Florida House Bill 749 "HB 749 - Sewage Treatment and Disposal Systems" Effects

On June 26, 2006 the Florida house passed, and the governor signed House Bill 749. The purpose of the law is as stated therein ... "An act relating to sewage treatment and disposal systems" .

Namely:

Sewage Treatment and Disposal Systems: Requires county commissions to include certain studies for the construction of a new proposed sewerage system or the extension of an existing sewerage system in certain reports; authorizes local governments and certain water and sewer districts to grant variances from connecting to a publicly owned or investor-owned sewerage system under certain circumstances; authorizes the Department of Health or its agents to require repair or replacement of drainfields, etc.

Effective Date: July 1, 2006.

Clearly, the City of Marco Island has to carefully review this law as it undoubtedly will impact the sewer construction.

The entirety of the law is posted as a comment to this post. It is highly urged that all citizens read the law and petitition accordingly.

Overview - Factors Affecting Real Estate Sales

Every market has a different reason as to why its real estate sales/prices trend up or down, and to what degree of variance they do so as compared to the national "average".

The factors that cause good or bad sales in, say Topeka, are not all the same as those here on Marco Island.

There are some national and even international factors that to some degree affect all markets. For example, interest rates MAY affect all markets, and a substantial international incident may affect all U.S. markets as well.

However, the extent to which these national/international factors affect a specific market, as say Marco Island, is more arbitrary than science. Namely, adverse national implications do not necessarily universally affect local markets.

As an example, a slight increase in interest rates may affect a predominantly working community adversely due to the amount of disposable income by the citizens of that community or those looking to migrate to that community. However, the same slight increase will not, as has been shown by myriad studies, unfavorably affect the affluent or “upper middle class” real estate markets given the amount of disposable income (as but one factor) of the citizens looking to invest in those communities.

As some of these discussions have played out, it is easy to blame local factors, such as real estate agents that have been nothing but order takers. However, it is significantly more erroneous to blame “interest rates” and “real estate is slumping everywhere” for the flat or dropping sales on Marco Island. Again, national factors may not, and historically substantiated by study after study, don’t always apply.

More examples. The real estate crash of California in the late 1980s. No other part of the country experienced such a drop. The factors for that buying back of America for 10 cents on the dollar were nearly all local. And recently, clearly can anyone blame interest rates for what is presently occurring or not occurring in the gulf cost areas that were devastated by hurricane Katrina?

Economics, beyond being a “dismal science” is nearly all formulated with common sense. Like the laws of physics applying to all of nature (except the sub-atomic world), economics applies to real estate. Within those controlling forces of national and global economies are the direct consequences of selling. Namely, if one can sell, it almost does not matter how the economy is doing.

Skeptical? Look at Microsoft. A near monopoly, with products that lay people deride and professionals know to be poor at best, is a huge success. Why? Because regardless of the “economy” and what people are saying about them, they can sell.

Selling. It’s the factor here. We have the sun, and the fun, and the quality of life (until the few on the council want to commercialize every square inch) and great rumors (like the Calusa Indian hex – or was it hoax?). We can blame the interest rates and the economy and the non-prophetic Indians and the hurricanes and the city council and the city manager and everything under the sun. But in the end, selling is king.

Call for a Moratorium

City attorneys at the planning board meeting expressed their concern regarding the on-the-fly interpretation to the building issues and density considerations. Citizens seem to think that the master plan is devoid of any covenant that checks developments. A city council member expressed his cynical disdain for citizens’ efforts to curtail density by 4% as being dishonest and amounting only to lip service. The same council member does not know what the 4% means while the debate rages on as to what rights apply to whom. Namely, can the city allow any development for the good of the community or is there a permanent, inalienable right of property owners to do whatever they please based on how the property was zoned when it was purchased. The chairperson of the planning committee addresses the council with concerns on how long term designs are being overridden willy-nilly by the committee without reconsideration by engineers.

And then of course there is Amerikapitalism. Yes, it too has infested Marco Island. Greed is good under the ruse that what is good for business is good for the community. For those 8 people that continue to believe this hoax, may they live out the rest of their life in oblivious peace by not coming across any information on Enron, Viacom, Tyco, WorldCom, Arthur Anderson and the wonders of Al Dunlap’s “Profit at Any Price” business model.

And here? A council member is the real estate industry. A pizza parlor makes a petition to make last minute changes to a huge engineering project just so it and its business neighbors can purportedly be better accessed by … ready for this one … by the citizens that would otherwise jaywalk. The petition prevails despite every citizen and the planning board opposing the change. The fact that the businesses wanting to make the change never attended a planning meeting is irrelevant. A hotel chain argues over density by calling whatever it is they are planning to build whatever it needs to be called so that the planning board can somehow apply the “voodoo” – yes, that was the word that was used – of the density algorithm since a condo is considered differently than a hotel suite which is considered differently than a timeshare which is considered differently than a “vacation unit” – whatever that means. A “hospice” business wants to do its civic duty by proposing to build a hospice facility on property deeded for a hospital. Very nice – except that the majority of the units are for “unassisted” living – predominantly for their workers. And the list goes on and on and on.

As one polite citizen eloquently stated while addressing the city council, “Marco Island – Commercial Enterprise; Business Over Citizens”. Amerikapitalism.

Consider that unbridled development is antithetical to the notion of a community. Lest anyone doubt this fact look no further than 90 miles to the east. A community is made up of PEOPLE and their families and their relations – and is NOT made up of its businesses. Marco Island is unique in this respect – where else can so many young children be blessed by growing up in such close proximity to their grandparents and their friends? Considering the pathetic record and promise of our public school systems (with the possible exception of TB as a good though not great school), where better can our children learn about their culture and their family history and their traditions than from the “older” generation? Not from chat rooms or cell phones or schools or eating at the local pizza joint or renting a whatever-its-called-room from a hotel chain – that’s for sure.

Growth for greed will kill this community as sure as it did Miami and scores of other “communities”. We can not afford the problems associated with congestion, limited infrastructure, and the associative problems given that the direct consequence of these avoidable ills is the moral and financial expulsion of the people that make up the community. We are even fighting amongst ourselves in the Tartarus that is the legal system in part because some citizens believe that the sewage treatment plant will not be able to handle the sewage that will flow from the new sewer systems that are being put in place in part to handle the … growth.

Is anyone comfortable with how growth is managed? Clearly not. When it comes to growth, the few nice people on the council appear to be a hagiarchy. The other members are clearly a corpocracy. The city council is not only “uncomfortable” – their words – with the density/growth issue, heck, they don’t even understand it. How is it possible to manage something you don’t understand? You can’t.

With no clear vision of where we are headed, or how even to get there, we are doomed to fight amongst ourselves all the while the commercialization of our area rolls on unabated.

Let’s stop this farce. Let’s stop selling out our community. Let’s get a handle on what density means. Lets know what are the near and long term ramifications of ANY business and commercial growth. Let the planning board and the staff and the citizens and the lawyers and the good folks at MICA – and yes even the businesses – come together to formulate a near and long term strategy. A strategy that is effectuated via a clear plan. A plan that is understood even by the most cynical and by the most ardent profiteers.

We can preserve a community. The community can prosper. Those are the first mandates of a society. Businesses can too survive – within the will of the community. Yes, for those council members that don’t yet understand eminent domain and the interplay of city ordinances, it is the will of the citizens of a republic that dictate what can or can not happen. If that were not the case, brothels and strip joints and adult stores would be next to every … pizza parlor.

Marco Island needs to seriously consider a temporary moratorium on development.

Any independent, citizen-oriented leader up to the challenge?

DENSITY: Let's help the City Planning Committee

Population density is a measurement of population per unit area or unit volume. Source: US Census Bureau. Area as in square feet, square miles or square kilometers – not area as in condos, timeshares or apartments.

Marco Island residents care about density - too much impacts our property values - negatively; impacts our taxes - raises them. Contrary to the propaganda, more is not better. Quality of living decreases dramatically. More transients (tourists) appear to be a boon for business (more people frequenting the crappy restaurants on the island). But in the long run such is not the case. If the business geniuses had any sense, they would appeal to the permanent residents – the ones that could maintain them throughout the year. But no, keep providing mediocre products with rude service at exaggerated prices – and not even the density of Manila, Philippines* will suffice.

Let’s keep or otherwise improve our quality of life. For those greedy souls that want more business more construction more people, feel free to move just 90 miles east to Miami and enjoy the grotesque congestion 24 hours a day. Hey, at least in Miami there are great restaurants at fair prices! (So what if no one speaks English – better than the grunts and blanks stares and smacking of the lips we get here on Marco).

Growth – density can be achieved intelligently – read: sans the gluttony.

Perhaps we should consider a moratorium on building and rebuilding and more building until we can get intelligent visionaries to formulate a sound long term plan for growth where the number one consideration is (not money, greed, and business) but people and families.

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*With a population of 1,581,082 and a land area of 38.55 km², it has the highest population density of any city in the world with 41,014 people/km². Source: Wikipedia.

Planning Board - Redevelopment of Radisson by the Marriott & More

Sitting through several hours of this June 16, 2006 experience in capitalistic democracy one could not help but feel that the presenting corporations could have saved us all a lot of time and merely said “We are proposing to build something that starts with the letter ‘A’”. As in a hotel, a condo, a timeshare, a vacation experience, a boat, a car, a spaceship, a mall. As we all have come to know and love, corporate America basically agreed with whatever it was being called in order to get whatever approved.

And of course the planning board, that seemed to show up without a plan, for the most part went along for a ride. With the exception of Mr. Needle’s occasional poignant and insightful comments, nobody – including the attorneys (recall Shakespeare) – could figure out what the heck to call whatever it was that the Marriott was proposing to build.

Intermixed into the nomenclature discussion was the issue of density. The most salient comment of the meeting came from a citizen who stated that there was less density in Manhattan (where he was from) than in Marco Island. It was unclear if density is measured in units per acre, or in people per acre or in 26 keys per acre. Are “keys” in this context the things we use to open doors?

To Mr. Moss’ credit, he expressed concern with the density. Since by this point the seven (read: 7) citizens that showed up were not allowed to speak, all we could do was roll our eyes and wait for the next tax increase to pay for the infrastructure improvements that assuredly will come with more people coming to the island.

On the entertainment side of things, the 175 foot height for the new building is arbitrary. For those 7 residents that care, the height is measured from the flood line to the median height of the roof – which brought the sanguine question “what about if it’s a flat roof?” Oh, by the way, whatever height is decided upon, it can be higher since architectural structures (isn’t the whole building an architectural structure?) and things on the roof (like air conditioners) are not taken into consideration when measuring the height. Now, city planners, this may be hard to fanthom, but if you leave the reg like this, our friends at the Marriott can sell space on their roof to put up a freaking cell tower of any height, or one of those docking stations used by zeppelins.

Summary: Corporate America will get what it wants, it can call it what it wants, more people will crowd our city and the rest of us will pay for the infrastructure to support the new … what is it?

The Confounded (Winterberry) Bridge

Only on Marco Island. And here we go again.

The city “government” desirous of maintaining the pattern of doing things based on what the voters don’t want, approves $4.5 million to repair the bridge – presumably after having done an extensive engineering study and checking with the usual suspects (like the U.S. Coast Guard). Not.

So the Coast Guard rows into town and after speaking with – get this – the property owners whose property value will increase dramatically by having a taller bridge – require, or otherwise document, that the city approved plans are inadequate, and the bridge needs to be raised by FIVE INCHES.

Here are the numbers: Five properties have to be condemned and eleven property owners were interviewed by the U.S. Coast Guard.

For those 11 property owners who are so heinously selfish, a question: what is the value differential between boats that vary by FIVE INCHES?

The FIVE INCHES will change the $4.5 million budget to repair the bridge by merely $15.5 million – to $20 million. Assuredly, this new budget amount was also derived after an extensive engineering study and checking with the usual suspects (maybe this time like with the U.S. Navy). Not.

It seems like, from rumor control of course since the engineering study that determined the new budget of $20 million is … where? … the super price tag is due to the requirement that the surrounding properties to the bridge have to be purchased in order to afford the ramp-up space. The property owners whose properties need to be purchased would not happen to be the same egocentric folks that spoke to the U.S. Coast Guard, would it?

Greed, greed, greed. Why couldn’t these property owners have sold their properties the old fashion way – by listing them with a local realtor who will do nothing more than wait for the phone to ring – you know, just like the rest of us.

Here are some predictions - suggestions – ideas:

• The $20 million new bridge will be contracted for despite citizen opposition.
• Yet another citizen’s group will sue the city.
• Have the U.S. Coast Guard pay for the bridge.
• Have Starbucks pay for the bridge so they can have a Starbucks on each end of the new bridge.
• For the city council – and the ultimate irony for the 5 homeowners that will cost us millions – since the of law eminent domain has been prostituted beyond comprehension by the prostitutes sitting (hiding) behind benches (and not the ones in the parks), the city should steal – eh, invoke eminent domain – on those 5 properties and pay each owner the value as denoted on the tax roles – not the market value.
• And yet another novel idea for the city – try checking with everyone and doing a study before guessing at a number to do something.
• And yet another novel idea for the city – have the 11 property owners that want the taller bridge pay for it – as opposed to having the it paid by the15,000 property owners that don’t want it.

Let’s see how this one gets spun …