Incumbent's Beware & County Commission Term Limits

Jeremy Wallace's column today emphasizes the precarious position many incumbents find themselves in. 

He mentions the District one race:

It is a similar line of reasoning for Jono Miller, a Democrat challenging Sarasota County Commissioner Paul Mercier, a Republican. Miller said he is counting on voters wanting to try something new.

"How do we get a fresh start with the same people?" Miller asked.

Mercier, first elected in 2000, went unchallenged in 2004.

For challengers, an incumbent's tenure in office is no deterrent to running as it may have been in the past. Instead, challengers say it helps them make their case for change.

Is this trend that threatens incumbents new? I'm not sure. In my lifetime only one commissioner (Andrew Sandegren) has managed to serve more than two terms as Commissioner from the first District. 

While incumbency can be an advantage to a candidate, Wallace's column reveals it can be a liability as well.   

One example is those voters who could never vote for someone seeking a third term.  Such voters will have plenty of time to convince me of the merits of their arguments. That jury is still out. But, incumbents beware, they have made it clear that they will not be voting for my opponent. 

Just for the record, I'm not a proponent of term limits for County Commissioners.

In my opinion, there's been sufficient turnover in recent years (albeit all Republican) and there is a real risk that too many neophytes could lead to a very weak commission. The average length of service of the five present commissioners is eight years, with a range from two (Barbetta) to twelve (Staub). 

In fact, if you go back to 1980 I think the average is still about 8 years, notwithstanding the long-haulers like Bob Anderson and David Mills. We tend to remember people that were leading for a long time and may mentally skip over other community leaders like Wayne Derr, Jack O'Neil and Ray Pilon. That effect may contribute to the perception that, in general, commissioners are staying too long. 

If at some point the future the average term of service drifts up above 10 years then we should be asking if that is because everyone is doing a great job as evidenced by healthy two party competitive races or if incumbency has once again become more insurmountable. Until then, I'm comfortable with the present reality -- that incumbents must prove themselves or risk defeat. 

May 14 POSTSCRIPT:  To see how the anti-incumbent two-term limit argument manifests itself, visit this blog. 

Personally, I don't like the idea that disgruntled voters in 1998 might determine who I can vote for in 2008. (Maybe we're more gruntled now?) If 68% of voters still don't like commissioners to serve more than two terms, then, I would argue,  68% of them can go to the polls and vote against two term incumbents on a case by case basis. It is hard enough to find good commissioners (or even people to run), getting rid of them because of a clock seems like a waste of talent to me. 

Do-It-Yourself Myakka Ranchlands?

One implicit goal of a political campaign is to turn up the contrast between candidates, eliminate the overlapping shades of grey and make the contest stark and polarized. But both my opponent, Paul Mercier, and I were there in Tallahassee in mid-December as part of a diverse and impressive team pitching an ambitious proposal called "Myakka Ranchlands", an 18,743 acre vision that would add close to 30 square miles of Sarasota County to the roughly 150 square miles that are part of what is known as Myakka Island. 

And although the proposal was placed on the short list of the "A" list, it really doesn't matter where the project is ranked if no additional money will be forthcoming. According to the Sarasota Herald Tribune, the Florida House has included no money for land acquisition this year. The state's economic downturn has created the perplexing paradox of not having money for land acquisition at a time when some relative deals are to be had. And the Myakka Ranchlands project appears to be time sensitive -- it is unlikely the offer will be around in its present form when the economy rebounds. 

Reacting to the sobering story in today's paper, Dan Lobeck wrote to a number of local leaders proposing, basically, that the county forget about the state and field another local land protection referendum to raise the funds to protect the Myakka Ranchlands. 

Lobeck is the President of Control Growth Now and is known for speaking his mind. As a result he simultaneously enjoys two somewhat contrasting reputations, first as saying what others won't and in the process frequently representing the views of 'average' Sarasotans more closely than many other spokespeople, and secondly as having utilizied a style that has, for some people's taste, relied too much on personal attack and accusation. 

His Myakka Ranchlands suggestion probably reflects his first tendency -- no doubt others have wondered about the County going it alone, but shied away from discussing it publicly.

Could it work? It would involve asking people for a lot of money to purchase an alternative future at a time when many are likely more preoccupied with the present challenges. But Dan argues: "Surely the taxpayers will perceive that it will cost them less to preserve the land than to pay the consequences of its development."

Dan proposes a next step of doing some polling or survey work to determine if the 'surely' in the preceding sentence is actually warranted. Such testing the waters could provide valuable baseline information about public attitude, but the numbers might be higher and more encouraging if someone actually developed a case statement that would explore and lay out for scrutiny the anticipated benefits of this ambitious vision.

I've put my time in fighting developments and I eventually realized the County could gain more true protection for natural areas by working to buy land and development rights from willing sellers than by trying to constrain development projects. I still believe that, but I'm not sure the values are intuitively obvious to the electorate. At least I know I spent a lot of time over two campaigns to drive home the point. 

If Sarasota leaders want to assemble the facts regarding local protection of the Myakka Ranchlands and take them to the people for consideration, first through polling and then, if warranted, through referendum; I'll be there. 

Of course, the cost of protecting the Myakka Ranchlands could be greatly reduced if the public were only paying for the land and the development rights could be preserved and relocated elsewhere in the County. That may not appeal to Dan, but it probably should be explored as an alternative strategy. The devilish detail, of course, is where those units would be welcome. Dan is already on record as opposing any relaxing of traffic concurrency, a key growth management element that, paradoxically, many feel is actually fueling sprawl. 

It is seen to feed sprawl because it limits growth in developed areas (where many want more density to support transit and affordable housing) while offering no comparable constraints on more remote areas that have not yet become clogged enough to trigger limits.  The County Commission will be holding a workshop (no public testimony yet) on these issues on Tuesday April 15th. 

Meanwhile, I need to find some more issues (see my March 25th blog entry) where Paul and I are on opposite sides. 

If I were a Commissioner #2: Dredging Big Pass Shoals

The April first edition of the Sarasota Herald-Tribune featured a front page story about six possible strategies for dealing with the incredible accumulation of sand found in what is called the Big Pass shoal south of Lido Key. According to the article, “After four years of study, coastal engineers hired by the county say sand can be mined from one of the coast's biggest shoals without causing Siesta Key homes to slip into the sea or eroding any sand from nearby public beaches.”

Pardon my paraphrasing, but the article goes on to say that the County will spend another $200,000 to get three second opinions and seems to suggest that the focus will be on providing reassurance that removing sand from the shoal (for some combination of beach nourishment and channel improvement) will not be likely to have a negative impact on Siesta Key, either by increasing erosion along the pass or somehow affecting the flow of sand to the Key’s beaches.

I like the “first, do no harm” aspect of the county’s approach and therefore support securing those second opinions. But I’m left wondering if there isn’t another side to the equation.

We can compute with some accuracy the value of the sand that might be used to nourish beaches and the savings that might accrue by finding it nearby rather than offshore. And some economist could no doubt take a stab at the value of getting boats in and out of Big Pass more reliably.

But who has been charged with calculating either the present or future value of the shoal as it is or may be in the future? What are those values?

The most obvious one probably will be taken into account and that is how the shoals function to dissipate wave energy. If the shoal didn’t exist the Siesta Key shoreline along Big Pass would be subjected to the full force of the Gulf’s waves. They’ll no doubt look into any potential reduction in that role.

And they will probably consider the potential for the void created by sand removal to intercept sand that might be moving southward – the risk that taking sand ‘upstream’ might starve, or at least reduce the amount of sand ‘downstream’.

But what about Sand Dollar Island – the somewhat ethereal, shape-shifting, seldom-mapped islet that has functioned as both bird hangout and boater destination? Boaters know that the shoal frequently sports supra-tidal sand. And even the sub-tidal portions of the pass area are noted boater destinations as described on the Sarasota Coastal Watch website.

The value of Sand Dollar Island today is questionable – it probably couldn’t compare with the value of sand that is there more or less for the taking. But might it be worth asking: “Is that it? A tiny, sometimes sandbar? Or might the deck get reshuffled into a winning hand?”

The amount of sand tied up in the shoal south of South Lido is enormous. In fact, that long tongue of sand is actually the submerged portion of South Lido. Without it not only would Siesta’s Big Pass shoreline be under more direct attack, but South Lido as we know it would disappear. For this reason I'm more inclined to the think of the shoal as the southern submerged portion of South Lido.

Put another way, beaches are like icebergs; the emergent part that we notice is supported by a far larger mass upon which it is based. The above-tide sand evident on Sand Dollar Island is a truly miniscule fraction of the sand below the tides. Could some set of storm conditions result in more of the shoal becoming above tide? I don’t know, I’m not a coastal geomorphologist. But I do know comparable events have happened elsewhere with striking results.

Wild and popular Lover’s Key in the Fort Myers Beach area formed in front of Black Island and Long Key, and the most impressive example locally is probably Johnson Shoals off Cayo Costa. Before that emergent shoal welded onto Cayo Costa it was a boater magnet and important bird habitat as well. Could something remotely comparable emerge on our shoal?  :::shrugs shoulders::: Who knows? But if it ever did the value to local boaters (and birds) would be enormous.

There is probably little percentage in waiting around wondering if some combination of events could lead to a more permanent or more extensive island or islands in Big Pass. 

But before this or future County Commissions vote on any action to deliberately change the shoal it might be prudent to not only consider avoiding future negative impacts to Siesta Key, but also to consider the positive existing (and potential?) values that may be ascribed to both the submerged and emergent shoal.

Our county's past is strewn with projects that seemed like a good idea at the time and now, in retrospect, we're left wondering how our predecessors could have been so reckless. We blithely flattened Indian Mounds for road base, diverted and straightened Cowpen Slough, connected the Myakka River to Robert's Bay and removed unique geologic formations and archaeological treasures from Warm Mineral Springs. Some of these hindsight-inspired errors are irreversible, others are now demanding large sums of money to partially rectify. There is no small measure of humbling irony in the fact that many of today's problems were yesterday's solutions.

Past decisions made about how our coastal areas should be managed and developed are beginning to vex us and in an era of shrinking dollars and expanding expectations we need to be looking for solutions that 'run downhill' -- approaches working in concert with natural systems instead of, as they say, 'bucking the tide'.

Five things to Improve Downtown Sarasota

Joe Moraca asked for five things we'd like to see happen downtown.  I'm posting mine here:

1) Water taxi to South Lido so people who live downtown could get to the beach without either a car or a bike ride.

2) A regularly updated (tabloid format?) downtown map that used color coding to identify most of the major retail themes, which I would list as Restaurants, Galleries, Antique/Resale, Bookstores. This would be sponsored by advertisers and help downtown retail business.

3) A more flexible Saturday Farmer's Market format that would let four people share one space so that each was only there one weekend a month

4) Greening of walls with creeping fig (Ficus pumila). See Bay Plaza, the west wall of Sarasota News and Books and a previous blog of mine from January 7th. 

5) Inexorable, but not necessarily immediate, conversion of most non-retail ground floor space on Main Street to retail. 

Oh, and 6) general recanting of the decision to banish the Rosemary Community Garden. 

Times Obit Triggers High School Memories of the Cambodian Invasion

Attempts by candidates to link present virtues to early indications sometimes fall flat and I like to think I've changed a lot since I was a teenager. But an obituary in the New York Times today connected me to a man I had forgotten and also to an early action of mine that, it could be argued, presaged some of my present style . 

The man was Robert Goheen and he was the President of Princeton from 1957 until 1972. I called him as an eighteen year old high school student to solicit his help. Actually, prep school student would be more accurate.

I grew up in suburban New Jersey and nothing about my family approached being wealthy. If there was any inherited money it wasn't evident to me and my father commuted to New York City to work as traffic manager for a steamship line. Our garage had a dirt floor, we had a one-bathroom house (on  the second floor) and our garden and chickens were both indulgences and a lingering habits from my parent's Great Depression experiences. 

But I was an only child and not doing well in school. School officials thought I 'tested well' but my grades usually didn't reflect my potential so my parents tried a private day school and, when that didn't work, a boarding school in Princeton, the Hun School. I repeated my junior year of high school there, and by senior year I had been elected to the student council.

Somewhere in the spring of 1970, the American public found out about the invasion of Cambodia and many colleges and some high schools were shut down by student protests and strikes. The Hun student leadership decided to stage a teach-in rather than a protest. I'm not claiming it was my idea, but it might have been and I supported it. It fell to me to call President Goheen to ask his assistance. It was with some trepidation that I called, but I made the call anyway and found President Goheen to be gracious and helpful. I believe he actually spoke at our teach-in, but that may be wishful memory. 

The NYT obit says of Goheen: "He weathered the protests, the rebellion, and the confusion that swept higher education in the 1960's, using humor and urging civilized debate. He had little use for angry protest, even when he agreed with the protesters, as he ultimately did with critics of the Vietnam War."

Although popular sentiment on the Princeton campus was opposed to the invasion, we found an articulate, confident, conservative student willing to come speak in support of the conduct of the war and, as I recall, mounted a balanced assembly that was an alternative to classes for one day. 

So is my flashback significant? What character traits do I chose to extract? Trepidation and not living up to potential? No. Hey, this is a campaign. 

I prefer to emphasize the reaching out to others not like myself, and the quest for balance, education and civilized debate. Oh, and using humor to defuse tension. And, in retrospect, I appreciate my brief, tangential interaction with one of Princeton's great President's who chose to listen to me and, in doing so, taught me one great life lesson, which is usually formulated as something like "the worst he can do is say 'no'". Fortunately for me, President Goheen said 'yes'.

Reflections on the Legacy Trail Opening

Today (March 28th) was truly historic day as the long awaited Legacy Trail opened. Former Commissioner David Mills was on hand and this must have been a gratifying conclusion to a long-held dream for him. 

I actually have been mentioning David when I speak, using him to exemplify a Commissioner who had a mission and vision that transcended simply taking care of County business. David has been stereotyped as the "business guy" just as some of us are stereotyped as "environmental guys", but like everyone he was multi-dimensional and thoroughly committed to recreational trails, particularly this one. 

Of course, thousands contributed to the existence of the trail from taxpayers and voters (not always the same thing) to Commissioners, county staff and exceptional volunteers like Rollins Coakley. 

I managed to make the ribbon cuttings at both ends of the trail, so I got to hear Commissioner Jon Thaxton twice. The first talk was punchy and assertive, but after traversing the entire trail he was more reflective and by the time he was done talking the trail seemed like a transect not only of his life, but even of Sarasota County. 

Who expected unsolved murders, school breaks in storm sewers and a graphic vignette of Sarasota's county's racist past at a trail dedication? Jon spent more than the alloted three minutes, but delivered  personal testimony that even attributed our enlarged Oscar Scherer State Park to the railroad right of way. 

It was a moving speech and it made me wonder how many of the Venice Elementary School Chorus members would be roughly my age fifty years hence, standing on the platform reminiscing how they had been present the day the trail first opened?

From "book club without a book" to "cabal unmasked"!

Rick Barry rips the lid off the soft underbelly of a mysterious organization unafraid of mixed metaphors!

Taking investigative journalism  to a new plateau, Pelican Press writer Rick Barry uncovered, documented and brazenly reported on a little known organization that has existed in our midst for four or five years. Code-named (well, actually just named) ENZYME, Rick was no doubt hoping for some dastardly entity comparable to SMERSH or SPECTRE, some underground organization plotting some nefarious action that will bring Sarasota to its knees; like installing roundabouts on I-75, opening a new pass along the Manatee-Sarasota County line on Longboat Key or draining the Myakka to create a mid-county recreational trail. 

What he found can barely be considered an organization. There are no dues, no bylaws, no minutes, no actions, no initiatives. As one member put it: " We don't really do anything." This puts the ENZYME 'cabal' on a level with any other group that gets together informally. I told him it was like a book club without a book. 

Here's what Rick quoted me as saying about the group: 

Miller more or less confirmed these assessments: "It's just a group of people who care deeply about the area. Each month, Debra will give us a homework assignment, and each group of two or three will look into a subject and make a presentation to educate the others.

"We talked about how Englewood and Longboat Key are split between two counties, and how that affects those towns; how North Port's physical layout affects its development, that sort of thing.

"It's named 'Enzyme' because they are natural catalysts. And we hope by getting together and learning ... and getting to know one another, we might have a positive effect on the community. But it's all very relaxed, informal ... and not really very secret at all."

Click on the highlighted text to read Rick's article.