DIRTY LITTLE SECRETS

We urge our residents of Martin County to read the email below which was sent to our Martin County Commissioners. It’s vital that our community understands what is happening behind closed doors and how these decisions are affecting all of us.

The lack of transparency and continued secrecy surrounding key issues are not just bureaucratic over sites- they are causing real, lasting harm to our community. When decisions are made without public knowledge, or input, the very foundation of our local democracy is shaken.

We believe in accountability. We believe the people deserve to know. And we believe our community deserves better.

Stay informed. Speak up. Share this message.

**********************************************

Is the secrecy deliberate? The first public hearing on the Martin County Commission’s April 22 agenda (PH-1) makes major changes to the Land Development Regulations for the county’s Community Redevelopment Areas (CRAs). The changes will affect development standards, buffering, landscaping, and tree protection standards within our CRAs.

Community Development Director Susan Kores prepared the agenda item, yet she did not mention any of the proposed changes during the April 9 meeting of the Port Salerno Neighborhood Advisory Committee. The agenda had already been published, as had the legal notice on April 2, yet not one word came from Ms. Kores about the proposed changes. That’s just wrong, especially if that was a move to keep NAC members and the Port Salerno community in the dark.

In some instances, according to the new code, requests for alternative compliance to CRA rules no longer would come before the Neighborhood Advisory Committees at all, although residents are expected to live with and look at the results on a daily basis within their own neighborhoods. That’s where any “alternative compliance” needs to be presented FIRST.

I invite you to look at the tables in the proposed code, which are difficult to understand — unless you’re a land planner. Even then, I suspect they are confusing. Go to Table PS-9 - Landscaping, Buffering, and Tree Protection Standards, the next to the last item: 4.667 (all subsections) replaced by 12.1.12.4.b 3.3., then see if you can follow that in the code! Don’t you think our NACs deserve an explanation?

Since many of the decisions, if the county approves the proposed changes, would no longer rely on NAC input, and instead would rest with the BOCC, the Growth Management director, or the CRA board, depending on the nature of the request. In a perfect world that might be acceptable; however, these new rules allow SUBJECTIVE discretion in those decisions. It appears there are no longer hard-and-fast CRA rules to follow that give weight to a staffer’s final decision on so-called alternative rules in the face of overwhelming political pressure.

Port Salerno’s NAC understands better than most the danger in losing their collective voice. They know from experience that what their District Commissioner thinks is best for Port Salerno often conflicts with and is opposite of the intentions of the Port Salerno Vision Plan. Commission Chair Sarah Heard made a brief appearance at the April 9 NAC meeting, but she never said a word about the proposed changes to the LDRs that affect HER district's NAC.

She also did not mention that the commission will vote Tuesday on awarding a $34,000 contract to the Treasure Coast Regional Planning Council to design a “complete street” for Dixie Highway from Cove Road to Jefferson Street in Golden Gate. Why on earth would we not ask our own engineers to design a street? Ah yes, I'm sure that it's to give more weight to the redesign of Dixie Highway through Port Salerno called for in the county’s Innovation Hub. Again, the Innovation Hub plan has apparently become the de facto “master plan” for Districts 2 and 4 with NO vote of approval by commissioners and with zero regard to the CRAs it affects. How on earth did that happen? Please stop giving the plan created by developers and designers' priority over the long-standing, community-based CRA plans.