IN YOUR CORNER
We questioned the need to spend $528 thousand with an outside consultant to study our own Comprehensive Plan when this idea was first proposed. We thought that local planners, the county staff and citizens’ groups such as Friends of Martin County could have provided much of the required input at a fraction of the cost. We NEVER questioned the need to study. In fact the MCTA has questioned the wisdom and pointed out legitimate concerns about limiting our future options for land use to only twenty acre “Ranchettes”. We are insistent that the Taxpayers not get stuck with the bill for a de-railed study while receiving absolutely no return on our investment. We expect all of our commissioners to stand up for an open honest debate of our options and a way to provide for our future. We think it a great idea to take more time, as much time as needed, to consider all honest viewpoints and alternatives to simply just dividing the remainder of Martin County into twenty acre parcels that will be re-subdivided in the future. We don’t think it’s a great idea to continue to force higher density development into our existing neighborhoods.
In 2000, now five years ago, the MCTA established an ad hoc committee to investigate these issues. We learned that a number of techniques have been successfully used in other locales to deal with the problem of suburban ranchette conversion of the agricultural community. Many of these have been developed by nationally recognized organizations, universities and planning institutes. We reported our findings to the county in a white paper and requested the county commission address these issues.
Thankfully, over the past five years, county commissioners and community leaders have extended our initial research on these issues, and are finally considering real action. A formal planning effort with extensive community involvement is necessary, and it should begin now. We urge the county to hold widely publicized and televised public meetings, and come up with realistic improvements and implementation of our existing Comprehensive Plan to implement the sustainable “vision” proposed years ago. We recommend a “peer” review by independent experts such as Florida Atlantic University, Florida State University and the University of Florida. Also, to encourage assistance from the Florida Department of Community Affairs.
Martin County’s adopted “vision” shows development with undeveloped green space, agriculture and/or preserved lands surrounding the developed areas. There are many reasons taxpayers should support this future. Compact planned development, with services conveniently located within them, is more efficient than suburban sprawl, saving taxpayers higher costs for government services. Planning should be required so that the overall cost of government does not increase faster than population as we have seen in the past twenty years. We expect to see a variety of housing opportunities as required by our current Comprehensive Plan, including places and opportunities for working people to live, work and raise their families, allowing them to continue to contribute to the overall society known as Martin County. We believe that Martin County must expand its non-residential base by encouraging the expansion of existing small businesses and industries, allowing new high-tech and bio-tech research and development and the clean manufacturing of goods and services to be exported out of our area. Only when these things are encouraged and allowed to happen, can we elevate our overall quality of life and opportunity for all of our citizens.
We simply must avoid what has happened in Palm Beach and Broward counties, and even here in Martin County, where agriculture land was legally divided into smaller acreage parcels and sold to individuals for “rural” equestrian communities. These residents demanded and eventually received urban services from county government. Once the services are extended, and the ranchettes converted from native land to pasture, those closest to the urban fringe were redeveloped into typical suburban subdivisions. The political rationale being that these lands were already requiring urban services, so why not allow re-subdivision to increase the tax base and tax revenues. This is a pattern of land consumption that we do not want to continue in Martin County, and that most residents falsely assume the Comprehensive Plan protects us from.
It is unrealistic to believe that land development regulations will preserve the overall ecology of central and west Martin County if it is subdivided into private parcels of 20 acres each. Native uplands and wetlands are not and will not be protected and preserved per the urban rules in a rural ranchette setting. We can have better and we demand the opportunity to discuss our options.