AHAC Minutes 04/07/2023April 7, 2023
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MINUTES OF THE COLLIER COUNTY
AFFORDABLE HOUSING ADVISORY COMMITTEE
STRATEGIC PLAN SUBCOMMITTEE MEETING
Naples, Florida, April 7, 2023
LET IT BE REMEMBERED, the Collier County Affordable Housing Advisory
Committee Strategic Plan Subcommittee, in and for the County of Collier, having
conducted business herein, met on this date at 10 a.m. in REGULAR SESSION
at the Collier County Growth Management Department Building, Conference
Room #609/610, 2800 Horseshoe Drive North, Naples, Florida, with the
following members present:
Chairman: John Harney
Vice Chair: Jennifer Faron
Steve Hruby
Paul Shea
County Staff Members Also Present:
Cormac Giblin, Interim Director, Economic Development & Housing
Sarah Harrington, Manager, Environmental Services
Mike Bosi, Director, Planning & Zoning
Jaime Cook, Director, Development Review
Jamie French, Department Head, GMD
Michael Stark, Director, Operations & Regulatory Management
Derek Perry, Assistant County Attorney
Julie Chardon, GMD Ops Support Specialist II, AHAC liaison
Kevin Summers, Mgr., Technical Systems Ops, GMD (via Zoom)
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Any persons in need of the verbatim record of the meeting may request a copy of the audio recording
from the Collier County Growth Management Department.
1. CALL TO ORDER & ROLL CALL
Chairman Harney called the meeting to order at 10:04 a.m.
A quorum of three was present; a fourth arrived later.
2. APROVAL OF AGENDA AND MINUTES
a. Approval of the March 2, 2023, meeting minutes
Vice Chair Faron made a motion to approve the March 2, 2023, meeting minutes. Second by Mr.
Shea. The motion passed unanimously, 3-0.
b. Approval of the agenda
(Approved, no changes)
Chairman Harney noted at the last meeting, he told Jennifer he didn’t have any real experience
with creating a strategic plan, but later realized he was a more tactical and strategic person. He
hopes to take some of the ideas from before and make them into more of a plan, a task list, which
is the goal for today.
Mr. Giblin introduced Sarah Harrington, who has been with Growth Management nearly a year.
She’s been attending AHAC meetings, so he asked her to sit at the table today. She’ll be stepping
up and helping out with the Affordable Housing and Economic Development group in the future.
Chairman Harney introduced Julie Chardon, the new liaison for AHAC meetings. He asked Mr.
Bosi if he wanted to add anything.
Mr. Bosi said he’s more tactical than schedule-oriented. AHAC is looking for what’s been done
and where it’s going, so you can incorporate a schedule for AHAC’s work activities. We should
use Jennifer’s expertise.
3. DISCUSSION ITEMS
a. AHAC Strategic Work Plan Development
Chairman Harney told the AHAC:
• We should review the document that Jennifer prepared for today. It looks at the task list
and provides steps: where did it start, where is it going and how do we get there?
• Paul brought up many times over the last couple of years that we never seem to have
target dates or deadlines. That’s important if you’re trying to finish something.
Fortunately, we had some recent success with the Board of County Commissioners and
getting the LDC amendments through after working on them for a long time.
• We’re near the end of the Rural Fringe Mixed-Use District changes, so those are good
landmarks. They’ve all taken a long time and have all been very start and stop.
• It would be helpful in the future if we can find a well-defined path and finish a project on
a more timely basis. It’s not entirely up to us, but we can do our best.
Vice Chair Faron told the AHAC what her goal was when drafting the document:
• She wanted to cover two things, laying out a strategy and keeping track of what we’re
doing and how each item is progressing.
• At the end of the year, we can see what we’ve done and what’s next.
• State Statute, Chapter 420 lays out the AHAC’s statutory obligations.
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• This includes strategic initiatives beyond what we’re required to do.
• It includes whether we should promote, recommend or review concepts.
• What’s missing is the level of review/recommended approval required for each and the
various boards that approve them. That should be added. She doesn’t have that
knowledge.
[Mr. Hruby joined the meeting at 10:10 a.m.]
Chairman Harney told the AHAC:
• We didn’t have a work plan before, aside from the annual report that goes to the Board of
County Commissioners that’s then filed with the state.
• That’s part of our statutory requirement and it’s submitted in the fall.
• Throughout the year, there hasn’t been a tracking document for what we work on.
• What we did before was review minutes from past meetings.
• He checked counties statewide and found that other AHACs aren’t meeting monthly.
They’re very irregular and hold meetings when they’re needed. We’re ahead of the curve.
• This plan will take our monthly commitment and tie that to goal posts, so we’re meeting
statutory requirements and beyond.
A discussion ensued and the following points were made:
• Vice Chair Faron noted that this document would be their internal tracking document.
• What does the BCC expect from us, to bring deals? Is that written anywhere?
• We should tell the BCC how we fit in to the solution. If they feel we overstepped our
bounds, they can tell us. We know more about affordable housing than they do.
• We need to define our role.
• The Planning Commission is more transactional.
• The AHAC is more policy based, a hybrid of policy and transactional.
• The AHAC has more to do with making plans and trying to execute them, rather than
waiting for someone to bring something for the AHAC to act on.
Vice Chair Faron further detailed the work plan:
• It’s a hybrid of experience she’s had developing strategic plans.
• The first part is the state requirements.
• The second is an interpretation of what else we want to do, what our mission is and how
our activities are categorized, whether they have to promote, recommend or review.
• We need to discuss our additional mission beyond the state statute.
• We could have a sponsor for each item and a GMD staff liaison. John is an expert in
ADU/guest houses, but we may have an AHAC sponsor for each item.
• “Current status” means as of the next AHAC meeting.
• Some items are ongoing with no hard deadline or timeline for completion.
• “Next steps” would be what else needs to happen. For the LDC amendments the BCC
approved, what needs to happen next? It may not be in our hands, but we should track
what that is.
• A timeline for completion is nebulous because you don’t know. You could predict the end
of a year or fiscal year.
• “Recommend” and “Review” come from the prior document. We need to review the
impact of affordable housing projects that have been completed and are open and make
recommendations on any changes to plans. Programs will add policies and incentives that
will improve the outcome in the future.
• That could be where AHAC connects to DSAC, where she’s now the liaison.
• We need to go back and take a look at what’s been done, what we’ve recommended and
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how it’s worked. That’s important to close the loop on that.
A discussion ensued and the following points were made:
• Mr. Giblin said the GMD liaison would depend on expertise.
• We can fill in the AHAC sponsor column at the next meeting.
• This could be a standing three-page report they can discuss/report on monthly.
• They can discuss a topic at each meeting.
• Some items may drop off the list.
• Some may require us to direct staff to move an agenda item to the BCC, or some AHAC
members can make a statement on an issue to the BCC.
• This subcommittee can act as a steering committee for the full AHAC, determining what
two items should be put on next month’s agenda. That will help shorten meetings.
• We need to keep working efficiently, getting input from experts.
• It’s our job to bring those experts and issues to the full committee.
• Should we change our name again? Steering Committee is neutral, not like Executive
Committee, and has a directional feeling. We’re not the Bylaws Subcommittee.
Chairman Harney suggested they call the subcommittee the Steering Committee. He announced
that he bought a house in Sarasota and they’ll be moving next month. He’s willing to do research
and gather recommendation and can join the meeting by Zoom but will step down. He can’t be a
voting member.
Mr. Hruby said he can be their consultant.
Mr. Bosi asked what the real estate market was like in Sarasota.
Chairman Harney said it’s considerably cheaper than here. What we were looking for there was
a difference of about $700,000 on the house we wanted to buy here.
Vice Chair Faron noted that she found that was true too, but she and her husband moved to
Naples for other reasons.
Chairman Harney said cost was part of the reason he’s moving, but his son lives nearby in
Sarasota and we wanted family support in both directions.
Action items:
• Appoint a sponsor for each item and a GMD staff liaison.
• Review the impact of completed and open affordable housing projects and make
recommendations on any changes to their plans.
• Review what AHAC has done, recommended and whether it’s worked.
• Add the boards/councils that approve AHAC recommendations to the three-page plan.
• Determine AHAC’s mission beyond the state statute.
• Change the name to Steering Committee and work on the agenda for the full AHAC.
Mr. Giblin summarized the discussion and decisions they just made:
• This subcommittee should grow into something different from just bylaws and strategic
plan.
• It should be a steering committee for the entire AHAC to take some of the load off the
agenda and the length of the meetings.
• It would do some of the heavy lifting and keep the AHAC agendas on track to target
specific action items.
Mr. Giblin noted that it’s a good idea but presents a challenge:
• It causes staffing and noticing issues by having multiple subcommittee meetings on top of
the full AHAC monthly meeting.
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• If that’s the direction you decide to go, maybe you can determine whether there’s a need to
meet monthly.
• Maybe it could be a quarterly meeting and the Steering Committee will continue its work
until there’s a full AHAC agenda.
• Maybe the Steering Committee only needs to meet quarterly or less frequently than
monthly.
• We have about 10 staff here now, not to mention the behind-the-scenes work it takes to
comply with all the Sunshine Law rules to allow the four subcommittee members to meet
and talk. That presents staff challenges.
A discussion ensued and the following points were made:
• Quarterly meetings are probably sufficient.
• We could have six subcommittee meetings a year and six full AHAC meetings yearly.
• If we find the schedule to be insufficient, we could add a meeting.
• Some of these discussions should be done at the full AHAC level.
• We should continue subcommittee meetings monthly until we understand this better, then
reduce the number of full AHAC meetings.
• We probably shouldn’t get involved in the same kind/level of detailed discussion here that
we do at the full AHAC meetings.
• We’re here to set the agenda and issues and use the spreadsheet as a guiding document.
• It’s the chair’s responsibility to keep the meeting focused on what we’re preparing for the
next AHAC meeting.
• We don’t need lengthy subcommittee meetings to prepare for AHAC meetings. We need
two to three items to discuss at each meeting.
• Mr. Hruby, chairman of the full AHAC, sits down with Cormac and Mike to develop the
agenda one to two weeks before the full AHAC meeting. Maybe they could develop it that
way.
• Subcommittee members can email Cormac and Julie to suggest agenda items.
Mr. Hruby asked Cormac what he’d suggest.
Mr. Giblin noted that:
• He and Mr. Hruby have worked together as a staff liaison and chair for many years,
meeting a week before the agenda was sent out.
• We would go over the upcoming list of items, the emails and phone calls from committee
members each month about articles they’ve seen or projects done elsewhere. Then we’d
put them on the agenda.
• All of that is welcomed. That’s the right way to go about getting something on the
agenda.
• As far as the structured meetings of the AHAC and the subcommittee, having too many
public Sunshine Law meetings can bog us down and prevent us from completing task list
items.
• If it’s a strategic plan, that should change from month-to-month. You report your goals,
staff works on it and reports back to you so you can keep tabs on it.
• It shouldn’t be something that needs constant input every other month.
• The way to set monthly agendas for the AHAC works best with staff working directly
with the chair every month.
Mr. Hruby suggested the subcommittee meet quarterly or every six months to refresh it, have
an opinion and send it back to the chair and keep the monthly agendas the way we’ve been doing
it, with him and Cormac sitting down for an hour a couple of weeks before the agenda is issued
to consolidate everything we’ve heard from this committee and other committees and put it into
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a reasonable agenda.
Mr. Giblin said the pre-work that goes into your real plan, the Local Housing Assistance Plan,
and the recommendations are required by state statute to go to the BCC. We’re going to start
working on those this summer for presentation to the BCC this fall. There are multiple levels of
getting things in front of AHAC members to keep them moving forward. Whatever is decided
here or recommended, we’ll take that to the next full AHAC meeting for approval.
A discussion ensued and the following points were made:
• This is a standing committee with the chair and vice chair and should meet quarterly or
twice yearly.
• None of this work changes on a monthly basis.
• We can decide what to add or delete and maybe meet at the end of the year to set
priorities.
• This chart can be an attachment to the AHAC agenda that’s updated for each meeting.
• It’s helpful to know what occurs at DSAC meetings.
• We get a housing report from staff quarterly with trends, so maybe this could become a
quarterly report and this subcommittee will meet for an hour every quarter to see if there
are any changes, additions or deletions.
• Providing more information to AHAC members will allow them to participate more in
major items going through county processes and to the Planning Commission.
• We could have a calendar showing all the NIMs and Planning Commission meetings and
what’s in between. We can pick and choose what we’re doing/attending.
• The intent is to have a calendar so members can offer to go to a meeting, so we have
coverage and adhere to Sunshine Laws. We want to ensure we have members there.
• Some items don’t need to be reviewed on a monthly basis. We’re promoting incentives to
developers on websites, so if that box is checked, there’s nothing to talk about.
• Actionable items include employer needs and positively engaging with developers.
• Vice Chair Faron said a developer found her on LinkedIn this morning and has a lot of
money and is interested in Collier County. Things like that can become agenda items, but
the rest can become an attachment to the agenda each month.
• Staff can help fill out the missing items and Julie can email the final version to us. We
also can provide input through Julie.
• If there’s a particular policy we want to recommend to the Planning Commission that
might have a time line, our goal is to get it to them.
• The first piece, promotion and support for projects, is ongoing.
• We need to keep track of key dates.
• AHAC meetings will be more effective if members read the spreadsheet before meetings.
• The ULI recommendations the BCC approved last week were the last set of four to go
through, so they’ve all been acted upon or the BCC decided not to act on them.
• Maybe the AHAC should re-review them now to see if there are others we should act
upon. They may be relevant now, seven years later. The BCC opted not to move forward
on seven of the 33 at the time.
• The Local Housing Plan passed in 2017 and within it, there was a five-year and a 10-year
checkup. We’re starting the process now of doing the five-year checkup.
• There were only two that were tried-and-true models of best practices nationwide that the
BCC at that time decided not to move forward with, linkage fees and inclusionary zoning.
They keep coming up again and again, ending in the BCC saying they wanted to put a
nail in that coffin.
• The Live Local Act makes a de facto inclusionary zoning if you to use it. It’s by right.
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Action Items:
• Attach the chart to the monthly AHAC agenda and keep it up-to-date.
• Use the chart as a calendar to assign members to attend meetings to promote
affordable housing, listen and answer questions.
• Keep track of key dates.
• Review the discarded ULI recommendations to determine if they’re relevant now and
should be acted upon.
Mr. Bosi expanded more on the Live Local Act, telling the AHAC:
• The Live Local Act has a requirement for a portion to be inclusion, to provide for
affordable housing. It will be on a project-by-project basis.
• Inclusionary zoning means requiring zoning on a project to provide a percentage of
affordable-housing units.
• Although the Board of County Commissioners rejected inclusionary zoning as a
countywide policy, they adopted an inclusionary zoning policy. The Rural Land
Stewardship Area requires villages and towns to have inclusionary zoning regulations.
They must provide affordable housing and 2.5% of the geographic area of the county,
the village or town, must be set aside for affordable housing, entitled at 10 units per acre
or more. The BCC has adopted an inclusionary zoning policy, but may not have
recognized that they did.
• Seven of the ULI recommendations were rejected.
• The BCC asked us to look at that and we’re in the process of trying to gather
information for the Urban Estates. He just spoke with the consultant and we’re
tentatively presenting this at the April 18th AHAC meeting to give it a first glance of
what we found on guest houses in the Urban Estates.
• The BCC allowed us to hire a community outreach coordinator.
• Cormac mentioned the linkage-fee nexus study, which the BCC didn’t support in mixed-
income housing inclusionary zoning. That’s an area for ADUs, the rentals of guest
houses. The BCC rejected that in 2017 but brought it up again and asked us to review it,
coordinate with the AHAC about the feasibility and bring the findings to the BCC for an
evaluation.
Mr. Hruby said there was another that he recommended, that they should set up a housing fund
and fund it from the general fund. That also wasn’t rejected. They just started doing that as a
result of the Housing Trust Fund Subcommittee pushing for that.
Mr. Giblin expanded upon those points:
• That involves money that goes into the surtax fund.
• The local Housing Trust Fund is funded when developers make a contribution. Some of
the Rural Lands did that. Some, like the recent towers on Isle of Capri, decided to do
that also prior to the 2017 ULI affordable-housing study.
• County functions were all grant-supported. No general fund dollars went to it, but after
that 2017 study, there have been general fund contributions to support staffing some
affordable housing functions.
• About $500,000 yearly went into the Housing Trust Fund for staffing and studies. It’s
been made available through the county’s Consolidated Grant Application Cycle.
A discussion ensued and the following points were made:
• That program ran for almost a year, with a lot of research and recommendations about
supplementing that fund. One recommendation is that they wanted $10 million from the
general fund.
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• That didn’t occur, but a checking account was created and small deposits have been
made.
[Vice Chair Faron left the meeting at 11:01 a.m.]
• The BCC established the $500,000 for that budget year without any long-term
continuing commitment to make that an annual county contribution.
Mr. French told the AHAC:
• Six months ago, we established a housing director to focus on policy and do something
in four months that no one could get done in over two years.
• We’re getting ready to set budget policy. There’s an effort that needs to be made, a
commitment from the County Manager’s Office or from the BCC. For every dollar we
use to fund a program, staff, or support an initiative or program that benefits the
community, whether it’s the County Attorney’s time or staff time, we cannot use
enterprise dollars to fund that.
[Vice Chair Faron rejoined the meeting at 11:03 a.m.]
• We’ve done so because we tie this into advancements that we think from the permitting
process that we could help recognize, but also on the on the land-use side to better serve
the client when they come forward with Site Development Plans or zoning petitions. It’s
a weak argument, but we look at this as a force multiplier.
• Your County Manager has made a commitment. AHAC was created outside of the
Community and Housing Services Division.
• We’ve started to reestablish that policy piece and we’re not clouded by the financial
commitments/financial monitoring piece. That should have been broken out years ago. It
stayed with the grant people. Now it’s back in Community Development, Environmental
Services, where it came from and the County Manager is committed to funding it.
• We’ve hired people for hardened positions. Many positions were grant-funded and went
when the money dried up and they couldn’t find a grant.
• The more initiatives you come up with, we’re looking at identifying them as unfunded
requests and a decision will have to be made during budget time with the Manager’s
Office and, ultimately, the BCC.
• The county budget is only so large and there are three incorporated areas, but the county
provides everything else.
• There’s a lineup between affordable housing, recreational programs, daycare, food for
seniors and many different programs. Mental-health is No. 1. There’s only so much
money that can be distributed.
• The County Manager recognizes the need hasn’t changed, but has continued.
• It doesn’t matter what the economy produces. There always must be a balance between
the transitional type of housing and a starter home that people can afford when starting a
career.
• We have an obligation to look at that and create or follow good methodologies to create
good policy.
• Many ULI study findings came up on a national level. Florida was not given any
consideration.
• What we see is a lot of erosion, where the state comes in and says you can’t do this to a
developer. The elimination of the Department of Community Affairs was one. We’re
grateful to Gov. Scott’s administration and the contributions he made, but that changed
the playing field and we’re monitoring that.
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• We’re supporting your ideas, but there are going to be times that staff may not be in
lockstep with you. We may make a recommendation to the BCC that won’t be favorable
to the AHAC because we believe it could be too intrusive or unlawful or it won’t work.
• He appreciated Jennifer being at DSAC on Wednesday, where we have tough
discussions.
• The idea is to link AHAC to the development community because there was always an
imbalance and communication didn’t occur. We’re moving forward with that linkage to
have functional meetings.
• Cormac won’t be going away, but Sarah will be moving into the interim director
position and Cormac will stay for another six months for the transition.
• We’re adding staff and have a staffing plan.
• It’s good to have the subcommittee meet once or twice a year. We blended the group
into GMD to remove the silos.
• The county manager has been telling residents that they show up to meetings for
controversial items, but not the budget, which is important.
• GMD has become very open.
• We’re here to guide the AHAC, but that reduces services elsewhere.
• He needs to expose the AHAC to what goes on in zoning decisions.
• Directors may not be able to attend all the meetings, but he, Mike Stark and the
remaining division directors talk and determine priority items based on what we’re
seeing in the market, trends, committee feedback and activity.
• The majority of the demand within the community is from businesses.
• We need to look at how to reduce homelessness, which will reduce Code Enforcement
cases and save money so it can be used elsewhere.
Mr. Hruby said we understand there are limited resources and the highest priority gets it. As an
advisory committee and as affordable-housing advocates, are we in a position to ratchet that
priority up higher in the BCC’s eyes to get you more money? We knew Mary Waller’s housing
fund committee wouldn’t get $10 million, but that brought it to the light of the public and BBC,
underscoring that this is the kind of money needed to get things done. Maybe we could ratchet
that up higher on the priority list to make your job of budgeting easier. When it comes to
proposing best practices and policy changes, we’re not lawyers or planners who implement this.
Fortunately, we have a lawyer sitting here.
A discussion ensued and the following points were made:
• The county looks at what could happen if we don’t make these decisions.
• The AHAC is lucky to have a BCC member on the committee, a champion for your
efforts.
• Commissioner Hall and Mr. French talked about affordable housing at least twice this
week and we’re going to continue to move forward.
• The AHAC appreciates all the staff who attended today.
• To have all this expertise, including Michael Stark, the GMD finance director, in this
room is eye opening.
• It makes a huge difference and keeps the AHAC on track.
• Sarah Harrington has been tapped as the new interim director and she’ll test it to see if
she wants the position.
• The AHAC wants to review the list of ULI recommendations and what happened to
them; Mr. Bosi will provide a PowerPoint slide on that.
• We need to start looking at the AHAC’s successes and revisit some things because
they’ve changed. Some could be rejuvenated and added to Jennifer’s list.
• The majority of the BCC wasn’t here when the ULI recommendations were made.
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• It’s important to have staff involved with the AHAC committee and provide input to
guide them, especially with the new spreadsheet, which will be AHAC’s road map.
• Vice Chair Faron asked staff to review the spreadsheet to fill in the blanks with more
information and offer suggestions about additions or deletions.
A discussion ensued about placing another AHAC member on the Planning Commission as a
non-voting member to increase cross-pollination, but AHAC members and staff agreed that
could be redundant and shouldn’t be a priority since Planning Commissioner Shea already is
on the AHAC and is a voting member of the Planning Commission.
A discussion ensued and the following points were made:
• On line 8, current consideration for impact fee adjustments or changes is ongoing and is
being handled by the County Manager’s Office.
• No. 9 involves changes to parking requirements. That’s already policy and can be
removed from the list.
• At the AHAC’s April 18th meeting, we should review the three-page spreadsheet in light
of the BCC’s vote and what the Live Local Act would do. Maybe some of these things
should be edited or refined. We don’t want to work on a moot point.
• Mr. Bosi addressed that, noting that when the Live Local Act was passed, Collier
County was ahead of the state. The ULI recommendations from 2017 increase density,
offer automatic conversion by right and other provisions in our GMP amendments. The
state has supersized it.
• Developers may prefer the local option over the state’s Live Local Act.
• Both have the validity to coexist side by side. Determining which fits the needs of a
developer at the time will be on a project-by-project basis and won’t detract from the
work the county is doing on them.
• From a land-development perspective, 82% of our land is zoned either agricultural or
residential. Neither of those two categories are applicable to the Live Local Act.
Industrial, commercial or mixed-use are less than one-fifth of our land area, so there will
be opportunities needed for continuing provisions and incentives that are on the books
and the ones we’re adopting to help promote affordable housing in non-commercial,
industrial-type areas.
• The City of Naples is reviewing how the Live Local Act will impact the city.
• County GMD staff are meeting with the County Attorney’s Office on Monday to
interpret that statute. There’s a lot of ambiguity and opinions on how the statute’s
regulations can be applied. We’re trying to get opinions on how it should be applied,
then determine whether it tramples over anything in our initiatives. What are potential
implications, where can it be targeted and what will the impact be?
• The Live Local Act says a developer is entitled to the density of the highest residential
allowed within the jurisdiction and the highest height. The city of Naples is unique
because there are no public hearings associated with that. The land has to meet water
management regulations, the landscape buffer, etc. The Site Development Plan has a key
role. What’s unique about the City of Naples is it becomes an administrative process.
City Council voted to review all SDPs and proceedings because they might not like the
height and may want to reject it because of that. They won’t be able to express that
under the new law.
• There’s a tremendous amount of ambiguity. It’s going to be messy during the first
couple of years as the Live Local Act process unveils itself.
Mr. Bosi told the AHAC:
• The Live Local Act overshadows the four GMD amendments the BCC just approved.
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• We have a cap of 25 units per acre within any one of our initiatives. To get to that cap,
you’ve got to start dipping down to some low categories to be able to get the full
arrangement of density. The state statute says you get what our maximum density is,
above 25 units per acre, so the state act trumps that. If you put 40% at 120 AMI, you’re
about 10-15% below market price, so the subsidization most developers will choose is
40% at 120 AMI. Will they really provide it to the most critical areas of need? No.
• But it is a solution designed to address the supply. About five years ago, Mr. Bosi told
Commissioner Taylor that if you really want to make headway within affordable
housing, you have to hit the supply-side issue. You have to add more units. That’s
exactly what this county, its residents and community leaders don’t want to hear.
They’ve spent 45 years saying they don’t want the intensity of the East Coast.
A discussion ensued and the following points were made:
• Our housing market is a lot different from the “hood” in Orlando. It may work perfectly
in Orlando to revitalize some downtown neighborhoods, but for here it’s a joke.
• The Live Local Act is the ultimate anti-NIMBY statute. It’s YIMBY, “yes, in my
backyard” everywhere.
• For years, the state legislature and governor were getting pounded by developers and
builders who wanted to help with affordable housing. They contended they’d get to a
board meeting and there would be 100 people in orange shirts showing up to say, “No,
don’t build it here.”
• With a stroke of a pen, the state decided that if it’s been good enough for whatever else
has been approved in that jurisdiction, such as 92 units per acre at Metropolitan Naples
or 120 feet for the towers in the Isle of Capri, then that’s going to be the standard. If it’s
good enough for a Naples beach tower, it’s good enough for an affordable housing
developer to just take it. It takes the Yes-In-My-Backyard initiative to the extreme.
• Building heights are a deal changer in Collier County, allowing a developer to build to
the highest building within one mile that’s already been approved for someone else.
Chairman Harney said he will continue his research for the AHAC and already has contacted
Sarasota’s AHAC to see if they need a board member. Maybe he can share ideas with Collier
County.
4. PUBLIC COMMENT
None
5. NEXT MEETING DATE
TBD
Conference Room 609/610
Growth Management Community Development Department
Mr. Hruby made a motion to adjourn. Second by Vice Chair Faron. The motion passed
unanimously, 4-0.
There being no further business for the good of the County, the meeting was adjourned by
the order of the chairman at 11:48 a.m.
―
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ヤ ■
Apri1 7,2023
COLLIER COUNTY
AFFORDABLE HOUSING ADVISORY COMⅣⅡTTEE
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