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CCPC Minutes 02/20/2009 S February 20, 2009 TRANSCRIPT OF THE RSLA MEETING OF THE COLLIER COUNTY PLANNING COMMISSION Naples, Florida February 20, 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 Brad Schiffer Robert Vigliotti David J. Wolfley ALSO PRESENT: Thomas Greenwood, Comprehensive Planning Heidi Ashton-Cicko, Asst. County Attorney Page 1 AGENDA COLLIER COUNTY PLANNING COMMISSION WILL MEET AT 1:00 P.M. FRIDAY FEBRUARY 20, 2009 [CARRYOVER DATE OF FEBRUARY 26, 2009) AT COLLIER COUNTY DEVELOPMENT SERVICES CENTER, CONFERENCE ROOMS 609/610, LOCATED AT 2800 N. HORSESHOE DRIVE, NAPLES, FLORIDA: ~ INDIVIDUAL SPEAKERS WILL BE LIMITED TO 5 MINUTES ON ANY ITEM. INDIVIDUALS SELECTED TO SPEAK ON BEHALF OF AN ORGANIZATION OR GROUP ARE ENCOURAGED AND MAY BE ALLOTTED 10 MINUTES TO SPEAK ON AN ITEM IF SO RECOGNIZED BY THE CHAIRMAN. PERSONS WISHING TO HAVE WRITTEN OR GRAPHIC MATERIALS INCLUDED IN THE CCPC AGENDA PACKETS MUST SUBMIT SAID MATERIAL A MINIMUM OF 10 DAYS PRIOR TO THE RESPECTIVE PUBLIC HEARING. IN ANY CASE, WRITTEN MATERIALS INTENDED TO BE CONSIDERED BY THE CCPC SHALL BE SUBMITTED TO THE APPROPRlATE COUNTY STAFF A MINIMUM OF SEVEN DAYS PRIOR TO THE PUBLIC HEARING. ALL MATERIAL USED IN PRESENTATIONS BEFORE THE CCPC WILL BECOME A PERMANENT PART OF THE RECORD AND WILL BE AVAILABLE FOR PRESENTATION TO THE BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS, IF APPLICABLE. ANY PERSON WHO DECIDES TO APPEAL A DECISION OF THE CCPC WILL NEED A RECORD OF THE PROCEEDINGS PERTAINING THERETO, AND THEREFORE MAY NEED TO ENSURE THAT A VERBATIM RECORD OF THE PROCEEDINGS IS MADE, WHICH RECORD INCLUDES THE TESTIMONY AND EVIDENCE UPON WHICH THE APPEAL IS TO BE BASED. 1. PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE 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 r 2120109 ccpe AlIendalTGJmk February 20, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, hello. Testing. Kady, are you there? Okay, it's working. Welcome everyone to the February 20th continuation of the Rural Land Stewardship Area review. Will you all please rise for pledge of allegiance. (Pledge of Allegiance was recited in unison.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Brad, are you going to be standing for this whole meeting, or are you -- oh, you got a chair? Good. Okay, will the secretary please take the roll call. COMMISSIONER VIGLIOTTI: Chairman Strain? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Here. COMMISSIONER VIGLIOTTI: Commissioner Caron? COMMISSIONER CARON: Here. COMMISSIONER VIGLIOTTI: Commissioner Vigliotti is here. Commissioner Wolfley? COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Here. COMMISSIONER VIGLIOTTI: Commissioner Schiffer? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Here. COMMISSIONER VIGLIOTTI: Commissioner Kolflat? COMMISSIONER KOLFLA T: Here. COMMISSIONER VIGLIOTTI: Commissioner Murray? COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Yes. COMMISSIONER VIGLIOTTI: And Commissioner Homiak? COMMISSIONER HOMIAK: Here. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yeah, everybody, when you do speak today, try to bring the mic close to you. The next meeting that we have is on February 26th. It will be a continuation of this meeting. It will be at 8:30 in the morning in these chambers. Does anybody on the Planning Commission feel they aren't going to be able to make that meeting? (No response.) Page 2 February 20, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Then we'll assume there's a quorum. For those of you who are wondering when we'll end the meeting today, we will end no later than 4:55. At 5:00 the county propaganda channel starts and we don't want to take it away from them. So we'll end five minutes to 5:00, or earlier, depending on the break point. Also, I can rest assured of everybody here, we are going to be going on next Thursday. So we will not finish today. There's no way, with the quantity of work we have, we can finish in four hours, so next Thursday will probably be a -- hopefully a summation and a time in which the Planning Commission can come to a consensus on all the different points that have been raised over the past two or three days and in summary format. And hopefully that's what we'll spend our time on next Thursday. We left off last time on Group 5 policies. We had finished up all of 4, and we saved 5 till today, and any other questions at the end of those. So with that -- and Group 5 policies start on Page 62 of our Phase II, Section 2 tab in our packet. Okay, and let's start on Group 5 policies, the first page on 62 is Policy 5.1. Does anybody have any questions on Policy 5.1 from the Planning Commission? (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, Bill, I have a few. The first sentence says, to protect water quality and quantity and maintenance of the natural water regime in areas mapped as FSA's and designated restoration zone on the overlay map prior to the time that they are designated as SSA's under the program -- and then it goes on from there. I thought the program was voluntary, and -- because this seems to indicate -- because Group 5 policies, I believe, pertain a lot to the areas that are not buying into the RLSA program, this would seem to indicate that they're going to be made FSA's whether they buy in the Page 3 February 20, 2009 program or not. Was that -- is that a true reading of that, or is that the intent? MR. McDANIEL: Yes, sir. Well, the intent of the entire Group 5 policies is to assist folks with the voluntary nature of the entire program. And for those who chose not to voluntarily participate, implement controls, if you will, to assist them with that. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, so if you're not buying into the program, this GMP amendment then basically forces you to accept some of the conditions of the program. MR. McDANIEL: Puts additional constraints, yes, sir. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: The whole premise under which the program was needed was because we were worried about this conversion of one to five-acre home sites. But if we can institute rules like this on the existing property owners against their voluntary participation, why do we have a fear of the one to five home sites being a problem? Has anybody thought that out, or -- I know you may not be able to answer all these questions. MR. McDANIEL: I can answer them, Mr. Strain, but it's certainly not a discussion from the committee's standpoint with respect -- I mean, that's something you and I can talk about at some stage of the game. I mean, there are -- there had to be within the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay a program in place to deal with properties that weren't voluntarily part of the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay. And with that, those Group 5 policies were in fact adopted to -- I prefer to call it additional incentivization for folks to participate in the program without stripping inherent property rights that -- without proper compensation. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: But this does strip property rights and doesn't provide compensation, and you end up stripping off the first four layers, which to me was the incentive to buy into the program was that -- I was just -- George, if you can answer it, I'd certainly-- MR. VARNADOE: I'm happy to answer that. Page 4 February 20, 2009 For the record, George Varnadoe. Number one, this is not in the proposed amendment. This is in the plan today. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I know. MR. VARNADOE: Okay. Number two, the only reason it's in there is because the landowner has voluntarily agreed to that. And you're absolutely right, it's ripe for a Burt Harris claim if they did not -- had not agreed to it. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Do we have a signed document where they've agreed to that? MR. VARNADOE: No, Mr. Strain, you don't. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Then George, how do you know they agreed to it? MR. VARNADOE: Have you seen anybody in the last five years file a Bert Harris claim, Mr. Strain? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: No, but I haven't seen anybody try to put development in a potential FSA that's required pursuant to Policy 5.1 either. MR. VARNADOE: If you want to delete those -- take that policy out, from the landowners' perspective, they'd be very happy with that. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: What I'm trying to understand is if we had a claim all along that this program was to incentivize people to voluntarily join and do something better for the environment in lieu of building one to five units throughout the RLSA, I think the argument that they could have one to five units in the RLSA is somewhat defeated by the fact that we can make them join into BFSA's. MR. VARNADOE: I don't agree with your characterization of that at all, Mr. Strain. You can't make them do it. They voluntarily agreed to that constraint on the land -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, and we don't have anything __ MR. VARNADOE: -- as part of an overall program. Page 5 February 20, 2009 And when you start taking these things little bit by little bit and picking at them, you're losing the balance of the entire program. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: But the purpose of the five-year review was to look at the whole program and make sure -- MR. VARNADOE: In toto. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: We have words in here that you've added piece at a time. Not you, the committee has added. So they've looked at the whole thing, why can't we? MR. VARNADOE: The whole thing in toto, though. They didn't pick out one piece. They tried to balance it. I think that's the point that gets lost doing it piecemeal. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I don't think we're doing it piecemeal, George, and I guess we'll continue to disagree on that point then. MR. VARNADOE: Yep. MR. McDANIEL: And from a committee's perspective, and I did serve -- it's Bill McDaniel, by the way, I didn't introduce myself early on, so forgive me. I found it rather ironic that they're -- as you have suggested, Mark, that there were a set of policies that were developed for folks that didn't voluntarily participate in the program. From the committee's perspective, our discussions that we had, these were additional incentives to have folks participate in the program and reduce the potential of the urban sprawl at the one to five. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And I think the idea of having incentives to get people to move into the program is the right thing to do. But then on the other way it seems to be written, if a property owner does not want to participate, it's punitive. Because it's probably going to change anyway. And further on in here there is much more punitive language that it only applies if you're not in the program. And I'm wondering, why is Page 6 February 20, 2009 it so voluntary if you're punishing people if they don't join. That doesn't seem to fit what the intent was. MR. JONES: Tom Jones. I think you really have to go back to the genesis of the program and back to 2002. And I think I'm just really going to probably reiterate what Mr. Varnadoe said, but perhaps in a different fashion. When this plan was put together, there was quite a collaborative effort between landowners, conservation organizations, county staff and other interested parties. And I think what you can't emphasize enough is that the landowners agreed to the language in Policy 5.1. It wasn't mandated to us, it was requested of us as we were going through the process, could you give us a higher level of assurances that things won't occur in these FSA's in particular. And the landowners agreed to it. So you may view it as punitive, but if I've agreed to do something, then I don't necessarily take it as a punitive action either on your part or my part to participate. But we as landowners elected to put that restriction on our property and we were able to do it. (At which time, Commissioner Midney enters the room.) MR. JONES: Because the landowners that were involved in the group at the time controlled all the lands that were designated as FSA's. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, I appreciate your time, Tom, thank you. The only concern I still have is I don't know where-- I haven't seen the agreement, so maybe I just need to get -- MR. JONES: Well, there is no agreement. Sometimes people's word is enough. And if that's not enough, it was included in the Growth Management Plan. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I wish people's words were enough-- MR. JONES: And as Mr. Varnadoe said, and I believe there's a time constraint when a Bert Harris Act can be filed, if I'm correct. And that time frame has long passed. Page 7 February 20, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: But I think the trigger ofa Bert Harris Act -- MR. JONES: So I think what the action is, if the peoples whose land this was placed on were opposed to it, although they voluntarily agreed to it, they could have tripped the play, asked for a development to occur in an FSA and then file a Bert Harris Act. That didn't change. I mean, we're arguing about something that was accomplished five years ago with everybody's agreement and consent. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, Ijust don't agree with-- MR. JONES: And as Mr. Varnadoe said, I guess we could take it out. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I don't agree with your trigger for a Bert Harris, because I think it's when a development order is turned down. In this particular case it wouldn't be until one's applied for. But we'll move on. Brad? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: And I've been trying to kind of get a grip on this. When you say the landowners all agree, how many landowners are there? I got some e-mail that says there's 200, you guys say there's five or six. MR. JONES: I'll clarify the numbers with respect to what I was addressing. When I refer to the landowners agree, I was talking about the landowners that own the land that was designated as FSA. And that's less than half a dozen that own land that was designated as an FSA that are specifically -- that are specifically impacted by Policy 5.1. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: And there's not a group of people that own small parcels of that, you're saying? MR. JONES: Not within the FSA, no. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: All right, thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: In that same paragraph, Tom, I notice that we changed the word only to not. So, I mean, I understand Page 8 February 20, 2009 probably why you did it because the way it read, someone could construe that you could only put essential services in there. But if you were to buy in the program, do you know ifFSA's can be used for anything else? Aren't we allowed to have infrastructure in there to a point where it has to be -- where you like cross an FSA and things like that for piping? MR. McDANIEL: I believe we did have some lang -- or there is some language in here that allows that for infrastructure to support those government facilities. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: It's on 4.9. And wouldn't we want to put that same language after the sentence -- I mean after the word not be allowed in FSA's, so that if it's fair in the RLSA, it should be fair in the regular properties, too? Anyway, I don't know why you would-- MR. McDANIEL: I can see your point. In tying those two together is probably a good suggestion from the Planning Commission with respect to that. I think it's -- I think we're talking about the same thing. By doing that, as Mr. Jones suggested, that the folks that do own the lands that were designated as FSA's are party to it, so -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. The only thing I would think that'd do is make the process equitable. If they can do it in the RLSA and it's required there, then it ought to be done elsewhere. If you were to go back on Policy 1.5, and let me read the last sentence. It says, no part of the stewardship credit system shall be imposed upon a property owner without that owner's consent. That's where my concern with the first paragraph came in, and the reference that FSA's will be created outside the RLSA -- or within the RLSA but outside those that voluntarily buy in the program. That seems to be a contradiction, unless there's some way to nail down the owner's consent. And I think we'll have to further look at that, but that's where the question rose. Any other questions on Page 62? Page 9 February 20, 2009 (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Let's move on to Page 63. Starts at Policy 5.2 and begins a long policy of 5.5. Questions on Page 63 from the Planning Commission? (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Hey, Paul, you're here. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Sorry I'm late. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: That's okay. Welcome. Thank you, Mr. Vigliotti. Ms. Caron? COMMISSIONER CARON: On 5.4 where it's talking about changing this map and putting potential habitat crossings. Once we establish a map like this, will that then vest whatever is there? So suddenly if we put -- if we change the map to account for these -- for potential SRA's, then they just become vested automatically? MR. McDANIEL: I don't think that -- that certainly wasn't from the committee's perspective, Ms. Caron, the process we were looking to do there. And again, recall -- remember that the maps that have been generated to date are conceptual maps that talk about the potential locales of the SRA's and the SSA's and so on and so forth. These wildlife crossings were a part of the -- were not necessarily part of the original plan, and this is the language that we talked about to establish those wildlife crossings and have it be -- COMMISSIONER CARON: So all of these maps, no matter what they are, will be labeled conceptual? MR. McDANIEL: I can't answer technically how they're ultimately going -- it would seem to me they would almost have to be conceptual. Unless an SRA has actually been applied for and been designated, it could only be conceptual. I know that we have proposed wildlife crossing corridors, if you will, as part of the SRA program to -- and again, the primary goal Page 10 February 20, 2009 behind those were to establish the wildlife crossings locales or areas so that they could be part of the budget process for the infrastructure, the highway construction improvements. But necessarily they would have to be conceptual until someone actually formally applies for an SRA. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: We're on Page 63. Go ahead, Paul. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: On the same area. So the purpose of this is you want to kind of figure out where the crossings might be based upon probably telemetry points and so on so that you could budget for the crossings and also maybe steer development away from those areas? MR. McDANIEL: That's correct. I mean, there are buffering -- there is buffering language in the program that establishes the necessary buffers as well. And if these corridors are designated in some form or fashion, that's going to ultimately, as part of the program, redirect development away from potentially environmentally sensitive habitat so on and so forth. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Yeah, that makes sense. How will you decide what's the threshold, how many to make? I mean, are you going to make three or are you going to make 30 or 15? How do you decide, you know, what's the criteria of what is a threshold above which you have to designate a crossing? MR. McDANIEL: We're not going to go there right now, are we? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: No, I'm just asking. MR. McDANIEL: I mean, there's a whole -- and there-- COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I'm sure that nobody knows, I'm just -- you know, I'm sure that you had something in mind when you made this, and -- MR. McDANIEL: What we had in mind at the committee level was the necessity of establishing those corridors. And in so doing, Page 11 February 20, 2009 delineating locales for wildlife crossings on the highway systems that we all know are inevitably going to be improved. And so to have that be part of the budget process, that was the main emphasis as to why we were doing what we were doing. There wasn't really any specific discussions about -- COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: No, I agree with you, it makes perfect sense what you're saying. But I'm just wondering, at some point somebody's going to have to decide what's the threshold where you need one. And, you know, if they've only crossed twice, you probably don't need one, and if they've crossed 200 times, you know __ MR. McDANIEL: And a lot of that's going to be determined. There's a tremendous amount of work being done right now as we speak. That independent panel of biologists that's determining the habitat qualifications and the locales and their corridors of travel and their -- what's happy for them, that's all being done right now. The language that we have in here in the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay covers newest and most avail -- best information as those information sources come along. As those priorities -- as our social priorities change, adaptations are going to inevitably occur that are going to dictate where those are, how many of those crossings are in fact going to be in place and so on and so forth. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: And also if they decide to designate these panther corridors and do the panther corridor credits and sort of map them out, that might change where the __ MR. McDANIEL: Of course. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: -- crossings will be too. MR. McDANIEL: Of course. I mean, you -- and again, there's been some extremely heated discussions about those corridors as to their worthiness and so on and so forth. At the committee level our goal was to establish the corridors, in so doing have the locales for the wildlife crossings and have that be part of the budget process. Page 12 February 20, 2009 There's going to be tremendous amounts of discussion as to how big they need to be and what type of vegetation needs to be planted with respect to making them happy places for the animals to travel. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: So this is just sort of like a preliminary planning thing at this point. That's fine. MR. McDANIEL: That's what this entire program is. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Yeah, thank you. MR. McDANIEL: I mean, in that -- and you bring up a very valid point, Paul, in that this is a plan to develop an area in our eastern community where we're going to have a mix of wildlife and people when it's all said and done. And this is to -- as this entire paragraph talks about, it doesn't just talk about the wildlife corridors, it also talks about the other wildlife, the human race that we're going to have. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: And the farming, I hope. MR. McDANIEL: Exactly. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Mark? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yes, Mr. Murray. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Looking at Policy 5.5, aside from the issue of the voluntary versus involuntary part of it, within that recommendation, what is the trigger for making this happen? Because it says shall be required under number one. Policy 5.5 under number one of wildlife survey shall be required for all parcels. And it states ahead of that, for those lands that are not voluntarily included. What's the trigger? And at what point? It seems to need something there, would you agree? MR. McDANIEL: My interpretation of that is a trigger is going to be when a non-participating landowner, which I don't think we have any, but a non-participating landowner in the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay program makes an application to develop his property or increase the intensity of use, if you will. That will be the trigger that's going to tip that over. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Well, okay, and I appreciate Page 13 February 20, 2009 that, and I can conjecture that as valid as well. So that leaves potentially large segments or parcels or tracks that because a landowner would not go forward, that those requested or required surveys and the rest, they will not be done. Who knows, ad infinitum, right? MR. McDANIEL: And it's currently the way it stands right now, yes. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: I appreciate that. But this is an intent to -- the intent here is for land planning, right? MR. McDANIEL: Agreed. COMMISSIONER MURRA Y: Okay. So what I'm suggesting, and I don't have any answers, of course, but what I am suggesting is that perhaps they're -- because that issue that Mark raised about the involuntary aspect of it, you know, if you're going to require somebody to be a participant in it in the first instance, wouldn't it follow logically that you'd want them to be compelled to step up next to Joe and Charlene and do the same things? I recognize there's a cost associated with it, but isn't there everything? MR. McDANIEL: Agreed. And I might suggest also that, I mean, there are other regulating agencies that folks have to apply to whenever they're looking to do some kind of increase of utilization of their land. And I would pro -- and I don't know this for a fact, but I would assume that you would have to make an application to the South Florida Water Management District or the DEP if you were to be going in for a mining operation that we're -- and I know that I'm required by those agencies to do those wildlife surveys, even if I were outside -- I think this is probably as much as anything a replication of the existing regulations that are out there for folks that are looking to utilize their property in environmentally sensitive areas. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: I appreciate that. But because of the nature of the involuntary aspect of it, that does provoke some Page 14 February 20, 2009 question. And I can understand where the intent is. And not to belabor it, but you must of -- as committee, you must have had a discussion as to when -- and I won't use the term build-out, but when these transactions will have reached a critical mass, so to speak, where a true plan can be seen on a map. What's the estimation on that, 2050? MR. McDANIEL: I think, yeah, we used the designation of 2050. That was the new number. Originally the plan was set up for 2025, and we jumped out to 2050. And that was partly done with -- in course with the East of 951 Horizon Study and all that information, and the Collier interactive growth model. So that's the reason we jumped out there. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: It's -- and I applaud the committee for trying to find a means by which you can, you know, get everybody in step with you. But it is probably from a -- from the point of view when we try to do growth plan amendments, it's going to be a sticking point, so maybe the committee might want to look at that. MR. McDANIEL: With respect to what? COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Trying to deal with these recommended amendments that talk about involuntary inclusion. MR. McDANIEL: Well, they are part of the original policies of the original Rural Land Stewardship Overlay. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Yes, but these are recommended -- these are going to be recommended. And what we didn't realize 10 years ago or five years ago, we now have a tendency to recognize. So I'm just suggesting. If you don't, you don't. But that may be an issue, a sticking point. That's all I'm saying. Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Any other questions on Page 63. Ms. Caron? COMMISSIONER CARON: Down under 2.B. MR. McDANIEL: Or not 2.B? Page 15 February 20, 2009 COMMISSIONER CARON: Or not 2.B. MR. GREENWOOD: That 2.B actually should be 2.A. There's some renumbering. MR. McDANIEL: Thank you, Mr. Greenwood. It truly is not 2.B. COMMISSIONER CARON: He's right, I hadn't even picked up on that. But it says on the first line there, listed species or listed species. I think it's supposed to read listed species or protected species and their habitat. MR. McDANIEL: I'm going to-- COMMISSIONER CARON: As it is in the paragraphs above. It's this corrected everywhere else but here. MR. McDANIEL: I believe that was addressed at Environmental Advisory Council as well. And your suggestion there has already been taken into account. COMMISSIONER CARON: Okay, thanks. Now, tell me why the line that was crossed out was crossed out and why the line that was added in was added in. It really reflects on the next page. MR. McDANIEL: The goal was -- the discussion I recall -- and Brad Cornell is here, so if you have really deep wanting information. The line that was crossed out was rather generic. And it encompassed a large area that was highly discretionary in what could in fact be considered habitat. So our -- utilizing that -- and that language I'm sure is mirrored off when I spoke earlier, Mr. Strain, with respect -- or Mr. Murray, one, I can't remember who I was talking to -- that the most current and completed data of the local and state guidelines is allowing us or affording us that opportunity as new information comes in to change these designations. And not with so much discretion as what was afforded in the original line that we chose to strike. Page 16 February 20, 2009 COMMISSIONER CARON: Okay. I mean, I'm not sure -- and maybe Brad, you do want to comment further. Because I'm not sure why we're -- I mean, it seems -- that second line seemed pretty specific in that you had to establish buffers. Now it just says we have to use these guidelines, and I'm not sure the guidelines are as strong as being required to use buffers. And I could be wrong, but when we get over on the next page, I think you -- MR. CORNELL: I'm trying to remember our conversation about this. But my recollection is that we've addressed buffers in a separate policy more specifically, and that what we're doing in Policy 5.5 is trying to be less specific in terms of referencing management guidelines for any particular species and just say listed and protected species in general will all have current guidelines that will be followed. Whatever the most current guidelines for mitigation and management will be followed for whatever the species is and their habitat. And then the deletion of the buffering language ends up being addressed in a separate place where we actually have a fuller policy on buffering. And right now I can't remember where that is. But it's -- that's my recollection of the rationale for those changes. COMMISSIONER CARON: Well, all right. Well, let's just get into this a little more. So the second line that's added says mitigation for impacting listed species habitat shall be considered in the management plans as appropriate. So once again, are we setting up our management plans to just pay mitigation into some mitigation bank, wherever they might find it and we're not actually protecting species? MR. CORNELL: No, no. This is a reference to the fact that the regulatory agencies are going to have something to say about impacts to habitat and listed species. Whatever they say, whatever that may be, we don't know. That's Page 17 February 20, 2009 why this is vague. That has to be contemplated in the management plan for habitat that's involved in that area. That's not saying what you do or what the mitigation is. That's obviously a deferral on that mitigation to those agencies. But it is saying that when you have management, when you write your management plan, you've got to consider what the agency said about mitigation. That's the way I understood that to be. That was the intent in writing that. Does that make sense? COMMISSIONER CARON: It may. Obviously it can be read more than one way, so -- MR. CORNELL: Yeah, it was meant to be only a way of being more inclusive of saying look, not only should you write a management plan, but you've got to remember to include and consider and incorporate into your management plan whatever the mitigation is that's been assigned for that area. COMMISSIONER CARON: Okay. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, anything else on 63? (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Ifnot, Bill, let's go back to your -- we're going to go all the way back to the top. And we need to go back to something you had said in response to Mr. Murray. You had said that -- I think you were trying to say that you believe all the landowners are participating in the program. Is that a fair statement? MR. McDANIEL: Mr. Jones? MR. JONES: No. MR. McDANIEL: Not all of the landowners. In the FSA's the landowners that actually have the designated FSA's. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. What do you deem to be -- what signifies participation in the FSA program as implemented here? I just didn't know. I mean, we've got Russell Priddy who has spoken many times, and I don't believe his property is yet attached or voluntarily Page 18 February 20, 2009 submitted to the program. I know that -- I think the Scofields have put some of theirs in. I know Barron Collier has some in. So I'm not sure what we're talking about here. And if they've already committed to this and the FSA's that they have by their active participation are committed to -- MR. McDANIEL: We're not, as the case may be. I mean, you know, just because they haven't designated an SSA, which would then ultimately establish the -- and those FSA's are already very well described and laid out, so -- just because they have -- in order to be part of the Rural Land Stewardship program, they basically have to have applied for an SSA or an SRA. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. So by the act of this policy, these policies, we create the FSA's in the non-voluntary areas, meaning everybody that's out there, whether they're voluntarily joining the RLSA or not, or the program or not, they got an FSA on their property by these policies. MR. McDANIEL: No, not necessarily. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, then let's -- that's what I'm trying to find out. I don't understand the -- MR. McDANIEL: You're picking on something that I was saying over there to Mr. Murray, or suggesting that I was -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I wasn't picking, I'm trying to understand, Bill. I don't understand how the FSA's can be created on properties that aren't voluntarily part of the program. And earlier I thought we said they are created by -- everybody has agreed to this. MR. McDANIEL: My -- and maybe -- you know, I hear comments coming from Mr. Varnadoe. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: That was a grunt. MR. McDANIEL: But those FSA's are very specifically defined overlays that are part of the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay. FSA's, HSA's, WRA's. Applications for an SSA are further designation in applying the credit system that's associated with those defined areas Page 19 February 20, 2009 within the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay. The Group 5 policies are additional incentives, if you will, instigations for participation in the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay and the credit system that applies for that overlay. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: You know, maybe somebody's thinking I'm going in the wrong direction here. I'm trying to protect the existing property owners' rights. That's the purpose of my questioning. If they have rights and they're hampered by forcing them to do things or changing the uses to their property without their authorization, that to me is a concern. It would be if it happened in the urban area or in the RLSA. So that's where I'm coming from. And if you've -- MR. McDANIEL: And I by no means disagree with that statement. I am very much an advocate of personal property rights. And I think you have heard from -- what are you laughing at? I think you've heard from landowners' perspective that the implementation of the Group 5 policies would -- it could be a recommendation to have them stricken. I mean, it's not something that I found very -- as a committee person very in flow with the voluntary program, as you suggested earlier. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, that's the only point I was trying to understand. And if we -- at some point we may have to come back and try to understand that better or clarify it. MR. McDANIEL: Can I, just from a lay person's perspective? I found the majority of these in instigations, if you will, are basically replications of other restrictions that are already existent through other permitting agencies that are out there and just further defined here. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, see, if I -- for example, Russell. If Russell came up and said I have no problem, all my property's FSA's, it doesn't bother me a bit. Okay. Then we know that we're -- because I think Russell's been fairly outspoken about his property and his Page 20 February 20, 2009 concerns. And that's great, that's what we're trying to find out. And ifhe's one of the people that buy into this, then I think okay, he's not got a concern, he's probably one of the more outspoken people who have concerns out there. George is outspoken and we've heard George. I don't disagree with George's argument. I just want to make sure that we get it clear so everybody understands that this is or is not voluntary or they have or have not given up rights and we don't have a challenge later on that cost the taxpayers money. That's my only goal here today. MR. McDANIEL: I'm with you 100 percent. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Russell, you must have heard your name mentioned. MR. PRIDDY: I think the easiest and simplest thing to do is take all of Group Policy out for the Planning Commission to recommend. Just to not have any Group 5 policies, period. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, when I got done today, that's where I was going. So you've already -- because if everybody's buying into the program, as Bill is saying, we don't need the Group 5 policies. MR. PRIDDY: Don't need the Group 5, take them out. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And I think that would be a great solution, if we could figure out a way to make it happen. MR. McDANIEL: Somebody call for an adjournment. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Go ahead, Paul. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: These are already in the policy now, so why are you wanting to mess with it? No one has had a problem with it up till now. It's been in for five years. MR. McDANIEL: It isn't that we -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Hey, Paul, if you want to say no one's had a problem with it, I haven't had a problem with the program for the five years either since it was implemented. But by the fact we're here today and spent three days and probably another day on this, there obviously needs to be changes. Page 21 February 20, 2009 We had a committee appointed who said there are changes to the program that are needed. The purpose of the five-year review was to go back and look at everything that needed to be changed. I don't see us being limited to just what the committee thought needed to be changed. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: No, I'm not saying that. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: So I'm suggesting there's probably another area we could look at for change that may not have been looked at by the committee, or even if they had, based on their explanation maybe we have a different course we may think it needs to go in. MR. McDANIEL: I don't think you do. I think you're on the same path. I can remember, and it's probably a matter of record. I'm going to be repeating myself during the committee process on these Group 5 policies. I found it very Hippocratic (sic) that this group of policies was even in here. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And we haven't got to the worst parts of them yet. But that's more need to say if we can -- if we did away with these Group 5 policies because all the property owners out there were in agreement, we're way ahead. And that takes a whole burden off of a process here we don't need. So that may be an idea to look at further. Anyway -- MR. McDANIEL: Time will tell. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: --let's go back. Because in case they are here -- COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Well, Mark? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yes, sir. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I mean, don't you think that the Group 5 policies are sort of in support of what the final order was saying, that you need to protect your critical species on these lands? I mean, it is a restriction on private property, you're right, but we have Page 22 February 20, 2009 other restrictions on private property that are, you know, part of law that, you know, it's kind of an accepted thing that when you have -- you want to get the highest and best use of the land. And some lands, their highest and best use is conservation of protected species. So yes, it is a restriction, but it's not necessarily an unreasonable one. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: But Paul, the purpose of the Group 5 policies is to deal with the lands that don't buy into the RLSA program. We've been just told that all the property owners out there are buying into the RLSA program. And if that's the case, that program addresses all of the concerns that you have by the mere fact we just went through group policies 1 through 4 and addressed all those. Group 5 only hits in if someone doesn't go in, and they're all agreeing to go in. So what do we need -- who's going to be left to administer Group 5 policies to? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Well, the six landowners, that covers what, about 90 percent of the land? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: We've been told there's six landowners. If there's more, then we've got a problem. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: No, there's more than six landowners. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: You're shorter than Bill. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Who can help me out? How many -- what percentage of the land in the RLSA is owned by these six landowners? MR. CORNELL: Isn't it about 160 some thousand acres? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: No, I mean percentage. MR. CORNELL: Oh, percentage? Well, put that over 182,000. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: But see, that changes then to Mr. Murray's questioning, because we've been -- MR. JONES: I think we're mixing up what different people are saying when they come to the podium. Page 23 February 20, 2009 You posed a question to me with respect to the FSA's and landowner agreement with respect to these restrictions in Group 5 policies with respect to 5.1 specifically. My comment was it wasn't opposed by the landowners who owned those lands that were designated as FSA on the overlay. Now, that doesn't mean those landowners have established stewardship sending areas on those FSA's -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I realize that. MR. JONES: -- but the FSA's -- well, for the benefit of the rest of the committee. But the landowners haven't established SSA's on all those committees. So if your question to me is have all the landowners bought into the RLSA program, I would say no. If your question -- I believe your question to me was do the landowners that own the FSA's, have they bought into the program. We bought into the program to the extent that none of us opposed the restriction placed on our properties that were designated as FSA's when the program was developed. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And that's a big plus. And there's where I was -- and I understand that's what you meant. And when Russell came up, he had a good suggestion. I know it was -- seemed to be maybe he wasn't serious, but it was a good suggestion. MR. JONES: Russell's always serious. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, if you -- I'm not sure everybody took it that way. But if you eliminated these Group 5 policies because everybody voluntarily not only to deal with the -- MR. JONES: The FSA-- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Let me finish. MR. JONES: No, no, no. You said everybody agreed to them. Everybody did not agree to them. The landowners that own these lands in the FSA's have agreed to these restrictions. There are other lands in the RLSA that -- Page 24 February 20, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: You didn't let me finish. MR. JONES: -- don't apply to the FSA. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: You didn't let me finish. That's what I tried to tell you. MR. JONES: All right. I'll go back-- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I understand that they agreed to the FSA piece that's in here. MR. JONES: Yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: The next step would be okay, at some point they're going to want to develop their property. Ifby -- if we eliminated the Group 5 -- MR. JONES: If the landowners that we're talking about in the FSA -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN : Yes. MR. JONES: -- are going to develop their properties. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yes. MR. JONES: Go ahead. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Ifwe eliminated the Group 5 policies and then they had to develop their property and agreed that they would enter the program under whatever terms the program had at the time, we're there. MR. JONES: There are many lands in the program that are not designated FSA or HSA. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I understand that. MR. JONES: You have thousands of acres that are in the open area where the restrictions or the covenants in the Group 5 policy apply to them. So if you eliminate all the Group 5 policies, then there are no additional requirements placed on anyone who's not participating in the program. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Right. But I think what I was understanding through some of the discussion, I thought everybody Page 25 February 20, 2009 was agreeing to at some point participate in the program. MR. JONES: That's what I was trying to clarify. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: So that's what we're hearing no, so now we have to have the Group 5 policies because Russell's not going to participate, is he? MR. JONES: No, I think we could take out the Group 5 policies too. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. I was just trying to make it simpler, ifthere was a way to get there. If not everybody's in agreement, then we'll just keep moving through it. I mean, we're -- COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Mark? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: -- going to do that anyway. Yes, Russell. MR. PRIDDY: Russell Priddy. These policies weren't really in there for the Russell Priddys or the Colliers or the big landowners. It was to discourage the landowner that had 50 acres from trying to go change that 50 acres under some other means. It was to further encourage them to participate under the first four sets of policies. So the Group 5 is really a disincentive and an incentive program. It is a disincentive for, you know, maybe those smaller parcels that are out there to not do a one in five or not to go do, you know, three mega-homes on 40 acres, it was to encourage them through disincentive to participate through the Group 1 through 4 policies. MR. McDANIEL: Very politically correct. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Mark? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, Paul? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Yeah, just sort of to add on. It's a subset of the landowners. First of all, it's the landowners who are not part of the six, which I guess is maybe five or 10 percent of all the land in the RLSA. And then a subset of that, Mark, which is those who have lands Page 26 February 20, 2009 where there might be listed species. Some of the landowners, it doesn't matter, they have open land or the land is not ecologically valuable. So it's just a subset of the landowners why we have the Policy 5 in there. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Anybody else on -- I was still into my questions. And now that we're back on track with another series, 5.3, Policy 5.3, I think you want Bill to answer these for a while until we get-- unless do you have something else you wanted to -- MR. CORNELL: I just wanted to add one more thing. Brad Cornell. Sorry, I should have said that before. I want to make sure that it's clear that the committee's position is that we need the Group 5 policies, even despite what you're hearing, somewhat in joking, but that they represent a regulatory floor below which -- you know, we have an incentive program, but we also have n you know, that's the carrot. But we also have a stick in the way of a regulatory floor that we don't want anybody falling through. And part of that is so that we don't see any one-on-five conversions in places we don't want it. You know, we only want to see the kinds of sustainable development out there that does not impact habitat, wetlands, and is not a burden on the public in terms of infrastructure, et cetera, and is that kind of devel -- we don't want to see one on five. And so this is, just as you heard Russell say, this is a disincentive to do what we don't want. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Thank you. 5.3, about in the middle of the paragraph there's a sentence that starts with baseline standards referenced in Policy 1.5 and does not elect to use the overlay, the following regulations are applicable. What regulations? And they shall be incorporated into the LDC. But I couldn't figure out what it's referring to because I didn't see any regulations attached. Page 27 February 20, 2009 MR. GREENWOOD: Actually, that should be clarified. It basically is the following policies. And it should be -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Should we rewrite that? MR. GREENWOOD: I think so, yeah. MR. McDANIEL: Call them policies or regulations. It wasn't a CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Or should we say the regulations of the Group 5 policies? So that way you've got 5.1 instead of the following? MR. McDANIEL: Certainly. We didn't talk about that at the committee level. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: On Policy 5.4 it says, a map of these potential crossings. Who would be producing the map? COMMISSIONER MURRAY: County, I hope. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I'm just curious as how that would actually happen. The county's so short on staff right now, I'm just wondering how it gets done. I turn to Elizabeth or -- MR. McDANIEL: We didn't really talk about -- I mean, there are conceptual maps that are already -- that have already been developed. We really didn't decide who was going to actually get it done, other than suggest that it was done and give a time frame for it. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. But what I'm concerned about in today's climate, you can suggest a lot of things right now, and if we don't assign and say -- and have somebody agree that they're going to do it, it may never get done. MR. McDANIEL: And that comes whether you do assign someone or not, Mr. Strain. I mean, there were things in the original Rural Land Stewardship Overlay that were suggested, and the Agricultural Commission that was designated to be established and set aside and advising and so on and so forth, and we struck that language out of here. Page 28 February 20, 2009 So that might be a suggestion from the Planning Commission to designate someone responsible to -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I just think it makes it clear in the future. MS. FLEMING: I remember this discussion. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Elizabeth, you want to take a shot at it? MS. FLEMING: Elizabeth Fleming, Defenders of Wildlife. We talked -- I remember this because at the end -- that the hangup was the period of time that it would take to produce this map. Darrell Land has done a lot of this already through the least-cost pathways, and the data exists now. And I think that it wouldn't take very much at all. The Florida Fish & Wildlife Conservation Commission and I think the Florida Department of Transportation are working on an effort such as this for the entire District I, which I believe is -- I can't remember how many counties, but it goes up to I-4. And they're working on that for panther and bear crossing locations where they feel that wildlife underpasses need to be installed. So it was just kind of putting it on the record in this document so that we didn't forget that we had to do that. But work is underway right now. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. And again for the policy, I think we need to try to focus on who could do that. We can certainly make that suggestion and see what comes out of it. Further in that sentence it says, within 12 months the effective date of the GMP amendment and used in evaluating community, cultural and historical planning for the RLSA. When you have the words used in, what does that mean? I mean, it doesn't say shall. Doesn't say will be. Doesn't say -- I mean, we just had a discussion about two weeks ago, not with this group but another around the water plant. And because the South Florida Water Management District doesn't have language that requires their policies Page 29 February 20, 2009 to be adhered to but just reviewed or considered, Collier County ignores them, basically. It's oh, yeah, we considered them, but we're going to write it our own way anyway. I'm afraid something like that could happen here if this language was as vague as it seems to be here. And that's my concern for those words. And I don't know if you have any ideas, but -- MR. McDANIEL: We, the committee, don't have any ideas with respect to that, Mr. Strain. I mean, again, the goal behind that was the establishment of those wildlife crossings, getting -- and to have -- and to develop a transportation plan for the entire Rural Land Stewardship Overlay. I mean, there's -- in conjunction with that, there's going to be necessary participation from the Department of Transportation of Collier County as well. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And I would realize that. I would hope so. But I just -- the way that it's to be implemented I think is -- we may want to say that even defer -- put language in here that defers the method of implementation or how it's to be used to the LDC language, that would work too. But just to say used, I'm concerned it isn't going to have emphasis if you leave it like that. So I just made notes and in the end we can figure out how we want to address it. On Policy 5.5, I notice in number one, the second line, the new language, or protected species was added. Now, if it's added to the existing property owners if they don't buy into the RLSA, why wouldn't the people who buy into the RLSA have to be just as concerned about protected species as listed? And the reason I'm bringing this up is because I don't think protected ought to be here. We took it out of the LDC, we didn't allow it to be added there in a broad range across the county. To put that damage -- or that onto a burden of a property owner to all of a sudden have to go out and do wildlife surveys, plans and Page 30 February 20, 2009 everything else, now not just for listed but protected is very punitive. And I think that is wrong. Either it's got to apply everywhere or it shouldn't apply anywhere, to be fair. MR. McDANIEL: You're entitled to your opinion. I mean -- and I can't recall specifically. Again, remember, these entire Group 5 policies are the incentivization to participate. And that was the language that was added in there for folks who chose not to participate in the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay. Did we not, Brad, include the protected species back in the other? MR. CORNELL: I don't remember. Earlier, you mean? MR. McDANIEL: In the actual RLSA. I thought we had. MR. CORNELL: It could be, yeah. I don't remember. Let me look. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. MS. FLEMING: Can I say something? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Sure, go ahead. The more input, the better. We're going to have public input, too, right when we finish this discussion. So you'll have another -- we need to get all the information on the table. MS. FLEMING: Elizabeth Fleming, Defenders of Wildlife. From what I recall of the discussion, the intention was to put them into I guess it would be Group 3 policies also. And then talk went around and around, and it sounded like they were in the growth management regs. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Of protected species? No. MS. FLEMING: Okay, if that -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I mean, if you're talking about now putting them in the RLSA program, I didn't come across that in the review of prior policies. MS. FLEMING: If they're in this section, we advocated that it be Page 31 February 20, 2009 consistent. It's not trying to make it stricter for the people not in the program. And the reason this came up is because in here there was a whole list of all the different species management plans. And we talked about why list some, you should list all of them and all this. This was meant to make sure that we referenced all the species that are being regulated anyway. These aren't additional regulations. And recognizing that when species are delisted on the federal or state level, the State of Florida is creating management plans for all species that are either delisted, down-listed, up-listed, change in classification. The Bald Eagle and the Peregrin Falcon are two examples where the Bald Eagle has -- well, I guess they both still have federal regulations that apply. And we just want to be sure that everybody knew that they had to check for these management plans and protected -- we tried all kinds of things: Delisted, down-listed. At one point we had only the Bald Eagle, because that was the most obvious example. That's just meant to catch the rest. But I don't think it should only be in Group 5, if that was your question. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, yes and no. I don't think it should be in Group 5 or Group 3. But the problem is, if you put it in Group 5, it should go in everywhere else. And the problem I see there is if the committee did not review the impacts of doing wildlife surveys and management plans for more than the listed species, they're talking about protected species as well, and that's a longer list. That's going to have -- may have an interesting impact on the committee's debate. Policy 3.2 is the policy I think in the Group 3 policies that pertain to this, and it says only listed animals and plant species. It doesn't say protected. MS. FLEMING: All right. I think then somebody said it should be adjusted in the LDC or -- I don't know. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: You can't impose it in the RLSA and the LDC if it's not allowed by the GMP. You can only put it in the Group Page 32 February 20, 2009 5 section implementation of the LDC. So we're not getting there. MS. FLEMING: I agree with -- the mechanics of it I was not aware of. But that was the recommendation at the time. It wasn't trying to make this section stricter. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, Bill, does your committee -- was your committee looking at adding protected species to the Group 3 policies as well? MR. McDANIEL: I know that we were not looking to make it more punitive necessarily in the Group 5's than anywhere else. And I recall a discussion, and I don't ultimately remember where it ran into, as to why it wasn't included in the balance of the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I mean, I think if you're -- and I don't know, maybe someone else knows how long the list is, but there's a long list of listed species, and then there's a longer list of protected species. And I'm just wondering if that has the potential of being in the RLSA program, that might change the dynamics of the way you guys are thinking as far as how you move forward with the RLSA. So it's either -- I think to be fair, though, I don't know how you can include it in one and not the other. MR. McDANIEL: And I -- and I'm not -- and again, these discussions happened at the committee level quite some time ago. And I recall our entire premise behind the Group 5 policies was for additional incentives for folks that were not going to voluntarily participate in the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay to find the benefits of the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay and disincentivize them from doing another methodology of development for their land. (Cell phone ringing.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: That was George again. MR. McDANIEL: Right at the end of my -- did you get that written down? Because that came out pretty good. I can't remember Page 33 February 20, 2009 what I said now. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, the only thing, Bill, is I'm concerned if we put it in one and it's not in the other. I think honestly it ought to be not added, because there was an attempt to add that in the Land Development Code as a whole, and it didn't succeed because of the involvement in the additional species that would be involved. MR. McDANIEL: As Mr. Priddy suggested, the Group 5 policies at the committee level discussions were additional disincentives for people to not participate in the program. We want them to participate in the program. We would rather they not have had the potential negative impacts that could occur from the underlying land uses. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. MR. McDANIEL: I don't refute what you're saying about-- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, it's punitive, yeah. MR. McDANIEL: -- immunity or being one and not the other, but that was where we pretty much ended up. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: After that word it says, protected species are directly observed on-site. If you want to remember that reference, I know we'll be ta -- I'll bring you back to it. Because further on in the policy it talks about the species that are utilized, the areas that are utilized by listed species. So either it applies when they're observed or it applies when they're utilizing it. And I don't think you can have your cake and eat it too in both of those, so it's one or the other. And I don't know why there's a conflict in the policies. But we'll get to it I guess when we -- MR. McDANIEL: It's not really a conflict. I recall having an issue with that because of the discretion that was afforded with respect to it having been observed or potentially could be utilized. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Ifprotected species were to be left in under Policy 2,5.5.1 -- 5.5.2, you have three or four references to listed species not followed by the words protected species. And that Page 34 February 20, 2009 same occurs also in B.A, A.B? MR. McDANIEL: Right. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: So in order to be consistent, it would have to be everywhere or nowhere. And if A is to be n if B is to be A, so let's talk about 2.A, the first underlined sentence, the most current and completed data. How does someone find that and where do they get it from? Do you know? Brad? I mean -- MR. McDANIEL: The regu -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: You have to use the microphone. MR. McDANIEL: I'm going to say the same thing I was going to say. I mean, it's the regulating agencies that you make application with will have that available. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. So it's whatever the agencies will supply. Okay. And then the -- and that gets us past Page 63. What I'd like to do is finish with the 5.5 policy on 64 and the first part of 65 before we take public comment. Because I think a lot of it may be on 5.5. So on Page 64 from the Planning Commission, does anybody have any comments? Ms. Caron? COMMISSIONER CARON: Under B, where they're talking about management plans, how does putting a park or a recreational area or a golf course as a buffer minimize human wildlife interaction? MR. McDANIEL: I think the reference there is for the lesser intense uses that are incurred by those properties. COMMISSIONER CARON: Okay. But one of the goals is management plans shall include provisions for minimizing human and wildlife interaction. So if one of the ways you're going to buffer this is to put a park in there, how does a park minimize human wildlife interaction? MR. McDANIEL: It's a less intense development than the-- Page 35 February 20, 2009 COMMISSIONER CARON: I mean, I understand the less intense use. But I don't understand how it keeps people away -- MR. McDANIEL: It doesn't keep people away. COMMISSIONER CARON: -- from wildlife. Well, it says minimize human and wildlife interactions. That's what the first line says. So I just want to understand. MR. CORNELL: Brad Cornell. The idea of that would be that you're putting some distance between human homes where people are using more intensively the land and where the actual habitat is. So there's that -- it's a distance buffer. COMMISSIONER CARON: Okay, so it's strictly distance. So when you send your kids in there camping, it's okay. MR. CORNELL: There are other ways of buffering. You know, there are different ways of buffering, and -- COMMISSIONER CARON: No, I understand. MR. CORNELL: -- I don't think we're trying to be prescriptive in here, just suggestive. COMMISSIONER CARON: But on the list are specifically things that are human interaction things, golf courses and rec. areas and parks. So -- MR. CORNELL: Yeah, but you -- COMMISSIONER CARON: -- I was just curious as to why. MR. CORNELL: Right, but those would be less of an interaction with wildlife than you would have with a residential neighborhood where there's pets and little kids and cars. COMMISSIONER CARON: Well, certainly ifit was an SRA, not if it was maybe one to five. But anyway, yeah. MR. CORNELL: Well, that's the idea, that the planning would be used to minimize interaction. COMMISSIONER CARON: Further on down, all that's crossed out, is that -- that's all crossed out because it's already in the LDC? Page 36 February 20, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: No. MR. McDANIEL: And/or dated information. I mean, it was -- Brad, please. MR. CORNELL: I'm sorry. Remember, that's the strategy we had. We took out all the specific references to management plans and we said we're going to use and consult the most recent, most current management plans for all the listed and protected species, rather than list some and not others, which was -- that was the problem we addressed. We saw an incomplete list that was outdated. And we said, well, how are we going to do this? We can either try and make it a complete list and update it, but as soon as we do, it will be outdated, so why not do a more global kind of reference. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Brad, before you leave that, can I ask you a question? When Donna questioned you about parks, you know that big, expensive, fancy water park we have in North Naples for $54 million? COMMISSIONER CARON: Once again. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Do you feel that's less intense than a house next to a -- in that location that would be allowed by that added language? MR. CORNELL: Well, it depends on what the uses are. I mean, if you've got people and dogs and pets and other -- you know, and wildlife n not wildlife, I mean livestock, you know that can be a much more intensive use relative to interaction with other wildlife. Something that's used only during the daytime, no one's there at night, nobody lives there, it could be argued to be less intense and less of a hazard for interaction from that -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: So a ball stadium operating at night till 9:00 with floodlights is less intense than a house next to wildlife. MR. CORNELL: Well, now you're getting more specific. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: But Brad, someone will interpret that Page 37 February 20, 2009 language to mean that. That's what I'm getting at. It says parks. Parks are anything that we want to describe as a recreational use. It could be anything. And if that's not what you're intending that's good, then say so. MR. CORNELL: Well, here's -- let me put it this way: We're suggesting a principle here in this of minimizing interaction. Now, if you've got some specific ideas that are going to address what you see as problems to better describe ways to minimize interactions, then please, make those recommendations. But that was the intent. The conceptual intent of this policy was to minimize interactions between humans and wildlife. And I agree with you, you can think of parks or recreational areas that would not fit that bill. And so I would hope that in the planning process that those would not be built, if that was the intent. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I would just want to make sure that if it's not the intent, it can't happen, and that's all -- MR. CORNELL: Right. And I think in the GMP, in the Growth Management Plan, that level of detail gets a little tough to be that prescriptive on. But I agree with your perception of the problem, I'm just not sure that we can address it here. We didn't obviously, apparently. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I think George just said something that might be a good point. MR. CORNELL: I didn't hear it. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Ifwe referenced that parks -- some sort of park that we could further define in the LDC, that would take care of it. That would min -- because you wouldn't want water parks, you wouldn't want stadiums, and maybe those can be spelled out in the LDC. That might be a good solution. MR. CORNELL: Well, I think that sounds reasonable. And maybe that would be reasonable for any of these what seem to be lacking for specific prescriptions, you know, let's look to the LDC as Page 38 February 20, 2009 an opportunity to clarify them. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Mark? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yes, sir, Brad? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Brad, this is for Brad, Brad. In 2.A, the prior wording, what was wrong with that, where the buffers were supposed to be either open space and vegetation preservation? Why did you go into this? Essentially what this -- we've been discussing is a new way of saying essentially what you want for a buffer. What was the wrong with the old one then? MR. CORNELL: I think we wanted to be a little more comprehensive. I remember we had extensive discussions about human and wildlife interactions, recognizing as -- the areas that we're talking about in the RLSA have a lot of wildlife in certain areas, particularly like the FSA's, the HSA's, even the WRA's. So we recognized a challenge that we needed to be pretty proactive about. So that was the motivation for the more descriptive policy that we put in, rather than the single sentence. We tried to be a little more descriptive. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: By using low intensity land use rather than the word open space? I mean, essentially -- MR. CORNELL: Well, we went on to talk about there's been -- for instance, there's been a lot of work recently and continuing on panther and bear interactions with humans, and recognizing the data and analysis that have told us why those interactions occur and how they might be mitigated or prevented. And so since we have some more specific information, we went on to talk about using that information to help plan our communities to avoid problems upfront. So I don't think it's just low intensity land uses. Go on. Consideration shall be given to the most current guidelines and regulations on techniques to reduce human wildlife conflict. Page 39 February 20, 2009 Well, that recognizes that U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service and other agencies and environmental groups and civic groups have been working together to try and figure out ways to reduce these interactions. You know, no open livestock pens, don't feed your pets outdoors, those kinds of things, and working with landowners who live out in the interface. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Okay. Who would be -- who would qualify as open space? In other words, my real question is, why did you get rid of the word open space and add in here these uses? That's all. I mean -- MR. CORNELL: I guess we thought that this policy in 2.B was a little fuller, a little more descriptive. But it wasn't really that open space wasn't a good idea or that sentence wasn't a good idea. We thought we were capturing that concept better in 2- B than that one sentence we deleted. We tried to put it in one place. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: It just seems more liberal, and I was just wondering why were you supporting that, that's all. MR. CORNELL: The low intensity -- COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I'm done. MR. CORNELL: I guess this is another thing where you have to use some particular professional judgment in the planning process. I mean, if you're going to be recognizing, for instance, the panther work that we've done recently, Defenders of Wildlife and U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service and several other organizations have spent a lot of time working on reducing panther/human interactions. If you're going to recognize that work at which this invokes in this language, then I think that solves of some of your problem. I think that solves most of your problem. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Enough said, thanks. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Mark? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yes, sir, Mr. Murray. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: I'd just make a comment with Page 40 February 20, 2009 respect to that. I believe that -- I understood that this language seemed to have been crafted from the point of view to protect the species. When we look at it from the code point of view, we have to find other ways of putting it. And I think it's well intended. I think I appreciate that. But I want to bring your attention to ii where you say when listed species, that's the beginning of that sentence, and you go down to the last sentence and you say, the county shall also consider the recommendation of other agencies. Okay. Any teeth or -- what are you trying to establish there? MR. McDANIEL: Well, it was already established -- that language that's up there in ii was already in the original Rural Land Stewardship Overlay. And again, if I might make a suggestion, just as a point of clarification, and this leads over to the conversation I was having with Ms. Caron earlier on, I think maybe from a description standpoint there on B, or whatever it's to be named as, the goal for minimizing human and wildlife negative interaction is what we're looking to, not necessarily interaction at large. I mean, creation of parks and golf courses, people in fact go into those places, so -- COMMISSIONER MURRAY: It's less habituated. And I understand that, I appreciate that. MR. McDANIEL: And the goal is for negative interaction. I mean, we're looking to disincentivize the negative interaction that could potentially occur. COMMISSIONER MURRA Y: Well, if we get to the point, we will probably have to modify language or find language that works for that. But I recognize -- now, you know, consider the recommendation. What will the county do after it's -- MR. McDANIEL: Well, you recently had a circumstance that Mr. Strain brought up that, you know, they had the opportunity to Page 41 February 20, 2009 consider it, chose not to, and did what they did. And I wasn't party to all those sort of things. And again, if you feel that -- COMMISSIONER MURRAY: What I guess I -- all right, what I guess I'm getting at is if that -- if it really essentially becomes potentially moot, why put it in there? Because the County Commissioners always have the right to consider recommendations of other agencies. And if they have the right to disavow them, it's moot. MR. CORNELL: Brad Cornell again. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: So it either has meaning or it does not, that's what I'm trying to -- MR. CORNELL: This is almost a direct reference to CCME, Conservation Coastal Management Element Policy 6.2.3 sub 3 or whatever it was, C. You know which policy I'm talking about? It's been -- COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Of course. MR. CORNELL: It's been debated -- well, I'm not being facetious. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: I was, because I don't remember that number. MR. CORNELL: Well, okay, you'll remember the debate, though. There's a policy in the Conservation Coastal Management Element about listed species that we have gone around for several years about. And it has some am -- there's ambiguous language in there. And it remains ambiguous. But it has -- this is the reference. And we have tried to address that, and the Board of County Commissioners have been unwilling to change it. And this policy here has not changed, and it is a reference to that policy. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Well, okay. And I guess that's really what it comes down to, that's the issue of home rule versus whatever. MR. CORNELL: Right. And it invoked -- it said, look, you know, if somebody writes -- if the agency writes a letter or does a Page 42 February 20, 2009 biological opinion or issues an incidental take permit, you know, the county shall consider that. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: All right, I appreciate it. MR. CORNELL: It's not satisfying, I agree. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: No, don't sit. Don't sit. Don't sit. Don't sit. That policy that's been the focus of discussion with the word parks and everything in it, and Brad kind of hit on it, you struck one sentence in the prior page that was apparently more restrictive than you thought it needed to be, and so you elaborated it further on the next page. But in essence, I think you opened it up. If we're supposed to be disincentivizing people developing the lands that they can without going into the RLSA, how does that meet that goal? Because this seems to do just the opposite. MR. McDANIEL: Well, and I'm going to lead you back down a different path. You made suggestions that we struck a sentence on the prior page because of it being less restrictive. It wasn't. It was to provide more clarity and allow for greater information to be gathered in order to make those determinations. And then further described it over here with respect to the language that we implemented here in the new 2.B. I mean, you led him down a path of our original striking of that language was because it wasn't -- or it was too restrictive. It really was actually too vague. It was -- too much interpretation could in fact be allowed. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. So you feel that by striking that first sentence, which -- you actually are tightening it by that sentence. MR. McDANIEL: Correct. And further defining as an example without specificity, just as examples, low intensity uses for the reduction of those wildlife interactions, negative wildlife interactions. Less positive. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, let's move on to Page 65. Page 43 February 20, 2009 Anybody have any questions on -- we're just going to go down to Policy 5.6 and then we'll hear from the public. Anybody have any questions to the end of 5.5? (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Bill, in number three in the middle of the page, this is where the word utilized was -- replaced the word containing. Yet in the prior things they used the word observed. I'm just -- at some point I would think it would be better to be consistent so there's not any kind of misinterpretation. MR. McDANIEL: And certainly consistency's a welcomed, recommended suggestion. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: If you look at the last sentence, no reduction of the wildlife protection policies of 5.5 will be considered, as these shall constitute minimum standards for wildlife protection. Aren't those referring to all the protection policies that were crossed out, B through H? MR. McDANIEL: And they -- they're not referring to obviously the ones that were crossed out. The language that we adopted was to use the best available newest science that was in fact there at the junction that an applicant came in to change the use or develop their property. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. So the wildlife protection policies of 5.5 are those really substituted by whatever the agencies have as the best management practices at the time. Okay. Anybody else have questions on Page 65 up and to before Policy 5.6? (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And is there anybody from members of the public that wish to speak on what we've covered so far in Group 5 policies? Allen? MR. REYNOLDS: Good afternoon. Al Reynolds with Page 44 February 20, 2009 Wilson-Miller, representing Eastern Collier Property Owners. It may be helpful for the Planning Commission to understand the context of these Group 5 policies as it related to the original adopted overlay. Because what happened in the original overlay that was transmitted by the county to the Department of Community Affairs for review, there were four policies, they fit on one page of paper. And it was Policy 5.1 that you were talking about where certain uses would be eliminated from FSA's with the concurrence of the property owners. The second policy basically said that if you have open land in the ACSC and you're not using the program, ACSC rules apply. Which is really what the policy still says. Policy 5.3 said if you're not using the program and you're not in the ACSC, there should be certain additional regulations adopted. And the original transmitted language laid out six recommendations. Subsequent to that, during the adoption process, because of objections from the Department of Community Affairs, that got expanded to everything else you see in Group 5. What it said when it was transmitted basically was that people who choose to develop and not use this program are subject to applicable federal and state laws with respect to the protection of listed species. So it really deferred all of the standards and all of the requirements to whatever the applicable laws were. The department objected to that because they felt that in keeping with the spirit of the final order, they wanted to see more specific measures incorporated in the plan. And that led to the addition of the next three or four pages of language that by and large restates applicable federal and state policies. So, you know, I think maybe it would help -- I think what the committee has done has been to try to streamline to the extent possible and make it as clear as possible a whole bunch of language that was added into the plan that from my perspective was largely unnecessary. Page 45 February 20, 2009 But nonetheless, it was added to address specific objections. And what this demonstrates is the slippery slope when you try to start embellishing on what -- our adopted regulatory policies and add to them, you wind up sometimes slipping down a slope where it starts getting very convoluted. So, I mean, I think the committee's recommendations are an improvement over what is in the originally adopted, but I do think it's important to understand that what the county originally intended was to keep this pretty simple for property owners that were not participating in the program. So I don't know if that helps or not, but that's a little history to how we got to this point. Thanks. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Question, Allen. Allen, I got a quick question. Under the Group 5 policies, those that don't participate are subject then to the rules of the state and federal guidelines. MR. REYNOLDS: Right. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Are the people in the RLSA that do participate, are they subject to the same rules? MR. REYNOLDS: Yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. So it doesn't really change. MR. REYNOLDS: It doesn't. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. And I think for the most part, the discussions we've had end up in some further clarification of the changes the committee made. I don't see -- the notes I've made don't take anything away from what they've made but possibly adding some considerations to make it clear. MR. REYNOLDS: And again, the whole genesis of this was in the final order it said that Collier County will adopt measures to protect listed species, okay? And so what the county originally said is okay, we've got this whole pile of regulations that are intended to protect listed species, and those regulations change over time. Now Page 46 February 20, 2009 we're going to create an incentive-based process that's going to do something else to protect listed species. And the something else is in Group 3 where we create these very large SSA's that go beyond any requirements of what's necessarily required under regulatory process. So that's really all it was intended to do. And then there was an acknowledgment that on top of the incentives we still have regulations. And so like I say, it just kind of got expanded from there to what you see today. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. Paul? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Yeah, I have a question for you, Allen. The ACSC standards that they're talking about in 5.2, those are State of Florida standards, right? MR. REYNOLDS: Yes. Yeah. And in the 5.3, as I said, there had originally been some recommendations to have some similar kinds of standards outside of the ACSC in the open lands for clearing. Ultimately that got eliminated and these other standards were incorporated into the Land Development Code. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, anybody else? Elizabeth? MS. FLEMING: Elizabeth Fleming, Defenders of Wildlife. Just a very quick point of clarification for that language on Page 64, the Policy 5.5.2.B that we were just talking about having a low intensity land uses, parks, passive rec. areas. That language is identically duplicated on Page 56 in Policy 4.5. So however that gets clarified, just make a note to do it in both areas. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Thank you for pointing that out. That's a good idea. Nicole? MS. RYAN: Nicole Ryan, Conservancy of Southwest Florida. I understand your concern about adding protected species in there, that there could be -- and I don't know how many protected Page 47 February 20, 2009 species are listed out there under that title. But I know that especially for the Bald Eagle, they're no longer listed but they are still protected, there are federal guidelines for their protection. So you may want to look at some of those very obvious species that still have federal oversight. Peregrin Falcon was also mentioned. And if you're going to take protected out, at least include in specific species where you do want to have protective mechanisms. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: That's interesting. If we were then to come back and say listed species and others -- and including, and then just limit -- list a few that are more exceptional, that might be a solution. Because I don't think that anybody's going to be real happy with the long list of protected species when they get to realize what that would mean in implementation in the LDC. MS. RYAN: And I'm not sure how long that list is, but I do know that for certain species such as Bald Eagle, I think that you definitely do want to have that included. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, that might be a good suggestion. Thank you. MR. HUTCHCRAFT: Good afternoon. For the record, my name is Mitch Hutchcraft, I'm with King Ranch and Consolidated Citrus. I just wanted to touch on a couple of things. One is I wanted you to hear from a different landowner with regards to the FSA. You've heard from some other folks, but we do have property that are designated as FSA's, and we acknowledge that there is a removal of some of the rights associated with that. But it's in light of the other incentives that are being provided by the program. So the success of the incentive-based program is critical to us. Talking about the Group 5 programs, we have a little bit different perspective about the property in that we are a landowner who has -- essentially all of our property is in open space. We have very little flow, FSA's, HSA's, and so these Group 5 policies have the Page 48 February 20, 2009 potential of impacting us more directly than anybody else. And normally I would be here arguing against these, because they could be very punitive to us, should we find ourselves in a position where we don't want to develop under the program. But I think again it's important for us to keep a big picture of the overall big picture, which is if the RLSA program and the incentives included therein provides greater protection of agricultural land, it reduces the impacts in the area of critical state concern, it provides a methodology for connectivity of panther habitat. And it can do that in a direct way that benefits the landowners. We ought to encourage them to utilize the program, which is I think what Group 5 policies are, it's an encouragement. There's this better incentive-based program, you ought to utilize that. However, that only makes sense to the extent that the program is beneficial, that incentives are fair and balanced and equal to all of the landowners. If that balance ever gets distorted to the point where it doesn't make sense for the landowner, I would argue let's take out Group 5 policies, because I'm not going to participate in the program if you make it so cumbersome or unbalanced that it unfairly impacts a single landowner or a group of landowners. So I would argue that I think the intent of the Group 5 policies is to say we do have a good program here that achieves these objectives. We need to make sure that that balance is fair to the landowners and achieves the goals that we're looking at. Then this is a reasonable effort to encourage people to utilize the programs. Two other quick comments. One is regarding the protected species. I would agree, I think let's remove that language from protected species. Because you could be opening yourself up to a long list of things that were never anticipated. There's a federal process, a regulatory process. If we need to mention specific species, let's do it, but I think let's narrow that focus. One other thing that I want to talk about was there have been a Page 49 February 20, 2009 couple references to the least-cost pathway of the panther corridors. My understanding -- and again, I'm not a panther expert, but my understanding of those corridors was that it's really a mathematical calculation of where is the easiest way to make the dots connect. That is not the designation on a map of "this is the corridor." And so I think that there's been some discussion as treating those as that is the recommended corridor. If you look at that map, the location that it hits our property essentially bisects our productive grove and our source of operations. I am here to tell you that as a representative of a landowner, I would never suggest to my company we're going to do a panther corridor in that location. It has a significant adverse impact on the operations of our agricultural use of that property. However, one of the very first things, and you might remember when we started having the conversation about is there a better way to do this, the first thing that I said is we are on board to look at is there a better way to achieve the ultimate goal of protecting panther habitat, of creating these corridors and to do it in a manner that is beneficial and meaningful to a landowner. And I'll submit, while there mayor may not be modifications that you want to make to the corridors that were proposed, they were at least done with the input of the property owners who understand their land and say here's a better way that we could achieve your goals without destroying our economic opportunities on the property. So again, I would encourage you not to look at that least-cost pathway as the solution, because it was a connect the dots. And I think the corridors that you have seen, and maybe there's opportunities to improve that, they at least represent an alternative alignment that the landowners have had an opportunity to provide input in. So I appreciate your time. Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. Paul? Hold a second, Mitch. Page 50 February 20, 2009 Go ahead, Paul. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Sorry. When you talk about that you wouldn't want to do with anything that would unbalance the program, could you be more specific? What should we avoid doing that would unbalance the program? MR. HUTCHCRAFT: Well, obviously the credit and the credit ratios, sending and receiving, that's a critical balance. And I think you've heard from Russell, and I appreciate his position. I'm kind of on the same coin, the opposite face, is that I have all receiving land and very little sending land. Well, if you tilt the program so it clearly benefits the receiving land property, Russell doesn't wind up -- it doesn't make sense for him, he's not going to participate in the program and the program fails. Conversely, if you tilt the program so much that it's focused solely on the sending lands and it devalues the receiving lands, I'm not going to participate. And so that balance has to be maintained where it's meaningful to both the sending and the receiving areas. So that credit calculation and how do you generate and does it balance is an important calculation. And so the ratios and the values of those credits is very, very meaningful. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Yeah, I really appreciate you're saying that. It's -- I agree with you 100 percent, it has to work. And there has to be a balance. It has to be advantageous to the one who's sending most of his credits, or selling or whatever you want to say, equally to the one who's going to be putting the towns and villages on his land, it has to balance out. Do you think that the proportions that we have now are pretty close to the right ones? MR. HUTCHCRAFT: I think the landowners had a significant amount of negotiations in putting these together -- putting this balance together. And it's a balance that I don't think any of the landowners would stand up and say I love this. But I think it is a balance that the Page 51 February 20, 2009 landowners will stand up and say it's workable, that I don't get everything that I want, but it's a program that I think that I could participate in. And if any of us stand at the -- you know, in this program to say if I don't get 100 percent we'll never get a program. And I think all of the landowners at least made -- and the environmental groups made a conscious effort to say let's keep our focus on doing the right thing and doing it in a manner that benefits the landowners so that they can participate. And I'll tell you, I think that's as close as we've come so far as what's included in the recommendation. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Does it seem fair to you the way it is now? MR. HUTCHCRAFT: Within the constraints of the program, I think it's a workable solution. And again, I think if you talked with any of us, we would say gosh, I'd rather have it this way or I'd rather have it that way. But I think it is at least a balanced approach. I think that it does do the overarching goals which are protection of agricultural, removing development for the area of critical state concerns, protecting of the significant natural resources, focusing development to the areas that are open space. And doing it in a manner that removes development opportunities from the one to five. Those are all the primary objectives of the program. And I think that this program does that. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Do you think it's fair to the nonparticipating landowners the way it's set up? MR. HUTCHCRAFT: I think the answer is yes, that the nonparticipating landowners, they are still going to have the opportunity to generate credits and to participate or to do development under the Group 5 policies. So there has not been a removal of any rights which is critical to the success of the program. I wouldn't tell you that hey, I'm going to absolutely develop all of my properties in the Rural Land Stewardship Page 52 February 20, 2009 program. I might not develop any of them. But I think the opportunity to know that I'm coming out of this with my baseline development is critical, particularly for the folks that may not participate. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: You're up around 850 near the CREW lands? MR. HUTCHCRAFT: That's correct. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: And the way it looks now, do you think that probably most of your land will either be receiving land or farms -- the farming credits or else receiving? MR. HUTCHCRAFT: I -- just to clarify, our property is probably a little bit further east of the 850. We're on State Road 82 and we abut on the east side, Lamb Road, or Little League Road. So that's our property. I would love to tell you that we're going to be agriculture, but in order to be agriculture it's got to be economically viable. I think that one of the corridors that has been identified, for us that's a recognition of maybe there's a corridor and then maybe there's an opportunity for us to augment that width by doing the agricultural credits. So that's one of the things that we were thinking that may address some of the width issues that you've talked about. I think that that is an area that because it's open lands, virtually no wetlands, frontage on the roadways, it probably is appropriate for development at some point. And I think that there will also be some agricultural component associated. I don't have a crystal ball and I can't tell you what that percentage is or when it's going to happen, but I can tell you that right now our company is actively farming that and we'd like to do that as long as possible. And that's one of the other issues, is we want to make sure that we're in a position that this program is fair so that if we stay in agriculture longer, that we have the same access and opportunity to Page 53 February 20, 2009 utilize the program as other folks that might use it faster. There shouldn't be a disincentive to folks that stay in agriculture longer. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: And do you think that this promotes agriculture? MR. HUTCHCRAFT: I think that the inclusion of the agricultural preservation credits is a critical component. And without that -- I had significant concerns, and I think the other landowners will tell you, that was one of the areas where I was very strong, because I think that we need to do a better job of addressing the protection of agricultural land. And I think that the inclusion of that provision was a significant step forward. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Anybody else? (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you, Mitch. Let's take a break and come back at five minutes till 3:00, and that will give us plenty of time to relax a bit. (Recess.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, everyone. If you could come back and take your seats, we'll resume the meeting. High, Bill. MR. McDANIEL: How are you doing, sir? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Boy, you're like the Rock of Gibraltar, you're always there. MR. McDANIEL: Some would call it that, yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: We left off going through and finishing with Policy 5.5 and public speakers in regards to that policy, and we're now moving into Policy 5.6, which starts on Page 65 and actually takes us over a couple pages and it ends on Page 67 with two final policies. Why don't we work our way through 5.6, 5.7 and 5.8 all at one time, and then we'll go from there with public speakers. Page 54 February 20, 2009 So starting on Page 65, are there any questions from the Planning Commission? Paul? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Actually, just a short comment going back to what we were talking about before the break and that was about the nonparticipating landowners. And I think it's significant that in all this time we've been talking about this, none of them has come in to voice any objections to it. And they've had certainly plenty of opportunity. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I don't think they're all here, though, Paul. I mean -- go ahead. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: May I add, and the last year and three months, we've not heard from them either. I didn't know they existed. I mean, honestly. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, that's fine. I mean, if the program's going along fine, that's great. We just need to -- like I had mentioned earlier, part of the objective is to make sure everything is as clear as possible, and the intentions here are as clear as they can be, and that's what we need to do. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: No, I agree with you too. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, anybody have any questions on Page 65 or 66 or 677 COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I do. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Brad? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Just a question on ii. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: What page? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: 66. It's wetlands and contiguous upland buffers. Isn't a buffer kind of a manmade created thing, or is n I mean, I'm not sure the word buffer's a good idea. MR. McDANIEL: At the committee level when we had this discussion, there were buffering language additions in the initial or in the original overlay that were add-ons or weren't necessarily described in the original Rural Land Stewardship Overlay buffer. Buffers were Page 55 February 20, 2009 brought in either as manmade -- they're not structures, if you will, but areas or other contiguous uplands that were -- that could be construed and utilized as habitat. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Okay. So you like the word buffer? In other words -- MR. McDANIEL: We're okay with that, yes, sir. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: -- it's a designation that somebody would make in a piece of land and -- MR. McDANIEL: Correct. And there is language in there when you create a buffer, utilizing those contiguous lands that could be utilized by those species. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Okay, good. I have a 67 question, Mark, can we go to that? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yeah, let's just finish up and go through the rest of these policies. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Okay, it would be IV. First of all, if those lands is in there twice. MR. McDANIEL: Fix that, Tom? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: And it's not in Tom's scrivener list. Is it an acre-to-acre swap, or how would that be worked out? It's a mitigation method. MR. McDANIEL: It is a mitigation method. And I think we left that open. I remember Nancy Payton was the emphasis behind that language. And because again, we're looking to establish parameters for property owners that are not necessarily participate -- that are not participating in the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay and that we -- there was no language in here that talked specifically about exotic removal. And we want to ensure that that's accomplished if someone does try to develop and not participate in the overlay. The actual acreage swap really wasn't a discussion at the committee level. Page 56 February 20, 2009 COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Okay. I'm done, thank you. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Mark? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Go ahead, Mr. Murray. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Help me with my ignorance, please. Buffers. Is it also possible that out there where fire potential is great that they also eliminate vegetation and consider that a buffer as well ? MR. McDANIEL: Only from an exotic removal standpoint. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Okay. No, I'm talking about in practical terms. Because I know in California and other places they refer to it as buffers. And was any consideration given to that? Is there any -- are there any areas out there where they strike or remove vegetation in an effort to minimize fire? MR. McDANIEL: I'm sure in the best management practices of the landowners that are out there and their fence protection and any particular structures they might have that would be in proximity to a wildfire that they do their own buffering in order to protect their own interest. I know the farmers that I have had the opportunity of being on their land, I mean, they regularly clear fence lines and so on and so forth just to reduce that -- COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Yeah, I guess what I was trying to introduce, even subtly perhaps, would be that there may very well come a time when we consider buffer the absence of a berm and the absence of vegetation and be reasonable in a rural land. MR. McDANIEL: Sure. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, anybody else? Paul? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: On Page 67, III, I guess, and IV, where it's talking about continuing exotic plant maintenance, is that quantified anywhere, such and such percentage of exotics permitted? Page 57 February 20, 2009 Because you're never going to get 100 percent exotics removal. What's the cut-off point? MR. McDANIEL: That's the irony of the exotic removal program. And when property owners -- I mean, you know, the cardinals love those pepper bush seeds. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Everybody. The robins, the bears, everybody likes them. MR. McDANIEL: Sure. And I believe that those exotic removal maintenance programs are addressed in the LDC aspect when you're developing an SSA. And outside it is -- then would -- of course these regula -- or these policies are suggested practices for development outside of the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay program, so I believe those maintenance programs are discussed at length in the LDC. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: So you think that there is some sort of a percentage of exotics that's permitted? MR. PRIDDY: Yeah, any of the management plans I think state five percent or less. It's a percentage and it's a low -- COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: So it is in there. Okay. MR. PRIDDY: It's in there. And anyone who has to go through the county and have a management plan written, that's the language. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Mr. Wolfley, did you-- COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: I'm sorry, I was just -- during the process of the RLSA, I kept trying to figure out -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Pull your mic. a little closer to you, if you could. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: How could the property owners afford to continue to maintain these things? And that's why I couldn't understand with as little as these things can be sold for. And that's why I was concerned about the dilution of the credits. In other words, adding more credits, because then there (sic) would be less expensive, Page 58 February 20, 2009 thus they can't afford to maintain it. And then we got into that whole we'll walk away from the property routine. That's always been my concern, that it is very expensive to continually perpetually maintain. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: That, it is. Anybody else have any comments on the last three pages, 65, 66 COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: One more. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Brad? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: And I think it's just a scrivener. Policy 5. -- should that be RLSA, rather than just RLS? That's all. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Rural land stewardship. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I'm done. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. COMMISSIONER CARON: Just before you start -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Go ahead, Donna. COMMISSIONER CARON: I just -- since we're talking about 5.7. This is -- 5.7 is that dark skies paragraph. And it says, any development on lands not participating in the RLSA program. Does it say somewhere in the RLSA program that you will -- MR. McDANIEL: Yes. COMMISSIONER CARON: -- adhere to dark skies? All right. Can you tell me where that -- MR. McDANIEL: Group 4 policies, I believe. COMMISSIONER CARON: It's Group 4, thank you. That's all I need to -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I think we need to read it then, because I didn't pick up on that. COMMISSIONER CARON: I didn't see it. MR. McDANIEL: Somebody will help us. COMMISSIONER CARON: I don't remember us talking about it. MR. McDANIEL: I know we talked about making sure that it Page 59 February 20, 2009 was in both and addressed in both. I'm pretty sure it's in the Group 4 policies. COMMISSIONER CARON: Where? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I didn't -- myself, I didn't find it. And if it, we'd sure like -- I'd like to know where it is so that we're comfortable in that regard. MR. McDANIEL: Our research advocate next to me here is hastily looking. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: You mean the abstract writer? COMMISSIONER CARON: You're too kind. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I'm going to pay for that, huh? Well, I'll tell you what, if your researcher can continue to look for it while we move forward, that would be helpful. MR. McDANIEL: That will be fine. We'll -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I couldn't find it. It was pointed -- that's a good point. COMMISSIONER CARON: I'm telling you, I mean, I looked and I don't remember us discussing it. I looked and couldn't find it, so MR. McDANIEL: Ifwe can't lay-- COMMISSIONER CARON: -- you're going to have to point it out specifically. MR. McDANIEL: -- our hands on it, I know that we had discussion when it was brought in for the Group 5 policies that it was something that should be added into the Group 4 pol -- because you're predominantly talking about development with respect to the lighting issues, and that's why I believe it should be included in the Group 4's. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Mr. Chair? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yes, sir. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: All I can think about in that lighting is when we talked about -- and I can't remember the name of the n Page 60 February 20, 2009 MS. NEMECEK: The lady came and spoke. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: -- gravel pit or whatever. The concern was about the lighting and nearby homes, and then also the wildlife around it. And it's right up north of Orangetree there, what was the name of that thing? But outdoor lighting came in. They were not participating in the RLSA program. And just -- I'm wondering if you can remember anything about that, because that's exactly what we're talking about here. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I think what we could probably suggest is Policy 5.7, ifit isn't in the other policies, we may want to find a way to put it in. But also, I don't think the policy's written clearly enough to indicate that we're going to utilize any of the dark sky recommendations that you can find on darksky.org. So as we get to Policy 5.7 and we consider language to rewrite, we may want to put some stronger references in there to the actual language that we could implement. And I was going to suggest that when I got to my part of discussion on 5.7, so -- but Ms. Caron, that's a good catch. I had made the same note, but if you guys can find it and if your intention was to include it there, then that ought to be simple to get it done. Now it's just a matter of clarifying it to make sure it gets there. MR. McDANIEL: I know we talked about making sure that it was there. It was a relevant subject and talked about at length at the committee level. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Exactly. And that development did not necessarily mean homes. COMMISSIONER CARON: Right. MR. McDANIEL: Correct. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And your discussion was referencing Page 61 February 20, 2009 not just the language that's here, but the term dark sky. You guys had actually focused on that a little bit to talk about it? MR. McDANIEL: It was brought up in, you know, the web page for the darkskies.org and such locale. But there wasn't any real specific reference to that as far as what we put in here. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, between now and the time the Planning Commission finishes with this, I can pull down some of those references and bring them to one of -- the next meeting and we can kick something around and see how we might implement or discuss about suggesting the implementation of these. Anything else on Pages 65, 66 and 67? (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Ifnot, I'll go back to 65, and we might as well start from the first sentence. Always go back to the beginning, Bill. I know this isn't changed language, but obviously we're supposed to be looking at everything. The second line says direct non-agricultural lands uses away from high-functioning wetlands. This is in Policy 5.6. MR. McDANIEL: I'm reading it. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: What is high-functioning wetlands? How is it defined? How do we know that -- how would someone know they've got high-functioning wetlands next to them? What tells them that? I saw no definition for that. And if we're correcting things, maybe we want to look at saying something -- wetlands with an indicy (sic) above 1.2 or something like that? Has anybody considered that? Brad, I mean, I know that's probably more of an environmental issue. MR. CORNELL: Where are you? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I'm on Policy 5.6, Page 65, the second line. It's referring to high-functioning wetlands. And I didn't find anything telling me what a high-functioning wetland was. So I'm Page 62 February 20, 2009 wondering, how would it mean anything, that whole sentence, which basically sets the premise of the policy. MR. CORNELL: Agree. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I think it's in 3.A.I. It talks about a functionality assessment score of 0.65. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I'm sorry, Paul, what page are you on? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: 65. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Page 65. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: The last paragraph. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Talks about the criteria for what is a high-functioning wetland. And then it goes on to the next page. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Then after the words high-functioning wetlands in the second line, could we -- COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Reference. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: -- make a note, as referenced in this policy? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Yeah. MR. McDANIEL: You can make a recommendation for anything, sir. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I could, but I'd rather know everybody was in somewhat of an agreement with it. MR. McDANIEL: Well, it kind of sort of stands to reason to me to read the balance of the policy and it would flow. But if it -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, maybe it will. I didn't catch it, I'm sorry, but that's one I didn't see. Thank you, Paul. COMMISSIONER CARON: Excuse me. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Go ahead, Ms. Caron. COMMISSIONER CARON: Do we know that that score is actually for high-functioning wetlands? It just says wetlands. So, you know, I don't know whether -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, it's -- the UMAM score is the Page 63 February 20, 2009 more valuable it is, the better the score, if I'm not mistaken. I think that's how they would look at it. That's a South Florida Water Management process. MR. McDANIEL: And that is Uniform Wetland Mitigation Assessment Method. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Oh, I'm sorry. That's UMAM. I wasn't saying you, ma'am, I was saying acronym. MR. McDANIEL: Yes, ma'am. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, if we move on in that same beginning paragraph, a direct impact is hereby defined as a dredging or filling of wetland or adversely changing the hydroperiod of a wetland. So if they change the hydroperiod of a wetland, that's going to be considered a direct impact, and that's what you're supposed to be limiting. MR. McDANIEL: That's correct. And if you'll -- again, reading further on down there, and I recall a conversation -- and Tom's not here right now. We're dealing with history in relationship to the Camp Keais Strand and the OK Slough. And those were high priorities of protection at the implementation of the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay. Voluntary land actions were done to enhance hydroperiods, and enhance or reduce the negative impacts of any kind of development in and around those particular designated flow ways. And that was where this language -- on the outset that one of the smaller landowners that wasn't actually being participatory in the development of the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay program didn't have a direct impact on those particular areas. And more specifically on any high-functioning wetlands. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. And WRA's have different levels of indices assigned to them, so that would establish whether they're higher functioning or lower functioning, right? MR. McDANIEL: I would assume that, yes. Makes sense that Page 64 February 20, 2009 that would be the case. They all function a little differently. MR. CORNELL: They're evaluated the same. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: But you can have a higher indices, you have a stronger -- higher indicy (sic) for a WRA ifit has native, more natural occurring conditions, than if it isn't; isn't that correct? MR. CORNELL: Oh, yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, that's what I was getting at. So your indicy then would be higher. That would afford it more protection. MR. CORNELL: Yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: On Page 66, ii, the underlined language was added but after that the word utilized. So far we've used three words in regards to how we judge what listed pieces are. We've used utilized, observed and contained, or containing. I would think to the benefit of everybody we need to standardize the reference. Is there one reference that works best that you guys would have thought of, or do you think that the ambiguity of three different words helps? MR. CORNELL: I thought that we-- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Is that a loaded question? MR. McDANIEL: It sure as heck is. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I was just thinking if we could standardize them all so it's either all observed or all contained or all utilized, it makes it clear for anybody reading these languages -- or this language. MR. CORNELL: I thought we deleted contained and we were only talking about observed or utilized. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Then we're down to two. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I would not want observed. I mean, you could see something flying overhead. That doesn't mean that it's there. Utilized would be better. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I have no problem with it. I'mjust Page 65 February 20, 2009 trying to say let's standardize the language so we avoid less confusion when people come in to do things in the future. MR. McDANIEL: That's a fine suggestion. MR. CORNELL: Utilize sounds good. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. MR. McDANIEL: And that's a fine suggestion. Standardization is the suggestion. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, on Page 67 -- the using exotics for mitigation, if I'm not mistaken that's now not allowed in our Land Development Code. Because it's required by code to remove your exotics. So if it's already required, why would it be mitigation? Do you know why it was inserted here? I mean, I understand, I heard the discussion earlier, but did anybody consider that the code already addressed the exotic removal as a requirement in order to get a CO, for example? MR. McDANIEL: No, sir. We -- this was an added language, I think by reference -- Tom or somebody might could look. I believe that this came from the National Wildlife Federation, was it not? MR. CORNELL: (Shakes head negatively.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And they honestly -- I think they said earlier they weren't aware of all our codes that implemented this text. So maybe they're inserting it, I think, and we didn't already have it protected. But I'm just wondering, if we do, does it need to be here? I'll pull out the code section of the LDC between now and our next meeting and try to find how strong that reference is and then suggest it at the next meeting. Has your researcher found that dark skies? No? Under four, you have some new text that was added. All landowners -- and I'll read real slow, Cherie' n shall be encouraged to consider participating in any programs that provide incentives, funding our other assistance in facilitating wetland, habitat restoration Page 66 February 20, 2009 on private lands, including but not limited to. Then you listed a series of things, but you didn't list the RLSA. Wouldn't we want to list the stewardship credit program that this whole policy is about? MR. CORNELL: This isn't people who aren't participating in RLSA. MR. McDANIEL: And that was where that discussion came from. You have to be careful, because she can't get you while you're talking. Again, that is -- these entire policies revolve around folks who are opting out of participating in the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: So they would opt out of that program, but they may buy into one of these other programs. MR. McDANIEL: We would hope that they would. And to list a few but not limit to that list, just list a few of those, yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Policy 5.7 is the dark sky policy. And I think we need to rework that in regards to making sure it's covered in the first groups like we talked about. And understand that see, there's nothing in here referencing dark sky, it just says outdoor lighting shall be reasonably managed. Well, that's not definitive at all. Reasonably managed in the eyes of one person could be totally different by another. MR. McDANIEL: Well, at the committee level we decided to -- we didn't have enough time at that juncture to actually review the -- all of the language that revolves around the dark skies processes. But acknowledging that there was no real lighting restriction within the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay developed that policy. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. I think if we can come up with some suggestions by the next meeting, that maybe there's a way to make it a little stronger. And that's probably where we'll go with it. Okay, that's the end of the policies. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Mark? Page 67 February 20, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Before we get into the appendices-- Paul? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I'm sorry. I want to go back. Rereading this, it suddenly doesn't make sense to me. On Page 67, Roman numeral IV. Are they talking about that if you remove the exotics from your land, that mitigates for the loss of wetlands in that land, or is it the loss of wetlands somewhere else that if you remove the exotics from this piece of land it mitigates for losing wetlands somewhere else? What does that sentence mean? MR. McDANIEL: The way that I interpret that sentence, Paul, it means that it may be considered as acceptable mitigation for loss of wetlands. It doesn't really say whether it's on that land or whether it's somewhere else. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Well, that's unacceptable. I mean, it doesn't mean anything then. Unless it can be better defined, it's like superfluous. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: The other thing, though, Paul, is when you do mitigation you don't have to do it for the property that you're on. The panther mitigation -- COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Right. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: -- credits are sold. So I think they're trying to get to that. But the word may is kind of puzzling, because who decides if that is worth mitigation or not? And for what mitigation is it of value if the may is there? And it can't be shall, because you don't know if there's going to be enough exotics to warrant mitigation. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: So it could be I have some exotics on my property and I remove five acres of exotics. That means that I could develop five acres -- fill in five acres of wetlands somewhere else? MR. McDANIEL: No. That's a far too -- and this is not the all-encompassing development regulation for lands outside of the Page 68 February 20, 2009 Rural Land Stewardship Overlay. There are a myriad of agencies that are going to have a participation in the development of land outside the guise of the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay, Paul. And that -- but there was -- there was a suggestion somewhere along the line that that may be considered acceptable at that level by whatever review agency, whether it's the county, the state, the feds, for loss of wetlands. And my perception, again, you're dealing with -- some will say I have selective memory issues, but I recall it had to do with the site specific, the lands that you owned yourself. It didn't give you the right to trot off somewhere else and destroy wetlands. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: All right. Well, what about this? Supposing I had five acres of land and it was dominated by Brazilian pepper. If I got rid of the Brazilian pepper, would that give me the right to fill in that wetland? That's the way it sounds like it reads. If you're not talking about some other land, then you're talking about that piece of land. MR. McDANIEL: But I think you're taking it out of context. And again, I'm not -- COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Well, I'm just trying to figure out what it means. MR. McDANIEL: Well, it may be considered as acceptable mitigation for loss of wetlands or listed species habitat. May be considered. Doesn't give you the right. You're not bequeathed that right because you have agreed to -- if you come in with a management plan and you're outside of the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay and its policies for developments, if you come in with a management plan and your suggestion is that you are going to remove these exotics off your property and for that you wish to fill in this wetland, whatever agency you're actually making that application to will be the one that will ultimately make that determination as to whether that's a viable consideration or not. Page 69 February 20, 2009 COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Well, then why is it in here? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Yeah, that doesn't make any sense. MR. McDANIEL: It was not part of -- it was something that we felt was not part of the originally adopted Rural Land Stewardship Overlay as it was adopted originally. And we felt that this was a way to address an exotic removal program. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Look at the prior Roman numeral III. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: I was going to say, it's -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Mr. Wolfley? COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: -- really a subsection of three, almost. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: If you read the prior Roman numeral, it talks about the preservation and the mitigation. And then once you do the exotic removal and the continuing exotic plant maintenance for perpetual management activities, somehow four and three ought to tie together. And I think that's where the disconnect may be. Because if you read -- and as Paul's pointed out on number four, the first line you talk about acceptable mitigation for loss of wetlands or listed species habitats if those lands now are placed under perpetual conservation easement. Are you referring to those lands that you have the loss of wetlands or listed species habitat, or are you referring to those lands that you cleared the exotic removal for maintenance? I think the language could be better, and that may be where the confusion lies, Bill. Paul, we can take a stab at it by the next meeting. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Yeah, the way it is to me is totally useless. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I was going to have a suggestion when we end up here today about how to approach the next meeting, and that will certainly fall into the suggestion I was going to make. Page 70 February 20, 2009 Are there any other questions on Policies 5.6, 5.7 or 5.8 from the Planning Commission? (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, are there any members of the public want to speak on those policies? MR. McDANIEL: Just as a further point, it was just pointed out to me, over on Page 66, number F -- or letter F talks about mitigation. And the goal there is to end up with no net loss of wetlands. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Right, I agree with that, but it still is not clear. Yes, there is such a thing as mitigation, but does that mean that removing the exotics from that piece of wetland gives you rights to develop that wetland? You're saying no. Does it give you rights to develop some wetlands somewhere else? You're saying no to that too. So I'm not sure what it does give you the right to do. MR. McDANIEL: And I think you have to look at the entire subsection there, E all the way down through, that talks about that as far as what you ultimately end up with. I mean, the entire discussion revolves around no net loss of wetlands. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Well, could you give me an example? Supposing I remove -- MR. McDANIEL: No. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: You can't? MR. McDANIEL: No. I can't. I don't want to. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: All right, then let's just stop there. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I don't know if we'll get any further with this line of discussion, that's why I'm suggesting maybe we can by next meeting suggest some clarifying language, and the committee can either accept it or not, and we'll just go forward. That would be one way to get around it. I don't know if Bill or Brad or anybody could offer any better explanation at this time. With that, is there anything else before we go into -- Page 71 February 20, 2009 COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: I just wanted -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: n public speakers? David? COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: n to say, if you just look at that F and go just sort of quickly through it. If you read the first mitigation shall be required for blah, blah, and then just go one, two, three, four, and read the conditions under which F means, it says mitigation requirements, colon, one, two, three, four and five. I mean, that's just one follows the other. I'm trying to support that. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: We can go on with this, and if you want to, we will. Under four, if you stop after the word mitigation and you put a period, then you're probably better off, because that is what you're trying to say is a form of acceptable mitigation. That exotic removal or maintenance may be considered an acceptable form of mitigation, period. You don't have to be redundant in the balance of the sentence to resay what you said in number F that starts the whole course of discussion. MR. McDANIEL: And it does start a whole course of discussion. And I guess I'm sitting here chewing on your thought process. If you were -- there could be a methodology, because we're talking about exotic removal management plans, best management plans for landowners outside of the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay. In the entire management program in the mitigation or the removal of those exotics, Paul, there could be construction of wetlands or creation of a wetland in another area that would ultimately result in the end want, which is no net loss. Just because it doesn't say no loss at all, it's a no net loss. So this -- I'm trying to -- again, I'm just trying to come up with an example that might ratify -- and it certainly could be worded a little differently to help clarify it. And if you could come up with that language, we'd certainly have a -- the board will have a look at it. Page 72 February 20, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. But ifF sets the framework for what you can do to obtain mitigation, and i, double, triple, four and five are all those things you can do to obtain mitigation, then all we need to do is -- and I don't agree with this, I'm just saying to clear up the language four would just be -- if you want to mitigate then you're saying exotic removal or maintenance may be considered as acceptable mitigation, period. You don't need to restate why it is, because you did that in F. But now we need to elevate a way why that might be. MR. McDANIEL: It ultimately drives back around to the front end definition of what a direct impact is defined as. And that's way back up at the beginning of 5.6. And when you are having a direct impact on those hydroperiods, that could have an impact on the wetland, or the availability of wetlands on the site. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Yeah, if you would clean it up, it would help me out a lot. Because I'm befuddled right now. MR. McDANIEL: Okay. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: By next meeting we'll try to have something that works better. Is there any other questions before we go to public speakers? Ms. Caron? COMMISSIONER CARON: Just back to that. I'm thinking do you also need to read the end of that sentence. And I think while you may be able to use this exotic removal as mitigation, you can only do that if you're placing it under a conservation easement. So you can't forget the end of the sentence, whether you like it or not. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, ironically, if you were to take the end of the sentence and put it in the front of it, you basically are saying the same thing III does but in reverse. Roman III says you can protect it by preservation, but after the initial exotic plant removal and Page 73 February 20, 2009 continued exotic plant maintenance, and by the perpetual maintenance activities, which is repetitive. So I'm not sure -- COMMISSIONER CARON: That's why we said we were going to -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: -- it's confusing -- right. COMMISSIONER CARON: -- in both paragraphs. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Right. So anyway, Bill, I think we can leave it at that and we'll just move on. We know what to do for next Thursday. And public speakers, if everybody's okay with that. Nicole? MS. RYAN: My first comment is to Policy 5.7 and the dark skies initiative. I also cannot find any reference in the Group 4 policies, though I know that's something that we had requested. In the language in 5.7, it doesn't get to true dark skies initiative, something that you could find a set of standards on the International Dark Skies Association web page. This language simply states, outdoor lighting shall be reasonably managed. Who determines reasonably managed and what set of standards apply to that? The Conservancy would like to see perhaps some sort of dark skies ordinance that would be passed and would be applicable to SRA's if a different ordinance or maybe the same ordinance to be applicable to development that is not going to participate in the RLSA but have a standard set of guidelines, especially because we're talking about development that is going to start from a blank slate from the ground up. You have the opportunity to put in place the lighting fixtures for residential lighting, outdoor lighting that are truly going to provide that dark skies intent. And another component would also be some sort of acknowledgment that with an expanded road network to get people from SRA to SRA, you're going to need a lot of lighting along the road network, and could there be standards in place for road lighting Page 74 February 20, 2009 within the eastern lands that would provide safety but also provide for decreasing the globe. So we would like to see not only in the Group 5, but I think especially in the Group 4 some sort of acknowledgment that within a year of GMP adoption the county will implement a dark skies ordinance that will have specific guidelines. And also in your discussion under the little four right above, it looks as if subsection F is dealing with mitigation for wetland function loss. But in number four, it ties in exotics removal or maintenance being considered acceptable mitigation, not only for wetlands but also listed species habitat. That kind of ties in a completely different component. And I hadn't caught that before, but I just noticed that, and I'm not sure how that listed species habitat ties into what you're trying to do with mitigating for wetland function. Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, just a comment. Your thought about the dark sky ordinance for the county, that might be something positive to work forward on, but I think for this committee's deliberations, we'll focus on just the RLSA at this point, just -- MS. RYAN: Oh, yes, yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: -- to keep it simple. MS. RYAN: Yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: So thank you. MR. PRIDDY: Russell Priddy. And I think it would be extremely unfair to focus just on RLSA. I think we need to focus on the Estates, I think we need to focus on all the roadways and take into effect public safety and welfare with lighting. Mr. Chairman, earlier you were suggesting language that wasn't specific to one thing but was inclusive of everyone, and I think this should be treated the same way. I'm not opposed to that idea, but let's do it county-wide, let's do Page 75 February 20, 2009 it with an ordinance, let's don't discriminate. Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And I agree with you, Russell. But the point is we're here today about this. And if this wanted to hold until the other opportunities were completed, I'd have no problem with that. Thank you. Anybody else have any comments? Elizabeth? MS. FLEMING: Elizabeth Fleming, Defenders of Wildlife. I know Nancy Payton of Florida Wildlife Federation was also interested in seeing something implemented, at least in the Rural Land Stewardship area, and so is Defenders. And from our perspective, not trying to be unfair to any geographic area or anything, but we've got the Florida Panther Refuge, we have the CREW area, we have of course the Strand, OK Slough. We're trying to keep these areas as good functioning habitat for wildlife, and obviously light at night is not part of the natural situation out there at this time. So that was our goal in seeing some kind of a dark skies initiative implemented into the program. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And while you're up there, there's a couple things that you might do to help us out. By next Thursday we need to have an idea where we're going to go with this. And I was going to propose to the Planning Commission before we ended today that based on the notes that we've taken, I was going to put together a summary list for us to discuss in our deliberations. If someone over the weekend, whether it be you and Nicole and Nancy, whoever, Brad, those involved in the environmental sector, there's two things that have come up that pertain to you guys. One is those species in addition to the listed species that should be considered if we strike the word protected. And I know the Bald Eagle and the Peregrin Falcon have been mentioned. If there are any specifics like that, it would be helpful to know them. And if you could e-mail them to me at markstrain@colliergov.net, that would be very helpful. Page 76 February 20, 2009 And then the second thing. If there are some particular initiatives in the dark sky policies that are more helpful to make sure that they're included as suggestions, this committee can review those. And I think it would be helpful if you got those over the weekend, and then by next Thursday I can compile everything for the Planning Commission's consideration during their deliberations next week. So thank you. MS. FLEMING: Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Brad? MR. CORNELL: Brad Cornell. I just wanted to make a note about this dark skies policy. There's another aspect to this policy that may not be real clear, but it talks about compatibility with surrounding land uses. That isn't necessarily just dark skies. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Right. MR. CORNELL: That encompassed a number of other issues, like burning, like agricultural operation, like all those kinds of things that we were trying to incorporate into this policy. This was -- so in our effort to better describe the dark skies desire, we don't want to leave that out either. CHAIRMAN STRAIN : Well, those words shall be compatible, I circled those and had the words next to it, how does this fit? And I didn't ask the question because I figured I'd do some more research between now and then. But, you know, compatibility has been an issue at almost every deliberation we have at the Planning Commission meeting. There doesn't seem to be a solid definition of what is and -- when things are or not compatible. It becomes more of an ambiguous term than a defining term. I don't know how to get away from that, but I thought I'd mention that, because I don't know how you can prove something isn't compatible by what we hear constantly on the Planning Commission Page 77 February 20, 2009 how everything is compatible. It makes it real hard to figure -- to sort out what is and what is not. I don't know if we have any definitive terms for it, so -- MR. CORNELL: I don't disagree, but I think there is some reasonable judgment that can be applied and say that's not compatible or that is. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: See, now the word reasonable. What you may consider reasonable may not be what everybody else does. So anyway, it's -- MR. CORNELL: I'm not in your chair, though, so you get to say. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, no, I don't get -- George gets to say. COMMISSIONER CARON: George wants to go to reasonable. MR. VARNADOE: Point me the czar of reasonableness, because I think I am. But having said that, and not gotten a second, I would like to say let's be careful how much detail we get into in this Growth Management Plan, as opposed to the LDC implementing aspects. Because I remember when the committee was discussing this, they started talking about how much detail we want to get into. And they were -- I think the reason they used that reasonable approach was thinking that when you get into the LDC, that can be fleshed out. But things put in this Growth Management Plan, if we want to change them in the future we're going to be going through another two-year process to change them. So Mr. Strain, I don't have any problem with some of these dark sky concepts, but let's do it where it's going to be implemented in the LDC and not get too specific in our Growth Management Plan. That's all I would request. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And I think that's a good point. And what I was hoping the committee could do is see some of the Page 78 February 20, 2009 examples, and then maybe find a way to reference the dark sky material, but not necessarily encompass all of it that wouldn't fit in our area. MR. VARNADOE: And I know in the SRA that we -- one SRA that has been done, we concentrated more of the dark skies as we got to the periphery of the development, not in the town center itself. Because, you know, you start intense, then you get back to more of a rural setting as you get to the further reaches of the proj ect. And so I think that we can encompass that, but let's just be careful we don't get too specific in our Growth Management Plan. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Thank you. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Mark? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Good point. Yes, Paul? COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Way down here. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Or Bob, I'm sorry. It's hard to see that far. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: In the appendix Page 520 under Item 13, your comments, you said concentrated centers of development will produce a nighttime glow, the luminary, from electric light sources, the impacts of which should be considered on nearby conservation lands such as Corkscrew Sanctuary. That was on April 28, '08. Dark skies program is not new, it's been going on for quite a while, if I understand it. And I think that even within villages, towns, hamlets, the intent is to try to minimize light all around. There's a good body of knowledge about it. So this is not new, and I do believe it belongs in the RLSA, at least to be able to get started on it so that we can think about it in the GMP. I don't know how you feel about that, Mark, but that's my-- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: No, that's a good point. And I think George's point, too, we need to put a reference in here that's strong enough to give us good implementation language in the LDC. And I Page 79 February 20, 2009 think that's the language we probably need to work on between now and Thursday. So thank you. MR. McDANIEL: Only to the extent that, you know, we have other areas of our community that deserve the same considerations with respect to those dark sky policies that aren't really addressed in the Rural Fringe Mixed Use District and in the Golden Gate Estates area. And I think we as stewards of our entire community can address that at a different level, not just -- I'm not saying we can't impose it or further strengthen the language here, of course, but we really need to take that into context on the entire community level. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: If! may, I would just tell you that of the number of successful dark skies programs, they have almost always been not regulated but incorporated by the use themselves. And the communities themselves recognizing -- there was some statistic, and I don't remember the actual number, but just to make a point without absurdity, the rest of the world can see the sky and can see at night. And I remember a statistic that was serious during World War II and the Korean War, the Americans who fought, and even in Vietnam, could not see the enemy, but the enemy could see us. And that is directly as a result of excessive lighting. So I think it's something that definitely needs concern. And somebody's got to start it, so I would hope you would do that. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, with that, we'll move on to n was that the last public speaker on this issue? (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Good. Let's move on to the exhibits -- or the appendices. And the first one is on Page 68. It's the RLSA over-map. Does anybody have any comments or questions on that particular map? (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Because I do. And I don't know if we Page 80 February 20, 2009 have an overhead. MR. McDANIEL: Lead us to the map, if you would, in our book. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Page 68. MR. McDANIEL: I thought you said 168. Forgive me. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: No, I'm sorry, just Page 68. There's been two changes on this map, and I just want to make sure that everybody understands them. Because one is adding more restoration area and the other is taking it away. I don't know how to point out where those two points are. MR. McDANIEL: Tom has a happy pointer. Or he did. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Oh, you've got a pointer? Good. MR. McDANIEL: Happy pointer. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Oh, now, this is more scientific than I may be able to handle. MR. McDANIEL: She's going to keep moving the map so you can't find the spot. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: See, that's a road right there. The area on the original map had all that white area as a restoration area. I brought -- in the original map I have shows it going straight up and adjoining Corkscrew Road. On your map it has a -- on this new map it has a jagged edge some feet back or who knows how far back, based on this scale from the road. So a lot of that restoration area is lost. Do you know if that was intentional, or by mistake? I have both maps. I mean, if you were to look at the original map, it's there. It's the one I pulled off the GMP section of our website. And down here -- MR. McDANIEL: And just to throw a question at you: Are not the restoration areas a voluntary process in and around the flow way designations? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, the restoration areas carry with Page 81 February 20, 2009 them different points that are all in the policies we just went over. MR. McDANIEL: Maybe the original map designated -- and I'm just -- I don't know. I'm just -- COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Mark? MR. McDANIEL: It certainly wasn't a -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yeah, Paul. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: As someone who's hiked in those areas, I can tell you that the CREW goes all the way to the roads. That's an excellent point. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, it was taken off the map that -- the new map. And I'm just saying-- COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: It's in error. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: -- ifthere wasn't a reason to take it off, you might want to put it back on the way the map showed it. MR. McDANIEL: Probably somebody could have a look at that. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: It fronts the road for a period of miles, so there's obviously an error there. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Who did the new map? Was it county staff? MR. GREENWOOD: This is a map that's been in use -- and I'm assuming it was done by our mapping department. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, Tom, by next Thursday could you find out from your mapping department why they changed that area? MR. GREENWOOD: I'll try to find out for you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. And the same thing, if you go way down here, see that area there? On the old map that was shown as open area, that little point going up and down, that one right there. And now it's shown as restoration area. And along those blue edges, there's some added restoration. I've got no problem with it, but I was wondering, why was it done. And I don't know what the landowners in that area think, Page 82 February 20, 2009 because now it's another change to the land ownership, and I don't even know who owns that land. But they're going from open area, which was more developable to restoration area, which changes things. MR. GREENWOOD: We'll look at it. I think there are some more detailed maps. This is kind of an overall general map, and it is perhaps misleading from what the detailed maps show, but I'll try to verify that for you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Because the map that's on our website is a bigger scale, and I was able to use it. The only way these could have been changed is if they were intentionally changed. And so I'm trying to find out what was the intent there. MR. McDANIEL: And that may be -- that was where I was going with it. I mean, wasn't there an SSA that has been developed subsequent to the original map designation? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I don't know. And I'm trying to find answers, so -- MR. GREENWOOD: Yeah, an SSA would not change that. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. MR. GREENWOOD: Should not. MR. McDANIEL: They-- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And if we had it as open space and now we're making it restoration, that changes the credit structure. And if the white space is the boundary of the RLSA and we have more white space than we have restoration space on the north area, it also again changes the acreage and credit structure, so -- MR. GREENWOOD: I'll try to find out what happened. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Bob, did you have something? COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Yeah. I was going to say, on any map you want a date of origination. And that would help you n maybe you could still find the origination date of this map and that would start the process of getting it oriented correctly. Page 83 February 20, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Does anybody else have any questions on the map on Page 68? MR. PRIDDY: You could get an answer if you wanted-- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Russell, come on up. Of course we want answers. MR. PRIDDY: I'll let Allen. I'll send my representative. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Which one is that? Okay. MR. REYNOLDS: I think when staff checks it, you're going to find that the committee didn't make any recommended changes to the map. So I think it's just a matter of the reproduction quality of what you're looking at compared to the original adopted overlay map. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Because-- COMMISSIONER MURRAY: It's a photographer's error. MR. REYNOLDS: Well, these maps have been photocopied and reproduced to the point where I think you're just losing some of the details off of it. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. MR. REYNOLDS: Because my recommendation is the committee did not recommend any changes to the overlay map. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Then if Tom comes back next week and verifies there just needs to be some corrections, we'll have the right map then. That works. MR. McDANIEL: And I'll verify that we didn't recommend any changes to the map. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. On Page 70, do we have any questions on Page 70? It's the new stewardship credit worksheet. (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I know it's small print. I think we were given blow-up prints of it a while back. That's the old one, that's not the new one. That's the new one. IfI'm not mistaken, that's going to replace the old one; is that right? Page 84 February 20, 2009 MR. McDANIEL: Yes, sir. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, there is one-- MR. McDANIEL: Assuming-- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: There is one difference here that I'm not sure that you all knew. Because it doesn't follow through with all the other documents. You remove one of the layers. You actually remove the recreational layer, or recreational use layer. Was that intentional? And what happened is the indices or the values that were part of that recreational layer now got spread and are changed over some of the other layers. Residential use layer, for example, went from .2 to .4. Earth and mining went from a .2 down to a .1 which disincentivizes people from wanting to do that. And the agricultural group one uses, rightfully so, went from .1 to .2. If you take a typical example of some acreage and you use the natural resource index on the left side of the page and utilize it with the land use value that you're now proposing, almost in every scenario that I could come up with you actually end up with a greater increase in acreage -- or stewardship credits. And I was wondering if anybody had gone through this process. MR. McDANIEL: And we didn't recommend any changes with respect to that, so I'm going to suggest that maybe there's a typo that ended up here in -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Boy, there's a lot of them then. Because you not only dropped the layer, but you changed the values of the other layers. So that isn't just a typo, that's more something that had to be known to be done. Why would you drop a layer, then increase the land use values of the other layers? MR. McDANIEL: Tom? Mr. Greenwood? MR. GREENWOOD: I'm not aware of any changes being done with this. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, let's walk through it then, Page 85 February 20, 2009 because I want you to understand it so that you can come back with an answer. Look at the one you have up there. And let's start with the table up in the right-hand corner that says land use matrix, land use value. COMMISSIONER CARON: Start one sentence above that. It says they recommended changes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well-- COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Mark, what page are we on? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: We're on Page 70. MR. GREENWOOD: Page 70. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And if you look at Page 69 and you go to the land use layers in the base credits on both tables, the one on Page 69, residential land uses is .2. The one on Page 70, the new one, is .4. If you go down to the earth mining on Page 69, earth mining is .1 and on the new Page 70, earth mining is .2. MR. McDANIEL: Can I make a suggestion? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yes. MR. McDANIEL: The committee did not recommend -- other than the addition of the credits for incentivization of agricultural preservation, we didn't recommend any changes with regard to this. So if I might suggest that we correct the misleading information that's gotten in here somehow for you by next week, then -- because it's been inadvertently done by somebody. It wasn't done by the committee. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Because you dropped a layer. And so you're going to put the layer back in and you're going to reestablish the land use values at the value that was in the old work sheet; is that what I'm hearing? MR. McDANIEL: Exactly. We didn't have -- there was no -- and I certainly would have recalled changing or eliminating those land use designations. Page 86 February 20, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, it has a -- I'm glad you want to fix it, because it has quite an impact. COMMISSIONER KOLFLA T: Mark? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yes, sir, Tor? COMMISSIONER KOLFLA T: When he does that revision, can we get a large copy next week? MR. McDANIEL: A bigger print? COMMISSIONER KOLFLA T: Yes. So we could see. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Tom, would you tell us next Thursday how this occurred, too? Because it would have had to come out of your shop, I would assume. MR. GREENWOOD: I'll try to find out. I was using documents that -- well, in the case of the -- of Page 69, that's a document that's been in place for quite some time. And Page 70 -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Right, that's what it should have -- so where did you get document Page 70 from? MR. GREENWOOD: Page 70 I received, and correct me if I'm wrong, I received it from Anita Jenkins with Wilson-Miller. MS. JENKINS: My fault. MR. GREENWOOD: That's my recollection. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. MR. McDANIEL: Let her defend herself. MS. JENKINS: Anita Jenkins, with Wilson-Miller. This is simply a typo. Those -- there was no intention of removing recreational uses or change in values at all. It was just an error. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. I mean, it's a series of -- MS. JENKINS: It was just an error. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: -- weird typos. Okay, so we're going to put it back the way it was. MS. JENKINS: That was the intent of the committee was to keep the layers as they were, yes. Page 87 February 20, 2009 COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Mr. Chair? MR. McDANIEL: With the addition -- this is Bill McDaniel again. With the addition down here in the bottom left of the restoration activity credits and the ago credits. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Right. Okay. COMMISSIONER VIGLIOTTI: Does that mean we're going to get a Page 70 that's going to match 69? MR. McDANIEL: With the new changes that we effectuated, yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: But the changes are for the stewardship credits involving ag., not the issues we just talked about. MR. McDANIEL: And a fine point of clarification right here. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Restoration, yeah. MR. McDANIEL: These. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: The bottom ones are the only ones that should have changed. And the other ones weren't supposed to change. MR. McDANIEL: Everything else should have stayed the same. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Mark, a question? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Yeah, Brad? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Are these in the text somewhere, these ratios, these numbers? Or do they -- they are? Okay. MR. McDANIEL: I believe so. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: No, I don't think they are. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I don't remember going over it. And it does point -- it probably would be a good policy to have it written somewhere, in case somebody does mess the chart up. MR. McDANIEL: They're not written in the policy? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: No, I don't recall them. That's why these charts are important. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Well, couldn't we then maybe recommend that there be a written version of these layers and the values, and then this chart is just a worksheet, or -- Page 88 February 20, 2009 COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Yeah, I would agree with that. Either that or you have to put revision dates, dates of issuance. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, the problem there is there's so many different indices here. If you try to start listing all the natural resources, you might -- it might be problematic to put them in text. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Mark, I'm not suggesting -- if you were directing that to me, I'm not suggesting that -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: No, I wasn't. THE COURT REPORTER: Mr. Murray, could you please speak into the microphone. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: I'm not suggesting that we change everything immediately, but if we're going to make any recommendations for change, I urge strongly that we initiate, we've said this before, date of creation and revision so that we know we all have the same document. Otherwise, I do believe Brad's statement is correct, you need it in another form. MR. McDANIEL: Well, and ifI might add, the worksheet that was originally adopted for the overlay program has functioned rather well for the development of the credit system. And obviously there's some mistakes here that would have gotten caught at some stage of the game, but we didn't recommend changing it other than to the substance for those additions. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: My issue has nothing to do with the detail found in there. My issue has to do with how easily an error can happen and you limit the potential simply by good, how shall we say, stewards of the paper. MR. McDANIEL: Agreed. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, if there's nothing else on Page 69 or 70 -- COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Well, let me just say -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Go ahead, Brad. Page 89 February 20, 2009 COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: -- one more thing, Mark. I think it's also very difficult. The coloring thing, it sure is pretty, but I can't read half the numbers. So if you could just kill the colors, we don't need that. I mean, I think we're -- we don't need the different colors and everything. Certainly if it's going to be reproduced somewhere. Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, Page 71. Any changes, corrections? (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: My only comment on 71 was that if you're going to drop layer four, recreational uses, why didn't you drop it here? But now we understand it wasn't supposed to be, so that's a moot point. MR. McDANIEL: We could have saved you a whole bunch of time if we'd have just done that right. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Didn't take much time. Actually, it was very enjoyable reading. Nobody else on 71? Then we move to 72. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I do, Mark. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, Brad? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: And it's on attachment C. The first one I assume is the old attachment, as if we didn't drop the hamlet, so we just skip that and go to the next -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Right, 72 and 73 are reproductions. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Okay. One question is the biggest thing is on the floor area ratio. Why are we really doing that kind of density? And if you are, why is the floor area ratio the same for retail office in a town, in a village and in a compact world? For example, to build something like, let's say, the three, four-story Ave Maria type product with an FAR of .5, you couldn't do. So what is the intent of having floor area ratio is the first question. The second question, if you do have it, why are they all the same? And is that Page 90 February 20, 2009 based on some study or just guessing? MR. McDANIEL: Well, it was in the original program. And so COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: It doesn't make -- MR. McDANIEL: And I don't know, somebody may have a specific answer for it. I -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN : Yes. MR. McDANIEL: -- remember at the committee -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: The county -- I was on the Planning Commission for the original program. And I remember all these -- and Brad, these issues were asked. The county had hired Wilson-Miller then to do the GMP language. And you guys -- and Anita, I think you were still -- you were involved back then. You all came by with a lot of examples of what town cores should look like, how they should function, how they should be walkable communities, how we should be looking at smart growth and a lot of things. And these numbers came out of that presentation. It was part of the presentation brought back then and a study back then. Now, Brad, I don't have it, but we'd have to go back into the records to find out why those numbers got there is what I think it boils down to. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I kind of remember that. And I also remember the hangup we got into on the Ave Maria. I remember -- wasn't Bob Mulhere involved in Ave Maria? Because I can kind of remember -- well, anyway somebody just had to fold. Because first of all, an FAR of .5 is not downtown Ave Maria for retail and office. MS. JENKINS: That's correct. Anita Jenkins again. These FAR's are minimums. And if you look at the entire characteristics, you have such a broad range of area that a town or a village could cover, so you need a range or minimum FAR's so that can be achievable in a village as a minimum, depending on the acreage, the number of units and the mix of uses there. So these are Page 91 February 20, 2009 mInImums -- COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: But they're labeled maximums. COMMISSIONER CARON: No, they're labeled maximums. MS. JENKINS: -- to go from. These are labeled as maximums. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: For example, an FAR -- you know, let's take an office building. Essentially for 300 feet, that's about the size of a parking space. So essentially you're taking a lot, making it one-story half parking, half office. That's not what you want to do. So the point is I don't know why the -- first of all, aren't these things going to come before us as PUD's and stuff like that where we're going to be working much like Ave Maria? And we actually-- this became an argument somewhere, I recall. I don't know -- obviously I think I recall it with the wrong person, but we just had to let it go and you're going to do it as per your -- MS. JENKINS: This information in the FAR's were based on the research at the time in 2000. And a lot of this was based on the smart code that had been developed by the congress of new urbanism and the mixed use towns that they had in place at the time. So we have continued to update that. And looking at these FAR's if, Mr. Schiffer, you feel like there's better examples now of FAR's and what they could be, we'd be interested in hearing that -- COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: And why -- MS. JENKINS: -- because they were based on the best available information at the time, those standards were. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: And maybe get back with that, look at that, and then even why have it really. The other question, though, the second question, is why would they be the same? Why would a town have the same kind of -- COMMISSIONER MURRAY: They shouldn't. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: -- intensity as a village, as the Page 92 February 20, 2009 compact rural? You think that there'd be some dissention in those numbers. Well, actually, I would boost the town up. Maybe .5 may make sense in the last column only. The other thing is I would move transit lodging, which is not an FAR, it's a density. I would move that up to the residential units. And you know how you have the per acre? COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Absolutely. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Do you see what I mean -- MS. JENKINS: Absolutely, yeah. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: -- in other words, they don't make sense in FAR. And then in the goods and services line, you're adding words corporate, office, manufacturing, light industrial. Essentially what that prior meant is that you wanted 65 square feet per dwelling unit for community and neighborhood goods and services. Why is -- or if you do want those words in there, maybe you should put them up with the other words so that -- in other words, they're kind of orphaned down at the end of that sentence. MS. JENKINS: I can say that this was a chart that I wasn't involved in, and I think that that -- MR. GREENWOOD: The underlined is actually already there. And I apologize for that. They probably shouldn't be underlined. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: But what does it mean then? I mean, because in other words, everything makes sense and you get to the DU, dwelling unit, and then these words are there. What are they trying to tell us? COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Brad, the fact is that the village was to be compact residential, and you wouldn't be advocating all of that activity in the village. So I don't understand that either. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Well, what you're saying is that you have a minimum of -- you want 65 square feet for every dwelling unit in the downtown core, which is obviously a bigger core than the Page 93 February 20, 2009 village has, which is 25 and 10. It just -- I mean, if those words -- you want those words in there. Maybe put community or town center with community, comma, neighborhood goods, comma, service, comma, corporate office, comma, manufacture. Because I think your intent is you want those things to be included in the 65 feet. MS. JENKINS: Yeah, that's how I read this. This is just trying to list, you know, in a table form the permitted goods and services that are used. But the 65 square feet applies to the community goods and services and not the corporate office and manufacturing. But those are just uses that are available. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Then we were handed out definition of floor area ratio. So the intent would be -- first of all, we got this last time? MR. GREENWOOD: Yes, sir. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: And is that in here, or is that -- MR. GREENWOOD: It's in the LDC. Those are actually definitions from the LDC, essential services and floor area ratio. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Okay. And so we're going to be measuring this from the gross land area, which would -- in the case of the envision I have of how you would plat a subdivided downtown would be individual lots and things, correct? Would it be the gross area of that lot, or is the gross area of that lot to the center line of the street like some definitions? MR. GREENWOOD: The floor area I think is defined as the total building area versus the site on which the building is being constructed. And pretty much as defined there. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Okay. All right. Anyway, I'm not sure that number's right or that's a good idea. Because remember, it's going -- everything's going to come and stand on its own, and at that time we're going to establish densities and things. And I think I would -- I don't think this is meaningful. Thank you. Page 94 February 20, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, do we have any other questions on Pages 72 or 73? (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Bill? MR. McDANIEL: Sir. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: IfI have a town of 1,500 acres and a village of 1,500 acres, what criteria do I fall under? What I'm asking you is a loaded question. I think what we really need to do is say that a village is 100 to 1,499 and less than 1,500, and a town is 1,500 and greater, up to 5,000. Otherwise you have someone in a situation where they're picking between village and town criteria at that split level. MR. McDANIEL: And I think that point of clarification is very valid. I recall some language in the discussion when we changed it to not exceed 1,500 acres, when we raised the acreage of villages up from 1,000 to 1,500. But it was to not exceed that amount, and certainly not flow over into a confusion between your definition. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And the same thing occurs between the village size minimum and the maximum size compact CRD. So I'll suggest something for that. MR. McDANIEL: In the prior -- of course we had the same issue in the original RLSA, if you go over there. You know, it was -- it did say greater than 100 acres for CRD's. But the same thing, hamlets could be a village and villages could be a town and n CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Right. Well, that's what we're supposed to be fixing after five years, so -- MR. GREENWOOD: And in the Group 4 policies, 4.1, 4.7.1, 4.7.2,4.7.3, some of that detail can be put in there. If it's not clear, we'll make it clear. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. If you go to the village column, all the way to the bottom you added county transit access. And I'm just Page 95 February 20, 2009 wondering why we wouldn't want to add that to the CRD's, since the CRD's are actually going to be expanded in their probable uses. Is there a reason that couldn't be done? MR. McDANIEL: I don't see any reason. I don't recall a large deliberation as to why we excluded it from CRD's. So -- and it certainly stands to reason. Other than it being the difference in size. I remember Nick Casalanguida talking about the -- yeah, there was an economic valuation that came into that -- the CRD from a populous standpoint, warranting the traffic stop being there. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And why is the county transit access an option? Why wouldn't it be a requirement? Because it doesn't help to have it as an option. No one will use it. And the reason I know it's an option is because anything underlined are not required uses. And I can understand equestrian trails, not everybody may not want to ride a horse, but you certainly need to have county -- the transit there. MR. McDANIEL: And there may be instances n just to answer your question from an example standpoint, there may not be county transit available, so it has to be an option if it's not provided for. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, then the option part of it's probably going to have to be defined somewhere, and it's not. Because if it's an option, then the possibility goes to whose option is it. And it may be something needed pursuant to retaining a level of service or other requirements. Last thing, last line underneath the fine print. MR. McDANIEL: I got you. I missed that. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Also, if you go up to the discussion that Brad just had under goods and services. And Tom Greenwood, I think you just made a comment that you shouldn't have underlined corporate offices, manufacturing and light industrial. If you take the underlining off, that means every town has to have corporate offices, manufacturing and light industrial. So I don't think you wanted to make it -- I think the intent of the underlining there was to call it as an option, whereas the underlining under the county transit down below Page 96 February 20, 2009 was where it was added new -- no, it wasn't added new, it was carried over. Boy, so some of the underlining is new and some of the underlining -- do you see the difference? MR. McDANIEL: Uh-huh. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Some of the underlining elements on the new table are new language, but also underlining represents optional elements that were carried over from the first table. So somehow the table doesn't reflect just what's new by underlining. So I'm not sure how you want to clarify that, but I think it certainly needs to be highlighted or double underlined or something if it's new and single underlined if it's optional. MR. McDANIEL: Yeah, because through the entire process, all our new language has been underlined, so it could be misconstrued that those are all add-ins, so -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, there are things here that have been added that are underlined, as they should have been, so -- MR. McDANIEL: It should be further designated. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: If you go to the double asteric on that page, villages and compact rural developments when (sic) the ACSC subject to location and size limitations, and it says per Policy 4.22. That should be I think Policy 4.21. Because 4.22 doesn't talk about that subject. 4.22 is the one that was newly inserted to talk about historic and cultural resources. It's 4.21 I believe that talks about the sizes that I think you're trying to refer to there. Unless you have an objection. MR. McDANIEL: I have no objection. Certainly it -- I mean, it wasn't the goal to mislead anyone. And I think it was an adaptation over from what we originally had in the reference to that policy of 4.20. And we changed and renumbered Policy -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I don't think you're trying to mislead anybody, I just think we need to be corrected. Another one of those Page 97 February 20, 2009 typos. MR. McDANIEL: Absolutely. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, that takes us through Page 73 and it ends the review of the primary document. Let's go to any further questions from the Planning Commission on those elements before we go to the public speakers. (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, are there any members of the public wanting to talk about the tables and charts and the other things we just went over? (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. With that, I guess we can hit any general questions, any questions about backup material, any questions the Planning Commission may have. And let me kind of outline what I think we can do on Thursday of next week, if it's okay with all of you. We're running out of -- we've only got six days, because today's the 20th. Over the weekend I can go ahead and finalize all of the discussions that we've had in some kind of written format, with suggested language changes, and implement it into in a red text for review the actual policies that we've discussed. I can have that done by Sunday night, I can send it to the county staff Monday morning, and then the staff can distribute it prior to the meeting on the 26th. That way you guys can get a copy of it so when we come to the meeting we can agree that the changes are something we all talked about and wanted or we can strike it or come up with new language, and I think that would expedite our meeting on the 26th. So if that will work for you all, I think that I can get that done over the weekend. On the 26th what I'd like to do -- Heidi? MS. ASHTON-CICKO: I'd just like to clarify for the members, though, please refrain from responding to Mr. Strain's -- Page 98 February 20, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I won't send it to them, I'll send it to Tom. MS. ASHTON-CICKO: Okay. Then when Tom -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I don't ever -- I always send stuff through staff. MS. ASHTON-CICKO: -- sends it to you, please refrain from responding to Tom's e-mail. You can please wait until the next meeting on the 26th to discuss it. Thanks. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Right. What I'd like to do next Thursday is take the first part of the day to start up on any questions we have that we don't finish today, because I still have a list of questions we need to go through. We have two other -- we have a couple of binders on this. We focused on one portion of it. This is the portion that probably is the most relevant, because it really summarizes everything the committee I think is -- not this committee but the RLSA committee is going to try to recommend they did in the form of GMP language. But there may be questions from the other documents that some of you have, and I think we ought to have time to air those next Thursday morning. Once that's done, I'm going to ask for any final presentations by members of the public, ifthere's anything final that they have to say. And then I'd like us to go into what I would consider a deliberation period in which we take the actual amendments or considerations to the GMP language that we may want to suggest and decide if each one of those by consensus should stay or be removed or modified. Then when we're done with that, we can take a vote then or whether to move this forward on whatever manner we decide at that time. After that meeting, since I'll have all the documents anyway, I can go ahead and do our consent agenda item based on the discussion of the meeting and forward that to the county staff as well so that we Page 99 February 20, 2009 can have that done by our March 5th meeting. And that will strictly be a consent agenda. Does that work for the Planning Commission? COMMISSIONER MURRAY: I have a question, Mark. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yes, sir. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Just to be clear, you said we can go over each of those and by consensus and then you said something to the effect of we can then do a motion. Wouldn't we be safer to do each one of the recommendations by a motion? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, that's what I meant by consensus is that we'd go through each language change. And there's nine of us here, and if five of us want the change to stay, it'd stay. Then we can go back through, and if someone objects to the overall program, I guess they could go back and isolate out their objections in the final statement. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Well, I understand you. Looking at it in my mind, I'm seeing a series of recommendations, and the mix may come up as a consensus, but it may not give adequate guidance to the BCC, because we will have then agreed to something that perhaps the ratio on any given item might change and may not be effective for the purpose -- I'm sure it can work if we force it to work, but I'm not sure it's the most effective. I would be an advocate of if we conclude, if we have a true consensus, we reach that view, then we ought to I think vote on that so that we give the BCC clear direction on each of the items we offer. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, Bob, so far we have four solid pages of changes, each one implementing -- you missed the first meetings. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Two meetings, actually. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, you missed the first-- COMMISSIONER MURRAY: I had food poisoning.d Page 100 February 20, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: -- two meetings. They were lengthy meetings. There is a lot of considerations. And for us to have a separate motion on every word or every piece of change -- the way it's done now, I think it might be harder for the BCC to follow that than if we just walked our way through it. And if someone disagrees at the end of the day, the BCC has asked us, if you disagree, state your reason. Then you can go back in and pull the policy out that you didn't like the changes on that the rest of us may have by consensus and say I'm going to vote no on this, but only because I disagree with Policy 1.7.8 or something like that and here's why. Then the rest of it stands as approved and that one issue you decided, or you or whoever, decided they didn't like becomes the exception. To me that would be possibly a cleaner way to present it to the BCC than motion after motion -- COMMISSIONER MURRAY: I know where you're going, Mark, and I don't really -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I'm not going anywhere. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: -- disrespect it. But to my mind you said, I thought, that you were going to do a heck of a lot of work, and provide that information and then that we would review that and then you sought to go through each and every one of those. So that would be the time, I thought, if you're going to go through them, not simply to go to consensus. I'll be okay with it, but I thought if we give them a voice on certain items this committee may disagree on, and I'm not sure that we have to cite anything very much for them. This is not an LDC or a GMP activity, so I -- and I'm not, you know, arguing for the sake of arguing, it's just my thoughts. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, anybody else have any concerns? COMMISSIONER KOLFLA T: Yeah, I do. I have a question, Mark. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Tor? Page 10 1 February 20, 2009 COMMISSIONER KOLFLA T: If for example you discuss one of the issues that you're going to list and the vote -- you take a vote or consensus reading and it shows that this board was four in favor of it, five were against it, will you forward to the commission then a recommendation that it be denied, since the majority did not support it? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I'd change it. We're going to actually recommend -- I would assume that we're going to recommend language changes to the language that's here. If a policy has some language in it we object to or we think could be clarified better, we would actually write in the clarification. If when we got done discussing and the five majority of this panel decided we didn't need to clarify that policy, then we wouldn't submit changes for it. Yet if the four who were in the minority felt that they had to have something going to the BCC to make their point on that issue, they could always do so under a separate cover or they could vote no and as a clarification, as a reason to vote no, this is why I voted no, because that Policy 1.7.8 wasn't changed. I don't know of an easier way to do it. You guys, if you have a better way, tell me. That was just one I came up with. And Bob expressed himself toward it. Anybody has as better idea, you all tell me. I'm willing to get it done to expedite it. I know that if I can do it over the weekend, it would probably be faster to get it done that way and more to the notes that I have than trying to leave it up to staff and not getting it maybe as timely as we would this way. So I'd just as soon get it done. What do you guys want to do? It doesn't matter to me. I'm just trying to -- COMMISSIONER VIGLIOTTI: I'm in favor of what you'd like to do. It's the most expeditious and we're going to get it done. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: All I can assure you is whoever n if there's a disagreement on anything, I think we should strive to be Page 102 February 20, 2009 uniform and we'll keep working on it till we're there. I mean -- Paul? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: But we're going to try to get consensus -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Right. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: -- which is I what I hope, yeah. I just hope we can do it in one day. It sounds pretty hard. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I think we're going to -- after today we're only going to have that issue left, and then I don't know if any of you have any questions from the balance of the backup material. But if you do, it would be a good time to bring it up now, since we have about a half an hour before we're out of here today. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Okay, I just -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Mr. Murray? COMMISSIONER MURRAY: -- have to make one more point. Consensus, as I understand the definition of it, is something that people can live with. They may not agree with all aspects of it, but they could live with it in totality. And I can certainly go along with that if that's the will of the people here. But I thought Tor made the point, too, if there's something that is not agreed to, then it just fails to go forward. And in some respects that's not good for the committee who worked hard on something. You're going to create a skeleton, so to speak, for us to work with and -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: No. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: You're shaking your head. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Everything the committee has recommended goes forward. Their language will be what goes forward first. We have a -- COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Oh, that's okay. Now you're helping me. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, that -- I mean, we can't change the committee's work, and the BCC wants to see their work. We're only Page 103 February 20, 2009 asked to review it. So we will have a -- staff will submit an executive summary and attached to it will be our work. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Okay. So you're just talking -- now I completely appreciate where you're going. You're suggesting that there'll be parallels; if there's any difference, there'll be parallels for them to review. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Right. If the Board of County Commissioners is interested in seeing what the Planning Commission thought of the committee's language, they would have another document they can go through where it would all be highlighted right to the very specifics of what we recommended. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Okay, then what it just means is that we have to agree with whatever skeleton you put together that we all agree with that, which -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: No. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: -- is fine. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: No, no, you don't have to agree with any of it. I don't even know if what I'm -- I'm just taking the discussion I've heard to date -- COMMISSIONER MURRAY: I'm not fighting with you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: No, but Bob, you just said something. You don't have to agree with anything I write down. That's not the point. If that was the case, I wouldn't be bringing it back here. I'd send it on myself and say here's what I hope they do, if they don't do it, too bad. That's not what I'm doing. You don't have to agree to any of it. I'm suggesting as a way to get us to consensus is for someone to put something down on a document in writing that we can decide on. I happen to have a lot of the notes, so I thought it would be easier for me to do it than anybody else. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: I didn't disagree with anything you said. MR. McDANIEL: I have a point. Page 104 February 20, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Go ahead, Bill. MR. McDANIEL: The thought process that I might add is because of the detail that the committee went into in the actual language changes that we recommended as we were going through, we are able to get farther down the path towards those ultimate GMP amendments that are ultimately going to come from this report in whatever shape it ends up, once the BCC actually makes its recommendation for changes, both from you and from the EAC. So the report, just for clarifica -- I mean, your report's going to travel and mirror along with the report that the committee has in fact already done, with these recommended changes and suggestions, based upon the information that you've come up with throughout this process. So we're just way farther down the path because of the specificity in the language changes that the committee effectuated throughout its term. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: I think I have a better grasp of it now. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. With that, do we have any questions from the backup documentation? Yes, Brad. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: And Tom, it's something we've been e-mailing. A lot of people have said there's only five or six owners, but some people have come to me out of these meetings who have watched them and said there's maybe 200 owners. I mean, I'm not interested in the names, but is there any way we can get a feel for what kind of ownership's out there, the size of properties? Obviously we're going to find some major owners and some really minor owners, that's what I'm expecting. But I wouldn't mind just seeing that, okay? MR. GREENWOOD: My understanding, it's more than 200 owners. And I did request that of another staff person, and that person has not responded. But we have some -- I think some information on the number of owners out there. I'll try to get that to you. Page 105 February 20, 2009 COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: And I don't want names. MR. GREENWOOD: No. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I don't want the name of the -- MR. GREENWOOD: Understood. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Alls I want is, you know, acreage, you know, a number of parcels within a certain window of acreage would be good. Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, ifthere's no other questions from the balance of the material, while we were in our discussions for the past three or four days, four days now I think it is, I've made some notes of things that still need to be touched on. And maybe we can spend some time on those to resolve any outstanding issues. Policy 4.10. Policy 4.10, the way I was reading it, Bill, and I need you to help me with this, seems to me that facilities like golf courses and stadiums and generally recreational open space does not consume stewardship credits. Is that right? I know I'm bouncing back to an old policy, but I wanted to make sure before I summarized all my thoughts that I understood it. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: You had asked that question before, Mark, and, you know, that was said like the answer was golf courses get a pass. And so it's the same question, and you're right, I don't think it was ever answered. MR. McDANIEL: I think -- you know, I don't know. Do you know the answer to that, Anita? MS. JENKINS: Public benefit uses do not require stewardship credits. And public benefit uses dealing with open space is defined as anything that is over the required 35 percent. So if you have open space in your SRA greater than 35 percent, that could be a public benefit use. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And a public benefit use can be described as what? MR. GREENWOOD: It's in Policy 4.20 -- I'm sorry -- yeah. Page 106 February 20, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yes, it is 4 -- for the purpose of this policy, public benefit uses are: Public schools, private schools, post-secondary schools, ancillary uses, community parks, municipal golf courses, regional parks and governmental facilities. So I think then by reading Policy 4.10, golf courses and stadiums and other recreational open space don't consume stewardship credits. Is that -- well, I mean, a stadium is a recreational facility. That's why I'm throwing that in. We don't -- just say recreational uses. If they're used for the public -- MR. GREENWOOD: If they're municipal golf courses. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Right. MR. GREENWOOD: Yes. MS. JENKINS: Right, municipal golf courses -- MR. GREENWOOD: Is a public benefit use. MS. JENKINS: -- are a public use. MR. GREENWOOD: A municipal golf course. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. So it has to be a municipal. MR. GREENWOOD: That's the way it's defined. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: On Policy 4.20, the one that you referred us to, that excludes the essential services defined in the LDC. And it says, the acreage of public benefit use shall count towards the maximum acreage limits described in 4.7, but shall not count towards the consumption of stewardship credits. But that excludes essential services, right? MR. GREENWOOD: That's correct. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: So that means essential services do count towards the consumption of stewardship credits or they do not count toward -- they do count towards the maximum acreage limits? MR. GREENWOOD: It looks like government facilities is a public benefit use, and they do not count toward the maximum acreage limits described in 4.7. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Excluding essential services. Page 107 February 20, 2009 MR. GREENWOOD: Yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, now, what does that mean? If you count governmental facilities but you exclude essential services, and essential services are those facilities including utilities, safety services, other governmental services necessary to promote the public safety and welfare, but not limited to police, fire, EMS, park, public libraries. Are we getting into a contradiction? Because -- COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Seems like 4.20 is an attempt to amplify -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Mr. Murray? COMMISSIONER MURRAY: It seems like 4.20 is an attempt to amplify particular services that were not deemed essential services. But curiously essential services have those same items. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Tom, do you understand my question? MR. GREENWOOD: Yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: If you could research it by our next meeting and let me know. I don't mean to put you on the spot with the language, because there's so much language here. It's just something if you could make a note of. MR. GREENWOOD: I will. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I'm trying to understand how that excluding essential services fits into the use of 4.20. MR. GREENWOOD: Okay. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay? MS. JENKINS: One way to look at it, Mr. Strain, is that essential services, fire, EMS, police, those things are part of the fabric of a town and should be counted towards your SRA acreage and your credits. But other governmental facilities that may not absolutely be necessary as part of the fabric of the town would be counted as a public use -- or would be counted not as a public use. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, I just think we ought to get it understood. I mean, I can't understand it, not that I should, but maybe Page 108 February 20, 2009 if Tom could explain it by next Thursday, that would be helpful. MR. GREENWOOD: Thank you. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: We had talked about utilizing Phase I audits, environmental audits for SSA's. And let me point that one out agam. If you have an SSA, it's supposed to be more or less preservation land, valuable preservation land. How do SSA's deal with the potential pollutants that may be on a piece of property in regards to their valuableness as preservation land? Has there been any way that that's looked at in the stewardship area? And Tom, I guess these are more your questions than Bill's at this point. And what I'm worried about is if we're calling a piece of property preservation but on it there's some environmental contaminants and damage and we don't know because we don't get any Phase I walk-throughs, are we really getting preservation land or are we getting contaminated land and we're giving preservation for it? Is that something that we should consider? MR. GREENWOOD: Yes. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And that was highlighted by the Pepper Ranch and the purchase there. Because when we actually went for the ranch, we found out there were quite a few areas of contamination that had to be addressed, and I believe they even escrowed money to address them. Russell? MR. PRIDDY: The difference is the county received fee simple title to Pepper Ranch. When I come forward with an SSA, I'm not giving the county my property. I'm still just as responsible for that property as I've always been. So the liability and the responsibility for whatever is out there remains with the landowner. And I can tell you that, and I'm sure you can appreciate this, if Page 109 February 20, 2009 I've got to do an environmental study on 8,000 acres, guess what's not coming forward? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, but see, in return for a clean environmental study, you would have your stewardship credits that you could then sell and make whatever potential you want out of them. In the meantime, you've gotten a benefit claiming to have preservation land that may not be valuable preservation land because of its pollution. That's the only consideration. I've been asking if it's something that ought to be considered in the process. And I understand your point. MR. PRIDDY: Yeah, and I'm saying that if you've got this object, and let's called it the Rural Land Stewardship program that's voluntary, incentive-based and it's fragile and you tighten down every bolt and every screw, you're going to throw the thing out of balance and you're going to end up with a pile of crumbled glass. It's just going to fall apart. I don't think you can micromanage every detail. And there are probably some landowners that can afford to do that environmental study. This is not one of them. And so you simply eliminate the possibility of that coming forward. Keep in mind, I don't have Mitch or someone else sitting out there waving a check at me, hurry up and do this so I can use your credits or give you money for the credits. I don't know that there'll ever be anyone come along with a check. I mean, this is a theory. And, you know, the incentive for volunteering is to promote setting aside some of this stewardship area that if I do now gives the county and the citizens of Collier County and Florida some assurance with this permanent easement on there that this is not going to be developed. But at that point, Russell hasn't gotten anything but the cost of getting here today. And if you're going to further pile on requirements to, you know, to keep spending money, I see that as a deal breaker. Page 110 February 20, 2009 CHAIRMAN STRAIN: And I appreciate that, Russell. My point is to leave basically no stone unturned in discussion. MR. PRIDDY: Okay. Point out an example that's not regulated somewhere else. And I think the first thing you're going to say is dipping vats. We've already established that that is the responsibility of the State of Florida. It's law. Oil might be your next concern. That is probably the most heavily regulated industry in the state. Those guys don't even stir the dust without somebody being on top of them. So what else is out there? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Well, there's the -- Pepper Ranch had a -- what was it, a garbage dump, but it's one that the people who had lived there apparently in one of the houses used instead of having their stuff picked up. And it was -- they had to clean that up. That was part of that ranch. I don't know how many of those exist. Those are the kind of questions we need to ask. Your input is the kind we need to have. And we just need to chew on it. And if it's not an issue, it won't go any further. If it is, if it dwells on our minds next Thursday, we'll bring it up. MR. PRIDDY: I just think it's a deal breaker. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. And I appreciate that, thank you. We talked about the financial impact analysis model, the FlAM. There is no provisions in the GMP that really have that review on it for SRA's on a regular basis to assure fiscal neutrality to Collier County. You guys didn't address it. And I remember I mentioned this on our first day. It was in my list of questions. I don't think we ever got it resolved, it was just something that wasn't in the program and you guys didn't decide at it. So it's still on the table. It's a concern that I have because of the -- we've got to maintain fiscal neutrality for these facilities, and I don't know how else to weigh in on it. I'm just making the discussion. So next Thursday if that's a bothersome issue, we'll bring it up again. Page III February 20, 2009 The GMP amendments, Tom, we have a lot of GMP amendments coming through the county right now. They're all paid for by the people that want them. Who's paying for the GMP amendments for this RLSA? MR. GREENWOOD: Well, first off, there hasn't been a direction from the BCC to go forward with these amendments. This is a report, a recommendation. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. So when the BCC makes a decision to move this to data analysis, who would do the data analysis? MR. GREENWOOD: At this point, I haven't gotten any direction from the BCC. As you well know, the department and division have been downsized in staff. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Oh, I know. And that's why my questions -- I'm having my questions right now, is if we have to -- if data analysis has to be done before transmittal, normally the GMP amendments are funded. I'm just wondering how they're being funded, whether it's the public that's funding them or the RLSA overlay area is funding them, how they're being funded. MR. GREENWOOD: That has not been decided. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. We talked about stewardship credits, looking for other places to use them to either increase their value or to possibly reduce the footprint they need to be used in the actual open lands of the RLSA. At times it was in the urban area. It might be kind of hard to get them used in the coastal urban area, but Immokalee seems to always be striving for more density, especially for their farmworker housing and things like that. Is there a possibility of looking at spreading these credits or allowing them to be used in the Immokalee urban area? And I know your department's working on the new master plan. Has that been brought up? Page 112 February 20, 2009 Paul, have you got any thoughts on that? COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: I would say that we wouldn't want them, because we have that whole slough south of Immokalee that we need to develop incentives for those landowners. So if we use these from outside, then, you know, that will sort of take away one possible way of incentivizing the use of those conservation lands that are already within Immokalee. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. Well, I mean, you live there. And I thought I'd ask, because I know at one point you wanted Immokalee's by right density treated differently than any other part of the county. So I'm assuming if you want that density, this would be one way to get it. And plus it incentivizes the stewardship credit program, but-- COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Yeah. No, I like the idea of incentivizing the RLSA credit program. But we have our own environmentally sensitive lands in Immokalee that don't have any credit program for them yet, and I would rather develop that first. MR. McDANIEL: From the committee's standpoint, and myself at large, Mr. Strain, I would suggest that the program as it sits now in whatever format that it ultimately gets transmitted off in has a review process of another seven years I think it's going to come up again. And it might be better to allow that seven years' worth of evolution to transpire to monitor what's in fact going to be a proper balance, if you will, and maybe redistribute some of those credits, and us an opportunity to determine priorities that are inevitably going to shift as we go forward with the program. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I wanted to throw the idea out to see how Paul received it. I know since he lives out there and he's been involved in density arguments with this -- not arguments, discussions with this board before, ifhe saw it as a good idea, it would help to understand it better. But if it's something that isn't that good of an idea, it was a passing thought. Page 113 February 20, 2009 COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: We've got at least -- I would say at least 5,000 acres of conservation lands within the urban limits that have no incentives to be preserved yet, so -- CHAIRMAN STRAIN: In all the deliberations of the committee, in all the RLSA lands, because they're surrounded by other areas of intense development or future development, one being Immokalee, Ave Maria, has anybody -- did your committee consider what is happening with the Indian lands? Because their casinos and hotels are going to have a substantial impact on that area, including all the infrastructure that's to go out there. And I don't know how that's being considered by anybody. And since the RLSA surrounds it, it would seem logical that it would have to go in and out of the RLSA. MR. McDANIEL: I'm not aware that the RLSA -- I mean, there's part of the Indian lands that the RLSA surrounds. But -- and no, to answer your question candidly, we did not have tremendous discussion. The new developments that the Indians have come up with as a -- or coming were not part of our committee's deliberations. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Mark? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Yes. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Aren't they all within the Immokalee urban area? CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I don't know. But I mean, even if they are -- MR. McDANIEL: Yes. Larger looming impacts though from -- COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: But there's none -- they don't own land in the RLSA, do they? MR. McDANIEL: No. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I don't think so. Because their lands are independent of our processes. And that's a little scary, and I just want to know if we've looked at it. Page 114 February 20, 2009 The other issues I have are planning elements that I didn't see in the policies in front of us, areas identifying the processes for finding landfill, how landfill is to be handled, where they could be. I mean, I doubt if anybody who owns property out there as an SRA wants to have a landfill on their SRA. They're probably not too popular. And wherever they are, the SRA's adjacent to it probably won't be too popular. But it's got to be addressed. And did the committee discuss that at all? MR. McDANIEL: Only at latter stages of our discussions. And it came more in line with the map overlay for the future traffic flows. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. And the same, there's some other major elements; jails, for example, and hospitals, government centers, shopping centers. And you know that VanBuskirk model showed the need for a shopping center out there, but I haven't heard any discussion on that from your committee's end of it. MR. McDANIEL: Only from the level of the regionality (sic). And as development ultimately occurs, and the regionality of the area becomes developed to warrant those things is when we'll be ultimately seeing those. And I think they'll ultimately be -- because of the economics that revolve around populations to justify and warrant those kind of footprints, you're going to see those come in as the population's already there. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: We talked about all the policies. Which one are you referring to? MS. JENKINS: Did you talk about the last one, Mark-- MR. McDANIEL: 3.7, I'm sorry. MS. JENKINS: -- 3.7? That's where it's addressed in the transportation -- MR. McDANIEL: I remember it was in the latter stages of our discussions. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: 3. 7? Page 115 February 20, 2009 MS. JENKINS: Yeah, if you look in your tab five. MR. McDANIEL: Anita. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I don't have that. I was looking -- I was looking in the policy language. Is there reference in the policy language? MS. JENKINS: There's a companion policy -- Anita Jenkins. There's a companion policy that the committee considered. It's a new -- it would go in the transportation element. It's in your book. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I know which one you mean. It's the one that would apply county-wide. MS. JENKINS: Correct. And it does address landfills, jails -- MR. GREENWOOD: Page 166. Page 166. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: I will review it again between now and Thursday. MR. McDANIEL: And it did come in in the latter discussions. We were wrestling over those Group 4 policies and revolving around transportation, and that's where that jumped in. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: The balance of my questions involve transportation, basically level of service elements. Tom, can you ask someone from transportation to be here on the 26th in the morning to discuss transportation issues involved in the RLSA? MR. GREENWOOD: I will do that. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay. I don't have anything else for today. Most of my stuff will be held -- we're going to finish up on hopefully the 26th. Does anybody else have anything they'd like to bring up today? Brad? COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I do. And what it is on, there was -- your response number eight which had to do with -- it's on Page 14, using credits out of the urban area. Now, I asked this question and somebody got up and read Page 116 February 20, 2009 exactly what that is. But what that is is punting, that's not dealing with it. So someone told me that there's a state law that says that you can't use credits in the sending area outside of the sending area. Is that true? MR. GREENWOOD: That's in the state law. This program does not come under the state law. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Okay. Then what does this mean? So within our own program we're stating you can't use them. But one of the things that the committee was to look at, which I guess was number eight on their list, was that issue. So stating that it's not allowed, stating that it would require a GMP change, which is exactly what everything requires, I just wonder if we addressed it this time. MR. McDANIEL: We did at the committee. I mean, we recognized the necessity for as you've heard on multiple occasions, the necessity for balance and for there to be an economic value for the credits. And you have heard a lot of suggestions on how to maintain that balance or ensure that balance. And again, as I shared with Mr. Strain, there has to be a marketplace, and we haven't gotten -- you haven't seen free trade with this credit system yet. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: No. MR. McDANIEL: And until that actually in fact occurs, all we've seen, and it's working successfully, is the transfer of credits within the same ownership group. Until there's an actual free market place that's established, that's going to be the true test for any program, I don't care whether it's the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay or the Rural Fringe Mixed Use District. Until those credits actually start to transfer on the open marketplace, that's going to be your true test. We recognize, though, and there were a lot of suggestions on how to get to that ultimate end to maintain that balance and a marketplace for those credits that at some stage of the game if our Page 117 February 20, 2009 priorities are for protection and preservation of agricultural and environmentally sensitive lands and the creation of credits does that, there may need to be a methodology for the transfer of those credits to the urbanized area where infrastructure and public facilities already in fact exist. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: And I do that. So what you're saying, first of all, this answer in here doesn't really reflect the intensity that the committee discussed that issue? MR. McDANIEL: Probably not. I mean, we talked about it on multiple levels, and again on a regular basis, Brad. It's obvious that there has to be a balance and there has to be a value for those credits at some level. And we're not sure it can be done within the Rural Land Stewardship Overlay. There are other mechanisms that may need to be considered for the ultimate utilization of these credits that are generated. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: And the thing I think that you lose me on is I don't see why a greater market for the use of those credits wouldn't help your program. I know you're saying you got to get it balanced, you're trying to get -- MR. McDANIEL: We're not saying a greater market wouldn't help. I mean -- COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: I think it would help immensely. I mean, 1-- MR. McDANIEL: -- that wasn't the intent of what we were talking about. I mean, if the greater the marketplace, obviously the greater the value at some stage of the game. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: And I'd be personally happy that if you sold all the -- all the credits were taken off and weren't even used out there. I mean, that would be a better world. Everything would be farming, everything would be clear. MR. McDANIEL: There's a lot of definitions of a better world. Page 118 February 20, 2009 COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: That there are. But again, maybe it's disappointment, maybe we wait. I guess it's five years we're going to do this again? MR. McDANIEL: Seven. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Seven. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Okay. Then it's a topic we push forward. But your response here just says that it's not allowed. We know that. You know, you're saying -- MR. McDANIEL: Well, there's no-- COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: -- that it requires changes of the GMP. MR. McDANIEL: -- it's not that it's not allowed, there's no requisite for them to be relocated at this juncture right now. And we see that, as Mr. Strain has suggested, as a viable alternative to managing the balance and the value of those credits. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: But you're interpreting balance to be born in the RSLA (sic) and used in the RSLA. MR. McDANIEL: As it currently exists, that's the only place we have to play. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Unless we open this up. And that's the problem. Okay, enough said. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Okay, it's getting close to the time that we break for today. Unless there's some other urgent matter, I'd like to ask if there's a motion to continue this meeting to 8:30 in the morning on the 26th here in this room. COMMISSIONER VIGLIOTTI: So moved. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: So moved. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Mr. Vigliotti, seconded by Mr. Wolfley. All in favor, signify by saying aye. COMMISSIONER SCHIFFER: Aye. COMMISSIONER MURRAY: Aye. Page 119 February 20, 2009 COMMISSIONER HOMIAK: Aye. COMMISSIONER KOLFLAT: Aye. COMMISSIONER MIDNEY: Aye. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Aye. COMMISSIONER WOLFLEY: Aye. COMMISSIONER CARON: Aye. COMMISSIONER VIGLIOTTI: Aye. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: Anybody opposed? (No response.) CHAIRMAN STRAIN: We're there. Thank you very much again for your time. And Bill, your patience. MR. McDANIEL: Yours as well, sir. CHAIRMAN STRAIN: You're a fine orator. And I don't want to steal your fancy pen. ***** There being no further business for the good of the County, the meeting was adjourned by order of the Chair at 4:50 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 Reporting Service, Inc., by Cherie' R. Nottingham. Page 120