EAC Minutes 02/02/2000 RFebruary 2, 2000
TRANSCRIPT OF THE MEETING OF THE
ENVIRONMENTAL ADVISORY COUNCIL
Naples, Florida, February 2, 2000
LET IT BE REMEMBERED, that the Environmental Advisory
Council, in and for the County of Collier, having conducted
business herein, met on this date at 9:01 a.m. in REGULAR
SESSION in Building "F" of the Government Complex, East
Naples, Florida, with the following members present:
CHAIRMAN:
William W. Hill
Ed Carlson
Michael G. Coe
M. Keen Cornell
James L. McVey
J. Richard Smith
Jack Baxter
ALSO PRESENT:
Stan Chrzanowski, Senior Engineer
Stephen Lenberger, Environmental Specialist
Bill Lorenz, Natural Resources Director
Marni Scuderi, Assistant County Attorney
Ron Nino, Current Planning Manager
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February 2, 2000
CHAIRMAN HILL: I'd like to call the February meeting of the
Environmental Advisory Council to order. If we may have roll
call, please.
MR. CORNELL: I could do that if you need somebody to call --
looking for a volunteer?
CHAIRMAN HILL: Oh, okay. Cornell?
MR. CORNELL: Here.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Smith?
MR. SMITH: Here.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Coe?
MR. COE'- Here.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Carlson?
MR. CARLSON: Here.
CHAIRMAN HILL: McVey?
MR. MCVEY: Here.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Hill? Here.
Let the record show that we have a quorum of six out of the
eight constituted members.
Call your attention to the agenda. I have one small item to
add to the agenda and Mr. Gary Julian is here and would like a
few minutes under new business to talk about the Sanibel gopher
tortoise ordinance. Did I get that correct? MR. JULIAN: Protection ordinance.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Protection ordinance. I'd like to add that as
the first item under new business and that will just take a few
minutes of presentation.
(Mr. Baxter entered the hearing room.)
MR. LENBERGER: We have our new EAC member, Jack
Baxter.
MR. CHRZANOWSKI: Mr. Chairman? John DiNunzio has an
excused absence.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Fine, thank you.
MR. CARLSON: Hunting season?
MR. COE: Gopher hunting season.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Okay. I'd officially like to welcome Mr.
Baxter to the council.
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February 2, 2000
MR. BAXTER: Thank you.
CHAIRMAN HILL: It's good to have you, good to have that
seat filled.
Is that an agenda copy there?
MR. BAXTER: Yes.
MR. NINO: I just gave him the reports, that's all.
CHAIRMAN HILL: With that addition under new business, I'd
like a motion for approval of the agenda as amended.
MR. SMITH: I'll so move.
MR. CORNELL: Second.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Moved and seconded. Any discussion?
Those in favor, aye.
Opposed?
(No response)
CHAIRMAN HILL: Minutes approved then, count of 7-0.
You have before you, I think, minutes of both the December
and the January meetings, I think December the 1st. Are there
any additions or corrections to the minutes?
MR. SMITH: Mr. Chairman, the minutes for December do not
show me as present, even though I was.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Okay. Could we add that then, please, that
Mr. Smith, was, in fact, here?
Any other comments or corrections to the December minutes?
MR. CORNELL: Move we approve.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Is there a second?
MR. CARLSON: Second.
CHAIRMAN HILL: All those in favor, signify by saying aye.
Opposed, same?
(No response)
CHAIRMAN HILL: January the 5th meeting of the council,
minutes are before you, I think.
MR. CORNELL: Move we approve.
MR. SMITH: Second.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Discussion? All those in favor, aye.
Opposed?
(No response)
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February 2, 2000
CHAIRMAN HILL: Thank you. Both minutes are approved
unanimously.
*** Item number four, believe it or not, land use petitions is
vacant. I assume we have none added to the agenda? MR. CHRZANOWSKI: That's correct.
MR. CORNELL: Does that imply the growth is slowing down in
Collier County or --
CHAIRMAN HILL: Either that or they don't want to come
before us or something.
MR. SMITH: Actually, Mr. Chairman, I'm not kidding, there is a
note here in front of me that explains it all. It says, good
morning, this is God. I'll be handling all your problems today. I
will not need your help, so have a good day.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Do I hear a motion to adjourn then?
*** Item number five, old business. We started our growth
management sub-committee, which is mandated by -- or
legislated when we were considering the NRPA in particular, and
since that time, it's kind of gone by the wayside and it's an
agenda item. I think we have to revive that and take a look at
our responsibilities. Mr. Lorenz?
MR. LORENZ: Yes, for the record, Bill Lorenz, Natural
Resources Director. Just to give you where we are with the
growth management process, we've got two advisory
committees that the board has developed and they were working
on various aspects -- or actually two geographical areas in the
county that would cover the requirements of the final
assessment.
What -- as staff~ what I would like to be able to do is to have
the EAC's growth management sub-committee, the ability to
provide information to that sub-committee, bounce ideas off of
that sub-committee, get input from the sub-committee as we
work through these other two committees, and to the degree
that that sub-committee would want to bring some major issues
or -- up to the full Environmental Advisory Council for
consideration for formal input into the process, then obviously
that's -- that would be the -- up to the sub-committee and how it
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February 2, 2000
works with the full EAC, but I definitely would like to be able to
have that ability for the EAC, especially since part of your
mandate in terms of your ordinance and your responsibilities is in
growth management.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Correct me if I'm wrong, Bill, but it seemed
to me from the outset that the growth management
sub-committee of EAC was to be built into the process, as you
said, mandated and be a part of the planning process along with
the two committees that are in existence, so that we were, I
thought, to be contacted in that process. Now, is that true or are
we totally to be active on our own?
MR. LORENZ: Well, I think that's kind of a -- maybe a choice
that -- how -- the direction -- your preference as the EAC. I mean,
there are advisory committees that -- that do meet. I know that
some of -- I know, for instance, Mr. Smith is on one of the -- is on
the rural lands committee. I think that some of the advisory
members may have attended some of the -- some of the
committees. I'd like to be able to get a -- the way you'd want to
be able to handle the -- your participation. For instance, if the
sub-committee -- if you want to have a standing meeting, let's
say, monthly for me to brief the committee and receive input, I --
we can do that. Basically I want to be able to, in other words,
confirm that your sub-committee will be involved in the effort and
set up the mechanism by which you prefer to be involved in it,
because I can work either way.
MR. SMITH: Mr. Chairman, I -- just to -- to kind of have some
discussion here, and I don't mean this to -- to say this ought to be
what it is, but I just wanted to explore the idea that what we're
dealing with really is a -- an order from the administrative
department with the governor and the cabinet ordering that the
community be involved as much as possible and that there be as
much input as possible from as many sources as possible locally,
so in that sense, I think the more, the better, but I wondered if
there might be a -- instead of having a sub-committee, and I don't
suggest that we do away with the sub-committee, but I'm
exploring maybe that as a possibility, that this EAC, the council,
schedule a time for public input at some point or another or for
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February 2, 2000
ideas or for reports from the various other -- from the other two
groups that have been set up specifically for that purpose rather
than having a sub-committee. It seems to me that the
sub-committee step may -- may impede rather than enhance the
ability to have more community input.
MR. CORNELL: Mr. Chairman?
CHAIRMAN HILL: Yes, Mr. Cornell.
MR. CORNELL: Isn't it true that the sub-committee is a part of
the ordinance?
MR. LORENZ: The EAC ordinance requires a -- one standing
sub-committee. It can be more, but it requires a growth
management sub-committee.
MR. CORNELL: Yeah. I mean, I personally think your idea's
great of getting together on a monthly basis and, you know,
working out with you the best way to interact with these -- with
these two advisory committees.
MR. SMITH: I'm just not clear on this. You mean the
ordinance that sets up the Environmental Advisory Council has a
requirement that a sub-committee be established? Okay. I'm
sorry, I didn't -- I was not aware of that.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Right. That's only one -- that's the only
sub-committee that's postulated in the enabling ordinance.
MR. SMITH: Well, then obviously my comments don't have any
significance.
CHAIRMAN HILL: When that committee started, it was my
understanding that with the heavy load of petitions before the
council, that it would be much more efficient to have some of
those considerations done on a sub-committee basis with
contact with the full council rather than have all of it occur
before the full council, but that sub-committee, I thought, was to
be built into the process, and we have not heard anything from
the other committees to involve us.
Now, maybe that's partly our fault for not taking the initiative,
but I think we do have to form the committee and I would hope
the council would feel that it would be a vital part of that whole
process. Now, how do we do that?
MR. LORENZ: Well, my -- my suggestion is to have the
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February 2, 2000
standing -- your standing sub-committee, whether it's three
members or five members, and I think we may have to even
maybe take a look at who's on the sub-committee, to meet on
some regular basis to get really detailed briefings and have a lot
of interchange with staff. The sub-committee at that particular
point -- your sub-committee then can determine what are the
issues that are -- that are important to bring to the full EAC, so
that the full EAC's time is spent more effectively through the, and
I'm going to use the term filtering process, of the sub-committee
members.
CHAIRMAN HILL: I think it makes the efficiency of both
sub-committee and the full council much more -- much higher. I'd
like to suggest, with the approval of the council -- see, Dan was
on that, and now with a new member, that we re-form that
committee and I think we had a committee of four and I was an
ex-officio member, I think, but however the council would like to
structure it, but let's, today, put that committee back together
again.
MR. NINO: Mr. Hill, if I may -- Ron Nino. If I may editorialize
from your comment. You said in the process. I think that once
you set up your committee and they meet on a regular basis to
review an agenda, which may be in part initiated by staff, but
certainly could be initiated by the committee itself, that that is
the process, you're then in the process. MR. CORNELL: Right.
CHAIRMAN HILL: But the process also includes the other two
standing committees, and I thought we were to be an integral
part of that process.
MR. NINO: Well, whatever comes out of those committees
would eventually end up on your table.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Okay. The council's table?
MR. NINO: Yes, EAC's table.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Right.
MR. CORNELL: So what do we do or who is on it or is it a --
it's been a while since we've talked about it.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Let me take privilege of the chair, and with
your permission, we'll reconstitute that committee completely at
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this point.
MR. CORNELL: Okay.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Is there somebody that would like to serve
on that committee?
MR. CORNELL: I would love to.
MR. SMITH: I would also.
MR. CARLSON: I will.
MR. NINO: Again, if I may, that committee could be an
unlimited number. It could be the -- it could be your entire board,
if that's what --
CHAIRMAN HILL: I think the efficiency would be highest if it
was a small portion.
MR. LORENZ: So it would be Keen Cornell, Ed Carlson, and I
didn't hear the --
MR. CARLSON: Mr. Smith.
MR. SMITH: Did you miss Smith?
CHAIRMAN HILL: Why don't I again -- let me digress for just a
moment. Between EAB and EAC and the reformation, when is
our anniversary year? It's not calendar year now, but -- and the
reason I ask, there will be people going off the -- the formation
was April; is that correct? Do you remember, Bill?
MR. LORENZ: It was April, yes. The terms --
CHAIRMAN HILL: So there were some one year appointees
that will go off the council in April?
MR. LORENZ: Yes. The terms would expire April 30th of
2000. Mr. Sansbury and Mr. McVey had the one year terms, so
your terms would expire in -- in April of 2000.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Sansbury and McVey?
MR. COE.' Because I think I was two.
MR. NINO: However, they can be reappointed.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Right, yeah.
MR. LORENZ: Subject to the board's appointment process.
CHAIRMAN HILL: And when do we need to notify the Board of
County Commissioners and ask for reappointment?
MR. LORENZ: Well, typically for -- Sue Filson, who is the
administrative assistant to the Board of County Commissioners,
typically monitors these expiration dates and will send out
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February 2, 2000
notices at an appropriate time -- time frame. I will -- I will take it
on my own and I'll just give her a ring just to make sure since
this board was -- this is its first year and I can give her a call and
make sure of that.
CHAIRMAN HILL: I will add my name again as ex-officio and
maybe suggest that the chairman might serve in that capacity
when a new chairman is appointed.
So let's have a -- a motion then from the council to appoint Mr.
Cornell and Mr. Smith and Mr. Carlson as full-time members of
our growth management sub-committee.
MR. COE: I'll make a motion to that effect.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Second?
MR. MCVEY: I'll second.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Discussion? All those in favor?
Opposed?
(No response)
MR. LORENZ: And Mr. Chairman, would -- just for scheduling
purposes, is there a time, a day, times that like kind of work on
here right now, because then I've -- we can't talk together, so is
there any better times or worse times for the members?
CHAIRMAN HILL: Let me ask for the three members to --
MR. LORENZ: Maybe we can set the first meeting up right
here and then we can get it on the schedule and I can get it
noticed.
MR. SMITH: Well, for me, evenings would certainly be a help.
MR. LORENZ: Okay.
CHAIRMAN HILL: We met at five, I think, the last time, didn't
we, when the committee met? It was five o'clock that we --
MR. SMITH: Two separate meetings. One of them was at five.
MR. CORNELL: Well, you guys work for a living, so I would
think it should start with you.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Don't look at me, I don't work.
MR. CORNELL: I'm looking at Bill also, so --
CHAIRMAN HILL: Ed?
MR. CARLSON: Afternoon meeting is fine, at five o'clock
would be fine with me.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Keen?
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February 2, 2000
MR. CORNELL:
CHAIRMAN HILL:
MR. SMITH: Sure.
CHAIRMAN HILL:
another?
Sure,
Richard?
Any day of the week any better than
MR. SMITH: Tuesday for me is probably the best.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Tuesday?
MR. CARLSON: That's fine.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Keen?
MR. CORNELL: So you're talking about normally Tuesday, two
weeks before --
CHAIRMAN HILL: That's a suggestion, yes. Okay. I think we
-- we ought to have one before that two week window. MR. CORNELL: Sure. That sounds fine. Sure.
CHAIRMAN HILL: May I tentatively suggest February 15th,
two weeks from yesterday?
MR. CORNELL: Okay. That's at five o'clock? And we'd meet
probably over at the --
CHAIRMAN HILL: Conference room over at --
MR. LORENZ: Probably over at Horseshoe, but let me -- I'll
shoot to set that -- that location up, but I will call everybody and
I'll confirm it and then we'll go through the regular public notice.
MR. CARLSON: I have an event that day and I'm not sure
when it's going to be over.
CHAIRMAN HILL: I just picked that as in between now and
Is Wednesday any better? Do you have a
the -- MR. CORNELL:
better day, Ed or --
MR. CARLSON:
MR. CORNELL:
MR. CARLSON:
Just the 15th is --
Oh, just the 15th?
Just the 15th is a conflict with me.
CHAIRMAN HILL: How about next week, the 8th?
MR. CORNELL: Sure.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Ed?
MR. CARLSON: That's fine.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Richard?
MR. SMITH: I don't have my calendar here. I don't --
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February 2, 2000
CHAIRMAN HILL: Why don't we tentatively set five p.m.
February 8th, and if you would notify us, Bill?
MR. LORENZ: Okay. We'll be able to do a public notice for
that.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Yeah. Does that give you time for public
notice?
MR. LORENZ: Yes.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Six days.
MR. LORENZ: Yeah, for -- in the past -- of course I'm looking
at Marni, in the past for sub-committee meetings, we've done it
as -- as less as 24 hours, but --
CHAIRMAN HILL: Does -- does that conflict with any of staff's
commitments, Tuesdays at five o'clock?
MR. LORENZ: No, that is fine. I'll be the lead staff for it, so --
MR. NINO: Wednesdays and Thursdays are bad days for staff
because DSAC holds their -- the DSAC and their sub-committees
tend to meet on Wednesday and Thursday and, of course, the
board meets on Tuesday.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Right.
MR. NINO: So hopefully the board's done by five o'clock.
MR. LORENZ: And since we're talking about the growth
management plan, the rural fringe committee has been meeting
the second and the fourth meeting -- second and fourth
Wednesdays at 5:15, so this month they'll be meeting on
February 9th and February 23rd, so just for kind of informational
purposes, that's the rural fringe committee.
CHAIRMAN HILL: The second and fourth Wednesdays?
MR. LORENZ: Yes, that's what they've been -- that's been
their meeting schedule.
CHAIRMAN HILL: At what time and where?
MR. LORENZ: 5:15 at conference room E at Development
Services.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Okay.
MR. CARLSON: Could those of us on this sub-committee just
get on the mailing list for all the agendas and meeting times and
minutes and summaries and everything that's going on in those
meetings so that we can attend if we want to and --
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February 2, 2000
MR. LORENZ: Yes, we can -- we can make -- I can make an
arrangement that if-- if--just the sub-committee members or
would all the EAC members like to receive the packets?
CHAIRMAN HILL: I'd like all the members to --
MR. LORENZ: Okay. We can make that arrangement so when
we -- we send those out. For past information, we do log on to
the natural resources web site, the growth management section,
and what we have done is we have put all the related information
on that web site in addition to the agenda and the -- all the
meeting minutes of the past two advisory committee meetings,
and what I'll also do too for the public is, we'll be posting the
dates and times of the EAC sub-committee's meetings as well on
that web site so the public has an opportunity to see -- to
participate as much as possible.
CHAIRMAN HILL: You know, I would hope that you'd pass on
to them, and maybe that should come in a letter from me, that --
that we and our sub-committee would like to be involved in this
and be thought as a part of the whole process, if you would pass
that on --
MR. LORENZ: Yeah, we certainly will. We'll make that
announcement at the next two meetings of the two
sub-committees -- of the two committees.
CHAIRMAN HILL: So their next meeting will be the 9th then?
MR. LORENZ: The fringe committee, that's correct.
MR. CORNELL: And what about Eastern Collier?
MR. LORENZ: That meeting has not been scheduled yet, the
next meeting, although we're looking at trying to get something
within the next month to look at what we're calling
environmental impact methodology for various land use
alternatives.
MR. CORNELL: Good deal.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Thank you, Mr. Lorenz.
I failed in my duty to welcome the public. What I'd like to do
with the permission of the council now is to ask, since we have
no petitions, but is there any member of the public that would
like to address the council under the new business category?
All right. Okay. I would like then to ask Mr. Julian, who has
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requested some time relative to the Sanibel gopher protection
ordinance -- did I get that right?
MR. JULIAN: Gopher tortoise. We'll have you saying it right
soon.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Yeah, not gophers. If you would state your
name and --
MR. JULIAN: Good morning. My name's Gary Julian. I'm just
a private citizen concerned with the plight of the gopher
tortoises. For months now, I've been trying to get the
commission to adopt the Sanibel gopher tortoise protection
ordinance. It's been working over in Sanibel. It supersedes the
state's policy. It's called the incidental take fee where they can
pay $6,000 an acre to develop without too much regard for the
gopher tortoises, and at this point, the population is estimated to
be around 25 percent, that's what's left of the gopher tortoise
population here in Florida, and since the gopher tortoise protects
by its burrows, I'm sorry, I'm kind of nervous, it supports the lives
of 360 other species. That's why I find the gopher tortoise so
important and I'm trying to bring this to everybody so we
understand and start really protecting the gopher tortoise
because he's not being protected. He's in danger, but he's not
protected by the State of Florida. He's an endangered species.
That's another thing everybody gets wrong, they get confused
with endangered and protected. Well, he's not protected. He's
endangered, and I propose that this ordinance Sanibel has
already, that Collier County adopt it, and that we do a study on
the gopher tortoises to find out exactly how many we have in
Collier County and start protecting them and that's -- that's what
I'd like to propose to this committee.
MR. CORNELL: You say there's an ordinance in the City of
Sanibel?
MR. JULIAN: Correct.
MR. CORNELL: Okay. And you would like something like that
to take place -- or we should have one here?
MR. JULIAN: Yes, I'd like Collier County to adopt Sanibel's
ordinance.
MR. COE: Do you have a copy of that ordinance?
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February 2, 2000
MR. JULIAN: Yes, I do. I'll make sure all you gentlemen have
one.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Yeah, If you get copies or -- leave one for
US,
MR. JULIAN: Yeah, before I leave this building, I'll make sure
you all have a copy. Are there any questions?
MR. BAXTER: Do you have a proposed study?
MR. JULIAN: Do I have a proposed study? Yes.
MR. BAXTER: Do you have the cost of it?
MR. JULIAN: No.
MR. CORNELL: Was there a study? How did it go in Sanibel,
was there a study done? What was the -- MR. JULIAN: Not to my knowledge.
MR. CORNELL: How do they happen to have one? I just
wondered.
MR. JULIAN: Sanibel doesn't have a study, that's the second
phase.
MR. CORNELL: But they have an ordinance?
MR. JULIAN: They have an ordinance, yes. I shouldn't say
they don't have a study, they might, but --
CHAIRMAN HILL: What was the impetus behind the ordinance
then, was an original study made on Sanibel Island?
MR. JULIAN: I guess just what was transpiring with the
incidental take fee, the money goes into a mitigation fund and
the tortoises are relocated, but the relocations aren't as good a
habitat as they were taken out of and because of the upper
respiratory tract disease, you know, a lot of them were dying out.
CHAIRMAN HILL: I know we've had some difficult and hearty
and heated discussions in the council on the gopher tortoise and
I -- I certainly think the council would like to take a look at what
you're suggesting.
MR. JULIAN: Great. Thank you. Again, I'd like to apologize
for my nervousness. This is my first time for --
CHAIRMAN HILL: Don't even consider it. We're all nervous up
here too.
MR. JULIAN: Okay. Thank you.
CHAIRMAN HILL: If you would get us copies of--
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February 2, 2000
MR. JULIAN: Yes, I will and I'll work on the cost of the study.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Mr. Lorenz, do you know of anything in
existence that might complement what Mr. Julian is saying?
MR. LORENZ: What we have done -- Commissioner Carter had
requested a report from staff that we presented to him in the
December, January time frame and he's -- he indicated back to
us that he was interested in staff pursuing the matter to some
degree, even to the point of perhaps proposing some land
development code amendments for the next appropriate land
development cycle. Just yesterday I began the -- the effort to
bring Barbara Burgeson in and my staff and to start to create a
little bit of a work plan and a study scope, and what I'll do is I'll
present -- I'll copy the EAC on that report that went to
Commissioner Carter.
We've addressed some -- some of the items in the Sanibel
ordinance. Very briefly, we're not sure that the Sanibel
ordinance is going to do much more from what -- from our
ordinance. However, we do have some areas for some possible
improvement, so that's part --
MR. JULIAN: Yeah, because our ordinance doesn't supersede
the state policy.
MR. LORENZ: Right. So that's part of the information that we
have in that -- that report. So I can present that to the -- I can
make copies of that available to the council and then we'll be
putting ourselves on some -- some type of schedule to -- to
develop that, flesh that out a little bit more, and then of course,
any of this information would obviously come back to the full
EAC for -- for input or for approval and recommendations to the
board.
MR. CORNELL.' Bill, didn't you express a concern a while ago
about the need for habitat protection ordinances in -- in -- more
generally?
MR. LORENZ: Well, yes, that was back in '92, '93, we were --
staff was working on what we called a habitat protection
ordinance that would have addressed some of the concerns, I
think, for the gopher tortoises with regard to prioritizing habitat
and looking at the highest quality habitats to be preserved on
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February 2, 2000
site through a ranking process that was built into the ordinance.
It may not have addressed all the issues for gopher tortoises,
but --
MR. CORNELL: Could this give new life to that effort or did
that just sort of fizzle or something?
MR. LORENZ: Well, I think this could be, to some degree,
incorporated into -- into that process. The process for the
growth management plan, the final order, we have to look at
listed species concerns through the final order, so that will all be
part of it as well. So one can kind of take a look at it as
everything kind of coming together through it all, so we're trying
to coordinate all those recommendations.
CHAIRMAN HILL: A question for Mr. Julian, have you
presented this to Lee County? Have they --
MR. LORENZ: No, I haven't. No, sir. I've introduced it to the
Conservancy and FGCU.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Any comment from the public members
relative to this? Mike?
MR. SIMONIK: Thanks, Mr. Chairman. Michael Simonik from
the Conservancy. Gary did come and talk to us at the
Conservancy and we support all of his efforts that he's doing on
the gopher tortoises, and as I told him, he wants us to make
gopher tortoises our number one issue. We'd like to have it our
number one -- we'd like to have everything our number one issue.
We're working on 133 different items right now, but we just -- our
board decided to pick the top ten for the year 2000 and gopher
tortoises doesn't make the top ten, but it's great to have citizens,
and Gary didn't tell you, he's from Marco Island. He's from Collier
County and he's been working behind the scenes on this issue.
He has a group that's been formed, the Gopher Tortoises
Guardians, he has a web site out on the web, people can read
about the gophers and find out more about them and educate
themselves about the gophers, and I come to these meetings, I
watch the EAC meetings, I watch what goes on with the
permitting and what happens with the gopher tortoises every
month that you guys meet and every Tuesday at the County
Page 16
February 2, 2000
Commission, and on the point of gophers, I had a call maybe two
weeks ago from one of the consultants on Little Pine Island that
was passed through EAC, and I don't know how far it's gotten in
Planning Commission and the Board, but they've got 40 gopher
tortoises, 30 to 40, he said they're trying to find a home for, and
he said, do you want them at the Conservancy, and I said, no, we
don't want any gophers, we've got enough already in rehab that
we're trying to fix their shells and find places for them to live too.
One of the ideas I had for him was the new Fleishmann
property, which, very good, was supported yesterday in the
election and won it four to one, now we have Fleishmann
property that used to have gophers on it, probably the only
gopher habitat in the city proper of Naples that some of those
gophers, maybe 10, 20 of those from Little Pine -- what's it
called, Little Palm --
CHAIRMAN HILL: Yeah, not pine.
MR. LORENZ: .. Little Palm Island can go to that site and
maybe be relocated onto Fleishmann if there's nice little fencing
put in or something, I don't know, it's an idea, but we're always
trying to figure out what to do with the gopher tortoises, and I
really do believe, Gary, that we don't protect them here in Collier
County.
There can be a better ordinance and this is the perfect
opportunity for the EAC members to work on issues exactly like
this. It's an environmental policy issue. It's analysis of the
policies that we have here in the county. It's the role mandated
by -- in the ordinance to the EAC. The reason why EPTAB was
molded into the EAC was because they told us on EPTAB, all of
these policy issues would be taken up at the EAC and in your
sub-committee meetings and meetings like this today. I really
haven't seen that happen as much as I'd like to see it happen on
the EAC, which is why I again tried to get on the EAC, and I think
your Mr. Baxter, congratulations, they'll never put me on, so don't
feel bad, and I'll keep trying, I'm persistent, but it is important to
talk about what our policies are in the county and what we have,
are they the right ones, are they the best ones, and I hear all the
time from land use attorneys, oh, Collier County goes over and
Page 17
February 2, 2000
above every other county. Well, that's just not true.
I've had DCA tell me that Lee County, some of their
protections are better than ours, which shocked me, to think that
Lee County was better than us, and now I'm going to go into
another subject that I want to talk about today.
There are other counties that protect environmental
resources better than Collier County and Martin County is one of
those. We keep hearing, oh, they're making us do too much, the
governor and cabinet is pushing too far for Collier County. Well,
they're not, because other places have passed and approved
ordinances that are much better than the ones we have here in
Collier County, and for example, is the Martin County wetland
protection ordinance, which is what this is.
A couple months ago, I had a commissioner from Martin
County, an elected commissioner, a Republican, call me and tell
me she wanted to send me their wetland ordinance they just
passed this June of '99 because they had heard that we were
dealing with the same issues here in Collier County, so she sent
me this whole packet and I talked to her on the phone, and I
think it's Commissioner Melzer, I can't remember her name, but --
it's been a few months, but this is a no wetlands loss, no
wetlands impact ordinance, and it passed, and it passed in
Martin County, and other places are looking at it and I believe we
ought to look at it.
They have just as many wetlands in Martin County. They're on
Lake Okeechobee and in the Everglades area. They have just as
many wetlands as we do. They have developers, they have
development pressure just as we do and they have a no wetlands
impact ordinance.
We don't come anywhere near that. I sit here on Tuesdays at
County Commission and watch us pass hundreds of acres of
wetland impact, wetland loss, wetland destruction, wetland
obliteration is what I call it, and we watch it every month here in
Collier County and this is something that I think the EAC should
take on in their sub-committees, growth management.
In EPTAB, we used to have a natural resource sub-committee
and we would deal with policy issues, do we have the right policy
Page 18
February 2, 2000
in Collier County, is it what's best for Collier County? We're the
western Everglades. We're not just somewhere in the middle of
Ohio. We're the western Everglades. We're a national treasure.
Eastern Collier County, all of Collier County, it's a worldwide
treasure. It's called the Everglades, and it's up to us to protect
it.
Martin County's doing their job. Other counties are looking at
it and I would like the EAC, and I'll leave a copy for Steve or
somebody to copy for all of you, so that a sub-committee can
look at this ordinance, see if it's -- whatever you want to pass on,
but at least look at it because other counties have done it. We're
not the only ones trying to protect natural resources in Florida.
So I'll just leave this with you, and thank you very much, but I
do support everything Gary says and he's really working hard and
he's just a regular guy from Marco Island and I think he owns a
sign shop or something, but this is the first time he's ever, you
know, called the Conservancy. He's not one of us. He's what
people are thinking out there, and the county ought to be doing
something about it because Gary's not the only one. I can tell
you, I get calls every day about this. Gary's not the only one. So
I urge you to look at both of these issues, on gophers and on
wetlands. Thank you.
CHAIRMAN HILL: How far is he from your top ten? How far
are the gopher tortoises from your --
MR. LORENZ: Today, it's number one.
MR. CARLSON: I have a question for Mike. Rather than just
handing us that ordinance cold, have you done a review of it or a
summary or an executive summary to --
MR. SIMONIK: I haven't -- normally the Conservancy does
position statements on issues. I haven't done that, but I plan on
doing one for this and giving -- a background of it, what we
believe is right for this, but I have perused through this. I haven't
read it all. I can say with everything else we're --
MR. CARLSON: But you expect us to read it. Come on.
MR. SIMONIK: Right. Well, you're sitting up there and I'm not.
Thanks. Anybody else?
CHAIRMAN HILL: I guess it needs to be said on behalf of the
Page 19
February 2, 2000
council, I'm sure we have missed some of the efforts that we
should be involved in, but we're brand new. We're feeling our
way in this whole process and we've had disruptions and
tremendous responsibility with respect to petitions, a lot of new
items for this group, but I think once we get our -- our focus
correct, I think we'll be involved in a number of these things.
When EPTAB and EAB were put together, a lot of
responsibilities were piled on and we weren't totally aware of all
of our responsibilities, but it's a growth problem and a learning
curve for us too. Thank you, Mike. Mr. Coe?
MR. COE: Marni, I -- I have to get my mike over here. I've got
a question for you. We have a court reporter that, you know,
does the minutes for us. They've got like 30 days, I guess it is, to
complete it and get it back to us. In that 30 day period, the
Planning Commission's met, the County Commissioners have
met. In other words, all the minutes do is, they come back to us
and we approve them.
Now, we also have VCR taping done of the proceedings here.
MS. SCUDERI: Right.
MR. COE: Why are we doing both? It seems to me the
minutes are a total waste of time and money when it's all on
tape.
MS. SCUDERI: We -- as far as I know, the reason that we have
the court reporter here is so that we have the written record,
which is necessary in case anybody tries to bring something up
to the next level. The video, I guess that's just --
MR. COE.' Why isn't the video good enough? It's good enough
for the police in their DWI cases.
MS. SCUDERI: Generally, if something want's to go to the
next level, you need to have a written record.
MR. COE: Can't you take it then, if they decide to go to the
next level, just take it right off the VCR tape? It seems like we're
wasting a heck of a lot of money.
MS. SCUDERI.' I can find out about it for you. I can't tell you
the exact policy reasons right now, but I can find out for you.
MR. COE: All right, fine. Thank you.
Page 20
February 2, 2000
CHAIRMAN HILL: I don't want to put words in Mr. Coe's
mouth, and I think one of the problems, and I think we've
discussed this before with the council, our deliberations
reflected in part by our minutes should be of value to people
down the line such as the commissioners or the Planning
Commission and it -- it's non-existent by the time our
deliberations and the petitions get to those -- those staff. So in
that sense, it's not doing any -- or isn't of any value to later steps
in the process.
MS. SCUDERI: So your request would be that the written
minutes come earlier so that the other councils can see it?
CHAIRMAN HILL: Well, I think we're all concerned that our
deliberations, except in very brief summary form, don't get to the
Planning Commission and the Board.
MS. SCUDERI: That, I would have to ask Ron about.
CHAIRMAN HILL: And whether there's a solution to that or
not -- Ron, do you have --
MR. COE: See, we discussed this a while back. You know
where it's coming from. You all don't even have the advantage of
having it when you write your summary, so basically, if you aren't
taking notes now to write the summary for the Planning
Commission and for the County Commissioners, the only thing
you've got is the possibility of getting the VCR tape or doing it
from memory, so why do we have minutes anyway?
MR. NINO: Well, the minutes are the official record, of course.
MR. COE: But the tape could be just as official, couldn't it?
MR. NINO: Well, I -- how do you get a tape and --
MR. COE: I've done it. All you do is call the little lady over
there and she makes you a copy and sends --
MR. NINO: Makes you a copy?
MR. COE: Yep.
MR. NINO: And that's a verbatim record of the minutes?
MR. COE: Exactly what we've got here. They throw on the
camera and we start blabbing.
MR. NINO: Then we should fire this young lady here and do
that, but you asked for, I think it was at your direction, that we
solicited the recording organization so that you could have
Page 21
February 2, 2000
verbatim minutes in print. We could always change that, but to
get back to your -- where you're coming from, in many instances,
we do have the minutes -- staff does have the minutes available
to it when it is preparing its executive summary for the -- for
presentation to the BCC, but aside from that, I mean, normally
what goes into an executive summary is a very -- is basically
your decision and why you made your decision.
I don't think we need the verbatim -- we don't need the
minutes in their verbatim style in order to convey that position to
the Board of County Commissioners. However, in the last couple
of months, we have included in our executive summary package,
the EAC staff report that I believe the commission -- you sign,
Chairman Hill, and once you sign it, that, in fact, becomes your
report. Now, those do go with the executive summary. We've
been doing that for the last couple of months.
MR. COE: So basically you're saying the same thing we're
saying, that generally speaking, you aren't getting a copy of the
minutes, you really have no use for them?
MR. NINO:
record.
MR. COE:
MR. NINO.'
MR. COE:
would be great.
Other than they're -- other than they're an official
Which a VCR tape is the same.
Correct. We don't need them.
Okay. Well, Marni, if you could get back to us, that
MS. SCUDERI'- Absolutely.
MR. COE.' All right, thank you.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Marni, were you saying that a written
record has more standing in, I'll use the term
court, not necessarily in the total formal sense, but -- than a
videotape?
MS. SCUDERI-' Well, the videotape would have to be
transcribed. When it goes to another level, it has -- it generally,
unless there's a situation I am unaware of, which is possible, it
has to be written. I understand Mr. Coe's point that the
videotape could be transcribed.
I don't know is my -- is an honest answer between the
transcription of the videotape versus the court reporter being in
Page 22
February 2, 2000
court, and that, I can find out for you.
MR. NINO: For what it's worth, of course, the Board of County
Commissioners' meeting is both video recorded and recorded by
a recording service, similarly, the Planning Commission. We -- I
would think that there's some legal, just conclusion behind the
fact that the Board does it.
MR. COE: I don't know that, so I'm not going to speculate. I
learned that a long time ago. As a second lieutenant, I never
assume a thing.
MR. SMITH: All right. Can I say something since I do have
some knowledge on this? The -- the transcription is something
that can be introduced as evidence. The tape probably cannot
be, even a transcription from the tape cannot be, so that's the
reason.
CHAIRMAN HILL: So a videotape would not have any standing
in the legal sense?
MR. SMITH: Likely, there would be an objection that would be
upheld, if somebody made such an objection.
CHAIRMAN HILL: I'm going to plead ignorance, and I -- I'm
sorry I missed it. What happened to the Little Palm Island when
it went before the commissioners?
MR. NINO: That entire -- that petition has been put on
indefinite hold. So we won't know for another three or four
months if they decide to go ahead with it or not. We'll let you --
CHAIRMAN HILL: Anything else with respect to an official
copy?
*** Okay. Official new business, item 6(A), planning and land
use approval process.
MR. NINO: Ron Nino, for the record.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Excuse me, Ron, can I interrupt you? Do
you need a break? Are you sure? Would you raise your hand
when you do?
MR. NINO: We're going to try to walk you through the
development decision making process. I'm going to talk about
where it starts, and it starts, of course, with vacant land and
zoning, in most instances. However, in those instances where
the land is already zoned, then it immediately jumps to an
Page 23
February 2, 2000
administrative site plan review and platting procedure.
Our rezoning process, of course, starts with a pre-application
meeting with the person who is interested in doing something
with their land or a use other than that which it is zoned. Now,
we have applications -- I mean, this is pretty elementary, but
we're not going to give you a course in 101 planning, we're going
to tell you what our procedures are. We have application forms
for various types of rezoning applications, for a standard
rezoning application, for a PUD, and for a conditional use.
I gave you the one application, but really the other
applications are -- are very similar and so to that extent, this
application indicates to you what we ask the -- the applicant to
tell us, and you'll note that a great deal of it is who owns the
property, who's buying the property, who has interest in -- if the
owner is not the applicant, the buyer's the applicant, who are the
members of that buying trust, who are the members of the selling
trust.
We're not only interested in who appears as the trustee in
many instances, but who are all the beneficiaries of the trust. So
it's important, and the Board has directed us time and time again
to make sure that our application fully apprises them of who is
receiving a benefit from selling land and who is receiving a
benefit from rezoning land, and that's why the application is
structured as it is.
Most importantly, the land development code simply doesn't
leave to the planning staff and to the county Planning
Commission the ability, without any foundation or basis for its
decision, to recommend that land be rezoned, and the land
development code specifically has findings that staff has to
make and findings that the Planning Commission have to make,
and indeed, findings that the Board has to -- they're all the same
findings, but we need to all make those findings in order to
justify a recommendation or an action to rezone land.
I've given you a copy of the rezone findings and the PUD
findings. However, there are findings not as elaborate as the
findings for a rezone, for conditional uses and for variances and
indeed for boat docks, and indeed for any type of land use
Page 24
February 2, 2000
petition we have. It's necessary for staff to make a positive
finding that supports the decision, the recommendation to
approve the petition. So it's not a shoot from the hip kind of
thing, or believe me, I'm a planner and I've been trained and I'm
telling you that this is a good land use decision and that's it, you
know. We have to follow the findings that are prescribed for
each and every application.
Now, it doesn't mean that you have to meet 100 percent of
the findings, but you need to meet a preponderance of the
findings and that -- to justify a recommendation to rezone, and of
course, the Board has to do the same thing.
Now, in addition to the findings, however, the growth
management plan says that a recommendation to rezone
property has to be consistent with the comprehensive plan for
county -- Collier County. That also happens to be one of the
findings, but remember, the zoning -- a recommendation to zone
land has to be based and has to be -- complement a
comprehensive plan for the community. Many years ago, the
courts said that zoning has to be based upon a plan and that
decision was some 50 years -- is some 50 years old now.
For a long time, we didn't know whether the zoning plan, the
zoning map for the community, in fact, could constitute the
master plan. However, that -- that lack of understanding has
gone away many years ago, and today what is a comprehensive
plan is something that is a lot more in depth in terms of how you
strategize the development of your land use resources, and the
land use -- and a zoning map simply doesn't do that.
A zoning map is -- is a wish list, you might say -- not a wish
list, but it's how you intend to carry out your master plan and
there needs to be a nexus there. We can't recommend rezoning
land that is inconsistent with the future land use map, for
example.
Keen? Stop me anywhere along the line.
MR. CORNELL: Just a question on that point. Does a -- if a
citizen feels that a rezoning is inconsistent with the
comprehensive plan, does he have standing in court?
MR. NINO: No, I -- well, now you're asking a legal question.
Page 25
February 2, 2000
That -- I don't believe so.
MS. SCUDERI: I'm sorry? You asked --
MR. CORNELL: I'm just asking, if a citizen --
MR. NINO: I can't play lawyer.
MR. CORNELL: -- let's say of the county, felt strongly that a
rezoning decision was not consistent with the comprehensive
plan, does he or she have standing to bring -- to bring an action
against the county or the --
MS. SCUDERI: I'm going to give you an off the cuff answer,
I'm going to say probably not, and Mr. Smith might know more
about standing than I do, actually, in these situations with land
use petitions. My -- my thought would be no, because there are
certain case law and standing that you need to fit into specific
groups.
MR. CORNELL: So you need to have a reason for standing -- to
have standing?
MS. SCUDERI: Right. I could research that issue more for
you, but as far as I know, it doesn't seem -- depending on that
landowner's proximity.
MR. CORNELL: Okay.
MR. NINO: So most importantly, when we stand here and
recommend a rezoning action, we're doing so because we have
concluded that that action is consistent with the county's
comprehensive development plan. That is a key relationship.
However, that's not the only relationship. The comprehensive
plan also directs that staff make a finding of compatibility.
Compatibility, as you know, puts you into a whole subjective
area. Everybody's opinion of what is compatible is different than
somebody else's.
However, it's my understanding that in terms of the legal
definition of compatibility, it has always been the relationship of
one classification of zoning to another classification of zoning,
and -- and more definitively, it has been residential and its
relationship to non-residential, or non-residential in relationship
to residential.
The -- the strict interpretation of compatibility is residential to
commercial to industrial. It's traditionally not multiple family
Page 26
February 2, 2000
residential to single family residential, but that has become one
of the more modern usages of the compatibility test, although I
personally don't believe that it is legal -- it would legally apply if
one made a compatibility conclusion based on single family
versus multiple family or two units per acre versus four units per
acre. In my opinion, that is not consistent with the legal test for
compatibility, but nonetheless, it is widely used and, you know, I
don't think we're ever going to dissuade people from arguing that
it isn't a valid compatibility test.
MR. COE: Wouldn't somewhat of a glaring example be the
boat storage there by the bridges in relationship to the
condominiums that are so close by?
MR. NINO: I would say that's probably a --
MR. COE: I know that wasn't a county deal, but --
MR. NINO: Yeah, sure. The traditional test has been a glue
factory next to a residential area would be the extreme example.
However, in addition to the compatibility test, there are also --
there are also relationships -- planning -- good planning
requirements that talk about the -- the availability of
infrastructure, you know. Is there a good highway system
serving it, is there sewer and water, is storm drainage adequate,
are there community facilities? Oftentimes, nobody thinks
about, you're putting a community out there and there isn't a
drugstore or medical facilities, so the relationship to community
facilities and services. The planner is charged with justifying
that rezoning action or recommendation based on that host of
available infrastructure. Is it adequate to support another urban
development in that location?
Timing is also a consideration. I would hope that if you
picked up our staff reports, you would see all of these things in
them. Timing. Is -- is the action to rezone premature? Is it
urban sprawl and is there a wide gap between the -- the nearest
urbanization -- urban portions of the county? That becomes a
question of timing. Is it appropriate at this point in time to move
the boundary, to jump 100 -- several miles and jump to another
area? That becomes an issue of timing. Even though your
comprehensive plan may have an urban boundary, it doesn't
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February 2, 2000
necessarily follow that an action to rezone anywhere in that
urban boundary is appropriate.
Unfortunately, Collier County's master plan -- or Collier
County's future land use map really doesn't give us direction in
terms of that benchmark that planners use in terms of the
question of timing.
Basically, the philosophy here has been, if you're yellow -- if
you're asking to zone land on the yellow portion of the future
land use map, we have to approve it, aside from whether it's
consistent with a timing theory that says you ought to progress
from the highly urban areas out in increments.
We have been, quite frankly, lumping land areas to get to
other land areas and --
MR. COE: How do we get that turned around?
MR. NINO: Pardon?
MR. COE: How do we get that turned around?
MR. NINO: By amending the growth management plan to say
that development ought to progress in an orderly fashion
outward to meet the extreme limit of the urban boundary.
MR. COE: I use for example, like I noticed a newspaper
article recently where Collier County accepts, I guess, level D
roads or whatever it was, that are like worthless, and if we
would require the higher level of road -- the infrastructure to be
in place ahead of approval of the developments, then it kind of
puts our feet, as citizens -- puts our feet to the fire and says, we
need to pay for that infrastructure before the development goes
in, and we've got countless examples in the county.
MR. NINO: Sure. That's not the way our --
MR. COE: Before -- before, what happens, the citizens step up
to bat, like just happened in Naples, and said, wait a minute, we
aren't gonna have that kind of height, we aren't gonna allow that
growth.
MR. NINO: Yeah. I certainly wouldn't argue with you, Mr. Coe.
That's not the way our growth management's set up. Our
growth management, in terms of the traffic element -- you know,
we have to make a finding that is consistent with every element.
The one that usually binds around here is the traffic element.
Page 28
February 2, 2000
Our comprehensive plan says, you know, to put it in the
simplest terms, it says that the road system can become -- can
be deficient, can go to pot, so to speak, for a period of three
years, as long as we have a committed correction of that
condition. In other words, within that three year window, we
have committed the dollars to bring that road up to standard, so
to get at your question would require us eliminating that window.
What you're saying is, it ought to be done before the
development is permitted. That would require an amendment to
the growth management plan. That's not the way our plan is
structured. Our plan is structured to say that, indeed, you can
permit development, even if the road has gone to pot, i.e., has
fallen below its design level of service, and in Collier County, in
most cases, that's D. However, in some cases, it's even E.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Are you saying, Ron, that there is no
method whereby an approved development can be delayed in
implementation until the infrastructure's in place?
MR. NINO: I'm saying that our growth management plan
doesn't provide for that. In other words, to meet the consistency
test, we merely have to find -- not merely, we have to find that
the road that is deficient will be corrected within a time frame of
three years.
For example, the Whippoorwill projects, you're going to get a
couple of those, Pine Ridge Road is operating below its adopted
level of service. The adopted level of service for Pine Ridge
Road is E and it's operating at F. We have to recommend
approval of those projects, even though that condition exists
because Pine Ridge Road, within the next three years, will be
widened to six lanes, and upon completion of that widening, that
level of service will become C, higher than D. In other words, it
will be corrected and that's the -- you know, that's the legislative
position we find ourselves in.
Now, that's not to say that -- that's not to say that the Board
of County Commissioners cannot take a -- a more restrictive view
of that position, say, for example, phase those projects to
minimize the impact on an already deficient road, but that's a
decision the Board has.
Page 29
February 2, 2000
CHAIRMAN HILL: That was my question. Is there a
mechanism whereby the Board can say, all right, this
development is approved, and we've had, what, four or five along
Livingston Road and Whippoorwill, can they say, right, we'll
approve that, that's consistent, but you can't implement -- you
can't make the development until the infrastructure's in place?
MR. NINO: No, I don't believe the Board can -- the Board can
do anything it wants to do, but to the extent it makes decisions
that are inconsistent with its own plan, it invites litigation and it
may not prevail and we could end up spending a lot of money in
the court system.
MR. COE:
MR. NINO:
MR. COE:
from E to C?
MR. NINO:
MR. COE:
correct?
MR. NINO:
MR. COE:
Correct me if I'm wrong, Pine Ridge Road is at E?
Uh-huh.
We approved the money to widen it to bring it up
Yes.
That's based on the current traffic conditions,
It's based on projected traffic.
Also projected. Well, if it's running at E right now,
one more lane is only going to bring it up to C, correct? Does it
take into consideration all those projects on Livingston Road
that are going to flush onto Pine Ridge?
MR. NINO: Well, Livingston Road will also be eventually
constructed to a six lane facility itself and --
MR. COE: But that traffic that's going to come down
Livingston Road to Pine Ridge is not going to overload Pine Ridge
and -- and drop it from a C to E again?
MR. NINO: Correct. That's -- at least that's what our traffic
experts tell us. That's what our MPO people --
MR. COE: Those are the same guys that are on their way to
work at three a.m. too, right?
MR. NINO: I can't say that. They have a model and their
modeling process supports the proposition that they're telling us,
that six laning of Pine Ridge Road will correct its current
deficiency and --
MR. COE: The reason I say that, I'm not a planner, obviously,
Page 30
February 2, 2000
you can tell by the haircut, but -- what hair's left, but I look at
Highway 41 that's been widened and I see all these homes that
are gonna eventually go out there, particularly if the Collier
project comes through. I don't know if you've been on that road
lately, but it's wall to wall traffic during the daytime. Obviously
this is the season, but you take the traffic that's there now and
what is projected for that area over the next five to ten years, I
don't see how there's any way that road is going to handle that
traffic.
MR. NINO.' Well, they have to because we're required by law.
The minute that -- when we go beyond the three year window and
that condition still exists and now we've widened the lanes to six
roads -- I mean, we've widened the road to six lanes, we know
we're not going to widen roads any more than six lanes, then we
have to trigger, and there's a mechanism in the growth
management plan, there's a mechanism that triggers in the
process leading to a moratorium, and we have to follow that
process. It's -- we have to declare the area as an area of
significant influence and we need to then trigger the public
hearing process to establish the moratorium. That process alone
takes a year.
MR. COE: But does that kick in before, say for example, Pine
Ridge Road drops to E again?
MR. LORENZ: No, it would -- Pine Ridge Road would have to
drop to E again, and there's no solution immediately in mind, in
sight, we have to trigger in the moratorium process or --
MR. COE: But we could change the ordinance and rather than
let it go to E, if it drops to D, then the moratorium would kick in?
MR. NINO: Yes, you could do that, but again, that would
require increasing or improving the level of services over and
above what we've now said is satisfactory, and that would be a --
I suggest to you that would probably be a tough sell because we
think that -- I mean, traffic planners say that while you might --
you and I might find level D inconvenient based on where we're
from and what we've historically been accustomed to, the traffic
planner would say level of service D is a satisfactory level of
Page 3t
February 2, 2000
service in an urban environment.
I mean, you know, I -- I'm -- I grew up in areas of stop -- you
know, stop and go traffic. I personally, I don't know how many
other people would -- would say, I am not terribly inconvenienced
traveling around Collier County, but somebody else may have an
entirely different perspective of that. They may find any
inconvenience as not -- you know, needs to be corrected. I
mean, their level of service standard is higher than mine, and I'm
sure that applies generally to a lot of things in life.
The experts -- the experts have set the standards. The Board
has adopted them, and by virtue of that, we've made a statement
that says that is a satisfactory level of service. Now, when it
goes below that, then we have a mechanism for -- we need to
correct it. By law, we need to correct it, and if we can't correct
it, we need to institute a moratorium.
MR. SMITH: Mr. Nino, I'm impressed sometimes when I -- my
son goes to Florida Gulf Coast University and I travel up there.
I'm impressed with the magnificent roads, as I know everybody
here has seen them, that go through the woods, basically, and
provide access to the university in a setting where you can
anticipate that there's going to be growth, but there has been
some planning done way ahead of time with some vision.
Is there anything in place here in Collier to put those kinds of
roads in areas where, right now, there's nothing but woods, but
where there can be anticipated growth?
MR. NINO: There isn't. We're not going to -- I don't believe
we're going to spend money on an if come somewhere else when
we have so many problems within the urban area that need to be
addressed, you know. The whole business of -- of -- the ultimate
solution, of course, are the fly overs and, you know, we're talking
in terms of just fantastic investments that need to be made if
we're going to deal with that -- that issue satisfactorily.
The day will come when Pine Ridge Road will be deficient
again, Livingston Road will be deficient and they'll be six laned
and --
MR. SMITH: That's what I'm concerned with is that -- and then
it becomes very, very expensive, as you well know, the higher
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February 2, 2000
the property values, the more expensive it is to build roads.
Whereas now I would think there's an opportunity to build for the
future at much, much less of an expense.
MR. COE: If we know this area is going to be an urban area --
in other words, the only way I see that it would not be an urban
area would be if some big benefactor came in here with a couple
of billion dollars and bought up the land between here and the
Everglades, so if we know it's going to be an urban area, why
can't we plan now, and this is what Mr. Smith's saying, why can't
we plan now, plat out the roads for the county? Not leave it for
the developers to do it, but --
MR. NINO: No, I think you're going to --
MR. COE: -- let the county take control of our county, plat out
the roads where we expect the development to be and how we're
going to do these roads.
MR. NINO: If I may, that wasn't really part of our workshop
agenda. The workshop agenda was the --
MR. COE: This is interesting. Again, it's not a battle with --
MR. NINO: No, I understand, but you need somebody else
here if you're going to discuss that type of question. My -- our
function was to tell you, here's how we make land use decisions.
MR. COE: You thought you were going to get away easy,
that's all.
MR. NINO: The issue that you're talking about is -- is a whole
different issue and --
MR. SMITH: But I think as far as the environment is
concerned that -- that it's a very important issue because, you
know, by doing what Mr. Coe's suggesting, we can have a look at
big environmental issues rather than take them piecemeal as
each development comes in.
MR. NINO: Sure, it would be very easy to widen Immokalee
Road to six lanes today all the way to the City of Immokalee, to
widen Pine Ridge Road to six lanes all the way to Wilson
Boulevard.
MR. SMITH: It doesn't go to Wilson.
MR. NINO: Well, where -- as far east as we can carry it and --
MR. LORENZ: That's one of the things that we'll be looking at
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February 2, 2000
when we start talking about the fringe area and the rural area.
We have the opportunity, through the final order, even though the
final order may provide some minimum requirements, to look at
what that growth pattern potentially will be on those areas and
look at what the impacts will be on various infrastructure or
community services, and so we do have that opportunity in the
next three years through the final order to maybe perhaps look at
those types of questions.
MIR. NINO: Yeah, but I suggest -- I think the suggestion here is
that we build -- we build the road far -- far earlier than we
anticipate a problem to arise. In other words, I hear you saying,
we should six lane roads long before the need to six lane them is
in place.
MIR. SMITH: Not really. What I'm suggesting is that it might
be possible to look at the overall Collier County area and
anticipate where there's going to be substantial future growth,
and instead of waiting for that growth to come project by project,
prepare for it by putting some infrastructure in and alleviate
problems that are already in existence by doing that and -- and
also in that process, perhaps address some environmental
concerns that otherwise just aren't going to get addressed.
MIR. NINO: Well, basically we're talking about roads. The
degree to which we marry the land development with the
preservation consciousness, you know, that could be easily
handled.
Maybe our standards aren't high enough right now in terms of
the degree of preservation that ought to occur, but you know,
those numbers can be adjusted and that's your function, to
adjust those numbers, because that's the issue that Michael
Simonik makes, that we're not doing perhaps a good enough job
here in Collier County in preserving those natural resources.
MR. SMITH: I grew up in Broward County and when I was in
Broward County as a child, areas that were -- where we used to
take horses and go out and spend days -- you know, a whole day
without seeing cars and just -- are now the center of town,
basically.
MR. NINO.' Sure, sure.
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February 2, 2000
MR. SMITH: And it occurs to me in looking at where Collier
County is now, that if there had been vision, Broward County
would not be, in terms of traffic and congestion, nearly the
problem it is now, and what I would suggest is that perhaps
there's a way to envision where the potential growth is going to
go so that you can lead it there, if you will, in a way that is going
to be less of an impact on the environment and on the
community as a whole and make it better for the people to have
the development as opposed to make it worse.
MR. NINO: Doesn't that mean building the road prior to --
MR. SMITH: I think it would have to, yes.
MR. BAXTER: Secondary system.
MR. SMITH: I think it would have to.
MR. NINO: And to give you a corollary, we're building
Livingston Road currently from Immokalee to Bonita Beach Road.
We know that road's got to be six laned someday. Aren't you
basically saying, build it six lane right now?
MR. SMITH: Well, one of the problems, I happen to own land
where they're building that road and they're taking part of it, and
one of the problems with Livingston Road is that they waited way
too long. They waited and waited and waited and the property
values kept going up and up and up, and finally they said, we
can't afford it. So what do they do? They look to a private
developer for the money. What I'm suggesting is, why do that
again?
MR. NINO: Because we can't afford to do otherwise.
MR. SMITH: Well, you can't afford to do otherwise either. It's
a question of, pay me now or pay me later.
MR. NINO: Well, it could -- what you're suggesting would
require Collier County to go up and borrow a ton of money in
anticipation of sufficient revenue from impact fees to make the
bond payments.
MR. SMITH: I'm not too sure about that, Mr. Nino, because I
wonder if it might be possible to have a private-public
partnership of some sort where there would be enthusiasm on
both sides and much less of an expense than you might
anticipate from the public coffer.
Page 35
February 2, 2000
MR. NINO: Well, we -- that's exactly the scenario with
Mediterra and Long Bay Park.
MR. SMITH: Yeah, but unfortunately there, it didn't happen
until the place was built up way out of proportion.
MR. NINO: Well, how would we have gotten the public
partnership from Long Bay Partners prior to them buying the
land? I mean, it wasn't going to happen.
Let me also say that Long Bay Partners is not building a road
free of charge for Collier County. They're getting credit for
impact fees. No one -- no developer builds anything for nothing
in Collier County. We give them a credit on their impact fees, so
we're paying for it from impact fees.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Of course, that was the reason the impact
fee was --
MR. COE: So what's wrong with that?
CHAIRMAN HILL: That's what it was for.
MR. NINO: Correct. The problem is, impact fees -- we don't
have enough impact fees to build the roads prior to their
requirement. So the only solution is to borrow money and make
the bond payment on anticipated revenues from impact fees, and
if they fall short, then it's the ad valorem tax, and I suggest to
you that elected officials are not going to gamble to that extent,
at least I don't think they --
MR. SMITH: I think there should at least be some exploration
of the idea. Impact fees, for example, in Golden Gate Estates,
that's, I guess, now the fastest growing area in Collier County, so
that each time there's a new home put up there, there's another
three -- what is it, three or four or five thousand dollars put into
the county's coffers, but very little or none of that money is used
to assist in the Estates, and I find that to be wrong.
MR. NINO: Well, it has to be. In fact, impact fee money has to
be spent in the area that it comes from within the district. There
are a number of impact fee districts and the money does have to
be spent there. In other words, impact fees from Golden Gate
Estates cannot be used to widen Vanderbilt Drive in North
Naples. It can't be. The impact fee money is an escrow account
that is directed to road improvements within defined districts
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February 2, 2000
from which they come.
MR. SMITH: Other than the anticipated -- very long
anticipated widening of Golden Gate Boulevard and the long
anticipated widening of Immokalee Road, nothing has happened.
CHAIRMAN HILL: I have a more fundamental --
MR. NINO: Can we get back to your agenda? I'd like Susan
Murray to tell you how we do the rest of our business in terms of
dealing with land use petitions.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Could I raise one question quickly? I think
there's probably a quick answer.
I'm frustrated every once in a while when a petition comes
through here for rezoning. Some come with half a site plan,
some come with no site plan. To me, rezoning simply says it's
land use compatible, but environmental issues, quite often, really
need more than just that, and yet we're not consistent in what
we require on those plans that come before us.
MR. NINO: Let me -- let me try to speak to that.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Is my question clear?
MR. NINO: Yes, it is. First of all, a site plan is not required for
a standard rezone. As a matter of fact, there have been -- I think
there are some legal cases there that suggest that if you require
me to submit a site plan on a straight rezone, you are, in fact,
contract zoning because you're -- because that requirement is,
tell me what you're building. That -- we can't do that on straight
rezones.
On PUD's, however, a PUD is its own -- establishes its own
development strategy, and traditionally, there has been a master
plan unique to that PUD, i.e., Pelican Bay and all of the -- Pelican
Marsh.
The question I think that you're getting at there is the degree
-- the degree of detail on that master plan for that community.
That has always been conceptual. You know, when Pelican
Marsh first decided they were going to ask for rezoning and
develop a master plan, I'm sure they didn't, at that time, and I
don't think any developer knows exactly what he's going to put
on every tract of land within that master plan community.
I hope that we have -- I hope that the master plans, however,
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February 2, 2000
accurately delineate the preservation areas, because that -- and I
think we have done that in all cases. If you look at the Pelican
Marsh master plan when it came in, it delineated very accurately
the preservation areas, but it didn't say where single family
housing was going to go versus multiple family housing. It didn't
lay out footprints for how commercial was going to occur within
the commercial tracts, and it would be unreasonable to ask them
to do that because that's market driven. So I don't know how we
could ever develop a plan that was less detailed than your
traditional bubble diagrams that say, this is going to be
residential, this is going to be commercial. They -- at that point,
they haven't even worked out the alignment of all the roads, you
know. It's very conceptual. Your kind of master plan is
something that we just never asked for and we don't feel is
justified at that --
CHAIRMAN HILL: When the process then is completed with a
site plan, et cetera, there may well be environmental issues that
arise that were not obvious when the conceptual plan was
introduced, and yet we and other environmental agencies are not
in that loop. Now, I don't know, should we be? It seems to me
that we should be in that loop.
MR. NINO: Well, if you're talking about -- if you're talking
about environmental involvement down to each and every site
plan, then you're suggesting that you ought to become involved
in the review of each and every site plan and I don't think that's
going to happen. The board doesn't -- the board hasn't asked -- I
mean, the board hasn't asked for-- the board has said, we're
comfortable with the site -- the process post-zoning as being an
administrative process, and that's by and large the way it is
handled throughout the country.
Legislative bodies and appointed advisory bodies generally
don't get involved in the day-to-day handling of the building
development process. You get involved in the more conceptual
stage, and that is the rezoning -- the rezoning stage.
That's not to say it can't be changed, but we're not going to
change it. The Board would have to change it. You'd have to
convince the Board that, indeed, you're -- you ought to be
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February 2, 2000
involved in -- in the use of land at the day-to-day decision making
stage. I'm going to have Susan --
MR. CARLSON: Can I ask one more question real quick? I
know you're not a traffic engineer, but we're talking about these
levels of service on these roads, the C's, D's and E's and that
must be -- it must boil down to some number somewhere. Can
you tell me what the main factors are that decide what level of
service it is? Is it just, they put out the traffic counters and it's
so many cars per day on a two lane road, or do they figure out
how many times you have to wait for the light to change, you
know, or something like that?
MR. NINO: I certainly would think that that's all factored
within the number of -- traffic lights, the stop and go's, the turn
lanes.
MR. CHRZANOWSKI: It has to do with numbers, but there are
also criteria like traffic moves freely, traffic must stay in its lane
and goes down to 45 miles an hour. A lot of traffic slows down --
MR. CARLSON: Well, I decided never to come to this meeting
on 951 and Davis Boulevard again because you get to within
about a mile of the interstate and you stop, and all the traffic
coming off the interstate heading, I guess for Marco, just totally,
totally gridlocks that area right there, so --
CHAIRMAN HILL: Does any of the council or staff need a
short break before we --
MR. NINO: Did you ever go to work from the suburbs of
downtown Detroit and --- work in downtown Detroit and come
from the suburbs? You know, people do it every day.
MR. COE: You know something? This ain't Detroit.
MR. NINO: Or Atlanta, what have you. People do it every day.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Would anybody like a break, including the
court reporter? Let's take five minutes. We'll reconvene at
thirty-six.
(A recess was had)
MR. NINO: Susan Murray's going to get into the more detailed
day-to-day aspect of what we do in dealing with land use
petitions.
MS. MURRAY: Hi. I'm Susan Murray. I'm chief planner in the
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February 2, 2000
current planning section, and I'm going to talk about the site
development plan review process which would occur
post-zoning. So if you look on the overhead, I have a site
development plan review process highlighted in relationship to
the development approval process. It's -- and that would occur
just prior to pulling building permits.
I'm going to speak in very general terms about the process.
I'm not going to go into too much detail. I'm going to talk about
the various processes within the overall site development plan
process, so feel free to ask questions, stop me. Steve Lenberger
and Stan Chrzanowski, I invite them to jump in. You may also
ask them questions relative to what they are charged with
reviewing through this process, so I had already invited them to
do that.
Basically, the site development plan process is an
administrative site plan review process to ensure compliance
with land development regulations prior to the issuance of a
building permit, and it's not applicable to all projects in Collier
County, but probably to a majority of them and that would be --
they would be applicable to commercial, industrial, multi family.
Single family residential and some minor improvements like to
golf courses and things like that are not required to go through
the SDP process.
The SDP process does require engineering site plans. That
would be specifically a site plan showing generally the location
of the buildings, structures, parking area and traffic circulation,
utility location, storm water management, conservation areas, et
cetera.
Some projects require signed and sealed architectural plans.
The county has an architectural ordinance which applies to
commercial development and some industrial development. And
also the site development plan process requires signed and
sealed landscape plans.
The purpose of the site development plan process is
essentially to ensure that development complies with the
fundamental planning and design principles, and that would be
consistency with the county's growth management plan, which
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February 2, 2000
us, as planners, are primarily charged with, and we basically
would look at consistency with the growth management plan and
compliance with the land development regulations.
We also have various team members that participate in the
site development plan review process and they would be looking
at other things, for example, like configuration of traffic
circulation system, the layout and arrangement of buildings in
open space. Other review agencies would look at things like
emergency access, architectural design in open spaces, the
availability and capacity of drainage and utilities, the overall
compatibility with adjacent development and the impacts on
natural resources and any environmental considerations.
I hope you can read this. You're gonna hear various terms
thrown around when you are reviewing land use petitions like
SDP, site development plan, site improvement plan, SDP
amendment process, so I thought I'd just throw up a slide that
shows -- gives an outline of the various processes. The first one
being the site development plan process, and again, I already
explained where it was applicable, and I just wanted to give you
an idea of how long it takes and how much it costs also.
The review time for a site development plan process is
generally ten to 20 working days, and I say that review time
being that that's generally the amount of time that county staff
has the plans in for review.
You also have to factor in time for revisions because often
there are various phases to the review, and I don't mean to say
phases, but I mean, for example, when somebody submits a plan,
comments are received, but the applicant receives county staff
comments and subsequently has to make revisions to the plan,
so they may have to resubmit.
MR. CORNELL: Susan?
MS. MURRAY: Yes.
MR. CORNELL.' At the risk of sounding like a broken record, I
love the overheads. Is it possible to get a copy of them?
MS. MURRAY: Sure, sure, no problem. So I just wanted to
clarify that, because the review time is generally the time that
the staff has the plans in their office. There is a time frame in
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February 2, 2000
which corrections and revisions need to be resubmitted and
re-reviewed by any applicable county staff.
We also have the site development plan amendment process,
and that would apply generally to any proposed change to a
previously approved site development plan. Generally our staff
takes five to ten working days to review a site development plan
amendment and we also have what's called a site improvement
plan, and that generally applies to where a site is currently
improved and where there is no expansion of existing impervious
areas or effects to on-site surface water management treatment.
Site improvement plans we use a lot for some of the older
structures around the county that were never -- that are
established, but we do not have a record of a site improvement
plan, and then that generally takes five to ten working days.
An SDP amendment would generally be applicable to any
proposed change to a previously approved SDP, and we define
those amendments as substantial or insubstantial. A substantial
change would be any change which substantially affects the
existing transportation circulation, building or parking
arrangements, drainage, landscaping, or preserve and
conservation areas. And an insubstantial change would be all
others.
Just to give you an idea of the cost for a substantial
amendment, that costs the same as a new SDP, $425, plus $9 per
dwelling unit, plus $21 per residential building structure, and
then you can read the rest for non-residential. Review time is
generally ten to 20 working days, so that gives you a little bit of
an idea of how much that costs.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Susan, excuse me for interrupting. Could
you back up to the previous overhead?
In one of the substantial amendments, you have preserve and
conservation areas. Can this be significant from an
environmental standpoint, and if so, would that come back to us?
MS. MURRAY: Yes, it could be--well --
MR. NINO: Steve, we have brought back some, haven't we?
MR. LENBERGER: Are you talking an insubstantial change to
an SDP? These generally involve -- substantial change? I can
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February 2, 2000
think of no cases where the preserve areas were significantly
changed.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Well, what I'm saying is if they were,
preserve or conservation areas were one of the possible
changes, would that, in fact, come back to --
MR. LENBERGER: We would -- it would have to be drastically
different than what's on the zoning, the PUD, which the
Environmental Advisory Council had reviewed previously.
MS. MURRAY: Generally that -- that would probably trigger
some type of PUD amendment, which would then come back to
you in that form, if it was a PUD. CHAIRMAN HILL: Thank you.
MS. MURRAY: Insubstantial amendments, $85, five to ten
working days. Pretty straightforward. Site improvement plan, I
already touched on that. It's applicable to a currently improved
site where there is no proposed expansion of impervious area or
changes or effects to on-site surface water management
treatment areas. That is for a cost of $85 and five to ten working
days for review time.
I wanted to give you a little overview of how the process
works. It's an administrative process. The project review
section coordinates a review process. Site plans are submitted
by developers, by the developer's engineer primarily. They are
distributed to various county departments for review and
comment. The departments are basically reviewing the project
for compliance with county codes, regulations and permitting
requirements, as you know, and the comments are then returned
to the project review section and then are funneled back out to
the developer for correction to plans.
They are then resubmitted and re-reviewed by any applicable
agency. So they would not go back through the entire review
process if the engineering folks had a couple concerns which
rendered corrections, then they would be the only ones to review
the resubmittal, and the planner also.
When all the reviews are complete and the plans meet the
county codes, provided that the applicant has met any of the
code and permitting requirements, administrative approval is
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February 2, 2000
given to the SDP, and once the SDP is approved, the developer
may begin applying for building permits. Once permits are
approved, the developer may begin construction, so that's kind of
the tail end of the development review process, that being
applying for building permits, and that's kind of it in a nutshell.
That's a very brief overview.
If you have any specific questions, feel free, I'd be happy to
answer them.
MR. NINO: Let me give you an example of where the kinds of
things that you guys are concerned about comes into this
process. For example, the native vegetation, the preservation
requirement, you know that every project needs to preserve 25
percent of their native vegetation. Steve and Barbara and -- and
the environmental staff, they're charged with making sure that
that happens, and believe me, they are very vigilant in that
process and --
MR. MCVEY: Amen.
MR. NINO: And you know that, being on the receiving end,
and -- and similarly with the conservation areas, I mean, those
jurisdictional lines are hard and fast and they're certainly not
going to be varied in the site development plan process.
However, you get to the -- one of the buildings that got a lot of
attention a few years ago, do you remember when Sports
Authority, they built on a beautifully wooded pine forest. They
knocked the trees down. They have a right to do that, you know.
That's -- that's not going to change unless our rules change
dramatically in this county, and that's not -- and I suggest to you
that that's not an environmental issue over which we have any
authority to deal with, but that is -- was one of the things that,
you know, kicked up a lot of heat. Nothing we could do about it,
and if we were to do anything about it, we'd need new rules.
Like I say, we work with rules. You give us the rules and we'll
enforce them.
I -- I hope that our discussion of how we do business has
helped. If you think we need to do something more, keep
scheduling these kinds of meetings, we'd be happy to do so.
MR. CORNELL: Thank you.
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February 2, 2000
CHAIRMAN HILL: Any other questions for Mr. Nino or Miss
Murray?
MR. CARLSON: You know what I thought was important today
was Mr. Simonik coming in with that Martin County wetland
thing. I mean -- and you've got to wonder how many other
counties have grappled with all of these questions about how to
save stuff and do better and have better rules and how much
great stuff is out there that we could just look at and adapt and --
MR. NINO: No question.
*** CHAIRMAN HILL: Item 6(B), is that --
MR. LORENZ: Yes, your annual report. Well, actually, that's
the segue into your annual report, because what I presented
everybody at the break, I presented one little handout for you,
your enabling ordinance and the code that I've quoted requires
the EAC to present an annual report to the Board of County
Commissioners, and it's due in May of each year, and this report,
as noted here, wants to look at your achievement, so what you
have done for the -- for the past year, your objectives for the
coming year and any -- and highlight any environmental issues
that need further study.
So that's exactly the type of thing that -- that we talked about
today earlier, the gopher tortoise, possibly amendments for
protection of gopher tortoises. I know that in the past, there has
been discussion -- some of the projects that have come across
the EAC's review, they say, well, is this enough wetlands that
have been set aside, and as Ron says, staff presents to you a
recommendation based upon our existing rules, and if you, as a
body, as an advisory body to the Board of County Commissioners
would like to see those rules change, these would be issues that,
as you come up with this annual report in May, that you could
identify and tell the Board of County Commissioners, we would
like to study these particular issues. So this is your -- this is the
opportunity here, in this annual report format, to obviously be
retrospective, but then to be prospective as well.
I've outlined a little bit of a timetable as a proposed timetable
for you to consider. This is your first annual report. Different
advisory committees do it differently. Staff -- for some advisory
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February 2, 2000
committees, staff simply develops the report and puts it into the
advisory committee, they sign off on it and it goes to the Board
of County Commissioners just as part of a written report.
It was envisioned -- the intent was for -- for this particular
advisory board, however, to make a presentation to the Board of
County Commissioners as part of the regular agenda, with the
chairman making a presentation of the report and then engage in
some dialogue with the County Commission for the County
Commission to say, yeah, you know, those are -- those are good
issues to work on or, well, maybe not these issues, but maybe
these issues.
That was part of the discussion process as the EAC's
ordinance was adopted by the Board of County Commissioners
more than a year ago, so the question -- the alternative for the
advisory council is, staff would be certainly willing to take a shot
at providing the retrospective portion of the report, providing,
you know, some of the statistics and the information, but in
terms of what the objectives are, your objectives and what your
issues are, that needs to come from you.
Another alternative would simply be to have EAC here assign
a member to draft a report for the EAC's consideration for March
1st and that could be either taken on by the chairman or have --
have that be assigned, but -- but the point is obviously, you've got
-- you have to meet to discuss it as part of a regular EAC
meeting, even though we're talking about May, meeting once a
month, you need to start working on it fairly soon here.
MR. COE: It doesn't have to be real elaborate. We can just
get the information from them and do it.
CHAIRMAN HILL: You mentioned that you would be able to --
or be willing to supply the statistics of the events that have
occurred in the last 12 months. That certainly would be part of
the report. Would that also then govern actions, in other words,
approvals, disapprovals, summary of -- of reasons and that type
of thing?
MR. LORENZ: Yes, we -- we do draft that for you and -- and
put that in your -- probably your agenda packet for you to review
on -- on March 1st, but as I said, the objectives for the coming
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February 2, 2000
year and the issues that you want to study, I think that needs to
come from you all.
CHAIRMAN HILL: What I'd like to suggest then, if staff will do
that for us, if the council members would come to our March 1st
meeting with items for inclusion for adoption in our report for
activities in the future, why then, we can put that together at the
March 1st meeting.
MR. COE: Can we get another e-mail --
CHAIRMAN HILL: And at the same time, if you would -- if staff
would get to us a history of the past year?
MR. LORENZ: Yes, that would be -- that would be in your
packet for March 1st.
MR. COE: Can we get another e-mail and telephone list made
up? Because I know like my e-mail's changed.
MR. CHRZANOWSKI: I just got everybody's e-mail at the
break and I told Kim that I would give them a copy so we can
e-mail each of you the new e-mail and telephone list of
everybody.
MR. COE: Okay.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Thank you. Be as specific, but not
necessarily great detail, but if you come to the March 1st
meeting with -- and Mr. Baxter, I would hope that maybe as a
newcomer, you have some fresh ideas of where we should be
going, so please let us know what you have in mind as far as
EAC's future.
MR. BAXTER: I will.
CHAIRMAN HILL: And if you remember, I handed out a couple
months ago, and we never got around to it, what I called the EAC
horizon. There were a lot of things on there. You might revisit
that and see if any of them are worth considering. If you don't
have a copy of that, I'll get you one, but it was based on a list of
responsibilities and the enabling legislation and it's -- a whole
potpourri of things we're supposed to be doing.
MR. SMITH: Would you mind e-mailing that to me?
CHAIRMAN HILL: Yeah, sure. Thank you, staff, and
everybody for your participation today.
Are there any comments from the council?
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February 2, 2000
Remind you five p.m. on the 8th, growth management
sub-committee. Mr. Lorenz, you'll let us know -- probably one of
the conference rooms there, so you'll confirm that indeed we can
meet there?
MR. LORENZ: Yes.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Would you also, when you -- Stan, when you
give us the e-mail addresses, I think in that table we had before,
we also had the terms -- term limits.
MR. CHRZANOWSKI: Yeah, Kim has a copy of that. Yes, we
did.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Okay. And I think--
MR. CHRZANOWSKI: We'll just update everything, the e-mail,
the telephone, the term.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Yeah. Any comments? Public? Eric?
I'll entertain a motion for adjournment.
MR. CORNELL: Move we adjourn.
MR. COE: Second.
CHAIRMAN HILL: Any objections?
There being no further business for the good of the County,
the meeting was adjourned by order of the Chair at 11:00 a.m.
ENVIRONMENTAL ADVISORY COUNCIL
WILLIAM W. HILL, CHAIRMAN
TRANSCRIPT PREPARED ON BEHALF OF GREGORY COURT
REPORTING SERVICE, INC., BY HEATHER L. CASASSA, NOTARY
PUBLIC
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