Hometown Democracy Operatives Support Amendment 4 with False Claims on WMNF Radio

On September 2, 2010, Hometown Democracy founder  Leslie Blackner and communications director Wayne Garcia appeared on Rob Lorei's Radioactivity Live Call-In Show on Tampa's WMNF (88.5 FM) to discuss Amendment 4.

No opponents of Amendment 4 were included in the discussion, which is very unfortunate, because during the course of the interview a number of completely false claims were made by the Hometown Democracy folks, and nobody was there to set the record straight for the benefit of Mr. Lorei's listeners.

The most egregiously false claims were made by Mr. Garcia regarding the relevance of St. Pete Beach and the staggeringly costly morass of litigation that resulted from the city's attempt to implement Amendment 4-style land use regulations.

When asked by Rob Lorei to address the claims of Amendment 4 opponents that the St. Pete Beach's failed "experiment" is proof that Amendment 4 would be bad for Florida, Mr. Garcia said the following:

"The fact of the matter is that Amendment 4 was not tried out in St. Pete Beach.  St. Pete Beach did enact a mechanism for its voters to be more involved in its growth process.  The big fight, all the litigation, all the things that people point to and say 'look at all the terrible things that have happened' didn't happen because of the land use votes out there.  They happened because of litigation over how it was attempted to be repealed.  So it wasn't a fight over the land itself as much as they then tried to repeal the voters being involved.  It was a fight over democracy."

Mr. Garcia went on to say:

"It really has not been tried out.  So there is no place in the State we can point to because this is a statewide problem." 

The problem:  Mr. Garcia is just plain wrong!!!  Mr. Garcia's statements are a complete misstatement of the actual facts of what happened in St. Pete Beach.  In 2006, the voters of St. Pete Beach amended their city charter to require voter approval of comprehensive plan amendments (a requirement similar in all material respects to what is required by Amendment 4).  When the city put comprehensive plan amendments on the ballot in 2008, those amendments were passed by an overwhelming majority vote, and lawsuits then were filed challenging the propriety of the ballot summaries used by the city when the comp plan changes were put on the ballot.

Contrary to Mr. Garcia's claims, the St. Pete Beach litigation did NOT arise because of attempts to repeal its Amendment 4-style voting requirements.  The St. Pete Beach litigation arose because the city put its comp plan amendments on the ballot (as all Florida cities will be forced to do if Amendment 4 passes).  If the Hometown Democracy folks don't want to believe me, they should believe Ken Weiss, Esq., the attorney for the guy suing St. Pete Beach.  In a May 18, 2010 settlement letter to the City, Attorney Weiss said:

"The central issue in this litigation has been the assertion by my clients that there must be full disclosure in the ballot summaries that the voters are approving the threefold increase in height and density...[I]t seems apparent to the objective observer (and probably the judge) that the only reason not to include specific language on height and density is because of the fear that the voters might not approve the plan.  The Commission is only being requested to provide ballot summaries which will tell the voters the truth."

Thus, straight from the "horse's mouth", it is clear that the Hometown Democracy folks are clearly wrong to deny that the St. Pete Beach lawsuits are similar to the lawsuits that could threaten all Florida cities if Amendment 4 passes.  As I explain in great detail in a prior post, if Amendment 4 forces cities to put their comprehensive plan amendments on the ballot, Florida election law requires those amendments (often hundreds of pages filled with complex land use details) to be condensed into a 75-word ballot summary...and Floridians will soon learn what we learned in St. Pete Beach:  that it's impossible to summarize a 200 page comp plan in 75 words in a way that can't be challenged by lawyers as being "deceptive", "misleading" or "incomplete."

Mr. Garcia was also wrong to claim that Amendment 4 hasn't been "tried out" in any other Florida city.  The charter amendment adopted by St. Pete Beach in 2006 and Amendment 4 share the same basic premises and mandates:  both require comprehensive plan changes to be approved by a vote of the people before they can be enacted by a city*.   The litigation in St. Pete Beach arose  from the city's attempt to in 2008 to comply with the requirement when it put its comprehensive plan changes on the ballot, not from any attempts to repeal those regulations.

In short:  St. Pete Beach tried Amendment 4--we tried it by actually putting our comprehensive comp plan amendments on the ballot in 2008.  The result:  Massive delays, costly litigation, and volatile polarization of the city's residents that has torn our small beach community to pieces.  That's the plain truth, and a similar fate awaits all Florida cities if Amendment 4 passes in November.

While Mr. Garcia referred in passing to St. Pete Beach's repeal of its Amendment 4-style regulations, the truth of the matter is that after suffering the disastrous consequences of trying to put comprehensive plan amendments on the ballot, the people of St. Pete Beach voted by an overwhelming majority vote to repeal most of its Amendment 4-style rules in favor of rules with drastically reduced scope.  Unfortunately, if  Amendment 4 passes, Floridians won't be able to repeal it once it's in place because cities lack the power to repeal constitutional amendments once they have been enacted.

There is no excuse for Hometown Democracy's misrepresentations of the facts.   Hometown Democracy co-founders Leslie Blackner and Ross Burnaman are both lawyers, and Ross Burnaman has personally been involved in St. Pete Beach's litigation as one of the lawyers suing the city.

In other words, they should know better than to say false things about St. Pete Beach...and Floridians deserve to have straight and true information when they go to the polls in November.

*Amendment 4's requirements are even broader than what we adopted in St. Pete Beach (St Pete Beach only requires a vote on comp plan changes affecting more than 5 parcels of land, while Amendment 4 requires a vote on all comp plan changes, even those affecting only one parcel).