COURTESY : The Daily Commercial
By Bill Koch
Published November 16, 2006 

THE VILLAGES - Sunshine State residents will get burned by rapid growth if they don't approve a proposed amendment to the Florida Constitution, the president of a New Smyrna Beach-based political action committee told Villagers on Wednesday evening.

Florida Hometown Democracy is working to get 611,000 signatures of Florida voters to put a question on the November 2008 election ballot.

The amendment would ask voters whether they want to require developers to get local voter approval to amend county comprehensive plans. County commissions have the authority to amend their comprehensive plans to allow for large development.

Comprehensive plan amendments would be "put to the electorate for final approval," said Lesley Blackner, president of Florida Hometown Democracy.

She said commissioners routinely ignore requirements in Florida's growth management act enacted in the 1980s and are easily influenced by big money from developers.

"County commissions just can't say 'no' to wealthy developers," she said. "I've realized the growth industry controls everything. Florida voters don't understand land-use laws, and we've been kept in the dark."

Blackner spoke to nearly 200 people at The Villages Property Owners' Association monthly meeting. Her presentation began with a 20-minute video show on the dangers of rapid growth to communities.

She said growth has strained roads, schools and other infrastructure needs and caused a $100 billion shortfall in public services. "Over development ravages infrastructure."

Blackner said the state's growth management act, which was devised to curtail and manage growth, "has been subverted, perverted and twisted and the rest of us be damned."

The constitutional amendment would force developers and local governments to rethink their decisions by subjecting development plans to voter scrutiny, she said.

It would "restore to the public the rightful place in making land-use decisions," Blackner said. "The process has been corrupted because there's so much money at stake."

Blackner said local officials, county commissioners and state representatives and senators are unqualified to make complex development decisions. She said her state senator, Republican Ken Pruitt, never graduated from high school and will oversee development decisions.

A local comprehensive-plan amendment, which is the first step for a residential development, would go on the next the regular election following the development application. Local governments would incur no additional expense. Developers may pay to hold a special election.

Association president Joe Gorman said his group would support the constitutional amendment.

"It would make developers more conscientious in dealing with these issues," he said. "I think that helps everyone."

Villager Sue Michelson said voters need to remember that the constitutional amendment would not halt growth. "Hometown Democracy is not against growth. It's for managed growth."