OPINIONS County policies hinder public input

The antidemocratic creep infecting governance nationwide is showing itself in Lee County and being a watchdog is now more important than ever.

Publisher Raymond M Eckenrode reckenrode@breezenewspapers com

Executive Editor Valarie Harring vharring@breezenewspapers com

Editor Paulette LeBlanc pleblanc@breezenewspapers com

Advertising Director Laurie Ragle lragle@ breezenewspapers com Advertising Sales

Charlene Russ cruss@breezenewspapers com

Design & Layout Chris Strine cstrine@breezenewspapers com

Debbie Carletti obits@breezenewspapers com

The rezoning of Commissioner Greenwell’s property in rural North Olga was about to get final approval when a Citizens f o r G o v e r n m e n t A c c o u n t a b i l i t y / S W F L watchdog contacted county staff about documents missing from the case file Because of his vigilance, the county conceded the original hearing on this rezoning wasn’t properly noticed to the public The rezoning application reviews had to be conducted again this time with notice and resident input

A foundational element of our democracy is citizen engagement everyday people lending their voices to and participating in g o v e r n m e n t a l d e c i s i o n - m a k i n g T h e Greenwell hearing was a do-over because Florida law mandates adequate notice to the public in a “newspaper of general circulation” and the county failed to follow the law Without such notice, all subsequent actions are void That’s how important legal notices are But today this is under grave threat

The idea of advisory committees for citizen input is laudable. However, many are dormant or meet intermittently For example, the Affordable Housing Advisory Committee meets only annually, despite the affordable housing crisis we are now experiencing M a n y c o m m i t t e e s a r e s t a c k e d w i t h appointees who are large, special-interest donors to commissioners’ campaigns and consequently are anything but “public” representatives Many seats are vacant Rules and regulations discouraging citi-

Incorporate?

To the editor:

I am an MBA I use to own Pine Island Paint, Framing and Art Gallery. I have been re-evaluating our prospects for incorporating only Pine Island, as the legislature won’t allow Matlacha to be included

Web Poll

Previous Web Poll Question:

Are you concerned about hurricane season?

■ Yes, because we haven’t recovered from Hurricane Ian yet 44%

F i n a n c i a l A n a l y s i s : I h a v e s p e n t 2 months in communication with the County CFO (Chief Financial Officer), Assistant C o u n t y M a n a g e r , T a x C o l l e c t o r , T a x Appraiser, Zoning, Planning, Sheriff in the Pineland Marina office, GPIWA engineer, the Matlacha/Pine Island Fire Department, C a l u s a L a n d T r u s t p r e s i d e n t , 2 0 / 2 0 , Fish/Wildlife, municipalities of Sanibel and Bonita Spring’s budget managers, as well as the Florida DEP I emailed Commissioner Ruane, with no response I called Honc Regretfully, I didn’t get a chance to speak zen input abound One example: to speak before the commissioners in the Greenwell case one must have testified before the Hearing Examiner at the previous hearing Another: citizen c o m m u n i c a t i o n s w i t h c o u n t y commissioners on zoning matters are prohibited and, indeed, criminalized, punishable by 60 days in the county jail and/or a $500 fine Another: the public can attend and listen to commissioner chatter at workshops, but should a resident want to voice their opinion, they must do so at a commission meeting the morning before an afternoon workshop Those are the rules

Jan Sommer

Guest Commentary

But it gets worse Under a new state law, jurisdictions can opt to cease publishing legal notices in newspapers and instead post them only on their website And that is what our Lee County commissioners have chosen to do Anyone using the county website knows it to be not very user-friendly and is sometimes offline, as happened for four days recently. Though often difficult to read, these notices can have tremendous impact on our quality of life and the financial health of our community Relegating them to a clunky w e b s i t e d o e s n o t h i n g t o f o s t e r c i t i z e n engagement

C o m m i s s i o n e r G r e e n w e l l ’ s r e z o n i n g request allowing higher density for residential and commercial development makes his land more valuable and puts dollars into his pocket It permits building on wetlands in the with him or the Waterkeepers, yet I have reviewed the 2022 Municipality Budgets and all of county services, for Pine Island Projected Financial Report based on 2022 budgets The report has been reviewed by the County CFO He thought it was very reasonable and thinks we have a very good chance to incorporate With these incredibly favorable numbers, I am 1,000% in favor of incorporation There will be no new taxes We will have a very strong financial position with a $9 2 million reserve, once all revenue and expenses are phased in Assessed Tax Base: According to the Tax Collector, taxes collected in 2022 were $25,574,724 Per the Census, our citizens have a mean income of $57,026 Per the County Tax Appraiser, we have an assessed tax base of Bokeelia and St James City, r e s p e c t i v e l y , $ 6 4 4 , 0 2 6 , 6 9 7 +

C o a s t a l H i g h H a z a r d a r e a T h e h e a r i n g p r o c e s s o r i g i n a l l y o c c u r r e d w i t h o u t the wider public knowing it w a s h a p p e n i n g W h e n t h e county was forced to notice it properly, residents turned out a n d m a d e t h e i r v o i c e s heard If this had only been posted on the county’s webs i t e , i t i s d o u b t f u l a n y o n e would have been aware of the proceeding

Our local newspapers play a critical role in informing the public; the obvious solution is to publish these notices in both newspapers and on the website so as to reach the most people The county justifies its action by asserting that it will be saving money by not publishing this information in print In reality, it’s the residents who ultimately pay with those who know how the system works ultimately benefiting Our commissioners must reverse this exclusionary decision

Citizens for Government Accountability/ SWFL is an all-volunteer watchdog group a f f i l i a t e d w i t h t h e F l o r i d a C e n t e r f o r Government Accountability, a 501(c)(3) organization dedicated to promoting investigative journalism More information can be found at flcga org To become a watchdog, write us at cgaswfl@flcga org

Jan Sommer is trustee of Citizens for Government Accountability/SWFL

$833,331,162 = $1,477,357,859

Cost and efficiency analysis: Waste, waste, waste Both the Fire and the Sheriff report to different entities, but we pay their costs They have all been very helpful However, I still have many unanswered questions:

Fire: 1) Why do we need to replace the St James City firehouse It is a heavy gauged metal building in very good condition The building DID NOT have damage from the hurricane, unlike all other stations The budgeted rebuild was $600,000 Two 1 acre lots w e r e p u r c h a s e d i n M a r c h 2 0 2 3 , f o r $190,000 2) A bathroom costing $65,000, etc 3) Medical responses with always a fire truck in tow The fire truck doesn’t have any more medical equipment than the ambulance One reason they need the extra people is due our increase in personal weight How about a fireperson’s vehicle and pay them millage instead of using their trucks? The cost of prematurely aging $3-500,000 gas-guzzling trucks seems wasteful 4) There is still confusion over the Fire Department servicing Cabbage Key for free.

Sheriff: They are paid extra hours and hours, as well as using extra gas and vehicles, unnecessarily They drive their cars back and forth from their homes in Cape Coral, Lehigh or wherever in the county They sit in Matlacha traffic, too