Staff directed to analyze whether adopted fee for staff work associated with sessions should be higher
With a 4-1 vote this week, the Sarasota County Commission formally adopted a resolution that requires applicants for land-use changes and amendments to the Comprehensive Plan — which guides growth in the community — to conduct in-person Neighborhood Workshops.
Such sessions are required by county regulations as a means of informing affected residents and property owners about the proposals.
The applicants will have the opportunity to include a virtual attendance option, the resolution makes clear, though they will not be obligated to do so.
The resolution’s stipulations went into effect immediately, as Matt Osterhoudt, director of the county’s Planning and Development Services Department, noted during a presentation about the proposed changes.
Chair Ron Cutsinger cast the “No” vote, to remain consistent with his prior action on the issue. During the board’s regular meeting on June 2, in Venice, he stressed, “In a day when we have millions and millions of Zoom and [Microsoft] Teams meetings,” online sessions would be his preference. Those “[allow] more participation,” he pointed out.
Nonetheless, he expressed support for changes that his colleagues discussed during their regular session on May 5, regarding the radii from the sites of the proposed land-use changes in which the meetings can be conducted. For applications involving property within the county’s Urban Service Boundary (USB) — within which infrastructure such as water and sewer lines already exist — the radius has been expanded from 2 to 4 miles; for sites outside the USB, the radius has been amended from 5 miles to 10 miles.
Commissioner Mark Smith had championed the return to in-person Neighborhood Workshops following his election to the board in November 2022.
As Matt Osterhoudt, director of the Planning and Development Services Department, has explained, a prior County Commission adopted the resolution allowing developers to conduct the sessions virtually, as necessitated by the COVID-19 pandemic. The resolution that the board members adopted this week noted that and then included the following statement: “[P]ost COVID-19, after reviewing the electronic/virtual hearings as to public input, the Board approved Resolution 2021-065 to allow for an electronic/virtual meeting format for neighborhood workshops to provide for better citizen interaction with the development community, a more open dialog to gain answers to questions, eliminate technical encumbrances, and optimize overall citizen participation …”
On a separate motion on June 2 — made by Commissioner Joe Neunder and seconded by Commissioner Tom Knight — county staff was directed to research the actual expense of county work related to the workshops, including the attendance of a member of the Planning Division at those sessions.
The relevant portion of the resolution says, “Sarasota County may charge the Applicant a reasonable fee for providing a staff member to attend the Neighborhood Workshop, which shall be paid prior to the Neighborhood Workshop,” with the amount set at $215.
However, during the morning Open to the Public comment period of the June 2 meeting, Lourdes Ramirez of Siesta Key, president of the Sarasota County Council of Neighborhood Associations (CONA), urged the commissioners to consider raising the amount. She stressed the need for the applicants, not county taxpayers, to cover all of the expenses related to conducting the workshops.
In his motion, Commissioner Neunder called for staff to “do a quick study on the fee schedule and bring it back as quickly as possible” for potential board action.
Osterhoudt of Planning and Development Services had pointed out that the resolution also said, “This initial fee is established at two hundred and fifteen dollars ($215), until it is modified by subsequent resolution of the Board.”
“That fee has not been updated in many years,” Osterhoudt told the board members during his presentation that morning. “I believe we started implementing it in 2009.”
He added that a staff memo in the agenda packet explained what the fee covers.
That memo said, “Current costs borne to the County for Neighborhood Workshops include creation of mailing labels for the applicant’s notice (GIS [Geographical Information System] data, Planner Tech), review of the buffer requirement, review of the applicant’s notice for accuracy (reviewed by Planner Tech and manager/supervisor), county white fleet usage (or mileage paid for personal vehicles) and staff attendance for an after-hours workshop.” (A county public information officer explained years ago to The Sarasota News Leader that the term “white fleet” is used for county-owned vehicles to differentiate them from the Sarasota County Sheriff’s Office’s vehicles, which have with green trim and green identification information on them.)
The memo further noted, “As no trust account is established until a project is officially submitted for review, there is currently no way to recoup the administrative costs related to Neighborhood Workshops beyond the existing $215 fee. Additionally, there is no guarantee that a project for which a Neighborhood Workshop was held will be submitted as a petition to the county.”
“I don’t have any record of … what methodology was used” to arrive at that figure,” Osterhoudt said in response to a question that Commissioner Neunder had posed about the $215 figure. However, Osterhoudt had suggested that, at the board’s request, he and his staff could work with the Office of Financial Management “about our hourly rates and so forth [and undertake] an analysis about how much staff energy and time is put into this part of the process.”
He did emphasize, “Remember: This [work] is not as robust as a staff review [of an application].” The workshops are conducted by the petitioners or their agents, he stressed.
Neunder replied, “I think it would be certainly prudent to go ahead and try to see if we could capture what the actual costs to the taxpayers are …” Neunder added, “I’m fully aware and appreciative that everything is incredibly expensive today.”
Commissioner Teresa Mast, who served as a county employee for a number of years, emphasized the fact that the analysis should consider the fact that the employee attending the workshop would be a member of the Planning and Development Services staff, and engagement in land-use issues is part of that staff member’s regular responsibilities.
Yet, she added, “I want to make sure we’re being very clear … that any fee … incurred because of this [staff work] is paid in full by the applicant.”
The issue of venue size
One person who addressed the board during the Open to the Public comments period that morning did cite concerns about the return to in-person workshops.
Joe Medred, one of the principals of Genesis Planning and Development of Bradenton, noted the difficulty of developers’ agents in gauging the size of venue they will need for the sessions.
He initially asked that the commissioners direct staff to reschedule the item for a public hearing on an upcoming agenda and allow “the participation by the many individuals most affected by these changes.”
Genesis Planning and Development routinely serves as an agent for land-use applicants, including Dr. Gary Kompothecras, who has been seeking for years to build a high-rise hotel on Old Stickney Point Road on Siesta Key.
Those affected persons could help “identify potential implementation issues before changes are adopted,” Medred told the commissioners.
The resolution that was adopted this week included the following modification regarding the need to accommodate all attendees:
Noting the fact that the resolution calls for the workshops to be held in enclosed facilities, Commissioner Mast nonetheless pointed out, “You never know how many people are going to show up. … I want to be very thoughtful in not putting unintended consequences attached to something.”
For example, Mast continued, if an applicant holds a workshop at a church whose fellowship hall can hold 250 people, “and 500 people show up, we definitely want the opportunity for the public to be informed. … I think we’re putting ourselves in a corner we don’t want to be put in,” she added.
Perhaps the notices that are mailed out about the workshops can include information about the capacity of the venue where the event will be held, Commissioner Mark Smith suggested.
Yet, Mast responded, how would the applicant or applicant’s agent know how many people would show up?
Commissioner Smith pointed out that in-person Neighborhood Workshops were conducted prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, so the board members were “not inventing something new.”
Commissioner Neunder proposed that applicants consider securing spaces larger than they think they might need, to be able to accommodate attendees.
Neunder added, “There’s a pulse here in Sarasota County …” Petitioners likely will hear enough comments from community members about land-use proposals before the workshops are held that the petitioners can gauge the size of venue they will need, he said. “I think the adults in the room could figure that out relatively quick.”