The P&Z non-decision
AL GREEN
Contributing Columnist
green@lbknews.com
The Planning and Zoning Board after many meetings and many hours of testimony on the application of Loeb Realty Partners decided by a vote of four to three to kick the can down the road and let the Town Commission handle the problem.
If you watched or listened to the board members groping for words like “guarantee” or “reasonable expectations”, you saw a group of people who wanted to approve a hotel and a conference center but weren’t presented with that option so they just threw up their hands and said “let the commissioners figure it out”.
Although none of the objections that had been raised prior to this final meeting were addressed, the Board still saw fit to pass it on leaving the commissioners to deal with it.
For example they wanted Loeb Realty to provide the funds for the new entrance to the Town that they used as a selling tool in their opening presentation. They wanted the Club to be liable for the costs of traffic studies if it should prove necessary. They wanted the location of the gatehouse to be adjudicated. As mentioned above, they wanted the hotel to be the first parcel to be constructed. There were others but most importantly for the Town, they wanted the Key Club to pay their land acquisition fee of five million dollars.
The Key Club representative blew off these demands by saying they didn’t have the authority to negotiate which is a strange position to take in the middle of what is presumed to be a negotiation. They did offer to pay half of the cost of fixing up the entry but since everyone knew the Town did not have a half a million dollars to put up the other half, this was an empty gesture. This, after making such a big deal out of how their project including the new entrance to the Town was going to enhance the look of the GMD.
The P&Z Board simply wiped the spit out of their eyes and voted to pass it on to the Town Commission.
The objections and requirements that were listed by the Board still remain unanswered and still in my mind would be impossible to accomplish without either a total change by the Club or a complete cave-in by the Commission.
The Land Acquisition fee of five million dollars, a payment that has been a standard obligation of developers from almost the beginning of the town should not be waived. By allowing the additional density to build the new units, the Town will already have added a huge additional value to the property. This is an extra benefit that no other developer received and to waive this tax that was always enforced previously would really be stretching.
To give you an idea of how much extra value this approval would provide, Arvida, the previous owner of the property, has already served Loeb Realty with notice that they intend to sue them to recover the difference that the added density would provide. In other words, Arvida is saying we sold you a property with a fixed number of tourist and residential units. If there are more units than we conveyed to you originally, we want to be paid for them. This is a legal battle between private companies but demonstrates how much this proposed change would add financial worth to the property owner.
The P&Z also tried to get some guarantees of the sequence of development into the final agreement but any attempt to enforce this will most probably prove meaningless. There is a State law on the books that requires arbitration if an owner feels that a zoning law harms his ability to enjoy the use of his property. Municipalities usually don’t do well in these cases.
This entire exercise still raises questions. In the long run, the only thing that will matter is the additional density. How that density will be used or sold to a future buyer is not going to be decided by this Commission. They can twist and turn and write all kinds of restrictions but at the end of the day, this modification will be on the zoning map. Whether it will contain a luxury hotel or a trailer camp is for the future. Whether it will be a Harris Act arbitration decision, a judge or just a weak Town government that will be the method, there is no action by this Town Commission once it changes the zoning map that is going to dictate the final result. Lawyers will find a way around restrictions and this will require fighting back. Town Commissions traditionally don’t like to pay lawyers and the public has been shown to be apathetic except for the group whose ox is being gored and even they show signs of weakening resolve.
A wise Town Commission will want to keep it simple and wait until a reasonable plan presents itself. Hopefully, by that time, there will be a Comprehensive Plan to act as the guide and an applicant not only willing but ready and able.
