typical suburban development plan. I mean, that's why I showed you this. It's not meeting the benchmark of an SRA. And if you don't mind me real quickly touching on the telemetry data that you mentioned. The reason why not all of the telemetry is shown on those agricultural lands is because the panthers -- a lot of panthers are no longer collared, but the panthers that were collared, they would take that data during the daytime, and they found out later when they did the GPS collaring that they do use the agricultural fields. But a lot of the telemetry data was taken during the day when the panthers are hunkered down into the forests. And the other thing is, the program was approved before best available science came out about the panther. And there's many documents. The Immokalee area study said that it was going to be updated with best available science. Once that Kautz study was published -- and it never was, unfortunately. COMMISSIONER FRY: We have RLSA amendments coming up in the next meeting. To me it seems like some of these changes you're requesting, that would be the appropriate time. MS. OLSON: We have. COMMISSIONER FRY: Okay. I think that's great. MS. OLSON: We have, yeah. COMMISSIONER FRY: But, I mean, you have had other environmental groups who have spoken to that nighttime telemetry issue and still said that these lands are a better choice to build on than the sending areas. And so we're trying to apply the rules. I'm going to let it move it from here, April, not to dispute this. I'm going to ask staff to clarify some of the points that you made. I'm sure that Rich has a few comments to make. MS. OLSON: Sure. COMMISSIONER FRY: And we have to make our decision based on the criteria that we have to work with. MS. OLSON: And this map right here just shows you of the adult breeding habitat loss that will come from Longwater and Bellmar Village. The red areas, the orange, the yellow areas, so it will be significant, a significant loss, I should say -- CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Paul? MS. OLSON: -- if these projects are approved. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: You have a question? COMMISSIONER SHEA: Just a quick question. You referred to Ave Maria as a better example of the continuum the density. Does Ave Maria have all this SSA and WRA type lands April 19, 2021 Page 20 of 73 intermingled in the middle of the property which creates a little bit -- it makes it a lot easier to have that central location and the continuity out. These lots, which are designated open space, it's a little more difficult there, I think, than Ave Maria. MS. OLSON: Well, let me back up. Ave Maria did -- it has that town core area, and since then I think it's been amended a lot, so it has become more kind of low density around and less compact. But these are -- Bellmar's a thousand-acre project. That's huge. If you remember Joe Minicozzi, when he provided that slide and he laid it over downtown Naples, it's a big area. They could have a more centrally located village area, but they're choosing not to. COMMISSIONER SHEA: Just a follow-up question. I know there's a lot of discussion about well -- whether a village center is in the center of the village. But when I look at this, and I look at the layouts and the transportation planning and with the goal out in that area to be to reduce the amount of traffic that finds its way back into the highways, it would seem to me -- and I'm looking to see whether you agree or not -- that locating the village centers on the perimeter end would provide access to the Golden Gate Estates and actually help further reduce the transportation issues than if it was -- if you had commercial in the middle of the property. By having it on the outside, you really open it up to the possibility of Golden Gate Estates using it as well and cutting down on future traffic. MS. OLSON: Well, having it on the outside, you're encouraging -- like what they're planning on the town plan is just the strip commercial where people are going to be driving by; it's going to encourage sprawl. If you have the village center centrally located and where you actually have a true village center where you can get a cup of coffee, get your hair done, that's walkable, that -- you're going to have more internal capture if you provide all those amenities inland -- I should say on the interior, but providing, you know, Big Cypress Parkway, you're going to have a lot of, you know, extra traffic that's going to be going outside of the village instead of maintaining that internal capture. COMMISSIONER SHEA: But outside of the village to the edge of the village where the commercial area is and also the areas to the west would also now migrate, whereas they're less apt to migrate to use those commercial facilities if they're in the center of the -- so that's just an observation. It would seem like to me that it would have a more positive impact on the traffic for the bigger area, not just the development. MS. OLSON: But the problem is, you're making it less walkable when you put it along Big Cypress Parkway. And the whole point of these SRAs, the towns and the villages, is that they're supposed to be walkable. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Karl? COMMISSIONER FRY: "Walkable" is another word that I wish there was a tighter definition of. COMMISSIONER SHEA: Yes. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: It doesn't mean you can't walk. COMMISSIONER SHEA: Yeah. That's what I was just going to ask you. COMMISSIONER FRY: That's where I think it's difficult for us to hold a hard line. But that isn't my point. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Paul, the reality is, if you had it -- you can have commercial in the center, but if there's no capture rate to support the businesses, all you're going to have is a bunch of empty storefronts. COMMISSIONER SHEA: Yes. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: I mean, we -- there are developments here in this county that have attempted to do that, and they failed miserably. So it's -- I mean, even the standpoint when we talked about Ave Maria, just to get a grocery store out there, they were subsidized for April 19, 2021 Page 21 of 73 quite a while because of the capture rate. Talk to any grocer; he's going to tell you they need 6- to 10,000 homes for a capture rate. COMMISSIONER FRY: April, Rural Lands West was a town that didn't make it. It had -- I think to most of us had a much more dynamic continuum and had a center -- city center in the middle, or a town center in the middle. Where did the Conservancy stand on Rural Lands West? Were you in favor of it? MS. OLSON: Well, first of all, it's the location. We look at location, and we look at design. And the location was inappropriate because it was also in panther habitat and also bisected by Oil Well Road. But it did offer more commercial. But, you know, first and foremost, the location was inappropriate. COMMISSIONER FRY: But would it have been better than the three villages and backing into the town plan? MS. OLSON: I'll talk about the town plan when we get to that. COMMISSIONER FRY: All right. Thank you. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Tom. MR. EASTMAN: What was your review and opinion of the Hyde Park project? MS. OLSON: We -- Hyde Park was outside of Primary Panther Habitat, and, you know, it did have some issues, but it was also a sand mine, I believe. So they were more constrained in having -- they already had the lakes that ran throughout it, so they were more constrained in having that center area. It did provide a little bit more affordable housing. We did comment that it was not enough -- I'm sorry, housing diversity, excuse me. So we did provide some comments, but it didn't have as many issues as Bellmar. MR. EASTMAN: Did you do the same type of fiscal analysis and if it was going to have an impact or if it was neutral; did you go through all of those relative to Hyde Park? MS. OLSON: We did not for that project. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. Rich. MR. YOVANOVICH: My turn? CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Yes, your turn. MR. YOVANOVICH: I'm going to follow up from where Mr. Eastman started, and then we'll -- I'll go back to other issues. Let's talk a little bit about Hyde Park. Where's the village center for the Hyde Park community? MS. OLSON: It's on the southeast corner, if I remember. I don't have the plan pulled up in front of me. MR. YOVANOVICH: Bob, would you put that up. It's actually not in the center, correct? MS. OLSON: Correct. Like I said, it had a lot of -- it was a mine. It had lakes throughout. MR. YOVANOVICH: Where's the amenity center for the Hyde Park SRA village? MS. OLSON: I don't remember. I'm here to talk about Bellmar today. MR. YOVANOVICH: I just wanted to -- you got up and started testifying about proper planning, and I want to understand the Conservancy's analysis as to proper planning. MS. OLSON: And we also did a much more deeper dive into Bellmar and Longwater. MR. YOVANOVICH: Okay. I just want to understand how committed the Conservancy is to proper planning. Would you believe me if I told you that the amenity center for the Hyde Park Village was smack in the center of the village? MS. OLSON: I don't know. I don't have it in front of me. MR. YOVANOVICH: So I'm going to tell you it was, so it was possible to put the village center in the middle of Hyde Park, correct? Correct? April 19, 2021 Page 22 of 73 MS. OLSON: As I said, I did not do as deep of dive -- we did not do as deep of dive as we did on Longwater and Bellmar. MR. YOVANOVICH: Okay. MS. OLSON: It is a smaller project, and so the walkability was better; it wasn't as long as Longwater and Bellmar. It wasn't as big of a property. MR. YOVANOVICH: How many acres was the Hyde Park Village? MS. OLSON: I don't remember. That was months ago. MR. YOVANOVICH: So you don't really know how far -- MS. OLSON: Probably around 600. MR. YOVANOVICH: It was a section of land? MS. OLSON: From what I remember. MR. YOVANOVICH: Okay. So the fiscal neutrality analysis that was used from Hyde Park, you would agree it was the same fiscal neutrality analysis used for Longwater and Bellmar, correct? MS. OLSON: I don't know. As I mentioned, we did not review their fiscal neutrality assessment. MR. YOVANOVICH: Well, is the Conservancy not concerned with fiscal neutrality for all villages that occur in the RLSA program? MS. OLSON: Yes, we are. MR. YOVANOVICH: And you didn't think it was necessary to review the fiscal neutrality analysis for Hyde Park? MS. OLSON: At the time we -- you know, we've learned a lot since then, so if it were to come forward today, we would have. MR. YOVANOVICH: When did Hyde Park go through the process? MS. OLSON: You tell me. What, six months ago? MR. YOVANOVICH: Was it the same time as Rivergrass? MS. OLSON: Around the same time. We did not do a deep analysis. We have limited staff, so we cannot look at every single project. What we do is we look at projects who have -- that have extreme environmental issues and planning issues, but we don't have staff to investigate every single SRA or every single PUD that comes forward to Collier County. So we start with those that have the most severe issues first. MR. YOVANOVICH: Severe issues meaning severe planning issues? MS. OLSON: Planning, panther habitat, kind of -- you know, we look at the whole thing at a high-level view, and we prioritize. MR. YOVANOVICH: Okay. So I want to understand -- you made the statement, in your professional opinion, we are not complying with the goals, objectives, and policies of the Growth Management Plan. MS. OLSON: Correct. MR. YOVANOVICH: So I want to understand your professional credentials. Are you a certified planner? MS. OLSON: I have a master's degree in environmental studies with an emphasis in land use and planning. MR. YOVANOVICH: Are you a certified planner? MS. OLSON: I am not. MR. YOVANOVICH: Now, you would agree that only -- only AICPs can prepare SRA master plans and SRA documents, correct? MS. OLSON: Let me explain my job to you a little bit. MR. YOVANOVICH: No, no. I've asked you a question. MS. OLSON: This isn't a court of law, so -- April 19, 2021 Page 23 of 73 MR. YOVANOVICH: How about you answer -- I'll let you explain -- MS. OLSON: -- I don't have to answer yes or no. MR. YOVANOVICH: Yes, you do. The question I asked you was -- MS. OLSON: I do not. MR. YOVANOVICH: Yes, you do. You do. I've asked you a question. MS. OLSON: I'm not a -- I am not a planner. MR. YOVANOVICH: Okay. MS. OLSON: What my job is is to review development proposals that have significant environmental issues, and one of my -- an area that I look at a lot -- but not for every project because there's one of me. We do have a team, though, that can help somewhat, and we rely on experts -- is to look -- read the Growth Management Plan policies, read the land development policies, and see if the projects are consistent with those policies. MR. YOVANOVICH: Okay. So I'm going to read you one of the policies. First of all, in the RLSA section of the Growth Management Plan, where does the word "walkability" appear? MS. OLSON: Did you say in the GMP or the LDC? MR. YOVANOVICH: No, I said where in the Growth Management Plan policies specifically applicable to the RLSA area does the word "walkability" appear? MS. OLSON: Well, I would have to -- it says pedestrian a lot, pedestrian friendly. MR. YOVANOVICH: And that would be in Policy 4.7.2? MS. OLSON: You know what, there's several policies that say pedestrian friendly. I had a whole list for Rivergrass. If you want, you can bring that one out. MR. YOVANOVICH: Well, you have it. You showed it, so I'll read it to you. It says, villages shall be designed to encourage pedestrian and bicycle circulation by including an interconnected sidewalk and pathway systems serving all residential neighborhoods, correct? MS. OLSON: Are you going to share -- pick one policy? Here we go. Walkable, Policy 4.7.2. Okay. Is that the one you read? MR. YOVANOVICH: I did. MS. OLSON: Let's look at -- let's look at Policy 4.08.07. Villages shall be designed in a compact pedestrian friendly form. MR. YOVANOVICH: Now, that's a Land Development Code provision. MS. OLSON: And in the Land Development Code applies villages -- or villages have to meet the Land Development Code as well. MR. YOVANOVICH: I just -- April, I'll let you clarify whatever you want to clarify. My question to you was, where in the Growth Management Plan does it say "walkable"? MS. OLSON: I don't have a copy of the Growth Management Plan in front of me. I mean, you think I would memorize every single policy? MR. YOVANOVICH: You put the word "walkable" there, and you cited Policy 4.7.2, and the word "walkable" does not appear anywhere in Policy 4.7.2, correct? MS. OLSON: I don't have the full policy in front of me, but if it says "encourage pedestrian," pedestrian is walkable. MR. YOVANOVICH: And it says through the provision of sidewalks and bicycle -- MS. OLSON: That particular policy. That particular policy, yes. MR. YOVANOVICH: Now, does the Bellmar Village have sidewalks on both sides of the street? MS. OLSON: Yes, but it doesn't -- MR. YOVANOVICH: Does it have a pathway system? MS. OLSON: Yes. MR. YOVANOVICH: Does it connect all of the neighborhoods? April 19, 2021 Page 24 of 73 MS. OLSON: Probably, but there are other policies where it says they have to be pedestrian friendly, and you have to walk to the village center. You're not going over all of the policies. MR. YOVANOVICH: It says that you have to walk to the village center in the Land Development Code and the Growth Management Plan? MS. OLSON: It says that they have to be pedestrian friendly. I don't have a copy of the GMP in front of me or the LDC in front of me. You obviously do. MR. YOVANOVICH: I do. And -- MS. OLSON: Okay. MR. YOVANOVICH: And you got up here and you testified to your expertise, and I'm just trying to understand the level of your knowledge of the Growth Management Plan and the Land Development Code. I'm ready to move on. MS. OLSON: Okay. And our expert already did an analysis for you on the lack of walkability. That is in the record. MR. YOVANOVICH: I understand what Mr. Minicozzi said and the standards that he applied. I'm trying to understand what this board or commission can rely upon upon your expertise, because you gave your professional opinion. Now, you're not an economist; do you agree? MS. OLSON: Uh-huh. MR. YOVANOVICH: You're not a transportation consultant, you would agree? MS. OLSON: Uh-huh. MR. YOVANOVICH: Are you relying upon -- what was your transportation consultant's name? MS. OLSON: Norm Marshall. MR. YOVANOVICH: The same consultant that agreed that Trinity Scott was the actual expert in transportation issues. MS. OLSON: For Collier County, he agreed; for Collier County. But he's -- he is a transportation planner and expert, yes. MR. YOVANOVICH: And this project's in Collier County? MS. OLSON: Yes. But it doesn't -- he knows how to do modeling. MR. YOVANOVICH: We'll rely upon what Mr. -- what was the name again; Norm -- MS. OLSON: Norm Marshall. MR. YOVANOVICH: -- Norm Marshall said. Now, with regard to -- there's so many things you said that I said about the project. I'm pretty sure I never said there shall be no public comment on this petition. What I did say is there shouldn't be repeat people speaking again that already spoke on the project. That's what I said, correct? MS. OLSON: I went back -- no, I went back and listened, and you tried to thwart public comment. MR. YOVANOVICH: No, I don't believe so. MS. OLSON: Yes. MR. YOVANOVICH: Then you'll show me -- you don't need to show me now, but you'll show me in the record where I thwarted public comment. MS. OLSON: Sure. MR. YOVANOVICH: I want to know where it was -- you made these -- you made allegations through asking questions, things like, we'll never know why staff changed their opinion. MS. OLSON: Uh-huh. MR. YOVANOVICH: Are you accusing staff of improperly changing their April 19, 2021 Page 25 of 73 recommendations on both the Bellmar and Longwater petition? MS. OLSON: I don't know what happened; that's why I asked the question, because it was very clear in that statement that they said this RLSA does not meet the intent of the policies, the program. MR. YOVANOVICH: And -- MS. OLSON: That was their statement. MR. YOVANOVICH: And you quoted something that was in May of 2020, and we're now almost in May of 2021, correct? MS. OLSON: Correct, and I showed you how the design had not changed. MR. YOVANOVICH: Now, are you saying that Mr. Giblin is now incorrectly determining that there is a variety of housing types in this project? MS. OLSON: It goes against what he had said in the past about other SRAs that he had mentioned that 10 percent wasn't enough. And now all of a sudden 10 percent, he's changed his professional opinion, so I'm not quite sure why. MR. YOVANOVICH: Well, didn't Mr. Giblin testify that we were providing either sites within the project or in close proximity of the project for affordable housing? MS. OLSON: Okay. But that still -- 10 percent is the only commitment, and staff said in their document that they would like to see a 42 percent, close to what the economic assessment says. That's what they would have liked to have seen a commitment for. MR. YOVANOVICH: You'll agree with me that the 42 percent that's in the economic assessment included villas as part of the multifamily calculation? MS. OLSON: Villas are single-family detached [sic] homes. MR. YOVANOVICH: I know what they are, but do you know how they -- MS. OLSON: Yes. MR. YOVANOVICH: -- were characterized in the economic assessment? MS. OLSON: As multifamily. MR. YOVANOVICH: Okay. So the 42 percent in the economic assessment included villas in the analysis, correct? MS. OLSON: I was just reading a statement from staff. MR. YOVANOVICH: And staff, a year later, reviewed the project and determined we meet all of the criteria, correct? MS. OLSON: A year later; that's why we didn't -- you didn't make it -- the project is not at the 42 percent. MR. YOVANOVICH: The -- isn't it true that staff did, in fact, determine that our project is innovative? MS. OLSON: As I mentioned, nothing has changed -- I should say very little has changed from that first master concept plan where they made that statement that it was not innovative to the final master plan. So the question is, why? That's why I asked the question, because -- MR. YOVANOVICH: Well -- and I'm sure the staff, when they get up, will explain the why, like they did in Longwater. So did you ask to meet with staff to go over your conclusions? MS. OLSON: No, I did not. MR. YOVANOVICH: So you've never given staff an opportunity to explain. You've just come in here and said, we don't understand why? MS. OLSON: Well, we've met with staff in the past about other Collier Enterprises projects, so there was really no need. MR. YOVANOVICH: I'm going to let that sink in for a second. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Yeah. That's interesting. MR. YOVANOVICH: I'm going to end it there. I'm done with my questions. April 19, 2021 Page 26 of 73 CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. MS. OLSON: Thank you. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Thank you. So we're going to take a -- we haven't done the staff report yet, right? So we'll take a -- MR. BELLOWS: We finished all the online speakers? CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Oh, there's one more speaker? MR. YOUNGBLOOD: Madam Chair, we have one more online speaker, Bradley Cornell, and that will conclude all the speakers for this item. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Is that all right? Okay. MR. YOUNGBLOOD: Mr. Cornell, if you would unmute your microphone. Are you with us? MR CORNELL: I am. Thank you. Madam Chair and Commissioners, I appreciate the opportunity to address you on the Bellmar SRA. I'll try and be as brief as I can. I know it's been a long and sprawling hearing on this over lots of days. So I'll start by just saying that Audubon's main concern about Bellmar has been this village as being sited too near the Florida Panther National Wildlife Refuge. We've had that concern for a long time. And in following up on that, Audubon has spent over a year with our Conservation Collier colleagues at Florida Wildlife Federation and Defenders of Wildlife negotiating with Collier Enterprises to reduce the impacts of this village's siting. We have received several very important commitments from Collier Enterprises on conservation improvements, as I noted in my comments on Longwater. Those include restoring and protecting a panther wildlife movement linkage with three wildlife crossings under roads and widened dimensions for this large mammal pathway. Also, we received a commitment to a coexistence plan, which includes mandatory bear-resistant trash cans for businesses and residences in all the villages and the subsequent possible town. Also a commitment to international Dark Skies lighting criteria being required, increased stewardship credit consumption from eight to 10 credits per acre upon conversions to a town with Longwater and Rivergrass and also Bellmar, and commitment to smoke easements for regional prescribed burning, including Collier Enterprises SSAs and preserves. Collier Enterprises has also committed to establishing SSA No. 18 to entitle Bellmar, which is over 2,000 acres in the southeast end of the RLSA. It is an advanced SSA designation that they don't need for credits right now but that the public and wildlife will benefit from this early -- by doing this early conservation action. Also, this permanent conservation area will help discourage any agency, including Collier County, from extending Big Cypress Parkway to I-75 and trying to get an interchange built there, which Audubon strongly opposes. Now, regarding panther telemetry, I just want to note that FWC published a study of GPS data showing similar habitat usages to the VHF radio daytime data, and I've seen these data mapped for the RLSA. And, indeed, the panthers do not select the farm fields over the forested or wet prairies and those sorts of habitat. So I don't think it's accurate to say that the farm fields were more important in the -- in looking at GPS data. I also want to point out that mitigation for north Golden Gate Estates single-family home impacts to primary and secondary panther habitat is entirely paid for by Rural Lands Stewardship Areas SSAs. That's -- the north Golden Gate are actual forested primary habitat versus the cleared farm fields that are primary that are being discussed in connection with these villages. So I don't think it's entirely the same kind of primary, and it's important to remember the mitigation value of these Rural Lands Stewardship projects. My final point is that you have heard many opposing comments on this proposed village, April 19, 2021 Page 27 of 73 including the last speaker's comments, and as well as all the other villages that you've heard comments on and the different versions of a proposed town in this area. These comments are missing the conservation purpose of the Rural Lands Stewardship Area. While I agree, there are important ways to improve the sustainability and smartness of our urban developments in Collier County, including in the Rural Lands Stewardship Area. The Bellmar proposal conforms to the current Rural Lands Stewardship Program criteria, and there are improvements to the Rural Lands Stewardship Area standards being worked on now, including through the amendment process that you're about to look at some adoption changes. But please remember from Audubon's big-picture conservation perspective, Rural Lands Stewardship is the strongest land-use planning tool we have for permanent protection and restoration of 134,000 acres of imperiled Florida panther and wood stork habitats and farms. These are the patches or isolated pieces but connected regional scale SSA preserves. The 3,500 acres of three villages and their town conversion will be entitled by permanent protection of 12,200 acres of vital habitats in Camp Keais Strand unit of the CREW Florida Forever project, including 2,600 acres of upland and wetland restoration. That is an outstanding conservation outcome and is why Audubon Florida and Audubon Western Everglades believes these SSA conservation achievements, in addition to the conservation commitments on the SRA village, Bellmar, far outweigh the negative impacts of Bellmar's proximity to the Florida Panther National Wildlife Refuge. So thanks for considering those comments, and I'm -- good luck in your deliberations. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Thank you. MR. YOUNGBLOOD: Madam Chairman, my apologies. We have one more online speaker, Julie Ann Thomas. She will be our final speaker for this item. Ms. Thomas, are you with us? (No response.) MR. YOUNGBLOOD: I don't think Ms. Thomas is with us anymore. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Madam Chair, if we could ask if Chris has anything. I know he's on the road, and he may not have a chance to unmute, but if we can ask him if he has any questions. Chris? CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Chris, do you have any questions? COMMISSIONER VERNON: Yeah, thanks, Commissioner Schmitt. No questions, but thanks for checking. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. MS. THOMAS: Excuse me. MR. YOUNGBLOOD: There's Ms. Thomas. MS. THOMAS: Sorry about yet -- tagnology. It's a good time. Thank you. Hi. My name is Julian Ann Thomas, and I'm speaking on behalf of the Conservancy of Southwest Florida. My comments are limited and will be focused on listed-species issues for the Bellmar site. I will remind you that GMP goal for the RLSA includes directing incompatible uses away from upland habitat. Panther scientists have determined that panthers are wide ranging, secretive, and at current low densities. Panthers require large contiguous areas to meet their social, reproductive, and energetic needs. And this requirement is specifically being impacted by the Bellmar project. Panther habitat continues to be lost, in this case to a proposed residential development with a small commercial component. Panther scientists believe that any further loss of the primary zone as identified by biologist Randy Kautz and his associates or adult breeding habitat identified by Dr. Robert Frakes and his associates will negatively impact the survival and recovery of the April 19, 2021 Page 28 of 73 Florida panther. For the record, 83 percent of the site is adult breeding panther habitat, and 100 percent of the site falls within the primary zone. We also note for the record that this land has been in active agricultural for a long time. At least since 1970s, probably earlier. This is important to note because the authors of Kautz, et al, knew that this was active agriculture when it was designated as Primary Panther Habitat, and Frakes, et al, knew that this was active agriculture when designating it adult panther breeding habitat. We should not second guess the findings of these two publications, which are the bases of best available science for identifying necessary panther habitat. However, it is your responsibility to rely on the best available science when making your recommendation. The best available science states that losing any Primary Panther Habitat will negatively impact the survival and recovery of the Florida panther. This proposed development does more than destroy and fragment Primary Panther Habitat and adult breeding habitat on the project site. The proposed development will also bring new roads and increased traffic to this rural area as people come and go. The leading known cause of panther death is vehicle mortality and, as April noted, the indirect impacts of this development will bleed into the surrounding land. In addition to Primary Panther Habitat and adult breeding panther habitat, there is a caracara nest near the project boundary near the middle of the project site. Caracaras are federally threatened. Both adult and juvenile caracara were observed on the property alongside this active nest, and over 80 percent of the site falls within the buffer zone for this caracara nest, which needs to be protected. We also know that 100 percent of the site is proposed critical habitat for the Florida bonneted bat and that 29 bonneted bat calls were recorded during the listed species survey in 2020. Ten different listed, threatened, or endangered species were determined to use this site based on the listed species surveys done by the applicant in 2019 and 2020. Due to the species richness of this property, it is not an appropriate location for the proposed development or increased development rights. This project does not direct development away from upland habitat, and we are asking that you consider these facts in your recommendation and that you recommend denial of the Bellmar application. Thank you very much. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. Thank you. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Madam Chair, just to point out, I did state prior to the meeting I have to make a 15-minute phone call at 3:00, and then we will not have a quorum during my 15-minute or so. And I don't know if Terri -- can we postpone then, or do we want to -- can you continue -- take a break now? MR. YOVANOVICH: Can I ask the previous speaker a couple of questions? CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Sure. MR. YOVANOVICH: Is she still there? CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Is she still on the -- yes. MR. YOVANOVICH: I'm sorry. I missed her name. Was it -- MS. THOMAS: My name is Julie Ann Thomas. MR. YOVANOVICH: Ms. Thomas, the studies you referred to are landscape-level studies, correct? MS. THOMAS: That's correct. MR. YOVANOVICH: They're not studying specific parcels of property? MS. THOMAS: They are not. MR. YOVANOVICH: And is it your testimony that panthers are actually breeding on these farm fields? MS. THOMAS: It's my testimony that Dr. Robert Frakes and his associates have April 19, 2021 Page 29 of 73 determined that this is a likely habitat that panthers would use to breed on. MR. YOVANOVICH: So these -- the landscape study, you're concluding that they're actually using farm fields to breed on? MS. THOMAS: I have read the studies, I've talked with the authors, and it is my understanding of their science that they believe that 83 percent of the Bellmar site is suitable for adult panther breeding habitat. MR. YOVANOVICH: So you don't really have a professional opinion on your own. You're just reporting what you believe the authors of these studies concluded? MS. THOMAS: I'm not a panther scientist. I am -- MR. YOVANOVICH: Okay. Thank you. MS. THOMAS: Sure. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. So that's it for public speakers. Okay. So we'll be done with the public speakers for now. And we'll go to the staff report. MR. COHEN: For the record, Thaddeus Cohen, department head, Growth Management. I'm subbing for Jim Sabo. So today what you will see is I'm here to support our staff. I think the presentations just done makes it even more important that you understand how we do what we do, the time and effort that has gone into other reviews and why we stand behind the recommendations that we make both to you and then on to the Board of County Commissioners. And so as you can see, what we'll be doing is talking about the Comprehensive Planning review and the process that we use for that; zoning; Cormac will talk about the affordable housing; environmental review infrastructure will be broken into two components, the utilities and transportation. We call it economic assessment, but that's the fiscal neutrality aspect; and then our recommendations. We have an extensive team that spends a lot of time and hours in their expertise in order to take a look at these petitions to have a greater understanding of why it is and how it is that we can make the recommendations that we make. We reach out both to the applicant and to stakeholders to be able to get clearer understandings of what these petitions mean so that we can provide you with meaningful information as part of your deliberations, and what we show here is those individuals that were directly responsible for coming up with the recommendations that you'll hear. From the Comprehensive Planning standpoint, one of the questions that was raised is innovation and what does innovation mean. As we said with Longwater, we believe the RLSA in and of itself is innovative. There's only two RLSA, as I understand it, in the state of Florida, with Collier County having the first one. It has already protected, as you well know from the other conversations we've had, 55,000 acres of SSAs are protected at no cost to the public. And I heard Brad Cornell also talk in terms of what you get for the exchange of development rights and protection of environmentally sensitive land. And I think as we go through this conversation, that ought not to be lost on the community as to that balancing act that we have. The RLSA, in and of itself, complies with Chapter 163.3168. So the program itself, statutorily, is compliant. And what we're bringing to you in a little bit, not today, will be some amendments to that program. So we feel comfortable that if you're in compliance with Chapter 163, which the program is, if you meet that, then, therefore, we are consistent in our recommendations. And, again, it's a voluntary program, which means that there's some level of give and take to -- from my aspect of it, if you're voluntary, there's something that we want, something that you give, and I think you've heard over time how we've opined through the policy those kinds of negotiations, aspect of what it is that we do in order to see how we can make improvements in the petitions as they come forward. So from the adoption process, it's been long held that there's a value and incentives to be April 19, 2021 Page 30 of 73 able to protect natural resources, retain agricultural lands, and plan for sustainable growth. As you know, Collier County grows at 2 percent per year basically, so how it is that we try to accommodate for that growth in a sustainable manner. And we believe that as we looked at this program and as we looked at the project in particular, that the proposed program or project is consistent with the RLSAO objective requirements, the Comprehensive Planning uses adopted RLSA documents, Attachment C, which we'll talk about in a moment, and the relevant policies, in particular, Group 4 policies we found that the project is consistent. That was something of debate by one of the advocates. So what does Attachment C do? As one of the advocates says, that you have a series of things that you can do in RLSA. You can provide a town, a village, a hamlet, currently, although we're recommending that hamlets be eliminated, and a compact rural development. So those are the things that you can do in a program that has been found consistent with Chapter 163. And then what we do is we go look at a village and we say, what are the criteria that we use in order to see whether or not you meet that requirement. Well, it says you must be at least 100 to 1,000 acres, so we find that it's consistent because it's 999.74 acres. Residential units per gross area needs to be one to four dwelling units per gross area. It's consistent because they're within that range. Residential housing styles must have a diversity between single-family, multifamily, types, styles, lot sizes. We say that's consistent. Maximum floor area ratio or intensity must have retail at .5. We see it's consistent. Must have civic and governmental institutions identified at .6, which they do, so it's consistent. Goods and services. The village center, with neighborhood goods and services within a village center must have a minimum of 25 square foot gross building area per dwelling unit. And when you do the calculations, they have 68,750 square feet. That would be the minimum that's required, and they're consistent because it falls within the allowable 65- to 85,000 square feet of commercial uses. Open space, consistent. Governmental civic institutional requirements, consistent. And the school was not considered at this point, so therefore it was not provided. So as you can see, as we start to go through that Attachment C, again, through the RLSA, which is part of Chapter 163, which in that document talks about its innovativeness because of the balance we provide between protection of environmentally sensitive land and development opportunities; that we then look at the entitlements as far as how do we protect those as far as credits, and the available credits are some 14,000 in SSA 15. So we show how many credits are required in order to entitle Bellmar and then how many credits are available in the sending area. And it says that the SSA must be established to entitle the SRA. Again, back to that balance between the two. And SSAs are reversible until an SRA is approved by the BCC. So that land is not protected until an SRA is able to go forward. And then the SRA must be entitled to ensure protection of the SSA. So as we have this conversation about design and what we hope to accomplish, we think it's important to keep in mind, as Brad Cornell have pointed out, what the importance of the program is and what it is that we're trying to accomplish between entitlements on the one hand and protection on the other. And there was much discussion about the Group 4 policies. We think that when you look at Policy 4.7, it has four specific forms, and we talked about those: The town, the village, the hamlet, and the compact rural development. But here the residential development of 1,000 acres or less provides for a center, provides for diversity of housing types, encourages public green space and pedestrian bike friendly areas, directs development away from the wetlands, and you'll hear that later in our conversations when we talk about the codes that are used, the fact that we actually April 19, 2021 Page 31 of 73 go on the site to see what the species are, and that perimeter of each SRA transitions from higher density to lower density so that there's a balance between the developments that take place. So with that, I'll hand it over to Nancy Gundlach who will talk to you about the zoning aspects of the project. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Joe has a question. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Thaddeus, I have a couple questions. For the record, can you state what your position is? MR. COHEN: Oh, I'm sorry. I'm department head, Growth Management. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Growth Management. So the staff -- every -- the Growth Management staff, Transportation staff work for you? MR. COHEN: Yes. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: In any way, shape, or form do you feel or do you believe that your professional ethics, your professional competency either of you or your staff was in question in regards to reviewing this project? Because it seems to -- some testimony seems to have implied that staff rolled and made changes to its original position. And I fully understand that during the review process staff provides review comments, the applicant then resubmits. But in any way do you feel that either you have been put under pressure, your staff has been put under outside influences or pressure to make a decision of recommendation for this petition? MR. COHEN: No, at no time. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Okay. Thank you. COMMISSIONER FRY: Thaddeus, just to add on to that question, describe the process, because you have some comments that were made early in the review process by staff, concerns, no longer appear in the final recommendation. So describe the processes as to why those comments changed and why sometimes those concerns disappear. MR. COHEN: Yeah. What is interesting -- and I kind of learned this by going through the white paper process -- is that the stakeholders and the public have an opportunity to look over our shoulder, literally, while we are formulating our opinions, and we have an opportunity to opine on what we believe we want to see, what we encourage petitioners to do, what we think our best value judgment may be at any moment in time. But at the end of the day, it is the Land Development Code and our policies that govern. So we can have that conversation and interaction with an applicant and say, it would be nice if you were able to do this, and in some cases they're able to do that, and that's reflected in some early versions of our staff report, but at the end it is governed by our GMP and what the Land Development Code says. And sometimes we overreach in those conversations and we have to say, well, you know, that's not really what the LDC says, and that's what planning managers and division directors and department heads get to look at. And then that's when we sometimes make an edit or a change. So to the folks who are not part of that process, they believe it might be something different, but it's -- truly, that's what it is. COMMISSIONER FRY: There are a number of terms that have come up for review with people having different interpretations of what they mean. MR. COHEN: Sure. COMMISSIONER FRY: Is there -- in your opinion, is there a way -- is there a necessity to tighten up the definition of some of those terms? I'm talking about walkability, pedestrian friendly -- MR. COHEN: Sure. COMMISSIONER FRY: -- interconnectedness, diversity of housing, continuum of density. Those seem to be some nebulous areas. MR. COHEN: And what we've said is there is that opportunity, and it's been a very long April 19, 2021 Page 32 of 73 travel that we've been on. So once we're able to bring the amendments from the RLSA to you and get those approved, then we're able to take it back to the Board, take it to the DEO to get the final approval that will allow us, through that amendment, those changes, to then start addressing the issues in the Land Development Code. So most of what you've been hearing about, the design and concerns about what the design may be, that's a product of what we will be able to start taking a look at in the LDC. But we're not able to get there yet until we finally have the RLSAO finally approved. COMMISSIONER FRY: So GMP first, then LDC, and that's where those definitions reside? MR. COHEN: And that's been the struggle, because people have been trying to jump to the end product without us being able to get the overall master document completed. COMMISSIONER FRY: Thank you. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. I think we'll take a break now till 3:15. (A recess was had from 2:58 p.m. to 3:31 p.m., and Tom Eastman is absent for the remainder of the meeting.) COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: That was a long 15 minutes. COMMISSIONER FRY: And that concludes our meeting for today. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. We'll continue with the staff report. MR. COHEN: Sure enough. Again, for the record, Thaddeus Cohen, department head, Growth Management. I'd like to end, or at least begin the next segment, where we ended, which is bring you back to how it is that we think about these petitions as they come through, is the question that you asked, Mr. Fry. And what you'll see is that it's an iterative process, and what you'll also see is that at the end we still make our way back to our governing documents. And with that, I want to pass it on to Nancy who will then talk about the zoning review and the basis for being able to make the decisions that we've been able to make. And I know that during the Longwater conversations, it kind of moved in lots of directions but at the end hopefully you'll come and take a look at the slides that we present, because that's the bases of us being able to make the recommendations that we make. MS. GUNDLACH: Good afternoon, Commissioners. For the record, Nancy Gundlach, principal planner with the Zoning Division. And Bellmar SRA is consistent with the Land Development Code, Section 4.08.00. It provides two context zones, the neighborhood general, and the village center -- the village center zones. And village center is the little one, and the larger one is neighborhood general. And it's important to note that the village center's context zone is a location -- it's not a location. It can be located in the center of the village or at the edge of the village, and it has the greatest density, intensity, and diversity and can include commercial, institutional, civic, and residential uses. It demonstrates an urban to rural transition. It's compatible with the ag -- surrounding agricultural lands, and adjacent to those agricultural lands it provides a Type A landscape buffer, and along the major roadways, such as future Big Cypress Parkway, it would be a Type D buffer. And Bellmar SRA, it's walkable, and it provides interconnected sidewalks and roadways. And the LDC allows for a 2,500-foot block perimeter in the village center context zone, and in the neighborhood context zone it allows for a 3,500-foot block perimeter. And the LDC also allows for alternative roadway cross-sections. And it's important to note that there were no deviations requested from the required sidewalks on both sides of the roadway. And with that, if you have any questions, it would be my pleasure to answer them, or we can introduce Cormac to present our housing affordable review. Welcome, Cormac. April 19, 2021 Page 33 of 73 MR. GIBLIN: Good afternoon. For the record, Cormac Giblin. I'm the planning manager with Development Review. I'll go through the housing affordability review. And you'll remember from the previous presentation, there are really two main policies that I review. One is from the Future Land Use Element that says villages are primarily residential communities with a diversity of housing types, and then the second is in the Land Development Code that says villages will offer a range of housing types and price levels to accommodate diverse ages and incomes. From the economic assessment of the Bellmar petition, the applicant has described various different product types and price points that they plan to be included in the SRA. And as Mr. Yovanovich mentioned at the beginning of his presentation, the applicant has agreed to the following condition of approval that at least 10 percent of all the residential units built, 275, will be sold at purchase prices in the moderate and gap affordability ranges. Those would be those product types from the previous slide that were in the townhome, Villa 1, coach, and Villa 2 designs or, as an alternative, land or units in or proximal to the SRA will be reserved for the development of housing that is affordable, and that land for housing that's affordable shall be identified within 45 months of the SRA approval and be equivalent to 2.5 percent of the gross acreage of the SRA. You also may remember that the Rural Lands Stewardship amendments cycle that's coming forward at your next meeting has a -- this is modeled primarily on the recommendations that are in that. I'd like to address one last thing about the evolution of staff comments and staff's interpretations. My review and recommendation, actually on every SRA that has been brought to the county going back to Ave Maria, have always started from the same place. It says, show me how you're going to meet the previous two code citations that I just put on the previous slide. What we have here is the proof of that evolution is that by working with the applicant throughout the review process, we get them to a point -- or we get the project to a point where we have a workable solution that does meet the code and that the applicant has agreed to. With that, your next presenter is Jaime, unless there's questions. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Paul has a question. COMMISSIONER SHEA: Question. In April's presentation from the Conservancy, she kept referring to a 46 percent or a 40 percent number. Can you clarify for me what's the 40 percent versus the 10 percent? MR. GIBLIN: Sure. That wasn't from one of my comments. I think that was from one of my colleague's comments in a previous version of the staff report from Comprehensive Planning. But what they were saying was -- if you go back to this slide that shows all the different product types, if you were to add those up, this mix is 1,160 units in the -- or, I'm sorry. It's -- yeah, it's 1,160 multifamily units versus 1,590 single-family units. That's that 42/58 percent balance that is identified in the economic assessment. That is not identified in the SRA document, but that was different staff commenters. MR. YOVANOVICH: Can I ask a follow-up while we're on that; do you mind? CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Go ahead. MR. YOVANOVICH: Do you mind? I think, Mr. Giblin, the coach homes is the only true multifamily product in that. UNIDENTIFIED MALE VOICE: Town. MR. YOVANOVICH: I'm sorry. Where? Oh, I'm sorry. The townhome and the coach homes are the multifamily product. They're not the villas. So when you did the 1,160, you were including some traditional single-family product in those numbers. So I just wanted to -- MR. GIBLIN: Okay. This comes right from the economic assessment, so it's a -- MR. YOVANOVICH: Right. April 19, 2021 Page 34 of 73 CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Karl? COMMISSIONER FRY: Cormac, the only reference to 10 percent is in terms of 10 percent of the total units, 2,750. So 275 units would be priced in the affordable ranges mentioned. MR. GIBLIN: That is correct, or land or units identified. COMMISSIONER FRY: Okay. So it wasn't -- that's the only reference to 10 percent. There was no reference that -- there's no requirement that those be townhomes or coach homes. It could be any of the above, correct? MR. GIBLIN: Correct. COMMISSIONER FRY: Thank you. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Anybody else? (No response.) CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: No? Thank you. MS. COOK: Good afternoon. Jaime Cook, principal environmental specialist with the Development Review Division, and I'm going to talk to you about the environmental review. So as I've told you for previous petitions, the environmental review for SRAs consist of two phases, including the document review, which includes the review of the listed species survey, the vegetation inventory, and the soils map. Staff works with the GIS staff to ensure that the GIS data that has been submitted is consistent with the documents. The second review that is done is on-site verification. Staff conducts site visits to the SRAs, and during the review of this petition, staff conducted multiple site visits to the Bellmar SRA. The Natural Resource Index Assessment is the basis for the environmental review. I won't go through all of this again, since we just went through it with Longwater, but it's important to remember that lands that score greater than 1.2 are required to be retained as open space in their predominantly vegetated state, and lands that score a value of less than 1.2 are eligible for development. So with respect to Bellmar, the NRI Assessment, which consists of six factors that you can see here, are scored on an acre-by-acre basis. For the stewardship factor, no lands within the SRA are designated as Flowway Stewardship Areas, Habitat Stewardship Areas, or Water Retention Areas, and none of the lands are within the area of critical state concern. So for this factor, all acres scored a zero. For proximity, none of the lands are enclosed by an FSA, an HSA, or a WRA; however, there are some acreages along the eastern property boundary that are within 300 feet of an HSA, so those areas scored a value of 0.3 for this factor, and the rest of the proposed SRA had a score of zero. For listed species habitat, this factor is scored based on the habitats that are listed as preferred and tolerated for the species as well as the documented observations of the occurrence of the species within its preferred or tolerated habitat. The listed species surveys must be done in accordance with LDC requirements, including that they be less than one year old. They must be conducted by a qualified individual, and they must be done in accordance with Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service protocols. Within the Bellmar SRA, sandhill cranes and crested caracara were identified in the southern pasture -- in pasture land in the southern portion of the village, and an alligator nest was observed in the northeastern wetland area. So listed species survey values ranged from 0 to 0.4. For soils, those are classified based on the USDA NRCS soils map and South Florida Water Management District classifications. Higher point values are given for soils found in wetlands and more aquatic environments. Lower scores are given to soils that don't retain water as April 19, 2021 Page 35 of 73 well, including habitats such as pine flat woods and upland forests. Soil scores typically don't change much over time, and they changed from 0 to 0.3 throughout the SRA. Restoration potential is only scored during the designation process for an SSA, not an SRA, so it's not applicable for this petition. And then land use and land cover, this factor looks at the type of vegetation on site. Higher scores either indicate wetland or native upland habitats. Lower scores indicate nonnative or impacted sites such as ag lands. Most of the Bellmar SRA consists of active and passive agricultural uses with one isolated wetland. So scores ranged from 0 to 0.4. When the individual factors are added up, the GIS output results in the maps shown on the right of the screen indicate that zero acres of land within this SRA boundary scored a value of greater than 1.2. In comparing the NRI Assessment with the applicant's master plan, you can see that the isolated wetland in the northeastern portion of the property, which scored a 1.1 -- so below the 1.2 threshold -- is being retained as a park preserve on their master plan. The applicant has included setbacks to this park preserve area, and they agreed to follow the LDC requirements for preserves including 25 set foot backs [sic] for primary structures and 10-foot setbacks for accessory structures. That commitment is found as a footnote in the SRA document Development Standards Table for neighborhood general. So there are -- using credits from SSA 15 as of right now, since 18 has not been approved. So our review is based on SSA 15. SSA 15 is 5,253.4 acres, located north and south of Oil Well Road as part of the Camp Keais wetland flowway system. An amendment to the SSA was approved by the Board of County Commissioners in January of 2020 which awarded 31,367 credits to SSA 15. Early-entry credits were established for SSAs prior to 2009. So this SSA was established prior to that date. And early-entry credits are derived as a credit earned for each acre of land that is considered an HSA. There are 1,826.9 early-entry bonus -- early-entry credits. The base credits are generated as a mathematical calculation of the NRI score multiplied by the base credit score for the land-use layers removed multiplied by the acres of land use. So SSA 15 has 8,112.1 base credits. The R1 credits for designation of restoration are available; however, the R2 credits are not yet available, as the restoration has not been completed yet; therefore, 20,653 credits were available. 6,198.08 credits were used to entitle Rivergrass Village, so that leaves a remaining balance of 14,454.92 credits available in SSA 15, which exceeds the number required for Bellmar. The graphic on the right shows the NRI scores for SSA 15 and, again, it's important to note that the scale for this is different than the scale for the Bellmar SRA. So everything that is bright green, turquoise, and blue scores above a 1.2 NRI score. Of the 5,253 acres within the boundary, 4,715 scored above a 1.2, which is over 89 percent of this SSA. So upon review of the GIS data and field verification by the environmental planning staff, we agree with the applicant's NRI assessment that zero acres of land scored above a 1.2 on the NRI assessment. So environmental staff recommends approval of the SRA petition with the following condition: Prior to issuance of the first SDP and/or PPL, a listed species management plan must be provided for review with approval from Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission and/or U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for management of the Florida panther and all other listed species. Unless you have any questions, I will turn it over to Eric Fey for -- CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Karl has a -- COMMISSIONER FRY: I do. MS. COOK: Okay. April 19, 2021 Page 36 of 73 COMMISSIONER FRY: The last caller for the Conservancy mentioned some listed species, blue bonneted bat being one of them. Is it that management plan where those issues would be addressed? MS. COOK: Yes. COMMISSIONER FRY: So it sounds like there is a possibility that some listed species might be occupying an area that we're going to build on, and because it's only a component of the NRI assessment, they could be out voted, I guess, so that they might lose some nests in areas where they are hanging out; is that accurate? MS. COOK: They could, but it's -- the way the LDC is worded, it says not only that they're observed there, but they're observed in their preferred and tolerated habitat. Farm fields are not preferred or tolerated habitat for bonneted bats so, therefore, they don't actually receive a score just because they're there. They have to also be found in their preferred and tolerated habitat. COMMISSIONER FRY: And if they were but you didn't get to the 1.2 where it had to be protected or left as preserve, what happens then? MS. COOK: They could potentially impact that site, but they would have to have approvals from either Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission or U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. COMMISSIONER FRY: So it is considered? They are -- MS. COOK: Correct. COMMISSIONER FRY: Listed species are considered in all cases? MS. COOK: Yes. COMMISSIONER FRY: Thank you. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Joe? COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Yeah. I'll follow up on that, Karl. Just for clarity -- and Jaime, this does not in any way, shape, or form relieve the applicant of the responsibility to comply with the Clean Water Act or the Endangered Species Act; is that correct? MS. COOK: You are correct. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: And in undergoing this process, they would have to go through -- possibly through a jurisdictional determination for a 404 wetlands. Now, that is being done not through the Army Corps anymore in Florida. It's now through Florida Department of Environmental Protection. So they still would have to apply for a Florida DEP 404 permit for any wetland impacts; is that correct? MS. COOK: Yes. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: This does not waive any requirements for 404? MS. COOK: You are correct. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: And then also in conjunction with that is typically a 401 water-quality certification through -- that EPA empowers the State to enforce 401 quality -- water-quality certification. That's through South Florida Water Management District. The applicant still has to apply for a South Florida Water Management District permit, correct? MS. COOK: Correct. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Now, in that process, through the 404 and 401 process, any federal agency can comment specifically in regards to endangered species, and that was the comment brought up about endangered or listed species. In this case they brought up the caracara and the Florida bonneted bat. Now, my information may be a little old, but U.S. Fish and Wildlife was doing a complete study of South Florida in regards to a Habitat Conservation Plan. I think that the Florida bonneted bat is still part of the HCP. And is there not still an HCP being studied and looked at for this development as with the others? MS. COOK: Correct, it's still under review, yes. April 19, 2021 Page 37 of 73 COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: It's still under review. So with all those questions -- because I know the answer. I just want it to be on the record -- do you follow up to make sure that they do the proper applications through the federal and state process, or is that pretty much just a state oversight to make sure it's done? I mean, does staff follow up to make sure that any listed species identified -- they're going to give you -- based on the process, a listed species habitat, but you do follow up to make sure, or do you -- MS. COOK: Yes. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: -- follow up to make sure they applied for the proper permits before anything is done? Even if they applied for a take permit or any other type of impact? MS. COOK: Correct. They would have to submit to us their permits before we can approve the SDP or PPL. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: The bottom line -- and the one speaker did bring up great points. There's no argument. But if there are listed species, the agencies will advise the applicant on whether to avoid, mitigate, or compensate; is that correct? MS. COOK: Yes. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Okay. Great. Thank you. MS. COOK: You're welcome. Any other questions? CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: No. Thank you. MS. COOK: Then I will turn it over to Eric Fey, who will discuss the utilities. MR. FEY: For the record, Eric Fey, principal project manager with Public Utilities. I'm going to refer, for the record, to March 18th testimony for Longwater and avoid being repetitive. But just a refresher, we have a northeast service area utility extension project that is in progress, the segments needed to provide service, potable water, wastewater, and irrigation-quality water to the Big Cypress Stewardship District, which includes the three Collier Enterprises villages. Those segments will be completed this year with the pipelines being done in June and the interim wastewater treatment plant being done in December. This is an overview of the project, and the segments I'm speaking of are the interim plant here and this pipeline segment to Rivergrass here. Like Longwater, we have just one condition of approval, and that is that the agreement to provide potable water and wastewater utility services be adopted concurrently with the Bellmar Village SRA resolution. Notice that I did not include irrigation quality, because that is actually, per the agreement, not being provided. So I'll just speak on the other differences between Longwater and Bellmar. As noted on this slide, the agreement to provide potable water, wastewater, and irrigation-quality water services to Longwater Village is a prerequisite to establishing potable water and wastewater services to Bellmar. That's just a matter of course because we will be routing water and wastewater services through Bellmar -- I'm sorry -- through Longwater to get to Bellmar. Another difference is the prepayment of ERCs. In the case of water, the landowner will prepay 650 ERCs, and in the case of wastewater, 350 ERCs, and that is to defray the risk to the water/sewer district on the initial capital costs. Lastly, the timing is different. The buildout schedule has services being extended to Bellmar by the end of Fiscal Year '24. And in the case of this interlocal agreement, the water/sewer district will be doing those improvements. For Longwater, it was -- the Big Cypress Stewardship District was doing the improvements, and the water/sewer -- Collier County Water/Sewer District was reimbursing. That's a difference between Longwater and Bellmar. In the case of Bellmar, Collier County Water/Sewer District will be doing the improvements. Those are really the only differences between this SRA petition and Longwater, so I will April 19, 2021 Page 38 of 73 be happy to answer any questions regarding my presentation, and any fiscal neutrality issues will be addressed later by Joe Bellone. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Paul? COMMISSIONER SHEA: Well, I was going to ask you about fiscal neutrality. So I guess that's not something you're going to share an opinion on? Somebody else will address that. MR. FEY: No. Joe and Amy will get into the economic assessment here after Transportation Planning. COMMISSIONER SHEA: Okay. Thank you. MR. FEY: I know there were some questions about flows and demands, and I'd be happy to answer any of those questions at that time. Joe will present a slide addressing, you know, average daily flow versus three-day and max month. Just generally speaking, you know, it's only water treatment plants that are required to meet max day demand. I think it was misstated in earlier testimony that water and wastewater have to meet max day. That's not the case. For wastewater plants, typically in Collier County it's the monthly average daily flow, which is -- you know, you use peaking factors for -- you apply peaking factors to average day demand and flow to calculate what you need for the plants. Hopefully that helps, and if you have any questions in that regard during Joe's presentation, I'd be happy to answer them then. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. Thank you. MR. FEY: Next will be Transportation Planning. I believe Trinity Scott will be presenting. (Music being played.) COMMISSIONER FRY: You needed some intro music. I think I found just the right song. That is Danger Zone by Kenny Loggins from Top Gun. MS. SCOTT: Wow. I don't know that my presentation will even come up to that level, but... COMMISSIONER FRY: Terri, did you get every word of that? MS. SCOTT: For the record, Trinity Scott, Transportation Planning manager. I want to start with a few items that have been discussed today before I get into my presentation. I wanted to address specifically the gating. As we talked about during Longwater -- and my Planning and Zoning team members here will correct me if I'm wrong -- but we do not have anything within the Comprehensive Plan nor the Land Development Code that requires that these villages be open; not gated. So from a staff perspective, we don't have the hammer to say it has to be opened. With regard specifically to Longwater, we had discussed that the Board had looked at and studied whether or not there would be an arterial roadway that goes through the middle of that, and the Board chose a different alignment. So it was something that we studied, but it was something that the Board of County Commissioners opted for a different alignment. With that, I'm going to go into -- so county staff completed a cumulative analysis of all three of the villages. By the way, it's going to be really reminiscent of about a month ago, so sorry. COMMISSIONER SHEA: We need the refresher. MS. SCOTT: Beginning in 2015, the county embarked on the Oil Well Road/Randall study, which was an extensive study that looked at corridor alternatives to accommodate the existing and future growth anticipated in Collier County. The study identified the Network Alternative 2 Plus, which was adopted by the Board in 2019. This network was adopted by the Board because it was best for enhancing the future roadway network, relieves intersections along Immokalee Road, and provides grid connections April 19, 2021 Page 39 of 73 while maintaining context sensitive to the residents of Golden Gate Estates. This network adopted by the Board of County Commissioners was incorporated into the 2045 Long-Range Transportation Plan completed by the Metropolitan Planning Organization. The MPO is mandated by federal and state law to plan for existing residents and anticipated growth and develop a Long-Range Transportation Plan with a 20-year planning horizon. What the LRTP does not do is it does not approve individual developments. It looks at areas where we anticipate growth, and we anticipate growth in the eastern part of the Collier County. And so we are trying to plan and set the stage for a roadway network to accommodate the increased population that the MPO must plan for. The MPO's cost feasible plan fully constructs projects on the following roadways between 2026 through 2045: Everglades Boulevard from Vanderbilt Beach Road to Randall Boulevard; Randall Boulevard from Eighth Street to Everglades Boulevard; Everglades Boulevard from Randall Boulevard to Oil Well Road, all of which are directly impacted segments or parallel relievers to other roadways but, ultimately, these were identified as part of the county's planning study to set the stage for what the transportation network would look like in the future. The Long-Range Transportation Plan must be developed based on revenues that are reasonably expected between 2026 through 2045. This is an excerpt from the 2045 Long-Range Transportation Plan where we are utilizing transportation impact fees and fuel tax as our means of paying for capacity-adding projects. What you'll note is the sales tax, the one-cent sales surtax is not included because it's anticipated to sunset in 2026, and right now there's no provision to extend it. Any decision to utilize ad valorem funding is a policy decision by the Board, but we do not plan based on having an influx of ad valorem. We are planning solely based on the transportation impact fees that we anticipate receiving based on the growth and the fuel tax that we receive as part of our extra option local fuel tax. So going back to that original study that I discussed the viable Alternative 2 Plus that shows what's anticipated within the Long-Range Transportation Plan, that does not take into consideration the improvements that are anticipated to be completed in the next five years as identified in the Capital Improvement Element adopted with the Annual Update and Inventory Report each year. The following improvements are fully funded for construction in the five-year Capital Improvement Element: Vanderbilt Beach Road extension from Collier Boulevard to 16th Street Northeast, which is Phase 1; and Phase 2 is from 16th Street Northeast to Everglades Boulevard; 16th Street Northeast from Golden Gate Boulevard to Randall Boulevard, which is a new crossing that will connect those two major arterial roadways; Wilson Boulevard from Golden Gate Boulevard to Randall Boulevard; Randall Boulevard from Immokalee Road to Eighth Street Northeast; as well as Oil Well Road from Everglades Boulevard to Oil Well Grade Road. You will see with these planned and committed improvement that there are significant projects to implement the Alternative 2 Plus, which I remind you was chosen because it was best for enhancing the future roadway network, relieves intersections along Immokalee Road, and provides the grid connections while maintaining context sensitivity to the residents of Golden Gate Estates. When we looked at the cumulative impact of all three villages together, several roadways were deemed deficient based on the background traffic alone, and they're listed here. Per Florida Statute 163.3180, when we determine an applicant's fair share, we must remove the deficient roadway segments from that calculation. The improvement necessary to correct this type of deficiency is the funding responsibility of the maintaining agency. So looking at those individual roadway segments and then looking at the planned and committed improvements, you'll note that we have multiple planned and committed improvements to deal with those deficiencies. We are doing that through our planning process. Through that April 19, 2021 Page 40 of 73 shorter range Annual Update and Inventory Report that you see, we are planning for what those deficiencies will be based on growth in the shorter term. I do want to correct the record of something that was stated earlier is we are not saying that we don't calculate a proportionate share if a project is included in the Long-Range Transportation Plan. What we are saying is is that it cannot be included in the calculation if it's deficient based on background traffic alone. So whether it's funded in the Long-Range Transportation Plan, that's irregardless. It doesn't matter. It's whether or not it's deficient based on growth only. COMMISSIONER SHEA: Can we ask a question on that before she goes? Because I get confused. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: I'd like to let her finish. Well -- I'd like to let her finish, because Karl and Joe are in front of you, so... COMMISSIONER SHEA: Oh, okay. COMMISSIONER FRY: I'm definitely going to ask about -- drill into that one. MS. SCOTT: So while we're not here to talk about Rivergrass or Longwater, we did include them in our cumulative impact analysis, and because many of these roadways are constrained, such as -- policy constrained such as Golden Gate Boulevard from Wilson to Everglades and Oil Well Road from Immokalee to Everglades, it's necessary that we look at parallel roadways to determine if sufficient capacity is available based on planned and committed improvements. And when we do that, we come down to a few roadways that are -- would be part of a calculation for a proportionate share. So we calculated that proportionate share; the applicant calculated that proportionate share for the remaining roadways. So going back to the Florida Statute 163.3180, the county must allow an applicant to enter into a binding agreement to pay or construct their proportionate fair share. Those facilities that are determined to be deficient from existing, committed, and vested trips plus the projected background traffic have to be removed because the improvement necessary to correct that deficiency is the funding responsibility of the maintaining agency. And the applicant must receive a credit for the anticipated road impact fees. So, in essence, the applicant is required to pay the higher of either the proportionate share based on Florida Statute required calculation methodology or impact fees, so the roadway impact fees for the three villages, approximately $53.6 million, which is significantly more than what their proportionate share would be. So the applicant will pay the higher of the two numbers, the calculated proportionate share or the impact fees; they're going to pay the higher of those two numbers. That is the impact fees, the expected impact fees. So for the Bellmar-specific analysis, projects identified in 3, 4, and 5 of the Capital Improvement Element are considered for consistency purposes. I went through those roadways in my prior slides. There's a map, just so you can see. On the top are the roadways that are expected to be deficient without Bellmar. On the bottom you'll note that there's three roadways in blue: Vanderbilt Beach Road from Logan to Collier; Randall from Everglades to DeSoto; and Golden Gate Boulevard from Everglades Boulevard to DeSoto Boulevard. So the applicant calculated their proportionate share going back to the same items. So those deficient roadway segments have to come off the list because they're the funding responsibility of the maintaining agency, and the applicant must receive a credit for the anticipated road impact fees. The proportionate share, as calculated in the TIS, was $4 million. The applicant is required to pay the higher of either proportionate share or impact fees. Their impact fees for Bellmar are anticipated to be $18.7 million. So they would pay the April 19, 2021 Page 41 of 73 anticipated road impacts, not the calculated proportionate share. In addition, we looked at operational mitigation. The TIS guidelines allow for equal mitigation, alternative mitigation, or fair share mitigation. In 2015, Florida Statute 70.45 was enacted that prohibited -- prohibited exactions. So what that means is is that the county can't impose something on a property owner that lacks an essential nexus to a legitimate public purpose and is not roughly proportionate to the impact of the proposed use. So the applicant will pay their fair share mitigation of all needed improvements to bring the intersections to acceptable operating levels of standards. Operational impacts are typically not impact fee credible, and the applicant calculated their fair share mitigation for operational improvement which resulted in the applicant being required to pay approximately $2.2 million. That will be on top of their impact fees. So we have a few conditions for approval. Within 90 days of the approval of the first development order, which will be the Site Development Plan or the plats and plans, the applicant must pay the full $2.2 million for their operational impacts; the developer shall be required to improve both Golden Gate Boulevard and Sixth Avenue Southeast from the project entrance to DeSoto Boulevard to a minimum two-lane undivided rural roadway consistent with the Florida Green Book Construction Standards. These will not be eligible for impact fee credits -- for road impact fee credits, sorry. And with regard to the school sites, similar to the Longwater petition, the school sites have not been evaluated for transportation impacts. We'll do that as part of the school board review when the school sites come in. And it's noted in the commitment that Collier County Public Schools is responsible for the roadway improvements necessary for both school sites. And I go back to, the Florida Statute required calculation for proportionate share is $4 million, and the applicant will pay their anticipated impact fees of 18.7, which is significantly higher than what the Florida Statute calculated proportionate share would be. Shoot. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. Karl. COMMISSIONER FRY: Having said that, the impact fees are intended to pay more than just for their proportionate fair share of road improvements, correct? MS. SCOTT: The impact fees are calculated -- and Amy can get into that more. Impact fees are calculated so that growth would pay for the amount of capacity that they're consuming. So that's different than a Florida Statute-related proportionate share calculation. COMMISSIONER FRY: Okay. And I'm hoping, Paul, maybe this is the question that you were after as well is, the point that was posed -- the question posed by -- during the Conservancy's presentation had to do with the background traffic, I believe, and how -- so I saw a slide that I believe clarified that when you consider background traffic, it is traffic other than that traffic generated by the proposed development. Can you clarify that? Because they seem to be saying or thinking that the background traffic included their traffic and, therefore, they were not having to pay a fair share for traffic that was, in fact, due to them. MS. SCOTT: So when the MPO, the Metropolitan Planning Organization, is doing their planning and their Long-Range Transportation Plan, they look at the county's county interactive growth model and where we anticipate growth. And so they place growth in areas in mainly in Eastern Golden Gate Estates, but other areas. We have PUDs that aren't built out, and so they will place that growth throughout the county and then run their traffic models. So when an MPO does that, that is not approving development. That is not approving that specific -- it's not approving that that -- in that initial traffic analysis zone that that is the density or intensity that's going to be approved ultimately. It is the best information that we have available to be able to look at our Comp Plan. So with that being said, yes, the growth -- we're planning for April 19, 2021 Page 42 of 73 growth. They're applying growth factors with regard to this. So it does not -- it's not specific to this development. COMMISSIONER FRY: But that would -- but it would include this development, theoretically, correct? MS. SCOTT: It includes all of our growth. Because when we're planning for the future, we're not looking at this project specific. We're looking at -- we're anticipating 300 -- or 500,000 population, and based on the MPO's plan, this is where we think it's going to be. When they do their traffic analysis, they're looking at growth factors, and so those growth factors, they're looking at that over multiple years based on their buildout of what traffic is anticipated during that time. Now, their buildout might only be 10 years from now. That's not all the growth that's in the MPO's Long-Range Transportation Plan. COMMISSIONER FRY: Can you go back a few slides to that particular section. There it is. MS. SCOTT: This, right. Facilities determined to be deficient with existing, committed, and vested trips, plus projected background traffic from any other source other than the development shall be removed from the proportionate share calculation. COMMISSIONER FRY: That would indicate that you must be backing out the traffic from their development from the projected total for the entire area. MS. SCOTT: Yes. COMMISSIONER FRY: Okay. MS. SCOTT: I guess I should have just answered your question "yes" at the beginning instead of getting into a long drawn-out model thing. It's really late in the afternoon. COMMISSIONER FRY: Okay. Paul may follow up on that, but I'll move on to one last question. You showed all the projected and funded road improvements, and there was one section that remained red. It was a section of Randall Boulevard. It was bright red the entire time. Is that mitigated by the -- keep going back. Is it mitigated by the other improvements? MS. SCOTT: Hold on. I have to get to that slide. COMMISSIONER FRY: There you go. MS. SCOTT: So that section of -- it's not red. This was part of the Alternative 2 Plus that the county looked at. And so that is one segment that is partially funded in the Long-Range Transportation Plan through 2045. It's not fully funded for construction. But you would have alternatives such as Oil Well Road widening that would help mitigate that. COMMISSIONER FRY: So while it is red -- MS. SCOTT: It's only red because of the map, not because it's -- COMMISSIONER FRY: There will be alternatives, and so it will not be a constant point of congestion? MS. SCOTT: Correct. COMMISSIONER FRY: Thank you. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Joe? COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: A couple of questions. In the summary conclusions that -- from the Conservancy -- and Amy probably will ask -- have to answer this as well -- they state the three bullets. This is not fiscally neutral. From your perspective as regards to transportation, is that in your purview or Amy? Is this deemed to be fiscally neutral? MS. SCOTT: Yes. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Because we talked -- also talked about gas tax. MS. SCOTT: Yes. So from -- the county is recommending approval. We did our analysis based on the fiscal neutrality and, yes, we believe that, from a transportation perspective, it is fiscally neutral. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: One bullet said, the project will cause roads to fail, but April 19, 2021 Page 43 of 73 roads were going to be failing anyway, as you identified, all the roads that potentially could be developed. And the last point, because it's related, the threat of one per five, meaning one unit per five acres makes zero economic sense. Well, the fact is that it's zoned for one per five acres. The county would have had to accommodate for that development regardless; is that correct? MS. SCOTT: That is correct. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: So the threat of one per five, I guess, from the Conservancy's standpoint does not make economic sense, but you, as a transportation planner, would have to accommodate or to formulate planning for one per five acres if, in fact, they chose to do that, and in today's market that's feasible. MS. SCOTT: If that's what they chose to do, then we have to plan for what the future growth would be. And with regard to will this development cause roads to fail, this is why we go through -- so we have a Long-Range Transportation Planning -- COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Correct. MS. SCOTT: -- but we're also doing that short-range planning, and we're looking at the Annual Update and Inventory Report, and we're -- every year we assess the level of service on our roadways. We're watching that. We're doing projections for the five- and 10-year mark so that we can have roads online ahead of that. And it's not just impact fees that are from this development. There are other developments out in eastern Collier County. There's single-family homes in Golden Gate Estates that are developing, and all of those funds go into the hopper and are part of what we're doing. And when we're talking about that AUIR, it's a very important document. It's that short-range planning that we're doing, not just the long-range planning. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Because we're not near in buildout at all in Golden Gate Estates, but the fact of the matter is it is zoned for development. It's zoned for permitting, and you can apply for a building permit. So the county has to do its long-range planning regardless of whether the RLSA was approved as your one slide showed, I think, five of the eight -- was it five of the eight? -- would have had to have been approved anyway. MS. SCOTT: It would have been -- they needed to be widened based on background traffic alone, which is why we have such a robust AUIR out in -- and five-year Capital Improvement Element in Eastern Collier County. There are a lot of roads that we're planning on building in Eastern Collier County in the next five years. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: So the only way you would not do it, if there was some kind of moratoria saying, basically, all construction would stop. But we probably still would have to accommodate for approval. MS. SCOTT: If we have a requirement -- and Jeff will jump in -- we have to have the fix within I think it's 12 months. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Twelve months, yeah. Okay. You answered my question. I just -- CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Paul? COMMISSIONER SHEA: Just more questions. Probably similar ones. I probably need to hear it spoken a little differently. But -- so when you say you're correcting deficient existing roadways, and you consider the problem, are you just solving the problem, or are you correcting it to build growth capacity into whatever capital expenditure you're doing? Are you doing just enough to solve the problem? MS. SCOTT: So if a roadway's deficient by 40 trips in the p.m. peak hour, I can't just add, you know, a quarter of a lane. You know, you've got to add a lane in each direction. But when we're doing that, we're also running those traffic models and looking at, what do we need to do in the foreseeable future. Transportation planning is a balance about having too much asphalt out there where we're maintaining it and we're not using it versus having enough capacity to where we're not out there April 19, 2021 Page 44 of 73 ripping up the road two years after we just finished it. So, yes, we look at that. We plan. In the past, we've gone -- on some roads where we thought maybe we should only do four lanes, we went ahead and went to six because we knew that that sixth -- that fifth and sixth lane were going to be needed. So we don't just go to where the cup's still full, you know. We have to plan ahead. COMMISSIONER SHEA: So you are planning for growth and that growth isn't paying for itself unless the impact fees cover their share of it. MS. SCOTT: Well, I wouldn't say that the growth's not paying for itself. Their impact fees come in as they're developing, and their impact fees go into the hopper, and they're broken out by impact fee districts, to fund improvements in that general area or adjacent, if it's a regional roadway, but -- so if a village were to come in and they've built 100 homes and we're out there widening a road, their impact fees that they've paid on those 100 homes are going towards those improvements that we're doing. So it's not that they're not contributing. COMMISSIONER SHEA: No, I understand that. The question, I think, everybody has is, are they contributing enough? That's the real question is -- you know, you're planning for growth. We're paying -- the rest of the county is paying for that somehow, and then they come in and they pay impact fees, and the idea of fiscal neutrality to me is those impact fees pay for that share that we're kind of funding as we fix current problems and expand the roadways. Am I seeing that correctly? MS. SCOTT: Their impact fees go towards their share of the capacity that they're consuming. It's just that we are not charging them more than their impact fees because the Florida Statute requires how I calculate their proportionate share. COMMISSIONER SHEA: So if we didn't have a Florida Statute, would they be paying fair share? MS. SCOTT: If they didn't -- COMMISSIONER SHEA: If we didn't -- you always refer to this Florida Statute. Take that away and just look at the cost. Will the impact fees cover the costs if you didn't have that burden of the Florida Statute? MS. SCOTT: That's a hypothetical "what if," and I haven't done that calculation to tell you what that would be. It's a hypothetical "what if" that's not consistent with state statute. So unless I'm going to use some jail impact fees -- MR. KLATZKOW: No, no. That's a fair question. What you're saying is you can't charge more than impact fees. MS. SCOTT: Unless their proportionate share was higher than that. MR. KLATZKOW: Right. But what you're saying is that since the proportionate fair share that's calculated is lower than your impact fees, the most you can charge them are impact fees. MS. SCOTT: Yes. MR. KLATZKOW: Period. So that in one sense the question is, are they fiscally neutral is irrelevant; we can't charge them any more. But what you're being asked is, is the impact fees we're charging enough to satisfy the fiscal neutrality? COMMISSIONER SHEA: Yes, exactly. Thank you. MS. SCOTT: And I would defer that question to Amy because I look at it from a different perspective, and she's behind me. She's walking up. COMMISSIONER SHEA: She's coming. MS. SCOTT: A great segue. Any other questions? If not, I'll turn it over to Amy. COMMISSIONER FRY: One question. MS. SCOTT: Do you have entrance music for her? COMMISSIONER FRY: Electric cars -- no, it's for you. April 19, 2021 Page 45 of 73 MS. SCOTT: Oh, okay. Sorry, Amy. COMMISSIONER FRY: You did have a slide where you had an arrow to the fuel taxes, and electric cars were brought up earlier, and the transition to electric cars is accelerating which, theoretically, I guess, would removal the fuel taxes. And I don't know if Tesla charging stations collect taxes that would come to the county. But is that planned for in the future expectations of revenue? MS. SCOTT: So when we did our revenue estimates for the Long-Range Transportation Plan, what we're experiencing from fuel tax is that for right now they're remaining steady. And while, yes, there are more fuel-efficient vehicles and there are more electric vehicles on the roadway, the amount of vehicle miles traveled for the other vehicles are kind of keeping that as a steady thing. We did not project an increase in fuel tax over that time frame. We kept it steady. So we didn't go start saying, oh, we're going to get an abundance of fuel tax coming in. And that is a statewide issue that needs to be dealt with as part of -- through the Florida Department of Transportation and all counties together. MR. KLATZKOW: It's a federal issue, too, because they use gas taxes for the federal highway system. So sooner or later people are going to have to figure out, okay, if we don't get our money out of this pot, how do we create a new pot? COMMISSIONER FRY: They've always been very creative at that. MR. KLATZKOW: Very creative. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: They will be created. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Paul, do you have -- COMMISSIONER SHEA: Okay. On the fuel tax, I guess, trying to understand that, that comes from all the residents of Collier County -- basically all the gas -- fuel that's sold in Collier County. So if you're funding part of that growth with the fuel tax from other -- that's paid by other people in the county, aren't existing people providing some money that goes into building the capital for the future development? MS. SCOTT: What I would say to you is so are visitors and so are people who are driving through Collier County and stop to fill up. You know, Alligator Alley's a really long way. COMMISSIONER SHEA: So growth pays for growth is my point. MS. SCOTT: To the maximum -- COMMISSIONER SHEA: It doesn't matter where it's coming from. It's not coming from the growth, is my point. MS. SCOTT: Growth pays for growth -- what does Amy say -- for the maximum legal extent that it can. So we utilize a combination of user fees, which are people utilizing the roadway, and the impact fees to pay for our capacity-adding projects. COMMISSIONER SHEA: You know, it's interesting because, I mean, we always say that, we're restricted by these laws and those laws, but it's supposed to be fiscally neutral. So absent all these other constraints, it should be fiscally neutral, right? You can't say it's fiscally neutral because I can't -- like you were saying, Jeff, you can't charge any more. And I get confused with that. MR. KLATZKOW: I don't know what to tell you. It's -- for most of the county's history, there were no impact fees, yet somehow roads managed to get built. You know, I've been here 19 years now, and we've had impact fees, and roads are built. None of this analysis is taking the thought process these new homes and these new commercial properties are all going to be paying ad valorem taxes to Collier County once they're established. We're just looking at a small piece of this, the impact fee. So all I can tell you is that this is as prosperous a county as I know of, and I think this argument is very short term. I think the long-term -- the long-term financial outlook of Eastern April 19, 2021 Page 46 of 73 Collier County is spectacular, and I think that the Eastern Estates are going to be valuable property as anything in Collier County absent waterfront. You'll be having people on five-acre lots, you know, with immediate access to commercial. Sort of like the Logan Estates are now and Pine Ridge Estates are now. It's -- and nobody's talking about that. It's just going to be a tremendous increase in property value over the years. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Is that it? Okay. MS. SCOTT: With that, I'm going to turn it over to Amy Patterson for the economic assessment and fiscal neutrality. COMMISSIONER FRY: Would you like some exit music? MS. SCOTT: Thank you. COMMISSIONER FRY: I don't have a song prepared. MS. PATTERSON: Good afternoon. Amy Patterson, for the record. I'm the director of Capital Project Planning, Impact Fees, and Program Management. I have, basically, an identical presentation to the last one on the economic assessment and fiscal neutrality. I am going to be followed by Joe Bellone, who's going to be here to talk about the utility-specific issues. I don't know that anybody wants to hear any of this again, but we'll go through it quickly. Let's talk about how we pay for growth. And this is -- for the purposes of looking at the eastern lands, there's a requirement for an economic assessment; that gets into the fiscal neutrality. We're going to talk about the staff review, and then, like I said, we're going to talk to Joe about the Collier County Water/Sewer District. So the economic assessment is required by the Land Development Code. It is used to demonstrate fiscal neutrality and identify deficiencies. It's currently using a static model. We like to say this is very conservative. We have a long history with impact fees and other funding sources in this county. We know how they perform, we know the things that change them, and by not building in any type of index or escalator into this model, we've assumed a constant state of revenue, and that is most unlikely to occur. Even in periods of recession, you have periods of recovery, and these impact fees are not at the levels that they have reached in the past, but they are approaching them. So we understand how they perform, and that seems fair. This methodology was accepted by the county. It's an interactive process with the infrastructure facility managers. It relies on adopted data, which is adopted by the county, and it is peer reviewed just to be sure that we have a third set of eyes on all of this data. And I have to emphasize, with respect to the infrastructure facility managers, these are people like Trinity, the Sheriff's Office, EMS, Fire that come in and they sit down with the people performing these economic assessments. They talk about their needs. They talk about the need for new facilities or new growth-related equipment as well as their operating challenges. All of those things are discussed. So if there's an EMS station needed, if there's an ambulance, a fire station, any of those things, where they're needed, where they're planned, how they'll be placed, that's all part of this process. As the fiscal component, we don't pretend to assume to know everything about the way that these facility needs happen or the challenges that are being experienced actually in the real world out there. So we want to continue to emphasize this is not done in a vacuum; that these experts are brought in, and they're brought into this process. So fiscal neutrality, it's required to demonstrate the development is fiscally neutral or positive to the tax base. It's not required that they use impact fees to do that. Now, here in Collier County we do use impact fees, but if we were to be preempted by the legislature, if we were to have a Board of County Commissioners that took a position that said, we don't like impact fees and we're going to reduce them or eliminate them, that doesn't mean that the infrastructure wouldn't get built. It would be built differently, and this economic assessment and this fiscal neutrality April 19, 2021 Page 47 of 73 determination would go on under the set of rules in place at that time with those revenue and funding sources in place and whether or not it is a positive, neutral, or a negative to the taxpayers. So, again, we want to try to detach a little bit from this idea that we're having an impact fee methodology argument up here. Now, understanding that they're central to what we do in Collier County doesn't mean that it's the only way or that we wouldn't be able to achieve fiscal neutrality without those impact fees. And I do -- I will touch on at the end of this some comments about the way that the current transportation impact fee is calculated and to the comments from the last meeting about what are perceived as flaws in the current methodology. I'll get to that in a minute. So the framework and assumptions in this analysis should be consistent with county fiscal policy. Again, we use impact fees. If we were to not use impact fees, we, obviously, wouldn't rely on that. So this needs to be consistent with all of those funding sources I did refer to, and so have others, as the basket. But the basket of funding sources that are paid for by all taxpayers or developers or whoever the party may be. So it's appropriate to consider things in the basket besides just impact fees because, again, this is not solely an impact fee argument. And, secondly, in the basket with the impact fees are those things that keep us from having a 100 percent impact fee. And there's a difference between an impact fee and growth paying for growth. Again, as Trinity said, impact fees pay for growth to the extent that's legally permissible, but we cannot overcharge or double charge. So these other funding sources that come into play are the ones that have to be considered in the methodology for the impact fees to ensure that we are not double charging. If we're using infrastructure sales tax to construct parks or EMS stations, when we go to calculate those impact fees, we have to consider those revenue sources in as a credit. We're going to get into that in a second. You've all heard this. I'll try not to go into too much detail. So, anyway, this integrates analysis of funding sources as well as level of service. It's another really confusing piece of this is the way that we do our level-of-service calculations and then how you apply the financials to those levels of service. That's where all of our conversations about population come into play. Now, the -- there are strategies to address deficiencies if they're created specifically by the proposed development, but we cannot require a proposed development to cure an existing deficiency. We have several facilities right now that are running a level-of-service deficiency. We know why. We know how we're funding those deficiencies. We're filling the gap. But that is not what new development is required to do. This analysis should show us whether or not the capacity that's going to be consumed by the new development is paid for by the new development; no more and no less. So back to does growth really pay for growth? It can only pay for growth to the extent that's allowed by law. Developers, as I said, cannot be required to pay impact fees above and beyond the cost reasonably attributed to the demand created, and there are factors that limit that. There's been questions about Board policy on impact fees being at their maximum legal limit. This board and prior boards have adopted our fees at the maximum legal limit with some very specific exceptions. One was at the direction of the school board to -- during just past the recession to lower the school impact fee. That's an impact fee that's on behalf of the school board, and their -- our Board of County Commissioners elected to take the school board's recommendation to lower that fee. There have been occasions where, inside of the methodology that some cost components had been adjusted, very infrequently. The most common thing that we do here is that we implement impact fees in phases. Sometimes when you have large impact fee increases it makes sense to put them in over a couple of years, still bringing them to the maximum legal limit. So sitting here right now, all of our fees, with the exception of one, are at the maximum legal limit at the time of their last study, and impact fees in Collier County are updated frequently, probably April 19, 2021 Page 48 of 73 more frequently than anywhere in the state of Florida. So even our impact fees that are sitting on four or five years of history are still probably more current than a lot of other places all over the state. I'm going to just scoot past this. You've seen this a whole bunch of times, and there's been some discussion about what's going to happen and all of this population not paying impact fees and there's going to be giant shortfalls in funding. That's absolutely not the truth or any way that we have seen it or calculated it, and I've really tried; tried changing populations, tried changing costs, tried changing units, and I still am ending up in the same place. So as far as our staff review, what goes into this? Well, it's a lot of different things. It's not just a straight line math. It's not just calculating revenue. We have to understand the funding sources and calculations. That's beyond impact fees. That's everything that goes into this both on the operating side of the house as well as on the capital. The knowledge of the application and calculation of level-of-service standards. There are lots of them, and they are applied differently depending on the facility that we're talking about. Understanding of existing level-of-service deficiencies. As I spoke about, there's reasons why there are deficiencies in some of these impact fees and adopted levels of service. It has to do with policy decisions made even simply about the ownership of public facilities. Knowledge of the difference between exactions, contributions, and other financial tools that are available to fund infrastructure. Trinity touched on this a whole bunch. We have, you know, statutory limitations and many, many other things that limit or help in some cases. There is extensive case law and Florida Statutes that provide some limiting factors and, again, or steer the way that we have to do this work. Population projections and datasets. I don't think anybody wants to hear me talk about population ever again, but that is something that has to be considered and understanding that you can take different populations, and by the time you're done, either factoring up or factoring down, you should end up in the same place. So this whole discussion about persons per housing unit and persons per household needs to be very carefully examined to ensure, number one, that we're being consistent in our approach and, number two, that we're not mixing datasets and, therefore, jumbling up the data to something that makes no sense. Methodology is an impact-fee specific item as well, but methodology makes a huge difference. I'm going to touch on that in a minute. And then the difference between planning and construction. And Joe will touch on this as far as how we plan utilities and how we actually go to construct them and the phasing and some different things like that. I'm going to go quickly through this. Common misconceptions, you've heard me a lot about this. It's applying a straight-line fiscal analysis to a complicated capital construction issue. Walking away from looking at engineering, how we plan, and how things are constructed, including phasing, can give you a wildly different picture than what actually happens in reality. And it actually, in this case, generates almost a "first in pays the most" type of scenario in the utility when, in fact, the most expensive of the infrastructure that's going to support multiple phases of expansion is going in the ground early. So you cannot assign all of that cost to the first people in. Overestimation, that goes to the overestimation of costs attributable to new developments. If you're first in, it doesn't mean you pay the most. It just -- that's not the way it works. Overestimation of population projections by not considering vacancies in seasonal population. You've heard me talk about that way more times than I'm sure anybody cares to hear again. Same thing with the population numbers being mixed, which causes confusion in the dataset, also can change the numbers and make them look like something that is not reality. And then again, utilizing datasets for purposes other than their intended basis for April 19, 2021 Page 49 of 73 collection. So we have to make sure that when you're selecting a dataset and running your analysis that you really understand what that data represents, what its intended use is, and is it really appropriate for placement into that analysis. Okay. And this -- Joe's going to -- get over all of this in his presentation, so more on the decisions to expand the utility. I'm going to fast forward over this. He's going to touch on each of these things in his presentation. We've talked to you about the utility expansion and how we believe we have reviewed all of the financial data to support this finding of fiscal neutrality. Same thing with impact fees. We've talked about that. We have an aggressive program to update these impact fees; therefore, the assumptions made through this economic assessment and the finding of fiscal neutrality is reasonable and conservative. And while we understand that there are some concerns about the method or the approach, we have found no reason to doubt this, the way that this has been reviewed. We've had an outside peer reviewer as well as the staff who's run multiple calculations, and the DPFG who provided the economic assessment originally. We all took a different approach. We've spoken each together, but we looked at it all differently and still arrived at the same conclusion. With that, I just want to touch briefly on the methodology questions, and I will answer any of your questions you may have carried over from the last time, but I'm going to throw this slide up on the visualizer. There was a conversation about methodology for transportation specifically in that it's inappropriate or wrong, maybe, to use the same rate throughout the transportation system, that we should, in fact, have or it's required that we have a different rate for urban versus rural. So in truth, that's not true. The urban/rural mix is not required; however, every time we update the transportation impact fees, this issue is reviewed by our consultants, by our outside legal counsel, and the Board to decide if it's appropriate to do an urban and rural split or to have a different impact fee by impact fee district. There's a lot of different ways that this can be approached. Our Board of County Commissioners dating back many, many, many years have stayed with this average that we use here where you have one impact fee rate throughout the county. There are a number of reasons why. In part, and particularly to the villages, you may find in an urban and rural setup that you have an impact fee three or four times higher in the rural areas than you do in the urban areas; however, in a situation like these villages, by the time they gain any critical mass, they will come in and they will do individual studies or alternative fee studies, and they will bring those fees down by internal capture and trip length, and you'll be right back to where we are now, essentially with an impact fee rate that's the same as the urban area, potentially lower, and the rest of Golden Gate now paying an impact fee that's three or four times higher than the urban area. And this issue has been looked at all the way up one side and down the other, like I said, by not only the consultant but by our outside legal, and there is no issue with the way that these impact fees are structured; however, they are looked at every three years, approximately, where this issue will be reviewed again. We pull the data, we pull the costs, we pull all the information and present it to the Board in the event that they want to send us out to set up a different mix of rates. And like I said, they could be -- there are counties that have an impact fee for each individual road impact fee district. We have eight of them; six of them actually have fee. Urban/rural. There's a number of ways that this can be accomplished. Secondly, transportation impact fees, despite what the speaker said, are not a forward-looking fee, generally speaking. There are some components where we look to the future and look at the costs of things like overpasses and bring those into the calculation, but this is not a forward-looking fee like public utilities. Utilities uses a 10-year look to be able to bring projects into the program. This -- the transportation impact fees rely on past data. So those are projects April 19, 2021 Page 50 of 73 we've actually completed, those costs. The consultant also pulls costs from similar and neighboring counties to ensure that the costs brought into the impact fee methodology are reasonable and accurate. So they maintain a database of costs from throughout the state. That way if we have anomalies in our costs, there's a way to fact check those, and you're not pulling extremely high or extremely low costs into your impact fee. Also, population's not a primary driver for transportation, but the interesting thing is is that losing -- in other population-driven -- very specific population-driven impact fees, using a lower population number actually drives impact fees up because when you're going to spread the cost across all of the users, if your number of users is smaller, that spreads the cost amongst less people, and that's that inverse relationship that people often don't think. So this whole idea that somehow our impact fees are being misstated or misrepresented because our population numbers are too low is not accurate. Also, again, methodology and data is independently reviewed by our outside legal counsel. Every single time we do an impact fee there's a separate outside legal review that's conducted, and anytime we have a question on methodology, on rates or any of these impact fee challenge type issues, we go to outside counsel for their review. They're experts in impact fees, and they provide us guidance. And their guidance sometimes is to do things differently, and we comply. So with that, if you have any questions, I'm available. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Joe? COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Amy, at the last meeting at the end of -- well, the last meeting that we actually had where we discussed this, Judy Hushon presented a two-and-a-half page letter representing the League of Women Voters and, in her testimony, had significant criticism with our methodology and our calculation of impact fees. Irrespective of that issue, the fact is we have a Board-approved policy, we have a Board-approved methodology, and that is the methodology we use, and that's the method you discussed. There's no other latitude? MS. PATTERSON: No. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Unless the Board changes the way it wants to apply or assess impact fees; is that correct? MS. PATTERSON: That's correct. And it's beyond the Board wanting to, because even if the Board wanted to make methodology changes, that would have to be reviewed by our own County Attorney as well as outside legal counsel for the appropriateness of those changes. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: And this gets into the whole dual rational nexus and all the other -- MS. PATTERSON: That's correct. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Okay. And also in this letter it made significant comparison to Ave Maria and made some rather significant statements that they paid for their own, well, why doesn't Collier -- Collier Enterprises pay for its infrastructure? Well, I don't know if that's entirely factual. MS. PATTERSON: It's not entirely factual. One, as discussed earlier today, there's no reason to believe that the private internal roads that will be in these villages and -- areas aren't going to be paid for by the developer through whatever funding mechanism they deem appropriate to do so, just like Ave Maria did. As far as the utility goes, that is -- that was then. There was not -- the utility was not -- the Collier County utility was not in the position to expand and to serve Ave Maria. They have now made the business decision, as well as the policy decision, to expand out into Eastern Collier and to serve these areas including these villages but not limited to them. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Yeah. It's no different than Orange Tree. When Orange April 19, 2021 Page 51 of 73 Tree was developed, Orange Tree developed its own utility plant many, many years later. Joe, I think, what, five years ago we took over? MR. BELLONE: Seventeen; 2017. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: 2017 we took over Orange Tree as now a county utility, but at one time it was set up under its own authority. Because her quote, and she quotes, we are letting Collier Enterprise off the hook because they should have similar debt obligations for their development. She cited that the taxpayers are going to be -- they have to meet the funding obligations within the boundaries of the stewardship district, and she's claiming that -- the League of Women Voters are claiming that that should not be the burden on the taxpayer, but I don't -- I think based on your statements it is not; is that correct? MS. PATTERSON: That's correct. To the extent that we collect the fees to pay or other funding sources pay for the infrastructure associated to the new development, we have done the analysis to show that the funding is in place reasonably anticipated and that they will be fiscally neutral, or positive in some cases, by the horizon year. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: And then they cited a $43 million shortfall. MS. PATTERSON: Which is not correct, and we've gone through that a number of times, that that is based on assumptions that are incorrect about the construction of the utility. And I have to say, as I did the last time that I stood in front of this very board as well as others on the Ave Maria discussion having a conversation about what a bad deal Ave Maria was at the time, it was a terrible deal, it was a burden to the taxpayers that we let Ave Maria get away with sticking the taxpayers with having to build a bunch of infrastructure, a road to nowhere. I mean, it went on and on and on, and now Ave Maria is being held up, as is fair, as excellent planning. So -- COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: I recall those discussions about -- not Oil Well Road, but -- MS. PATTERSON: It was Oil Well Road. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Oil Well Road, okay. MS. PATTERSON: Yep, yep. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Okay. Yeah, there was a lot of discussion about that. Okay. So but the other -- the other area you covered, she said that the county impact fee formulas are not and were never intended to be applicable to rural areas. You've already stated that, in fact, we have one rule that we apply across the board unless the commissioners decide to do otherwise. MS. PATTERSON: That's right. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: My recommendation, if the League wants to pursue this argument, that argument is probably not a very solid argument in regards to disapproval of this, but it may be an argument for future impact fees -- MS. PATTERSON: Absolutely. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: -- and how we calculate. MS. PATTERSON: Absolutely. And as I said, we evaluate this every time we bring the transportation impact fees forward. It is provided to the Board so that they can evaluate if they want to adjust the impact fee structure that we have throughout the impact fee districts. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Somehow I always wanted to forget those meetings, but now they're coming back, and now I'm suffering posttraumatic stress. Okay. MS. PATTERSON: Right? COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Okay. No. I just think, though the arguments were there, they're really not pertinent to this issue, because the impact fees are the impact fees, and those are based on the assessment. And just for Joe, I know you're going to get up and talk, but the accusations -- I'll call them accusations, because they were an inference that, in fact, the taxpayer -- the taxpayers are going to April 19, 2021 Page 52 of 73 be held -- I guess the water/sewer district ratepayers are going to be accountable for all of the expansion and that none of this is actually going to be passed off to any of -- the developer. Well, actually, it will be to the homeowners out there, but -- MR. BELLONE: True, impact fees, sure; water and sewer impact fees. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Paul still had a question for you. Sorry. COMMISSIONER SHEA: I think we wore her out. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: We wore her out. Amy says it's time to go home. COMMISSIONER SHEA: Very nice job. MS. PATTERSON: Thank you. COMMISSIONER SHEA: So you feel that the Bellmar Village application is fiscally neutral. MS. PATTERSON: Yes. COMMISSIONER SHEA: And what does that mean to you? MS. PATTERSON: Well, by the requirements of our review, it means that they are not going to place the burden of the development or the construction of their infrastructure associated to the demand created by those developments onto the taxpayers. It does not mean that the taxpayers won't make a contribution into the basket or baskets as they do, but it is not going to be increased based on Bellmar being approved or being constructed. So to the extent that their tax dollars or General Fund dollars going into these various programs like EMS or any of the others, it may continue at their current funding levels, but it's not exacerbated by Bellmar and those units coming online. COMMISSIONER SHEA: Thank you. MS. PATTERSON: You're welcome. MR. BELLOWS: Good afternoon. For the record, Joe Bellone, the director of Utilities Finance. Many of these slides you've seen before, and I won't drag you through every single bullet. But on this particular slide, I just kind of want to point to the center, that the special act gives the Board the overall responsibility for provision of water and sewer services to prevent the proliferation of package treatment plants across the county. Imagine having so many multiple Orange Trees as we did. Going to the next slide. This slide, again, I presented to you on April 1st, the expansion timeline. Just the very first bullet is that the utility anticipated capacity expansion as far back as 2003. They purchased this site on Northeast Mecas (phonetic) with the foresight of the great leadership that we had at the time. That seemed to be the area that would be growing in this time frame. One last bullet on expansion. Right there near the top, on September 11th of 2018, the Board approved the resolution that expanded the service, again -- the service area, in accordance with the special act to serve the areas that are now included in the RLSA. This slide is exactly the same as you saw on April the 1st. I will draw your attention to the center because I will mention this: The water/sewer district will be building capacity in phases, both water and wastewater, and when I get to the very next slide, we talk about the Bellmar example, we'll talk about that for a second. So this slide -- and it's a little bit different from the one that I presented for Longwater. It's a little expanded thanks to Eric and my -- the principal project manager for utilities planning. He helped me out with these. At the very top you'll see the same two flows that I presented for Longwater: The average daily flow and the max three day. Let me just say something about max three day, and I'm sure Eric will run up and take over if I say something wrong. A max three day is a number that our utility uses to try to understand what the impact that April 19, 2021 Page 53 of 73 an unusual weather event may have on the utility and its ability to treat. It's not used for any other purpose other than internal purposes for us to figure out what might happen to the utility should we get one of these horrific weather events. Eric did help me with -- the Conservancy did have an issue with permitting, and so DEP permits are issued, and these are requirements for the two current regional plants that we have. So not knowing what our requirements will be for the new plants at buildout, we'll use those as an example. And these, again, are all based on peak factors. If -- I'll move you down to the bottom of the exhibit, if you might. You'll see for water and wastewater, the peak factors that are applied to the average flows to get to the max three day and the permit requirement flows. So for water they apply a 1.35 percent peak factor, and for wastewater a 1.2 percent peak factor. And we've applied those percentages across the board for daily flows, max three day, and permitted. In the very center of this slide, you'll see that we -- in addition to the residential anticipated revenues at buildout, I've also included an estimate of commercial, and that will depend on exactly what's built. Restaurants have more of an impact than a retail outlet. But these are just reasonable estimates, and you'll see they're small compared to the residential impact. So we would expect close to $10 millions in water impact fee revenue and about 9.8 million in wastewater revenue. There were some questions as we move down to the next section where we talk about costs. Those costs in FY '19 are those related to the bond that we took out in 2019. FY '21 costs are those that we are actually reviewing right now. We'll issue a 2021 series bond to fund this portion of the expansion. FY '25 we'll be doing some design on the new water plant, and then beginning construction at this point, talking about beginning construction on the wastewater plant, the four MGD wastewater plant, and thereafter we're looking at starting construction on the water plant in 2030. Now, as Amy mentioned, water and sewer impact fees are forward looking. It's a 10-year look. And when we did the impact fee rate study for water and sewer back in 2019, we were only looking out 10 years. We were looking out from '20 to '30, and the Phase 2 and Phase 3 of the expansion were not included in that because they were beyond the 10-year horizon. So they are not -- those costs are not reflected in the impact fee and, therefore, not reflected in the anticipated impact fee revenue. That's why those costs are not included in the cost. It's sort of an apples to apples, if you will. To include the costs down below and not the revenues above would be incongruous, I believe. So you'll see on the water side, even if you apply the 8 percent permitted capacity to the total cost, you'll see that it would be approximately $11.3 million fair share compared to 10 million in revenue. On the wastewater site, a little bit different. We're talking about applying that 5.9 percent permitted capacity requirement to the total cost, and that would be about $8.4 million. Net net, if you add the revenues together and you add the costs together or the fair share together, we're within $132,000 to the favor of the utility. So net, by this example, we can demonstrate that this particular village is fiscally neutral. I do want you to take note, I did put it in bold at the bottom that -- so that you know and we get on the record that the costs for Phases 2 and 3 were not included in the impact fee rate study and, again, depending -- we'll have a master plan for water and wastewater coming in June. That will have a 10- and a 20-year outlook that will help us identify when those costs will be incurred or anticipated to be incurred, and they may or may not be in the next water and sewer impact fee rate study, which we will start in 2022 to be in line for our Fiscal '23. And with that, I'll take any questions. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. Joe. MR. BELLOWS: Sure. April 19, 2021 Page 54 of 73 COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Yeah. Joe, can you go back a slide. I've got a question. MR. BELLOWS: Sure. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: In regards to -- looking at the second-to-last bullet there, it includes -- all those were once units served by Orange Tree. Now the new power -- new water/sewer plant, water plant and the sewer plant are servicing all those communities in addition to the SRAs? MR. BELLOWS: Well, right now, water in those communities is coming from the existing capacity in the two regional plants that we have. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Okay. MR. BELLONE: The four-square-mile Orange Tree, their wastewater service is coming from the existing wastewater plant that was the Orange Tree wastewater plant, that .75 MGD facility. Over time we anticipate that we'll have -- either keep that and use it as backup or we may divert all those flows to the new plant. But we've got a bit of planning to do about that. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: I guess, irrespective of the SRA, the expansion was required? MR. BELLOWS: Exactly, yeah. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: In the analysis done by the Conservancy, I'm looking at their Slide 16, and it says, our analysis used -- I'm trying to -- basically -- they're basically stating, again, that it's not -- that all this cost is going to be passed off to the taxpayer. And the rest of the utility users within the county, we're all going to pay for this expansion and pay for the service to Bellmar. Is that, in fact, a valid statement or no? MR. BELLONE: That's not a valid statement. Let me just say that the utility, since its existence in Collier County, has never gotten a penny in general tax funds from taxpayers. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Will we, as ratepayers? MR. BELLOWS: As ratepayers, only once in the lifetime of the utility has the User Fee Fund had to make a loan to the Wastewater Impact Fee Fund, and that was during the recession when building slowed down, impact fees were not coming in. That was paid off within three years after the recession ended. So once -- that did happen once, but that was repaid, and it was considered a loan, and it had to be repaid. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: I'll ask the same question from -- what Paul asked. From your perspective, this is fiscally neutral? MR. BELLOWS: Yes, Joe, from my perspective. We will do impact fee rate studies as often as we need to as construction costs increase. And as estimates and costs change, if we need to, we'll go back and do rate study updates -- impact fee rate study updates to ensure that those fees are sufficient to cover the cost of the expansion. MR. KLATZKOW: This is not fiscally neutral. We're making money on this, okay. This is better than fiscally neutral. We're expanding out. They're not -- we're not expanding out there with the thought that the rest of the county's going to subsidize us here. We're expanding out here with the thought that it's profitable. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Well, the good news also is it's supporting water/sewer and not creating places where we have to put in septic systems. MR. KLATZKOW: That's a side benefit, and I completely agree with you. But simply on the fiscal analysis of it, this is not fiscally neutral. We're making money on this. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: All right. Thanks. COMMISSIONER SHEA: So Joe asked the first half of my standard question. The second half is, what does that mean to you, being fiscally neutral? MR. BELLOWS: Being fiscally neutral to me means that expansion costs for the entire area that this serves, not only Rivergrass and Longwater and Bellmar, but any villages or anything that comes up in that area will be -- will be able to be served by this capacity that we're building on April 19, 2021 Page 55 of 73 this site, the water quality will meet water-quality standards and wastewater will be treated on site. To me that means that the utility is planning years ahead to ensure that the fees and -- the fees that we're getting are in line with the services that are provided. So, yes, I would consider this to be fiscally neutral. COMMISSIONER SHEA: Thank you. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Karl. COMMISSIONER FRY: The question was asked about peak daily demand versus the average daily demand and what the fees were based on. Did I hear you correctly; it's based on the average daily flow rather than the peak? MR. BELLOWS: Let me go back. On this example, if you go down to the bottom, Eric was kind enough to provide all three of those at the bottom of this slide. So if you look at the water column on the left side, the permitted capacity, which is what we're required to provide, at Phase 3 is 8 percent. If you take 8 percent of the $141,690,000 of water costs, that means it would be 11 -- essentially be 11.3 million would be fair share. That is slightly -- obviously slightly behind the revenues we anticipate. On the other side, on the wastewater side, that 5.9 percent at buildout, 5.9 percent of the 141,161,000, represents 8 -- a little over 8.3 million of costs, of costs, which is favorable. If you net -- and, again, we're -- these costs are changing, you know, consistently. But if you net the two revenues together and you net the two costs -- you net the two fair share costs at the permitted requirement, we're $132,400 favorable. COMMISSIONER FRY: Okay. So it's just -- it's based on the permitted quantity. Why is the permitted factor less -- on the water side the permitted factor is a little bit higher than the three-day peak demand, but on the wastewater side, it's actually three-tenths -- I believe I'm reading it right. Yeah, it's three-tenths of a point less. Why is that? MR. BELLOWS: I'll defer to Eric on that one. MR. FEY: Good afternoon. For the record, again, Eric Fey, principal project manager with Public Utilities. You know, the peak factor for water, as I testified earlier, is the maximum day. So as you widen your time frame, the factor goes down. So when you say maximum three day, that's going to be a lower factor than your maximum day -- COMMISSIONER FRY: Right. MR. FEY: -- because, you know, it's that bell curve. You're looking at the peak of the bell curve instead of a range within the bell curve. So does that answer your question? COMMISSIONER FRY: Well, my question was, why is the permit factor different for wastewater than it is for water? Why is it higher? It's 1.35 compared to 1.3 on the maximum three day for water but, yet, on the wastewater side it's 1.5 for the maximum three day but it's only 1.2 permitted, which would support a question of when you look at fair share. If it's based on a lower number, then, of course, that fair share would come out less. MR. FEY: Sure. The maximum three day for wastewater is influenced by extreme weather events more so than water demand. So that's the reason you see a higher factor on the wastewater side than on water. The reverse is true for the permit requirement because, as I mentioned earlier, the plant capacity is permitted for a maximum monthly average daily flow. So you're looking at a 30-day period. It's spreading out those peak events over the course of a month; whereas, on the water side we're looking at the maximum day. So for permit requirement, the 1.35 is higher on the water side than on the wastewater side because we're looking at different time periods. COMMISSIONER FRY: But in your opinion, basing the proportionate share on the permitted factor is fair compared to using the maximum three day? MR. FEY: Correct, because, you know, DEP regulates us based on what our permitted April 19, 2021 Page 56 of 73 capacity is. So, you know, when we start approaching that permit capacity based on apples-to-apples comparisons, that's when capacity improvements are required. COMMISSIONER SHEA: But that's what also has the biggest influence on the cost of the project is the permit, right? MR. FEY: Could you repeat the question. COMMISSIONER SHEA: I'm just saying for Karl's sake -- and I'm not sure I'm right -- but the permit has the biggest impact on the cost of the project, the permit numbers, permit flow. MR. FEY: Correct. COMMISSIONER SHEA: That has the biggest single impact. MR. FEY: That's correct. I mean, to do apples-to-apples comparison, you know, the plant has to be able to meet, in the case of water, maximum day. So we presented these numbers for permit requirement and maximum day for water. Wastewater, again, max month. You know, I think that was one of the complaints in the Longwater presentation was we were looking at average day. So to address the concern of the Conservancy, we're doing an apples-to-apples comparison here for Bellmar. COMMISSIONER FRY: You're building to the permitted requirement, not the average, not the three day. You're building to the permit -- to clarify what he's saying, the cost is -- you're building to what is the permitted peak factor? Is that -- MR. FEY: That's correct. COMMISSIONER FRY: Okay. So that's what the proportionate share should be based on, because that's what affects your cost most directly. You're a water engineer, correct? COMMISSIONER SHEA: I'm saying you're right. COMMISSIONER FRY: Well, I'm saying you're right. Thank you. I think I get it. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Joe. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Eric, since you're up, Deviation 12 is asking that -- it says -- okay. Seeks relief from LDC Section 4.03.08.C, potable water system, which states, separate potable water and reuse water lines shall be provided by the applicant at no cost to the Collier County for all subdivisions and developments, and reuse water lines, pumps, and other appurtenances will not be maintained by Collier County, to instead allow for such facilities and appurtenances to be conveyed to and maintained by the county. So you concur with that? So, basically, the water/sewer system being installed by the developer will be conveyed to the county? MR. FEY: It will be conveyed to the county. I think that deviation is left over from prenegotiations on the IQ system. We had included deviations in Rivergrass and Longwater to allow the water/sewer district to own and maintain IQ infrastructure. As I mentioned earlier, the result of our negotiations was that we will not be supplying irrigation-quality water to Bellmar, so that deviation really should be taken out. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Okay. That's my question is if they have consumptive use permit and provide their own water for irrigation, that is their responsibility. That will not be conveyed to the county; is that correct? MR. FEY: That's correct. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: And so that is a developer responsibility? MR. FEY: Correct. And -- COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: I'm probably looking at an old staff report. I would ask Mr. Yovanovich, when he comes up, would he clarify that. It's Deviation 12. Because I think that's -- it says it would be -- I'm specifically talking about reuse water. There's not going to be reuse water supplied to Bellmar, so that should be amended. MR. FEY: I agree with that. April 19, 2021 Page 57 of 73 CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: There's only three deviations in the PUD, in this SRA agreement. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Okay. I was probably looking at Bellmar -- I mean Longwater, sorry. Okay. MR. COHEN: For the record, Thaddeus Cohen, department head, Growth Management. So I'm sitting in for James Sabo, who would do the close. But let me kind of recap what you've heard. And what I like to say is you've heard from serious people who do serious work. You've heard from utility planning and operations to give you the facts and figures to help you think in terms of whether or not these villages are financially feasible or neutral, and you've heard yes. You've heard from a nationally renowned -- actually, because she spoke in San Francisco at an impact fee conference on impact fees -- that we meet the standard. You've heard from our transportation planner about the relationship between the Long-Range Transportation Plan, the plan that the county has come up with in order to meet its expected growth needs, and how that then matches and parallels with what we can do from a statutory standpoint for new villages as they come online. You've heard from Cormac on the conversations that he's had on how to move a developer to think in terms of affordable housing, which is somewhat different from where we were just a year and a half ago. And you've heard that we actually go on site acre by acre to determine the environmental aspects of a petition that comes before us. And you've also heard from us the zoning aspect, that it meets the Land Development Code, and you also heard from us from a Comprehensive Planning standpoint that it meets the GMP. So I think from staff's standpoint that puts us in the position to make the following recommendations, and I'll paraphrase these because they're similar to what you saw in Longwater; that at least 10 percent of the residential units, that's 275, be sold at purchase prices moderate and gap affordability ranges or, as an alternative, that the SRA be reserved for development of housing that's affordable -- land reserved for housing that's affordable, and 48 months an SRA approval to be equivalent to 2.5 percent of the gross acreage of the SRA. Again, something that kind of mirrors what we're talking about for the RLSAO amendments that will be coming before you at the next meeting. We also recommend prior to the issuance of the first SDP and/or PPL a listed species management plan must be provided for review with approval from the FWCC or USFWS for management of Florida panthers and other listed species. So, again, we have that ability, as Mr. Schmitt asked, will we take a look at that document to ensure that those permits have been done, and we said yes. And you just heard about the agreement on potable water and wastewater shall be adopted concurrently with the Bellmar Village SRA. So you just heard that presentation on how it is that we'll go forward and the differences between what we're proposing and recommending for Longwater and the agreements that we have with Bellmar. And, again, within 90 days of the approval of the first development, the applicant must pay 2.2 million to fulfill their fair share of mitigation and operational impacts as supported by the applicant's Traffic Impact Statement. So questions of whether or not we're able or the developer is able to fund those improvements, you can see in Recommendation 4 as well as in Recommendation 5 that the analysis done by Trinity clearly provides for an opportunity to be able to maintain traffic as these villages come online. Recommendation 6 is -- and 7 are noted with the school district. The school sites have not been evaluated; that when they do come online, we'll use the standard Traffic Impact Statements and operational review at that time. And it was also noted that a commitment that the Collier County School Board shall be responsible for the roadway improvements necessary for both school sites. So, again, it's how to apply, where it is that we get those funding sources for those who April 19, 2021 Page 58 of 73 provide those impacts. With that, Madam Chair and Board, those are our recommendations. That's our presentation. If there's any additional questions, we've got staff here prepared to answer those, but we look forward to your decision, and we can take this to the next step. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. Karl? COMMISSIONER FRY: I think you also introduced another important piece of information, Thaddeus, in the presentation is that some of the conflicts we have have to do with the definitions of some terms in the policies and at the time where those can be resolved is in the -- after we approve and vet the GMP amendments is in the LDC follow-up to that, correct? MR. COHEN: Correct. COMMISSIONER FRY: I think that's a very important point. One last question I have is the genesis of the town plan, which we know is coming later -- have we had -- we have not had a -- I know I missed -- COMMISSIONER SHEA: We're going to. COMMISSIONER FRY: We're going to, but we have not yet had it, right? I only missed one meeting -- MR. COHEN: We had a one-hour conversation about the town plan before the town plan. COMMISSIONER FRY: I'm just wondering what the genesis of it was. Obviously, you've come forward with a town plan. Who approached who? MR. COHEN: I would rather have that conversation on May 6th. What's before you today is moving forward with a recommendation of approval or not of Bellmar, and I think we can more fully -- or I guess I'll more fully explain, I think, how we've been able to get to where we are. COMMISSIONER FRY: Let me rephrase the question. Has the -- in your opinion, has the developer worked in good faith to negotiate issues and resolve issues along the way to get here? MR. COHEN: I would say yes, that it's -- it's taken longer than I believe they wanted to. But what I will say is, it's my belief that we needed to have lined up a series of things in order to help facilitate this opportunity. And I think as you look at the conversations we've had about the RLSAO and being able to move that forward as far as the GMP is concerned and some of the changes we've been able to make as far as the white paper and the five-year plan, I think helps us set the stage for the conversations that we then had on how do we go from three villages and the fact that the community and most folks wanted to have something of a town, and I think that we'll be able to talk about the iterations of that and the result of where we are. COMMISSIONER FRY: Thank you. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Paul. COMMISSIONER SHEA: Question. Could you go back to Recommendation No. 1. I just wanted to make sure -- so what is the 48, land reserved for housing that is affordable shall be identified within 48 months of SRA approval. It seems like a long time. That's four years, if my math is right. Is that normal? MR. COHEN: I'd have to have Cormac speak to the length of time, but what I think you'll find is on May 6 we have the ability to resolve an affordable housing issue within the context of all the villages. MR. GIBLIN: Cormac Giblin, your planning manager, for the record. The 48 months was arrived at with -- between -- conversations between staff and the applicant. We were looking for a defined period of time. I think it was mentioned by one of your colleagues up here during one of the first Longwater hearings that we needed to have some kind of more specificity in this commitment, and that's where we added the second half of the commitment putting a size and a definite time frame. We worked with the -- talked with the developer over the course of a couple weeks, and we came up with the 48 months. I think given the horizon buildout date of the SRA, that's more than April 19, 2021 Page 59 of 73 reasonable. MR. COHEN: That was the point that I was going to make, that we tend to be talking about this as a project and, for me, if you're talking about a town, that's a much longer maturation process, and I think the key point here is that we're talking about having land reserved, which is something that we haven't been able to do before. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Paul, just to go through the federal permitting process, and I'm sure they may have started, it could be as long as 32 -- 24 to 36 months just to go through the federal permitting process. COMMISSIONER FRY: To break ground. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Before they even break ground, absolutely. COMMISSIONER SHEA: Okay. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: They've got to go through all the water management and go through the -- well, Section 4.04 of the Clean Water Act and 401. So they've got to go through the permitting process. And, frankly, the issue in Florida now, because it's been turned over to DEP by the Army Corps of Engineers through state legislation, that is now being challenged in the courts. Who knows where that's going to go. Personal opinion, I think it's going to be back to the Corps. COMMISSIONER SHEA: So you think the 48 months is -- COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Probably. COMMISSIONER SHEA: -- probably not even long enough, huh? COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Probably -- it will be at least -- probably 36 to 48 months before anybody turns dirt out there. There may be a nice sign posted, but that's -- COMMISSIONER SHEA: That's all I had. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. Nothing else? (No response.) CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Thank you. MR. COHEN: Thank you. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: I did make a mistake, Joe. There are 12 deviations. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: There are 12, that's right. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: I'm looking at the development document, and it's Section 7, and it's under other deviations, and it's the third one, so -- COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Yeah. And that deviation did state about reuse. So Rich will have to correct the record on that deviation. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Oh, do you need a break? Yes. Sorry. Ten minutes good? 5:35. (A brief recess was had from 5:26 p.m. to 5:35 p.m.) CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. We're ready, everybody. MR. YOVANOVICH: All right. Are we ready? CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Yeah. We're waiting for you. MR. YOVANOVICH: Waiting for me. Okay. Just real briefly, because I thought Mr. Cohen did -- he basically -- I was reading my notes, and he basically did my closing argument for me. What I think is really important for you to remember is what was the program when it was originally adopted, and the program is on your visualizer. The pink is where development goes, and the other areas were to become SSAs. That was the program, and that's what we're doing. We're developing -- and remember who were proponents of the program. You have Collier Audubon, which is Brad Cornell's group; you have Florida Wildlife, Meredith Budd's group; and you have the Conservancy. They were all proponents of this program in this map. We're developing where the map said we should develop. They want you to change the April 19, 2021 Page 60 of 73 program; "they" being the Conservancy. There's a process, and that process is not during this petition. So all of the competent substantial evidence that was before you says we meet all of the criteria. It was our experts, it was the county's experts, and in some cases, for fiscal neutrality, a third-party reviewer. We have satisfied all the criteria in your Growth Management Plan and your Land Development Code, and we have proven -- if you want to use the Conservancy's words -- our privilege to develop our land, which in Florida you have a right to develop your land. We've met our burden, and we are requesting that you make a recommendation of approval to the Board of County Commissioners for the approval of the Bellmar Village, and I'll try to be brief, be brilliant, and be gone, as the former County Manager, Jim Mudd, said. And with that, we'll answer any questions you may have. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Joe. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Yeah, I have one question in regards to one -- MR. YOVANOVICH: The one deviation needs to come out, you're right. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: The one deviation you recognize will come out. That was Deviation 12. MR. YOVANOVICH: Correct. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: There are 12 deviations. Second, we had a resident talk about Sixth Avenue as an emergency entrance only. That's beyond your capacity because that's a -- Sixth Avenue is a public road. MR. YOVANOVICH: Right. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: So if action were to be taken on that, it would have to be at the direction of the Board of County Commissioners. MR. YOVANOVICH: Correct. And if you remember, the goal is to have interconnection. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Interconnection. MR. YOVANOVICH: Interconnection of roads, and that's what we're doing. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: And so that would have to -- the Board would have to take some kind of administrative action to create an emergency entrance of some sort. So that's beyond -- beyond your position, and I defer to the Board of County Commissioners in regards to that request, okay. I won't even ask Trinity for that. MR. YOVANOVICH: And as I opened up, we had agreed to all the staff conditions when we made our initial presentation, so that's not an issue. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: I'm -- close the public hearing? CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Yeah. The footnotes, did you change them? MR. YOVANOVICH: Yes; yes. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: All right. Thank you. Okay. We can close the public hearing now. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: I just want to, again, make a statement for the record, if I could. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Sure. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: You know, we started this petition it seems like six years ago, but I think it was only two months counting just this petition, and we heard opinions from numerous public speakers, and it certainly involved numerous points of concern and consideration that we were to take in our deliberation. But I do want to thank the League of Women Voters, they stepped up, the Conservancy, the Florida Wildlife Federation, National Audubon Society for their input and detailed presentations for both this and, of course, the Longwater, and I cited those April 19, 2021 Page 61 of 73 as well. But as I stated with the Longwater petition, we are not here to establish new rules and to establish new criteria for the proposed development. The proposed development was submitted under the RLSA criteria, and my position is that I'm compelled to follow the GMP and the LDC as passed. And in this case, as Attorney Klatzkow stated, these areas were identified almost 20 years ago as areas for development where we were going to steer development towards in order to save and preserve land. Bellmar is preserving 2,200 acres, SSA 15, and that's a significant issue. During the public hearing, we repeatedly heard of references to protect panther and panther habitat, and those giving testimony cited why panther habitat and Primary Panther Habitat should be protected, and not doing so would lead to the extinction of the Florida panther. That's our concern up here as well, but it was also why the RLSA was developed. The RLSA was developed to do just that, provide an incentive program for private landowners to put their land in preservation to develop on land that was identified as a Stewardship Receiving Area. And one of the authors that were cited, Ran Kautz, concluded that we need to develop an ambitious comprehensive strategy for working with private landowners to protect, enhance, and restore panther habitat within primary dispersal and secondary zones, and that was an essential part of the program. I believe that's what the RLSA was doing. It certainly meets the strategy regarding the primary and secondary zone, and the dispersal zone, as I understand, really is in Hendry County. With that, as I stated, the RLSA was developed over two years, exhaustive meetings, the intent covering 300 square miles, 193,000 acres, 102 -- approximately 102 -- 182,000 acres of private property, so about 94 percent put in preserve. Ninety-three thousand acres were identified as Stewardship Sending Areas. So that is the intent of this program. I see that -- my belief is that that's what this petition is doing. The goals are being met. The Collier County goal is to protect agriculture activities and to prevent premature conversion of agricultural lands to nonagricultural uses. That was Goal No. 1 of the RLSA program; to direct incompatible uses away from wetlands and upland habitat; to enhance -- or to enable conservation of rural lands to other uses in appropriate locations, which is what the SSAs are doing; and to discourage urban sprawl. It was cited that these developments are really urban sprawl, but they are really not urban sprawl as what was originally approved out there at one per five acres. These are condensed developments. I'm not sure whether the answer is -- to even have more density is the answer. I believe what is being proposed meets the intent of the RLSA. And just for clarity, and I did state, the applicant still has to go through the federal permitting process. I, too, am concerned about the location of the preserves -- of this development. It is an SRA, but it is an area that is very near to wildlife preserves and -- but the applicant has clearly understood that they may -- the residents may be impacted by smoke due to prescribed burns, and that is going to be clearly noted as one of the requirements in regards to this development. So with that, I recommend approval of SRA PL20190001837, the Bellmar Village, that includes Deviations 1 through 12 with the amendment of Deviation 12 that does not include reuse water that will be conveyed to the county, that remains with the applicant, and it includes approval of the recommendations as proffered by Staff Recommendations 1 through 6. So I propose to recommend approval as proposed with -- including Deviations 1 through 12 and, as noted for Deviation 12, eliminating reuse water, and with Staff Recommendations 1 through 6. COMMISSIONER SHEA: Second. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Second. Any discussion -- any more discussion? COMMISSIONER FRY: I would just like to say I do think there is room for us tightening April 19, 2021 Page 62 of 73 up some definitions in this process so that we can be in more agreement rather than -- a defined agreement rather than a "he said or she said" or whose interpretation of what one term means versus another. My opinion of this, I think, has changed over the course of all of this testimony, and I really -- even though, you know, we've got environmental groups and civic groups that have come in with different perspectives, I think we've benefited from everybody's perspective, and I would like to see -- I mean, the Conservancy has mentioned new and better data for panther that maybe is not built into the program. We have an amendment process, and I agree with what Joe said, that maybe that's not the purview of this meeting but that that is how this is supposed to work. We go back and change it, fine tune it, apply new information, define the terms that are nebulous, and we make this program better and better. I am, I think, also made more hopeful by the town plan even though at this point it's a nebulous concept, but I think the mere attempt to go back and bring in some of the positive attributes of the town that we lost with the Rural Lands West not being approved I think is actually -- it is a factor to me because there is a commitment -- even though we haven't had it defined, there is a commitment to come back with a town plan within 12 months to fill in that hole, and I think that represents an outreach, perhaps, from the county and good faith from the developer that we're all in this together and we all really have the same -- a positive objective for the outcome on the county in mind. So I just -- I'd like to commend staff. I really felt that there were a lot of objections raised, and they were very solid objections. I felt that they stated -- they stated their case very well and helped me get over a lot of those objections, and if I was looking at this from kind of a burden of proof, I felt like I don't have enough seed of doubt that there's been anything missed by staff, so at this point I would -- I'll be voting for approval. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. COMMISSIONER SHEA: Wow. There's not much left to say. I share a lot of those same feelings, and I'm -- I think the town proposal is very exciting to me, and I think we actually chartered the group to go find out why we can't entice more of the development to be in the form of town, and I think in response to that challenge we gave them, I think they're coming back with something having worked very hard. And I, like Karl, was probably -- could go either way coming into this; some great arguments on both sides. I think when it was all said and done, though, I think it sums -- it basically sums up the way Joe described it. This was the intent of the plan. When I look at that plan that's up there, I can -- I look at all of the colored areas which are preserved areas, and so I support it as well. I think it's consistent with what our obligations are as commissioners, which is to follow that plan. COMMISSIONER FRY: I think it meets the intent of the overall project in terms of targeting development and preserving more environmentally sensitive lands. I do think there's room for perhaps reinterpretation of what each development looks like -- COMMISSIONER SHEA: Sure. COMMISSIONER FRY: -- moving forward. COMMISSIONER SHEA: We can find out what "center" actually means. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: It doesn't necessarily have to be in the center of anything. A center is just -- well, you know what I mean. Okay. There's a motion and a second on the floor. All those in favor, signify by saying aye. COMMISSIONER SHEA: Aye. COMMISSIONER FRY: Aye. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Aye. April 19, 2021 Page 63 of 73 COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Aye. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Opposed, like sign. Is Chris still there? COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Is Chris still here? COMMISSIONER VERNON: Yeah, I'm still here, and -- CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Sorry. COMMISSIONER VERNON: And I'm voting -- you know, I will tell you that, you know, I was driving, so I couldn't look at the slides, and connections were going in and out and broken conversations. I swear I heard Rich say he was against it at one point. COMMISSIONER FRY: Then I change my vote. COMMISSIONER VERNON: But it's clear -- it's clearly better to be there in person. I don't have anything to add on what my fellow commissioners have said except -- and this is purely subjective by just listening by phone, you know, and I've seen this -- I saw this with One Naples. I felt like -- and I definitely want to listen to people who object and really hear them out, and I respect their right to challenge the staff, and, you know, and I respect their desire to do it this way, and it's fine. And this is, again, purely subjective, and I know -- I think it's a good idea to list all the problems they see with the project. But just for people objecting in the future, I really like a theme, this is the real problem. I mean, you can tell me there's 20 problems with the project, but just sort of drill down what is your biggest concern about the project, because sometimes I feel like I'm being hit with a number of objections and kind of sift through them to what I think is the most powerful objection. I'd rather have the objector do that, because they're the ones that have the objection. So that's a very generic thought I had, but it did cross my mind as I was listening. But I will be voting in favor of it. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. COMMISSIONER FRY: We already voted, Chris. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: So that's 5-0. MR. YOVANOVICH: 5-0. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Yeah. Thank you. MR. YOVANOVICH: Mr. Vernon, you need to get your connection fixed. COMMISSIONER FRY: You need to get here in person. COMMISSIONER VERNON: That's another problem with listening by phone. Can I second the motion now? COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Yes. COMMISSIONER FRY: Vernon seconds, thirds. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: While we're waiting, just for the fellow commissioners, and this is -- unfortunately there was a conflating -- back about the time when this RLSA was developed, we also had what was the Community Character Plan made and developed by -- under contract by a company called Dover-Kohl, so a lot of people refer to it as the Dover-Kohl study. That's where some of this terminology came with compactness and walkability. The Community Character Plan proposed the street front porches, the old community type environment. Though it looked nice and it was, you know, kind of homesy type thing, it just was not marketable and nobody wanted it. But some of that -- that's what bled into some of the RLSA. So I don't even know if staff -- I'm sure they're somewhere in the archives, and somebody's footrest, the Community Character Plan. MR. BELLOWS: Yes. We have that plan, and it was used to help create a lot of goals and policies in the Growth Management Plan -- COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Right. April 19, 2021 Page 64 of 73 MR. BELLOWS: -- and LDC amendments. That was used as the basis for LDC amendments. So the plan is implemented through those amendments. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: The first real attempt to use that was to do some redevelopment and restructuring of Naples Park. It was overwhelmingly turned down by the community in Naples Park. COMMISSIONER FRY: But, Joe, to play devil's advocate, Ave Maria is a much different vision than these three villages. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Correct. COMMISSIONER FRY: And even backing into the town. And I think that what a lot of people are lamenting, including myself, is what's missing is the identity, the sense of identity from the communities that are suggested by terms like "village" and "town" and "hamlet." COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: But when the Ave Maria came in, it was clearly defined as a town, and the intent was to build a town in conjunction with the university. MR. KLATZKOW: Yeah. But Ave Maria is a unicorn. It's not going to happen again. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: It's not going to happen again. COMMISSIONER FRY: Never? MR. KLATZKOW: Well, you had Mr. Monahan come in and fund a lot of that. It's a university town. It's just -- it's an absolute unicorn. It's highly unlikely to ever happen again. COMMISSIONER FRY: Well, but Rural Lands West was an attempt to do something similar. I mean, it appeared similar, very diverse and interconnected and roads and walkways and pathways and distributed village centers and town centers and things. It looked -- to me it looked a lot more like an Ave Maria than what we ended up with. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. Let's get moving here. ***Okay. We're on to 9A2 and 9A3. We will be talking about them together, right, or separate? MR. ARNOLD: Would you -- for the record, Wayne Arnold. They are separate items on your agenda. There is a relationship because of some ownership interests. I think we'll try to make presentation for each, and I'll probably just describe the overall relationship. I don't think, hopefully, these are going to be very lengthy in discussion on either one. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. Because they're Growth Management Plan amendments. This is first transmittal for both, right? MR. YOVANOVICH: (Nods head.) CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. MR. ARNOLD: Thank you. Wayne Arnold representing the applicant. Rich Yovanovich is our land-use counsel. We have Jim Banks in the room, who's our traffic engineer. Marco Espinar is our environmental consultant. He couldn't be with us on the continuation hearing date, nor could Mark Minor from our office, who's the professional engineer. But I'm going to go through and make a short presentation. Karen, you may have been the only Planning Commission member on the Planning Commission when this was originally approved as the Estates shopping center. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: I would say so. It was -- Joe was working here then? No. I don't know. COMMISSIONER FRY: Joe was just a child then. MR. ARNOLD: Joe was one of the staff members, I believe. And this project is located at the corner of Wilson Boulevard and Golden Gate Boulevard. It's undeveloped with the exception of single-family homes that have been built on it. This was one of those projects that was highly controversial back in the day because of its size and scope, and that went all the way to a ballot issue for the Golden Gate Estates folks to vote for this as to whether or not they wanted it, and it was overwhelmingly -- at the end of the day, they wanted a April 19, 2021 Page 65 of 73 grocery-anchored shopping center. But roll forward now, gosh, more than 10 years, and the same property owner is under contract to purchase the county's 50-acre parcel at Randall Boulevard and Fourth Street and Immokalee Road, which is your next item. But this is fairly straightforward. This was approved for 190,000 square feet of commercial space as part of the Comprehensive Plan amendment. What we're essentially doing is saying, we want to reduce our commercial component to 50,000 square feet, that 140,000 that's left over, we're going to shift that largely up to the Randall Boulevard property, and then we're making room here for a 10-acre property that will be owned by Collier County Government as part of this Estates shopping center property as well as another parcel that at the moment is destined to become Shy Wolf Sanctuary. If for some reason that doesn't occur, we've made provisions for there to be single-family residential just as if it were Estates residential zoned property. So, I mean, in a nutshell, that's exactly what we're doing. We're asking for a change in use as well to limit it to C-3 zoning rather than the very long, exhaustive list of uses that were approved as part of your plan amendment previously. Staff is supportive of the concept and is recommending transmittal, and we hope you will, too. And Rich and I are here to answer any questions that you may have. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: I do recall this; very controversial at the time, yes. MR. ARNOLD: I would go on to say that we held a joint neighborhood informational meeting for both projects, and we did have a few people attend. But I think the sentiment is pretty consistent that they would rather us put the larger-scale commercial out on Immokalee Road rather than at this location. So the scale of commercial that you're getting is what was originally a neighborhood center to begin with. And it seems like there's wide support from everybody we've spoken to in the community for the change. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Any questions? COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Didn't one of our planning commissioners have great opposition to this at one time? This is a significant -- CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Probably, yes. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: -- reduction. We won't bring up that. MR. YOVANOVICH: The guy with the beard. MR. ARNOLD: One of the things I would point out -- it's not on the table, and I don't want to belabor the point -- but this was a conceptual plan that was approved with the original subdistrict, and the new one's going to look a lot more simple. I've got to change the abbreviated names. We originally started out by calling the westernmost parcel a semipublic use, which was sort of the Shy Wolf parcel, if you will. The P in the middle was the public use that's destined to be Collier County Government, and then the C on the hard corner of Wilson and Golden Gate is C. I think we agreed that we'd be changing the semipublic to something civic or educational or something like that. In our PUD it's just simply called out as Tracts 1, 2, and 3, and then we describe what would be allowed in each of those tracts. MR. YOVANOVICH: The only thing I would add, historically, where you see the C now, that was always a neighborhood center, so commercial was allowed on that corner anyway before we did the Comprehensive Plan amendment to allow the entirety of the 40 acres to be a shopping center. So we're essentially going back to what was originally the intended commercial under the Comprehensive Plan. MR. ARNOLD: Thanks, Rich. The other thing that was added here was specifically a library use. It wasn't one of the C-1 through C-3 uses. Staff was recommending the library use, and we have, obviously, no objection to that. COMMISSIONER FRY: Are we in a question-asking mode? April 19, 2021 Page 66 of 73 MR. ARNOLD: Sure, absolutely. COMMISSIONER FRY: The 50 residential dwelling units, can you walk us through that. MR. ARNOLD: I can. We've asked for 50 total units as part of the Comprehensive Plan. When you see our Planned Unit Development come through, it's going to be most likely less than that, so that number is one that may go down. We weren't clearly sure how some dormitory housing that was associated with Shy Wolf and some of their educational aspects would be counted. We also made provisions -- the county originally thought they might want to do some essential service personnel housing on their tract. I think that's now no longer on the table. And then there was also a provision that should none of this happen, we had always the right to go back to the 18 or 20 platted Golden Gate Estate lots that are there. So that's kind of how the residential component plays into this, Mr. Fry. COMMISSIONER FRY: So they would go on the semipublic and public parcels? MR. ARNOLD: Correct. And we made provisions for those to be in accordance with Estates zoning standards. COMMISSIONER FRY: So we would learn the details when the PUD comes through? MR. ARNOLD: You absolutely will, yes, sir. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Anybody else? (No response.) CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: No. MR. ARNOLD: I don't know if there are any public speakers or anybody on Zoom or not. We didn't have a lot of participation. As I said, I think most people -- CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: No public? No, no speakers. MR. ARNOLD: Oh, I'm sorry, Anita; staff. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Staff. MS. JENKINS: Good evening. Anita Jenkins. I'm filling in for James Sabo. I won't pull up our presentation. It's very similar to what you've seen from the applicant here. Staff has reviewed this application thoroughly. There are no adverse impacts to infrastructure from the plan. We would note that the accessory uses for housing will be tied to Shy Wolf, and we would expect to see that when it comes back, that those uses are accessory to Shy Wolf use. Also, there is a maximum daily trip cap of 410 p.m. peak-hour trips, unless that's changed. MR. YOVANOVICH: Yeah. And, I'm sorry I didn't bring this up. We will agree to the trip cap as part of the PUD. I've never seen it as part of a Growth Management Plan amendment. So we did have an objection to including it in the Growth Management Plan amendment, the trip cap. We will agree to a condition that there be a trip cap as part of the PUD but not the specific number as part of the Growth Management Plan. It will be part of the PUD. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Yeah. I don't really think it belongs in the Growth Management Plan. MS. JENKINS: Right. And we're fine with it when it comes back, that they include both the accessory use of the residential to Shy Wolf and the trip cap when it comes back for adoption. Again, this is transmittal, so you will see this come back as a Growth Management Plan amendment for adoption as well as a Planned Unit Development. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. Thank you. Do you have -- anybody have any questions? COMMISSIONER SHEA: No. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: No. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: No? Okay. MR. YOVANOVICH: That's it. April 19, 2021 Page 67 of 73 CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Anything else? MR. YOVANOVICH: No rebuttal. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. We're looking for a motion then. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: I make a motion that we submit this petition for transmittal and for review as proposed. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Is there a second? COMMISSIONER SHEA: Second. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Any discussion? (No response.) CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: All those in favor, signify by saying aye. COMMISSIONER SHEA: Aye. COMMISSIONER FRY: Aye. COMMISSIONER VERNON: Aye. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Aye. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Aye. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: I heard Chris say aye. COMMISSIONER VERNON: Yes. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. MR. ARNOLD: Thank you. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: ***So the next one, 9A3. MR. ARNOLD: All right. So, again, Wayne Arnold, for the record, and here representing the applicant. We have the same applicant team, so I'm not going to belabor that. But I would let you know that this is property that's currently owned by Collier County Government. It's a curved property that's located between Fourth Avenue Northeast and Immokalee Road just north of Randall Boulevard. The hard corner is currently used as a dry detention system for Immokalee Road project. As part of the contractual obligation, we'll be taking in that water management system and expanding upon it for some future roadway improvements that are planned at Randall and Immokalee Road, so that will be incorporated into our overall project. But in this particular case, we've asked for -- just show you the relationships. It's about 3.2 miles from the Estates shopping center property. It's also within the drive time that Mr. Weyer analyzed as part of the market-demand analysis. And as I mentioned, the 140,000 square feet we're taking away, we're asking for a maximum of 150,000 square feet for this subject district as well as up to 400 residential dwelling units. So we're creating our new subdistrict that will identify that as a mixed-use project. There's a companion mixed-use PUD that has been filed. It's winding its way through the process, and they'll obviously come back together. But we've asked for C-4 permitted and conditional uses. And I guess that's kind of deja vu. I had the pleasure of representing the Collier family on the parcel immediately north. And what they ultimately agreed to do, with your recommendation, was to come forward with C-3 plus uses, if you will. And we've had that conversation with Ms. Jenkins that we'd like to be transmitted with C-4 but acknowledging that our PUD as well as, if necessary, the subdistrict can come back in maybe a revised form to limit some of those C-4 uses. But one thing we did here -- it wasn't so much evident at the neighborhood meeting, but our client and Rich and myself and others have talked to several of the community leaders in the Estates, and to deliver some of the uses they want -- and we can't promise that we're going to have a large-scale big box hardware store or a large-scale membership club/warehouse type facility, but we can't get those if we're stuck with C-3 uses, and the community would really like to have those April 19, 2021 Page 68 of 73 services in that part of the county. And we'd love to try to deliver those, but I can't unless it's allowed as a permitted use. So no promises but, again, that's what we're trying to do. That's why the C-4 permitted and conditional are important to us. The other thing we've done here is we've made provisions to take in and do the water-quality pretreatment which affects sort of the development envelope, and I'm getting ahead of myself, because this is our PUD master plan. But the components of this I wanted to highlight are that we've got some substantial lake and preserve areas that are going to be included as part of this because we have that obligation to take in water management from Collier County. So that's driving part of our plan. We think there's a strong market out here for some non-single-family housing. And I don't think we've had any negative pushback. We did agree early on not to have any vehicular access to Fourth Street North -- Fourth Avenue South -- Northeast, sorry, and so our master plan does not note any vehicular access there. It does provide for pedestrian connection for those residents that live along Fourth that may desire to shop at this PUD. But this, obviously, shows an interconnection that you-all discussed for the other project to the north, and it does align, and there's an interconnection agreement in place or soon to be in place to handle that connection. So, again, I know that the details are in the PUD document but, again, here I think staff is making a recommendation for us to transmit. I think our only real disagreement here was over the intensity, and C-4 to us makes sense and, like I said, we will come back, and we can hone down on those uses that we know we need when you are looking at this for adoption. MR. YOVANOVICH: And also, they also -- this one recommended the trip cap be included in the Growth Management Plan amendment. I talked to Anita. We'll include that in the PUD and not the Growth Management Plan amendment. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. Oh, Joe. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Yeah, Wayne -- yeah, Wayne. Wayne, I recall, and you stated -- did you represent the client that was developing just to the north? MR. ARNOLD: I did. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: And we got into a lot of discussion on the intensity on that site, how much square footage. And then you came in with a larger intensity. We reduced it based on staff recommendation, but now we're adding more commercial out there. I guess Russ has already done a market analysis. I don't know if Russ wants to come up and state that, but from the standpoint -- come up. The market analysis is there to already -- that will work the demand, or do you want to do it? Whatever. I mean, I'm trying to sort through -- we were -- we're faced with quite a dilemma over reduction in the last petition you brought forward, and now we're asking for more commercial in, essentially, the same area. MR. ARNOLD: And this is a little different because we don't feel like there's the same justification required because we're transferring so much of that intensity from the Estates shopping center, Joe, to the site that's only three miles away. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: All right. MR. ARNOLD: I think staff understands that concept as well, and they've been doing this Randall/Immokalee corridor study, and I think there's just an incredible amount and demand for commercial in this corridor because it's, one, such a heavily traveled roadway, and the Estates residents have clearly said we'd rather have the commercial on our perimeter than in our interior. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: And, again, I don't argue that. I'm just now confused because the last petition we forced it down, by 10,000 square feet, if I remember. MR. YOVANOVICH: It was 20,000. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: 20,000, okay. April 19, 2021 Page 69 of 73 MR. YOVANOVICH: But that's to be debated. That's going back to the Board of County Commissioners, and they're obviously seeking the full amount. And I can tell you just the amount of interest that's out here for commercial -- commercial users is incredible, you know, the amount of traction there is for this corridor. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Oh, I have no argument. It's been discussed for years about commercial out there. All right. I understand. I just wanted to know -- all of a sudden now it's recommend approval when staff moved forward to reduce the last petition out there. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Karl, do you have -- COMMISSIONER FRY: No. I'll clear it. I'll wait. MS. JENKINS: Again, Anita Jenkins, the zoning director, for the record. And we have reviewed this petition as well. And, Mr. Schmitt, the demand area, the commercial area that was evaluated, is the same area as the other. So they are just basically taking this square footage of 140,000 square feet and transferring it. But it's the same area that we evaluated with the CIGM when we came to the recommendation for you. So we recognize the demand that is there. The CIGM demonstrated that as well. And this is the same demand area. So they're just moving it from a less attractive area to a more attractive area where they can handle the type of shopping that's needed. So staff was recommending a reduction to the 3-C uses, but I think that we've heard the applicant commit to a C-3 plus. So when they come back with the PUD, they'll be more specific in what those C-4 uses are so we can look at compatibility for the surrounding area for those uses, and we feel that that's fair. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Okay. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. Karl? COMMISSIONER FRY: Anita, by transferring all this commercial up to Immokalee, which is a somewhat heavily traveled road, what about the impact on the traffic? MS. JENKINS: Well, I would have to ask Mike to address that for you for the traffic assessment, and I believe the applicant's transportation, is here as well. COMMISSIONER FRY: And are you satisfied -- maybe this is for you. Are you satisfied with the buffering in the southeast corridor? MS. JENKINS: Right. So generally when we come to you for transmittal for a Growth Management Plan, we're not at that level with buffering, but that will be something that we will discuss when we come back with the PUD. So when we look at that compatibility with the surrounding neighbors, then we'll talk about the buffering then. But for these specific uses, then, that's what we're looking at for transmittal of the Growth Management Plan. COMMISSIONER FRY: Okay. Thank you. MR. SAWYER: Good evening, Commissioners. Mike Sawyer, Transportation Planning. To answer your question, we have, obviously, looked at both the GMP as well as we're still reviewing the GMP. We've looked at the TIS that they've provided. In a lot of cases, just as you heard from Trinity this morning, or this afternoon, I should say, sorry, a lot of the roadways in this area are being improved over the course of the next five years or so. Those are being taken into consideration. These developers, just like anybody else, are going to be able to use that incremental increase in those improvements in their TIS. They will also be paying their fair share, based on their impact fees primarily. We're still reviewing everything, making sure everything is set, but it still looks like we're going to be able to say, similarly to the SRAs that we've been talking about, that they are meeting the needs and will -- and we will be able to service the project. COMMISSIONER FRY: Even this 3.2 miles shift to the north, this is -- this is -- you do believe this is a better location for the commercial rather than down closer in to a lot of the people April 19, 2021 Page 70 of 73 that don't have these -- the major commercial benefit. MR. SAWYER: You do have more development that is condensed, a bit more, as far as from a density standpoint in these particular areas as opposed to the Estates, which tends to be more spread out. So from that aspect, yeah, you're probably serving more numbers. You've got more rooftops to serve in this particular area. Additionally, you probably certainly have more units being -- more new units coming online in this particular area. COMMISSIONER FRY: But the people that would have been served previously are now going to drive farther to get services and -- MR. SAWYER: No. There's still going to be a certain amount of -- COMMISSIONER FRY: Commercial down there. MR. SAWYER: -- commercial down within the original location on Golden Gate. COMMISSIONER FRY: Just not the bigger commercial uses. MR. SAWYER: It's not going to be as big. It will be a different type. It will be more neighborhood orientated. COMMISSIONER FRY: Thank you. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. Anybody else? COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: No. (No response.) CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Is there a motion? COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Do we have any public? CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Oh, is there any public? I didn't think there was. No. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: I make a motion to forward this recommendation to the Florida Department of Economic Opportunity as proposed by staff with the modifications as cited by staff. COMMISSIONER SHEA: Second. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. Discussion? (No response.) CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: No. All those in favor, signify by saying aye. COMMISSIONER SHEA: Aye. COMMISSIONER FRY: Aye. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Aye. COMMISSIONER VERNON: Aye. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Aye. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Opposed, like sign. (No response.) CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. Chris is there, too, so that's 5-0. MR. ARNOLD: Thank you very much. MR. YOVANOVICH: I want to thank you on behalf of my clients that are here today for coming in today to have this meeting and getting us back on track. I know it was a sacrifice, but I want to thank you all for that that -- CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: You're welcome. MR. YOVANOVICH: -- since we weren't able to do that on Thursday. COMMISSIONER FRY: You owe us bigtime, Rich. Leave it at that. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: We have one more -- there's no old business or new business, but we have meeting dates to discuss for -- MR. FRANTZ: That's right. Jeremy Frantz, for the record. Speaking of sacrifice, we do have a couple of LDC amendments that were initiated from the private side, and they will require a night hearing of the CCPC. We are hoping that we can April 19, 2021 Page 71 of 73 tack that night hearing onto one of your upcoming existing CCPC days so that we're not asking you for another day. So we had three dates available; May 20th, June 3rd, and June 17th. Looking for kind of a polling of your availability on any one of those dates. I think ideally we'd hope for the May 20th hearing date. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Well, that's the second -- well, that's fine with me. COMMISSIONER SHEA: I'm good with all of them. Prefer the 20th also. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Yeah. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: I will not be here on the 20th, but hopefully we do have a quorum. I have to travel again that week. COMMISSIONER SHEA: Let's look at another date, because when we get into these, I really like to have your view on these things. COMMISSIONER FRY: Will you be here on the 3rd, Joe? CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: These are LDC amendments. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: I'm here the 6th, but what day do you want to do it? COMMISSIONER SHEA: Third. COMMISSIONER FRY: Third of -- wait, is that a CCPC day, the 3rd? COMMISSIONER SHEA: Yeah, 3rd of June. MR. FRANTZ: You know, Anita just reminded me, we are also -- I think we had asked last time we were looking for a potential additional CCPC date for some other land-use petitions on May 26th. I think we were looking for your feedback on that date as well. We could potentially have these LDC amendments on that date. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Twenty-sixth works for me. I may be gone on the 3rd again as well, and I'm going to miss two meetings there, the 20th and then the 3rd. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: The 26th would be a -- from 9:00? MS. JENKINS: (Nods head.) COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: The 26th works. COMMISSIONER FRY: What day is that; what day of the week? CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Wednesday. MR. FRANTZ: That's a Wednesday. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: That's fine with me. COMMISSIONER SHEA: Well, if we had to do both that day, starting at 9:00 would be kind of -- don't you have to do -- CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: That's what you have -- COMMISSIONER SHEA: Yeah, you have to do the evening. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: That's what the other date was, too, May 20th. They're all regular dates. COMMISSIONER FRY: But that was a piggyback to an existing meeting where we stay past 5:00 or come back at 5:00. So this one we'd have to meet, then come back at 5:00 that same night? I can't predict that far in advance with my business. MR. FRANTZ: I can't really speak at this point to how long May 26th might take, whether we would already be a full day anyways. We have such a backlog right now that I'm -- you know, it's likely that we could end up having a full day on the 26th, and we're not asking you to pause and then come back later. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: What's our 6th -- what's the 6th May agenda look like? MR. FRANTZ: We have the two items that were continued today, the RLSA and the RFMUD, and then we also had, I don't remember off the top of my head, how many items already scheduled for May 6th as well. So we have a very full schedule for May 6th. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: All right. COMMISSIONER SHEA: We have the town meeting then, too, right? April 19, 2021 Page 72 of 73 COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: And then the town meeting. MR. FRANTZ: Correct. And we wouldn't be able to hold these LDC hearings on that date because we need time to advertise. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Right. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: So the 20th is good for everybody but Joe, and we don't know about anybody else, though. COMMISSIONER FRY: And I do agree with Paul that Joe's history and expertise on the LDC -- COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: I'm putting in for a pay raise. COMMISSIONER SHEA: I approve. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: And so the 3rd is not good either, June 3rd? COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: I'm out the 3rd as well. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: So May 26th we were talking about having a meeting that whole day. What about that day? COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: I'm here. COMMISSIONER FRY: Not sure yet. COMMISSIONER VERNON: Commissioner Vernon's available May 26th. COMMISSIONER SHEA: I'll make it work. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. So we have one, two, three -- we've got four available and one maybe. COMMISSIONER FRY: You have Ned and Robb still to check. MR. FRANTZ: We can reach out to them individually. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: I mean, the 3rd is iffy, but I'm pretty sure I'll be gone the 3rd of June. COMMISSIONER SHEA: But you'll be here on the 26th if we had a -- COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Yes. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: So we need to have an extra day meeting anyway, right -- MR. FRANTZ: Correct. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: -- because we're backed up. So the 26th we know there's four people that will be here, so that's an in-the-room quorum. MR. FRANTZ: Okay, great. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: So let's do that and do the nighttime on that day? MR. FRANTZ: Perfect. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Is that the proposal for -- what's that LDC amendment? MR. FRANTZ: We have two LDC amendments; one is in Goodland and the other is Chokoloskee. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Chokoloskee and Goodland, yeah, okay. MR. FRANTZ: Thank you all very much. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. So that's it. All right. Okay. MS. JENKINS: Again, Anita Jenkins. I just wanted to add one thing before you adjourn, and I'd like to thank and recognize Jeremy Frantz for his service to Collier County for over six years now. Jeremy's going to take another opportunity from the county, but I just wanted to recognize Jeremy and thank him for that and his service. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Oh, thank you. (Applause.) CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: I hate to see you go. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Who approved his transfer? CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Yeah, who said he could go? April 19, 2021 Page 73 of 73 COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Who said he could go? MS. JENKINS: Jeff. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Oh, bummer. COMMISSIONER SCHMITT: Thank you. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. COMMISSIONER FRY: Did you say Lee County? He's going to Lee County or another county? MS. JENKINS: Just another opportunity. CHAIRMAN HOMIAK: Okay. That's it, then. With no further business, we are adjourned. ******* There being no further business for the good of the County, the meeting was adjourned by order of the Chair at 6:23 p.m. COLLIER COUNTY PLANNING COMMISSION _____________________________________ KAREN HOMIAK, ACTING CHAIRMAN These minutes approved by the Board on __________, as presented _________ or as corrected ________. TRANSCRIPT PREPARED ON BEHALF OF U.S. LEGAL SUPPORT, INC., BY TERRI LEWIS, COURT REPORTER AND NOTARY PUBLIC.