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CCPC Minutes 01/30/2009 S January 30, 2009 TRANSCRIPT OF THE RLSA MEETING OF THE COLLIER COUNTY PLANNING COMMISSION Naples, Florida, January 30, 2009 LET IT BE REMEMBERED, that the Collier County Planning Commission, in and for the County of Collier, having conducted business herein, met on this date at 8:30 a.m. in SPECIAL SESSION at Collier County Development Services Center, 2800 North Horseshoe Drive, Room 609-619, Naples, Florida, with the following members present: CHAIRMAN: Mark Strain Karen Homiak Donna Reed-Caron Tor Kolflat Paul Midney Bob Murray (Absent) Brad Schiffer Robert Vigliotti David 1. Wolfley ALSO PRESENT: Jeffrey Klatzkow, County Attorney Thomas Greenwood, Comprehensive Planning Heidi Ashton-Cicko, Asst. County Attorney Page 1 Am:NDA COLLIER COUNTY PLANN[NG COMMISSION W[LL MEET AT 8:30 A.M., WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 28, 2009 [CARRYOVER DATE OF JA1'o'UARY 30, 2009] AT COLLIER COUNTY DEVELOPMENT SERVICES CENTER, CONFERENCE ROOMS 609/6 10, LOCATED AT 2800 N. HORSESHOE DRIVE, NAPLES, FLOR[DA: NOTE: INDIVIDUAL SPEAKERS WILL BE LIMITED TO 5 M[NUTES ON ANY ITEM. INDIV[DUALS SELECTED TO SPEAK ON BEHALF OF AN ORGAN[ZATION OR GROUP ARE ENCOURAGED AND MAY BE ALLOTTED [0 M[NUTES TO SPEAK ON AN ITEM IF SO RECOGNIZED BY THE CHAIRMAN. PERSONS WISHING TO HAVE WRITTEN OR GRAPH[C MATERIALS I'lCLUDED IN THE CCPC AGENDA PACKETS MUST SIJllMIT SA[D MATERIAL A MINIMUM OF [0 DAYS PRIOR TO THE RESPECTIVE PUOLlC HEAR[NG. IN ANY CASE, WRITTEN MATERIAl.S INTENDED TO OE CONS[DERED BY THE ccpe SHALL OE SUOMITTED TO THF APPROPRIAT[' COUf;TY STAFF A MINIMUM OF SEVEN DAYS PRIOR TO THE PUBLIC HEARING. AFl. MATER[AL USED IN PRESENTATIONS BEFORE THE CCPC WILL OECOME A PERMANENT PART OF THE RECORD AND W[LL BE A V A fLAIlLE FOR PRESFNTA TION TO THE BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS IF APPL[CABLE. ANY PERSON WHO DECIDES TO A['PEAl. A DEC[SION OF THE CCPC WILL NEED A RECORD OF THE PROCEED[NGS PERTAINING THERETO, AND THEREFORE MAY NEED TO ENSURE THAT A VERBAT[M RECORD OF THE PROCEEDINGS [S MADE, WHICI{ RECORD INCl.UDES THE TESTIMONY AND EVIDENCE UPON WHICH THE APPEAL IS TO OE OASED. I. Pl.EDGE OF ALLEG[ANCE 2. ROLl. CALl. BY SECRETARY 3. FIVE YEAR REVIEW OF THE RURAL LANDS STEWARDSHIP PROGRAM PHASE II REPORT PREPARED BY THE RURAL LANDS STEWARDSHIP AREA REVIEW COMMITTEE, DATED JANUARY, 2009. 4. ADJOURN ]f2RI09 cepe Agcndn/TGJmk: 1 January 30, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, we're 8:30. Everybody, we need to come -- start the meeting. I ask the audience to quiet down, please. Everybody rise for pledge of allegiance. (Pledge of Allegiance was recited in unison.) Item #2 ROLL CALL BY SECRETARY CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Will our secretary please take the roll call. COMMISSIONER VIGLIOTTI: Commissioner Schiffer? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I'm here. COMMISSIONER VIGLIOTTI: Commissioner Kolflat? COMMISSIONER KOLFLA T: Here. COMMISSIONER VIGLIOTTI: Commissioner Midney? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Here. COMMISSIONER VIGLIOTTI: Commissioner Murray is absent. Chairman Strain? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Here. COMMISSIONER VIGLIOTTI: Commissioner Caron? COMMISSIONER CARON: Here. COMMISSIONER VIGLIOTTI: Commissioner Vigliotti is here. Commissioner Homiak is absent. And Commissioner Wolfley? COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Here. COMMISSIONER VIGLIOTTI: Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, thank you. Page 2 January 30, 2009 Item #3 - Continued from the January 28, 2009 Meeting FIVE YEAR REVIEW OF THE RURAL LANDS STEWARDSHIP PROGRAM PHASE II REPORT PREPARED BY THE RURAL LANDS STEWARDSHIP AREA REVIEW COMMITTEE, DATED JANUARY, 2009 Just so everybody understands what we're going to be doing today, we left off on Page 51, and that's where we'll pick up with our review of the GMP amendments. Once we complete the GMP Amendments, we'll then go into review of any remaining docu -- questions from any of the remaining documentation that any member of the Planning Commission may have. And then after that, general questions that may have come up through the review of all this. Then finally after that the Planning Commission will go into its discussion prior to making a motion. (Commissioner Homiak enters the boardroom.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: So with that in mind, on Wednesday we left off on Page 51. And we only had gotten into a very light amount of questioning at that point. Let the record show that Ms. Homiak is here. So we'll resume then. Brad, I think you asked the last question. I assume it got answered. If I'm wrong, somebody -- does anybody have any other questions on Page 51? Let's just start there and we'll move right into it agam. Paul? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Yeah, I'd like to know ifthere's any prohibition on intensification within ago For example, changing pasture into row crops. Or is it ago ag.? MR. McDANIEL: With specificity in the designation of the individual ago designations, Ag-l and Ag-2, if you will-- Page 3 January 30, 2009 COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Right. MR. McDANIEL: -- when you're in those -- and not to lead you down a path, Paul, with that, Tom could probably answer it a little bit better. But -- MR. JONES: Good morning again. Once you take a land use layer down to a particular level, that's what it's frozen at. Improved pasture is an Ag-l designation, so within Ag-l, it could be converted to either row crop or citrus. Semi-improved pasture would be an Ag-2 layer, and it can't be intensified once it's taken down to an Ag-2 layer. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: But if you started off where you are, you know, what the fields look like now, it couldn't be intensified above that? MR. JONES: It just depends on how it's classified. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Okay, thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: If you're Ag-l, you can go to Ag-2, but if you're Ag-2 you can't go to Ag-l. MR. JONES: Right. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And if you're Ag-l growing tomatoes and you want to switch over and grow peppers, you can do that. So you can change the type of row crops in Ag-l, but you can't go above Ag-l for use. And ag-2 is ranching and grazing and stuff like that, more passive, isn't it? MR. JONES: Right. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Does that-- COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Yes, thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: -- need you where you need to go? Any other questions on Page 51 ? (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, let's start at the top. The crossed-out sentence that says, analysis is shown that SRA's will allow the projected population of the RSLA in the horizon year Page 4 January 30, 2009 2025 to be accommodated on approximately 10 percent of the acreage otherwise required, if such compact rural development were not allowed due to the flexibility afforded to such development. Well, let's -- for round numbers we're looking at 200,000 acres, and 10 percent of that would have been 20,000 acres, which is when you take the real numbers, that's maybe how we got to the 16,008, because that was nine percent of the real numbers. Why are you crossing that sentence out? MR. McDANIEL: On a couple notes, Mr. Strain -- do we need to name ourselves again or are you okay with all that? THE COURT REPORTER: I'm fine, thank you. MR. McDANIEL: A suggestion that I might add is when the adoption of the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay program was put in place, there were estimations as to in fact what was going to transpire. And there were communications and estimations of credits to be generated, acreages to be generated, so on and so forth. And there was a rather lengthy explanation given at some stage of the game -- I don't believe it was to you folks -- with respect to those initial estimations as to the credits to be generated and the acreages that could ultimately be developed into SRA's are somewhat misleading. And if you'll recall a few days ago during my -- we weren't intentionally misleading, I might add, but during our presentation -- or my presentation of our report, our goal from a committee's standpoint was to provide clarity and to reduce ambiguity throughout the entire Rural Land Stewardship Overlay. And from our perspective on the committee's level, these were -- these particular eliminations, if you will, were somewhat skewed as to what in fact actually transpired for the adoption of the actual Rural Land Stewardship Overlay. And misleading. A lot of folks hung on that 10 percent number, when in fact after -- there was a transition of time from when it was actually developed until it was ultimately implemented where there Page 5 January 30, 2009 were additional credits that were allowed to -- that impacted that ultimate acreage, up close to the -- and again, with specificity. If you'd like, I can have Allen come up here and share those specificities with you as to the transition of events that occurred. But this particular section we at the committee level found to be contradictory to ultimately what transpired with the implementation of the program. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Why didn't you, instead of striking the section as you did or the piece, the couple of sentences, why didn't you just take the 10 percent and use the number that it really is? MR. McDANIEL: Well, we necessarily addressed that over in the group four policies when we set a cap out there for the ultimate developable area. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Right. MR. McDANIEL: And so therefore elimination here we felt was a clearer path to travel at that time. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: But inclusion here makes it very clear to the public the percentages of land that is being developed. And you're looking at 25 percent compared to the 10 percent that's here now. MR. McDANIEL: And again, with respect -- and again, you know, the committee, we went through this process. But this particular Group 2 policy revolves specifically around agricultural lands and incentivization for the retention of agricultural lands in the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay. And we felt that this information, where it was necessarily plugged in here, wasn't really flowing along with the entirety of the Group 2 policies. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Another reason this 10 percent may have been important at the time is it's consistent with what our -- the DCA had thought that the developable areas ought to equate to from the original format of the agricultural areas, meaning you would be able to develop so much at a one-to-five. And if you multiply that out and you condense it into a compact rural area, then they were looking Page 6 January 30, 2009 at within -- that area should take up about no more than 10 percent of the gross area that it would have previously. So maybe that 10 percent was there for a reason, basically to signify some -- and I know we don't have to concur with DCA because we're ahead of the curve in regard to their rules. But maybe that was an attempt to do that. I don't know, but I thought it'd be more obvious to the public, instead of saying 10 percent, you just change the number to what it really is. MR. McDANIEL: And we did, sir. And in so doing struck the language with respect to the entire Rural Land Stewardship Overlay and established a cap of 45,000 acres. But we did that back in the Group 4 policies where there is specificity and designation for the entire Rural Land Stewardship Overlay in its entirety. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Did you use a percentage anywhere? MR. McDANIEL: Not to my knowledge. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, that's what I was getting at. MR. McDANIEL: And so -- I mean, in your discussions with respect to DCA and that sort of thing, I mean, they were ultimately participatory in some of the ultimate changes that occurred that impacted that 10 percent number at the end of the day. I believe there was -- it was their suggestion to implement the early bonus program for incentivization of credits. And that wasn't part of the original process. I know that there were several items that came about. The restoration credits came in necessarily, if you will, after the fact as we were already going through the process. And those were -- those were items that had impacts on that percentage amount, which led to, as you have suggested, some misleading items to the public. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Is there any other questions on this before I move on? (No response.) Page 7 January 30, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Then the next paragraph, Policy 2.2, you added under the second sentence, the protection measures for SSA's are set forth in policies, and it listed them. And you added Policy 1.10. I've read 1.10 and I can't figure out why you added it. What do you feel it does that needed to be in that sentence? MR. McDANIEL: Do you have an answer on that? I don't recall, Mr. Strain. I don't recall off the top of my head. There was -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, because it says the protection measures for SSA's are set forth. And I don't see Policy 10 talking about any protection measures. MR. McDANIEL: Other than the fact that the number of uses eliminated in SSA's and in respect to the natural resource value. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: But that's what you've got -- you've got that in 1.6 and 1.7. MR. McDANIEL: Priority of protection for SSA's. I think that was just some cleaning up language that we felt tied those two policies together. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, I don't see it, but it may not be that important. Although I don't understand why it's there. Further on down in the middle of that new underlined added sentence there's a sentence that begins with open lands. It says, open lands are those lands described in Policy 4.2. If you turn to Policy 4.2, there is no reference to open lands that I find in there. So I'm wondering what definition it is that we're saying are open lands, if the definition isn't -- maybe I'm missing it. Do you have -- in 4.2, if you could point out a definition of open lands. MR. GREENWOOD: Mr. Chairman? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yes, sir. MR. GREENWOOD: If you look at 4.2, there is a second sentence and it says, land proposed for SRA designation. SRA's can Page 8 January 30, 2009 only occur in open lands. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Where is the definition that ties the words open lands? Because it's capitalized to a definition in 4.2. MR. GREENWOOD: Open lands I think on the overlay map is capitalized. But the open lands are the only areas in which SRA's can be located. And there's specific criteria, you know, that are outlined in this GMP as well as the LDC. MR. McDANIEL: And as a definition standpoint, the last sentence on Page 55 has somewhat of a definition with respect to lands that are eligible for designation as SRA's of similar physical attributes and they are consisted predominately of agricultural lands which have been cleared and otherwise altered for this purpose. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: So what you're saying is everything listed the under 4.2 FSA's, HSA's, WRA's, SRA's, everything here are open lands? MR. McDANIEL: No. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, well, then what is open lands? Specifically. Can someone tell me what open lands are? Is it agricultural fields -- MR. McDANIEL: There's a definition -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: -- is it WRA's? MR. GREENWOOD: Open lands are lands that are not in SSA's, SRA's, water retention areas, habitat stewardship areas or flow way stewardship areas. In other words, it's everything that falls outside of those designations. So if -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Then why don't we just say that --leave that, and that's in that same paragraph, and that's what I circled. If that's the definition of open lands, why do we want to refer it to Policy 4.2? MR. GREENWOOD: Because 4.2 also refers to the standards, they tie back basically to the SRA designation and the criterion Page 9 January 30, 2009 standards described in Group 4 policies. So they're all -- these are linked, okay? And that's why this was proposed by the committee. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: It says, therefore in lieu of using the natural resource index on lands designated open. Now, what lands are designated open? Because now we've got a new definition. We have one called open lands and now we have one called open. What is open? MR. GREENWOOD: I think they're one in the same. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Should we use the same reference to them? MR. GREENWOOD: Probably. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Mr. Wolfley? COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Would it be -- in going back to Section 4.2, would it be wise in the first sentence to be -- because all privately owned lands within the RLSA shall meet the criteria set forth. And then it says, it goes on, except land delineated as the FSA's or HSA's and so on. Couldn't we just say prior to that are open lands eligible for designation? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: It's almost like by process of exclusion. So we're saying -- we probably need to clarify that and say anything not designated as FSA, HSA, WRA or land that has been designated as SSA is open land. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: It says that in the paragraph Policy 2.2. And that's why I'm -- and I'm not arguing whether or not it's right or wrong. I'm simply saying let's clearly define it so there's no question about it. I had it understood until I read the reference to Policy 4.2. And I couldn't see in 4.2 where it was made clear what open lands were. MR. McDANIEL: And ifI might add, from a committee standpoint, maybe from the Planning Commission, that's one of your recommendations as we go forward with this. I mean, we at the Page 10 January 30, 2009 committee level felt there's def -- there is somewhere in here a list of definitions as to what FSA's and HSA's and all those sort of things are. I can't point to them right this moment. But we felt that the designation and the tying of these two together over to the 4.2 was sufficient at that particular juncture. MR. GREENWOOD: I might also point out -- for the record, Tom Greenwood -- there's about 25 pages in the overlay. There's about 67 or 68 pages in the Land Development Code. The Land Development Code does spell out a lot of the things that are not spelled out here. The overlay is intended to be more general, but directive to the LDC. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I understand that. I just -- if you're going to reference a definition, I just think the definition ought to be clear. That's the only point I was trying to make. MR. GREENWOOD: Yes, sir. MR. McDANIEL: A really good comment to -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Next sentence says, therefore in lieu of using the natural resource index on land designated open -- now that will be open lands -- these lands shall be assigned two stewardship credits. So really what we're saying is all open lands are ago lands; is that a true statement? COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Not necessarily. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Because if we are saying that, then why don't we just say ago lands? Because otherwise that sentence is going to give two credits to add to open lands that may not be ag., and was that the intention of what the committee was proposing to do? MR. McDANIEL: The intention was to incentivize agriculturally used lands. And I hate to utilize the statement all open lands are in fact ag., because I'm sure somebody could find something somewhere that could be designated as open that isn't necessarily utilized as ago Page 11 January 30, 2009 But, I mean, it certainly was the intent to -- the entire policy, group of policies, is revolving around agricultural land. And our goal with this amendment to the policy was to incentivize agricultural lands and their retention. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, should we then say that ago lands within the open lands shall be assigned? And that way it's limited to those, so that if there's some oddball piece of open land that doesn't fit any of those categories that someone's not getting two credits for it because -- MR. JONES: That was never the intention. MR. McDANIEL: I think that would be another fine suggestion as we're moving through here, to help clarify, if there's a perception that that's somewhat misleading. Again, our goal was to clarify and reduce interpretation issues. So anything in that regard to assist is certainly welcome. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Mark? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yes, sir. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I think that's a really good point you bring up. Is the committee implying that any land that's ever been farmed is still ago land? You know, things that might have been farmed 20 years ago, abandoned fields, is that still classified as ag.? I think we need to define it more closely, since these are all going to be given credits that will be worth something. MR. McDANIEL: And again, the definitions of agricultural lands, Ag-l and Ag-2, have very specific uses that can in fact occur or do in fact occur. And a layman's interpretation of a particular use as far as ago land, either prior or in the future, could be misconstrued. And I think the Chair's suggestion for clarification there would certainly reduce that option for interpretation of open lands, if you will, if there were a swath of land out there that wasn't necessarily ago but it could be construed as being open, so -- Page 12 January 30,2009 COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Yeah, I think we need to have a definition. Because, I mean, it's obvious, stuff that's being farmed now is ago land. But where do you draw the line? I mean, there's a lot of lands now that are -- you know, they used to do a lot of farming around Everglades City and Chokoloskee. But those lands have been so long abandoned that -- I mean, you can still see in aerials where the irrigation ditches were, but you would hardly call those ago lands anymore, because they've been out of it for so long. MR. McDANIEL: And there is farming practices. And just as a point of reference, there are -- you know, those lands down around Everglades City and such certainly aren't a part of the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: No, I'm just using that as an example. MR. McDANIEL: There is a farming practice of rotation of crops and allowing regeneration of soils through letting the fields grow fallow and refertilization and that sort of thing, so -- and there is definitions here with respect to estim -- good estimations, relatively speaking, of the ago lands and their current uses and what they were five years ago when the program was initially developed and what they are in fact now. And we had rather lengthy discussions about that, the fallow issue, if you will -- COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: What is fallow and what is not fallow. MR. McDANIEL: -- and whether it's good or not. And that really isn't necessarily the intention here. I mean, the underlying uses are in fact there, they're going to stay there. And there is a specific definition for ago lands in the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay that I think would -- that I think helps us. I think what the Chair's suggestion here is helps clarify that with respect to the incentivization process that we were looking to get to to assist in the retention of ago lands throughout the Rural Land Page 13 January 30,2009 Stewardship Overlay. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I still don't see a sense of definition, though. Are we going to say that any land that was ever farmed is ag.? Or there has to be some sort of a cut -off in terms of years that it's been fallow, CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Before you answer that, Paul, and I-- having a break between these meetings was kind of nice, it allowed more time for research yesterday. After you had made your point on Wednesday about how important the preservation of the ago was -- and it's one that I had made and others have made as well -- I got to thinking about what you may have even thought you were saying. And if you couple that with the statement you made in the beginning about the Farm-workers Coalition being involved in this document, I'm not sure where farm-workers come into play on all levels of ago But the way this is written, any level of ago would be getting two credits for preservation. That includes pasture lands, ranch lands, as well as row crops and citrus and other things. So -- and it's not differentiated. I mean, there's more labor needed and there's more maybe value in regards to some people's thoughts on row crops as a consumer product than there is ranch lands. Yet all ago would be getting the same benefit, two per acre. So if someone wanted to keep their land at Ag-2, basically pasture minimal and cattle to limit -- some minimal amount, they would get two credits per acre. But I don't know if that accomplishes what you were thinking in regards to the helping of farm-workers who usually are thought of to be more intensified in row crops and things like that. So I just thought I'd throw that out for food for thought for you, because there is a difference in the way the ago plays out with this two credits per acre. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: IfI could, Mark, I wasn't really Page 14 January 30, 2009 thinking so much in terms of that. I know that in terms of the row crops they're more labor intensive, they're much more valuable to our farm-workers in Immokalee. And just if I might add, where the rest of the economy of the county is going bad, the farm economy is going good. I mean, we're having as good of a year as we always do. It's a normal year. And that economy is helping Immokalee be in a lot better shape than a lot of other areas. It's something that shows the value of diversification of the economy. But I just think that it would have been better, not so much the coalition of Immokalee workers, I never made that suggestion, but something where the interests of the people whose livelihood depends on farming were at the table. But thank you, Mark. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Tom, did you have something you wanted to contribute? MR. JONES: No, I don't think so. I think you answered the agricultural question eloquently. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, I was just trying to clarify it. The other question on that same paragraph I have is right now I think there's about -- and let's just say for round numbers 90,000 acres of ago Is that a fair statement? MR. McDANIEL: Of designated open lands, yes, sir. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Let's just talk about ago MR. McDANIEL: Okay, yes, about that. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Because I think in your Phase I report you call it ag., 89,357, to be exact. MR. JONES: I think that's right. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Let's just say 90, because I can multiply and subtract with 90 a lot better. MR. JONES: I can, too. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: In the 45 -- oh, you got a calculator. Page 15 January 30, 2009 That was a good idea. As long as you don't rent it to me more than four bucks a day. In the amount of land that you're asking to become the new development footprint as a maximum, 45,000 acres, 40,000 of that is agricultural land. Is that a -- MR. JONES: Yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. So out of the 90 that's currently present, if the development were to proceed as projected by this document, we would end up with about 50,000 acres of ago left in Collier County. And that 50,000 acres of ago could not be developed as an SRA, because all the SRA was already developed -- all the ago land that would be SRA would have been developed in the 45,000 that's basically mentioned in this document. MR. JONES: Yes. To reach the proposed 45,000-acre cap, you would have to include the balance of all the open acreage under the agricultural preservation credit SSA's. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Right. But the balance meaning up to about 40,000 acres, based on the paper you all passed out last week and other statements I've read. Of the 45, 40,000 is expected to be agricultural lands -- MR. JONES: Sure. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: -- that will be part of that 45. MR. JONES: Right. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Because that leaves you 50,000 of ago So the 50,000 of ago then can't be developed because it's outside and above the 45,000 that you're being requested to be entitled here. So then why are we giving two credits per acre for that additional 50,000 acres if it can't do anything else anyway? MR. JONES: No, I think you've missed the point. In order to reach the capped acreage, you have to generate credits from the agricultural lands to reach that cap. If you don't take down the open agricultural lands, then you can't generate a sufficient Page 16 January 30, 2009 number of credits to reach the 40,000 plus the 5,000 assumed public benefit. So if you don't have an agricultural preservation credit, one, they don't get any credits, and under what we're proposing you would probably only reach the 43,000. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. But if you didn't-- MR. JONES: Well, you wouldn't reach the 43 either. I think what we estimated when we were going through it -- I don't remember what the credit -- go ahead. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: If you have the -- if you have the ag., though, that can't be touched because it goes beyond the threshold of the developable area, what does it matter whether it has credits associated with it or not? I know you want the credits so you can get to the developable area, but it doesn't do anything to incentivize more ago from being preserved because it can't be used anyway. I think that was the intent of the statements made, how are we encouraging less ago to be used? And I'm trying to figure out how that's happening with this paragraph. MR. JONES: There's a couple things. One, the agricultural credits disincentivize the one-in-five development. But what you've got to go back to is the entire -- the credit generation scenario. And in those calculations, under the baseline on the restoration credits, X number of credits could be generated. In addition to that, because there was no agricultural preservation credit, then these were designated to be able to generate credits additionally. That number led to a potential development of 57,000 acres. Then the calibration was done from eight credits per acre to 10 credits per acre to bring it back down in line to a 45,000-acre cap. So what we did, we had a number of suggested changes to the existing program. One of those proposed changes was to establish an agricultural preservation credit. One, it was done to establish credits Page 17 January 30, 2009 for agriculture, because there really essentially weren't any. And two, they were generated to disincentivize the one-in-five. Therefore, when you took a look at the sum total of all the changes that were being proposed, it took it up to 400,000 plus credits. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: 421. MR. JONES: 400,000 plus credits. That was then recalibrated at the 10 and dropped back down to the 45,000. So you can't look at just one little piece and say there's no point to do it. It was done as an improvement to address a hole in the program where there were -- where there was no incentive for agricultural preservation. And after that was coupled with all the other proposed changes, then the model was recalibrated to get to 45,000. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Because this seems like the credits for ago were created to justify more credits to get to the 45,000 developable area, rather than really preserve ago Because what I thought this was going to do when I suggested that we needed something in my questions a long time ago to help incentivize ago to remain to create that balance that the Governor's order always strived for, we would be looking at a way not to develop so much ago That's already done. Ag. isn't going to go above 40,000 acres. MR. JONES: It's only done if it's considered as a part of the whole. Take a step back to where we are with this thing. We have no agricultural preservation, there's no cap, okay, under the existing program. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: There's no cap on acreage. MR. JONES: There's no cap on acreage under the existing program. We have 90,000 acres of open designated lands in the Eastern Collier area. And under the existing program, through the credits that can be generated, we can develop approximately 43,000 Page 18 January 30, 2009 acres. That leaves us -- let's just round to 45, okay? That leaves another 45,000 acres of open agricultural lands that are eligible for the one unit in five-acre development, okay? The committee took a look at that, recognizing that there were no incentives for agriculture, because under the existing system, agriculture generates about two-tenths of a credit per acre. There's no incentive there for somebody to keep farming at two-tenths of a credit per acre. Therefore, we addressed the system and created a credit system for the agricultural lands. That system then, either the two or the 2.6 on the 45,000 acres was then added to the existing program. So if you add those credits to the existing program, now you're in a range of probably 380,000 credits that are sitting out there. So then you take the -- the changes to the restoration system were incorporated into it, panther corridors were incorporated into it. All these proposed changes to address a need were then laid on top of the existing program. Then the program was recalibrated to pull it all to 45,000. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And I read all that, Tom, I understand it. MR. JONES: Well, without the-- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Let me -- I think what a lot of people seem to be hanging on is that if we don't incentivize the ago with something so that the rest of the 45,000 can utilize those credits, then the ago will be developed with one-to-five housing and the 45,000 acres will be developed as well, is that -- MR. JONES: No -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. MR. JONES: -- I don't think so. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Mark? MR. JONES: I think we're just not hitting it. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Paul? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I think I might be able to help Page 19 January 30, 2009 you a little bit. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: What you're doing with the ago credits is you're going to take 40,000 acres and keep them in agriculture. And in exchange -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: 50,000, actually, but -- 40,000 is going to be part of the 45. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: What you get in exchange is about 9,000 acres of developable land. So you're making a trade. Preserve 40,000 or 45,000 of ag., and you're only adding 8,900 developable acres. So the ratio is very good. And it's going to make these developments very, very attractive. Because not only are they going to be surrounded by natural land, but they're going to be surrounded by either farms or fallow land. It's -- I'm starting to get a little bit excited about the concept of this. I think it's really good. And you are -- the only way they can get those developable acres is to set aside that 40,000 acres of farmland. So it really is going to work in the sense of preserving agricultural land. MR. JONES: Very well said. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: What do you think you're preserving agricultural land from? Let's go there first. MR. JONES: One-in-five development. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. That's what I want to ask. So now let's go back to round numbers. You have 200,000 rough acres out there. If you develop it at one-to-five, that's 45,000 homes. We're trying to avoid that. So now we're coming up with this program. We're going to have 45,000 acres that we can develop at four units per acre. So instead of 45,000 homes, we're looking at 180. So now you're telling me that after we have the potential for 180,000 homes, towns, industries, schools, everything to go with it, you think that we're going to develop the remaining ago on a one-to-five basis. I Page 20 January 30, 2009 don't see it happening. And that's why this constant threat of one-to- five is pretty impractical, because I don't know how you're going to get there. MR. JONES: I think you missed what Paul said. The agricultural -- and I'll try to -- he did say it very well. The agricultural preservation credits weren't established to get to 45,000 acres. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: You just said that a little while -- MR. JONES: No, no. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. MR. JONES: The agricultural credits weren't set up to get to 45,000 acres. The agricultural credit was to disincentivize one unit to five acres. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, when you started out, someone said that the 45 -- or the credits for ago got you from 43,000 to a cap of 45000 so-- , , MR. JONES: No, we were getting all confused with numbers. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Mark, can I try again? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yeah. I mean, don't try to convince me. I'm just asking a question, and the answer's going to be the answer. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: No, absolutely. And your questions are excellent. I think a lot of people are thinking the same way you are. But what they've done by adding in the agricultural credits, they've put more into the pie. But at the same time, by readjusting from eight credits to 10 credits, they've sort of taken away. So they've added and they've taken away. But what they've done is changed the mix so that agricultural is a part, is going to become a permanent incentivized part of it. But, I mean, they probably have raised the amount of developable acres some, but they've also taken back some of it too. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I understand what you're saying, Paul. Page 21 January 30, 2009 Thank you. And you too, Tom. I just still have a concern the way it's calculated. So we will continue on, but I'm sure it's going to come up again in a policy in a few more pages, so we'll -- MR. JONES: Well, let's-- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: -- have a chance to re-explore it. MR. JONES: Well, why don't we just try and nail it down now instead of later? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Because maybe in discussion on how the 45,000 cap came about, I can better understand this issue here. Because I ran some calculations last night, and I still am trying to figure out where the incentivization is in ago And Paul, I know your explanation, and Tom, I know yours, but it's not making a lot of sense to me at this point. But maybe it will as we go through this. And that's the purpose of going through the whole document, so we'll keep working at it. Don't give up. MR. JONES: I'm not going to give up. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Because one way or another we're going to understand this when we leave here. MR. JONES: I've got my pen and a piece of paper. I'm ready to go through the numbers now. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Mr. Chair? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yes, sir. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I have a question on how we add this in. So essentially you're going to take two in lieu of the natural resource part of the calculation for the credits, correct? MR. JONES: Right. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: So you'll be adding it to -- well, it can't be another full one, because you're not removing the agricultural layer. Page 22 January 30, 2009 So what is the most somebody would get for each? MR. JONES: Two credits per acre. As opposed to going through the -- know, it's like -- I don't know ifI said it yesterday, I don't know if I said it the day before, but we were trying to streamline that credit generation process. A lot of criticism, well, this thing's too complicated. Okay, we're going to streamline it. So instead of going through the NRI scoring for the agricultural credits, we will assign those credits. So you're going to get two credits per acre, period. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: But the NRA (sic) scoring is added to the base -- MR. JONES: The NRI scoring has nothing to do with the agricultural preservation credits. The credit is assigned, and there is no NRI scoring associated with it. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Okay. But in the worksheet, the NRA scoring is added to the base credit. MR. JONES: No, not for the agricultural preservation credit. There is no scoring on the worksheet with respect to the agricultural preservation credit. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Okay. Well, should we make that clear, that the total credit would be two? In other words -- MR. JONES: Yeah, that could be a recommendation, sure. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Because essentially what happens is you start with a base credit, maximum of one, depending -- MR. JONES: I think it does say it's assigned. Go ahead, I'm sorry. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: It says assigned two stewardship credits. MR. JONES: Yeah, open lands, da, da, da, da, da-- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: These lands-- MR. JONES: Therefore, in lieu of using the natural resource index on land designated open, these lands shall be assigned two stewardship credits per acre. Page 23 January 30, 2009 COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Right. Now, my point is, though, is the natural resource credits are added to the base in the process, according to this chart. COMMISSIONER CARON: It says in lieu of. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Not so? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: It says in lieu of using. MR. JONES: In lieu of. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Okay. I mean, alls I'm doing is I'm looking at the worksheet and -- MR. JONES: For anything other than the ago preservation credits, yes. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Okay. But this worksheet does say base credit plus natural resource credit. MR. JONES: Right. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: The way you phrased this say in lieu of the natural resource credit. You're not saying ignore the base credit. That's my point. COMMISSIONER CARON: Right. MR. JONES: The base credit's included in the NRI scoring, though. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Not according to my view of the worksheet here. But we can go over that on the break. MR. GREENWOOD: Mr. Chairman? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yes. MR. GREENWOOD: Mr. Chairman, Tom Greenwood for the record. It might be well, because we're talking numbers, to look at section three, if you don't mind. Because -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: No, I'd rather wait and get to section three in order. If we start going out of order we'll be all over this book, Tom. And I can -- I know what I'm going -- MR. GREENWOOD: No, just in understanding -- Page 24 January 30, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: -- to need to ask in section three, I have it laid out that way. And I'm sure we all have read it in order, so let's just keep moving on. One thing that this policy doesn't address is the different values ofag. As we heard Wednesday, there are some -- there's arguments both ways that some of the ago is primary panther habitat. Would there be a benefit to utilizing a higher credit for that ago to discourage that ago from being used over ago that is not considered or questioned as primary? Once the study is done another study, apparently -- I don't know how many studies are going to be done. MR. JONES: In our committee discussions, we didn't think that warranted being done. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Why? MR. JONES: We were focused on an agricultural preservation credit, and there isn't unanimity of agreement with respect to the primary zone of panther habitat. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Mark? MR. JONES: I mean, that's really a panther discussion that you're about ready to launch into. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Go ahead, Paul. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I think in a sense they have assigned 2.6 to the ACSC and 2.0 otherwise. Because the ACSC to me is pretty much crucial panther habitat. That's right in the area. So I think there's at least some differentiation. Not, you know, on an acre-by-acre, but in a general way. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, the only thing I was thinking about, at some point the study that's been undertaken by the private parties will come out. It mayor may not coincide with one of the other studies. But if it does and we needed to consider protecting the primary ago lands and there was a way to incentivize that protection to discourage those lands and encourage ago lands that weren't so primary, because there obviously are plenty of more ago lands, there's Page 25 January 30, 2009 45 -- 50,000 leftover acres of land in ago that could be used over what may be the primary ago areas. If those primary match up to any new studies or certain studies are now further qualified. It just seemed like a natural way to go. I understand the committee's position, so I don't need any further explanation. But I thought I'd make that statement. Because it is something I should have been -- might have been considered as a solution to some of the concerns we've heard. Next on that -- MR. JONES: Well, there were concerns on both sides. You've heard concerns -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: We heard them from both sides. MR. JONES: And that's the point I'm making. There were concerns -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: That's my point, too. MR. JONES: That's my point, too. There's a -- there is one train of thought that thinks the agricultural credits should be tied to natural resource values of panther habitat, and there's another side of the discussion that says they shouldn't be. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, and I was looking for a possible compromise or a solution that might help weed it out when the final analysis came down again. So regardless -- MR. JONES: Well, where the final analysis really comes out, Mr. Strain, is through the consultation process under the Fish & Wildlife Service. I mean, there is an Endangered Species Act in place. People who want to develop their land have to go through that process. The SRA, the rural lands program in Collier County isn't an island. And although we can get approvals at the county level or the state level to move in these directions to develop SRA's, we still have to go through an extensive federal process that makes the determination whether or not those areas can be impacted. Page 26 January 30, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I'm familiar with it too, so thank you. MR. JONES: That was for the benefit of the rest of the committee. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I notice you struck all of Policy 2.3. MR. McDANIEL: Correct. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: If you're so concerned about ag., and rightfully so, everybody is, why would you want to strike that? Why wouldn't that committee come out and be as a benefit for future reviews when they come up every seven years in the EAR process? MR. McDANIEL: And from the committee's perspective, that direction was given to be -- that committee was directed to be created within one year of the adoption and the creation of this program. And it was not, it has not. And so therefore again, in a move to provide clarity we chose to strike it. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Why wouldn't you choose to reignite it? I mean, why would you choose to strike it? Do you see it as not a benefit to the agricultural industry? MR. McDANIEL: There really wasn't a lot of discussion as to whether it was or it wasn't. Our -- that was our decision at that particular juncture. These questions of why, Mr. Strain, are a difficult thing, because of the diversity of opinions that travel along here. I mean, there can be benefits to a lot of different things. Our goal at the committee level was, amongst other things, to provide clarity and reduce ambiguity, and that was a clarification move that we at the committee level made. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. I mean, I understand what you just said. I still -- to me it would seem to have an advantage to have a committee like that open to the BCC. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Mark? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yes, go ahead, Paul. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I would like to support that idea, too. Because I really think -- I love the guys on the committee and Page 27 January 30, 2009 what you've been doing and I like a lot of what you've done, but I really think that if we're relying on the landowners to necessarily be advocates for farming, even though I know that's your business, I don't think you can totally rely on that, because I think you're more loyal -- or your allegiance is more to how you can get the most value for your asset, which is the land, than necessarily in the agricultural industry. And so I think that it would be good to have some advocacy and some advisory group that was definitely interested in the continuation of agriculture. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, along with that thought, the same would be for Policy 2.4. It was struck. And if both policies were to come back, that's something we probably need to discuss during our deliberations as to if we feel maybe that you ought to reconsider that. So moving on, Ms. Caron? COMMISSIONER CARON: Yeah, Ijust wanted to make the comment that I -- I'm a little disturbed that we think we can pick and choose which policies we're going to follow once they're a part of the GMP and those that we're not going to follow. And apparently we just opted out of this. MR. McDANIEL: Not necessarily. There's direction there that that was to be created by an action of the Board of County Commissioners, and it never occurred. So be that as it may, there were -- that was the maneuvers on behalf of the committee. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Heidi, can the Board of County Commissioners not respond to a requirement of the GMP without modifying the GMP? I know they can modify ordinances at whim. But the GMP, because it goes through a process through the LP A and eventually through Tallahassee and DCA, can policies of the GMP be modified without a process? Because if the board chose to ignore this after it was a policy, I'm just wondering on how that could have happened. Page 28 January 30, 2009 MS. ASHTON-CICKO: That's correct, it would require a GMP amendment. The board just can't ignore a policy that's in the GMP. MR. McDANIEL: There's an interpretation issue here as well. I, while we were going through this at the committee level, perceived this to be a direction of the Board of County Commissioners. Actually, if you read the policy that was struck, it says Collier County will create this committee who will then advise the Board of County Commissioners and make recommendations as to how to promote agricultural activities in our community. It doesn't necessarily delineate a delinquency on behalf of the Board of County Commissioners, so -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, who is Collier County? So I mean, if it wasn't intended to be the Board of County Commissioners, then when this was written, who (sic) do you think the intent was? People just gather up one day and say we're going to be a committee? I mean -- MR. McDANIEL: I'm not going to go there. Again, going back to it, from a committee's -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Have you been talking to Bruce? We're getting into word-smithing here and I think -- MR. McDANIEL: Yeah, we got to put a definition of Collier County in here somewhere. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, well, I think we've talked about it. We got a drift on that. We'll bring it up for deliberation when we get to that point. In Policy 2.5, which has been crossed to 2.3, I'm just wondering from a -- what the value of that is. And if you're -- I know you didn't change anything here, but your goal was to change things that need to be changed, eliminate things that were duplication. If -- we have the Florida Right to Farm Act and it supersedes our local laws and our state laws -- or actually this is a state law, why would we need to restate it in this policy? Heidi, is that a necessity Page 29 January 30, 2009 that it be done that way, or-- MR. McDANIEL: I don't mean to interrupt Heidi, but from a committee's standpoint, one of our goals, one of our charges, one of our precepts, if you will, was not to eliminate duplication. Jiminy Christmas, there's duplication all over the place. This was a stated fact. It is part of the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay, and didn't feel necessarily required to remove this. This is just, if you will, an enhancement of one of the goals and policies of the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Heidi, is it necessary to have a policy like 2.5 to restate that the Florida laws basically apply? MS. ASHTON-CICKO: It's not necessary, but it's, you know, policy decision if the board wants to include it or not. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. That takes care of my questions on Page 51. Does anybody on the Planning Commission have any other questions? Mr. Midney? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I'd like to ask Tom a question about that open land versus agricultural land. Do you see all open land as being classified agricultural? And ifnot, how would you classify it? Because I think if there is a distinction, it needs to be made. MR. JONES: Knowing what I know about Eastern Collier, I would say probably all of it is classified as agriculture. Nearly all of it, if it's not being farmed by and large, it has cattle on it. Maintained green belt on lands that were farmed previously and aren't being farmed? There might be a small acreage that's slipping through someplace, but I think most of the land in Eastern Collier outside the urban area is probably classified as agriculture on the Future Land Use Map. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: But if it's most of it, you know, we're talking about a monetary compensation. Don't you think if something hasn't been farmed for a generation or so, that the owner Page 30 January 30, 2009 doesn't necessarily have the right to this credit, or do you think they do? I don't know. MR. JONES: Well, I think they do. Because again what we're trying to do is retain land for potential agricultural production. And as some land is taken out, land that's an improved pasture now may go back to crops. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Okay. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, and before we move past the page, we'll turn to the public. Are there any members of the public that wish to address any of the policies on Page 51 ? Allen? MR. REYNOLDS: Good morning. For the record, Allen Reynolds, Wilson-Miller, representing Eastern Collier Property Owners. I want to speak to the discussion relative to Policy 2.1, and specifically the language regarding the 10 percent, because that language has been widely I guess misinterpreted or misrepresented. And I'll start by saying that the statement, although it's been proposed for deletion, is still an accurate statement. And if I may, let me just walk you through a couple of numbers. You can actually do the math on your calculator, if you'd like. If you turn to Section 3 -- and I would really encourage, you know, as you go through this, even though I know you're taking these in order, Section 3 has a lot of the explanations to some of the credit calculations that I think would make this a little bit clearer. But if you go to Page 81. And what you'll see there is population projections from various sources for the year 2025. And what I'd ask-- DR. HUSHON: Would you give the number? MR. REYNOLDS: Page 81. DR. HUSHON: Page 81. But what's-- MR. REYNOLDS: I'm about to do that. DR. HUSHON: 3. -- Page 3 1 January 30, 2009 MR. REYNOLDS: No, it's Page 81. It's in the supporting information. And there's a table in there that shows different estimates of what the projected population and unit count will be in the rural land study area in the year 2025. And if you look up there, you can see it up on the -- 25,700 dwelling units. That's the Collier County MPO's forecast. You can see there's some other forecasts there that are slightly higher and slightly lower, but that's the one that's been used for the purpose of the analysis. Okay, so now if you take that number and you multiply it by five, you're going to get to 128,500 acres at one unit per five acres. That's the number of acres that would be required to accommodate that population under the baseline standards. Now, if you take 10 percent of that, you're going to come up with 12,850 acres. That's 10 percent of the acreage that would be required to accommodate that population on baseline conditions. Now, if you'll turn to page -- I believe its Page 90 in the supporting data. What Page 90 shows is the projections of acres that will be required to be developed for the purpose of doing transportation analysis in the year 2025. And you're going to see the figure down at the bottom of 10,200 estimated acres developed. What that means is that it would take approximately 10,200 acres at the densities that are allowed in the stewardship receiving area to accommodate 25,700 units. So what you're going to see if you compare those two numbers is that the footprint of development under an SRA accommodates the same projected population on roughly 10 percent of the acreage that would otherwise be required without an SRA. That's what that statement means. So it was true in 2002 and it's still true, because the simple math is that when you allow average densities of two to two and a half units Page 32 January 30, 2009 per acre in an SRA, you can accommodate the same population that would otherwise be required on one-tenth of the acreage that you would have if you were using one unit per five baseline rights. So because this statement has been so misrepresented I think over time and tied to other things, the committee, when they went through this, as has been explained, felt that it was probably best just to delete it, because now we have provided and vetted I think a lot more accurate estimates of exactly what's going to happen. So I just want to make sure that you can see in fact that the math still works based on that statement. I hope that helps clarify. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: It does, but I still have some questions. MR. REYNOLDS: Okay, sure. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: On the example used on Page 90 with the 10,200 estimated acreage developed, actually that acreage could support by the density allowed 40,000 units, not 24. But you're suggesting that the density that's going to be built out is far less, two to two and a half? MR. REYNOLDS: Yeah. Because if you look at what the market actually absorbs on an average density basis, although you may have instances where in certain places you could get up to a gross density of four units per acre, the reality is, is that typically the markets drive that down because it's a mix of single-family and multi-family homes. So when you get to the mix the markets actually absorb, you find that the densities generally fall within the two to two and a half units per acre range. Ave Maria is an example of that. Lots of other examples that we could point to. So that's what explains it. Yeah, you can -- what's important I think is when you're trying to do estimates, you need to look at as close to reality as to what markets absorb as possible. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And the realty in Collier County is what you just said in regards to density. But I thought the whole purpose of Page 33 January 30, 2009 this was to reduce urban sprawl. And part of the reason we have urban sprawl is that low density. How are we encouraging a reduction in urban sprawl by maintaining the density we have along the coastal area? MR. REYNOLDS: Well, we're not talking about the coastal area right now. But I would -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I know. MR. REYNOLDS: The coastal area -- I mean, let's take the City of Naples, if you want to use that as an example. I don't know if you consider the City of Naples to be too dense or not dense enough. I think the typical thought process is, is the density is pretty good. Some may argue that it's too high. The average density in the City of Naples is about two and a half units per acre on a gross basis. When you talk about sprawl, I think now you have to put it back into the context of what I just described before, which is one unit per five acres. Baseline zoning is, without anybody's question, sprawl. It's sprawl not just because it's low density, but it's sprawl because it does not provide for the supporting facilities, services, commercial facilities, job opportunities that you get when you create something like a new town. So the way that this solves the sprawl problem, at least in Eastern Collier County, is by substituting more compact development in the form of towns and villages as an alternative to one unit per five acres. That's really the simple explanation. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. I know there's some language up in DCA or Tallahassee floating around for a new 9J-5 section called .026. And I understand it's being challenged. But in that section they do have an exam -- and it's for RLSA's. It spells out what the state would like to see for an RSLA. And I'm trying to understand how it would equate. I know we don't come under it. I understand that. We got in under the wire and we are exempt from these. But one sentence there was a bit puzzling in trying to fit it to Page 34 January 30, 2009 what we have in front of us today. And again, I know it doesn't have to fit, but I'm wondering how it would. It says, demonstration of residential land use need is not required if the maximum amount of residential development for the RLSA does not exceed the cumulative amount of residential development allowed by the underlying land uses within the RLSA, as established in the preexisting comprehensive plan. Of course the underlying land use primarily that we're constantly here about is the one to five. And for rough numbers, that comes out to about 45,000 homes, if you use 200,000 acres. The RLSA that we're presenting would be 45,000 acres, and at four units it's 180,000 homes. But if you were to take the density that would apply in a compact rural development and divide it backwards, you'd end up with 11,250 acres that could be developed under the RLSA program compacted, versus the spread-out program of a one-to-five scenario. Is that the way the state was thinking their programs would be run in the future? Is that a fair comparison for them? MR. REYNOLDS: Well, I don't know how much time you want to spend talking about the proposed rule that you're reading from. But as you mayor may not know, that rule has now been withdrawn by the Department of Community Affairs, because it has been challenged on the basis of being an unworkable rule. So what they had proposed, however, in that rule is that there would be two thresholds, if you will, for a rural land stewardship. There would be a threshold that would be what they would consider to be -- I'll use the word a safe harbor, okay, which would mean that if you follow that part of the rule then you get an automatic go, if you will, for having been found consistent. And what they were saying in that part of the rule is that if all you're doing is what you just described, which is compacting existing density to a smaller footprint and nothing else, that's -- you're free to Page 35 January 30, 2009 go. But there's a second part of the rule that says if you're going beyond that, then you have to do something similar to what Collier County has done, which is to do a rural lands assessment, to go through an analysis, and to show a demonstration of how that all works. So there were two tiers to the rule that provided for both a simplistic process and one that's a little bit more involved. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. Any questions of Allen before we go to any other speakers? (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Any other public speakers? Page 51. Elizabeth? MS. FLEMING: Elizabeth Fleming, Defenders of Wildlife. I wanted to say a couple of points about Policy 2.2. We have supported the intent of this. We understand about the incentives. We were particularly concerned about the area of critical state concern, and we didn't want to see the one per five spread throughout that area and certain areas within open the area west of29. At the same time, we know that there are some areas where this -- where agriculture could remain and work in tandem with some of the other land uses intended to go on in the open area, particularly west of 29 where the SRA's are intended to be. And hypothetically, I'm not -- I hope -- who knows who will-- we've discussed this some. But I'm imagining a situation where a corridor could be envisioned. And perhaps it looks thin now, but if that -- if the credits required to do a very wide corridor would make the possibility of it happening next to nil, if that could be planned in conjunction with perhaps retaining citrus, which is not fabulous panther habitat, but it could be buffer, could keep the citrus in place, keep that industry going, and the two could work together to retain the rural character, retain agriculture and we get a panther corridor, that's Page 36 January 30, 2009 how I'm imagining this working. I don't see them as mutually exclusive or doubling up on credits. There would be one credit amount applied for the one purpose and another for the other. But I see them, if this program works, with all the parties working together, I think that that could be very beneficial. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Any questions? (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Elizabeth, if -- to use your example of the citrus next to a panther corridor, if that citrus next to a corridor and the corridor was maybe narrower than it needed to be and the citrus could help widen it, more or less by use, would there be a benefit to incentivizing that citrus to stay there over a town being there? MS. FLEMING: I would think that it would work with the corridor, if that's -- I'm using this as a hypothetical example, but I think those two could work together. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: See, we had -- I can't remember if we still do because we're not to it yet, but along certain flow ways, we had incentives to restore some of the properties that were closer to the main flow ways than others. And I'm wondering if we shouldn't have looked at some of that as a possibility to where we want panther corridors and primary habitat and things like that. But it was just a question. It seemed like it would be more beneficial, although it hasn't been -- it's not laid out that way right now, so -- MS. FLEMING: During the committee meetings, there was some language addressing remaining -- some of the adjacent upland where it met with an SSA, a flow way or a habitat stewardship area. There was that intention to have some upland for travel corridors for panthers and other species. That's in one of the policies. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. MS. FLEMING: You're welcome. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Anybody else? Nicole? Page 37 January 30, 2009 MS. RYAN: Good morning. Nicole Ryan, Conservancy of Southwest Florida. I first want to address Policy 2.1, because we seem to be going round and round about this. But I think that it does need to again be pointed out that when the program was initially designed, it was to compress the allowable units within the RLSA, the one per five, down to a much smaller, more compact footprint. And that's why we supported Policy 2.1, in stating what development would be if participation were fulfilled in the program on about 10 percent of what would otherwise be needed for development in the area. That was really the only policy within the RLSA that indicated how much development we thought would occur. And we see now there are many more credits than was initially envisioned. But we recommended that instead of simply removing the policy, we'd take a frank look at what is out there, how much is out there, if that is still compatible with the goals of the program, and modify and update that number. So we had asked that that be kept in. We still believe that it would be important to be kept in. So we ask that you, in your deliberations, continue to consider having that stay in the policies. In moving to the Policy 2.2, the ago policies, it's very difficult to take a look at the credits attached to these ago lands without looking at the credits that are also being proposed in Policy 3.11, and also taking a look then at Policy 4.2 which puts a cap on SRA's, and Policy 4.19 that then recalibrates because you've infused so many more credits into the program that you have to devalue them by requiring more credits per each acre of SRA. So I would hope that in your discussion of the concepts of do we want to attach additional credits to ago or to other things, that the actual credit numbers may be discussed later, because they all fit together and it's very difficult to say that 2 or 2.6 credits works here without looking at how it impacts the entirety of the program. As far as protecting ag., The Conservancy believes that the Page 38 January 30, 2009 current RLSA program does a pretty good job of setting land aside for ago If you look at the current SSA's of the 37,000 some odd acres that have been approved as SSA's, almost all of that has been taken down to its ago uses. So that land has been protected for ago I think only about 651 acres have actually been taken down to conservation. And I believe that that's also the case with many of the pending SSA acreages. So we see -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: You have to slow down a little bit. She's got to type this as fast as -- MS. RYAN: Oh, I did it again. Okay. We see that this program does do a good job of protecting ago However, we have always wanted to see that those open areas that do have high natural resource value, that being primary panther habitat, that they also be protected and incentivized for becoming future SSA's. So this idea of an ago preservation category and incentivizing the protection of those ago lands that also have higher natural resource values, directing development away from those in the form of new towns and villages we certainly do support. We think that that is a good concept. However, what you have in these policies, it selectively decouples the natural resource value from the crediting system. Right now you get more credit if an acre of land does have higher natural resource value. In what is proposed, the higher natural resource value of the open lands within the ACSC is acknowledged by higher credits, yet the open land outside the ACSC that is panther habitat isn't treated any differently than non-panther habitat. So we see this as acknowledging natural resource value in one case and not in the other case. And we would like to see all of that primary habitat be treated in the same way. Now, we'll get in the panther discussion I'm sure in the Group 3 Page 39 January 30, 2009 policies, so I'm not going to go into that further, but something just to keep in mind. This program was based on tying credits to natural resource value, and this would really move away from that. We believe that you can protect ago and tie credits to natural resource value. So we would like to see that being done and really directing SRA's, new towns, new villages, outside of those higher natural resource value ago lands, simply not allowing the new towns there. In the policies, I thought I heard that when you take the land down under the proposed policies that if it's in pasture, passive pasture, that it could not be intensified. I don't read it that way here. I read it that for the ago conservation preservation, it's taken down to levels five, six and seven. And that is the Ag-l, the Ag-l support and the Ag-2. I don't see anything that says that you cannot move between those ago uses. So I think that needs to be clarified. Because The Conservancy believes that once you do take credit from that ago land, you should not be able to turn pasture into row crop. I don't believe that it says it here, but I'd like to have that double checked. And just a point on the credits that are being proposed in this policy. Keep in mind from the Wilson-Miller numbers; they're saying that you have approximately 42,300 acres of SRA's available today. Conservancy believes that if you actually applied more restoration credits, there would be more land. But using their number as an example, they're wanting to go from 43-3 to 45,000 acres to cap the SRA's. So that's 1,700 additional acres for SRA's that they're wanting to obtain. This policy would infuse 89,000 additional credits into the system. And if you divided even by that new calibration of 10 credits per acre of SRA, that equates to 8,900 acres of new SRA's. So that's why I say, you don't look at specific credit values attached to this right now. I think that we really need to dig deeper into those numbers to make sure that we're not just infusing so many Page 40 January 30, 2009 more credits in the program that five, 10, 20 years later we find we have credits and all of a sudden we need to remove the cap. We believe that there is too much SRA acreage out there today available, so we would like to see that compressed. But definitely we want to make sure that future incentives are going to be able to be tied to things that aren't going to simply throw more acreage at development. Because from a natural resources perspective and an ago preservation perspective, we really need to compress things down. If we have a lot of extra development out there, where is it going to go? It's going to go on the ago lands. So we ask that you consider those. And just briefly, to the Policy 2.3, this wasn't a big issue for The Conservancy, but we do agree that if preserving ago is so important, wouldn't a committee that could be a forum for researchers and scientists to come together, wouldn't that be something that was a benefit? Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Nicole, one question, and Mr. Midney has one as well. You reference a number on a computation of the credits that could be generated from the additional agricultural credits. MS. RYAN: Yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Ifwe have about -- and I know it's pretty close to 50,000 acres of open lands, which are considered to be ago lands. Wouldn't that give us about 100,000 credits instead of the 89 -- I think you said 89,000 credits. Did you mean -- MS. RYAN: I'm taking that from the supplemental material. So CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. Mr. Midney? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Nicole, what would you think about the idea of leaving the 2.6 credits for the lands in the ACSC and adding all the other primary panther habitat as 2.6 and then reducing the ones that's not primary panther habitat by a proportionate amount Page 41 January 30, 2009 so that it came out to the same number of ago credits? MS. RYAN: Well, I think that we really have to look at what credit values make sense. If you try -- if you're going to avoid the primary panther habitat throughout the RLSA, you're left with, excluding Ave Maria, about 32,700 acres for potential SRA footprints. And the concern is that depending on how many credits you add in, you may be actually entitling development that would exceed that 32,700 acres and then would have to go on primary panther habitat. So the real challenge is to make sure that as you're directing development to an appropriate area, an appropriate footprint area, that you're not entitling credits that would exceed that area, thus defeating the purpose of protecting those ago lands or protecting the natural resource areas. But we definitely would like to find a way to incentivize protecting those ago lands that have the higher natural resource value. We just see that as a double benefit. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: But you wouldn't have to do that as long as you kept the acreage cap. MS. RYAN: If you kept the acreage cap, sure. But I think there is a legitimate concern that if you infuse so many credits into the program and then you've hit your acreage cap and landowners have credits that have no value and they can't use them, then what happens? Do you provide a mechanism then for increased density within the SRA footprint so that they have a place to use those credits? Do you allow for transfer of density to other parts of the county, maybe into the urban area where appropriate? Those could be some ideas for making sure that there is an outlet for those credits so that you're not creating too many credits that then have no value. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. Russell ? MR. PRIDDY: Russell Priddy. I think if you try in any way to tie ago preservation to the natural Page 42 January 30, 2009 index -- resource index, you do away with the ago preservation. Because no landowner is going to be able to generate enough credits out of that system to even think about making it work. So, you know, the two credits is probably a bare minimum. And, you know, I can only eat so many Hershey bars, so don't give me more credits. That's -- you know, because we had to calibrate down to stay with the 45. I think what we're really trying to do -- and Nicole has mentioned that the SRA's to this point have done a good job in protecting ago They've done a good job at protecting Ag-2, because most ofthose SRA's have been in the ACSC and those areas. What we're trying to do here is protect Ag-l more with keeping row crops and citrus, and giving those landowners an incentive or a backup, financial backdrop to stay in ago And it's going to take, you know, this 2 credits or 2.6 to accommodate that. And I know while we don't agree, and your Chairman is one of them and rightfully so, that, you know, no, we can't go out there and develop all 200,000 acres at one-to-five, but I think if we narrow this down, Ag-l can certainly more readily be converted to one-to-five. And if that's 50,000 acres, that would be much easier to convert to one-to-five, which we want to stay away from. I think this policy addresses that. Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. Any questions? Anybody else? Oh, Brad. MR. CORNELL: Good morning. Brad Cornell. I'm with Collier County Audubon Society and Audubon of Florida, as well as a member of the committee. I just wanted to make one point, going back to the conversation that Russell just mentioned and that you all had on why have ago preserve credits when it seems like the ago will just be preserved anyway if you build the 45,000 acres ofSRA's. Page 43 January 30, 2009 And to that let me just throw this into the discussion, that it was my perception that if you build more and more SRA's, Ave Maria or Big Cypress or Serano or whatever your development is, is being entitled through credits. Once you get -- the more you get out there, the more you're going to incentivize somebody who does not participate in the Rural Land Stewardship Program to avail themselves of conversion to one on five. Because right now it just doesn't seem reasonable that you would expect a farmer, a small farmer or any farmer to convert to one on five, because there's nothing around them. There's no infrastructure, there's no grocery store, there's no place to shop. They wouldn't do it. But as you build these other communities out there, legitimately being entitled, then you have incentives to convert to one on five. They would piggyback -- basically without having to build their own infrastructure, they would piggyback in a sprawl fashion in areas that we don't want to see that. And that would be my perception of why we need that ago preserve. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you, Brad. Bill, you've got comments on that page, or are we going to move on? MR. McDANIEL: I do have one final, if I might. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Absolutely. MR. McDANIEL: Just that there's been quite an interesting discussion going here. And I'd just like to offer this up as a thought process from my position on the committee. Time is going to be a huge benefit to all of us as the evolution of the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay goes forward. And I cite the example, look how much we've learned in the last five years with the creation of Ave Maria and such. There's a lot of discussion about the valuation of credits. Those valuations are going to be determined by the marketplace. And I can assure you that if we find that there's a deficit or a disincentivization Page 44 January 30, 2009 with respect to the creation of credits, that during the future review processes that we have placed in here, we will make amendments to the process to provide that value. Ultimately therein the goals of the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay are for incentivizing the retention of agriculture and the protection of environmentally sensitive lands. And I just would like to -- there's a lot of accolades with respect to devaluation by too many -- and it's a perception that's not incorrect. But that actually devaluation has not occurred. And we all know at the end of the day there has to be a marketplace for these credits that we're in fact generating. So I would just like to offer the thought process that, you know, with time, as time goes on, we'll have an opportunity to make adjustments, as has been suggested for the further valuation, either increasing of densities inside the SRA's or relocation of these credits that are in fact created to other urbanized areas that already have infrastructure in such a place. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, Bill, if we could move credits back and forth and issues within the GMP policies back and forth at ease, I'd be much more comfortable that the future could adjust any mistakes we made today. MR. McDANIEL: And I -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: The problem I have is that along the coastal community of Collier, when the original GMP was put in place, it entitled landowners. And once you give them an entitlement, you can't take it away. So my concerns are not that we can change this in the future, my concerns are can we go back if we make a mistake. And so I think that we have to be overly cautious to make sure we're not giving too much that we can't take back. Because we can only give more in the future, as we're learning now after five years, we're giving more than we intended, or at least we thought, some of us, five years ago. MR. McDANIEL: And again, a lot of that's perception. Page 45 January 30, 2009 Our goal from the committee's standpoint, it was discussed at length, a tremendous amount of time was spent on assuring that there was a valuation process in place for these credits to be in fact utilized to ensure the success of the program. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And your primary concern is that the credits get utilized; is that a fair statement? MR. McDANIEL: And that there's a marketplace, yes. I mean, there has to be a value for those. I mean, and again, those values are such and we did our best throughout the process to assure to assure that there was value for those. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, before the day's over, maybe we'll have some ideas that would help with your concern. And with that, well, we're close to a break time. And before we go to Page 52 in Group 3, why don't we take a break till 10 after 10:00 and resume. (Recess.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, if everybody will please take their seats, we'll get it moving again. Okay, we left off on Page 52. Fifty-two contains basically -- begins the Group 3 policies. There are three policies written on Page 52 with Policy 3.4 on the bottom, starting on that page and going to 53. Very little changes by the committee recommended on Page 52. Does anybody have any questions from any of the policies on Page 52? (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: No? The WRA's on Policy 3.3, there's no changes there, but had the committee discussed the idea that there may be different values, different uses or different values for WRA's? Some of the WRA's are not as intense farm fields with straight line ditches and non-native growth in the littoral areas and things like that, versus other that are Page 46 January 30, 2009 more natural in habitat and formation. And I'm not sure this is the right policy to put that in, but I noticed that the -- I don't know how that was taken into consideration, or even if it was. MR. McDANIEL: There were discussions with respect to the utilization and the evaluations, if you will, ofWRA's and how they're in fact included or were in the past necessarily excluded from the overall acreage of SRA's. And I think we -- and I'd really like for you to hear from Mr. Jones. He gave a very in-depth discussion yesterday with respect to that process. He's not back yet from the break, but -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: That's okay, because that exclusivity issue is actually three pages forward. So we can hold off till we get to that one. It's under Policy 3.13. MR. McDANIEL: That's correct. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, if there's no other questions on that page, we'll move to the next page, which is Page 53, Policy 3.5 through Policy 3.9. Anybody have any questions on those policies? There's only one small -- or a couple small changes on that. Go ahead, Ms. Caron? COMMISSIONER CARON: Just down at the bottom under 3.9, it says the Ag-l group includes row crops, citrus, specialty farms, horticulture, plant nurseries, and it goes on to say aquaculture. And I think that got eliminated altogether, right, on the chart in the back? So you want to delete it from here as well? Didn't you take that out as a possibility? MR. McDANIEL: Yeah, there were lengthy discussions revolving around aquaculture and its relationship to agricultural uses. And I know that we in fact -- I don't know that -- I don't know why we didn't actually strike it from here, Ms. Caron, but the -- I know that we made suggestions outside of this specific report to direct staff to Page 47 January 30, 2009 review aquaculture as it resides within the Land Development Code. There are -- COMMISSIONER CARON: Well, it needs to be consistent is all I'm saying. You've taken it out. MR. McDANIEL: Correct. COMMISSIONER CARON: You've crossed it out completely. So you should probably take it out here as well, I would think. I mean, I don't -- if you don't know why you left it in -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I'm just curious as to what the reaSOnIng was -- COMMISSIONER CARON: I know, to take it out. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: -- to take it out. Can you tell us? If that doesn't go under agriculture, what does it go under? MR. McDANIEL: It -- do what? I'm sorry? It necessarily has a purpose, it has a definition. But we found that there were some deficiencies in the Land Development Code relating to the utilization of aquaculture as a methodology for extraction of aggregate materials. And quite a misuse, actually, with respect to that. So that was the premise there. I mean, there -- and again, I'm not certain what -- you got an answer, Russell? MR. PRIDDY: Well, I think that that was a big issue with Nancy over just what he's saying, being able to go into an SSA and extract fill material. If it's in an SS -- you know, once it's in an SSA, then it's out. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. COMMISSIONER CARON: But that's not what this is saying. Go ahead, that's all right. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Ifag -- how did you decide that Ag-l is really limited to only certain uses in ag.? And I know the example Nancy is maybe basing her assumption on. There was a case that came before the Planning Commission, and it ended up being I think denied by us, and it involved what you're talking about, they were taking Page 48 January 30, 2009 aggregate. Now, they claimed they weren't going to do that, and they were providing all kinds of arguments as to why they weren't going to do it. But because of some other lacking details, we did not agree that that wasn't going to be happening more than the agriculture might be. So it didn't succeed, but it set an example as to some of the problems and the way this can be interpreted. But at the same time, bona fide aquaculture would be a hugely beneficial element to have in Collier County. And you can't have it without some modification to the land, just as you can't have row crops without modification to the land. So if you can go in there and bulldoze down trees, dig ditches to take runoff and convert land to row crops which basically changes the landscape, isn't there a way to limit or value aquaculture so that it could be utilized under an Ag-l? MR. McDANIEL: And again, the premise of the discussions at the committee level -- and Anita Jenkins is here to further this. But our thought processes were the impacts of aquaculture within the creation for the SSA's and those impacts that you necessarily were just discussing. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Anita, are you speaking for the public or helping the committee? MS. JENKINS: I am Anita Jenkins, with Wilson-Miller. And I'm going to help answer your question about where did these land uses come from. That's the question that I heard. How were they defined. In the original program, when the program was created, and as it's adopted, the land uses that are on your layers on Page 71 are the land uses that are permitted or as conditional uses under the existing zoning of agriculture that is on the property now. What was proposed by removing aquaculture from the agriculture Group 1 only removes that use if you are putting it in an SSA. So the use is still there underlined. If you'd like to do Page 49 January 30, 2009 aquaculture, you need to do it under your baseline rights and not as part of an SSA. So you still have the ability to do it out there, but it's just not part of your SSA land use. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: That sure does clarify that lot. Does that work for you, Ms. Caron, as far as an explanation? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: In other words, it goes in ag., not SSA. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Right. So thank you. COMMISSIONER CARON: Yep. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Well, Mark, can I ask a question? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Sure. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Could it ever be confused that by stripping that layer you're not stripping the aquaculture? No? MR. McDANIEL: No. My perception with respect to the creation of an SSA, you take it down to certain layers of agricultural uses. So those SSA's are in fact there. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: But if you decide to make an SSA and you have Ag-l and you turn that Ag-l into an SSA, then once you turn it into an SSA, you cannot do aquaculture. But prior to that you can. Is that what we're saying? MR. McDANIEL: Basically, yes, sir. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Before we move on to the next page, since we've gone through two pages of policies, are there any public comment on Pages 52 or 53, Policies 3.1 through 3.9? MR. McDANIEL: Only to the extent, Mr. Chair, that Mr. Jones is back. And if you want to reenter that discussion on WRA's over there on 3.3. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: No, I'm going to wait until we get to 3.13. MR. McDANIEL: Okey-dokey. Page 50 January 30, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, seeing nobody else, on Page 54 there's a series of policies starting at 3.10 and 3.11. Anybody from the committee? Paul? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Yeah, going down to policy 3.11 near the bottom, you're talking about -- I guess you're calling this the tiered restoration credits. And I'm having trouble with the definition of what that is. The first one that they talk about is caracara restoration, which I guess they define as properly managed pasture. I'd like to see that better defined. The next one is exotic control burning. What does that mean? How often do you do it? For what duration? When do you get the credit? Once you get the credit, what incentive is there for the land manager to continue managing that and burning to keep the exotics down? Flow way restoration at four credits per acre and native habitat restoration at six credits per acre, I don't see those terms defined anywhere. And I think if this is going to be part of the land use regulation, it needs to be defined a lot better. MR. McDANIEL: And I might add that in the creation of an SSA, there are very specific regulations, if you will, as to maintaining perpetual oversight of these created restoration areas. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Where are those regulations? MR. McDANIEL: I believe they're -- MR. GREENWOOD: There's about 68 pages in the Land Development Code. I have a copy with me, but I'd certainly be willing to share that with you. MR. McDANIEL: And it is rather specific with respect to amounts of times of these management practices that are there. And at the committee level, because there was rather extensive definitions that are relied upon in the Land Development Code, we chose to not put all that in here, other than just to specifically describe Page 51 January 30, 2009 the credit systems associated with those. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Are their credits, Tom, for caracara restoration in the Land Development Code? MR. GREENWOOD: No, it's not addressed. It's proposed by the committee. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: And are there in the Land Development Code regulations for exotic control burning? MR. GREENWOOD: I'm not sure offhand. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I think for whatever -- a lot of the language that's being introduced, Paul, is new language. I think the next step is going to have to be modification of the LDC to implement the changes to whatever extent they're approved. So there may not be these items in the Land Development Code now because we couldn't have anticipated it. But that code itself is going to take probably a year or less or more after this is approved to get it initiated and approved and through our committee as well as others. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: But if we approve this and we don't have the details of what it means, we don't know what we're approvmg. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I would assume, and maybe Tom you can answer this. If the GMP's approved, can it go into effect any sooner than the implementation LDC's are adopted, or can it happen without any implementation language? MR. GREENWOOD: I refer that question to our attorney here. But the GMP basically serves as the basis for Land Development Code regulations and changes. And the Planning Commission will see if some or all of these or some of these are adopted into the Growth Management Plan. You will see some Land Development Code regulations and standards that are very specific that carry out the intent of the policies. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yeah, but I think the problem is Paul's Page 52 January 30, 2009 concern, rightfully so, of the gap. This may take six more months to get done. Then the language starts getting written because you can't write till you know what's adopted. And by the time that's written and approved and through the process, it could be another year. So in that year's time could someone come in and say I'm going to do caracara restoration, here's my field, there's my tree, I want the two credits. So I think that is what the concern is. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I mean, you know, a lot of these things, burning in order to maintain certain types of habitat, it has to be done at least every three years. Is that in the LDC? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Not yet. Heidi, you want to try helping us out? MS. ASHTON-CICKO: Yeah. You know, the GMP amendments have an effective date and process that it goes through. Once they're effective, you know, we do follow them. However, we do provisions in the Land Development Code in some instances to clarify how to implement it. So I have seen staff apply it once it's effective, but there probably is some sort of lag time generally for staff to -- for the implementation portion, especially with this type of a program, so -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Should we build in language that indicates that the changes in this RLSA being proposed to whatever point they're adopted won't become effective until the Land Development Code implementation language is adopted as well to -- that institutes them? MS. ASHTON-CICKO: I don't think that that's necessarily required. However, you may want to define these terms in the Land Development Code as it goes forward. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, then let's go back to Paul's question. If this is adopted, say by June and the LDC's couldn't get adopted till June of2010, in that year could someone come in and say I want two credits per acre for caracara restoration, when we don't Page 53 January 30, 2009 have a Land Development Code telling us what qualifies for caracara restoration, we just have a GMP amendment that says he's entitled to it? MS. ASHTON-CICKO: Well, I think the answer to that would be is you see if this language is going forward for staff to start working on the LDC amendment so that they're implemented as close to the time of adoption as possible. So that would be my recommendation. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. But what if they're not adopted in close proximity to one another? What if there's a week in between or a month in between? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Mark? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I think that's a concern. Go ahead, Paul. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I have a suggestion. I mean, there's a lot of credits that are going to be coming on line as we go through the process. Maybe we could defer the actual restoration credits. Because this is going to be going forward until the year 2050. You could just defer the granting of those credits until the terms are defined exactly. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, and that's what I think we'll probably end up considering when we come into -- Tom? MR. JONES: Mr. Midney, to some of your question, under the current system there are restoration credits that can be generated. And they're generated through the SSA application, and a plan of restoration that accompanies that application. And in there it specifies what's going to be done to meet these goals of the restoration. And that's approved by staff. That's the existing program. What's also included in Policy 3.11 is about halfway down through the -- three-quarters of the way down through the first paragraph with the line starting, with owner. Owner also complete blah, blah, blah, blah. Credits for each -- credits for each acre of Page 54 January 30, 2009 restored land upon demonstration that the restoration meets applicable success criteria as determined by permit agency authorizing said restoration. So there is a plan that accompanies it, even today. And, you know, it doesn't get into all your definitions and stuff, but according to the program that's in place, a plan has to be developed, it has to approved, it has to have success criteria before the credits are awarded. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: But that implies that there are some sort of criteria that staff has. What are those criteria? MR. JONES: Probably professional judgment, I would guess. I don't know what their criteria (sic) are. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Is it on a case-by-case basis, or is MR. JONES: Yes. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: -- there some absolute standard? I think you need -- MR. JONES: It is on a case-by-case basis. Because the way the restoration credits work today is rather broad as far as what can be done. Flow way restoration can encompass a number of things. It could involve culverts, it could involve berm removal, it could involve exotic removal. What we've tried to do with this system is break it out a little bit more refined than it exists today. And no, and everything's not defined. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: But would you like to see it defined better? MR. JONES: I would prefer to leave it to -- no. Because I think there's enough variability in it that once you say this is what happens -- a piece of land is very dynamic, and what may be appropriate in some portion of Camp Keais Strand, if you had to do that -- well, if you had to install culverts and that was part of your flow way restoration, there could be restoration areas that don't require culverts. Page 55 January 30, 2009 I think it would get more complicated. I think if a plan's put before staff, then staff can determine what's in front of them, if that's meeting the goals and objections of the restoration. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I for one would disagree. I think that you -- MR. JONES: I figured you would. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I mean, especially if you're going to give somebody a credit and say okay, my land is restored, give me the credit, I'm going to put up these units over here. MR. JONES: Well, again, there's -- COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: After that what incentive is there for the landowner to make sure that it's -- five or 10 years from now it's still, you know -- MR. JONES: Part of the requirement with the restoration plan is management in perpetuity. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I think, Paul-- COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Yeah. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: When we get into our discussions, we can always suggest that something be added that these are subject to the LDC amendment adoption that puts them into implementation. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I think that would be good. And I don't think it would be that much of a burden because we are talking about a long time frame here, and there should be enough time to get the regulations in place so that these terms are defined and the landowner has a certain amount of certainty about what he has to do and what he doesn't have to do. And the public also. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, the Land Development Code currently has some very species specific language for the RLSA, because it mirrors what's being struck in other pages of this document. And it may have some general language that functions for management plans for any other species. But that can be worked out Page 56 January 30, 2009 as we move forward, so -- and we can see what that has. Anybody else on Policy 3.11 on Page 54? Paul and then -- I'm sorry, did you finish? If not, go right ahead. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I finished with 3.11. I was going to go 3.11.1.2. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, why don't you finish your questioning and Brad will go next. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Okay, on 3.11, section two where it's talking about the panther corridors, I would like to see something in there that the corridor has to be kind of an all or nothing thing. It's like the links of a chain. If you have a corridor but one piece in the middle is going to be developed for something else, then the whole corridor will be kind of functionless. And I would hate to see credits given for something that has no hope of working. Could we write it in there in some way so that -- MR. McDANIEL: I have an oversimplified answer for that. I mean, because you're going to get a myriad of people up here in a minute talking about panther corridors and the viability and what's right and what's wrong, what's good and what's bad. At the committee level we saw a deficit, if you will, or a need for the creation of those corridors. And in so doing, you've seen maps that have been floated around that designate currently -- we created an actual area of some 2,300 odd acres for these corridors. And that was done from a land ownership perspective to provide for that continuity, Paul, that you're talking about for the initial creation of those corridors at the committee level, recognizing that the original program virtually had nothing there with respect to the creation of those corridors and the necessity for some kind of creation coincided with wildlife crossings that ultimately need to be part of the planning process, which is what we're all doing, to allow for the locale of those potential wildlife crossings to be part of the budgetary process for the road improvements that are ultimately coming to this area. Page 57 January 30, 2009 So that continuity that you're looking for is in fact there through the process of the ownership interest where they currently are suggested to be located now. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Well, I don't think there are, because all you need is just one landowner in the middle to say I don't want to cooperate with this and you have no corridor. MR. JONES: I think it's a reasonable suggestion. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Why don't you articulate that suggestion a little bit more so we can make a note of it to discuss it during our deliberations. You're looking at suggesting that a panther corridor won't be -- how do you -- COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: The stewardship credits can't be assigned for the panther corridors until there's a commitment of enough landowners to set aside enough land so that there is an entire viable corridor that's not missing any important pieces. Sorry, that's not very clear. MR. McDANIEL: That's close enough. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Close enough. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Well, we could use the word contiguous to simplify some of that. Contiguous panther -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, it wouldn't matter if it's a -- it has to be a viable corridor, it would have to be contiguous. MR. McDANIEL: And there was discussion, just for your information. I mean, you could look at the record, there was discussion with respect to the continuity of those corridors. And that was the path that at the time that the committee -- with the information that we had in fact available, that we chose to ensure that. Now, it's a viable point. And we did that by the consent, if you will, of the land ownership interests that are involved in that currently. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Yeah. I mean, I hope it works. Page 58 January 30, 2009 But, you know, I'd hate to see a lot of credits given for something that's not viable. I think about driving down the McDaniels (sic) extension in Lee County between the airport and Lehigh Acres, and you have these -- you have a four-lane highway, divided highway with panther crossing signs going over it, and it's just ridiculous. You know that there's no panthers crossing that, it would be suicide. And I would hate to see something that is set up sort of like in name as oh, yeah, this is a panther crossing but it's not functioning, it's like possible. And we have such a great ability to delude ourselves into thinking that if we name something, that it will actually be what we say it is. MR. McDANIEL: And it wasn't without a tremendous amount of discussion, Mr. Paul, about the designation of these corridors, if you will -- and again, these are conceptual maps locating these conceptually -- but it was with a tremendous amount of information. And you're going to hear that there's more information coming. You've already heard that. And as Mr. Strain already suggested, you know, there's going to be continuing studies as to the viability of these things. But these corridors weren't necessarily willy-nilly put there. There were in-depth discussions with Darrell Land as to the type of habitat that the panthers prefer to travel, their existing habitats where they're living now, where they're going, the telemetry marks or hits, if you will, that are picked up, the paths that they travel, the known corridors. And you can see, if you look at those two maps, we did that yesterday, of the two maps side by side, that there was a reason behind what in fact it was to get to a point where -- and again minimally the establishment of the corridors places in the planning process the wildlife crossings that are ultimately going to be necessary, whether it's here or over there, whether the panthers or wildlife read the signs or not, these are known travel routes that the critters like to use. And Page 59 January 30, 2009 that was why we at the committee level chose to establish the corridors conceptually as they are. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Did you have any more, Paul, on 3.11? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: No, that was it. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, Brad? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Yeah, and to follow up on that too, in 2 does that mean that the landowner who puts in the missing link of a corridor, does he get 10 credits or eight credits? He gets two for being in the corridor and then there's an additional eight prize for completing the chain, which Paul might discourage, complete change (phonetic), because everybody wants to be the last guy in. MR. McDANIEL: I don't -- that wasn't necessarily the intent there, Brad. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: What is the intent there? MR. JONES: The way it works is similar to the other credits. If you're in the proposed corridor, realizing the discussion we just had with Mr. Midney, the way it's written, if you're in the proposed corridor and you designate your land for corridor, you get two credits upon designation. The eight credits don't come until the corridor is established. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Okay. So anybody in the corridor is ultimately going to get 10 credits. MR. JONES: Yes, at completion of the corridor. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Okay. All right. And then -- MR. JONES: If they build it. Ifan agency steps in and builds it, then they don't get the credits. If Conservation Collier were to build the corridor, the landowner wouldn't get the credits, but he does get the two credits for designating the corridor. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I think that last sentence could be reworded, but -- because it appears to me the last guy in gets the pnze. Page 60 January 30, 2009 And then the other thing, Mark, up in the top, there appeared to be an exotic control. This is a scrivener thing. I think the word acre should be singular, not plural. That's all. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Tom, do you see where he's talking about? Hello? Tom, did you catch where Brad was talking about? You might want to re-describe it, because Tom will have to make the notes on that. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: In 3.11 in the additional word there's a small scrivener word, in exotic berming, the word acres should be singular, I think. MR. GREENWOOD: Okay. I'll make that change. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Anybody else on 3.11? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Sorry, 3.11.3 on the bottom. Again, what is -- how do you define seasonal shallow wetland wading bird foraging habitat? How do you define what a restoration, successful restoration is? I think that needs to be defined, you know, before we can start giving these credits. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: That would be an LDC issue. Okay, anybody else on this page? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Again -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Brad? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: -- it should be noted that what's going to happen there is they're going to get two for joining in and then once it's complete they get an additional six, for a total of eight. MR. McDANIEL: Correct. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: But everybody gets it. I think you do have to reword that. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Ifwe go back to the top of3.11, it says that, first of all, should -- the fourth line down, should a property owner be willing to dedicate land for restoration activities Page 61 January 30, 2009 within an FSA or HSA. So first of all, they're in an FSA and an HSA, which has a high ranking value of stewardship credits, NRI value. So most likely it's not going to be developed for anything but FSA and HSA. Then all they got to do at that time is say, and by the way, I don't care if you restore it or not, and he gets two more credits, is that right, on top of any credits he would generate by being an FSA or an HSA? MR. JONES: Yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, who wouldn't say that? I mean, we're just -- why don't we just -- I mean, why would -- who would you not want someone to say that, give me two credits? Why not? MR. McDANIEL: You know, from a committee level, and again, it's not a matter of who would say it or wouldn't say it, the prioritization for restoration activities in and around FSA's and HSA's was our goal there. Remembering that, that there are benefits associated with restoration that occurs in and around FSA's and HSA's. Our mentality there was for again incentivization. It was brought up in the original plan. There were priorities put on specifics, Camp Keais Strand, if you will, and the Ok. Slough and such, that needed to have, wanted to have that sort of thing, and that there were designation of upland lands and things that were close there that weren't necessarily part of that process. So that was the main reason from the committee's standpoint of implementing that. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: But if the FSA's and HSA's have a high NRI value, they're going to have to be preserved anyway, because that's the most profitable point of them, unless they stay non-SSA's, which is not too likely. So we're just giving everybody two more freebie credits, it seems like, in those conditions. Page 62 January 30, 2009 MR. JONES: Remember, that's the verbiage from the existing program, the designation credits. What the committee is proposing is a change to that. But back to your question of who would do it and why not do it, I think from a practical standpoint with the SSA's that have been submitted and approved thus far, it certainly isn't being done willy-nilly by any stretch of the imagination. What the landowner -- and the designation credit, I think, you know, it came from the early discussions. And whose corner it came from, I don't recall. But by the landowner designating and the discussion that took place -- and Camp Keais will probably be a good example for it. Simply by designating, you do get some credits. Because the landowner's at some risk at some point in time. If you were to have an HSA, a designated HSA that's farm land, for instance, and you go in and say I'm going to put a restoration plan together, here's my plan, I want my two credits per designation, and your intention is to continue to farm that infinitely or indefinitely, a possibility could exist that a government agency may think that's a suitable piece of property that should be restored for some reason or another. You could take our farming operation in Catherine Island on the southern end of Camp Keais Strand, which is 2,000 acres of tomatoes surrounded by HSA's. It's some of the acreage that was included by request from the conservation organizations. But if we were to go in there and say okay, we want our two credits, give them to us, it wouldn't be inconceivable that an agency such as the Water Management District might think there's a real opportunity to convert that land, take those farm dikes down and reestablish sheet flow through that area. So it was not -- it was to provide an opportunity because the conversation at the time of creation was well, the government might Page 63 January 30, 2009 want to convert some of these lands back, or some of the conservation organizations may have some money, maybe they want to do it, and that's why it was put in. And it remains in. What we've done in the program, recommendation from the committee, as opposed to four for designation, we've dropped it to two for designation. But there's still an outside incentive, if somebody else thinks it needs to be restored, to have an opportunity to do it. And by the landowner designating it, he really doesn't have an option but to go along with it. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: So you dedicate it for restoration, you get the two credits. But you do so basically by taking a gamble that it's not going to happen because the government doesn't have enough money or some other agency may not. And you get two credits knowing darn well that's not why you really put the two credits on the table, you're just taking a gamble. MR. JONES: Well, again, I mean, people do that. But if you look at what's been done so far in the SSA's, that hasn't happened. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Interesting. It says too, the restoration improvement is not required for the owner to receive such credits and the cost of restoration shall be borne by the government agency or private entity undertaking the restoration. Hi, George. MR. VARNADOE: Good morning. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Are you up here for the committee or for public comment -- MR. VARNADOE: I wasn't on the committee. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: -- because we're not to public comment. Okay. We're not to public comment yet, but if you want to-- MR. VARNADOE: IfI could just -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Sure. Page 64 January 30, 2009 MR. VARNADOE: Thirty seconds. I've handled either nine or 10 SSA's, I just don't remember which. And I thought maybe some practicality needs to be brought to this, or be of some help. Out of those nine or 10, I think five of them have taken some restoration credits. And every instance the restoration credits were only taken on land the landowner went ahead and has done the restoration or is responsible for the restoration under a restoration plan. So I understand your comment, Mr. Strain, but history hasn't borne that out to date. Nobody has, on the 10 I have done, has asked for restoration credits and just walked away. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, thank you. As we move on with some of the other underlines, Mr. Midney, I concur with your concerns over some of the restoration. Before credits are awarded, it certainly would be nice for this committee to know what it takes. I mean, I understand that caracara restoration isn't too complicated. And I had someone at staff mention that there was one occasion where you basically put a cabbage palm for so many acres or miles and that's caracara. MR. McDANIEL: Acres. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, acres. And a cabbage palm is 75 bucks, maybe 25 to plant it. So you drop -- for 100 bucks you put this tree in the middle of something, and all of a sudden you've got caracara credits for restoration. Is that all it takes? I mean, I haven't seen -- I don't know what this is, and it seems odd that we would provide two credits for it or think that's legitimate without knowing what it is. MR. McDANIEL: From the committee's standpoint there are definitions with respect to restoration plans that have to be adopted and approved by staff, along with long-term management plans. And so actually going through those specific definitions in the Rural Land Page 65 January 30, 2009 Stewardship Overlay as it particularly lies, we didn't move into that process. I mean, there were definitions, there are definitions that are available, and those restoration plans have to be accepted and approved by staff and then perpetually managed by the property owner. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I understand that. But if you guys are changing the credit -- the way credits are disseminated and you're asking -- you're going to be going through various processes to get that approved, I can tell you, it would be interesting to know what it takes for caracara restoration that's worth two credits. And if you're looking at every acre -- and how many acres does one cabbage palm qualify for caracara restoration? Is it 100 acres, is it 10 acres? But now we've got 20 credits given for one cabbage palm over -- MR. McDANIEL: Ten acres. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: -- a lO-acre area. MR. McDANIEL: One per 10. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, so one cabbage palm for every 10 acres, you get 20 credits for that. I'm just -- those are the kind of things that help us understand this credit process and how fast we're accumulating credits. MR. JONES: Well, there's a couple of points. One, under the existing program, restoration plans are required to be submitted to staff and approved. Under the existing program, restoration is I guess to an extent in the eye of the beholder. And there is no distinguishing characteristics between caracara restoration or native habitat restoration. Therefore, today under the existing system I not only get two credits, Mr. Strain, I can get eight credits. And by the same token, were I to go into Camp Keais Strand, remove farm dikes, install culverts, reestablish flow, I get eight credits. So the proposal that was brought forth was recognizing there's some inequity in here with the awarding of credits. But -- and the Page 66 January 30,2009 tiered system was an attempt to put some type of an economic analysis on the required input for these restoration components. The caracara, although it is not an intensive economic input, it requires not only the planting of nesting trees, it requires the maintenance of short stature grasses in perpetuity. That's part of the management plan. That's also the prescribed management plan from the authorities in caracaras. The basic point, though, is caracaras are a listed species, they're threatened under the Endangered Species Act. You have to mitigate for them if you impact them. And mitigation is along the prescribed course that I just described, the planting of trees and the maintenance of the stature. I don't think it's the landowner's fault that it's not required to do a lot, but from an endangered species perspective I think they would view caracara restoration as important as they would panther habitat restoration. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And I'm not disagreeing with you that it's important at all. I think it is. I'm glad to see that there are people willing to do it. I'm trying to justify the way the credits are disbursed in regards to that, especially when your committee is recommending an increase in credits of almost, what, 25 percent? You're going from 315,000 to 421,000 credits. And so -- MR. JONES: When you look at the entire suite of proposed changes, yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Right. MR. JONES: And we're also -- and we're also proposing a recalibration so all those credits don't flood the area with development. I think we've taken a reasonable approach. Today you can get eight credits. Under our proposal you get four credits. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. You mentioned that part of the caracara management technique besides the nesting tree is the burning. Page 67 January 30, 2009 MR. JONES: Is the maintenance of short stature grasses. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Burning one of those solutions? MR. JONES: Burning could be one, mowing could be one. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: So if you have caracara and you want that credit, wouldn't you be better off going to the exotic control burning for four credits, since that's part of the maintenance -- or could be part of the maintenance process anyway? I mean, there's no incentive then to do the two credits, because if you're going to have to maintain it for exotic control and burning, you might as well take the four credits. MR. JONES: Well, the exotic control and burning is a component different than the caracara management plan. The caracara is the maintenance of short stature. You don't have to burn to do it. You're not nec -- if you have an overgrown pasture of Brazilian pepper and you were to establish that, then you probably could get the exotics. If you clear the exotics from it, then yes, you should be entitled to it. Again, you could go to the highest level of whatever the restoration's accomplishing. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Exotic control, Tom, is I believe part of our requirements for development now anyway. In order to get a CO, you have to have all your exotics removed. MR. JONES: These are in SSA's. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. So we're just giving more -- okay. COMMISSIONER CARON: Why are -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Before I go to two, do you have anything? COMMISSIONER CARON: Well, yeah. I'm trying to understand why we're giving credits for something you have to do anyway. You're required to do something to protect the caracara. You just told me it's on the endangered species list. Page 68 January 30, 2009 MR. JONES: If it's used as a mitigation component, what's wrong with that? I don't have to do it this way. I can mitigate for it -- I don't know, I can probably mitigate for it somehow in Hendry County if I wanted to. COMMISSIONER CARON: So what you're saying is that the reason to give credits is to keep the mitigation here in Collier County? MR. JONES: No, the reasoning for doing the restoration is to improve habitat for caracaras. COMMISSIONER CARON: Here in Collier County. MR. JONES: Yeah, because that's where the RLSA program is. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay? COMMISSIONER CARON: Uh-huh. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Mark? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yes, Paul. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Sorry. So I think what you've brought out here is that not only do we have to define what restoration is for each category, we have to define which category ofland would be appropriate, the caracara restoration, which would be appropriate, the exotic control burning, and which would be -- you know, would be for native habitat restoration. You sort of have to categorize where you're starting from in order to decide what you're eligible for. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Is that a statement or just a-- COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Yeah, I'm saying that we need to map that out in the future. Because if you wanted to get more credits you could say well, I want to move my improved pasture into native habitat restoration and get all those more credits. So instead of getting two, you could plant pines and palmettos and oak trees and, you know, you'd get more credits than what you would before. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I would agree with you. But I don't know if that's what the committee agrees to. And I think-- MR. McDANIEL: And I might say, you folks have a different skew on things than we do, those of us who don't get to have the Page 69 January 30, 2009 opportunity to see with definity (sic) what you get to look at on a regular basis. At the committee level when we were discussing these things it was shared with us that when you come in with an application for an SSA and you're looking for restoration credits, there's a plan. You come to the staff with your plan, it's reviewed by plan and accepted by plan, and with that comes a perpetual maintenance and upkeep and so on and so forth before you're entitled to these things. So at our level -- I can see where you're going, because there's a lot more, if you will, definitions that are in other places. But at the committee level, we were looking for avenues for incentivization for creation of restoration in these areas that it isn't necessarily happening in other places. And I don't want to take away from Miss Elizabeth, but I think yesterday, you know, the caracara really isn't managed for in other areas of our state, in government owned lands and such because the management practices that are requisite for other endangered species aren't necessarily all that for the caracara. So -- and I understand where you're going. I'm just trying to share with you, Paul, from our perspective. If staff says to us during this process, they come to us with an SSA program -- or application and there's a restoration component within that, and within that restoration component there is a process of events that are to transpire that ultimately have to be agreed upon, accepted and then ultimately regulated by staff, that was okay for us at this level. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Somebody maybe at county staff could answer this question for me. What's the sanction, if somebody has agreed to permanent restoration and they don't keep their end of the bargain? What's the punishment? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Ten to life. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: You've already gotten your Page 70 January 30, 2009 credits awarded, so you've already gotten the award. What can you do to them? You can't take the credits away. COMMISSIONER VIGLIOTTI: We hang them. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I mean, I don't know what staffs MR. GREENWOOD: There are no credits awarded until the actual restoration is done. I don't know if that answers your question, but -- COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: But it has to be perpetually maintained. MR. GREENWOOD: Correct. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: What if they don't? MR. GREENWOOD: Well, first off, there's no credits. And I think somebody from environmental, Laura Roys, may be able to answer this better than I, obviously. MS. ROYS: Laura Roys, Environmental Services. The perpetual maintenance of the restored habitat is a requirement of the -- somebody can correct me if I'm wrong -- stewardship credit agreement or the -- one of the credit agreements that is a legal document that's approved with the SSA. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: And what if they don't-- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: The SSA's, when they get approved, go to the BCC. One of the recommendations that we had suggested, or maybe I have, I don't know how many did, was that the SSA's be reviewed by this panel as well so that we could understand that and we could actually make sure that those things were included. That didn't seem to sit well with the committee. But anyway, the SSA's don't -- they do go through public review and they have a separate agreement to which they have to abide by. I think that's what Laura's saying. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I understand that. But once you have the credit, you've gotten what you wanted and you don't abide by Page 71 January 30, 2009 it, what's the sanction? What's the punishment for not keeping up your end of the bargain? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Whatever the agreement says, I would assume. During lunch could you locate one agreement as an example and bring it back to us so we could kind of understand how those things are addressed in the agreement? MS. ROYS: Yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Were you planning on being here after lunch? MS. ROYS: Yeah, I'll be here. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Sometime between now and then. Would that work? Would that help you, Paul? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Yeah, ifit answers the question. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Mr. Wolfley? COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: I just wanted to add something to what Paul was saying. It's not just that -- what I found in the committee was that it's not just that you have the credits, it's that you've already sold them and then walk away. I mean, you've already taken the cash and you're in Ohio now. And I think we discussed that. And I've been looking through here and I just cannot seem to find a resolution. I remember there was a resolution, I just can't remember what it was or where it was. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Let's see what staff comes back with. I mean, I've read some of those SSA's, I just don't remember the language. And I'm sure that -- if staff says it's here, we'll just take a look at it when they come back. I had not finished my questions on 3.11, so I'll just continue until I do and then when we can get public comment. In number two, the last line said, should an owner also effectively complete the corridor restoration. The word effectively is troublesome, because that's very ambiguous. Do we need that word in Page 72 January 30, 2009 there? It's either you complete it or you don't. So I was just suggesting that you don't need the word effectively. I think it would provide some arbitrary arguments that may not work as well if you have it there. Also on number two it talks about the panther corridors. And I heard language about the incentive to complete the corridor and how everybody in the corridor then gets more credits if it finally gets completed. What happens -- and Mike DeRuntz, I need to probably ask you to comment on this. There is a conditional use request for a large mining pit in the north panther corridor right now. Is that a true statement, Mike? MR. DeRUNTZ: Mike DeRuntz, Comprehensive Planning. Yes, it is correct. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. And my concern is if you have to have a minimum width for a panther corridor and you have to have a viable panther corridor, because that's what I think we wanted -- was part of the discussion, is the viability for that corridor problematic, knowing that there's a conditional use sitting out there that could be approved under the old system and thus that would defeat the purpose of anybody wanting to buy into that north corridor because in the end they can't get what they thought they could get because the conditional use has already ruined that. And I don't know how that fits into Policy 3.11.2, but in your committee's deliberations did you not know about that pit that's been applied for up in the north panther corridor? And if you did, what were your thoughts on how to work around it to get the conditions in number two met so the people that do want to see a viable corridor there could have met those? MR. McDANIEL: Mr. Chair, I personally knew that there was at least aspirations at best for a mining operation to be permitted up in that particular area. But at the committee level there really wasn't any discussion Page 73 January 30, 2009 about that with specificity that I can in fact recall. I do recall, though, again as I shared with you earlier that, you know, we did talk about the continuity of the corridors and the necessity for some kind of designation of those corridors and the success necessary for the corridor at whatever designation, size, shape or color that it needed to flow at that particular stage. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, maybe when we get to public speakers -- I know there's been a lot of people banking on the various panther corridors, and I would like to see what their thoughts are on how this could be worked around if they had -- if it had crossed anybody's mind prior to today or whenever. Tom? MR. JONES: I could make a comment on that, but I think it -- I couldn't make it on behalf of the committee. I don't know if you want me to comment -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: No, go ahead. MR. JONES: -- on it now or later. Okay. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Your insight's always welcome, Tom. MR. JONES: Thank you. The landowner of that property in question acknowledges that there probably will be potentially -- there is the potential for the development of the corridor. And in their application to the county they have put the northern boundary of the pit at what they believe to be a reasonable distance that would be able to accommodate the corridor. In addition to that, since there aren't any specifics for the corridor and it's a conceptual corridor, should a design actually be implemented and move forward, that particular property owner would have the ability then to adjust anything under any approvals that they may have acquired by the time that the corridor is actually laid out. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Do you know what the minimum width is for a panther corridor? Page 74 January 30, 2009 MR. JONES: No, I don't. I know there's a lot of discussion. A lot of people have different opinions, a lot of people have different science to back up what they want. But no, I don't. But the corridor is conceptual at this point. And I -- and the landowner in question would make allowances if they agreed with the corridor that was designed and actually approved by the landowners. And I think it goes to Mr. Midney's earlier comment: There's going to have to be a cooperative effort among the landowners to make those corridors work. The landowners aren't necessarily going to put things on hold, but they're certainly recognizing that there's an opportunity that a corridor may be implemented in that area. The landowners involved recognize that and they're willing to work with it to put in a feasible -- they're taking steps to work together to implement a feasible corridor in these areas that have been tentatively located -- identified. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Is the landowner a member of the six major landowners out there that are part of that orgi -- I think it's EPOC or something like that? MR. JONES: ECPO. Eastern Collier Property Owners. Yeah, the landowner is Barron Collier Companies, and we are a member of the Eastern Collier Property Owners. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, see, you kind of know a lot about them. MR. JONES: I know a lot about it. Not only are we members ofECPO, we're also the largest private landowner in the county, and we are the largest landowner in Eastern Collier County. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: So you have a memorandum of understanding that talks about a northern panther corridor, and we have all this work done on this RLSA program to work towards the corridors that are I think in question. Yet you went in and applied for a conditional use for a mining pit right in the middle of the corridor. Page 75 January 30, 2009 What was your -- why did you do that? MR. JONES: I need to correct something. It's not in the middle of the corridor. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. MR. JONES: The boundaries that we've applied for are south of the corridor that are conceptually proposed by the landowners. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. I was just wondering why you would do that, knowing you had all these other things based on that -- banking on that corridor. MR. JONES: Well, we do it because we don't stand still until everything ultimately comes together. We have a keen recognition that we would like to see a corridor implemented in the northern portion of the county. For whatever reasons it may not come to fruition. If it does come to fruition, we'll incorporate it into our plans. We can always modify. You're very well aware that we can always modify what's ever approved. I think to limit what we would apply for would be foolish on our part, because what if for scientific reason there's no validity to implement a corridor? We've submitted to the county for approvals and now we would have to go back up and ask for more. It's always easier to ask for more in the beginning and reduce it than to come in with a smaller application and ask an entity to increase the size of it later. We recognize what's going on. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: The timing just surprised me. MR. JONES: Timing's always bad for everything. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: It sure is. MR. JONES: It's not exactly what I was going to say, but-- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Let's move on to paragraph three. MR. CORNELL: Mr. Strain, can I-- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Oh, yeah, Brad. MR. CORNELL: I just wanted to add a comment in answer to a Page 76 January 30, 2009 question you had earlier. And also about the corridors, I want to reemphasize what Tom Jones said about the conceptual nature of that map that showed the southern and the northern corridors. Because, you know, the test of what actually would be restored as a corridor or maintained as a corridor is what's functional and successfully completed that meets, you know, a management plan that the agencies would approve. And to that same end, you question the word effectively complete the corridor restoration in that sub-paragraph two. If you look at sub-paragraph three, which you're just going to, you see a different word used, which is successfully complete. I think that's the intension of effectively. I know that was my interpretation of seeing that language was that we want to see not just completion but successful completion. And that implies that you're complying and meeting the criteria of success that would be in a management plan. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I've got successfully circled too, so-- MR. CORNELL: You don't like that either? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, it's arbitrary. Whose success are you depending on, yours or the landowner's? MR. CORNELL: The criteria in the management plan that the agency would approve for that corridor restoration. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, that goes back to Paul's question, which will be answered when we see an SSA as to how effective that language is. MR. CORNELL: Well, I agree that there's -- there is some gray area in the GMP, and it asks the question I guess of you all as planners, how much detail about the specificity of the restoration plans do you want to have in the GMP spelled out. And it is an issue. And I guess that's a debate about how much detail you want in there. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I don't think the question was how much detail we want in this document. We just want to make sure that the detail is addressed somewhere. And if the addressing of that detail is Page 77 January 30, 2009 in the SSA awarding, then that's maybe something that works and we just needed to see that, so -- MR. CORNELL: And particularly with regard to restoration, my understanding is that there would be oversight and approval of management criteria and management success by an agency that oversees that species, if it's for a specific species. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I hope -- I imagine that's what we'll see when Laura comes back with an example of SSA's, so thank you. Let me try to finish up with my questions. Number three -- MS. FLEMING: Could I just add to that point? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Were you a member of the committee? MS. FLEMING: No, I wasn't. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Are you speaking for the committee or as a public citizen? MS. FLEMING: I don't know who's speaking. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Let's just wait. We haven't got to public comment yet. Let's just keep everybody on the same level playing field. Right now it's the Planning Commission's interaction with the committee. I'd like it to stay that way. Public comment from non-committee members can come when we ask for public comment. As far as number three goes, the second to last line says, should the landowner successfully complete the restoration, the additional six credits per acre shall be awarded. Up on top, it's the government that completes the restoration, so what this is saying is if the landowner comes in and chooses to allow restoration and he wants to do the caracara restoration, he gets the credits at six credits per acre; is that right? MR. McDANIEL: Say that again, please? MR. JONES: Yes. MR. McDANIEL: Yes. Page 78 January 30, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, Tom understands where I'm going then. Basically that's what -- okay, that's what I understand. So the government doesn't have to do the restoration, the landowner can do it. And if it's beneficial financially for the credits he's to receive, undoubtedly he would do it. MR. McDANIEL: Correct. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: The last line, only one type of restoration shall be rewarded with these credits for each acre designated for restoration. And this is something I'm sure Brad had wanted done too, because he's usually the guy that likes format in these languages. But doesn't that apply to all of 3.11 ? And if so, wouldn't you want to drop it outside paragraph three so it fits? MR. GREENWOOD: That's probably a very good suggestion. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, somebody had suggested to it to me so it wasn't mine alone. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: And Mark, on that point? Is there a way somebody could run through this paragraph and come out with 36 credits, which would be all the prizes? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, that's a good question. What is the maximum amount of credits anybody could gain for any acre under restoration? MR. McDANIEL: Ten? MR. JONES: Yeah. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Ten. MR. JONES: If they implement the panther corridor. MR. McDANIEL: And that's through the implementation of the panther corridor. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Any other questions from the Planning Commission? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Point out where you see that. I Page 79 January 30, 2009 mean, where does that lock that in? MR. McDANIEL: In number 2 of3.11. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Eight and two. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I mean, I read that number two is you get two and you wait around until you finally complete it, then you get eight more. I think -- definitely think that last sentence has to be rewritten to say that. So you're saying 10 is the most you can get because you can't use any combination of these, and that's the one that gives you the most. MR. McDANIEL: Yes, sir. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: So for any restoration opportunity accumulatively, you can't do more than 10 credits per acre. And that includes the two base credits for agreeing to restoration? MR. McDANIEL: I believe so. MR. JONES: Yes. And you actually can -- it's not accumulative of the paragraph. The maximum allowable, if you do the panther corridor, is 10. The maximum allowable if you do the native habitat restoration is eight. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: So then you can have 18 if you do the restoration and the panther corridor? MR. JONES: It's not cumulative. It's not cumulative. Panther corridor is specific. Just like under the existing program, the existing program today, the maximum number of restoration credits you can get is eight. COMMISSIONER CARON: No matter what you do. MR. JONES: Right. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And now you can get 10. MR. JONES: If you do the panther corridor. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. So the eight additional credits per acre within the panther corridor become part of that 10. MR. JONES: Yes, correct. Page 80 January 30, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Does that answer your question? Although I -- it's not clear on here that it meets that. Is there some way that you would discuss possibly in that last sentence adding the maximum through any method at all could be 10 acres per -- I mean 10 credits per acre? MR. McDANIEL: There was no real specificity from the committee's standpoint with regard to that. We weren't as -- I mean, to myself it's fairly evident that -- and again, the separation of that last sentence out specifying that there can't be layers of credits established for restoration might be a different way of saying the same thing. But my interpretation looking at this is if you can't have layers and if you only get 10 on the panther corridors, up to 10, that was it. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Mark? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. David? COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Would it solve Brad's issue if we just put at the end of 2, 3.11.2, comma, to a maximum of 10 allowable credits per acre? Would that help? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I think-- COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: I mean, I know we all know that that's the maximum allowable, but -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I think if you're going to add a reference to the -- you want to add it at the end of the last line separate from a paragraph, because it would have applied to all three paragraphs, not just to paragraph two. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: That's true. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And I think that's something we can debate when we want to go in to deliberations on recommendations as this goes forward. MR. McDANIEL: And ifI -- just as a point, and I'm not belaboring it too awful much. I mean, these aren't the specific GMP hearings that we're dealing with at this stage. Ultimately this language is going to be taken and developed into those things. So with Page 81 January 30, 2009 specificity there's going to be -- can be more discussion with respect to how we get happy language, if you will. CHAIRMAN STRAIN : Well, I think part of the exercise, though, is kind of a forewarning. So Brad, did you have anymore? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Yeah, I was just going to say, this is really dangerous, because we're constantly saying add a credit, add a credit, add a credit, add a credit. I mean, I'm not clear where you stop. I mean, obviously what we've done is getting closer to that, but how does that work with other things in -- MR. McDANIEL: And again, it's not a -- there is, when you look at the policies in their entirety, there is an aggregate amount of credits that are out there. There is a cap on the acreage of developable land that's associated with that. So it isn't just an add a credit, add a credit thing. I kind of take exception to that. I mean, I can see how you're feeling there, but there was methodology, there was reasoning behind what in fact it was that we determined here. And it's not just -- there wasn't just willy-nilly thrown in here, we took into account a tremendous amount of information to come up with these suggested amendments. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Yeah, I think I'd be happy if the word "or" was used more often, that's all. Just to differentiate. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, well let's move on to public speakers on this item, there are no other questions from the committee then. Are there any public speakers on -- I don't know if anybody's got anything to say. Elizabeth? MS. FLEMING: Yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Now we're into public speakers. MS. FLEMING: Thank you. Elizabeth Fleming with Defenders of Wildlife. Page 82 January 30, 2009 I wanted to make the comment, with all this discussion of the restoration and different credits awarded and the management plans and the easements themselves. This is related to a point I made the day before yesterday in Policy 1.7 where the signatories to the easements, we were a proponent of having the Florida Fish & Wildlife Conservation Commission also be on the easements. Because within those SSA agreements, the credit agreement specifies the land management measures that will be undertaken and the party responsible for such measures. So if one of these easements is going to include species such as caracara, Florida panther, other threatened/endangered species of special concern, the Wildlife Commission should have a role in evaluating the terms that go into that and the management measures and see that they're carried out. And that was a point I made the other day. And I think you questioned the reasoning for that. But this is an example. I just wanted to make that point. Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: One question. On another level of expertise that you expressed on Wednesday, and that is the panther. I know you're heavily involved in panther protection. What is a viable corridor's minimum width or length? And the one I'm talking about is that northern corridor. I don't know how wide it is, I can't tell by the scale we're using here and by these little maps. But what does your organization see as a viable width? MS. FLEMING: There are different sources in the literature, and there is a panel of six experts looking at it right now. I do not consider myself an expert on Florida panther corridor widths. I could quote what others have said. And my understanding is that the viability of a corridor weighs heavily on what it is next to. If it is adjacent to a development or a road, it would have to have a different configuration than if it were, you know, in the middle of an undeveloped area. Page 83 January 30, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: What if it's next to a centroid? MS. FLEMING: I'm not an expert to answer that. We work a lot on panther habitat -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: We have some centroids located near the northern -- or at least one, at least, near the northern -- MS. FLEMING: There are six people looking at this very plan right now, and we expect their results -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Can they come and speak to us about what they're looking at? Because we have to make a decision before they may be done. MS. FLEMING: You'd have to ask them that. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Thank you. MS. FLEMING: I did ask Darrell. We did try and get in touch with Darrell to see ifhe could answer some of these panther specific questions, and he said that ifhe'd been contacted earlier, he could have put it in his schedule. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, thank you. Next speaker, please. Tim? MR. DURHAM: Got all the way till now before I had to come up here. That's great. Tim Durham, Wilson-Miller. I just wanted to clarify something. The north corridor, please don't conceive of that as a fenced tunnel that the panther's moving through. Probably the more proper term for that would be the restoration zone for the corridor. And what we're really looking at is within that line work you see there, having the property owners create a series of natural areas that the panther would connect across the landscape, the panther would still be free to move through the ago areas in the adjacent portion. So it's not being restricted to that area, rather it's the backbone of the system, if you will, areas where the property owners would restore habitat and the panther could use it as stepping stones, as Darrell puts Page 84 January 30, 2009 it, to be able to move through the landscape. Panthers don't use that area in any consistent pattern because there aren't enough natural cover areas for them to feel comfortable with on a repetitive basis. So the corridor's really a restoration zone. I think the ultimate corridor, or whatever that width is or whatever, it will be determined by others. But at least we've identified a series of connection points that could be restored that do respect the property ownership issues, rather than just drawing a gash through the area, which isn't specific to ownership or interests that are out there. So by no means is that the definitive final corridor location or width, it's a backbone system, if you will, starting point. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: The other day when you spoke, there was some question about the width of a panther corridor. And you said well, what is the length, because the width would depend on the length. It led me to believe you may have some knowledge regarding widths of panther corridors. And if that is a right assumption, and knowing that you know about this northern corridor, what widths are you thinking is appropriate up there? MR. DURHAM: The debate about widths gets fairly technical. If you're talking -- it depends on what it's running through. If you've got heavy development on both sides, you'd have to have, you know, a fairly wide corridor. Also, how long is that corridor. By the same token, in agricultural land settings, you know, in speaking with Darrell Land and others, there's been occasions where they'll use an old tram road as their main connection point that's, you know, 30 feet wide and use that as a corridor, because that's where they feel comfortable with the most cover moving through an area. I think if -- we're talking about agricultural settings on both sides of the corridor? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: On this one, on your north-south link Page 85 January 30, 2009 you have a -- I don't know how you all want to define a centroid, but you've got a centroid on one side and potential development on the other. I don't know what that other potential element could be. MR. DURHAM: Right. And again, that's where buffering requirements come -- will playa factor. Human activity that's up against the panther corridor will have to buffer, all right, and that plays into that equation as well. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. MR. DURHAM: Again, I'm not trying to be evasive. It's just a complicated question. I think there's other answers that are going to come out. We've at least identified a corridor. We've coordinated that with Darrell Land. At least, you know, it shows the intent in that area. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I think your statement that you have at least identified a corridor is what drives my questionings. Because you may have identified it as a corridor, but is that truly a corridor? And that's what my concern is. MR. DURHAM: It is not until it's established and functions as one, so -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: A lot of the program that we have in front of us and a lot of the agreements that are made to the side have depended upon that being something. And all I'm trying to find out is if all that was worthwhile. So thanks. I appreciate it, Tim. Ms. Caron? COMMISSIONER CARON: Well, and if you look at the rest of their conceptual plans, they have towns running up against there. I mean, this is a town. MR. McDANIEL: Can I make a suggestion there -- COMMISSIONER CARON: And a village. MR. McDANIEL: -- for and on behalf of the committee. And again, I'm speaking on the public side of it as well. Page 86 January 30, 2009 Do not get all hung up on those concept maps. The locations of towns and villages throughout the rural land stewardship area are going to be where they are ultimately decided to be. And the creation from a committee level of the corridor was an establishment of that as an opportunity for that to be. As development comes forward, Ms. Caron, with respect to applications for SRA's, we will have far better information and data sets available to make decisions as to the viability of the locations of those centroids, as you've mentioned. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: You called them that, now, I didn't. I mean, somebody did. It wasn't my idea. MR. McDANIEL: With that, it's just a -- you look at the map, it's really, really important that in the existing program there was -- there is no established corridors. We have learned -- we at the committee level learned that the experts out there, Darrell Land specifically, likes the idea of the connectivity between the CREW lands and the eastern portions of the primary habitat out there for the panthers. And so that was our endeavor to get there. And knowing that wildlife crossings ultimately had to be implemented in that process. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. Next? Nicole. MS. RYAN: Nicole Ryan, Conservancy of Southwest Florida. Beginning with subsection one of Policy 3.11, The Conservancy has also been concerned about this awarding of credits simply for dedicating land for restoration that the landowner mayor may not ever do. We had requested that that be revisited and actually removed. It's been taken down by 50 percent. But we would like to see that if restoration credits are awarded that at least you have some sort of specific plan in place before any credits are up-front rewarded. And then the balance of the credits would be rewarded after specific success criteria have been met. But the idea of awarding the credits and then saying that the government, the taxpayers can restore your lands, we believe that that is Page 87 January 30, 2009 inappropriate. And as was mentioned earlier by Mr. Varnadoe, if no one has taken the credits and walked away, then what would be the problem with making this correction. Also, in looking at the aspects of restoration under subsection one, restoration is something that is key. The concern that The Conservancy has is that when the program went from transmittal and then to adoption, restoration credits were added and the program just blossomed into how many additional credits were available for SRA's. So we're very concerned about the adding of more restoration credits, of the manipulation of restoration credits. We believe that this is something that really, really needs to be looked into. For example, in the Wilson-Miller technical support documents, when they're discussing how they're going to get to the 400 some odd thousand credits that will then be backed into the 45,000-acre cap, they make some assumptions as to how many credits this tiered restoration under subsection one will generate. Their estimate is that 11,600 acres will be suitable for such restoration activity and that it will generate 72,000 credits for that generation. But there's nothing in here that caps it at that credit amount. So it could be much, much more. If it's more, then that means that there would be more potential land available for SRA's, which would then exceed the 45,000 acres. Then you have credits that have no value once you hit that cap. The same thing in subsection two. And Mike or Tom, if you wouldn't mind putting up the Wilson-Miller transportation map. The same issue. You have 10 credits for panther corridors. That's based on panther corridors of2,300 acres, which equates to 23,000 credits. If those corridors need to be wider than that, again, you're generating many more credits than you've based your assumption on, and you've really flooded the market with credits. In looking at these specific corridors, in the first sentence of subsection two, it references in certain locations as generally Page 88 January 30, 2009 illustrated in the RLSA overlay map there may be opportunities to create and restore corridors. There isn't anything currently on the overlay map that actually specifies corridors. These are the only maps that really have the corridors on them. So I'm not sure if those would then be added to the RLSA overlay map where those corridors would be located on that map and what happens if the corridors need to be wider or in different locations. So I'm not sure how that is going to tie in there. But I did want to point out, and it's interesting with the sand mine application, The Conservancy was wondering why the corridor went straight up and then took a 90-degree turn at the county line. And perhaps it is because of current conditional use applications. Commissioner Strain, you had asked a question about the appropriate widths of corridors, and The Conservancy had distributed a map on Wednesday of some corridor locations and widths that we felt would be appropriate. There was also some discussion amongst the committee about where we got some of our data from on this map. So I -- I'm going to turn our presentation over, if it's acceptable, to Jennifer Hecker, who is in charge of our natural resources policy program. She and her staff put this map together, so they can answer your questions on the corridor widths and where we got our documentation and data. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, thank you. MS. HECKER: We also have some supplemental information about the map. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I'll hold one for you, Cherie'. We'll be breaking a little before 12:00. MS. HECKER: Thank you for the opportunity to explain this and clarify. This map is really a representation of the best available science on panthers and answers a lot of the questions that the committee has been raising with regard to appropriate location of panther corridors, Page 89 January 30, 2009 appropriate widths. If I can walk you through this document that I've just passed out very briefly. The Conservancy's proposed build-out map avoids development or intensification of land use within the primary panther zone, also synonymously referred to as the primary panther habitat, as identified by Kautz. This is an expert panther scientist who has a published peer reviewed article that has identified these areas. And we also have based the corridors on this map on current pathways of panther movement as identified by Swanson. And again, this is a published article that was created by the Florida Fish & Wildlife Conservation Commission, and we'll go into some greater detail in a minute about that. But the source of our data for this, I want to make it clear. The shaped files is what it's referred to in GIS, were derived from agencies. The agencies provided those to us directly and we in no way manipulated those shaped files. The data is as the agency has provided to us. So in the case of the primary habitat zone, which is represented on this map, that shaped file was provided to us by the Florida Fish & Wildlife Conservation Commission back in 2006. And that's the basis of that on that map. Okay, that's actually a representation out of the Kautz paper of that. But if you wouldn't mind putting it back to the other map for discussion purposes. A lot of talk has been about primary zone and primary habitat. I think there's been somewhat an assertion of confusion and an effort to reinterpret the science. The science is pretty clear on this and the scientists do not have any disagreement as to what is primary. The primary habitat was based on not only telemetry, because telemetry is not a complete representation, only approximately. And this is according to Darrell Page 90 January 30, 2009 Land, who others have mentioned. Less than a third of the current population is currently collared and being tracked, so you cannot use telemetry alone to determine where areas are being occupied by panthers. They used a whole host of other types of scientific data, including preferred habitat types and other data. And the primary zone is specifically -- and I want to quote this directly out of the article. Not only includes these preferred habitat types but also other natural and non-urban disturbed land cover types between forest patches that serve as landscape connections that accommodate panther home range and dispersal movements. So it was understood that this is a landscape level look. It is not meant to Swiss cheese out every farm field, it was meant to look at what were the needs of a wide-ranging mammal that typically has 100 to 200-mile square mile home range. The primary zone has been reinforced, if you will. Not only did the Kautz paper, which was peer reviewed and published in a scientific journal support this as the best available science, but the Service has endorsed it and has reiterated it in its recently released Florida Panther Recovery Plan. And I would just like to read again a direct quote from that Recovery Plan with regard to the primary zone. It states, quote, the primary zone supports the only breeding panther population. To prevent further loss of population viability, habitat conservation efforts should focus on maintaining the total available area, quality and spatial extent of the habitat within the primary zone. So this is essentially the science of where we should be focusing our conservation efforts. And The Conservancy is trying to communicate that to you in this map of what the science is dictating here as far as where we should be focusing, putting those agricultural preservation areas, which we believe should be limited to the primary zone, and where we should be focusing development, which we Page 91 January 30, 2009 believe should be limited to only areas outside the primary zone. And as it was mentioned earlier, the area of critical state concern is of course concern to us, but it is primary zone. So this primary zone protection would capture that. I want to read -- a lot has been discussed about the scientific review team. And because there are two members of the scientific review team that are public agency officials, one from the Commission and one from the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, they are subject to public records laws. And we've obtained a lot of the communications, and I'd like to read a couple quotes directly from the panther exerts themselves, in lieu of them not being able to be here. The first quote is from Randy Kautz, who is the author of this published peer reviewed article that is the basis of the primary zone. And it reads, the primary zone boundary was drawn in a manner that was data driven, achieved with the consensus of 11 experts willing to have their name on a manuscript and survived scientific peer review that led to the publication and biological conservation. The reason that the tomato fields are in there is that they are part of the mosaic of landscapes that support panthers based on telemetry, and that provides buffers against indirect effects of intensive human activities. So I want you to know that it's no mistake -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I don't mean to interrupt your train of thought, but you and Nicole have one thing in common, you talk very fast. And it's okay for us to hear that, but she types everything down. I want to make sure everything's accurate for the record. MS. HECKER: I know I'm standing between you and your lunch, so I was trying to be as quick as I could. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Don't worry about it, this is far too important to worry about lunch. So take your time, we'll still take a lunch break and we always can come back for more. MS. HECKER: Okay. Well, it was no mistake that these fields Page 92 January 30, 2009 were included. These fields are important to providing the prey base that the panthers -- I mean, obviously panthers need to eat and, you know, so they venture out. They prefer forested cover. Obviously a lot of our telemetry has been collected during daytime, and in which case the panthers are resting in trees. So that gives a representation of what they're doing then. But at night they're hunting, and they are known to go out into these fields. And we do have some limited data. Very little data at this point has been collected, but we do have some data that has shown that they are venturing out into these open areas. But again, I want it understood that the biologists saw the fields as fields when they designated them primary panther habitat. A little bit about the corridors. Again, these corridors are based on what the scientists have derived as functional corridor locations, of active corridors, patterns of movement that they have mapped in the least cause pathways. And I want to read something about the northern corridor that's been proposed by the landowners at this point. This is from one of the scientific review team members, and he is writing it to the other scientific review team members. And he states: Based on all the ecological design concepts that I've studied, I could not support the landowner's proposed north corridor as is as a viable functioning wildlife corridor. I would think that most of our colleagues would laugh us out of the building for supporting that concept. The thoughts are that the probability of ever promoting any movement between Camp Keais Strand at the Ok. State Forest are virtually nil. My role, as I interpret it, is to evaluate it based on my knowledge oflandscape ecology and conservation biology. I understand that the landowners are more mindful of land ownership and economic value associated with any particular design, and while it may work well for those objectives, for facilitating wildlife movement different designs should be considered and proposed. Page 93 January 30, 2009 So I think that it's important that -- and we would be happy to provide any of these, because these are public records, to the committee after lunch, copies of these communications. But I think it's important to understand that as you have already brought up that it's easy to give but it's almost impossible to take away. And what you're doing here is going to shape not only the future growth in Collier County but the future of a critically endangered species of which there's only estimated to be 100 left. Twenty-three died last year, and three have already died this month. So I think that it's very important that you weigh these credits and the location of where these are being awarded very carefully. We want this program to work. We believe in incentive-based approaches, but they must be compatible with state and federal regulatory guidelines and laws. And the Endangered Species Act, right now we do not believe that the current RLSA program is compliant by allowing development into these areas. And we certainly don't want to be awarding agricultural preservation credits in such a manner that it would actually lessen our incentive -- and that's how we view it -- lessen our incentive to protect primary panther habitat that is currently vulnerable to development because it's designated open lands under the current RLSA program. We have an opportunity here to rectify this program and to incorporate the science and make science-based policy. And we really are encouraging you to look at the science carefully. This is not our opinion. This is the scientist's opinion we are representing here, these are straight from federal agencies and state agency scientists. And we would be happy to support and justify and defend any of the data that is here. In closing, I just had a couple last minute thoughts. I know that there's a lot of concern, I know on our part, that just protecting the panther isn't really enough. Because we need to be looking more holistically at other natural resources. Obviously we have great Page 94 January 30, 2009 concerns with our water resources, water quality, other listed species that are in the area. And I wanted to mention a couple things about why it's so important to protect primary. Because the panther is an umbrella species, that in protecting primary panther habitat you would also be protecting all documented eagle nests as of 2006, all Florida black bear recorded through telemetry as of 2006, most documented wading bird rookeries as of 1999, most natural land cover, including existing wetlands as of2003, and most panthers recorded through telemetry as of 2008. That really demonstrates, when we did this GIS analysis, how much of an umbrella species the panther is, and how important the primary panther habitat is in not only protecting the panther but protecting other wildlife and our own sustainability. And so we encourage you to revisit the program, to back up and look at the program more holistically and think about taking this as an opportunity to fix the program, to further it. And specifically in limiting the ago preservation additional credits to those areas that are primary panther habitat open designated areas. If you give credit to everywhere, you're really not incentivizing anything specifically. You could be inadvertently awarding credit for someone to develop the primary and save non-primary lands in return. And that does not achieve the natural resources goal. That is not a balance between agriculture development and natural resources protection. So we're encouraging you to look with us at solutions. This is a map, in our opinion, of a solution of how we could retool the program. Those yellow areas represent open lands outside the primary zone that are lesser of value from a natural resource perspective that could be developed. 33,000 acres. That's plenty of land for additional growth. We need to compress our growth to stay within that area. If we don't, if we entitle more, we are going to necessitate the impact of Page 95 January 30, 2009 primary panther habitat and other critical natural resource areas. You can't have it that way unless you maintain that balance of development, natural resource protection and agricultural stewardship. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I'm going to have to ask you to start wrapping up. You've had a little over 10 minutes. MS. HECKER: Sorry. That's it. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: We've got to have a lot of other people COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Mr. Chair? MS. HECKER: That was my only thing I'm going to say this whole time. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Let's see if we have any questions first. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Mr. Strain? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Mr. Wolfley? COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Could you please just turn your whole folder thing over so you show the type, the text that she was reading from? Just turn that whole thing over. Just turn it over. There you go. And if you can get that to show. And I was reading some other stuff, having a difficult time reading this in the dark over here, but there are two -- I think the question was how wide are panther corridors. There are two paragraphs in the middle that seem to answer that. MS. HECKER: Yes, they do. I'm-- COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: And I can't remember if you -- MS. HECKER: I didn't mention that, and that's -- thank you, that was a point I meant to make. There is science. In fact, the 2008 Florida Panther Recovery Plan speaks specifically to widths, and it recommends ranges in widths from half of an average home range, about 5.5 miles width for a corridor to at least, and that is in quotes, one mile in width. That is considered minimal. And that is why we use that as the basis for the widths that we represented on our map. Page 96 January 30, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Your map is approximately one mile wide in the northern corridor? MS. HECKER: The northern corridor is one mile wide. This -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Do you know how that scale corresponds to the scale we've been seeing on that other map, the centroid map, as I -- MS. HECKER: Yes, the centroid map, we have calculated in GIS ranges from 300 to 600 feet wide. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. Anybody else? Brad. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: You know what would be -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Jennifer, don't walk away yet. We're getting questions for you before you leave. Thank you. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: What would be helpful if you took -- is his name Kautz? MS. HECKER: Kautz. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: If you took on the Kautz map, could you outline the RLSA area? MS. JENKINS: Well, that is what our RLSA map does, in essence. We took the Kautz layers, if you will. The primary is that area that is in light green and dark green. It's already captured with some of the current flow way stewardship areas and habitat stewardship areas. But the areas that are light green that are adjacent to the yellow are areas that are primary that currently are designated open. So those are the areas that we're really trying to target. Those are the areas that are currently vulnerable to development that are within the primary zone. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: But could you -- I mean, would it be difficult for somebody to actually do it on his map, overlay his map? I mean, I know you say that, but it's not exactly what I would see I think if I did it. So could you do that? Page 97 January 30, 2009 MS. JENKINS: Well, we did that to the best that you can do that in GIS. We geo-referenced. We took the shape files that were used for his map and we laid other features that were also of the same scale on top of it. But we don't have -- I mean, I don't know what you're really getting at. His map is a paper map. And the shape files that were used for his map are what we used for our map. We don't have a way to manipulate his map directly. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: My thought would be -- you know, technically lets you and I talk when the meeting's over. MS. HECKER: Okay. I appreciate it. Thank you. Any suggestions are welcome. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Any other questions of Jennifer? Paul, did you have some? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Just a comment. I think it almost sounds as though it's kind of an adversarial thing. But I would just like to make the observation that it could be something that is complimentary. Because as you protect the primary panther habitat and the agriculture, you're making the communities' developments that are left that much more valuable and that much more well designed. And I think that it could be economically viable, even with what we're asking -- what she's recommending for panther protection and agriculture preservation, it could be, even though you might have to reduce the footprint by some amount, economically it might still work. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. Now, before we go to the next public speaker, I'd like to just mention about lunch. Last time we took a little longer than an hour for lunch, only because I'm not sure where you go for lunch around here. But everybody got back here at 1 :00. Did you need that additional time? COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Yes. Page 98 January 30, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Mr. Wolfley says yes. Do the rest of the members? Okay. Then we'll plug on for just a little bit yet and we'll try to break close to 12:00. Next public speaker? MR. PRIDDY: Daddy asked to go first. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: George? MR. VARNADOE: And I listened with interest to the interpretations of The Conservancy as to science, but somehow I thought we were talking about corridors with this policy and not overall panther protection. But maybe I missed it. But I like the map. Look at the northern corridor. Do you see any primary habitat in that northern corridor? No. Now, tell me how you're going to establish that northern corridor without writing a big check and without the landowner's cooperation. Because that land is an active ago now, and that's why the panthers aren't using it. There's not a bunch of native vegetation up there, it's not primary habitat. So none of the scientists have said that's something we ought to be protecting. So we come in with an innovative program to try to improve the situation and what do we do, we have people saying, well, that's not enough, you really need more. Well, at some point in time the landowner's going to say no. And then what are you going to have? You're not going to have anything. So remember, this is an incentive based voluntary program. This is not regulatory. The Conservancy says they like incentive based, but I'm not sure that's not a little bit disingenuous. So I just want everybody to remember, the only thing I see endangered by this map is private property rights. Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you, sir. Any questions? (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: If not, next speaker. Page 99 January 30, 2009 MR. PRIDDY: Russell Priddy. I'll respond to one of Jennifer's comments or observations about the northern corridor and why it suddenly took a right-hand turn. I think that's real obvious to everyone in the room. You get into Hendry County and we don't have jurisdiction to do anything up there. We can only work within the envelope we're given. If we turn -- our other option would be to turn left, but that doesn't ultimately hook us up to where the panthers need to go. So, you know, while that conceptual line for a corridor may not be perfect and may get moved, may get widened, may get narrowed, it has to turn right and go to where the panthers are. To the issue of issuing these restoration credits or early entry, let me first back up and remind everyone, because there seems to be an overtone that it's the landowner's greed that's driving this. The landowners did pay for the study, the three-year study that ended up with RLSA. Not one time did we mention restoration credits. In fact, we first, when it was introduced to us, thought that that just wouldn't work. That wasn't our idea. So please don't -- when you're talking about restoration credits, please don't blame that on us. And I keep finding myself having to use me as the example. I have to stand here and tell you I'm a prime example for why you would give a landowner two credits now, it was four, but two credits to offer up their land for restoration. Folks, I don't have the money to do the restoration. So do I not offer it up and restoration never take place or do I try to do the right thing and make it available? Not necessarily for the public to come pay for it. The Conservancy can use some of their $25 million they just raised. They got there so fast they had to go to 33. Maybe they can use some of that extra to pay for the restoration. It doesn't have to be the taxpayers, there's other folks out there that can chip in. Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Russell, the questioning that I have Page 100 January 30, 2009 initiated and I think others as well, I don't believe it was from a position of greed. As a Planning Commission, we're trying to understand how the credits equate in the bigger picture, why two credits for a caracara is worth two credits for a caracara, what it means as far as application of land codes. Because you're asking for a large increase in credits. And whether that's right or wrong, we're trying to figure out how it's legitimate to get there. It has nothing to do with forcing people to spend money or not, it's just simply what does it take to get there and does everything balance properly. MR. PRIDDY: Well, and I think the landowners tried to offset that in recalibrating the credits. Because yes, if you add the total of what's being proposed, we got way beyond what we could -- you know, the 45 would allow. And, you know, we realized amongst ourselves that that had to be recalibrated back to get to the 45. Number one, it has to be in balance. And I don't want to be the one stuck with credits at the end of the day with nowhere for them to go. So, you know, I've on occasion had to remind my colleagues and my fellow landowners that this had to be fair. And we're the ones that's most concerned with that being fair. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I understand. Thank you. Anybody else? David? COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Yeah, and I'm not meaning to pick on you, Mr. Priddy. MR. PRIDDY: That's okay. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: But let's say that you get your credits and you sell them. And what -- I guess what was a concern over here was what is to assure that your grandchildren and great grandchildren will maintain that piece of property? I find it difficult -- I find it hard to believe that the generation down, how that will work. MR. PRIDDY: Well, I think the legal document, and maybe Heidi can answer that. I don't have the specifics in my SSA that's in Page 10 1 January 30, 2009 process. Mr. Varnadoe has been the author of those, maybe he can answer that. But, you know, we're creating a legal document, a legal easement. You know, what specifically that is, I'm not sure. But there's certainly a financial commitment. And I think I've been told somewhere along the line that when my SSA goes through, I have -- particularly with restoration, there has to be some either cash deposit or bond put in place. And again, I've been several years, and I'm almost there, but I'm not quite through that. But there are others in the room that's been there, done that and have that document in hand. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: I just found it very difficult on why it would even be worth it. MR. PRIDDY: Well, you know, again, I think you have to give some credit or credibility to people and not assume that everyone out there is a gangster and is going to get their money and run to Ohio. You know, some of us have -- my kids are fourth generation on this property. We as a family take a lot of pride in the ownership of the land, number one, and the stewardship of the land and the diversity of the use of the land. Not only for generating cash flow so we can pay our ad valorem taxes, but for the protection of wildlife. And I'll offer our property up against anyone as far as quality on any of those things. I think it's second to none. Perhaps equal to several, but second to none. You know, so I don't know, I think there's a cynical element there that everybody that comes along is going to rape and pillage and leave town. And I just simply don't believe that. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Well, that's not really what I meant, but thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Next speaker? DR. HUSHON: Do you want me now or do you want to break for lunch? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, you know, it would probably be Page 102 January 30, 2009 better if we took -- came back at 1 :00. Is that in agreement with everyone on the Planning Commission? Thank you for offering. If you don't mind, we'll break now and come back here at 1 :00 and resume with Judith's discussion. (Luncheon recess.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Good afternoon. Okay. It's one o'clock everyone. If you could take your seats and we'll quiet down. And before we go into the discussions that we left off on, we've got some housekeeping issues to attend to, and that is the termination of today's meeting to a continuation of another date. First of all, the Planning Commission has a one-item agenda next Thursday. We're scheduled for the entire day to be over at the Board of County Commissioners' chambers, which is our normal meeting area. The meeting there starts at 8:30. I would think it's going to be over rather fast. And I think a good idea would be to continue to that meeting, as long as there's no problems here. But there is a logistical problem between us and the EAC and the committee. I don't know -- the EAC is, for some reason, meeting that day on the same issue. And Judith, is there -- is that locked in stone? MS. HUSHON: Well, I cannot meet the following week. That was the date -- we were going to meet today, and then you all took our day today. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: We didn't take it. They gave it us to. MS. HUSHON: Well, I was told that you all said you had to have this day, so you got it. But the next day that my committee could meet was the 5th, and they gave us one o'clock on the 5th. CHAIRMAN STRAIN : Well, we're not taking this room. MS. HUSHON: No, I understand that, but that's what they've given us. And, Tom, you may able to speak to this. MR. GREENWOOD: Well, it will be at one o'clock on the 5th in this room, and you'll be in the other room. And, you know, if Page 103 January 30, 2009 necessary, staffwill covered both if it's -- ifthere's an overlap. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I'm not worried about staff. I'm worried about the -- MS. HUSH ON: The public and committees. MR. GREENWOOD: Well, yeah. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: The committee and the public and everybody else that wants to respond. MR. GREENWOOD: Yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I think the way we'll end up working it out is next Thursday we'll continue. We'll continue to then, spend the morning at our meeting, if everybody continues that -- votes to continue it, on the 5th at the chambers down there, and then the EAC can continue up here at one o'clock, and we'll have to stop at lunchtime down at our place. MS. HUSHON: Okay, that's fine. The other thing you could do, Mark, just -- would be to do this in the morning, have lunch, and you could do your one item after lunch, if that worked. I know it's been noticed, and I know that's an issue. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yeah, we can't do it. We've already noticed it. MS. HUSHON: Can't do that. Okay. But I would -- I think that would be appropriate if you need more time. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Oh, we'll need more time. MS. HUSHON: Then it would probably be appropriate to find another date to go -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yeah, we'll -- MS. HUSHON: And we may have to do the same thing. I don't know whether we will finish on the 5th, but that's -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Next Thursday, the Planning Commission will have another date picked by then, so we'll continue to another day after next Thursday. Page 104 January 30, 2009 MS. HUSHON: Mr. Wolfley has a comment. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yeah, David? COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: I'll be leaving the country (sic) for a bio-diesel conference and may not be back by Thursday. It's in San Francisco. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, as long as we have a quorum, we can go on with the meeting. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Another country, yes. I'm sorry? Yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, we need a quorum. I know we have one for the meeting so -- COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Yeah. I may be able to get back late Wednesday night, so -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. MS. HUSHON: Okay. I think that's fair to the people who want to be present. They certainly can't be going up and down Airport Road. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I think they could, but we won't put them through that. Thank you, Judith. Appreciate it. Okay. So we'll-- and Tom, as far as another meeting date after that Thursday goes for the Planning Commission, if staff could look into what's available in the Board of County Commissioners' first and this room as a backup to that if we can't find a reasonable date over there, and then we'll continue it from there. MR. GREENWOOD: Is your preference any particular day of the week? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Thursday. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, Thursday's our regular meeting day, and we have in between Thursdays that are generally available. And Paul, I think your worst days are Mondays and Tuesdays; is that right? I mean, we may not be able to find a Thursday, so we'll do the best we can, but -- so, yeah. Ifwe can avoid Mondays and Tuesday, Page 105 January 30, 2009 towards the end of the week, that works out the best. It's important for Paul to be able to attend if it's at all possible. He's more representative of the area than any of us, so -- MR. McDANIEL: And for and on behalf of the committee, we'll all do what we have to do in order to meet your request. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I thought this is all you did. I saw you yesterday and the day before. Okay. When we went to break, we were still talking about the panther corridor issue on policy 3.1.1. There was a series of public speakers, the next of which was Judith Hutchinson (sic). MS. HUSHON: Hushon. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And so -- Hushon, I'm sorry. I always call you by your first name, so -- MS. HUSHON: Right. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: So Judith, proceed. MS. HUSHON: Okay. I'm going to speak to you right now as the -- I was chairing the EAC for these -- you may have seen the wonderful meetings yesterday. Anyway, we did have something on this item, so I thought, relating to the setting aside restoration credits and designation of panther corridor there was some discussion. It was pretty much in agreement with what we saw on a southern corridor and that we could live with some southern corridors, not necessarily this one. It would be nice to have it a little wider. The northern corridor was very much a discussion item, and the committee was very dissatisfied with the shape and tenuousness of it. It seems to be much longer than it would ever have to be. In addition -- I mean, it's partially because they've tried to keep it all within Collier County, and that may not be optimal. And we heard -- you heard a presentation from Hendry, which alluded to the fact that those people up there are interested in retaining a rural character right in the same area. So it's something to be discussed, I think, before any panther corridor would get laid to rest. Page 106 January 30, 2009 The EAC wants to revisit this, and they want to revisit it -- it will probably have -- we're hoping that the panther team report will come back before the -- this has to go for GMP approvals. The thought was there, because of the language in some of the emails and things like that, it was highly unlikely that a number of the scientists are going to go along with this projection. I also wanted to say that there was -- thrown around at our meeting was this comment that Darrell Land said he was 95 percent happy with what he was hearing. This came out in July, but I'd like to show the map that was available at that time. Mike, you want to see how different that map is from this map? Flip over to my -- can you zero in just a little bit? This -- whoop. This is the map that was put up at that meeting, and this came out of the Naples Daily News. It's in the books. MR. DeRUNTZ: Can you turn the light off? MS. HUSHON: You can see -- I don't have a pointer, but you can see the northern corridor indicated with two arrows there, and you can see the southern corridor. It was very general. Oh, I do have a pointer. Oh, thank you. There's the northern corridor as demonstrated at that time, and here is the southern corridor demonstrated at that time. I think Darrell could be quite comfortable with that as opposed to -- could we now put the transportation map back on? Oh, I gave you a copy. If you could just slip it-- MR. GREENWOOD: Well, there's a better high-def map here. MS. HUSHON: Okay. You're right. It's high-def. MR. GREENWOOD: It will take a few seconds. MS. HUSHON: I think he would be -- have some problems with this one as well if what he was agreeing to was the other map. So we're concerned, but we want to wait for the experts to come back in. Our feeling is that that northern corridor isn't going to meet the needs of the panther and do what it has to do. Page 107 January 30, 2009 So we're concerned about giving credits for it, if it isn't -- if it -- the experts don't think it's going to work. I mean, that's always an issue. And we're being asked to put credits out for it without a design and without an approved pathway, and so I'm -- we're -- that was an Issue. We had -- we also talked a lot about how the acres of ground -- and I think you're going to talk some more about that -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Right. MS. HUSHON: -- in terms of the general growth of this. But on this particular item and on the panthers, we got into a large discussion on panther science. You prob- -- hopefully you can avoid that today. You were presented with what is the primary panther area as defined by Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and that is an area to be encouraged in some way for development. Development should be encouraged to be in that area and not outside of it. Okay. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Thank you very much. Any questions of Judith at this time? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Well, let me ask. Judith? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Judith, we have a couple. Go ahead, Brad. MS. HUSHON: Yes, Brad. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Judith, there's one thing I'm having trouble with is they want to create this northern boundary, yet it's bringing it across major roads and things, and obviously from the statistics early (sic), the panthers' worst enemy is the car. MS. HUSHON: That's correct, and that's one of the reasons we prefer something that would do more -- what you don't realize. See this area right -- can you kind of see that line? That's the San Green (sic) area continuing north, so that's habitat, too. You can't -- just can't tell that because of the way the map's highlighted. And panthers are up in that area. That's just fine. There have been Page 108 January 30, 2009 no panthers crossing here yet. This is a dream right now. It actually isn't a reality. We don't have panther telemetry across this area. We have panther telemetry up in here that comes right down in here, but it never made it across. It never made it across that road. So maybe that road was a little bit of a deterrent. That's a state road, county line road. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: And, you know, it is not a primary area, so we're going to create a brand new connection to primary areas right through the kill zones, which -- MS. HUSHON: Right. And this was the map that was put up -- here you can see. Here's where it came down and in. There is the county line road. That's the dot right there. That's the road. This was that green area. This was another green area. There's multiple -- this is a panther, and these panther tracks where one panther goes from point A to point B to point C to point D. So you can see how this panther came down and came right along the road, and this one came down to the road and went back again. Maybe the same panther. I don't know. But the road is a deterrent. The panthers don't like it. These were the least cost pathways. There were three of them. It also has to do with length of the pathway, and the longer the pathway gets -- and the one that was proposed was like that, very long, three sides of a rectangle, whereas these are more like the diagonals of the rectangle -- the panther is less likely to follow it. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Thank you. MS. HUSHON: Yep. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. Any other questions? Next speaker? Russell? MR. PRIDDY: Yeah. I was at the meeting almost all day yesterday. I may have stepped out for a minute, but I don't remember the EAC authorizing their vice-chair to come here on behalf of them today, so her earlier statement -- MS. HUSHON: I told them I was going to come. Page 109 January 30, 2009 MR. PRIDDY: She -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Russell, for the record, she made it clear she wasn't here on behalf of the EAC, but she's explaining what happened is all. MR. RUSSELL: Okay. That road up there that she kept referring to, that's not a road. That's the county line. There is no road there. MS. HUSHON: There's scheduled to be. MR. PRIDDY: On whose schedule? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, wait a minute. MR. PRIDDY: I'm not done. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Russell, the discourse between the audience and you doesn't occur at our meetings. If so you have a question, you address it to us. If Ms. Hutchinson (sic) wants to get back up and address them again afterwards, she can. So that's how it works. MR. PRIDDY: Okay. So it's okay to get up and throw out any bogus information and sit down? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: No. It's -- you're trying to clarify your position. She had hers. Everyone's going to have a different position. We have a right to hear all of them, so -- MR. PRIDDY: Okay. Let's move on because my next question is something that's going to be near and dear to your heart, Mr. Strain, and that is the protection of the taxpayers. The Conservancy has offered up this map with this northern corridor. I think it's fair to ask what cost is associated with that and maybe have them bring back a cost estimate for what it costs to acquire the land, what it costs to restore or create a corridor that does not exist, and what it costs to maintain it. The landowners with the conceptual northern corridor have given you the answer to the cost of the land. It's free. So I think that's a concern. Number two, there are no panthers using that corridor, and it is right through, Mr. Midney, some of our most fertile rural crops and Page 110 January 30, 2009 active ago one. Thank you. THE COURT REPORTER: What was your last name, sir? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Priddy. You want to spell your last name, Russell? MR. PRIDDY: Priddy, P-R-I-D-D-Y. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I would have gotten it wrong, so I'm glad he did that. Okay. Tom? MR. JONES: I have a public comment. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: You can have all the comments you want, Tom. You have plenty of time, so-- MR. JONES: I don't know. I'm about running out of time. You know, I do ascribe to the theory that no good deed goes unpunished and, you know, the landowners, conservation organizations, they thought it was a good idea to try and put a northern corridor in. But if the overwhelming consensus is that it's just not going to work, then we just won't do it. You know, I mean, we don't have to continue to talk about it ad nauseam. It either works or it doesn't work. Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yeah. We have a new court reporter, so you're going to have to re-state your names a couple of times till she gets used to us. Are there any other public speakers on policy 3.1.1 ? MR. McDANIEL: Public/committee, in might. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, Bill. Go right ahead. MR. McDANIEL: Bill McDaniel. Public comment -- well, it's based on the fact that I served on the committee. The map that Judy had up there in advance was one, I think, produced by Darrell Land or given to us at the committee level. And when Darrell -- and we could check the record for sure because I do have selective memory issues, but during that conversation or during the discussion with Darrell and his Page 111 January 30, 2009 representation that he was 95 percent happy. It didn't necessarily revolve around the -- with specificity, the locale of the corridors. It was with the Rural Land Stewardship Program in its entirety. He suggested that a northern corridor be produced. I recall that during the process. That was one of my acknowledgments, if you will, again, of the creation of this corridor, wherever it ultimately ends up. But during that discussion, it's pretty-well evidenced by the telemetry hits and what's going on, the southern corridor and where its proximity ought, in fact, to be. But he suggested connectivity between the CREW's land and OK Slough area. And so that was our stab, if you will -- it should probably not fine term in this stage -- but that was my beliefs as we were at the committee level endeavoring to effectuate some process for that northern connectivity between those two habitats of -- for the Florida panther. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Thank you, Bill. Bruce? Oh, Mr. Wolfley, before-- COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Some of this seems contrary to the Conservancy's maps, as Mr. Priddy brought up. I was just wondering if before we get away from this -- where are, we 3.1.1 -- if we could hear from the Conservancy to kind of -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, they've already been up once. They can come back up if they want to. But right now we're still trying to get through the public speakers on 3.1.1. Do you want to -- let's finish -- COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: I'm almost -- I was on the committee and I'm almost more confused now than I was the first month. That's my point is, I just -- I'm trying to figure out where are these panther credits. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Bruce? MR. JOHNSON: For the record, Bruce Johnson with WilsonMiller. I would just like to cover one point that Bill just made. Page 112 January 30, 2009 The meeting in question where Mr. Land spoke to the oversight committee was June 3rd, 2008. And I disagree with Ms. Hushon's characterization. What he was saying he was 95 percent happy with was the current program and the current overlay map. So what his statement was, was he was 95 percent happy with it. Now, what he was not satisfied with were some of these linkages. So what he was implicitly saying was, I'm 95 percent happy with the existing program. If we can figure out a way to make these linkages work, I'm good. And I'm sure at some point he'll be before the committee to verify that statement, but that was in my mind, and in most people's minds, clearly his intent on that day. It's fortunate that the Conservancy and Ms. Hecker this morning referenced the Kautz 2006 paper so much this morning because I'm going to give you a series of factual statements from that paper and some supporting information from other documents produced by U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and other researchers. But I would like to point out one thing about the nature of the panther telemetry. Yes, the telemetry you look at are typically recorded between six a.m. and ten a.m. every morning. And just to be clear how -- what the volume of data is for right now at this moment, the collaring and the tracking was begun in 1981. It continues to this day. Even though a third of the cats are collared today out of the known population, that has varied from year to year depending on the intensity of the capture effort and the size of the population. But what we have right now is 28 years of data, over 150 cats collared, and over 90,000 data points. That is not insignificant. Anybody who does statistics -- you know, they sample presidential election polls with 1,200 -- a sample of 1,200. Within the RLSA there's nearly 10,000 data points alone, just within the RLSA. So we have a very robust data set. Page 113 January 30, 2009 Now, one of the things they started to talk about was the issue that -- the nighttime telemetry is confirming that the cats are somehow utilizing things differently. I have the paper right here from Darrell, David Shindle, and others, that clearly says they can show no significant difference between daytime and nighttime usage. Now, what does that mean? It means that the best available evidence to date tracking cats round the clock with GPS collars and tracking them during the day with daytime telemetry, what that information tells you is the daytime data is a sufficient proxy for where the cats are and what they're using. Cats do not stick in the forest at night and run three miles into the middle of a vast citrus grove and run back to that forest before daytime so the plane can catch them as it flies over, okay. So this data is very robust, it is very solid, and it does tell us where the cats are. I'd like to read verbatim from the Kautz paper, the same one that Ms. Hecker referred to this morning, the definition of primary zone as it occurs in the introduction to this paper. We identified areas of suitable habitat that have been consistently occupied by panthers in the past 20 years, okay. What does that mean? There's three parts to that definition. It's got to be suitable habitat. If they went and sat on the Sunniland mine, that may not be suitable habitat if it was -- had to be not only occupied, but consistently occupied. So if a cat ran out a few hundred yards into a tomato field, sat on a cypress dome when the plane flew over that morning and took a point, they did not consider that as part of the primary zone by this definition, by this definition. So you had to have suitable habitat consistently occupied over the last 20 years. That is a powerful statement. And as I mentioned to this committee -- commission before, and I believe the EAC yesterday, there is a discrepancy between the verbal definition of this primary zone and what you are shown on the maps as being primary zone. That map does not fit this definition. It does not. So one has to Page 114 January 30, 2009 be reconciled. Now, I'd like to go into a couple of reasons why that might be. For all of their analyses of what cats are actually using, they use a home range estimation technique that looks at all the points and draws a line around them using computer algorithms, and they use that technique specifically to determine what habitats cats are actually using, not just what's available to them. What they're actually using. Now, when they -- in a moment when I go through this paper and tell you about those habitats and the rankings that they came up with, they use that technique, which is called fixed kernel. When they did the modeling for the mapping in GIS, they used a far more extensive technique called minimum convex polygon which can take an area where a cat has gone out once to that cypress dome and once to this flat/wood and once over here and drawn a line around the whole thing. Now, it should tell you something that they chose not to use that method to analyze what cats are using, okay. But that is the method that they used when they created the map of primary zone, which is extremely broad-brush. And I'd just like to tell you flat out here, there's a couple of facts. The scientific review team that reviewed this work for the Fish and Wildlife Service have a paper from that report and it says, the minimum convex polygon approach may include large areas of unused habitat within the home range. They're acknowledging that minimum convex polygons are broad-brush. From this paper -- one of the things that they did in this Kautz paper was they looked at all those data points, and they estimated their home ranges, and they came up with tables that tell you the rankings of various habitats, and I'd like to quickly put it up here. But I'd just like you to take a look at these tables. Now, when I mentioned that they said it may contain unused habitat, let's get right to the heart of the matter. The primary zone, which some people say we cannot afford to lose a single acre of, only has 64.3 percent of Page 115 January 30, 2009 potentially suitable habitat patches. That is right in the Kautz paper; 64.3 percent. That means over a third of the primary zone is not even potentially suitable habitat. So they're acknowledging as clearly as you can that the primary zone has been over-mapped, okay. The purpose of it is to guide consultations, guide decision-making to get people into the arena where they can begin discussing impacts to panther, but they are acknowledging over a third of the habitat is not suitable. On this table that you're looking at, you're looking at two different statistical methods for deciding what the cats really prefer and what they don't prefer. And if you go down that list, you'll notice the upper half of both lists consist almost entirely of forested habitat and native habitats. The interesting thing is you'll notice about a little more than halfway down we have urban in both of those categories and below urban in terms of preference is pasture and grassland, cropland, orchard and citrus groves. Now, I'm not implying that they prefer downtown Immokalee to a citrus grove nor would the people who created this table say that. What they would say though is these big open agricultural lands are not the things that panthers like. And we basically already knew that anyway because there's no telemetry out there. Again, a cat is not going to run a mile out into a citrus grove and then run back to the forest at daylight. It will hunker down wherever it is. With 10,000 data points in the RLSA, we would have picked up on that by now. So basically I would just like to say one other thing, and that is, even if you accept the premise, even if you accept that premise of how the primary zone is met, they make allowance right in the paper, the Kautz paper, and they say that the recovery plan would allow impacts so long as it resulted it no net functional loss in panther habitat support. So in other words, if you made impacts somewhere within that Page 116 January 30, 2009 primary zone and took out a citrus grove that the cat's not using anyway, or even small cypress domes that a cat may have been in once in the past 30 years, and you compensate by mitigating somewhere and improving the habitat so the prey-base capacity is higher or you actually extend some habitat into the secondary zone, then you can continue with your activity. So I disagree strongly with the implication that the primary zone is sacred. We have an acknowledgment that more than a third of it is not suitable habitat, and they provide for allowances to impacts to the prImary zone. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Mr. Vigliotti? COMMISSIONER VIGLIOTTI: It seems to me that everyone believes in this expert. I don't remember his name. But everyone seems to believe in him. Why isn't he here and when can we -- because it seems like everybody's trying to interpret what he said. MR. JOHNSON: Well, there are a couple of reasons. Number one, the expert, I think you're referring to Darrell Land. And just so people understand, he's the FWC panther research team leader. He has over 20 years capturing, tracking, analyzing data for and publishing scientific studies on the cat. He was not informed in a timely manner of these meetings. And some of the things, as people have alluded to, the technical review team is in the middle of evaluating all this information. And even ifhe could be here, I'm not sure he could tell us much because that is information that's developing right now. COMMISSIONER VIGLIOTTI: Okay. But it seems as though everybody's trying to interpret what he said. You had one interpretation. She had another interpretation. When can he come here so we could ask him some questions and maybe get some solid answers? MR. JOHNSON: The commission will-- I'd leave it to you as commissioners to make the arrangements to do that. Page 117 January 30, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Bob, he doesn't work for the county. He works for another level of government. He goes and comes where he has to go and when he's needed and when asked and when it can fit into his schedule. It may not be coinciding with ours. At this point we've got a document to move through the best we can. I don't know if it's -- we've got the time afforded to wait for his schedule to meet ours. COMMISSIONER VIGLIOTTI: Okay, that's fine. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Anybody else have any questions of Bruce? Bruce, I have one. MR. JOHNSON: Yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I probably need to re-ask the same question of Nicole or Jennifer. MR. JOHNSON: Okay. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I understand your argument and I understand theirs. There are occasions -- in fact, most of the land that is in dispute as to whether it's primary or not and it's farmland, is contiguous to uplands that are primary, habitat, forested, that rank high in your list there. How far from that habitat and forested primary where there is telemetry, where there is evidence of good panther activity, do we feel comfortable allowing development to a point where it doesn't disrupt any of that primary activity? MR. JOHNSON: I think that's contingent on several things. The nature -- number one, you do realize the site design standards for the RLSA, as they exist today, talk about intensity being centered in an SRA or away from environmental assets and decreasing intensities as you get to the margin of the SRA. So first of all, you're decreasing intensity. You're going from dense neighborhoods and the town center to less dense neighborhoods and to recreational activities, golf courses, things like that, and then Page 118 January 30, 2009 you are required to put a buffer between the SRA and the environmental assets, okay. So that's -- there's quite a bit of site design work that you can do to mitigate the effects of the development. But on top of that, almost all of this, between the procedures we have to go through to get an SRA approved at the county level and to get that same proposed development approved through the DRI process and through the permitting process, there -- trust me, there will be numerous regulations by numerous parties insisting that the appropriate buffers be in place so that a cat that is using a cypress strand today would not be impacted by the development. They could continue to use that cypress strand. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. Anybody else have any questions? Brad? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: What is the prey for panthers? What's the primary prey? MR. JOHNSON: Primary prey are deer and hogs, wild hogs. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Okay, thanks. MR. JOHNSON: They'll eat other things. They'll eat raccoons and stuff as they get them, but the primary is deer and hog. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, thank you. MR. JOHNSON: Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Next public speaker? Is there anybody? No. MR. McDANIEL: Tim said he didn't want to. I just would like to make a sugg- -- is there -- while he's on his way, in might just reiterate. We at the committee did hear from Darrell Land. We at the committee did hear that Darrell Land was 95 percent okay or happy with the entire Rural Lands Stewardship Overlay as it was, as it currently exists today. And in an attempt to assists with one of the things that he would Page 119 January 30, 2009 like to see fortification to that plan was an east/west corridor to the north, and remembering that incentivization is the basis for this voluntary program. That was a methodology that we utilized to -- in order to effectuate that thought process that he's looking to have as far as, if you -- I don't know if you're ever going to get to completely satisfy him, but start the process, if you will. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Did he express a width in that corridor as a minimum? Did he talk about any kind of detail like that? MR. McDANIEL: No, not at all. If you hop over to that map that was popped into the Naples Daily News, those were happy arrows that were there. And, again, from a planning standpoint, as Brad brought up, these are -- that area -- that corridor transects two major highway systems that we all know are in the process of being expanded significantly to facilitate traffic for -- on a regional basis to and through that particular area. So our shots there was, getting that corridor established, with that, designate potential wildlife crossings that can be put in the budget process from a funding standpoint to help facilitate ultimately what Darrell was looking for, was that connectivity between the CREW's land and the OK Slough area. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, thank you. Next public -- Dane? MR. SCOFIELD: Hi. Dane Scofield. Half Circle L Ranch, private property owner in eastern Collier County. I'd just like to weigh in myself, my opinions, and for your consideration. I've heard some statements made here today that I felt the need to address. As a landowner, I've been involved through extensive negotiations, dialogues, meetings, with private landowners and a group of environmental interests who have represented themselves at those meetings. They -- through those meetings we have -- and through extensive dialogue, we've come to compromises, and that is -- Page 120 January 30, 2009 those compromises have been largely reflected within the documents that have been presented to you by the review committee. You have one instance of representatives that were here today through the Conservancy who were initially part of that process. They removed themselves from that process of dialogue to hold to their extreme position of uncompromise. And the question that is before you is, are you as a committee going to give more credence to the overarching group of landowners and environmentalists who have come together to try to work out an agreement to a program that needs to be balanced, or are you going to give more credence to a separate individual group that's holding to an extreme position? They have identified an inequity based on their proposal. They have -- they want to limit the areas of development while maximizing areas of preservation that will set up a scenario of excessive credits coming from SSA areas. Their solution is to have the county deal with that problem, to take those credits outside the rural land stewardship area. Well, we've discussed that ourselves, and it's been met with extreme resistance, and it is a near-impossible task when you consider the numbers of people involved in the areas that you're trying to take these credits to. An agreeable compromise that I would certainly entertain is a financial compensation, purchase those credits, retire them, and they don't enter into the system. I haven't heard those proposals coming from anyone. There's a precedent that the county has already established of purchasing lands that they wish to preserve, and an easy solution would be instead of purchasing the lands with the long-term maintenance of those properties, purchase the credits. The land stays in the ownership of the landowner, he has the responsibilities for the maintenance and the taxes. Page 121 January 30, 2009 And those are my comments. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, Dane, you've pointed out a good problem that's going to come out as we weave our way through these many pages of documents is that the program is creating a lot of credits, and somehow those credits have to be addressed. MR. SCOFIELD: I believe-- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And that either happens at the expense of taxpayers or it happens at the profitability of who can utilize those credits. And I'm for one and not for the other. So I guess we'll see how it weaves out. I don't have answers to your questions now, but we certainly will try to after we get through all the policies, so -- MR. SCOFIELD: Well, that very issue was wrestled with by the review committee, and I believe that their suggestion that has been put forth to you in the documents tried to address that, and the landowners initiated the compromises to deal with those inequities. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Anybody else have any other questions? Thank you, Dane. Elizabeth? MS. FLEMMING: Elizabeth Flemming with Defenders of Wildlife. We want nothing more than to work towards improving the conservation and recovery status of the Florida panther, and we have been working in good faith with the largest landowners trying to really reach some benchmarks and understanding of where -- where they will be and where the land and conservation will be in 50 or 100 years, what we're trying to imagine is the build-out or the maturity of this program, but still withholding our judgment until we hear from this expert panel of six scientists about whether this particular configuration will work or whether that road needs to have a slightly different alignment or we need a crossing at this juncture. Page 122 January 30,2009 So we've viewed all of this as conceptual. You need to get something on a map. We view it as conceptual but a plan that can have it -- there will be input. I know that as I stated when the first meeting was the other day about the scheduling and the different processes that are all in flux. Again, the federal one is going to have, perhaps, a much larger impact into what happens with the panther than what is decided with these committees. But the point I'm getting at is we are still withholding our final -- our final judgment of all of this till we hear from that scientific panel. And I don't want to see their findings or their process or their working methodology in any way compromised by them feeling pressure to turn something out quickly to satisfy us and the press and whoever's asking questions. We, the parties who've worked, the landowners and conservation organizations, have stepped back, and we have -- we have asked them to maintain a certain schedule. But we are not interfering, we are not asking for their findings, we are not pressuring them to have certain findings. And it is of great concern to my organization, and I'm sure others, that other organizations and entities and members of the public and anybody here now has fragmentary fIndings, snippets of data, things that have been leaked. I mean, it's like I -- if I were a scientist, I'd feel like I have a dog on my pant leg trying to shake the information. We wanted them to have the time in an objective setting to reach their findings, and I just want to state for the record that I'm -- I don't want to see that process undone by our inadvertent actions here. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. MS. FLEMMING: Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Are there any other public speakers? Okay. Nicole, did you want to say something? I couldn't tell. You Page 123 January 30, 2009 started to get up, then you sat back. I wasn't sure where you were gomg. MS . RYAN: I wasn't sure if I could have two shots under these policies, so -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I think we're looking for clarification. I'd asked a question of Bruce, in which he answered. I suggested at the time that I'd probably need you to answer the same question, and if you remember the question it's about the setback from primary panther habitat that's known in an uplands wooded area, how far back, if you had a development, would you need to be for it to still retain its primary qualities. And that may move into the question that you've been raising about why these open spaces are considered primary. I don't know, but I wanted to understand that better. MS. RYAN: For the record, Nicole Ryan, Conservancy of Southwest Florida. I believe that Jennifer Hecker is coming back, and she is more familiar with the panther science and those sorts of things, so I would like to hold off our answer on that. We can maybe insert that in later policy so that we don't hold things up. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: That's fine. MS. RYAN: But our concern is that because of the mosaic of habitat, that these tomato fields, these farm fields, they are important. So if we're -- again, when it gets down to carving up and what portions of primary could we go ahead and carve out because it is a farmland, we believe that the science is clear, that those areas do provide for function, they provide for that buffer. And once you start nipping away, then it just keeps with the encroachment. So we would like to see all that primary really focused for keeping development away from that area. As far as the buffers and some of the other things that we've proposed, our map, we believe, is a compromise. We felt that this Page 124 January 30, 2009 program was going to produce much less development than we now see that it will produce. Our map has 32,700 acres on top of Ave Maria that we're saying we believe could be appropriate for development. So we don't see that as a hard-line extreme position. We kept bringing our suggestions to the table -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: You're going beyond the question. MS. RYAN: Okay. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: So let's try to rake it back in, and when Jennifer gets here, if she wants to address it more succinctly then, that's fine, too. MS. RYAN: Okay, fine, sure. Thanks. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. Tim? MR. DURHAM: Tim Durham with WilsonMiller. I had a problem with some of the things I heard this morning from Ms. Hecker. Since she's going to come back, I'll reserve those comments till she's present in case -- so they're not, you know -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: That would be better, sir. MR. DURHAM: Keep that clear. So I just want to reserve a chance to respond to anything she brings up. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Absolutely. MR. DURHAM: Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: This is an open forum. Bruce? You haven't got much to rebut because there wasn't much said, so I'm not sure what you -- MR. JOHNSON: I totally disagree with you. For the record, Bruce Johnson. Just speaking to what Nicole said. Land cover's only part of the story. Context is everything. And you'll recall -- and it's right in one of the policies -- that when we designed this program, we understood that the landscape had already been fragmented to some degree, and that was the purposes of the overlays. The SSAs or the flowway Page 125 January 30, 2009 stewardship areas integrated all of the regional hydrology into these systems that we could protect, and the habitat stewardship areas were designed specifically to create large interconnected blocks of habitat. As evidence of that, there are 15,000 acres of active agriculture within the 45,000 acres of HSA. And within the first 56,000 of approved and pending SSA acres, we have 15,000 acres of ago one within that. So we are talking about -- if we're talking about a tomato field down near the panther refuge in SSA6 that has telemetry points all around it and we're wondering if a cattle will run a hundred feet out of the woods to catch a deer or a hog that's gone into that field, that's one thing. But if we're talking about a 20,000-acre area of citrus like we have south of Immokalee and wondering if that's utilized, that's entirely another thing. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. MR. JONES: Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Bill, I think we're back onto the policies. And out of the discussion, one thing that seems that may need to be answered, and I'm hoping you could address it, the credits that are in the restoration area were calculated into the maximum number of credits used by this suggested new policy or policies, up to 421,000, if I'm not mistaken, but it's based, I think, more on the plan that -- the Centroid plan than, obviously, on the Conservancy's plan. If the science comes back and agrees more with the widths of the corridors as minimums in the Conservancy plan versus the Centroid plan, we're going to end up with a lot better corridors and thus the potential for a huge amount more of panther area. How do we stop the flooding and oversaturation of credits as a result of that scenario if it occurs under the program that you have here? MR. McDANIEL: And I -- that really wasn't a discussion that the Page 126 January 30, 2009 committee had as we were going through process. I mean, the committee had lengthy discussions with respect to the credit generation process and the value of those credits and ensuring that there was a place for those credits to ultimately go. In so doing, from experts that came and spoke with us, we determined that the creation of the corridors was a viable incentivization process, knowing ultimately, you know, there are larger -- I don't want to say larger -- but there are other powers that are ultimately going to regulate what, in fact, can transpire with the Florida panther. It's at a federal level. So as we go on, we recognized the necessity for the establishment of the corridor based upon Darrell Land's representation that that's something -- a fellow that's been chasing those kitties around for 20 years, made a proclamation. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: But I think -- and I heard someone on your side of the issue recently say that those arrows were conceptual. Did Darrell Land ever realize the width of the corridors in his discussions with you guys? MR. McDANIEL: No, sir. It was me that said that those arrows were conceptual. It was I that said that. I think he did it with a pointer. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: What worries me is -- and again, whether we have a north corridor for the panthers or not is not my issue. My issue is the protection of the taxpayers from the establishment of too many credits that have to be handled. MR. McDANIEL: Right. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Right now you're telling us by your Section 3 documentation that we can expect restoration credits of around 154,000, and that's based, I would assume then, on the plan that you all produced for the corridors, not the Conservancy's. MR. McDANIEL: Correct. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: If the science comes back and says, well, your plan was nice but the corridors have to be a mile wide instead of Page 127 January 30, 2009 300 feet or 600 feet, then you're going to see, what, five times the amount of land needed for -- that could be necessarily created that could produce restoration credits that we would have to then abide by somehow, and that's the point that I'm concerned about, the oversaturation of an issue that's unexpected, and this may be unexpected. Mr. Midney? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Yeah. I've been listening to this discussion about the northern sector quite a bit, and it seems to me that it's not going to be worth it in the end because of the cost of making it wide enough so that it's really usable; plus, in taking the northern corridor, you're using secondary panther habitat, which would actually be a better place to put the towns up in. So I would be more inclined to drop that in exchange of concentrating the preservation more in the primary habitat towards the east, because it's a lot easier to conserve land that's already primary than to try to create primary habitat out of nothing, too. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Good point, Mr. Midney. It's one I'm sure we will have more of a debate on when we come into our deliberations. We could debate it now, but I think we'll be opening up a can of worms to hear the same thing we've heard for the past hour, not that I don't (sic) mind that, but we've already heard it. And, Tim, you look like you want to try something. Is Jennifer back? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Mark? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: No? Then you're going to say something against Jennifer when she's not here? MR. DURHAM: No, sir. I don't foil people's information and read it without them here. I want to respond to what you were asking about the credit scenano. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Sure. Page 128 January 30, 2009 MR. DURHAM: I think it still may be hard for some folks to visualize what we're talking about for the northern corridor. Out there today is pretty much monolithic agriculture with a few small pockets of natural areas. The reason the panther aren't moving through it is they don't have enough stepping stones to go through. What we're saying is, if you create a series of steppingstones, they will start to use that area. That line that we're showing is where -- one possible route the steppingstones could be. The panther would still use a much larger area then, but at least within that zone would be where the landowner would restore from agriculture to some native community a certain size area, which would be the steppingstone for the panther. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. MR. DURHAM: So what we've identified on there's more of a restoration zone of the panther corridor, a potential route for the landowner to say, yeah, we could live with that if we restored a series of steppingstones there. That's not to restrict where the panther goes, but more to give him at least something to go through the area, and that's where this gets a little bit confusing. As long as it's agriculture on all sides and he has the steppingstones, the corridor is as wide -- you know, as wide as you want them to be. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: You just said we did this. Do you mean we as the committee or we as WilsonMiller or we as the landowners with WilsonMiller representing them? What we did you follow that by? MR. DURHAM: Darrell Land and I spent time together going over this and sending emails back and forth trying to come up with a corridor concept. I would try something, email it to Darrell, Darrell would come back, okay. I then used that information to come up with a drawing working Page 129 January 30, 2009 with some of the landowners and some of the agriculture folks to come up with the exhibit that was then put in front of the oversight committee and discussed. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. That was the clarification I needed. MR. DURHAM: Yes, sir. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Ms. Caron? COMMISSIONER CARON: Yeah. I understand what you're saying about setting up this area for the cats to begin to use again, but what happens to all of this once you stick towns up there? MR. DeRUNTZ: And that's where that buffering issue comes into effect. It's really important to recognize any intensification of land use near the panther corridor will have to be buffered appropriately. COMMISSIONER CARON: So what is an appropriate buffer? MR. DURHAM: It depends on what it is. Darrell has worked with certain landowners describing that, and there's different parameters for that that gets fairly detailed. It could be open water, for example, of a certain distance. It could be a heavily vegetated buffer and some kind of physical structure and some light blockages. There's a series of things that could be implemented in there. But that's evolving. And I'm sure it will be part of the science team's recommendations. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Thank you. Brad? MR. CORNELL: Brad Cornell with Collier Audubon and Audubon of Florida, and the committee. And I wanted to respond a little bit to this from the perspective of a committee member, and my recollection is that we didn't have a real conversation about what would happen if the recommended width and dimensions of either of these corridors was large enough that it would flood the market with credits. And my answer to that personally as a committee member is that Page 130 January 30, 2009 I believe we would have to look at how we would be able to accommodate that. And one scenario of accommodation would be that the landowners themselves do not build the corridor, that the money comes from an agency through mitigation from other projects, through other funding sources, through something like that, in which case that would not generate credits in the stewardship credit system, and you would be able to accomplish the dimensions that would be recommended and not have put the system out of balance. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I'm just going by what's written in the documents we're reviewing, so that's all I have to go by. MR. CORNELL: Right. And I think that the documents, the policies that you've got, would be able to accommodate a different -- the conceptual corridors that you saw on that map, I don't think anybody should be holding those up as that's what we're planning to build or anybody's planning to build. I think that's just a concept. And the general idea of having a connection between the Corkscrew Marsh and Okaloacoochee Slough is what we all desired. And we understood from panther experts that there was a need for a connection between those two systems and that we wanted to facilitate that through a policy in the rural land stewardship. I don't see yet that we have a conflict with that, even if the science review team or anybody else, let's say Fish and Wildlife Service, who I know is also looking at these policies, if they come back and say, oh, you need a mile-wide corridor, you need a three-mile-wide corridor. Whatever they said, I think we would not be necessarily in conflict with the policies we have in front of us that we're recommending. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. MR. CORNELL: Sure. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. I think that we've exhausted our discussion on policy 3.1.1. I've made plenty of notes. I know some of the others may have. And when we get to the point we're making Page 131 January 30, 2009 deliberations for a motion, we'll decide after we've heard the balance of the document how it all fits together, come back with a -- any kind of suggestions that we may have. With that, let's move on to Page 55. Fifty-five, the last three policy -- three policies of Section 3 -- of group 3, that is, policy 3.12, -13 and -14, let's take those first and see if there's any questions from the committee on any of those. Does anybody on the Planning Commission have any questions concerning the group 3 policies remaining on Page 55? Ms. Caron? COMMISSIONER CARON: Yeah. Under 13 where it says, however, if the WRA provides water treatment and retention exclusively for an SRA, the acreage of the WRA shall be included in the SRA, that language was not in there before. Tell me what required it to be in there now. What's come up that required this change? MR. JONES: Well, we're kind of getting back to the no-good-deed-goes-unpunished thing. In the original language it's not in there, and if you develop an SRA, use an adjacent WRA for your-- for your project's stormwater retention and water quality, you don't have to include it within the SRA. So what we are trying to close the hole on is that situation. If you're using it for your project, then you would have to include it in the SRA acreage. COMMISSIONER CARON: But isn't there some caveat in here that if you just used a little bit of it then you don't have to include it? MR. JONES: You know, it's open to interpretation. If somebody wants to try it, somebody can try it. I mean, this was the recommendation from the committee, and I think it's a formidable recommendation to correct a deficiency in the existing program. If you -- COMMISSIONER CARON: I'm not saying it's not. MR. JONES: -- want to suggest some other things -- if you want Page 132 January 30, 2009 to suggest some other, you know, language or something, I think that's why you all are here. COMMISSIONER CARON: Great, thanks. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Anybody else? Brad? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: But you could then include it in your base density in the area that -- MR. JONES: Yes, it would be included within the acreage of the SRA. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: And it costs no credits, but you can include it in the base density -- MR. JONES: Ifit was -- ifit was within -- if it was the -- above the 35 percent, right, it wouldn't require credits. If it's being used as part of your project, potentially it has these live credits. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. The word exclusively, I think, causes the problem, because if even I percent or even a half of a percent of the WRA was used for anything else besides that SRA, by this language, there are plenty of attorneys that would argue -- land use attorneys, and we know there's plenty of them in Collier County-- would argue that it doesn't mean that, that we can use that. We don't have to count it because we have I percent used for ago farms over here. That's the extreme, but we've seen the extreme on the Planning Commission many times. I'd rather we play it safe, drop the word exclusively, and where it says, however, ifthe WRA provides water treatment and retention for an SRA, the acreage of the WRA used for the SRA shall be included in the SRA. And then that covers it more like what I think you said a little while ago, and it takes out the ambiguity of that word. So that's a suggestion that I would make, and see where it goes. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Mark? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: With that -- yes, sir. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: The difficulty, since water seeks Page 133 January 30, 2009 its own level, how would you really determine what part of that is used for the SRA? I mean, essentially once you put a drop in, it goes throughout the whole thing. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, you've got to utilize a water management cubic runoff that you'd have to have in there, unless these are used for outfalls, then we have a whole different problem. But if they used it for an outfall and it changes the staging or control elevation, that would change the hydrology, and that, again, ought to be a consideration for something. But if it's used for water management, you've got to calculate water management through South Florida, and so much cubic runoff has to take place and be held somewhere. And if that's what the WRAs are being used for, it seems to me it's a development issue, not a -- COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: And you're comfortable, you could isolate what amount of that WRA is for the SRA? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I mean, I'm sure that during staffs data and analysis they would look at that, but I would -- I mean, the calculations I've used or seen for Southwest Florida, it's right down to the very finite amount. So if you know how much water runoff you're going to have, you've got to provide storage for that at a rate of 1.5 in Collier County. So if you're doing that, I think you would know how much you're using of that WRA. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Okay. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I mean, that's first blush, but that's how I would suggest at this point. We could delineate how we determine use in the SRA in the LDC, and that's where we'd probably flush that out. Anything else on policies -- those first three policies to finish out group 3 by the Planning Commission? (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Public speakers? George? MR. VARNADOE: I thought maybe before you went to policy Page 134 January 30, 2009 four, if you wanted, I'd go back and try to respond to Mr. Midney's question on SSAs and long-term management and what the rights were. Would this be a good time to do that? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Sure, that would be great. That would be fine. I'd rather finish up. And, Paul, we did have a document sent out. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I'm looking at it right now. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I think you want to look at, starting on N. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Yep. MR. VARNADOE: If I could -- let me just kind of walk through this, in could -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Sure. MR. VARNADOE: -- because I think that you guys haven't been exposed that much to it, and I'll use -- there are three restoration areas, and so I'm going to go with C just because it's short and easy. And you're starting on policy J, restoration area C is so many acres, and the restoration improvements will restore the greater wetlands and manage the lands within restoration area C for listed species, wading birds -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: What page are you on? MR. VARNADOE: I'm on Page 2828 of the restoration plan, which was Exhibit G to the easement. I'm sorry. I apologize. If you go down, it's on page 2828, the recorded document. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Item 1. MR. VARNADOE: Paragraph J. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Paragraph J of the second document. MR. VARNADOE: And you're missing one page, which I think Mr. Greenwood just gave you. So you'll see that the -- and I'm just picking this one out at random because it's easy to run through. The restoration improvements here are to restore, degrade Page 135 January 30, 2009 wetlands, and manage the area for wading birds. The improvements are spelled out, including removing the wetlands -- exotics, excuse me, from the wetlands, contouring the land and planting with native species. Freudian slip. COMMISSIONER CARON: George is always a help. MR. VARNADOE: And planting with native species in order to create marshes and wet prairies. And then you have an attachment to what kind of plants that you would use. And then getting to Mr. Midney's, then you've got two years -- going to the top of the next. You've got two years to complete these improvements. And then it goes on, after these improvements are done what the land management measures are, and that's basically to control the exotics of that area after the restoration is complete. And then if you look at Paragraph N, Mr. Midney, for ten years you post a bond or other surety to make sure the stuff is taken care of, doesn't die out. Now -- and during that time period, the grantees can call on that money if it's not being taken care of by the -- by the landowner. But getting to your point which was, what happens long-term way in the future. Let's go to the bottom of that page, Item R. And after the ten -- this is after the ten years has transpired and now the bond or surety's gone. In the event the grantor fails to maintain the restoration areas pursuant to the land management measures set forth herein, the grantees or either of them, in this case it was Collier County and the Department of Ag., may, after written notice to the grantor, perform such land measurement measures and then lien the restoration areas for the cost of their maintaining the restoration area pursuant to land management measures, and if necessary, then foreclose on such liens and attaches to the restoration area. So in the event the landowner doesn't do it, it's just like a condo or anything else, if you don't pay your assessment, they put a lien on you. You don't pay the lien, they come in and foreclose on the land, Page 136 January 30, 2009 and the land, or condo -- and the land is there. So that's how this is set forth. These are all recorded documents, part of the easement agreement, and I thought maybe just walking through this would be helpful to understanding what the long-term management techniques were and what the assurance that they would happen would be. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: It's extremely helpful, and foreclosing on the lien, that's an extreme sanction. I wasn't even thinking it was going to be that extreme. MR. VARNADOE: Well, I think that -- you know, yes, okay. I'll settle for that. I just thought maybe, Mark, it would be good to -- before you get into policy four, group four, to go through that directly. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: No, that's helpful. Thank you. MR. VARNADOE: You bet. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. We are -- any other questions for members of the public on policy three, group three? Jennifer? Tim Durham wanted to say a bunch of bad things about you, but he wanted to wait till you were here. MS. HECKER: He's my former boss. I don't think that's nice. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Now that you're here, we'd like to finish the discussion that got started while you were gone but stopped on some of the issues in the panther corridor. Tim, if you wanted to come back up here and go into the discussion you were going to have but waited till Jennifer was back, now that she's here, we can get that done with and over with and move on to the next policies. So Tim was your former boss? MS. HUSHON: Yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: That's interesting. Okay. MR. DURHAM: It's a small world down here. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Isn't it bad when you train someone too well, huh? MR. DURHAM: Yeah. No, I think Bruce Johnson did a find job Page 13 7 January 30, 2009 responding. You had asked a question, and then the topic came up that maybe Jennifer had an answer to that. My point previously was just, if Jennifer had an answer, I wanted to stop, have an opportunity to come back and respond to that. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, then Jennifer, I guess, it's your question. And there's -- I think Nicole tried to -- oh, you don't know what it is? MS. HECKER: No, I'm sorry. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Oh. When Bruce was here, he described some of his position in regards to how the farm fields would not be primary. And the question was, if you had some primary habitat, uplands, wooded forested primary habitat acknowledged to be primary alongside farm fields, how far back into those farm fields would you normally expect to go before you could -- your development or activities would cause harm to the primary habitat that would be in the uplands portion, the highly wooded portions? MS. HECKER: Again, I think -- I think the question really needs to be flipped on its head on what is the science to support that those areas are not primary that are farm fields within the primary zone, because the science is very clear as far as what we're using to support our VISIOn map. And I would like to see, what is the science that supports the Centroid map corridors as being functional corridors, as being the appropriate widths. I think the same level of rigor that we're providing and supporting our position needs to be provided for the other position as well. But in saying that, the primary zone does not distinguish the -- all the land that is within the primary zone is recognized to be essential to maintaining the current population of panthers. It's a mosaic. Some of it is forested, which is areas that are known to be preferred, some of it is open. The scientists understood that. And, in fact, we are going to have Page 138 January 30, 2009 one of the scientists who was involved in that come here in the next few minutes -- he's on his way right now -- to speak to that. They were aware of this. They understood it. We're talking about a wide-ranging mammal. And you don't put cities just in the middle of a farm field surrounded by forested areas that are being heavily utilized, because it doesn't make any sense. Intuitively, I think you would understand why because of the adverse panther/human interaction that would occur naturally as a result, but also because those fields are areas that they do cross, that prey go regularly into. If you go out there, you'll see deer, you'll see hogs out there. And what do the panthers eat? Deer and hog. So they were looking at their entire spectrum of needs, and they were looking at landscape level. And when we're talking about landscape level, that's exactly what the scientists were trying to do was to try to find large contiguous areas understanding that these cats, an individual male, will roam 200 square miles, an individual female, about 100. So they need a lot of space. And you can't fragment and have little pockets within that because that would not be safe for the residents and it would not be safe for the animals. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Could you, Mike, put that -- the plan that the Conservancy has come up with back on the screen so I can show an example of what I'm trying to get to? I heard both of your arguments, I know we all have, and I'm trying to find a way that maybe it can be described in another manner that it's better understood. MS. HECKER: Okay. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: So maybe you can help me when that map comes back up. Okay. See where it says -- there's a line across that wall. See where it says Oil Well Road and you have that blue area that's south of Ave Maria, and there's a light blue area between Ave Page 139 January 30, 2009 Maria's -- where the yellow ends and the green starts. In that blue area where the word Well Road is. MS. HECKER: Yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I believe that blue area is what the argument's over. Is that the right location? MS. HECKER: Yes, yes. That light blue/light green area was the primary zone habitat that was mapped by the scientists that currently is overlapping areas that are currently in -- used as agriculture that is also designated as open, meaning that they can be developed in the future, so that there was a conflict there in that area that's light blue/light green. That was the focus of our energy and what we had hoped in trying to build additional incentives to protect, because that's the primary zone that is currently vulnerable to development under the program. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, then so far I've understood it correctly. The light blue area is what you are believing is primary zone, and others believe and others don't. That's where the argument is. The yellow area immediately to the north of the initials RD for road, for example, why is that area yellow and why is there blue -- why the blue stop? I mean -- MS. HECKER: Because that yellow area is outside the primary zone. It is open area that is outside the primary zone. So we are saying that we would prefer development to occur in those areas that are currently designated open that are outside and to preserve agriculture in those open areas that are currently -- that are currently designated open that are inside the primary. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. And if I was walking along in that farm field stealing vegetables and having a meal and I walked from the blue to the yellow, how would I know when I'm in either blue or yellow? MS. HECKER: The -- you wouldn't necessarily. The -- it's not something that you can just see like habitat cover is going to change. Page 140 January 30, 2009 It may be in a farm field. But the scientists understood that and wanted to capture certain farm fields that they believed were occupied based on telemetry and other scientific data that they had. They used a combination of information to designate what was primary. But that primary is to represent what is currently being occupied and utilized by the remaining population of Florida panthers. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: The Planning Commission is notorious for definitions. We have definitions for multiple kinds of measuring height and for doing everything else, and definitions help make decisions. It would be very helpful to know why the blue was picked and the yellow wasn't. I understand what you're saying, that maybe there's telemetry that might have caused that or something else. But if we could nail that down -- and we're going to have more meetings. We're not going to finish today by any chance. So that means we're going to be continuing that to next Thursday, and then another day possibly after that. But in those -- in that period of time, we would very -- I think it would help all of us to understand how that occurs, how you -- how the blue got picked and the yellow didn't. MS. HECKER: Well, we did put some of that in the explanation that we provided earlier this morning, the detailed explanation as to the map. It explains -- it actually provides the definition of primary straight out of the scientific paper. That was where that was established. We also do have an authority on this issue, a preeminent panther biologist and expert on his way over, so if we could -- oh, he's here, fantastic. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, when he gets here, we certainly can -- MS. HECKER: So I think he could answer that question for you more. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Oh. Well, whoever you are, come on up. Page 141 January 30, 2009 Tim, do you mind him first, or do you want to go first? You had dibs so-- , MR. DURHAM: Yes, that's right. I had dibs. I'll cash it in. I think in some of Jennifer's words, you hear some of the conflict we have. She's very happy to be talking about landscape planning. That's where we should be at, the landscape level. And I think what we're looking at with the RLS program is getting closer than landscape level, all right? I think that's been part of our disagreement. We had these big swooping lines called primary zones. Our debate is that within that primary zone, you can have a much more refined line and still accomplish what you're trying to do. Landscape level planning is one thing. This is much more refined than the landscape level that we're dealing with here. I think that's part of where this rub kind of comes in. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: But what do you mean by that? What do you mean that it's much more refined? Because the Planning Commission, as in all our projects, have gotten down to the gnat's eye and detail on everything that we do. MR. DURHAM: Right. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: We look at more detail probably than most boards in the county. MR. DURHAM: Right. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: So we want detail. MR. DURHAM: Right. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: We want to know exactly how that piece at that dividing line between one foot and two foot occurs. MR. DURHAM: And I agree with you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. MR. DURHAM: That's where it gets tough. What you're -- I think the answer to your question in that regard, it's a mathematical construct. It's an offset from forested habitat that was done when it was screen digitized for the primary zoning. Page 142 January 30, 2009 Your question as to the ago fields, when they originally drew the primary zone, there was still a lot of debate on, what do panthers do at night, okay? Maybe they do spend more time in the field. We didn't know -- they didn't know. I say we because I was watching. And so there was an offset done there. You know, anybody who hunts in Southwest Florida kind of has a sense of this, because you have to think of the cat at -- you know, get on your hands and knees in the woods and you're going to see the world from a cat's point of view. What I have seen more often than not is deer and hog are very happy to wander into some of those ago areas or pasture areas. There's a certain distance they'll go before they start getting nervous about being out in the open. I think it's that similar distance the panther, likewise, is under cover, and then he stalks and preys and pounces on something, so there's a distance. There is some distance. That's what you're kind of after that sets it out there. What we have for the primary zone is a mathematical offset, and I believe it's 300 feet. Could be wrong, I have to go back and check the records. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I don't remember right now. MR. DURHAM: But that's how that was generated out. So you're out in the middle of a field at some arbitrary computer line, right? There is no difference between the two sides of the line. It's just a mathematical construct out there. And I think what we're saying is, with the detailed site information that we have on some of these sites, with the fact that we still have to go through all the Fish and Wildlife Service consultation process, the input that comes in there and everything else, is that projects that may be within the primary zone on the primary zone map should have the right to at least go in and explore the opportunity to refine that in their project area and have the opportunity to do a project if they can demonstrate that they are either not removing any primary zone function, or if they are, Page 143 January 30, 2009 they're adequately replacing it somehow. So we're not -- we're not as far apart as the debate sounds. I think it's just a matter of what scale we're looking at this at. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, why don't you try, between now and next Thursday, to come into agreement, and that will make the next meeting a lot easier. MR. DURHAM: Can we use your parking lot for a while? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Go right ahead. Okay, thank you, Tim. And now if the gentleman who is the renowned expert -- I don't know what your name is, sir, but if you don't mind telling us, we are cunous. MR. SHINDLE: Name's Dave Shindle, biologist, Conservancy of Southwest Florida. I'm here at their request understanding that there is some questions regarding some panther science issues. So hopefully I could help in that respect. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: There's -- MR. SHINDLE: If -- but I'd like to preface it by stating that I am also serving as part of the scientific review of the Florida Panther Protection Program, and I'm acting as an independent scientist, independent of my affiliation, as is the other members of the team. So I would prefer, and hopefully with due respect, that I would not answer any questions that relate specifically to the RLSA revision review, especially the components of the Panther Protection Program, because we're still reviewing those components. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, there's two general areas that I think -- and I'll try to sum it up, and if the Planning Commission wants to join in before I finish and when he starts, that would be fine. The two areas is one -- one of them is what you just heard the interaction on when you came in, and that's about how the blue and yellow lines on the Conservancy's map were separated out, came to, because blue is primary and yellow is not, yellow is development, and Page 144 January 30, 2009 there -- they could be the same in the same field. And the second item is the width and accessibility or usefulness of the panther corridor as it's shown on the -- what we call a Centroid plan, what was the WilsonMiller plan showing the road system with some narrow corridors on it. So we had those two big issues that I believe focused most of our time on it. I don't know how comfortable you are with either one, but that's where we're at. Does anybody else have any more refinement to that. Brad? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Well, I just have a panther question, I do, but answer yours first. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. MS. HUSHON: Definition of primarily. MR. SHINDLE: Well, I'll speak to your questions. The -- the corridor design I guess you're referring to -- I'm assuming. Again, the Internet feed is very poor, so I've caught bits and pieces of the -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Mike, could you put the Centroid map up? He'll show you in a minute. MR. SHINDLE: But, you know, those are -- those are two components of the Panther Protection Program that we're being asked to review. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: So that's something you can't comment on or you -- MR. SHINDLE: I would rather not comment on my opinion on the specifics of corridor designs on those two particular corridors, given that -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Then let's move into the-- MR. SHINDLE: But I can answer any questions that I possibly could or render an opinion on panther and use corridors in general. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: We appreciate you're here -- your presence, so I don't want to put you in a box that's problematic for you. Page 145 January 30, 2009 Then I think the next focus ought to be on what is and what do you define primary panther habitat. And Brad, was that where you were going with your -- COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: No. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Where were you going, just so we get it all -- COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: My question was just curiosity, how do panthers roam? Are they territorial, are they nomadic? Creating this corridor, is that so they can walk around in a big circle, or would one panther set up fort in the middle of it and not let any other panthers through or -- MR. SHINDLE: You're referring to the north corridor, or just panther -- COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Panther. MR. SHINDLE: Just panther ecology -- well, I mean, panthers are, in a general sense, territorial. You know, they only -- they only pair up during mating or a female with kittens; otherwise, they're solitary animals. They do, in a general sense, particularly the adult males, defend their territory, per se, but that doesn't mean that there's not overlapping territories amongst adult males. The behavior of dispersing males are a little bit different, especially if they were to move through a landscape like that. So in order to -- I think what you're asking, what would a panther do in a certain situation, I wouldn't want to put any money on it. But given certain landscape components, I think you could make some predictions of how a cat would use a landscape over the long-term. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: So my concern could happen, that in the middle of that corridor could be a great food source, and this panther, an alpha cat, is really happy here, and nobody else is using it but him. MR. SHINDLE: Are you giving the north corridor area as an Page 146 January 30, 2009 example? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Any corridor. MR. SHINDLE: Or I guess any corridor. Well, corridors mean different things, it depends on scale. I mean, so that's the first -- and it's an important detail because, I mean, a corridor can be a landscape connection underneath a -- using a panther crossing underneath a highway, or you can talk about larger landscape linkages that -- potential corridors that move across the Caloosahatchee. So there's different scales of corridor. So I don't want to give any insinuation that I'm speaking of one or the other. But kind of the general description you laid out about a panther moving through a corridor, per se, and finding a habitat node that has sufficient prey, I would hope that a corridor design would accomplish that, and -- but the ecology or the biology of the cat, the cat's not going to, just because he finds a deer or a hog and satisfies himself for a night or a week, he's not going to stay there. There's things bigger than that that drive them, particularly the opposite sex. And so they have a natural preponderancy to wander, particularly disbursing cats. And so whether there's food there or not, they're going to continue to move to go onto the next bar, I guess you'd say. But, you know, we have examples where cats have used different areas that have different prey densities that may be artificially enhanced, like a game preserve where they have easy pickins, and they know that they can come back and hit that same spot and be successful within it, but that doesn't stop them -- stop a panther from being a panther. And so the males still cover a wide-ranging territory because they want to meet up with as many females as possible. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Do you know what the range of that territory is, a typical? MR. SHINDLE: Average male home range is 200 square miles. It's a fair number to throw around, but it depends on the density of the Page 147 January 30, 2009 other cats in the area, it depends on the prey base, prey levels, landscape configuration. But, you know, a rough estimate is, you know, 200 square miles for an adult male, and it can be small for adult female. And it depends on the time frame that you're looking at that, because when a male leaves his mother and disburses, his home ranges will be deceptionally large because he will be covering a large amount of area that wouldn't be considered his home range or established home range. But once they settle down in an area, you know, on average, it's approximately 200 square miles. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. The -- there's been a map produced that shows a different primary location -- or I shouldn't say -- a controversial primary location, and we're trying to understand why something is primary versus not. Do you have a definition for primary panther habitat? MR. SHINDLE: I do, but I'd be reading it verbatim from the Kautz, et ai, paper, so I'll save you that time. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. And that's, I think, the one Jennifer read earlier to us. Mike, could you put the Conservancy map back up? You may have heard me ask the question earlier when I think you were sitting in the audience about the differences between the blue and the yellow down by where it says -- and just as an example, where it says, Oil Well Road, the letters RD. You've got blue going up and then yellow coming down to the same location. What would have been the reasoning why the blue is considered primary and the yellow isn't? Would you be able to talk about that? MR. SHINDLE: Again, I'll qualify it by stating that if you want the specifics, a factual version -- and I'm disqualified so I don't make any mistakes in the interpretation of the paper. You need, you need to Page 148 January 30, 2009 ask the authors of that paper, particularly the lead author, Randy Kautz. Mr. Kautz, I'm sure, could answer it very specifically. But my overall interpretation is -- and I can't look into that area. They had different -- a different criteria that they went through. You know, they started out, I think, with cats through 2001 maybe, and they used, you know, basically all the -- all the panther locations together, collected through that time and used what's called a minimum convex polygon home range for the pooled data. And they used that as the -- kind of the area available to the South Florida panther population based on where panthers have been and used before. And then I believe they then looked at individual panther home ranges using a different home range methodology called a fixed kernel home range. And what they basically did is kind of compared the composition of habitats within an individual panther's home range and compared that to the proportion of habitats available throughout that larger area and compared those percentages to come up with a general definition of what cover types are panthers -- do panthers prefer. And that's a general practice and wildlife biology. There's different home range estimators to use depending on the question being asked, depending on the type of data set you have. There's different assumptions for every one. So I won't go into any of those details. But as -- my general interpretation of what they did, they took that first approach, and then they looked at those important cover types that they found that individuals used. Then they also looked at the issue of a forest pack size, using the same type of compositional analysis, comparing the size of individual forest patches compared to the larger available area in South Florida in general. And when they came up with all these habitat criteria, they created a habitat model that basically kind of helped explain the cover Page 149 January 30, 2009 types that panthers use within this general area. And then I believe, you know, they went through a process where they overlaid those results of the spatial model on top of the telemetry points, combination with the larger minimum complex polygon, and they went -- and I think they took into account a 200-meter distance from these patches. They obviously took into account areas that -- or types -- cover types that had lower preference or lower importance to panthers, whether it be an agricultural field or other type of more open habitat. And, you know, because the South Florida -- as you know, the landscape, it's not a homogenous forest cover. It's a -- there's islands of forest cover, different forest pack sizes. And that's the case whether you're in northern Hendry or some of the private lands in Collier where you have native forest patches interspersed within a mosaic of ag., whether it be pasture or row crop. And the same kind of components apply whether you look down into kind of the long pine key area of Everglades National Park. You have a -- kind ofa system of tree islands interspersed within a larger mosaic of more open habitat types. So back to that question. You know, they took into account that these forest patches are linked together and form a contiguous landscape with these other cover types. And knowing that panthers have to traverse the landscape, acknowledging that these other cover types likely support resources for the panther that may not be as directly quantifiable but are kind of intuitive that, you know, that provide important components of the panther's life history, primarily being prey based, for an example. So I imagine that if you went back through that process, that would be -- yeah, there would be a combination of that distance from forest patches that met that criteria that allowed them to draw that line around, and I think if you look -- probably if you look at the area north of Oil Well Road between what looks like a corridor representation at Page 150 January 30, 2009 Ave Maria, you could see that those water retention areas, which are forest cover, likely met those criteria. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: So if you have islands of upland forested habitat, you know, separated by open fields of agriculture, then there's a probability that the open fields of agriculture in those points would be considered primary? MR. SHINDLE: Well, they'd be considered primary if they're in the primary zone as Kautz, et aI, mapped it. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I think that's what I'm asking. MR. SHINDLE: Yeah, sure. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. I don't have any other questions. Does anybody here on the committee have any other questions? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I mean, if there's any panther questions, this is probably the best time to ask them, so if you have any -- COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I mean, I have questions -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: All right. Brad? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: -- on corridor design, but he's mentioned he doesn't want to comment on that. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yeah. I think the corridor design is off limits, so. Okay. David, thank you very much. MR. SHINDLE: Okay. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: It was certainly helpful. MR. SHINDLE: Well, I'll stick around for a while in case something else comes up. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. Okay. Yeah, we're going to go to five. Why don't we take a 15-minute break right now, and that will give the court reporter time to rest her busy fingers. So we'll come back at 2:45. (A brief recess was had.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. If everybody will please come in Page 151 January 30, 2009 and have their seats. We'll try to figure out where we left off and then restart. And we had finished up now, I believe, the group 3 policies, and Mr. McDaniels has left us. We wore him out. He took off. Tom still here? I can't imagine we wore him out. MR. PRIDDY: You wore him out, too. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Oh, no. Okay. So Brad's going to -- MR. CORNELL: I'll be the MC on this for the committee. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: -- run defensive on this thing, so. Okay. Let's start with group 4 policies on Page 55, and let's -- there's only two policies on that page, 4.1 and 4.2. There were no corrections or changes recommended by the committee on that page. But when you get into Page 56, a continuation of policy 4.2, there's extensive changes involving, and this is where the cap of the acreage is. So let's move to Page 56, and we'll take that entire page and start from the top. And where's Brad? He's usually -- not you, Brad. Brad Schiffer. I hate starting without him because I know he's got questions, especially about density issues. There he is. Thank you, George. Brad? Brad, you just -- without you here, we went already from Page 55 to 56. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: For you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Fifty-six is a continuation of policy 4.2. And 4.2 is the policy that broke out the acreages and all that. So what we need to find out, is there anybody that has any questions on Page 56 of our document? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I mean, it goes -- I do have a question on the 45,000. You know, essentially we're trying to create agricultural. That leaves the agricultural at 40. This is 45. So is this where we discuss that number? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Absolutely. This is actually what Page 152 January 30, 2009 happens. We have about -- and for -- let's just use round numbers, because 89,375, let's round that up to 90- for sake of easement. Forty- of the 45,000 is ago So 40-, that leaves you 50,000 ago after, if this were to be built out in the manner that's suggested here. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Right. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Is that what you were getting at? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Right. So I mean, is this number -- can we horse trade it or, you know -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I mean, it's just a matter of what we feel is the right number if we don't feel the committee's is the right number. There's been another number introduced, which is the Conservancy's number, and there's been an original number introduced, which was 16,800. I mean, it's a full gamut, but I think we need to have justification if we believe it needs to be different is all, so -- so I guess that's the first point of contention or discussion is, what do we think about the 45,000? And what I thinks' unique here -- and maybe at some point I'll ask Heidi to jump in. When the program started out, it was -- the property owners had rights, and the rights included a creation of 315,000 credits. That's what was in the first -- in the 2002. And if you look at the backup that they have in their supporting documentation, they believe there was 315,000 contracts generated by the approvals provided in 2002 for the rural lands stewardship area. Today they're asking for 421,000 in increasing credits because some of that has to do with the ago preservation, and they want to cap the acreage at 45,000, and that's a new -- new term for us to have to deal with before. We asked what we thought the acreage would be. We were told 16,8-. Some of us doubted it, but 16,8- was what we were believing at the time, and now we're looking at a cap of 45-. And so what that may mean to some people is that that's an obligated amount. Meaning, if you're going to tell them they can do Page 153 January 30, 2009 45-, you've got to be able to provide the infrastructure of 45-. And I'm not sure where the county has the opportunity to do that. We haven't had data analysis to see if that's even viable from that point. My concern is -- and I might as well express it now is, why are we looking at acreage to be the cap? Ifwe provided property rights to these people out there in 2002 that provided restoration credits to 315,000, why are we looking at the credits as the cap, and let them be what they may in regards to usage and then undermining acreage. That way we're safe with the property rights arguments, they've gotten the credits that they were -- we agreed to give them in 2002, and we're not looking at a situation where we're crea- -- we have any potential of creating more credits that we can't provide acreage for. And that's a big concern I mentioned earlier. If we provide 421,000 credits and the panther corridors are bigger and create more credits and we end up with a half a million credits but yet we say, we're only going to give you 45,000 acres to put that on, I would think someone might have an argument that you've -- you've asked me to create something that you won't give me land to develop, and there might be some sort of a legal claim against the taxpayers in the future; whereas, if we stuck to credits as the amount and if it was the original, because that's what was already provided, 315,000, and we said look it, work it out however you want to re-split those credits up. If you want to change restoration to move the credits around, fine, but the credit is the amount that sticks. In the future after seven years and the EAR goes through, if the credit system's working well and it looks like it's preserving a lot and we want to further enhance it, it's easier then to add credits than to find out we made a mistake in the future and try to take them back. So that's kind of where I -- last night, and when I was running numbers and trying to figure out all this stuff, that came as a thought to me, and I was going to ask it of the committee to see if they had considered that, and that's certainly where I'm -- what I'm going to be Page 154 January 30, 2009 doing here eventually. Paul? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I think it's a good idea. And the other thing is, when you have a cap of 45,000 footprint acres, you're not including all the road and all the rights-of-way, which is going to eat up a lot more of the ago and conservation land. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And that's an interesting point, because I believe that, too, Paul. And when I first broached that subject in meetings with other -- with some people involved here, I was told it contains the acreage for the public facilities. Well, there's a lot more to the acreage that has to be counted than what's in public facilities. And I have a list of all the things that have to be counted in one of these papers, and I'm -- it was the sheet that I did in 2002. Besides public facilities, you have open spaces, municipal golf courses, schools, roadways, excess open space, WRAs, which don't count. Now, some of those are in part of their government facilities, but they're only allowing -- and Brad, do you know if it's 10 or 15 percent? MR. CORNELL: Ten percent. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Ten percent? MR. CORNELL: Ten. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, the problem with that is, take the first SRA that we have, Ave Maria. Twenty percent is not counted as an SR -- as SRA credits, because 20 percent is excluded for some reason. So we already know that the 45-, by the very first SRA that's in place, is going to be exceeded by another 10 percent on top of the 10 percent that was allowed. And if you consider the WRAs and other things that weren't counted because they're outside the SRA footprint but they benefit the SRA, it even gets bigger. So your development footprint potentially is going to be bigger than the 45-. Page 155 January 30, 2009 But if the 45- contains 10 percent of government facilities and you back that out, that means you end up with about 40,000 that's being really utilized by credits. Well, now we're producing more credits than 40,000 acres can sustain. So we're already putting ourselves into a box, and that's a big concern that I reviewed in my analysis over the last couple days since I got more involved in this on Wednesday. And I don't know how you -- if you even can respond to it now, Brad. But when we come back at some point, I'm sure it's going to have -- I would like the committee -- not the committee -- or however you guys meet now, or if you even meet. MR. CORNELL: We are still a committee. We -- and we do have a meeting scheduled later in February. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, we have to come to a resolution, and it's probably before your meeting -- MR. CORNELL: Fine. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: -- unless we take time. But that suggestion of capping credits instead of acreage, did the committee ever kick it around? MR. CORNELL: No. That angle -- I mean, there were -- there were different ideas about how are we going to balance this -- this whole system with the recognition that we needed to do some more work on restoration -- on corridor creation and restoration, and we wanted to protect agriculture in some way. And the way we came about doing that was to establish the SSAs for ago preserves, and that obviously created more credits. So we had to -- we balanced the system from that side. We saw that there were more credits being generated to accomplish the better public good. How are we going to balance all that? So you saw the increase in the requirement for entitlement. It could have been a reduction in the generation of credits. That would have been the other side. It's just -- you know, it's as broad as it is long as far as that goes. Page 156 January 30, 2009 And essentially we came down and said, look, we need to know -- we need to assure up front that we have agriculture preserve, we have functional ecosystems that are sustainable in the end, and we need to assure the property owners, landowners, are kept whole in terms of what they can expect to get out of this. So there's got to be a mutually agreeable balance to all that. So that's where this 45,000 acres came from, where the 132,000 acres of SSAs and other preserves that result in the final -- what we consider to be a concept maturity map. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And I think what I'm -- what I would have thought might be a better idea is if you took the 315- that we gave you -- in 2002, the county committed to 315,000 credits based on the analysis I saw in Phase II, Section 3. Assuming that analysis is correct and we use that as a basis, you've got that. It's real hard to take something away once you give it. But if you took that 315,000 credits and you felt that the way the credits were applied through the restoration and other avenues and even through the fact that ago wasn't incentivized enough, or at all, you could move those 315,000 credits around as -- anywhere you -- any way that would better benefit, whether it's the environment, whether it's ag., or whether it's development, but at least the community is protected from the extent of the footprint until such time that a further review proves that the credits can be expanded. And that is -- seems to be a safer, more cautious way to approach things from a taxpayer concern than it does to entitle basically by -- 45,000 acres by saying you can have it, and that basically says, if we -- not we, but the government says you can have it, that means the government better be prepared to make sure it can supply it. And that's -- that's the concern I have by approaching it in the different direction from what I'm suggesting, so -- MR. CORNELL: And I see Brad has a comment, so -- I guess maybe -- I hear you arguing the alternative to what we had considered, Page 157 January 30, 2009 which was, you could lower the credit generation, which would be kind of what you're talking about. You would have the cap on credits, and then if you have additional public interested to address, namely increased restoration or increased agricultural protection or what have you, then you accomplish that through reducing the credit generation rather than increasing the number of credits. Is that what you're saying? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: No. I think you reprioritize your credits. Maybe the credit system now, by giving a blanket four for restoration isn't the right way to go. In fact, I don't think you guys think it is, because you tiered the restoration process. So I think that's a good idea. But you keep the same amount of credits at this point until we see how the system rolls out, because my concern is overgiving at this stage to a point where we find out that seven years from now in the review we've made a lot of mistakes that we can't go back on. I'd rather see seven years from now -- and I don't think anybody in this room thinks you're going to use 315,000 credits in seven years. So in seven years -- and we looked back at this program and we see two or three other towns, they fit in like they were supposed to, their development footprint is good, the amount of density that they're utilizing is fine, their retail's working, the road system getting there, the utilities, the landfills that are needed, the jails that are described, the shopping centers that may be needed, all that's now come into play. Then I think you'd find a more receptive time to say, you know what, this is doing so well, why don't we find a way to preserve even more, create more credits, and that's easier to give then when we know a program's working as well as everyone thinks than to take it back if it isn't, and that's the cautionary issue that I'm working on, so -- MR. CORNELL: I understand. And I guess our committee looked at it upon -- as a -- basically a maturity problem. How do we solve the build-out question? What do we want our concept map to Page 158 January 30, 2009 look like in the end? Because it seemed like that was what was pushing everybody to figure out what -- what possibly could happen. And if really what we're -- you know, from -- this is my perspective now -- from an environmental perspective, I don't want to see part of an ecological landscape preserve. I want to see it all. I want to see a sustainable ecological landscape preserve. People who are interested in agriculture want to see a sustainable agricultural landscape. So how do you do that when you only go part way? And I guess that was the question that we answered by saying, well, let's look at the entire picture and see how we can balance that picture. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: But I think your idea of looking at the entire picture is absolutely correct, but I don't know why the picture can't be approached in phases as we see that the picture that is envisioned is the actual -- the one that's turning out as the progress moves forward. Again, because if it turns out wrong, the taxpayers are going to be severely punished for it, and that's where my biggest concern is? Brad? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: You know, one thing this committee was supposed to do, which I'm kind of waiting to hear -- I haven't heard, and that's the use of these credits in urban areas. If that's something that we're going to think of, then the amount of credits we need might be different. But was that ever addressed, Brad? It was -- MR. CORNELL: Yes, it was. We discussed that very early on, and the problem with credits in an urban area is that you can get density in an urban area many easier ways. Why would anybody go by it from a landowner in the rural land stewardship area? You know, you can go to the county commission or the city councilor what have you, and they'll give you your density. The density in an urban area is already very high, and it's not utilized to its fullest extent now. So -- I mean, it's being underutilized. So they don't Page 159 January 30, 2009 need any more density really, if you look at it that way. Unless there was some -- if government intervened and said, well, you have to do this or you have to -- the only way you can raise your density is this way, you have to buy it or you have to, you know, have some sort of performance standards, then you can do it that way, but that's not what we have, except for maybe affordable housing. We've got some density standards that way. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: And I think it would be nice if we were using this for that. I mean, there'd be nothing better than to tighten up the density. In terms of efficiency and sprawl, that's where you honestly really need the growth. And it's coming from preserving land in the eastern lands. I mean, when -- you know, there was a list of items. I think it's 1.22. Did you report on all those items, or did you have a conversation and, if you were interested, you carried it, if you weren't, you -- MR. CORNELL: I'm sorry. What's your question? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: You know, in the report every five years, the report we're going through now -- MR. CORNELL: Right. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: -- you were supposed to review a list of items. MR. CORNELL: We did. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Did you report on all the items or just the ones that are of interest to you? MR. CORNELL: We considered them all. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Okay. So is there someplace I can read responses to -- I think it was -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: He's looking at policy 1.22, item number 8, it's on Page 50. I think that's the one you're referring to, Brad. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Yeah. MR. CORNELL: And so you want to know where is it written what is our response -- formal response is to the urban designated -- Page 160 January 30, 2009 urban sending of credits? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: In terms of smart growth, that to me is an important question. I mean, it's nice to have a conversation, but I think it should have been seriously addressed. MR. DeRUNTZ: It's on Page 14, Page 14. CHAIRMAN STRAIN : Well, it's on Page 50 of our book. MR. CORNELL: Well, it depends on which -- MR. DeRUNTZ: Page 14. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: So it is -- okay. I'll read that then. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: But I think, Mark, the reason that's important to say now is that ifthere was a recommendation to take credits out of this area, then limiting the credits versus the acreage might be a different concept, might not be the best concept. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Limiting the -- COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Well, in other words, if we're going to be able to take credits over the line -- but I guess we're not, so CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, it would also fix the concerns over any expansion of the science on the panther corridors. If we get the corridors, come back and say, they need to be a mile wide instead of 300 feet wide as shown on this interim plan, then all of a sudden this is passed by then, or it's close to being passed by then, it creates restoration credits for all those panther corridors. And I'm concerned that we might have -- I don't want to leave the door open to even generate even more that we're obligated to address, and that's kind of what I was thinking, so -- MR. CORNELL: But I think that this -- the proposal that we came up with -- now mind you, we did this with a really close eye towards balance. I mean, balance was the name of the game. It was our -- it was our chief guiding principle, if you will. Page 161 January 30, 2009 How do we balance all the desired outcomes that we're looking at as a committee, as a public committee? I mean, it's -- as you know, you do the same thing with the things that come before you. It was -- we just decided that you can accommodate changes that might come from various sources like the science review team by looking at -- at ways of -- well, perhaps the public can buy land like we bought Pepper Ranch, all -- some of the credits that were on Pepper Ranch are now not going to be used, as well as maybe somebody else can do the restoration. I mean, we had -- I made that comment an hour or two ago, and I think that's still a viable alternative to generating credits. And if it's so untenable, if it's going to be so unprofitable, if the value of credits is going to be -- seem to be so diluted that, why would anybody do that, the landowner's not going to do that, and then it becomes the only option you have is to have the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service or somebody else come in and make that restoration happen, and they don't get credits. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I think we've talked that enough. Paul, did you -- COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: (Shakes head.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Anybody else have any issues on that first paragraph on that policy? (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I do. In the last sentence, you struck the words principle of the Rural Land Stewardship Act as for the described -- why? MR. CORNELL: We had that conversation a long time ago, and let me see in can remember. This was originally in 2002. The proposal was set up to follow a pilot program that was passed by the state legislature that has now been superseded by subsequent legislation and it is now proposed to be superseded again by the rural land stewardship rule that's -- you know, DCA's trying to implement. Page 162 January 30, 2009 So this stands on its own, I think, in recognition that our program is a prototype. It's a unique program not aligned with the state's -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: So is the Rural Land Stewardship Act a reference to the 9J-5 portion of the law or the Florida Statutes? Because I believe we're ahead of 9J-5, but we come under the portion of the Florida Statutes in regards -- but I'm not sure on that, so -- MR. CORNELL: I believe that this program was patterned after a prototype that is -- if I'm not mistaken, and somebody will have to correct me -- that has been repealed since then, has been replaced by actual legislation on rural land stewardship. That is somewhat different. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: It's an issue that, as we move into transmittal, we can always further address it there, if need be. MR. CORNELL: And somebody else may know more. Tom or somebody else in the audience may know more about that than I, but I believe that's the reason for that. It's no longer patterned after the state laws. It's its own entity. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Anybody else have any questions on Page 56? (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: If you go down to 4.5, the first few words of the first line you added, to the extent practical. Love that language. What does that mean? Who decides if it's practical or not? Why don't you just drop that and say, the SRA master plan shall be consistent with the county's then-adopted long-range transportation plan? By saying it's to the extent practical, I mean, that doesn't -- we learned on the I O-year water supply it doesn't mean anything. So I would think we want some further definition. MR. CORNELL: This was language that was worked out with transportation staff and other folks. I think some of the landowners were in this discussion. My take on it is that it was recognition that these two processes kind of move separately, and there wasn't a whole Page 163 January 30, 2009 lot of coordination necessarily. So there was a reluctance to tie it directly. But I see your point. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Mr. Wolfley? COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Brad, as I recall a lot of the things that we -- I think that would -- let me just put it this way. We didn't have a lot of the information that we have now. We didn't have a road plan. We didn't have a map of that. We didn't have a map of the concept plan. We were going through this, so I think that, you know, it can -- we sort of see where the road's are going to go and sort of see where we can put human habitat. Maybe that can be struck now, but before we just didn't have that information from the agencies. MR. CORNELL: I think that's true, and we still don't really in any specific terms because there's a vision plan -- I can't remember what it's called. Nick Casalanguida referenced it yesterday, and it's in the transportation element policy that we're adding, whatever that number is. MR. GREENWOOD: Mr. Chairman? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Called the county build-out vision plan. MR. CORNELL: Thank you. That vision plan -- MR. GREENWOOD: Mr. Chairman, Nick Casalanguida is on his way over, just so you know. He should be here shortly. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: That will lighten up the day, won't it? MR. GREENWOOD: Yeah, he's watching us. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, good. MR. CORNELL: I just said his name now. It's like two seconds later, he's -- well, anyway, that -- I think that's -- you know, there's more definition to be brought in a year when that plan comes to pass. And this is just sort of acknowledging that we didn't have a whole lot of understanding of where the transportation planning would intersect this, except that we -- there is a requirement that this be not a burden on current taxpayers. That's in the plan now. Page 164 January 30, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, I think that -- and I did ask Nick prior to this meeting, give me a copy of that build-out plan. It's referenced multiple times -- or actually the division plan -- in this document, and my understanding is it's not even close to being done, so -- MR. CORNELL: It's a year away. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Right. Yet it's brought up many times in this document, so it's a little concerning as to what we're buying into. But anybody else -- go ahead. MR. CORNELL: I was just going to say, the -- partly why it's a year away is that the 2050 concept plan is a long ways away as well. And there's a lot of assumptions being put into that map and some of these ideas of coordination, and I think that the periodic reviews that will come with the EAR process and the reviews of these policies are going to be really important for making sure that that stays connected. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, if anybody will delay the process in Collier County, it certainly will be Nick -- oh, Nick's here. Nick, come on up. You're always good to see. MR. CASALANGUIDA: I won, Mark, I won. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: You won? MR. CASALANGUIDA: How can I help you this afternoon? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Could you explain the status of the county build-out vision plan first, and then we want to ask you about some language in the beginning of the added sentence on 4.5. MR. CASALANGUIDA: Sure. For the record, Nick Casalanguida with transportation. Right now we are drafting the scope for the vision build-out plan right now. We're doing the horizon study for the roadway network. The vision build-out plan is a little bit more different, and what -- there's a lot of public involvement in the works with other divisions and with folks from ECPO. So right now we're doing a transportation build-out network plan. Page 165 January 30,2009 But to figure out what we need to do to build less roads is where the vision build-out plan goes. If we can find ways to provide goods and services and include mobility, you know, public transportation, land use items, maybe we don't have to build as many roads. So that's the scope of the vision build-out plan. It will probably take us about, I would say about a year to complete it. With or without the board's blessing to do that as a GMP amendment, we're going to work towards, as staff, getting that done. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, when that plan's done, is it the intent of your department that this county follow that plan if it's voted on and approved by the BCC? MR. CASALANGUIDA: It will be used as a guide both for the MPO and for the county. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: That word guide. Bruce and you must have talked. I don't know ifhe's even here right now. He uses words like that, too. Used as a guide. Does that mean we shall conform to it? MR. CASALANGUIDA: When you say shall conform, the issue with even the plans that have been put up by ECPO and the Conservancy is their estimates are what we think they'll be. And when I say guide, if a town wants to come on another side of a road that we have proposed and we need to adjust that road, we can do an update to that plan. So it is a guide. It says, if we do these things and build a roadway network and consistent with this concept plan, when we're done, we'll be okay. Now, that doesn't mean if one of the rural landowners wants to modify that plan that they can't. They'll just have to show that it still meets the transportation and other needs that are in that plan. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Would that plan talk about items like integrating transit systems between towns, planning road networks if landowners don't agree to where those road networks should go? How Page 166 January 30, 2009 do we plan the uses for the need for travel between each SRA if only -- if each SRA only considers its internal systems? It that plan going to get into all those issues? MR. CASALANGUIDA: That plan will get into all those issues. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, then why wouldn't that plan be shall instead of to the extent practical or shall -- or be considered? Why wouldn't we make sure that that plan then is incorporated into the design of the RLSA? MR. CASALANGUIDA: It would be, but we want to be able to have flexibility. Because as talked about -- and I agree with the folks that have worked on the ECPO plan, you're going to have to have the ability to modify it at some point in time, because we don't -- we have that first-hand knowledge of what it's finally going to look like. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: But see, we're not talking about the plan. We're talking about the GMP language. And what I'm suggesting is the GMP language become more definitive in the references of that plan, but the plan is the fluid document that's changed more readily between your department and the BCC. So I'm not sure why the GMP has to be so flexible when you've got the flexibility built into the plan. MR. CASALANGUIDA: The idea would be, it shall comply with the plan unless the plan is otherwise modified. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, that's not what any of this says. MR. CASALANGUIDA: Okay. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And that's where I'm coming from. MR. CASALANGUIDA: Okay. I understand. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And if you look at the policy 4.5, the first words added to the underlined sentence, to the extent practicable. Well, that eliminates any need to abide by it then. MR. CASALANGUIDA: If you want to make that more stringent and that's your recommendation, I fully support that. Page 167 January 30, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. And if you -- and there's other instances where the county build-out vision plan is referenced, and each one of those is a consideration and not a shall. And if the document itself is flexible and this document requires you to tie it to that flexible document as it changes, then I think that's a better protection for the plan's implementation, and then obviously for the taxpayers hopefully, so. MR. CASALANGUIDA: Okay. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Does anybody have any other comments on that? (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Nick, I think that's the only issues on this page right now, but we're going to probably have more. MR. CASALANGUIDA: Okay. Fair enough. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: So thank you for your time. MR. CASALANGUIDA: You're welcome. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: It's always a pleasure. Policy 4.5, the second paragraph, the last two lines -- and this is more of a Tom Greenwood issue. On the second to the last line you repeat the words, such as appropriate ways, disposal methods. You repeat that at the last of the last line, too. I don't think you need it twice, so you may want to look at that in the future. Policy 4.6, your reference to that section in 9J-5, I pulled that section. It doesn't seem to be a reference that has anything to do with what you're referring to it for, so you may want to double check that 9J-5 reference. You see what I'm saying in 4.6, Tom? MR. GREENWOOD: Yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Then that takes us through the end of Page 56. Does any of the Planning Commission members have any other questions on Page 56? Page 168 January 30,2009 (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Are there any comments from the audience on Page 56? Russell? MR. PRIDDY: Yes, Russell Priddy. I'll just repeat something that was said earlier. And I don't personally have a dog in this fight, but I believe what my fellow landowners tell me. You all are concerned about, if this panther corridor has to be a mile wide, about the credits it would generate. Forget it. It's not going to generate credits. It's not going to be built in that, using credits or in that fashion. It's just way more than what the landowner's going to be able to do. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. MR. PRIDDY: So, I mean, the answer is there. If it gets -- if it gets too big, it gets done in another fashion, not with credits. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. Anybody else have any comments on Page 56 before we go to Page 577 Allen? MR. REYNOLDS: There were a couple of discussions regarding, first of all, the language that was deleted. Chapter 163.3177, which is what was referred to as the stewardship act, our program is not under that statutory provision, so that's the reason that that was struck. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: AND just before you go, then that same reference is in policy 4.6. MR. REYNOLDS: Right. And the reference in 4.6 is that in that part of the statute it references a variety of innovative planning strategies and techniques, so this is a reference to that list of techniques that can be used, which includes satellites communities, new towns, and other types of innovative practices. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. It says it shall be based upon. So would the changes that you're making -- and namely your change in the -- you're removing hamlets and you're changing the uses in a CRD, or you're trying at least. Is that going to be any conflict with the reference that you have in 4.6 to Chapter 163.31777 Page 169 January 30, 2009 MR. REYNOLDS: I don't believe it will be -- I also don't believe that if that language was taken out that it would make much difference. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. MR. REYNOLDS: Yeah. I think you could leave it either way. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. MR. REYNOLDS: The other thing is that when you were talking about the 45,000 acres, I wanted to make it clear that under the committee's proposed recommendations, any public benefit acres would be counted as part of that 45,000 acres. It's included, not excluded, as part of that. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I thought it was up to 10 percent. MR. REYNOLDS: No. The 10 percent is the best estimate of what we think that acreage would represent. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: So that means all community acreage would be include in the 45-? MR. REYNOLDS: Correct. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. So that brings the 45- potentially down to 35-, which means then you're entitling 35,000 acres with credits, which would give you even a greater excess of credits that we would have to deal with, so -- MR. REYNOLDS: No, because what happens basically under the program right now is that, if you look at the calibration of the credits, you'll see that the credits generated actually produce less than 45,000 acres of development. It's only when you add in the noncredit acres for public benefit do you get to 45,000 acres. Did you follow that? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I follow what you're saying. I'll have to go back and do the calculations again, because if you take 421, divide it by ten, you add 42,000. So you're saying that the noncredits bring it from 42- to 45- when actually if it's 10 percent, it would be maybe a little more than that, but I understand how you rounded it off then. Page 170 January 30, 2009 MR. REYNOLDS: Yeah. There's a table that's contained in Section 3. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yes. I spent some time on that one last night, so -- MR. REYNOLDS: And when you get to that, we can go through that in more detail, if you'd like, but-- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I'm not sure we'll get to it, but there's no -- I understand what you're saying, Alan, so there would be no sense in -- very good. MR. REYNOLDS: Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you, sir. Any other questions for anyone on Page 56? Nicole? MS. RYAN: Nicole Ryan, Conservancy of Southwest Florida. On policy 4.2, the Conservancy was also concerned about that cap being put in. From the natural resources standpoint we believe that allowing 45,000 acres for SRAs would negatively impact natural resources. And also from the public perspective, essentially Collier County will be saying that infrastructure, roads, and everything that the county is obligated to do for new communities, that the county will provide that level of service for 45,000 acres of development out in the rural areas. To date, we don't have any specific number attached to how much development could occur out there. Ifwe jump to the 45,000 acres, we better have a road network that is going to be somehow financially feasible. It seems like it's quite a leap. I do like the idea of looking at -- instead of capping acreage, capping credits. The credits contain the value. And if we have an acreage limit and more credits at the end, then there's going to be an impasse of how then do you attach value to those remaining credits. And it seems that there's still a debate about how many credits are out there today, how many credits would also be generated by the proposed amendment? Page 171 January 30,2009 So if we agree that it's 315,000 credits to date, I would like to explore the idea of shifting those credits around to how we feel they can best protect the agricultural resources, natural resources, panther corridors, what we want to protect in that footprint that we have of credits to date. So we certainly would support exploring that idea further. As you said, we can't take those credits away, so let's work with them, but wait and not give more at this time. On the policy 4.5, we very much support the idea of taking out the, to the extent practicable and implying -- putting something in that says it shall comply as the plan is then updated and modified. On policy 4.6, it talks about dealing with mass transit and making sure that you have bus subsidies, but it doesn't get into if that is going to be paid for by the SRA, by the developer, and I don't know if that's something that would be better placed in the LDC, but I think the obligation for who is going to fund that really needs to be brought out at some point. So just make that as a side note. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. MS. RYAN: Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Any questions? Mr. Wolfley? COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: It's not necessarily for Nicole, but it is about what she said. Yesterday I attended an economic development conference that was held here, and the State of Florida is trying to attract much more technology-based, well, companies to bring a different revenue source to the State of Florida, and specifically to Southwest Florida if we can. To do that, we've got to have and be ready to have some places for them to go, not only for the industries themselves, but places to live. I personally couldn't think of a better place for that to happen than in the rural lands, and that's who's going to pay for it. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Page 172 January 30, 2009 COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: In other words, if we're going to attract these people, we better get this thing done and get going. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. Paul? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Mark, you mentioned 315,000 credits. It was the first time I've heard that. Could 315,000 credits cover more than the 45,000 acres that we're talking about already? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Depends. It comes out to eight credits per acre. If they go into ten for some reason that changes it, but even at eight, which is the worst-case scenario, divided by 315, I think you're about 39,000, something like that. I got to -- 39,375 acres. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Brian? MR. GILLIGAN: Brian Gilligan with the Barron Collier Companies. I do think -- and this was talked about, Mark, the other day, that 45,000 acres doesn't obligate the county. That's a max. We have certainty that it's going to be not more than 45,000 acres. I think if you haven't done so already, it's really important to take a look at these credits calculations, what the current program is compared to what's being proposed. I think, again, it's worthwhile looking at that. I want to say that I do believe with this cap you actually are going to have less development that's currently to be -- happen under the program. Under the current program you'd have 43,000-odd acres of potential SRA, plus the rest could be one to five. This 45,000 acres is if all the credits were used, so the rest would be ago preserve. I want to make one other point though, and that is, when you look at these, these are maximum calculations. And it's important to do that. We need to understand the maximum impact. But this is if 100 percent of the people out there all participated in this program. I don't think that's a valid assumption. I think some people are just not going to participate at all. And if it becomes, well, Page 173 January 30, 2009 what is that percentage? Maybe it's 10, maybe it's 20 percentage -- 20 percent. Let's say 20 percent don't participate in the program at all. You don't have 45,000 acres of development. You have somewhere in the mid 30s. Most likely that's really what's going to happen. But, again, I understand the need to go through these maximum calculations. I do believe when you look at that table for the 45,000 acres, I think you'll find that it is in balance, that there aren't excess credits being generated above the 45-, and the reason I know that is because we have people like Russell, we have people like Dave, that don't want excess credits in the system. If they're in the credit side, that would devalue what they have to offer. So those numbers have been looked at very, very carefully to make sure that's in balance. And I do go along with the northern corridor. It's going to have to make sense ultimately. There's been some great discussion today on the size. But ultimately, in order for that happen, it's going to be -- have to be a win-win for everyone, and it's going to have to be of a size that makes sense to everybody. That's how I think that's going to play out. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Brian, since you mentioned the northern corridor -- and I know you're a signer on the MOU, and I know the MOU factors into this kind of in the background. It's not really a surface document for our discussion. But was the -- if the northern corridor doesn't materialistically evolve from the scientific committee, is the MOU still valid? MR. GILLIGAN: You know, Mark, as it relates to that -- and I think it was expressed before, maybe it was by Elizabeth -- I mean, that's a document. It's not as binding. It says clearly that it's not a binding agreement. Weare going to see how the scientific technical review committee comes out, and then we're going to decide how we go forward from there. Page 174 January 30, 2009 We think that it makes abundant sense to work together to try to create something that's wonderful for Collier County. We're going to have to assess how that comes out. We're going to have to assess whether all the components of what's being proposed stay intact or if we're going to have to make some modifications to it. So it's not cast in stone. We're going to have to assess where we're at when they come back. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. Any questions? Mr. Wolfley? COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Brian? Brian? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: David's got a question. MR. GILLIGAN: Yes. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: I hate to put you on the spot -- well, maybe I don't. But I'm wondering, you talked about devaluating of the credits. Can you give us a range? I know it's very difficult, nearly impossible to do, but can you give us a range of a value of the credits? MR. GILLIGAN: You looking for a price range? COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Yes. MR. GILLIGAN: You know, unfortunately, we don't have that because, you know, the only transaction to date is Ave Maria, and we were fortunate enough, we had the credits off the 17,000 acres of properties to, you know, place on Ave Maria. So there hasn't been yet an exchange on the open market to know exactly what that dollar value is. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Internal thing. MR. GILLIGAN: Yes. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: You know, it's unfortunate. It would help us put a little substance to it. But, I guess, you know, we may get to it later. MR. GILLIGAN: Yeah. And that's the thing. I mean, I know I can understand, you know, the question and the concern, but, you Page 175 January 30, 2009 know, that's going to play out and it's going to be market driven. There are certainly a number of people out there. If they want to move forward and do projects, they need credits. They're going to have to approach people with credits. And you know, what those credits are today might be different from what those credits are (sic) a year ago, so there's going to be a lot of variables, but I do think ultimately a value will be established. I mean, it's not going to have to be one that's cast in stone. I think it's just going to be kind of on a transaction-by-transaction basis. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Okay. I was going to ask some more but-- , CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, go ahead, David. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: No. We'll go in a loop. Thanks. MR. GILLIGAN: Okay. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. Hey, Tom. Before you start, David, the rural fringe is different than the stewardship area. The rural fringe uses TDRs. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Right. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: TDRs were pegged at a starting rate of $25,000 per TDR, and each TDR was worth one unit, and the stewardship area, each steward -- two stewardship credits equal one unit. Now, I'm not saying the TDR program is successful, because it's not. The 25,000 is probably not right. But if you were to take that as a rule of thumb, you're looking around 12-and-a-halfthousand for each stewardship credit, which is probably way too high. So I would expect they'd be less than that to give you a ballpark. So we're not probably above that. We're probably less than that for the COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Okay. Well, that's kind of where I was figuring, thank you. Page 176 January 30, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Tom? MR. CONRECODE: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. For the record, Tom Conrecode with Collier Enterprises. A quick comment on the language change to policy 4.5. If you can scroll back up to that. It's important to understand when we say to the extent practicable versus shall, the first thing that you need to recognize is that the LRTP is updated once every five years. And so to the extent that you're proposing an SRA that coincides with LRTP of five years ago or four years ago, that there is some timing associated with the cycles that the county goes through. The other thing that's important about that language -- and we spent a considerable amount of time working with Nick on finding language that everyone would be comfortable with -- is that this county build-out vision plan does not exist and that this future corridor vision that is prescribed in another policy does not exist. And so to the extent practicable is the appropriate language, I think, in this particular case. Had those documents existed or we understood that they were updated on the annual cycle, it may be shall may be the more appropriate language. But it's important to understand the cycles and the time frames that these things operate under and yet still give Nick comfort in that his concerns are being addressed in this RLSA update. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you, Tom. And Nick will be back to visit us at some point in the future before we're all over with this, and then we'll have to run that by him again at -- and did you have something? COMMISSIONER CARON: Well, I was just going to say, I thought the way we had talked about it as updated and modified kind of covered that situation. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: That's what I was thinking too, but we can run it by Nick when we see him next week, so. Okay. If there's no other comments from the public, let's move on Page 177 January 30, 2009 to Page 57, and that's a continuation of policy 4.6 and ends towards the end with an almost complete 4.7.2. Are there any questions from the Planning Commission on Page 57? Ms. Caron? COMMISSIONER CARON: Yeah, I have a dumb question here because I don't understand quite what this means. Under policy 4.7, the next to the last line, I guess it is, says, the base residential density does not restrict net residential density of parcels within the SRA. Isn't the base density the net density? All right. So explain to me. MR. CORNELL: I believe that that has to do with acreage and where you're concentrating your development within what you call your town, isn't it? COMMISSIONER CARON: No. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, wouldn't it be -- and Brad, in the urban area, for example, when we get a PUD, it's calculated on the density by a gross amount. If you have 50 acres, you have 200 units, but your parcels, because you have a restriction on open space and all that, your parcels have a higher density. It could go ten -- eight, ten, 12, whatever, per parcel. I thought -- when I was reading this, I made a similar note, but I thought in trying to figure it out, I thought that's what I was getting to was that kind of collation of the total gross down to a net on a parcel. COMMISSIONER CARON: Okay. Could we just have them confirm that, because I want to make sure that's what it means. MR. CORNELL: That's my read of it. I'll let somebody else talk about it if they have a different opinion. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: You're standing alone. MR. CORNELL: Going once, going twice. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Oh, Alan's going to come up here. MR. REYNOLDS: I thought staff was going to take that one. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: No. Staffs hands off. Page 178 January 30, 2009 MR. REYNOLDS: All right. COMMISSIONER CARON: AI, is that correct? MR. REYNOLDS: Total hands off. COMMISSIONER CARON: Was that correct? MR. REYNOLDS: What Mark just described is correct. COMMISSIONER CARON: Fine, thank you. That's all I wanted to know. MR. REYNOLDS: You'll typically find that the net residential densities are probably at least twice the base density in a typical town or village. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. Are there any other questions from the Planning Commission on Page 57? Paul? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Well, just on 4.7.2, villages within and with -- outside the area of critical concern. Since the area of critical concern is all primary panther habitat, I think everyone's pretty much agreed with that, I would like to not see nodes of any kind within that area. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. So the villages of not less than 100 acres but not more than 1,000 acres inside the area of critical concern, and not more than 1,500 acres outside. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Yeah. I'm more concerned with the inside part. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, that hasn't -- has that changed? MR. CORNELL: The -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Inside. MR. CORNELL: No, but what has changed inside is the proposal to have the agricultural preservation stewardship sending areas. And if those come to pass, as we hope they do, there won't be any villages in the ACSC at all. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Yeah, that-- MR. CORNELL: It would be, perhaps, the potential for one Page 179 January 30,2009 CRD, and that's it. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: That would be a good outcome. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, Paul, I think what he's saying is, if it comes to pass. And what is that dependent on? What do you mean, if it comes to pass? MR. CORNELL: It's a voluntary program. If people participate and say, yes, I will put my agricultural acreage under an agricultural preservation stewardship sending area easement, keep it ago or less forever and will not build a village in the ACSC. That would -- I mean, that's the landowner choice. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Right now there's the ability to build -- is there -- the ability to build a village in the ACSC is up to a thousand acres; is that -- or it's up to 500 acres? A thousand? MR. CORNELL: I have to go back and look. I believe it's a thousand. I don't think that's changed. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. MR. CORNELL: What did change was outside the ACSC, they increased it to 1,500 acres. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And that's the purpose of this insertion? MR. CORNELL: Correct. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. That's what I was getting at. Okay. Anybody else? Paul, does that get to your -- COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: That was my point. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Anybody else have any questions on that one? (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, let's go back to the top, the second line, underline on the very top of the page, it says the development of the SRA shall also consider the needs identified in the county build-out vision plan. Depending on when we re-talk to Nick about it and how to change the language, where it says shall also consider needs to be Page 180 January 30, 2009 considered to be changed because that's just as ambiguous as the other item that was pointed out. Under policy 4.7, the reference in the middle where it says Chapter 163 then it says OJ-5, that should be 9J-5. And, again, that's the reference I -- Tom, I mentioned earlier that you may want to double check and make sure it's the right reference. MR. GREENWOOD: I will. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Number -- policy 4.7.1, it's talking about the towns. The town sizes have changed, and it -- there's some language in here that didn't get changed by the committee, but I want to explore some ideas. Towns are the largest and most diverse form of SRA with a full range of housing types and mix of uses. It seems to me that we could reduce the footprint used in the RLSA area by utilizing more density under what everybody likes to think is smart growth, and that means your town cores could afford a higher density under a mixed-use capacity whether you're concentric bands of multifamily and then getting into single-family. I have been told -- and I've not been there myself -- that Ave Maria hasn't followed that pattern exactly, that they've got -- density isn't as concentrated there as maybe it could be before you got to the single family. That's fine. That's their development. They got in before these changes. But I don't know that to be a fact. And I see Brian jumping up, so maybe he can confirm it, whether it is or whether it isn't. I'm wondering why the committee may not want to consider adding language so that we can focus higher densities in town cores under a mixed-use program that we've tried so desperately to promote here in the county. And I know Ave Maria in their town center has utilized some of that from what I heard. And then looking at stepped down layers of density before you finally get to single family so that if we were to say in the gross density calculations of the RLSA, instead of four, it was Page 181 January 30, 2009 six, then your credits could be used up more rapidly on less footprint, affording more open space and more green space. MR. CORNELL: From the committee perspective, I certainly understand, and we had a fair amount of discussion about this issue. And it is an important principal of smart growth, and the question becomes one of, what is marketable, what is compatible with the rural landscape out there. And I agree with you if there were more -- if there were higher density, that would potentially reduce the footprint, and I don't know that that still isn't possible to happen, and it could happen as time goes on and it becomes apparent that we need to increase densities in these kinds of developments. Today the workable marketable mix from the landowner's perspective seems to be about what it is in the LDC now. I think the LDC has pretty good smart growth criteria for town design, but I certainly understand your point. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, this morning, I think it was Alan who indicated that the density being used out there is not much different than that in the coastal area, which is two to two and a half. That's real low density. That's the density that's got everybody concerned about urban sprawl. I mean, if we've got a whole new area that's being looked at, is there a way to plan? Maybe we ought to be looking at it. MR. CORNELL: Well, one point I want to make about the SRA density, and perhaps Brian would say something about this, too, but I know that there's a fairly significant percentage -- I want to say 35 percent -- that is open space within those SRAs, and that, you know, contributes to less density on the gross acreage, but you would have a higher density on a net basis. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: But, since you don't have to deal with 15 percent water management because you've got the WRAs not being counted as SRA credited acreage, you have the ability to put more on that acreage than you do in the urban area. Page 182 January 30, 2009 So 15 percent of four is what, another five maybe, maybe more. So I'm just suggesting that it could be a little higher, and you probably have the room to put it there. MR. CORNELL: It could be, and I think it becomes a question of marketability and what they think they can sell, and I -- to that question, I would send you to the developers and landowners. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Brian, what I'd like to do is let us -- it would be just a minute. MR. GILLIGAN: Sure. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I want to get the questions done to the committee from the Planning Commission before we go to public, okay. And is there any other questions before I go to one more, and that is, under policy 4.7.2 that starts on Page 57, the second to the last line, it said appropriately scaled uses described in policy 4.7.4 shall be permitted in villages. Now, in 4.7.4, you get into all kinds of things. Aviation -- which I'm wondering if it means airports -- research centers, aerospace, corporate headquarters. What is appropriately scaled? How do we determine what that is? Is there any way -- guideline for that? Because what may be appropriately scaled to a landowner who has a potential on that site versus what the other parties may think would be two different things. MR. CORNELL: Well, as you might guess, Tammie Nemecek had significant input on this particular 4.7.4 -- I mean 4.7.4, and appropriate scale, I think, is a professional judgment call unless there are some specific criteria attached to that, which I suppose there would be a license to do that in the LDC. Right now I think professional judgment. I defer to staff to answer that question more specifically. MR. GREENWOOD: I don't have a definition for appropriately scaled, and I think that language did come from Tammie, I believe. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Brad? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Mark, wouldn't we, when we Page 183 January 30, 2009 established the LDC requirements for this, if we put a public hearing in there, that hearing could establish that. MR. CORNELL: It's kind of like a compatibility test, you know. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: As long as it's thought of. I just was curious if anybody could tells me what they intended when they put it here. I mean, that's fine. I have no problem with that. Donna, did you have a question? COMMISSIONER CARON: No, that's okay. We can wait until we get done. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, let's -- then on Page 57, let's turn to public speakers. Brian, I know you've been anxiously awaiting. MR. GILLIGAN: Just wanted to comment on the density issue. Brian Gilligan with Barron Collier Companies. You know, it's interesting. I mean, everyone has different opinions. When you take a town like Ave Maria, what works, what doesn't works, what could be done differently. We're pretty proud of it, the way it turned out. And on the density issue, when you look at our town center core, we have mixed use, we have residences above that commercial. What you don't see yet in the ground is, kind of on the outer band of our town center, we're also going to have more multifamily there, which is a more dense product, and then it's going to scale out into the residential neighborhoods. From there, you go into the TND, traditional neighborhood design-type product, very dense, with the requirements of the Rural Land Stewardship Program, there's pocket parks and other things like that. But the actual homes themselves are fairly dense in there. And somebody touched on it. With the overall requirements of the Rural Land Stewardship Program, with the 35 percent open space, we do have overall density across the entire project of, let's say, 11,000 units we're entitled for basically on 4,000 acres. So it's going to Page 184 January 30, 2009 work out of a density of probably about two and a half or so. And that's just, you know, because of the requirements of the Rural Land Stewardship Program. You have to put in parks, which are great, you have other kinds of open space. But I think if you were to drive around Ave Maria, if you went on Del Webb, went through Del Webb or the Polte product, you'd see it's relatively dense product. Mark, I'd have to say, I mean, if a homebuilder could put more units on an acre of property, they'd love to do so. That means they're going to make more money. So, you know, there's no push back from the developers or the homebuilders of wanting to go higher density if they're able to build an attractive product that the market wants. But I would say this, I would say with the overall four units per gross acre allowed under their program, we have quite a bit of room of Ave Maria. If you take a look at the Ave Maria plan -- Tom, I don't know if you have it -- but if you take an aerial of it, it's pretty dense overall. And if you got denser, I still don't think you're going to exceed the four units per acre. I don't know how -- I don't know how you'd get up to a density of five units or six units or something like that with all the requirements of the Rural Land Stewardship Program. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: My goal was to try to find a way to use more credits to make them more valuable -- MR. GILLIGAN: Right. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: -- and at the same time reduce the footprint. And if it's not practical, I understand, but I thought I'd throw it out there and hear what kind of -- MR. GILLIGAN: Right. And I think it's a good idea. I just wanted to relay, you know, from -- practically speaking, when you're doing a project like that, that's kind of the reality right now. Also, with Tammie not here, I'm, you know, more than happy to answer any questions about what she put in. I'm chairman elect of the Economic Development Council. Page 185 January 30, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: There's one paragraph in here you don't want to answer for her. It's on 4.1.8. I cannot figure out -- I have read that thing and read that thing. I cannot figure out what it says. But you might be prepared if she's not going to be here next Thursday and you are, so. MR. GILLIGAN: Actually, Mark, I mean, what are you referring to? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I don't want to jump ahead, but I'll tell you what it says. MR. GILLIGAN: Okay. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: It says, it is recognized that the SRA development in the RLSA may generate surplus revenues to Collier County and Collier County may choose to allocate a portion of such surplus revenues to ensure that sufficient resources are available to allow Collier County to respond expeditiously to economic opportunities and compete effectively for high-value research, development -- MS. HUSHON: CRDs. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: -- and commercialization, innovation and alternative and renewable energy business project. MR. GILLIGAN: I can address that. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, that's okay. We'll wait till-- MR. GILLIGAN: But no, I just want to comment, because there was a workshop with the Board of County Commissioners a few weeks back that we talked about the creation of economic development zones, and that language mirrors exactly what we talked about with the Board of County Commissioners. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Should have known. MR. GILLIGAN: So that's where that language comes from. So if you'd like to talk about it some more, we can. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, we will, because -- I mean, it doesn't surprise me now that I know it came through a political Page 186 January 30, 2009 process, but we'll go on. MR. GILLIGAN: No. But Mark, I would like to talk about that. I really believe that based on the fundamental compact, sustainable nature of the developments in the Rural Land Stewardship Area, I think there's going to be surplus revenues generated, that is, taxes and other charges and fees, over and above the cost of the county delivering the services, and what that speaks of is a way to stimulate economic development by using a portion, not all, but a portion of that surplus to invest right there within that community which will further generate more revenues coming to the county. So that's what that concept is, and that's why you see that language there. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, good, because I have -- then based on that, we will certainly have a lively discussion when we get to 4.1.8. MR. GILLIGAN: Okay. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. Okay. Next speaker on Page 57. MS. JENKINS: Anita Jenkins with WilsonMiller. Mark, I just wanted to address some of your comments about density and the circles and how density is applied in the town centers and town cores, and that idea is identified in the Land Development Code, that it directs the highest density and intensity of uses to the town cores, the town centers, and then the intent is, with the neighborhood general and neighborhood edge, that those densities and intensities decrease as you move out towards the edge. So that is defined in the Land Development Code. And also appropriately scaled towards the villages, if you look on Page 73, there is attachment C to the Rural Land Stewardship Program, and it defines your stewardship receiving area characteristics. So then if you have one of those uses within a village, that use has to be scaled in such a way to fit with all the other uses that are Page 187 January 30, 2009 required to be part of that village. So the -- that particular use couldn't consume all of the land that is in the village without accommodating these other uses. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. So the fact that 4.7.4 is a new policy, it still has to be incorporated equally in the Page 73, attachment C? MS. JENKINS: Correct. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, good. Thank you. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Mark, a question. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yes, Brad. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Can we talk about attachment C now? It does come up in 4.7. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Fine. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Anita, maybe you can answer this thing. Obviously we discussed the gross density is up to four units per gross acreage, okay. These areas that have floor area ratio, you're going to be calculating that then by the parcel in which they sit? MS. JENKINS: There has been interpretation from the county staff that those are calculated based on the contact zone. If it's in the -- within the town core, it's calculated from the town core. I'll have to go back and look at that, Mr. Schiffer, to remember how the county interpreted that. But I believe that when we were going through Ave Maria and looking at that specific issue for a parcel in the town core in Ave Maria, it was -- the interpretation was that the FAR was by context zone. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: And I think if I remember the Ave Maria before the board is, we really had a little bit of trouble with this, and we had to kind of leave it to the PUD to answer it. Because, for example, if you have retail office, that's your ideal mixed-use with residential, yet this has a floor area ratio of .5 that is not going to create the downtown. January 30, 2009 MS. JENKINS: Yeah. I think it's fair to look at those and look at the interpretations that have been made on those. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: And then could we revisit and make -- you know, I think this matrix should actually work rather than -- if the answer is it's staff-made interpretation, that's not exactly an answer to that. I think we should look at their interpretation and all of us discuss how we want that to work. And Mark, there's your density in those. Okay. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Good point. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Okay. Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Is there something you could bring back to us from after you review what staff -- staffs interpretation was when we meet next week? MS. JENKINS: Sure. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. Nicole? MS. RYAN: Nicole Ryan, Conservancy of Southwest Florida. Commissioner Schiffer, you really segued nicely into my comments because my comments do deal with that SRA characteristics table. First, just to discuss, in policy 4.7, hamlets are eliminated, and I'm sure you'll get to more discussion on that when you get to the specific hamlet policy to be eliminated. But I did want to say the Conservancy supports the elimination of hamlets. We never really believed that they would be sustainable, so we like the fact that they've been eliminated. Our concern in policies 4.7.1 and 4.7.2 are that they -- we support the towns being able to go up to 5,000. If you're going to create sustainable communities, we think that it's probably better to have one larger community versus a bunch of very small communities. But our concern is the proposed amendment of the minimum size of towns and the maximum size of villages. Towns currently are a Page 189 January 30, 2009 minimum of 1,000 acres, and this is being proposed to be increased to 1,500 acres. Villages currently are up to 1,000 acres, and their maximum is being proposed to be extended up to 1,500 acres. And it has been understood that with the villages and with what that attachment C, the SRA characteristics table, requires for villages, that villages need to be larger to be sustainable. Our concern is that by allowing additional acreage for villages instead of making towns out of something that is going to be 1,001 acres, towns by design are going to be more self-sufficient. They have to have more jobs, more goods and services. They're really sort of that ultimate of a self-sustainable community. Some developers have said that they really would like to bump that acreage up to make villages work, but we haven't seen any evidence that simply upping the acreage of villages is going to solve the problem; therefore, instead of a knee-jerk reaction of saying, let's make villages bigger and see if that works, let's really revisit that whole SRA characteristics table. Towns have to have mass transit. They really have to be much more sustainable. So I'm not sure that we want to be increasing the size of villages and not looking at all of those issues. So we would ask that you revisit this issue, and maybe if Anita's going to be bringing forward some additional information on that characteristics table, we can find a solution looking at, again, increased density. Would a village of 1,000 acres work if the density were doubled? It very well might. So instead of, again, adding additional acreage to it, let's take a look at the whole form and see if we can make it work. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Nicole, before you leave. MS. RYAN: Yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Ifa village is 1,000 acres or a town is 1,001 acres, what -- why is that a big difference from an environmental viewpoint? Page 190 January 30, 2009 MS. RYAN: Well, I think that it gets to if a village is 1,499 acres. You know, I think that ifthere is some sort of scaling or continuum, how can we make sure that when these acreages get to a certain level, we're actually creating something that is going to be sustainable. We like the idea of towns much better than the idea of villages because the towns are going to have, by design, more of the mass transit component of it. They're going to have more goods, more services. That is going to be where people live, work, and play. Villages -- you're going to have more travel outside of the villages simply by design. So ifthere's some sort of sliding scale or continuum that we can look at that make sure that villages really do function as they should and towns really do function as they should -- I'm just not sure that bumping up the acreage is going to be solving the problem. And I haven't seen anything that has shown that. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, the only reason I was trying to compare on the exhibit, attachment C, the differences between the two, and there's very little difference, and especially in transportation. They've got a -- they're almost identical. The only thing that villages have are equestrian trails over the town, and I'm -- if all that's present, it seems like it's going to function pretty much the same as a town. I'm not sure it's that big of a concern. MS. RYAN: Well, there are some different levels of -- I'm looking through here -- for the transportation actually in the GMPs when we get a little further. I believe that it -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. MS. RYAN: There are some different levels of what is expected as far as the transportation connectivity. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: We'll take a look at that when we get to it then. Okay. Thank you. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Chair? Page 191 January 30, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yes, Mr. Wolfley. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: That just -- I mean, I agree. These things have got to be big enough to where, let's say, 75 to 80 percent of the needs are going to be handled within that community. There's got to be jobs there. There's got to be places to go to work, and that's what I was trying to get to before to make it attract -- attractive, have some company want to come here. We've got to attract them somehow. And with, you know, a 500-acre entity, I don't think that's going to do it. So I mean, I'm in sort of agreement there that they should be a larger size. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Judith? MS. HUSHON: Judith Hushon, private citizen at this point. Mr. Wolfley, you just gave me a good lead-in. I spent the beginning of my married life in a planned town of Reston, Virginia, back when it was very small. And the one thing that, to me, the one town we have put in is lacking is an infrastructure put in by the developer that was bought into by the local businesses and attracted people to live there without having infrastructure at least at a minimal level to start. And I think this can be scaled properly in the Land Development Code, but I think it's something that you as the Planning Commission could be looking at. What is a requirement for a minimum town? A tiny grocery pharmacy, a gas station? Some of these things are things that people cannot go through a week without visiting, so that if you're trying to keep people local-- which is what we are doing with these towns, we're trying to focus them in -- the only way to do that and make it work is to put some of these requirements on from the beginning and lay those in and say, even if you have to underwrite it, this is part of the development cost. At a certain point, you can -- you stop underwriting because it's making money. I mean, it's doing -- it's getting enough. It also is jobs. Every one of those stores is 20,30,40 jobs that -- for people who will Page 192 January 30, 2009 want to live there, because wouldn't it be nice to live there and work there? And where I started originally, of course, there were more jobs out of the community. Now there are more jobs in the community than out. So I see that as a really necessary thing. The whole concept of walk-ability, being a local, being a community, focusing in on being a community, having town centers where you can go, having places where -- day care center is another one you need very quickly. If people are going to have jobs, then you have to have day care centers so that -- because half of these people are female, and a number of them may have children. And so these are all things that I see as being really essential to having a town work, and I've seen a town that did work. And I think that in terms of writing and looking at this -- I mean, you're looking at towns now, that's the reason I -- and new towns. And that's the reason I look to the Planning Commission. We on the EAC aren't going to be able to take this up. But the Planning Commission can look at some of this, whether they look at it right now or whether you look at it through -- by putting a little bit of language in here now, and then in the LDC, something in terms of required infrastructure by size of town would be the concept. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. MS. HUSHON: Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Your comments have interest, though, but before we go to the -- why don't we take a shorter break, give Terri a chance to rest her fingers, and come back at ten after four, and we'll continue with Brian, and I'm sure he's going to tell us that part of the prohibition is the high impact fees, which they are, for things like gas stations out in Ave Maria. Now we'll break for ten minutes and come back at 4: 10. (A brief recess was had.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. It's ten after. We can start back up Page 193 January 30, 2009 again. And Judith got up and stirred the pot, and now we have some public speakers. Brian, go ahead. MR. GILLIGAN: Brian Gilligan, Barron Collier Companies. I'm just going to be real brief. I know Judy's comments were given with very good intentions, and everyone has a different idea of what makes a town work; but I'm here to say the program is fantastic, it's flexible, it allows these things to happen. I encourage her and other people to visit Ave Maria. We have over $400 million invested in our infrastructure and our buildings and our university. We have a town center that has got nothing but praise on a national basis. It's a beautiful spot. We have a public that's under construction. We have Arthur X, one of our leading companies that's going to be building a 140000-square-foot manufacturing facility to create jobs. I mean, these are things that happened, and the Rural Land Stewardship Program allows these things to happen. It's not government's role to get in and mandate and dictate that immediately a grocery store of this size and that sells this should be there. Those things are going to happen, but they're market driven, and that's how -- that's how things work. And believe me, we would love to have, you know, as much commercial as we possibly can. But it does take time. It takes some time to get critical mass, but we're comfortable we're well on our way. And, again, I think the program, as written, allows that flexibility for that to happen. Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Brian, just so we're clear, the Publix there, you did have to incentivize that to be there, didn't you? MR. GILLIGAN: Well, I can't disclose the details of our deal, but suffice it to say that we worked closely with Publix to make sure Page 194 January 30, 2009 that they came in very early in the process. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Would they have normally come in at this stage had you not worked closer with them? MR. GILLIGAN: Well, I think that in any new development, you have to work with Publix, or whoever else it is, to have them come in. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. MR. GILLIGAN: I mean, are you saying that-- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, no. I'm trying to -- I understand what Judy was indicating. MR. GILLIGAN: But I guess, Mark-- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: It looks like you tried to do that -- MR. GILLIGAN: Yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: -- by moving the process ahead of time by getting that retailer to come in -- MR. GILLIGAN: That's right. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: -- before they normally would. MR. GILLIGAN: And that goes for other, you know, retailers, too. I think anytime you want to seed a town -- because it's always the chicken and the egg -- you need to have the commercial services to have the residential. You need to have the residential for the commercial services to want to be there. So early on you have to do things to jump start it and get it going. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, thank you. MR. GILLIGAN: Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Anita, hi. MS. JENKINS: And I get a treat. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: You're the one. You got it. MS. JENKINS: I know it. Whosever it was. I just wanted to address walk-ability and assure you that in the Land Development Code the towns are to be designed as walk-able. That's one of the intents of the program. And unlike other areas in Collier County, one of the nice things Page 195 January 30, 2009 is that you're required to put a sidewalk on both sides of the street. And in Ave Maria, not only do you have sidewalks on both sides of the street, but you have buffers and parking between that to give the pedestrian a higher quality of experience. And not only is the walk-ability addressed in that manner with having the use facilities on both sides of the street, but those town centers in Ave Maria are allocated and disbursed throughout the town so you have choices of different town centers depending on where you live. And in addition to being able to walk to those areas, the entire town sits within the classic bicycle distance of three miles. So you have the choice of different modes of transportation. Not only walking, but bicycling as well. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. Anybody else have anything? Nicole? MS. RYAN: It's been a long three days. So when I said that there was a policy that I thought was later on, it was right here in front of me, so I apologize. I had mentioned under the towns that they had an additional component for ensuring internal mobility, and that's the new language that has been added under policy 4.7.1, the third and fourth line from the bottom -- or three and four lines up from the bottom, it says, towns shall include an internal mobility plan, which shall include a transfer station or park-and-ride area that is appropriately located within the town to serve the connection point for internal and external public transportation. There isn't a similar provision that has been added to the village. And in looking at attachment C it looks as if the villages do have to have a county transit access, which I'm assuming will correspond to similar language that has been newly added to the town provisions. So -- make a suggestion that that sentence also be added under the villages so that there's a certainty that you have this mobility plan and Page 196 January 30, 2009 sufficient public transportation access. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Thank you. Brad, is there any concern from -- that you know of from the committee's side where they would react to the use of villages including that language where it says -- so it says towns and villages shall include instead of just towns? MR. CORNELL: That's a technical question. I don't remember any discussion. If there was some, then I have amnesia. I would ask Nick Casalanguida in particular about the feasibility of that scale of development having mobility plans. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, it's one of those things we'll put on the Nick list when he gets back. Okay, thank you. That wraps up, I think, everything on Page 57. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Mark, just so -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN : Yes, sir, Brad. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Just a question for Brad. Brad, would you have a problem if the towns didn't start at 15-? Let's say we started at 2,500 acres. I don't think there's any necessity to have a village's acreage grow to the point where towns pick up. And I think the reason that might be good is to encourage -- you know, and maybe even let the towns grow bigger. But do you think it's important that villages have the acreage requirement and towns start right after? MR. CORNELL: I personally do. I wouldn't be in favor of raising the bottom of the town. I think you lose some of the advantages that are delineated in the town parameters, you know, like this mobility plan and some of the other aspects. I -- I mean, from a sustainability standpoint, it needs to be bigger anyway. Why have the bottom end of it? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Right. MR. CORNELL: I think you also need some flexibility in not really knowing what every situation is going to be. And also, if you -- Page 197 January 30, 2009 if you picture several more SRAs out there, towns, villages, there is going to be some interrelationship, both through transportation and commerce and travel between those towns. I think that, you know, as time goes on, there's going to be some shared benefits that they'll have out there, just by proximity. So I'm not sure that you want to cut out a bottom that might be more feasible for, perhaps, a smaller landowner who didn't want to capitalize as much. I'm guessing that, but I think flexibility is important, so I would bet that that would be an issue. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: All right, okay. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. And Jeff, I think, wanted to comment on this page before we leave it, so. MR. PERRY: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'm sorry. Jeff Perry with WilsonMiller. Just a quick note on the issue with the towns and the mobility plan. That was something that we worked with transportation department on and crafted for the language like this for the town to ensure that the master plans as they were developed and came through the process got the attention that -- for towns. We really didn't talk about it in the context of villages. But keeping in mind -- I don't think it's a bad thing necessarily if we have something like that to consider, but keeping in mind that villages can start as small as 100 acres, that transfer stations and things like that could -- in fact, could be not an appropriately scaled use for villages of that type. But I think it's certainly something that we can look at in the context of villages, what kinds, especially if villages are going to be having some of the more economic uses that are talked about in the following paragraph. I think it might be appropriate to consider bus transfer stations and things like that that might be -- as long as they're appropriately scaled for the kinds of uses, and that would, of course, come through you as part of the SRA process. All villages and towns, Page 198 January 30, 2009 all of those SRA master plans come through you and get the scrutiny, I think, that these policies are pointing to. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Thank you. Any other -- any questions? Ms. Caron? COMMISSIONER CARON: Yeah -- no. I just think that having some sort of language that we can work on that gives an indication that that is a component so that you don't read this and think one thing and then, whoops, you get back to the chart and it's something else, so CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. With that we'll move on to Page 58. Fifty-eight starts with policy 4.7.3, which was a deletion of hamlets and ends with policy 4.8. Are there any comments from the Planning Commission? Brad? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Yeah. Just -- and ask Brad, why did you get rid of the hamlets? MR. CORNELL: Not sustainable. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: That word sustainable means everything today, so what do you mean? MR. CORNELL: Well, too small to be -- have a critical mass of commercial, of residential, of -- it would -- it would be more of a burden on taxpayers or the CDD or whatever infrastructure provider was going to be paying for services for such a small development. It just didn't seem like that was something we wanted to be fostering in the rural lands. We wanted something that had more trip capture, more self-containment. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Okay. MR. CORNELL: They'd be forever dependent on whatever was built around them. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: For employment, for most shopping and everything? MR. CORNELL: Right. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: But that's all. I mean, the kid-- Page 199 January 30, 2009 the young kids would go to school there. I mean, it's the scale of the development. I mean, if we want to do big towns, we do big towns, I guess. But I'm not so sure that that might not be an opportunity, especially something that could be themed, for example, like an equestrian neighborhood or something. MR. CORNELL: If you wanted to do something that was on a sort of ecotourism-type thing like a hunting lodge or equestrian lodge or something like that, you could do a CRD and capture what you're talking about, a sort ofless multi-faceted, more single venture oriented kind of development. But a hamlet -- COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: But density, doesn't it drop? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: A CRD is two units per acre. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Right. I mean, so was the hamlet, I guess, so that's -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And a hamlet was two units per acre, so I think the CRD and hamlet in that regard would be the same. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Yeah. Okay. I mean, if that's why they did it, that's why they did it. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I think what they-- MR. CORNELL: That was our thinking, right or wrong. We felt like it was not a sustainable kind of development to have in the rural lands. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Anybody else have any questions on Page 58? Ms. Caron? COMMISSIONER CARON: Yeah. On 4.7.3, these compact rural developments, this first line or two is absolutely gobbledygook. It's language that, you know, it's like out of a seminar, you know. We're going to support and further Collier County's valued attributes, and then we list, you know, anything we can think of, agriculture, natural resources, economic -- and we're throwing all these things into a hundred acres or more. Page 200 January 30, 2009 I just -- I think you've got to work on this language. I think it's become meaningless because you're trying to throw everything but the kitchen sink in there and then say that it's really what CRDs were originally meant for, were ecotourism things. I mean, we're talking very small, very specific -- MR. CORNELL: I think that's -- I think that's what we're trying to capture in this. And if we haven't, then you all will tell us, I'm sure. And maybe that's what you're doing. But that is what we're trying to capture, that it's a relatively small-scale development that's oriented towards some of the Collier County unique characteristics that would be compatible with that area, you know, and ecotourism is one way to term it. But we used these terms just to give it some flexibility. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Have you ever -- COMMISSIONER CARON: How does that get you to research and education and tourism and recreation? I mean, then you've thrown everything here into the mix, too. MR. CORNELL: Well, we didn't want to eliminate those because those wouldn't necessarily be incompatible kinds ofCRD. I mean, I think of something like Rookery Bay, and that's not a residential development, but the kinds of uses at Rookery Bay in that setting aren't necessarily incompatible. They're good for the public. They're good for the resource in a long-term sense. And you can envision something like that out in this rural land stewardship area, which has some tremendous attributes that many people don't ever get to see. So that's what we tried to capture. If we've failed, then you tell us. But that's what we were looking for anyway. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, Brad, did you picture -- I don't know if you've been up -- I think it's -- my goodness, it's up near Punta Gorda. You go out on these farm fields and all of a sudden, there's this giant warehouse there surrounded by Wal *Mart trucks. I couldn't figure out what that was, so I went online and I found out it's the regional distribution center for W al *Mart. It's on a piece of property Page 201 January 30, 2009 that's probably less than a hundred acres, but it's one giant, big building will all kinds of massive trucks running in and out of it. Why would you want the CRD to have one of those on it? Because if you look at policy 4.7.4, which was added to the reference of this CRD language, and go down and look at 4.7.4, you can have aviation, aerospace, health and life services, corporate headquarters, software information technology, wholesale and trade distribution. I don't think your group intended that. MR. CORNELL: Well, those don't apply to CRDs, I don't believe. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, look at the fifth line down. It says, appropriate scaled compatible uses described in policy 4.7.4 may also be permitted in CRDs. MR. CORNELL: Oh, I see, yeah. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And I brought this up in some meetings I had with some of your people before this meeting as a problem, because you're putting in intensity in CRDs I don't think you or anybody intended ever to have there. So I think that that's -- something needs to be fixed in that regard. MR. CORNELL: Well, I'm going to have to defer to others, but I'm going to guess that we have some constraint on what can be built; because I agree with you, that doesn't sound like something we want in those kind of places. But there would be some constraint in the criteria in that attachment C. But I'm afraid I'm not expert enough to interpret that and tell you how that would constrain that. It was definitely not our hope to see giant warehouses. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Right. And I didn't think it would be yours, and that's why when you were relaying what you thought it was, that's what I think everybody thought it was. MR. CORNELL: Yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And when I brought this up to others, it Page 202 January 30, 2009 was a surprise to them as well. So I'm not sure it was ever intended to be relayed like it ended up being. So -- George? MR. VARNADOE: If I could just interject a second. CHAIRMAN STRAIN : Yes. MR. VARNADOE: George Varnadoe, for the record. This came, I think, through Tammie Nemecek as the EDC, and I think it probably could be narrowed some. And I would ask your indulgence to have her be ready to address this when you reconvene on the 5th. And I will tell her of your concerns, and maybe she'll be ready to suggest a much narrower scope of this, Mr. Strain. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yeah. And you might suggest to her, the simplest way to get there is to take out that sentence that says, appropriately scaled compatible uses, then we're there. Then we get back to where everybody thought a CRD was supposed to be. MR. VARNADOE: And I don't want to talk for her, but I think the idea was that we may have some unique research, but it has to do with ago or some high-tech industry that just needed a small office and some land to do their -- whatever the research was. So let me -- without predisposing as to getting rid of the sentence or changing, let me ask that we, if we can, have her revisit that with you on the 5th. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: That's fine. Does that work with everybody else? MR. VARNADOE: Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you, sir. Before we go to public speakers, I'm sorry. George kind of slipped in to try to help -- MS. HUSHON: Did he slip in? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: -- solve the problem, yeah. Hardly saw him come up. Let's make sure we're done with the rest of the committee requests first. And is there any other questions from the Planning Page 203 January 30, 2009 Commission? Brad and then Donna. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Yeah. I think -- and this is to -- Brad, since you've essentially merged hamlets into this, I mean, some of the phrases in and hamlets -- for example, I do think you want convenience retail uses in the CRD, correct, or not? MR. CORNELL: I would think that that would be a part of a CRD but-- , COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Right. Because you moved over, you know, the requirement often square feet per dwelling unit or something. MR. CORNELL: Right. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: So could you make reference to attachment C? I guess it's that one line up -- and it -- you know, it should include convenience retail uses and a ratio provided in attachment C. Obviously they would finally get there, but -- MR. CORNELL: Right. And we don't make reference to it, but it would be -- COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Good idea to name them. MR. CORNELL: Yeah. I don't see a problem with that. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: And then I think what you've essentially done is merged hamlet into the CRD, and then added all of Donna's sales brochure wording. MR. CORNELL: Well, to have -- and to have it a little bit more defined in what direction we'd like to see that go in scale. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, as an example, you know, you've got a potential CRD south of the Pepper Ranch. Would you want to see a distribution warehouse there? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Yeah. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: So those are -- if you're thinking of it, we -- and I know you're on the right path. I just -- maybe somebody ought to take a revisit to this from your group, so -- MR. CORNELL: Right. And that reference -- I think anytime Page 204 January 30, 2009 you reference policies, there's sometimes unintended consequences of -- well, I didn't think that would exactly apply there, but we're trying to describe a picture with words, and sometimes that's not so easy. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Donna, did you still have a question? COMMISSIONER CARON: Actually I just had a comment on 4.7.4. The beginning of the paragraph -- paragraph says, existing urban areas, towns, and villages shall be the preferred location for a list of things. Do we not actually mean the Immokalee urban area -- MR. CORNELL: Yes. COMMISSIONER CARON: -- plus towns and villages? I think we need to say that, because I think that's important for Immokalee. MR. CORNELL: And I think this really refers to any existing urban area, but then towns and villages, this isn't described by existing. COMMISSIONER CARON: Yeah. MR. CORNELL: That adjective is only for urban areas. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Anything else? Brad, one question. When you get to policy 4.7.4, in the middle it says, agricultural research, aviation and aerospace. What did you -- what is meant by aviation? Is that like airports? MR. CORNELL: Aviation and aerospace, I think, is a buzz word that I heard yesterday in a talk that the lieutenant governor gave, and it's kind of a popular industry that people in Southwest Florida would like to bring here, and they're looking for places to plug it in, and so I think it got plugged in here through the EAC's thinking. And I would defer to them or to Brian to expound on that some more. MR. GILLIGAN: Shaw Arrow. MR. CORNELL: Shaw Arrow? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. So the intention is not airports, it's aviation-related businesses? MR. CORNELL: Yes. I don't think we're looking for competition with Naples Airport or Immokalee Airport. We're looking for-- Page 205 January 30, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I was hoping not. Okay. Any other questions on 58? Brad? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: A question in concept, Brad, is that the 7.4 -- 4.7.4, essentially that's going to draw people into that area, correct? I mean, obviously you could say everybody who's living there, but I mean, there are people from the urban part of the county that would -- might be associated with a lot of these things. MR. CORNELL: Yes, not in a residential kind of way, but in a tourism or work sense. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Workplace, right. MR. CORNELL: Yeah. Yeah, right, right. But the scale is not so monstrous that it would be a huge burden on that area. And obviously from an ecotourism standpoint, that would be incompatible, so -- COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: And it would counter-flow to most traffic anyway, so -- MR. CORNELL: Right. And there's going to be a compatibility test that you're going to have to meet, with you, with the Board of County Commissioners. I mean, that's something that's going to have to pass muster when you look at any specific proposal on scale. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Thank you. I think we'll probably ask questions of the -- hear from the public. Judith? MS. HUSHON: Judith Hushon. I have some problem with the two units per acre, given the fact that what we've been talking about is ecotourism or research. I think of ago research being a logical thing, but it could be other kinds of research. And I have this vision of 200 trailer -- a trailer park with 200 units, and I don't want to see that. I think -- I would like to -- you to consider holding this to a density, the base density of one to five. Instead of two units per acre, one unit per five acres, and that would let you have 20 units on the hundred acres. But why would you -- why in the world, for something that's Page 206 January 30, 2009 being set aside this way, would you want to limit it in that way. That's my concern -- would you want to allow that density? Because the only thing -- I could just see some really horrible things happening. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: But on the other hand, some sort of density's going to be needed to at least have the CRD involved so it's viable. And I think the word that's been used is sustainable. If you're going to have convenience facilities, if like -- that are convenience retail or market, if you're going to have a gas station, if you're going to have a business, there's got to be some way to keep the workers or the people that would want to need these services close to it. If you allow the business but not the -- MS. HUSHON: Yeah. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: -- residences, you're going to force people to drive. MS. HUSHON: Well, if what you're having, a research -- I mean, I see it as a dormitory of some sort for research out of a -- like FGCU or something like that might have a research plot. Those were the kinds of things, or an ecotourism lodge. And in those cases in general, they may have a little store right there, something right on the facility. But those people are generally eating their meals at the lodge or they're -- it's that kind of thing, at least I would see more of that. I don't know. I'm just wondering at the density that's being proposed. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, the density they're processing, Judith, just so you know, is I think the same as the density in the original plan. MS. HUSHON: Right. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And plus they're now adding more viability to the facilities by more uses. And if they do that, it may justify some more residential, so -- Anita? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Mark? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Brad? Page 207 January 30, 2009 COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: And the residential appears to be subordinate to the other activity as opposed to the residential being the prImary, so -- MS. HUSHON: I agree. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: -- you would hate to have a need for more density and not be able to have it in your dormitory setting. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Anita? MS. JENKINS: Anita Jenkins with WilsonMiller. I just wanted to talk a little bit about the uses in 4.7.3. And the uses in 4.7.3 say that the primary uses shall be those associated with research, education, tourism, or recreation, and those need to be related there to the attributes. So it needs to be research dealing with agriculture, research dealing with natural resources, to that effect. So they are related there, and that was the intent. It might be hard to get there, but that's the intent of that language. And as far as the appropriately scaled uses, 4.7.4, I went back and looked at the committee's deliberations on that because I couldn't recall. And if you look on Page 144, you'll see those delineations. But I'll let you know what it was. They were struggling with these same issues. Why would we want to allow all of these uses in 4.7.4 in CRDs? Well, what they did was, like in towns and villages, it says that the uses in 4.7.4, shall be permitted. This language says, may be permitted. So they had -- they can ask for it, but it might not be viable. But what they were trying to do is allow for it, if it makes sense, but it's not a given. It's not a shall be permitted. It's a may be permitted. And they also added the word compatible in there as well to give it that compatibility test. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, the problem I have there is having been on the Planning Commission for quite a number of years now, I can tell you that if you give it once, you give it to all. So may becomes mandatory once one gets it. If you don't give it to anybody, then the Page 208 January 30, 2009 challenge is, why'd you put the language in there letting people think they could have it but never give it to them? So one way or the other, you end up being -- trying to think of a polite word to say which end I'm being. But it doesn't come out like you want it to, let's put it that day. MS. JENKINS: So that was the intent of the committee as I-- you know, as I read back through it. So if you can help them with that, that's what they were intending. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: We'll lend a hand. Thank you. Russell ? MR. PRIDDY: Yes, Russell Priddy. You know, throughout the day I've heard a number of people get up and say where the people ought to live that come here next, and I doubt if any of us or if any of the people that are making these suggestions actually live in the housing types that have been suggested. Does the Conservancy have a dormitory for their employees? MS. RYAN: Yes. MR. PRIDDY: You do? You know, are you all putting in a mass transit station? Would you redesign? But anyway. Ma'am? COMMISSIONER CARON: You're in the urban area. MR. PRIDDY: Oh, I'm sorry. I'm in the rural area, and they're not, so does that mean they can't comment on it? COMMISSIONER CARON: No, no. It's just the difference in what you were saying. MR. PRIDDY: Okay. I'm going to paint a picture of what a CRD in my mind might look like. On my 9,000 acres, I have an active quarry that has been in existence since November 26, 1955. That will at some point play out. There is a defined footprint, and we're going to end up with maybe a thousand acres of lakes. One of the big criticisms for government buying up land -- and when I owned the Sunniland store, people would stop there all the Page 209 January 30, 2009 time and want to know how to access the Big Cypress National Preserve for recreational benefits. When we mature in the rural lands, people are going to want recreational opportunities. My phone rings three or four times a week, people wanting to go fishing. At some point -- not in my lifetime, I don't think -- I envision there being maybe a fish camp around those lakes, a lodge, overnight lodging, maybe some cabins. Yeah, it would make sense to have a little store and sell some soft drinks, maybe even some adult beverages, fishing tackle. You know, if some research group wanted to come in and set up shop to do research on how to provide us with future food source, you know, that would be allowable. But that's the type thing that I would envision taking place in these CRDs. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I hate to tell you this, but probably for the last time in the last two meetings we're all in agreement on this one. MR. PRIDDY: Time to go home. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: So moved. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I think we're there. Okay. That wraps up Page 58. Anybody else have any other comments? If not, we'll move on to Page 59, it starts on policy 4.9 and finishes on policy 4.13. Are there any questions from the Planning Commission on that page? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: None. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: None, okay. Brad, the last -- the line that's been added where it says, infrastructure necessary to serve permitted uses may be exempt from this restriction provided that design seeks to minimize the extent of impacts to any such areas. There are essential services. Does that mean you can put essential services in FSAs and HSAs? Was that -- and essential services have a broad range of elements. Was that what the -- was that ever considered? MR. CORNELL: We had a discussion about this, and to be quite Page 210 January 30, 2009 honest, I can't remember. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. MR. CORNELL: So I'd have to go back and read some of my notes. I can't answer that right now. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: We can revisit that on Thursday if that works better, but I think that's important that someone looks at the list of essential services we have in Collier County and realizes that -- and tell us if that language, the way it seems to read, that you would end up putting -- that would have accessibility to all those areas. And I don't think you really intended that, or you may not have. MR. CORNELL: Yeah. I know we had extensive discussion on this, and I apologize for not really remembering enough to answer your question. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Policy 4.10, why did you cross out the CRD reference on that policy? MR. CORNELL: Because it refers to them exceeding 100 acres. They don't anymore. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. MR. CORNELL: They're less than. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Then the ones less than 100 acres don't need to have a minimum open space? MR. CORNELL: I don't believe so. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Seeing as how the intent was for -- that's got a minimum of 1 percent of gross acres. Public green space or neighborhoods, minimum 1 percent gross acres. But there is no open space reference in the new CRD recommendation. In the old CRD recommendation it was greater than 35 percent-- or greater than 100 acres. So since they can't go above 100 acres, I guess it doesn't matter anymore. MR. CORNELL: That's minimal. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And then it says in that same paragraph, lands within an SRA greater than one acre with index values of greater Page 211 January 30, 2009 than 1.2 shall be retained as open space except for the allowance of uses described in policy 4.9. I tried to figure out what they meant by that, and I didn't get -- I didn't get to there, that point. And I know you may not, because this is probably something that you -- MR. CORNELL: It's tying back to the same issues. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Right. It ties -- I couldn't tell what they were trying to get to, so maybe if -- MR. CORNELL: I'd like to have a chance to look back into that because, you know -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. MR. CORNELL: -- I don't -- I can't answer that right now. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Then the last line, as an incentive to encourage open space, such uses within an SRA exceeding the required 35 percent shall not be required to consume stewardship credits. Now, that means if you have 45,000 acres and you provided open space greater than 35 percent, say it's 50 percent, that means that 15 percent of the acreage then is not going to be counted towards the use of stewardship credits, but they would be part of the developable properties. MR. CORNELL: I believe that's correct. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Because that would encourage more golf courses to be spread out more, more sprawl, because you would be creating open spaces that wouldn't be counted, so -- MR. CORNELL: If that's something you could sell and if it met the criteria for the design of SRA towns and villages, which it mayor may not. I think you still have to compare the SRA development plans with the criteria in the LDC, which are pretty good. I think they -- the intention is to get a walk-able trip capturing mixed-use compact sustainable development. And if a golf course is in conflict with that, I Page 212 January 30, 2009 don't think you could do it. And you guys would have a say on that. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I'm not sure we could argue a winning point if it's allowed by the GMP or by a code. So I'm not concerned about that one, but then if this whole thing takes a look at credits as the answer instead of acreage, it may not -- still it's going to be counted as non-SRA acreage. MR. CORNELL: No. It's going to be counted as SRA acreage. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: But not SRA credits. MR. CORNELL: You won't need to consume credits, but it will be part of the acreage within the SRA total. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Do we know exactly what open spaces are included that they're trying to talk about? MR. GREENWOOD: Yes. That's in policy 4.10. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Public and private conservation lands, undeveloped areas of designated SSAs, agriculture, water retention, water management areas, recreation uses. Is that what we're saying is open space? MR. GREENWOOD: That's the way it's defined in 4.10. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. So that does create a problem because you've got -- your recreation uses could be a lot of everything. And basically, if you're above 35 percent, none of that gets counted, so you'd be encouraged to do that, which increases the footprint of the development area, especially since a lot of it might be internal so you can have amenities. It can be used as amenities. That's not new language. It just is a concern. MR. CORNELL: Right. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: So I think we'll just have to deal with it when we deliver our points. MR. CORNELL: Right. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Does anybody else have any other questions on that page? And we're on Page 59. Okay. Are there any comments from the public? Anybody got Page 213 January 30, 2009 any questions? (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, we will move on to Page 60. Top of Page 60 we start with policy 4.14, and it ends at 4.15.3, or at least it almost ends there. Any questions from the Planning Commission on Page 60? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I do, Mark. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Mr. -- Brad? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: In 4.14, is it common for all developments with public roads to have them maintained by the developer? So essentially, once you pull off of these existing roads, it's totally maintained by the development then, everything? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, that's the way it reads. In fact, I was suggesting that we change that line. Instead of private -- public and private roads within an SRA shall be maintained by, it says the primary town or community it serves, I would just simply say by the SRA it serves, and that way, any SRA, whether it's -- any uplands that are developed, they have to maintain their own roads. That's like CDD -- it probably would encourage the formation of CDDs because then they have a municipality in which they could do that with. I don't see that as bad. And for the taxpayers of Collier County, it's probably an advantage. Any other questions from anyone on the -- on Page 60? On the top, Brad, where it says, 4.14 -- MR. CORNELL: Yeah. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: -- the fourth line down -- well, the third line it starts the sentence, at the time of SRA approval, an SRA proposed to adjoin land designated as an SRA or lands designated as open shall provide for the opportunity to provide direct vehicular and pedestrian connections from said areas to the county's arterial collector roadway network as shown on the county build-out vision plan, and then it goes on and on. Page 214 January 30, 2009 Is there anything -- is that where we would want to include the connections between SRAs? MR. CORNELL: I believe this is what it's getting at, and it's anticipating what that vision plan is going to be articulating. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Because one of the things that we need to address is to make sure we have an integrated transit system and each town -- each SRA doesn't stand alone. It looks at how it's going to connect to the other SRAs in the area. MR. CORNELL: That was -- that was discussed at some length and definitely was the intention of all the parties that we're discussing it on, the committee, with transportation department, ECPO, landowners. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, maybe when we start up on Thursday Nick could address that issue for us when he's back here. And also as far as the maintenance of the facilities, instead of writing in primary towns and community, simply reference back to the SRA, then it's more comp- -- and it catches everything in case something's not defined there. MR. CORNELL: That's a good idea. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Then the last sentence of that 4.14, these actions shall be considered within the area of significant influence of the project traffic on existing or proposed roadways that are anticipated to be expanded or reconstructed. And I guess that's another Nick question. I'll hold that to him. I'll wait for him to get here. MR. CORNELL: That's in reference to mitigating an SRA traffic impact. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Right. MR. CORNELL: So he's trying to describe what area you would be talking about. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, the area of influence -- significant influence is what I was going to ask, because right now we have a project called the Silver Strand that's coming forward, and its area of Page 215 January 30, 2009 significant influence has become a difficult issue to overcome with transportation, so I think it ought to be spelled out as where we're talking about. And at the same time, there needs to be some language in this document as to how those mitigations are going to be paid. I know we have traffic impact fees, but there's an item called proportionate fair share that Nick's working on. Some -- some of that language needs to get in here if that's going to be the way we're going to be looking at agreements for traffic in the future. I spoke to Nick about it. When he's here on Thursday, maybe we can ask him where that would be most helpful. MR. CORNELL: I would encourage you to do that. That would be a -- probably a better time to have a good discussion of that. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Policy 4.15.1, they crossed out the reference to 4.7.4. Now, why would we put it in if we're going to take it back out again? Because we -- 4.7.4 talks about what the preferred locations of different uses are. And it's been referred to as even being applicable now to CRDs, which is now in question. But then when it says, SRAs are intended to be the mixed use to be allowed the full range of uses in the urban area, why would we -- why would they not want that reference in this one? I mean, it's certainly now not all SRAs. But at the time this was written, they would have applied it to all SRAs, towns, villages, and CRDs. So I don't know if you really want it in there for a CRD purpose. But why wouldn't you want the towns and villages to have 4.7.4 when that's what it pertains to? Maybe it's a cross-reference we ought to follow up. MR. CORNELL: It looks like a mixed cross-reference. I agree with your question, and I can't answer it. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. MR. GREENWOOD: Well, on Page 58, the existing policy 4.7.4 would be stricken -- I'm sorry -- would be renumbered, and it would Page 216 January 30, 2009 be renumbered to 4.7 -- 4.7.3. That's -- MR. CORNELL: Oh. MS. HUSHON: Oh. MR. GREENWOOD: That's why the change. MR. CORNELL: Oh. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Wait a minute. MS. HUSH ON: That's the CRD, then that's wrong. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: No. 4.7.3 is the policy up above. That 4.7.4 was stricken and changed to 4.7.3. MS. HUSHON: 4.7.3 should be out. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: In 4.7.3 in the old text, which was 4.7.4, 111. COMMISSIONER CARON: Yeah. 4.7.3 needs to-- MR. GREENWOOD: W e'lllook at it. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Would you look at that, because what I'm worried about, it's blanketing all SRAs. And right now it appears that even -- that CRDs may not take the blanket applications of uses that all the other SRAs provided. And this would be contradictory to that, and I'm not -- that contradiction could cause problems in the future so-- , MR. CORNELL: It does look like it's a mistake, but -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, let's try to get through this page if we can and we'll call it a night. Are there any other issues from the Planning Commission on this page? (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Anybody from the public? Judith? MS. HUSHON: One of the things that came up when we did finally review Ave Maria was -- as the EAC, was the wildlife crossings that was what were basically requested and were agreed to. And then they ended up being take- -- I understand, taken out of the impact fees. And I don't know whether this is going to come under Page 217 January 30, 2009 this proportionate fare share concept, which it could, or whether the -- something like the -- putting installation of a town that requires now -- increased traffic, which now means we need the wildlife crossing, becomes the responsibility of the town developer to put in. But that's my -- where I'm coming at. I'm not sure that should come out of the impact fees that were collected on a per-square-foot basis or whatever for the town. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I think, Judith, what we ought to do is save the discussion of proportionate fair share till Nick gets here. MS. HUSHON: That's fine, but I just would add to that the wildlife-crossing issue. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I agree. MS. HUSHON: I'd just highlight that as a -- kind ofa sub-issue to that. That's where I was coming in. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Are you going to be attending our meeting next Thursday morning? MS. HUSHON: I'm not sure. I will listen. I'm not sure whether I'll be there or not. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, I made a note to bring it up. MS. HUSHON: Okay. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I'll try to remember to bring it up. Notes sometimes get missed, too, but I'm -- MS. HUSHON: Depends on whether I definitely am doing the other meeting in the afternoon. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. MS. HUSHON: Okay. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And we'll wait till then to bring it up, and I think what we'll do by summation right now is stop this meeting here where we're at. When we resume on Thursday of next week, we'll begin with policy 4.7.3 and touch on the issues that either Tammie or Nick are more involved in and try to resolve any of the remaining issues on those and pick up where we left off today. Page 218 January 30, 2009 So with that, is there a motion from the Planning Commission to continue this meeting to 8 -- I mean actually to 9:30 in the morning on February 5th at the Board of County Commission chambers Building F at the Government Center where we normally meet? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I so move. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Mr. Schiffer. COMMISSIONER VIGLIOTTI: (Raises hand.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Seconded by Mr. Vigliotti. All in favor, signify by saying aye. COMMISSIONER KOLFLA T: Aye. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Aye. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Aye. COMMISSIONER CARON: Aye. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Aye. COMMISSIONER HOMIAK: Aye. COMMISSIONER VIGLIOTTI: Aye. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Aye. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: So moved. The meeting is continued. ***** Page 219 January 30, 2009 There being no further business for the good of the County, the meeting was adjourned by order of the Chair at 4:55 p.m. COLLIER COUNTY PLANNING COMMISSION MARK STRAIN, Chairman These minutes approved by the board on presented or as corrected as Transcript prepared on behalf of Gregory Court Reporting Services, Inc., by Cherie' R. Nottingham and Terri Lewis Page 220