Council Minutes : February 16, 1996
FORT MYERS BEACH
SPECIAL TOWN COUNCIL MEETING
WORKSHOP ON PROPOSED CLUP ORDINANCE MORATORIUM
FEBRUARY 16, 1996
ST. RAPHAEL'S EPISCOPAL CHURCH
5601 WILLIAMS DRIVE
FORT MYERS BEACH, FLORIDA
I CALL TO ORDER
The meeting was opened by Mayor Anita T. Cereceda
at 1:10 P.M. on Friday, February 16, 1996,
with a pledge of allegiance to the flag.
In attendance at the meeting were Mayor and Council
Member Anita T. Cereceda; Vice Mayor and Council
Member; Ted Fitzsimons; Interim
Town Manager Marsha Segal-George and Council Members
Rusty Isler, Ray Murphy and Garr Reynolds.
Town Attorney Richard Roosa was also in
attendance.
Mayor Cereceda announced that there would be no public
input at this meeting and that it was strictly
an educational workshop for the Council.
II PRESENTATIONS
A. Wayne Daltry, Executive Director,
Southwest Florida Regional Planning Council
Outlined by Mr. Daltry were matters that faced the
city council in
home rule. Foremost is their need for a comprehensive
plan. They have about
a year to designate what is known as a local planning
agency. Florida law
requires that the local planning agency have a comprehensive
plan by about
three years from the date a town is created. Florida
law provides a lot of detail
of what a comprehensive plan is supposed to be but,
frankly, Mr. Daltry advised,
it is your vision of yourself for the future. Mr.
Daltry described this vision as
being both internal and external. He said that the
town already had some
internal vision that enabled them to become its own
community. The trick,
however, is to get everybody to reach some consensus
of what that looks like on
paper and then adopt it into law.
The comprehensive plan document that describes a
town's vision
has several mandatory components, Mr. Daltry advised.
There is to be a future
land use map, a future land use element. There is
supposed to be a
transportation element, one major road, a parks and
recreation element. You
are supposed to have in effect a public services
element -- water, sewage, solid
waste, drainage. You are supposed to have a capital
improvement element, an
interval coordination element, a conservation element,
and a coastal element
because you're a coastal community. A coastal element
should address the
subject of hurricane evacuation.
You are a parks and recreation site, Mr. Daltry stated.
One-half of the
traffic is non-residents and Fort Myers Beach is
their destination. They are here
to recreate. Your recreation is not just for the
town but is a regional recreation
source for this county, for other counties in Florida
and for a greater part of
northern United States. This is something that is
part of your burden and part of
your ambience.
Mr. Roger advised that our public service is our
water system. Our water
is not self-sufficient. We definitely need to be
concerned how water is managed
elsewhere in order to have a water supply here that
we can depend upon for
tomorrow.
Mr. Daltry doesn't think the town has the land to
meet the FAS waste
treatment systems of the future and will have to
work with that regionally.
There is no incinerator for solid waste and so it
must be leaving the
island, Mr. Daltry said, and he indicated that that
was an expensive way to take
care of it.
The drainage may go into the bay and the town may
be able to improve
the drainage here so that the water quality is good,
but the bay isn't in good
quality if the other communities around here don't
protect it. So we have a point
of discussion with surrounding communities if we
want to have good water
quality in our bay
The plan is our basic document by which we are going
to discuss things
with our neighbors and the Lee County Commission
for sure, according to
Mr. Daltry. We will find that we have points of discussion
probably with Naples,
Cape Coral. With the plan we can find out where this
new town fits in the overall
regional and state community of Florida.
Mr. Daltry stated that the town of Fort Myers Beach
has a few challenges.
One challenge is that someone else's negligence becomes
a burden for the
town. Sanibel, Lee County, will be part of the town's
picture. They will be there
no matter what.
The town's comprehensive planning effort, which on
the surface may
seem little, can be very good. It may be the best
tool to continue to hammer out
community consensus on any of the subjects with which
you know you are going
to be faced. An awful lot of communities have been
there before you. I think
they cheerily will be willing to help you, Mr. Daltry
said.
Rusty Isler asked Mr. Daltry what the concept would
be of taking the
county plan or the current plan and modifying it
to fit us. Mr. Daltry indicated
that the town is going to need information. When
Lee County does a plan they
have to balance things, Mr. Daltry said, and this
town is going to have to balance
things also, although in a lot smaller area. You
can be self-serving. You don't
have to accept, for example, an evacuation plan of
the county. It sounds simple
but the modifications are going to be very difficult.
But when you get done with
your modifications, there won't be a lot of resemblance
between what you started
with and what you have done.
Ted Fitzsimons said that he assumed then that there
is no law protecting
other municipalities' comp plans from potential plagiarism.
We can go through
other communities' that we see that have similar
geographics and try to see how
they handle particular problems, how they define
things. You might check with
copyright, Mr. Daltry told him, but most of them
do not copyright. It's not
uncommon. That's how things got started. Mr. Daltry
said that he could produce
for us three different plans that started from the
same template. You start off
with a basic template, but when you are done you
have created something for
your community.
Mr. Fitzsimons advised that this particular workshop
was precipitated
because of a request to have our town attorney draft
a modified moratorium
ordinance. Mr. Daltry said that moratorium means
you are stopping something
today that you are going to allow later, perhaps
with modifications. He set forth
three different concepts of a moratorium and said
that each concept has to be
indexed to why you are doing it, how long you are
going to do it and what you
want to accomplish by the time it's done. You can't
just turn your selections on
and off like a light switch.
Ray Isler said that it was his understanding that
the reason for the
suggested moratorium here on Fort Myers Beach was
to use it as a planning
tool, a freeze, so that council could work on the
comprehensive plan. Would
that be a good reason to effect a moratorium Mr.
Isler wanted to know. Speaking
extemporaneously, having not reviewed a particular
document, Mr. Daltry said, if
you're freezing your community land use map while
you're doing this, you would
be declaring in effect that the county's zoning act
will stand until you get around
to changing it, and you won't change it until you
have the change in your
comprehensive plan. That is a rezoning moratorium.
That's not, I would think,
uncommon for new communities. If I were your planner,
I would probably be
asking you to do it. I would not probably be asking
you to impose a building
moratorium that was consistent with that land use
map's zoning ordinances
unless I had a public service reason: the roads don't
work, the water doesn't
work, the sewer doesn't work. The reason why I condition
it that way is because
later on I would probably be asking for that kind
of moratorium too, but only after
you had reached closure on what you expect it to
be. Then we'd be targeting all
sorts of buildings and saying don't build them because
we're going to change the
zoning and we'd then be going to court because that's
the only way we're going
to be able to do this. A speculative change would
be if somebody came in
wanting a rezoning and you give them a reason to
expect one.
Mayor Cereceda asked Mr. Daltry if the plan had to
be created three
years from the creation of the LPA or from this municipality.
He replied that it is
his recollection that it is the municipality. Mrs.
Cereceda then quoted him as
saying that this is largely a built-out community,
to which Mr. Daltry replied in
effect that it sure looked like it when he was driving
through it.
Mayor Cereceda presented other questions to Mr. Daltry,
such as,
a. How then does a moratorium help or hinder a largely
built-
out community?
b. You said that a moratorium stops things for a
while. What
happens to those things when the moratorium is lifted?
Do they then have to
conform to the plan or do they just go ahead as they
were before the
moratorium?
B. Bruce Rogers, Planning Director, City of Sanibel
Mr. Rogers stated that he is here to say that everything
Mr. Daltry
said is correct and that they should feel that they
have a tremendously large task
in front of them, because they do. He noted that
there are a lot of similarities
between the town of Fort Myers Beach and the city
of Sanibel, but they are not
the same and they shouldn't try to be the same. We
all have our attributes that
we want to build upon, and that's how you should
be looking at the town of Fort
Myers Beach. Mr. Rogers said there are many many
things that were good
about our town and that is what we should build upon.
Rusty Isler had asked if
you could look at the plans of other barrier islands,
but you will find, as Wayne
Daltry indicated, that when you are done your plan
is only going to be good for
the town of Fort Myers Beach. You can get ideas from
other places, but in the
final analysis this place, like any other place,
is unique. So don't think in terms
of we'll do it like Sanibel did, because we're just
not the same. There are
tremendous differences between Sanibel Island twenty
years ago and Fort
Myers Beach today. Also, the law has changed tremendously
in twenty years.
Under today's law you have much less flexibility.
With respect to moratoriums, Mr. Rogers advised that
we needed
to take a look at the plan that is in effect today
for Fort Myers Beach. It's not like
you don't have a plan, he said. There is a set of
zoning regulations in place
today. There is a land development code. There are
rules and regulations for
what you have to do to get a permit. All of those
are in place today and it is my
understanding that under your local agreement with
Lee County they will
continue to issue permits. You do have a plan and
it's in place and it's being
implemented. The question you have to ask yourself
is do you like that plan.
Some things you may want to keep and others you may
want to change.
Mr. Rogers said that the town should ask itself regarding
the
problems it has had with Lee County whether the problems
arose out of the way
the county administered the codes of if the problems
they had rested in the
codes themselves. You are in charge here, he advised.
It is up to you to decide
whether rezonings are going to be granted. It is
up to you to decide whether
special exceptions are going to be granted or a variance
is to be granted. Is that
enough for you to be satisfied to leave everything
else in place? If you feel that
there is some fundamental problem with the code itself
... then you need to exert
more control than what you have set up now. Mr. Rogers
gave examples based
on Sanibel's experiences.
Rusty Isler noted that we are very much constrained
by our traffic.
The only way to concentrate density is to go up,
Mr. Isler said, and asked for Mr.
Rogers' views regarding high risers. Mr. Rogers said
that if over three stories is
a high rise, then Sanibel doesn't have that. Even
under Lee County zoning that
was in effect for Sanibel Island before it became
a city, there was a 35-foot
maximum height restriction. If you want high density,
if you're looking for a way
to maximize your density on a per square foot of
land, then obviously you go up.
But if you're looking to restrict density, then a
very quick way to do that is to
place height restrictions in combination with land
coverage restrictions. If you
can't go up and you can't go out, then that obviously
restricts you to a much
smaller building envelope and you are going to restrict
densities that way. If you
want a mechanism to accommodate those densities,
then you will have to permit
people to go up.
I don't think our density matches our road system,
and I don't know
how that was allowed to happen with all these plans.
We obviously have more
density than our roads can handle and all this planning
doesn't seem to protect
us from that, Mr. Isler said.
Mr. Rogers said that one would think it would. You
would think it
would have protected Sanibel, but it didn't. There
are more dwelling units in
Sanibel than there are population. In that sense
our problems are quite similar.
What clogs up the roads are the units that are here.
There is nearly 100 percent
occupancy at this time of year, plus, he indicated,
when people go to the beach,
Sanibel and Fort Myers Beach is where they go. A
lot of the traffic you have out
here at this time of year is not in any way associated
with dwellings, but is
caused by people just coming out for the day. Controlling
density does not
automatically control traffic.
Ted Fitzsimons wanted to know if Sanibel had restrictions
in place
for traffic control purposes, such as when businesses
should close or not open.
Mr. Rogers advised that they didn't have regulations
of that type.
Do you feel that there is a direct relationship between
density, i.e.,
dwelling units, and traffic volume? Mr. Fitzsimons
wanted to know. Mr. Rogers
assured him there was a direct relationship. Single
family detached dwellings
with multiple cars and drivers generate more trips
per day than do hotels and
motels.
If we were planning for our community, we would have
to have a
complete inventory of every dwelling unit that existed
in the community, is that
right? Mr. Fitzsimons questioned. Mr. Rogers said
that that should be an
objective, but it would be very difficult to get
that number. Asked about sources
for this information, Mr. Rogers suggested people
who provide utilities, but said
a street by street canvas would be the best way to
go but it may not be legal. It
may have invasion of privacy implications.
Garr Reynolds asked if Mr. Rogers now feels that
the moratorium
that was imposed by Sanibel was a mistake. Mr. Rogers
said he thought it was
the right thing for Sanibel to do at the time. It
was extraordinarily popular with
the residents although there were some who did not
welcome it.
Mr. Reynolds said that our situation is that we have
to do
something and want to do something for the visitors
and also the permanent
residents on the island but have been threatened
with lawsuits. He asked
Mr. Rogers for a figure on how many millions Sanibel
paid out in the early years
of their moratorium. Mr. Rogers' reply was that he
didn't know how one would
separate out legal fees associated with a moratorium
from legal fees just simply
associated with the advice of a new counsel and legal
fees associated with
doing the legal background necessary to develop the
plan. But he could say
that the legal fees incurred from the day of incorporation
through adoption of the
comprehensive plan, which was 19 months following
adoption, in today's dollars
amounted to millions and millions of dollars, a substantial
expense.
Looking back, would you say that the money you spent
protecting
your community was money well spent? Mr. Reynolds
wanted to know. Yes, was
Mr. Rogers' reply. Obviously, every time you do something
you take chances.
You have to do what you think is best, and then you
have to protect it the best
you can. You have to know that you'll be able to
afford it.
Ray Murphy inquired of Mr. Rogers that if he could
have been the
first planner for Sanibel, why would he have wanted
to be the first one and why
would he not have wanted to be the first one. The
first one, Mr. Rogers said, in
any situation like this is really in an almost no-win
situation. As an employee
you are going to be the one that everybody comes
to see. You keep office
hours, you get paid, and you're expected to have
answers. But so early in the
process you can't possibly give anybody answers.
All you can do is speculate
with the person you are talking with, because you
have no context in which to
answer questions. The advantage of being the first
one is you have a chance to
try out ideas you have always wanted to try but you
have never had the chance
to do it because there were always so many rules
and regulations in place. You
have to work very closely with your council, much
more closely than after you
have rules and regulations in place. Mr. Murphy asked
Mr. Rogers if he would
have wanted to be the first planner on Sanibel, and
he replied no.
The mayor asked Mr. Rogers if the impact on the infrastructure
was
greater commercially or residentially. Mr. Rogers
said he wasn't sure if you
could say one or the other had the greatest impact
where traffic was concerned.
From a planning perspective, the mayor wanted to
know, would you look at them
equally or would you weigh one over the other. You
have to look at them
equally, Mr. Rogers advised. You have to ask yourself
from what area do you
want your commercial traffic to be drawn. Do you
want commercial development
to be such that you are drawing people from other
areas, trying to attract that
traffic here with some type of a commercial development,
or do you want your
commercial development to serve the residential community?
Attorney Roosa asked which had the greater impact
on water
usage, commercial or residential? Mr. Rogers said
that goes back to what's the
purpose of the moratorium. Is it to give you a breathing
spell to figure out what
kind of community you want it to be, or have you
identified an infrastructure
problem, such as inadequacy of water supply, waste
water disposal. What is it
that you are trying to hold down and why are you
trying to hold that down? He
didn't think one could make a really good distinction
-- commercially it would
depend on the kinds of businesses they were talking
about. Restaurants and
beauty parlors use more water than business offices,
for instance. What you
control is the permit. What you can't control is
the traffic that just comes over
here.
Regarding Sanibel's legal challenges, Rusty Isler
wanted to know if
they were all the same and if so, what was the basis
for the lawsuits against the
moratorium. Mr. Rogers replied that most of the legal
challenges were
associated with density reduction. Were you getting
sued after the new density
requirements went into effect, Mr. Isler asked, or
were those lawsuits specifically
against the moratorium. He was told that some were
filed while the moratorium
was in effect and others after the adoption of the
comprehensive plan and the
densities were in place.
Ted Fitzsimons wanted to know the breakdown on how
many
dollars Sanibel spent on lawsuits associated with
people not being able to get
permits and dollars spent because of not being able
to get their project started
within 60 days and thereby invalidating an existing
permit somebody held.
Mr. Rogers said he couldn't help him with those numbers.
Is it unreasonable, Mr. Fitzsimons asked, to ask
those people with
expectations to disclose what they are? Mr. Rogers
said it wasn't unreasonable
to ask. You would then have a public record of what
the expectations are in the
community.
Garr Reynolds on the subject of Sanibel's lawsuits
asked
Mr. Rogers if he felt that Sanibel could have afforded
to not do what they did. If
the city council had not done what they did, Sanibel
would be a different place
today, Mr. Rogers said. There certainly would have
been more condominium-
type development along the beach. There would have
been differences and
Mr. Rogers feels that most people would have found
those differences less
desirable than what they ended up with. If the moratorium
had not been
adopted, Mr. Rogers added, that doesn't mean that
there wouldn't have been a
plan adopted. And the plan would have ended up looking
much as it does now.
But there would have been considerable development
that would have taken
place during the 18 months the plan was being worked
on, so there certainly
would have been differences.
In the planning process we will have to weigh and
evaluate the
impact of allowing us to be a viable, unstressed
community for eight or nine
months of the year and completely over utilized,
unaccommodating for three
months of the year, it was noted.
Different zoning categories were discussed and the
impact they
would have on traffic.
C. Ken Phafzer, Assistant Planning Director, City
of Sanibel
Mr. Phafzer said that Sanibel had a very real goal.
Now they want
to put a new plan in place. Their present plan was
developed in the mid-70's
when building had stopped. In the 80's there was
a condo glut and single-family
homes were a perfect alternative. What they share
with Fort Myers Beach is a
demand to be here. He noted that traffic is the only
thing that keeps people from
coming to Fort Myers Beach.
D. Michael Reitman, Executive Director,
Lee County Building and Industry Association
Parts of Mr. Reitman's speech are as follows. He
expressed his
opinion that the moratorium would hurt the individual
who makes his living here.
These are not just the builders but bankers, appraisers,
automobile dealers, and
real estate agents. He feels that the harsh reality
of a moratorium means
higher property taxes, lower wages and salaries,
fewer jobs, and in the long run
more expensive housing. Fort Myers Beach's economy
is dependent mainly on
tourism, real estate, and to a certain extent retirement.
A moratorium can take
three years and you can become known to the banking
community and any kind
of investment community as not being a good place
to invest money. The
moratorium will greatly devalue undeveloped property
without vested rights. A
moratorium can be politically popular in the short
run, but they typically create
larger problems as economic costs mount. Let's work
together, Mr. Reitman said,
to resolve whatever the real problems or the perceived
problems are. I urge you to
carefully consider the repercussions of the imposition
of a building moratorium.
The impending reaction by individuals denied the
use of their property could be
devastating to this community. As I heard today,
you cannot arbitrarily
differentiate between commercial and residential.
Some further observations of
Mr. Reitman are the following:
1. The building industry and all related industries
oppose any kind of
moratorium. We cannot understand why the town council
would even
contemplate imposing a moratorium.
2. There currently is in place a comprehensive plan
in Lee County
covering Fort Myers Beach. Can this not be utilized
until you, the town, adopts
its own plan? At one time Lee County's plan was designated
as one of the best
in the state.
3. The proposed moratorium is discriminatory and
is arbitrary
because it includes only commercial and not residential.
In the question and answer segment, Ted Fitzsimons
asked
Mr. Reitman what constitutes a depressed area. Mr.
Reitman responded that
when a town imposes a moratorium, the perception
in the investment community
is that the area is a no-growth one. Individuals
will not be able to sell their land
and their property will decrease in value.
If we have a waterfront community and they are not
making any
more waterfront land available for development, Mr.
Fitzsimons asked, why
wouldn't the basic attraction for waterfront property
and dwelling units and
commercial property be maintained regardless of whether
there was a
moratorium or not? If you restrict the supply, does
the demand go away? Mr.
Reitman responded that in normal circumstances, when
you restrict demand
there is an increase in supply, but that has not
been the case when it comes to
moratoriums. When you restrict supply and the demand
stays the same what
happens, Mr. Fitzsimons asked. The price just goes
up, right? Mr. Reitman
responded that was correct.
Mr. Reitman was challenged on his statement that
a moratorium
would cause an area to become depressed. He was told
that the draft of the
moratorium ordinance shows that improvements would
be allowed. Nor does it
specifically rule out commercial but only asks for
limitations. It also mentions
both residential and business density and intensity.
We are not being
discriminatory.
III DRAFT MORATORIUM ORDINANCE
Marsha Segal-George feels that having the town manager
decide what to
do with the LPA's findings is inappropriate. That
should come back to the
council, she feels, and the town manager should not
be in a position of making
judgments on what the LPA says or doesn't do. Mr.
Roosa said that he thought
it would depend on how much time the council wanted
to spend on what he
considers an administrative function. Ms. Segal-George
said that being in a
position of rejecting a recommendation of the LPA
creates a difficult problem
perceptually for a town manager. She doesn't think
the community wants the
town manager in that kind of position and she doesn't
think the town council
does either. Mr. Roosa said he would see what he
could come up with as an
alternative. Mayor Cereceda said that the town manager
is our facilitator and
her position should remain as neutral as possible.
She should have no decision-
making capability whatsoever in solving problems
for the community.
Mr. Roosa said it seems to him that there needs to
be a finding in the
early part of the ordinance that commercial establishments
have a greater
impact on traffic than do residential establishments.
What we have here on the
island is unique, in that the residences attract
their owners, occupants and
relatives, but the commercial establishments attract
off-island people.
Other observations are the following:
We have to look at things in terms of what is best
for the entire community
and not just for individuals.
I think that the growth that we've had in the last
five years has been
reasonable and good.
If people's expectations for the use of their land
is greater than what we
feel is required to provide for the future of the
community, it is conceivable that
that particular conflict would cause litigative efforts.
It sounded pretty clear to me that to effect a moratorium,
you really should
have a reason. Now the reason that came up today
was sewer, or water or
traffic. When traffic came up I saw light bulbs go
off and everybody jumped on
the traffic. I want to know if that is justification
for a moratorium or is the reason
for the moratorium still, as proposed in this draft,
that the changes in land use
will limit the town's ability to plan effectively.
Is that still reason number one for a
moratorium, that traffic is used as a justification
for that moratorium, or are we
going to use the traffic issue as the reason for
the moratorium. A response was
that it wasn't thought that the fundamental objective
and justification for the draft
ordinance had been changed. What we have to plan
for of course is how we're
going to accommodate the present and expanding use
of our infrastructure,
including, naturally, the roads which is the traffic
problem.
If the objective of incorporation was to control
the rate of growth, already
you potentially have litigative problems. Or if they
take issue with our new
comprehensive land use plan which attempts to deliver
that which is going to
control and get us to the twenty years from now that
we want to be, if they don't
like that and they want to do it some other way they
are entitled to go to court.
It seems to me that we are going to get sued by all
the people who have
slid through in this last rush. Those are the people
who are going to be
dramatically impacted. I want to know what is going
to happen to those people
when this moratorium is lifted.
When the moratorium is lifted, it is presumed that
all of the elements or
certain elements of the comprehensive land use plan
would be installed.
Everybody would have to comply with that. And if
they don't like that, they'll sue.
Is it the Lee County Comprehensive Plan that we are
challenging or is it
the administration, It seems to me that if it is
the administration, then we as the
new administrators have solved that problem already.
The Lee County Comprehensive Plan is a good plan.
There has not been
very much enforcement. But it is not something that
we can arbitrarily adopt.
The assumption that traffic is a justification for
this moratorium is
stretching your imagination a bit. I don't think
that anyone has said that this
moratorium has anything to do with traffic. It certainly
will not change the traffic
pattern in any way. Also, I don't think that a lot
of lawsuits will prevail. I think
there may be some, but then I think there are some
in litigation right now. I
doubt that a whole lot will change on that because
it is allowing for exceptions.
As long as we take a fair approach to this for the
benefit of the community, I
think the community will prevail. This moratorium
is simply for breathing time. It
is a time for allowing some planning for responsible
growth.
IV COUNCIL DISCUSSION AND DIRECTION
During this segment of the meeting the council members
discussed
among themselves subjects related to the comprehensive
plan and the effect it
would have on the community. Mr. Roosa suggested
they needed a planner.
The mayor advised she would not be here on the 26th
and hoped that
nothing requiring her vote would be scheduled on
that date. It was decided to
reschedule the CRA portion of the meeting to March
4. It was advised that
Marsha should continue to schedule meetings with
the knowledge that perhaps
one or two of them may not be able to make a meeting.
It was announced that
they could schedule a workshop where they are not
allowed to vote followed by
a special meeting where they can vote.
Mr. Roosa passed out copies of a letter from the
county attorney that
responded to Mr. Roosa's letter asking the county
attorney to reconsider his
position. The county attorney's position has not
changed. Mr. Roosa advised
that there is a procedure that they could file prior
to filing litigation to have this
issue resolved. Mr. Roosa has talked to the county
attorney about this and has
the feeling that his position would be that he would
waive that procedure if it is
waivable, or in the alternative, he would meet with
the county commissioners
and they would waive it if it is waivable so that
we could get early hearings for a
declaratory judgment on the issue of statutory construction
of the ordinances to
see if they apply to the town. There is another alternative
and this is the
alternative that the county attorney favors, and
that is for the county commission
to adopt an ordinance which would make the county
ordinances apply to the
Beach. It is my position that they already apply,
but it certainly wouldn't hurt
anything if they adopted it for that same reason
so that they would be satisfied.
Their concern is that they might be enforcing invalid
ordinances. And if they felt
comfortable and if they felt that procedure would
protect them, Mr. Roosa said
he would have no problem with it. The only concern
he would have is how they
drafted the ordinance and if they were to shift some
of this responsibility over to
the town. These are county ordinances and they should
be the responsibility of
county to enforce. That has been our position all
along. The county attorney
has informed Mr. Roosa that he believes the county
commission would without
hesitation adopt those ordinances and apply them
to our town. He said the other
municipalities expressly requested to be left out
and that's why they were left
out. The mayor added that the other municipalities
also had sheriff departments.
Those are our options, Mr. Roosa continued. One would
be to pursue the
method to the court and have the judge judicially
determine whether or not the
ordinance would apply, and that would protect the
county and that would protect
us. The problem however is that that's expensive.
The county apparently are
willing to enforce ... their concern is liability.
So it would protect the county if
they were to adopt an ordinance just for our town.
However, they won't do it
unless we request it. So that's the issue there.
I would need you to think about
that and decide whether you want to request that.
I haven't seen the ordinance,
Mr. Roosa admitted.
V ADJOURNMENT
Mayor Cereceda adjourned the meeting at 5:00 P.M.
Respectfully submitted,
Lorraine Calhoun
Recording Secretary
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