May 29, 2007
Commissioner
James O’Connell
Flagler
County Board of County Commissioners
1769 East Moody Blvd.
Suite 301
Bunnell, FL 32110
RE: HAMMOCK
COMMUNITY CONSERVATION CORPORATION POSITION PAPER ON THE NEED FOR STRATEGIC
PLANNING FOR THE FUTURE OF THE HAMMOCK
Dear Jim:
All of us in the Hammock Community Conservation Corporation value our relationship with the Board of County Commissioners. We believe that the Board in recent years has come to understand better our vision for the barrier island's future, and to sympathize with it. And we appreciate that. We are writing this letter to continue that valuable dialogue.
We still have much to do to ensure the future quality of life in the Hammock. We know that we must do it a step at a time. But those steps cannot be taken haphazardly; they must reflect a larger vision of the island's future. The concerns we raise in this letter are in the areas of zoning/land use, drainage, water and sewer, and parks. We also need to know more about county and regional hurricane planning, especially for evacuation for those of us on the barrier island. We summarize those concerns below. But more important still is the need for them to be addressed not piecemeal, but as parts of a broader, future-friendly process.
Zoning/Land Use
We regret that in the past various Hammock land use and zoning applications that have dramatically increased density and intensity have been approved without sufficient consideration for the A1A corridor as a whole. In addition, the presence of R/C zoning up and down A1A could create a potential patchwork of incompatible uses that could result in future blight, and dramatically increase all of our infrastructure needs, including the widening of A1A. We therefore support the county's decision to hire a consultant to assist it in updating the comprehensive plan; and we are heartened that the consultant's work plan apparently provides for serious citizen input. We in our organization will participate with enthusiasm. We also remind the BOCC that the Treasure Coast Regional Planning Council Charrette exercise several years ago produced very useful insight into how the residents of the A1A corridor see its future. It is the request of the HCCC that the charrette report be utilized by the consultants and the County in updating the comprehensive plan (the report can be found on our website Hammockccc.com on "Favorite Links").
The old comprehensive plan is now seriously outdated, and should be treated as such in county decision-making pending approval of the new plan. In the interim, we encourage the county to use whatever flexibility it has at its disposal to look to the future, not the past, for its decisions on growth management in the Hammock.
Drainage
Our drainage problems affect entire neighborhoods. They include the almost complete lack of storm-water retention and conveyance in Marineland Acres and the difficulty of cleaning drainage ditches in Hammock Beach Estates. The Malacompra Canal is compromised by overgrowth, perhaps because of drainage changes resulting from the Hammock Beach development. We believe it is impractical to look at drainage issues in a fragmented way, since drainage systems on the island are generally interconnected, with most of the flow going to the Malacompra Canal. We propose that the BOCC schedule another workshop on this issue, with the intent of moving toward the development of a long-term stormwater management plan for the barrier island. This plan should include short term actions to reduce current risks and long-term actions to move away from the "band-aid" approach.
In the past County staff has put the burden of finding solutions upon residents - this is a case where citizens are ill-equipped to handle the complexities and logistics of such fixes and our local government really needs to step in and coordinate. Just in the case of Marineland Acres, there have been at least two expensive drainage studies performed that were quickly forgotten. We should invite representatives from St. John's Water Management, state Department of Environmental Protection and other appropriate state and other officials, as well as representatives from Hammock Beach Estates, Hammock Beach and Ocean Hammock HOAs, and Marineland Acres.
Parks
We appreciate the effort put into the Greenway parks by both concerned citizen volunteers and county staff. We are grateful to Amy Kennedy, Doug Wright, Pete Celestino, Faith Alkhatib, and others who have been working hard on the these projects to get them back on track. Although the scope of some projects has had to be reduced, we are now seeing progress. In addition, we were pleased to see the purchase of the 4.7 acre addition to the MalaCompra Oceanfront Park in 2006 and additional projects recently supported by county staff.
We nevertheless underline that $1.675 million has been
sitting in the Funds 307 and 308 accounts since 1998. Fortunately, this money
was used to get matching grants for another $1.1 million. However, four
hundred thousand dollars was spent on planning by Carter Burgess and produced a
plan that was unrealistic and expensive.
We hope that future spending from these grants will be more productive
and more closely monitored, since much remains to be done. It seems that
better communication between County staff and consultants could keep such
projects from getting off-track.
Water and Wastewater Treatment
We are concerned that the county may not be taking limits on future water availability seriously in its land use and development planning, and will be having conversations with St. John's Water Management about their opinions on the issue. We would appreciate input from the BOCC on this as well.
Current regulations allow developments as small as a handful of homes to install package plants to handle sewerage. It is difficult for small homeowner groups to maintain such facilities, and the potential failure of these plants represents a serious environmental threat to the fragile eco-system of the island. Developments are now being planned in the A1A corridor that would be served by sewer, even though Palm Coast has informed us that it has shelved plans to extend the sewer main to Marineland.
Hurricane Preparedness
We believe that county residents and the county administration have long been as prepared and proactive when dealing with the threat of hurricanes. We are not well informed on planning done by the county on dealing with the especially serious threat a hurricane would pose to the Hammock. How many hours would it take to evacuate the Hammock's nearly 5,000 residents, not including Beverly and Flagler Beaches? What plans does the Sheriff have to direct an evacuation? Has the county done a study to ensure that all bridges leading off the island would be used equally, avoiding a rush to any one bridge? We will be asking the county office of emergency management to meet with us to respond to these and other questions that might occur. We will also ask a representative of the Regional Planning Council to take part.
We cannot remain passive on this issue. We must all take it seriously. We ask that the BOCC provide to us a statement on the degree to which, and how specifically it takes hurricane preparedness and evacuation needs into account in its decisions on land use management in the Hammock.
The Future
The issues raised above all serve to emphasize the need to plan comprehensively for future development and infrastructure provision. It would be a prudent investment of county resources to conduct master planning that would include:
· a strategic park plan for short and long-term park improvements
.
Having these guiding documents would allow the County and residents to spread improvement costs out over the long run so that we would not be faced with the constant short-term realization that funding is not available for this or that specific project. It would also allow us to keep our eyes on the end result and not be distracted by various bumps in the road -- new administrators or elected officials among them -- that can sidetrack the community improvement process. We hope you will consider funding such efforts – the timing for them couldn’t be better, given that the County is now beginning the process of revising its comprehensive plan. We understand that budget shortfalls are looming, but in the long run careful planning will save the taxpayers money, particularly money that must be spent to address crises that could have been averted through the strategic planning process, and money that must be spent on fragmented solutions to larger problems. Master planning for the A1A corridor is in keeping with the goal of the comprehensive plan to plan for orderly growth.
Thank you for your service to our community, and we appreciate your taking these issues under consideration.
Sincerely,
Thad Crowe, President
For the Members
Copies: Doug Wright, County Administrator
Jim Jarrells, Assistant County Administrator
Al Hadeed, County Attorney
Patrick Miller, Director of Development Services
Pete Celestino, Director of Parks and Recreation
Adam Mengel, Director of Planning and Zoning