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They’d cut straight through the northeast field a month before. The steam shovel harvest lay there still, bent up cornstalks boulders with their shins skinned. The hide of the earth split open and quartered. And now they’d come to finish off the job to cut our lives up too. Thinking about the dogs I’d chased down through the yellow corn, the girls I’d walked back home along the fence, mostly the smell of the field, the song of the crows, the rattle of the field mice on the new turned ground made me stop watching them. They were harvesters and spoilers too, no different from the farmer in the next field down the road. Tomorrow we’d start smelling gasoline and diesel smoke as the road came crashing through. Mama said, “It’s just a road.” But she knew too that with the coming of the road our lives would change, it wouldn’t be the same. And it wasn’t.” When Rod McCuen penned that poem, The Day They Built the Road, he had no idea how that imagery would be so descriptive of Southwest Florida over the past 25 years. The construction of Interstate 75 south from Tampa has been the single most important physical factor to have changed Southwest Florida over the past quarter century. Isolated from the urban centers of Tampa and St. Petersburg to the north, access by road was restricted to U.S. 41, a constricted federal highway that in some locations still had not been widened past its original two lanes. Prior to the extensions of I-75, attempts by companies like General Development to carve cities out of raw land, adjacent to water and the main highway had failed. Their idea of developing acreage on the fringes of established cities and building housing and job opportunity in “self-contained” new cities was premature at best. But I’m getting ahead of myself. Having moved with my family from Ohio to this area in 1952, I have witnessed the change from agrarian small town to the bustling, exploding urban sprawl of Southwest Florida. The area south of St. Petersburg, encompassing the cities of Bradenton, Sarasota, Venice, Punta Gorda, Cape Coral, Fort Myers, and Naples, began the last half of the 20th century as a sparsely inhabited coastal region, dependent upon agriculture and the occasional winter visitor who had lost their way while searching for Miami. That is not to say that the residents of this area did not plan, or long to be more like their big city cousin to the southeast Miami. Oh yes, thanks to Plant and Teddy Roosevelt and the Spanish-American War we had a railroad that brought initial hope to bring residents south from Tampa. But it was not until the 1920’s that the entrepreneurs in the form of John Ringling, Mrs. Potter Palmer, Thomas Edison, Henry Ford, Powell Crosley, and Goodyear became winter residents that the first signs of large development began to crop up. Mrs. Potter Palmer bought 1000’s of acres in order to establish cattle ranching on the scale of Texas. John Ringling also bought land, but with the thought of creating a destination that would become the winter White House for the President of the United States. He built a bridge, subdivided a barrier island into single family building lots, and created a commercial center that he named “Harding Circle” in order to entice the then U.S. President to make St. Armands Key his winter home. Unfortunately, Harding died the the week before the grand opening of the bridge. Despite the creation of all the building lots in the 1920’s, the staple of trade was not land for residency, but for trade. Options called “binders” were bid up in price while the land they covered remained in its original unimproved state. Despite the fact that cities were platted, and lots sold, it was not until post World War II that the Southwest coast started to come alive. In fact all Florida started to explode. Florida’s population grew from 2,771,000 people in 1950 to roughly 4.8 million in 1959, thanks to in-migration, which is responsible still today for Southwest Florida’s’ growth. Some may think that today, with a state population in excess of 15 million that we are no longer dependent upon in-migration. However, consider this…Sarasota County recently became the first county in the history of the United States to have more deaths than births. Not a statistic that bodes well for the closing of the door to new residents. In fact the marketing of Southwest Florida through the 1960’s, was almost exclusively directed towards the retiree. As there were little if any employment opportunities, most new development depended primarily on retirement, or permanent income people who brought their pensions, social security, stocks, bonds, and rental incomes with them. Generally it was felt that there were enough Americans reaching the age of 65 to be able to supply Southwest Florida with enough newcomers to fuel all the economic development that could be handled. Single-family lots were sold by the 1,000’s. General Development sold close to 100,000 lots in Southwest Florida and reported that the majority of the owners would build on their lots in five to ten years after purchase. Today, North Port, just south of Sarasota, still has 55,000 building lots that have yet to see a home. So what happened? The developers didn’t do what they had promised – build cities. The promise that cities would soon take shape, never materialized. The developers continued to sell lots while the selling was good, but then the public realized that there was no rush to buy homesites because the promised cities weren’t being built. Southwest Florida’s explosive growth over the past twenty years created a set of combustible problems. The success of real estate development has simply outgrown everything else including revenue and creative ideas to deal with what fifty years ago was an agrarian economy with the occasional winter visitor. Rural developments are cropping up all along the corridor outside of the traditional urban centers, in hopes that they will attract jobs and commercial activity. Government regulation that includes impact fees for everything from parks, to roads, to schools, as well as imposed “stipulations” on planned unit developments and most rezonings, have made lot prices in most areas go beyond the point where builders of middle-priced homes can absorb them. Where housing developments in rural areas, away from the pricey waterfront communities were once considered affordable, they too are now seeing prices for single-family homes in excess of $1,000,000. All the while the agriculture community, faced with curtailment of water usage from the water management districts, storm water fees in excess of ad-valorem taxes, is itchy to join the development game. Profits on citrus and cattle are down, and government has forgotten that “greenbelt” was a recognition that in order to keep farming as a viable occupation it had to be lenient on taxation. Coupled with agriculture operating and taxing problems, is the opportunity that the real estate development players are no longer the small builder and developers, but instead the large, public building corporations like WCI, Lennar, Toll Brothers, and the like. The tremendous amount of money needed for construction and development has necessarily taken the play away from the small builder and developer, and afforded the large agriculture landholder the opportunity to cash out quickly. The promise to build cities broken by the developers of the 1950’s and 1960’s is not being broken today. Why? Local government in Southwest Florida has adopted a very stringent approach to development. Zoning for the most part rather than being performance based is regulatory to the point where some believe that rather than having property rights we have established instead the Socialist Republic of Southwest Florida. Major development is a process that can take longer in permitting than in construction. For those participating it is our version of the full employment act for the legal, planning, and engineering professionals. Let me give you an idea about the number of agencies to deal with beginning with local government. First there is the appointed planning board and elected commission. Next the regional planning council, regional water management district, state department of transportation, department of community affairs, environmental affairs, and on and on. Each agency has a set of rules, promulgated by every incident that went wrong in the history of development, plus “stipulations.” My definition of “stipulations” is that they are rules, thought of too late which can’t be adopted as part of a code, but if you accept their imposition, it will make things easier in getting your project approved! Foul you cry! Property rights violation – blackmail – we’ll sue!!! Ah, “We’ll sue” - the two words of comfort to the elected official in southwest Florida in the 21st century. In the first instance you have confirmed my political integrity by showing that I have not been bought-off or bullied by the evil development community. Second as an elected official I have a bottomless checking account available to me at the First National Bank of the Public Trough. I have no fiduciary background, or experience, having never signed the front of a paycheck, so I can now have staff attorneys along with the judiciary make the decision on whether you have any private property rights. At election time I can tell the NIMBYS how I fought the evil empire, and I can tell the development community how some ferret faced shyster who was head of the government’s legal department advised me that rather than settle the suit, government should fight you to the highest court! But rest assured if you contribute money to my re-election campaign no pasty-faced legal adventurer will cause bad blood between us ever again. And so without having to make a decision, I am re-elected, to continue to not make a decision. And the planned cities continue to be developed. Despite government making it difficult to develop, the requirement of upfront financial commitment for infrastructure that was never made of earlier developers is ensuring that developments today get developed. And you say, what is different in southwest Florida from the rest of the country? In the first instance, we are pushing the farmer out of business. Land values are escalating past the point where the value of the land justifies the value of what can be produced. Florida lawmakers in the just ended legislative session approved a ban on Florida counties ability to regulate farms, as an appeasement to an ever-growing chorus of disgruntled farmers. The Florida House of Representatives passed the bill entitled the “Agricultural Lands and Practices Act” by a vote of 117-0. It passed the Senate 37-0. Essentially the bill prohibits counties from regulating any activity of agriculture that is covered by Federal, state, or water management district regulation. The counties and environmentalists are up in arms, while the Farm Bureau feels that county governments only care about urban amenities and city creation. The range wars have returned, and attorney’s waiting for the governor to sign the bill, are locking and loading to fight the constitutional infringement question on whether the state can usurp so completely the powers of local government. The bill says that a county “may not exercise any of its powers to adopt any ordinance, resolution, regulation, rule or policy to prohibit, restrict, regulate, or otherwise limit an activity of a bona fide farm operation on agricultural land.” I can see it now; all new developments will be changing their names to “Marvin’s Gardens,” “Strawberry Fields Forever,” and “Farmer’s Dell.” Each homeowner will be given a goat, chicken, and horse to assure that the agriculture character of development be kept. No more 500-foot setbacks, tree ordinances, earthmoving ordinances, and storm-water districts for me. I am bona fide AGRI-CULTURE! Seriously though, while expenses keep going up for ranching and crops, staying in business and making a profit are becoming more difficult. As the urbanization of the rural areas of our coastal communities takes place it is the beginning of the end for agriculture as a business. As one large parcel sells it impacts the adjacent lands, as one by one, these rural lands are converted to residential, commercial, and industrial properties. In the second instance, what was once agricultural land is being turned into “new” cities. With the adoption of stringent requirements imposed by both the State of Florida and local government the developers are creating “new” cities because they are required to provide their own entire infrastructure. In the meantime the earlier developments that were built in the unincorporated county areas with no zoning, no central water and sewer, substandard or never built roads are now becoming the nightmares of government. As late as the 1980’s County governments felt that their only responsibility was to control mosquitoes and pay for the sheriff and his posse. As late as 1988 Sarasota County for example, remained focused on not providing central utilities and refused to join with the City of Sarasota to build a regional sewage treatment facility. By the time that the county officials awoke to the benign neglect that had taken place from their refusal to deal with infrastructure that they had never provided, they were faced with polluted bays and creeks, contaminated potable water wells, and inadequate roads. When a revelation of this magnitude strikes a political body, its first order of business is to look for a “bad” guy. Clearly the bad guy had been development who had responded to market demands, but did not build the infrastructure. Again rather than deal with the issue, some counties like Sarasota, decided that in order to stop this relentless march of development that they would only allow residential development of five and ten acre lots on rural land. In Southwest Florida these are called ranches. Still built with wells and septic systems, some on dirt roads, the counties added to their problems and have only now begun to recognize that rather than stopping development it proliferated. And rather than raise cattle and citrus on these so-called ranches the only thing that is raised is a cocktail! We call them “martini ranches,” and based upon the new rules just enacted by the State Legislature we are about to get more of them. It is just more urban sprawl without infrastructure. So now begins the catch up. Government is establishing central water and sewage facilities over vast land areas with not only purchases and hook-ups of package water and treatment plants, but also the digging up and replacement of individual septic tanks, and the shutting down of polluted shallow household wells. The cost to do this in dollars amount to 100’s of millions. The disruption to existing neighborhoods is immense. The lack of adequate road construction in southwest Florida is even worse. North – South roads that should have been built are limited. In Collier County which is Naples, they never bothered to build any North – South local roads and are now left with the Federal highway of US-41 and I-75 as their only road ways to go north and south. It is so bad that if there is ever a major hurricane headed for southwest Florida, that the only hope for evacuation would be to use all lanes of I-75 going north. Oh, I forgot to tell you, we couldn’t get to the center of the state or the east coast either on any multilane roads unless we go to I-4 out of Tampa or Alligator Alley south of Naples. Until recently we all lived in the belief that someone, from someplace else, was going to take care of all this for us. However, we are now waking up to the tremendous costs that we face in trying to retrofit our communities. Which leads me back to the creation of cities. With government spending their energy and attention dealing with the sins of omission and commission of the past, the new cities that are being created today are far different from what was built yesterday. All the burden of infrastructure placed on the developer has changed the face of community. Beautiful and complete with offices, shopping, golf courses and other amenities the cost of development leaves few if any housing units priced under $200,000. The regulatory framework and permitting process being subject to appeal and collateral attack, together with environmental and wetlands regulations driving up the cost of land, leaves new housing availability only accessible to the most affluent. The rising cost of housing to support an integrated economy of teachers, service industry personnel and the like is an ignored threat to the functioning economic and social well being of what we have traditionally known as “community.” Moderate-income workers are finding that not only can they not afford the purchase of a home, even the prospects of rentals in places like Sarasota and Collier (Naples) counties is out of reach for many. In Sarasota and Collier (Naples,) over 50% of the population does not work, despite the fact that government statistics show these two communities to be some of the most affluent in the country. I did a paper a number of years ago referring to the “Tale of Two Cities” where half the population in Sarasota does not work and enjoys a high standard of living, thanks to transfer payments of rents, stocks, and retirement, while the working population enjoys a standard of living at the same level as the citizens of Shreveport, Louisiana. In turn the working folks are forced to live far away from the affluent centers and are forced to commute long distances to work, adding to an all ready heavily congested road network. The same tool used for “growth management” of impact fees, and over regulation by government, has led to a loss of affordable housing. Long term the prospects for the employees of a service economy are not good. Without an adequate work force the prospects of our improving and upgrading our local economy is not good either, as we continue to export our children to other markets. Which brings me full circle to Rod McCuen’s poem The Day They Built (that damned) Road! In truth, we were poorer then than we are today. We had less of everything – including cars and people! But we had one hell of a lot more mosquitoes! We thought we got along better with one another, until you think back about how the sheriff escorted the Grand Kluxen of the Klu Klux Klan through town, and how one of the pillars of the community stole money from the church offering to bet at the dog track. How Billy Joe grew up in a house with no running water, nor electricity. How we didn’t have air conditioning. It does seem that during the last half of the 20th Century and now during the first half of the 21st that the constant of Florida is change. That is not to say that some of the change has been the most constructive to the state or region, but it doesn’t mean that we have not been eager to roll up our sleeves with the faith that the future holds something better. When Florida became a State of this Union, no one expected that this mosquito-infested swamp would ever amount to much. Sometimes I shut my eyes in the midst of what surrounds me today, and marvel at the experiences I have lived through in Southwest Florida. The good still outweighs the bad. We just have to live with the belief that if we keep tinkering long enough, that we’ll get it right. It is our insurmountable opportunity, that keeps us all going in trying to get things right. Speech delivered by Kerry Kirschner to the American Bar Association, State & Local Government Law Section, 2003 Spring Section Meeting, May 10, 2003, Don Cesar Beach Resort and Spa, St. Petersburg Beach, Florida
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