Growth management is a set of techniques used by government to ensure that as the population grows that there are services available to meet their demands. These are not necessarily only government services. Other demands such as the protection of natural spaces, sufficient and affordable housing, delivery of utilities, preservation of buildings and places of historical value, and sufficient places for the conduct of business are also considered.
Impact fees are a charge on new development that helps pay for the construction or expansion of roads, mass transit, schools and parks that are needed as a result of development’s added demand for these services. Adequate Impact fees are a necessary funding mechanism of concurrency. The principle of concurrency holds that a development may not proceed until specific infrastructure services that serve that development: for example schools, roadways schools and public transit are in place. Developments are not permitted if they reduce services below certain levels and should be required to pay for the added public services they require via a "pay as you grow" system.
Amendment 1 funds must be applied for land acquisition and land conservation in a manner that fulfills the intent of Florida Voter's who by a 75% margin approved dedicating 33 percent of net revenue from the existing excise tax on documents to the Land Acquisition Trust Fund. Per the mandate Florida Voters funds in the Land Acquisition Trust Fund shall be expended only for the following purpose:
1) As provided by law, to finance or refinance: the acquisition and improvement of land, water areas, and related property interests, including conservation easements, and resources for conservation lands including wetlands, forests, and fish and wildlife habitat; wildlife management areas; lands that protect water resources and drinking water sources, including lands protecting the water quality and quantity of rivers, lakes, streams, springsheds, and lands providing recharge for groundwater and aquifer systems; lands in the Everglades Agricultural Area and the Everglades Protection Area, as defined in Article II, Section 7(b); beaches and shores; outdoor recreation lands, including recreational trails, parks, and urban open space; rural landscapes; working farms and ranches; historic or geologic sites; together with management, restoration of natural systems, and the enhancement of public access or recreational enjoyment of conservation lands.
For a better understanding of how this intent is not being fulfilled through bills currently passing through the Florida legislature please see this article: http://www.tampabay.com/news/politics/stateroundup/voters-suggest-amendment-1-funds-were-supposed-to-be-spent-acquiring-land/2222817
The death of Growth Management under Rick Scott
In 2011 The Tampa Bay Times decrying the demise of the Department of Community Affairs-aptly characterized the pro-growth-at any-cost fantasy world that is Rick Scott’s vision for Florida: “Growth management, an imperfect but noble effort to protect Florida from selfishness and greed, died Thursday June 2, 2011. The cause of death was legislation passed by a Legislature lacking perspective and signed into law by Rick Scott, a new governor ignorant of the state's history and indifferent about its future. Growth Management was 26 years old. The agency that oversaw it, the now-vanquished Department of Community Affairs, is survived by a handful of relatives not up to carrying on the mission: water management districts decimated by spending cuts; regional planning councils and similar agencies with little authority; and county commissions with neither the will nor the vision to stand up to developers.”
The concept of Growth Management--the purpose of the Department of Community Affairs--is a simple and valid one: Developments of a certain scale (otherwise known as DRIs or Developments of Regional Impact) have impacts that reach far beyond the communities they serve: environmental impacts, transportation related impacts and level of service impacts. Development comes at a cost, a cost that the taxpayer invariably shoulders in terms of supporting added infrastructure, added water management and public works. And the cost of losing the most precious asset of all--what the land had to offer in its natural state: Its ecological character whether for wildlife habitat, water recharge or just for the value of its native beauty--wild vistas lost forever to hideous strip malls or thousand’s of acres of barrel-tile roofed homes replicated on the landscape like industrial output.
Quoting again from the Tampa Bay Times: “Growth Management was an ambitious attempt to bring some sanity to the mad rush to pave over Florida. It required cities and counties to plan for growth, determine where and how much development would be permitted, and forecast how roads, utilities and other services would be paid for to accommodate it all. Most important, the 1985 law gave the state the authority to approve or reject those plans. And under a concept called concurrency, developers eventually were forced to help pay for new roads, schools and parks to accommodate the growth their projects generated. In the late '80s and early '90s, Growth Management was a given. The question was how to pay for it. Florida never resolved that question, and now the state has given up on the very idea of managing growth”
Campaigning during for his first term Scott “demonized Growth Management and joined state lawmakers in claiming less regulation [would] create more jobs.” But Scott and his cohorts in the legislature were virtually silent about “creating a quality of life — clean water, clear roads, good schools, nice parks — needed to attract and keep businesses and workers.” With the state giving up practically all of its oversight responsibilities and its authority to require developers to help pay for roads, schools and parks local government was left to its own devises, to do as it pleased. And that is exactly the legacy we are living with currently here in Lee County—a County Commission dominated by pro-growth-at-any-cost special interests (indeed one Commissioner who initially gained office as a direct Scott appointee) who fail to see the need to hold developers financially accountable through impact fees for the impacts they make on the existing community and the environment. Oh the taxpayers will pay and pay dearly in due course (and maybe that’s what it will take to finally get an enlightened electorate) but what a price we must pay in the meantime. Huge swaths of Florida landscape swallowed up in the blink of an eye by rapacious interests allowed to profiteer and then leave town while we --the lowly tax payers--are left to pick up the tab.
Another Nail in the Coffin: dismantling of Regional Planning Councils
True to form as the no-holds-barred pro-growth dictator that he is, Rick Scott denied funding to Regional Planning Councils from year 2011 to the present. When the Tampa Bay Times asked his press secretary, John Tupps, why the councils had been singled out Tupps came back with this carefully worded double-speak: "this budget works to protect Florida's environment, create jobs and improve our state's infrastructure….the funding for all regional planning council projects comes from federal and local tax dollars."
False: “The 11 regional councils could always count on getting some money from the state, until Scott was sworn in. One of his first acts was to join the Legislature in dismantling the state's growth management watchdog agency and the law it enforced. Then he vetoed money for the planning councils. The Legislature always approved $2.5 million, and Scott has consistently cut it to zero.”
Certain bills currently going through the Florida legislature may well be the death knell for Florida’s Regional Planning Council and the entire DRI process: “SB 562 (HB 579) eliminates the “development of regional impact” review process for major proposed developments. SB 832 (HB 933) would revise substantially the sector planning process over the objections of environmentalists and SB 484 (HB 873) would eliminate the state’s 11 regional planning councils outright.” Please call your Florida Representatives and Senators and object to the passage of these bills while there is still a Florida left to fight for.
Sources:
http://www.tampabay.com/opinion/editorials/an-obituary-for-florida-growth-management/1173456
http://floridapolitics.com/archives/9691
Contact Us , Responsible Growth Management Coalition’s website or email them at rgmc@hotmail.com for more info.