St. Pete Beach Struggles With Yet Another Hometown Democracy-Style Ballot Problem - Part 1

On Tuesday, June 8, 2010, the St. Pete Beach city commission grappled once again with a troublesome and potentially costly problem that will vex all of Florida's cities if Amendment 4 passes in November:  how to put a comprehensive plan amendment on the ballot in a way that fully complies with Florida's 75-word ballot summary limit yet also minimizes the risk of lawsuits alleging that the ballot language is incomplete or misleading.


St. Pete Beach's charter requires all comprehensive plan changes to be approved by referendum.  The St. Pete Beach requirement is similar to Florida Hometown Democracy's Amendment 4  in that it requires approval of all comprehensive plans and amendments by a vote of the people.  However, St. Pete Beach's rules differ from Amendment 4 in two respects:  

1.  St. Pete Beach's rules only require a referendum on changes affecting 5 or more parcels, while Amendment 4 requires a referendum on all changes, even those affecting only one parcel.
2.  Amendment 4 requires the referendum vote to occur after approval of the comprehensive plan/amendment by the DCA and city commission, while the St. Pete Beach version (which was adopted in 2006) failed to include this requirement.  

Supporters and opponents of Amendment 4 have been arguing passionately (but not always effectively) whether St. Pete Beach's litigious and costly experiment with putting comprehensive plans on the ballot is a fair example of the flaws in Amendment 4.  It may well be the case that such arguments will only be resolved on Election Day in November, 2010.

However, one thing was clear on the night of June 8:  since St. Pete Beach is the first Florida city to adopt Hometown Democracy-style referendum rules, it is the first Florida city to run head-first into the many technical problems and legal challenges that can result from trying to put comprehensive plans on the ballot.

As reported in the St. Petersburg Times on June 13,
the city commission examined whether the city should hold a referendum election on a comprehensive plan that had previously been approved by vote of the people during an election on June 3, 2008.

The tricky issue was that the final version that was approved by the prior city commission included two minor, technical changes that were required by the state, and thus the final version of the comp plan that was approved by the prior city commission was not 100% identical to the version that had been approved during the June 3, 2008 election.  In an effort to fend off legal claims that the prior commission was wrong to have approved the slightly-revised comp plan without putting back to the voters for approval, the commission on June 8th voted unanimously to put the comp plan back to a vote of the people of St. Pete Beach on August 24th, the city's next regularly-scheduled election.

In her St. Petersburg Times story, Ms. Estrada focuses primarily on the question of whether the city should have scheduled the election for August 24th, or whether the city should have waited until after a court ruling by Judge Demers after the trial that will occur a few days later.

To me, however, the more important aspect of the city's discussion (which was not mentioned at all in the Times story) was the question of how to successfully summarize the 115-page comprehensive plan in a ballot summary that uses only 75 words (as required under Florida law).

I believe the commission's discussion and its struggle to comply with St. Pete Beach's Amendment 4-style referendum requirements is the same sort of discussion that many, if not all, Florida cities will be forced to have if Amendment 4 passes.  I've inserted my transcription of the discussion below, and you can view the streaming video by going to the St. Pete Beach website and selecting the Commission menu and then selecting the June 8, 2010 meeting.

The ballot language proposed by Suzanne Van Wyk, the city attorney, for the amended plan was identical to the ballot language used for the previous version of the plan.  When Commissioner Alan Halpern asked the attorney whether the ballot language should also describe the two minor changes, she responded:

VAN WYK

"Therein lies the issue with reducing a 114 page comprehensive plan amendment into a ballot summary."

HALPERN

"I understand that, but isn't there a way, in 75 words, that we could say that this is the same plan that you voted on last time, with the exception of the two sentences that were removed or added?"

VAN WYK

"That's an excellent question, Commission Halpern.  I spent a couple of hours with this language.  The point is, if that is what we are doing, then we fail to summarize what they are voting on.  So we went back, and I went through this four or five times...we looked at adding... 'this differs in the following ways', or 'these are the two items that were deleted'.  I've tried several times to come up with language that would incorporate that.   I have not been able to do it within the 75 words.  Believe me, it is difficult.  But more importantly, we want to avoid additional challenges by putting new language in there that may just create additional litigation."

HALPERN

"I understand the fear with that ... but if any of the voters do even recall the language is the same as what they voted on last time ... people are going to say 'why are we voting on the same thing again?'

VAN WYK

"The local government isn't hamstrung in terms of putting out information ... You can put out information as to what has changed ... There are some steps the city can take to make sure the information is out there."

 Later in the discussion, after Commissioner Halpern had expressed his concern that the proposed ballot language did not describe the two minor technical changes to the comprehensive plan, Commission Jim Parent added:

PARENT

"This just points up the 75-word limit on ballots...

HALPERN

"I realize that ... this is the best description we came up with last time, and its the best description that we have now.  But the fact that we are voting for this again, because we changed it, per the DCA's request, and they were two minor changes, somehow I think we need to convey that."

VAN WYK

"Let me just add this, if it helps.  All of the litigation that surrounds [the] ballot title and summary challenges is whether or not the title and summary convey the chief purpose of the issue, and in this case the chief purpose is to get the voters' approval of the entire comp plan amendment, not of those pieces that were left out.  It's almost an abstract concept to put out to the voters 'Do you want to approve the deletion of paragraph 8, footnote 1.  I understand that some of the members are interested in just putting the changes before the voters, but if we want to stick with what is required under the law we need for the voters to be approving the whole amendment."

Commisioner Shavlan then added:

SHAVLAN

"The problem is the 75-word limit, but that is the law, so what can we do about it?"

PARENT

"I think part of the point is that in 75 words it is difficult to explain the entire 114 page comp plan, and regardless of whether it is before DCA or after DCA's minor changes, minor changes certainly shouldn't affect the ballot language.  And therefore it's essentially the same plan.  And if that is difficult to convey, then so be it, but to change it because of those minor things says that every time you change a punctuation or a phrase you are going to chase the ballot language around in 75 words [and] that doesn't make sense to me."

HALPERN

"It doesn't make sense to me either ... When you talk to your neighbor who isn't at this meeting .. and they go read this thing and vote on it, how do they know what we are doing?

SHAVLAN

"That's why maybe they shouldn't be voting on it.  I mean, in most cases, city commissions make these decisions, because they are more involved with the product ... if [voters] want to make an informed decision, they need to go study the comp plan, and unfortunately most people don't."

PARENT

"And the best we can do is provide different levels of summaries..."

A few moments later, Commissioner Bev Garnett added:

GARNETT

"You know, I was at the hearing where this was discussed in front of Judge Demers, and one of the statements that he did make at that hearing was, and this is in reference to the litigation that is against the [ballot summary] verbage in here, and he said that he is not sure what verbage could be put in a ballot summary, because you are limited to only 75 words, and that [he questioned whether] it could ever meet the test and [you] could be sued by anybody at any time, and anybody could disagree with it." 

"And so, that is a challenge we have.  We have only 75 words.  We have to try to put this out there.  Is it going to stop litigation, who knows? ..."

"But the reality is, he [the judge] said it in court:  'I don't know that people would ever be happy with exactly what it says.  You will always have somebody who questions [the ballot language]."

This tortured exchange is relevant to the Amendment 4 / Hometown Democracy debate because, in general terms, it illustrates that implementing Amendment 4 -style referendum rules is not as simple, easy and clear-cut as the Hometown Democracy campaign seems to want voters to believe.  It emphasizes that summarizing comprehensive plans in 75 word ballot summaries is not a simple task, and that local governments can and will face both significant logistical difficulties and significant potential legal exposure when they try to comply with Florida's 75-word ballot summary limitations.

Click Here for Part 2, where the arguments of Amendment 4 supporters are examined.

Note:  Amendment 4 supporters who follow this blog and who read this should read Part 2 before posting their comments.