County planning needs an overhaul

Published 1:20 pm Friday, August 22, 2008

As a member of the Warm Beach Stewards, who have been concerned about the 100-unit development of the Soundview project of the Warm Beach Senior Community, I was not surprised to learn from Bill Sheets’ article on Tuesday that the Senior Community would most likely appeal the recent hearing examiner’s decision. According to that decision, the project failed on many levels to comply with state regulations for ahoreline management, environmental protection and also county development codes. What I was surprised to learn was that the county’s Department of Planning and Development Services would also appeal.

Such an appeal would only aggravate the misleading and misunderstanding of the development procedures which the department obviously has concerning this project. Their callous disregard for bringing logic and reasonable guidance to the senior community is mind boggling. As the decision states, “The Examiner is pained that this proposal, brought forward by a nonprofit organization, has gone this far with such a gaping flaw.” The examiner goes on the criticize the department’s handling of the project with such language as “a fairly obvious misreading of the code,” “a deliberate misreading of policy,” “weakest of rationales” and “impermissible and patently unfair to all the other landowners in the County…”

What is fairly obvious is that the department is in dire need of new direction. Other areas of the county continue to experience this foolishness of the department’s granting of preliminary approval of airport expansion into flood zones, car lot development into designated farmlands and a host of other inconsistent decisions which cause great anguish to bushwhacked neighbors. Even the county executive’s supporters in the building trades must be uncomfortable with how poorly these development projects have been handled by the department.

It’s time for new leadership.

Tim Clancy