Grimm says, "It was a fine time to sabotage the state's growth-management policies". Said Grimm about Crist signing the SB 360 Growth Bill:
"With 300,000 unsold homes languishing on the market, with another half-million in various stages of foreclosure, with God knows how many stalled projects moldering amid rusting rebar, bare cinder-block walls, concrete slabs and fading ''no trespassing'' signs, growth management lately seemed more about nostalgia than policy.
Floridians, living amid the rubble of a real estate collapse, hardly noticed SB 360 as it was slipped through the Legislature. Who was paying any attention to growth issues? Housing prices were down 31 percent from a year ago." County Commissioner Katy Sorenson said in the column:
''No doubt about it, the recession gave them cover to pass this bill. Calling SB 360 a "growth-management bill, was a downright Orwellian touch."
Looking for Developer blood money in your Senatorial campaign Charlie? This move by Crist is more about financing an upcoming election than promoting good government policy.
5 comments:
The St Pete Times had a series of letters to the editor yesterday. The writers claim to be Republicans, each one said they would not vote for Crist for US Senate. If these letters are a representative sample, Crist is in trouble. Signing 360 had to be a stupid move. Who was he listening to? Not the people, that's for sure. I thought he was better than Rubio but he is just as bad.
I have to say signing SB360 is a stunningly stupid move for a man who has otherwise made so many politically astute moves. The irony of ironies for me is that why is he kowtowing to the developers? They have no money to support him in his political ambitions, they are all going bust!
I have to admit I am very disappointed in both the legislature and Crist. I had such high hopes that the Gov could be better than the rest.
Eyeonmiami was clamoring about this bill for weeks. Herald editors and writers read this blog all the time. Why didn't the Herald mount a campaign against the bill? It might have helped.
It is not a bad thing that Fred published this editorial on June 6, but other newspapers were publishing editorials on this bill weeks ago.
What gets me steamed is that the Herald/St. Pete Times joint Tallahassee coverage had picked up this story weeks ago, and printed it and prominent editorials in the St. Pete Times but not The Miami Herald.
This AFTER THE FACT approach at the Herald means that either someone is very very lazy in the editors office or simply doesn't care.
The Miami delegation of the Florida legislature has a lot of responsibility for this horrendous bill and past bills but the only time we ever hear about legislators and what they have done is at the end of the session.
If the Florida Chamber of Commerce thinks it is a great idea, you don't read a word of criticism in the Herald: that's the take-away lesson of this bill.
It doesn't matter short of the government writing a developer a fat check there won't be much building going on in Florida anytime soon. That's just an economic reality. What I finf Ironic is that developers are asked to pay impact fees (25K Per unit in some counties), property taxes and fees are still going up and yet counties cry poverty and complain about lack of affordable housing.
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