Florida voters will have only one chance in their lifetimes to change the relationship of campaign funders to zoning and local government that shapes communities. The Growth Machine says, no! to Amendment 4. But look around at South Florida, and the ghost suburbs, foreclosures, unemployment and shattered dreams: Amendment 4 is your chance to vote YES! for change.
To reach the state-wide ballot, Amendment 4 was a monumental effort led by grass roots supporters of Florida Hometown Democracy. The development and real estate lobby threw everything they could muster against the measure. Why? Because when it passes, it will crack the bond between local political campaigns and zoning changes required by "comprehensive" planning. (please click, 'read more')
Opponents of Florida Hometown Democracy deride the measure as being superfluous to representative democracy, where voters choose public officials by a majority vote. They also cite abuse of citizen petition to change the Florida Constitution by referendum. But they are the very same big campaign contributors who threw up a massive roadblock in 2006 requiring a supermajority-- or 60 percent of the popular vote-- to amend the Florida constitution: all in anticipation of Amendment 4.
Despite all the roadblocks, including a series of legal challenges to the Florida Supreme Court (one former Supreme Court justice went to work for the law firm representing a poison pill, competitive amendment that was eliminated from the November ballot), Florida voters will have their chance to change the equation of special interests that helped push the economy into a ditch; bad development, over-development, and the false claims of a stable economy based on temporary jobs tied to the housing bubble.
In my opinion, it is the first and LAST chance that Florida voters will ever have. The reason is the insurmountable cost and difficulties of mounting a citizen-led referendum against the Growth Machine. If not for the founders and leaders of Florida Hometown Democracy, Lesley Blackner and Ross Burnaman-- both attorneys who have spent careers involved in land use issues on behalf of community interests-- Amendment 4 would never have existed. The personal toll on the two leaders has been severe. If there was ever a David versus Goliath struggle: Amendment 4 is it.
Where Florida Hometown Democracy has struggled to raise enough money to wage a state-wide campaign, the Growth Machine has quietly set out to raise millions, perhaps tens of millions of dollars. Its signs are appearing on highways, against the measure. And dark, hit-and-run mailers to likely voters are just around the corner. The slimy lies and half-truths are intended to sow enough confusion and doubt, that the measure will not achieve the magic 60 percent.
But I have hope. If voters read the amendment-- and that is a 'big if'-- it will pass. Voters are that angry. Voters are that fed up with economic interests who claim to represent the best chance to rise from the Great Recession. Voters know how we got to this place, and they will vote in droves for Amendment 4. Here is a recent editorial by Lesley Blackner, leader of Florida Hometown Democracy:
Lesley Blackner: Ex-mayor of Port St. Lucie, his council's rubber-stamping
of development, one of reasons Amendment 4 on ballot
BY Lesley Blackner
Monday, August 30, 2010
Remember when St. Lucie County was going to declare itself a man-made
disaster area? It is, after all, ground zero for the over-building bubble
that nuked Florida’s economy.
St. Lucie elected officials deserve a lot of the blame. They are the ones
who rubber-stamped one pie-in-the-sky subdivision after another. What did
the frenzy produce? Thousands of houses are empty or unfinished. Foreclosure
central. Crime and grow houses. Collapsed home values. Rising taxes to cover
all the infrastructure and services the new construction requires. The
politicians own this mess.
Bob Minsky, former mayor of Port St. Lucie, helped set the stage for the
disaster, rubber-stamping the city into a future bubble and collapse. He
deserves an ample share of blame. I’ve yet to hear his apology. Instead, he
blasts Amendment 4, the constitutional amendment sponsored by the
nonpartisan citizens group Florida Hometown Democracy.
Amendment 4 gives voters the final say over whether their local
comprehensive plan should be changed. Now, three votes on the commission is
all it takes. It’s just too easy. According to a state report, St. Lucie
County has enough growth built into its plan for the next 200 years! And yet
the rubber-stamping continues.
Mr. Minsky says voters are too busy to take the time to study the issues. He
says land use is too complicated. I think voters can understand whether they
want a 200-acre parcel designated rural turned into another mall or
subdivision. Put the ballot question in plain English. If voters can sift
through evidence on jury trials, they handle the occasional comprehensive
plan change.
Political rubber-stampers like Bob Minsky created the impetus for Amendment
4. If they had shown some restraint, Amendment 4 would not be on the ballot.
Experience has proven they do not have that ability. During the past year,
Florida politicians rubber-stamped a tidal wave of even more over-growth to
accommodate developers and speculators trying to get ahead of Amendment 4.
That’s why Floridians must make this intervention.
Opposition to Amendment 4 consists of professional politicians, real estate
speculators and lobbyists — the very people who wrecked Florida! They admit
to raising $6 million since April to defeat this reform. About $2 million
comes from giant construction companies like Lennar and Pulte Homes that
went off the deep end and overbuilt, crashing the market and themselves. But
the over-builders got bailed out this year by the federal government to the
tune of $33 billion. They promptly took some of that money and gave it to
the No on 4 campaign. Another $3.5 million comes from their lobbying groups.
Remember the source when the deluge of anti-4 TV commercials crank up. They
will say anything to preserve their power. But the wreckage of the real
estate collapse demonstrates our homes and communities are just too
important to leave in the hands of politicians and their lobbyists.
Amendment 4 is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to provide a commonsense
check-and-balance on a corrupt, out-of-control system that works for
speculators and politicians but has failed Floridians. Is even more
development worth it for us taxpayers? Do we want even more construction?
Because Florida taxpayers are the ones who must live with the consequences,
we deserve a vote. The politicians have failed us miserably. We must take
back the keys to our community’s future. Vote yes on 4 on Nov. 2.
4 comments:
I am still not convinced that Amendment 4 is the way to go. Wouldn't its passage just increase the number of elections and developer money in those campaigns? What makes you think developers won't continue funding campaigns of the elected officials if Amendment 4 passes?
As with any change of this significance, there will be a period when voters will realize new authority has been vested at the ballot box. Amendment 4 will not increase the number of elections, once local governments recognize that they have to work with the public to create solid master plans. Amendment 4 only covers CHANGES to master plans. Senseless changes, like building small cities in Everglades wetlands or valuable farmland, will not pass the voters' smell test. As to the second question: developers will have to make new choices about how to invest their money in political campaigns. Since the routine, quid pro quo votes by local legislatures on comp plan changes will no longer be needed, nor paid jockeying by lobbyists who earn to rig the outcomes, developers will have to decide whether pouring hundreds of thousands of dollars into local campaigns still makes sense. This scrambles both the business models of the downtown "land use and environmental" practice of law firms and of developers, who will need a different model to influence an election. For example, why would developers from outside Dorrin Rolle's district pour gold into his campaign... or Pepe Diaz' for that matter, once they don't need their votes for sprawl? Some people argue that all we will be doing is swapping out one bad equation for another bad one; ie. developers will buy elections to change comp plans, instead. I predict that a better model for Florida will emerge, because eventually the Florida legislature will come to terms -- under Amendment 4-- that there has to be a better way to earn the voters' trust than the broken status quo. Observers understand that the legislature's main purpose, related to construction and development, has been to repeatedly attack the one government agency charged with trying to make sense and order out of Florida's interest in protecting communities and natural resources. When Amendment 4 passes, the legislature will eventually be forced to reform. In the interim, there will be some creative attempts to screw the public interest: it is the legislature's first instinct. In time, INHO, the legislature will reclaim eventually the broad bipartisan consensus that conceived growth management in the first place; hopefully, to a better purpose.
As an observer of the political process since the 1980's I think you are wrong to think developers will not continue to be as financially involved in the political process should Amendment 4 pass. The "usual suspects" will find another way to influence the process even with votes to change the comprehensive plans of local communities and counties.
I believe that if it isn't land use changes the lawyer/lobbyists are playing at, it will be contracts at the beach, the seaport, the airport, roads projects, etc.
Here is another question for you Gimleteye: Who bares the burden financially of these elections should Amendment 4 pass?
And lobbyists will continue to jockey for votes forever: that is just business.
As bitter as many people are towards developers in this state I don't think you will see as many petitions for land use change. Developers are going to realize they no longer have as good a chance at getting one over on the taxpayers and they will not pursue them. I'm not worried the least about an increase in elections expenses.
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