A legislative proposal that would restrict local development control cleared its first Senate committee hearing this week, with members of the Community Affairs committee voting 5-3 to advance the measure.
The bill (SB 1118) would retroactively dismantle a rural boundary charter amendment approved by 73% of Orange County voters in November, as well as any other such referendums enacted after June 1, 2011.
Orange County’s new rural boundary protections cover about 54% of the county’s land acreage. In those designated rural areas, the protections make it harder to boost density or development intensity, by requiring a supermajority vote from the board of county commissioners to approve such changes. A supermajority is also required to remove any property from a designated rural area.
East Orange County resident Rachel Hildebrand helped campaign for the rural boundary ahead of November’s election. She said she’s discouraged by state lawmakers’ willingness to circumvent the will of county voters.
“It’s just taking away our voice and giving it to people that don’t even live here. … We voted at a local level,” Hildebrand said. “Even if you don’t care about rural boundaries or sustainable development, you should care about your vote being upheld.”
Hildebrand and other critics of the measure also say they’re concerned it would jeopardize Florida communities by allowing for unfettered growth.
“When they say that we need to do this to speed up development … maybe you're rushing developments, but it's the wrong developments,” Hildebrand said. “If developers want to improve the rate of development, just build how you should in that area.”
Also against the bill is Chadwick Leonard, who spoke at this week’s committee hearing on behalf of 1000 Friends of Florida. Leonard is the group’s conservation and planning advocacy coordinator.
“[These] provisions could endanger agricultural lands, intensify urban sprawl, strain public resources and severely limit opportunities for meaningful local citizen participation,” Leonard said.
Although recent tweaks to the legislation are appreciated, there’s still much room for improvement, Leonard and several critics of the bill said Monday.
“While we oppose the bill in its current form, we are dedicated to constructively collaborating with your office to improve some of these concerns,” Leonard told the committee.
The bill's sponsor, Sen. Stan McClain, R-Ocala, said he’s open to more changes.
“Obviously, there will be some things we’ve got to strip out. There will be some things that maybe we get to change,” McClain said. “Certainly, this is not to run over local government. This is to try to find a happy medium between growing and not.”
At this week’s hearing, McClain said as a seventh-generation Floridian, his goal isn’t to pave over all the state’s natural lands.
“That's not my intent, is not to go into my own farmland preservation area,” McClain said, referencing the northwest pocket of Marion County designated to encourage agriculture and protect natural resources.
Instead, “I want to pack as [many] people [as possible] into that urban growth boundary that we have, so that they don’t sprawl out into the country,” McClain said.
Speaking in favor of the bill on behalf of the Florida Home Builders Association, Kari Hebrank said Monday that the measure would help resolve a problem stemming from 2021 legislation that capped how much local governments can raise impact fees, at 50% over a four-year period.
The goal was to deliver some level of predictability for developers, but an exemption for local governments with “extraordinary circumstances” dulled the impact of the 2021 law, Hebrank said. “We didn't define ‘extraordinary’ in 2021, and what we've run into is multiple local governments claiming they have extraordinary circumstances.”
“So what we’re trying to do in this bill is define what we meant by ‘extraordinary,’ ” Hebrank said. “We meant unique, unforeseen, unpredictable circumstances. We didn't mean tourism, if you're Orlando.”
Sen. Kathleen Passidomo, R-Naples, shared her tentative support of the bill in its current form along with some concerns, saying she still has “a myriad of questions.”
“I’m going to vote for the bill because I have the opportunity to intervene in the future,” Passidomo said Monday. “But I think this bill goes too far.”
Passidomo’s concern is that the bill would “usurp the right” of locally elected officials to act on behalf of their constituents, she said.
“What this [bill] is doing, I believe, is saying: OK, let's do one project after the other with just administrative approval,” Passidomo said. “Is that good or bad? I don't know, but I think the people who live there should have the opportunity to weigh in on it.”
Speaking on behalf of the Florida League of Cities, David Cruz said the bill “severely undermines” the ability of local governments to properly manage their growth.
“Cities are not opposed to development,” Cruz said. “They are, however, advocating for responsible, well-thought-out, well-planned growth that protects the existing homeowners and the community, and that ensures that we have adequate infrastructure in place to support that.”
The three no votes from the eight-member Community Affairs committee came from Sen. Shevrin Jones, Sen. Barbara Sharief and Minority Leader Jason Pizzo, all Democrats.
Two other legislative committees are still slated to hear the bill.
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