More work needed on evacuation plan
DCA:
It's too early to talk about more development
BY LAURIE KARNATZ
Citizen Staff
The main question on the
minds of Florida Keys environmentalists and proponents of affordable
housing — how many new building permits will the Keys receive based on
hurricane evacuation improvements — remained unanswered Friday.
State officials, who
created the Monroe County Hurricane Evacuation Working Group, had
promised at the group's December meeting to answer that question today.
Instead, state Department
of Community Affairs planning administrator Jim Quinn asked the group,
comprised of officials from the county and Keys' cities, to go back to
their respective boards and get permission to begin "phase two" of the
effort to reduce evacuation time in the Keys.
Quinn said the request
came from DCA Secretary Thaddeus Cohen.
The group was created
last year by the DCA, and was first convened in September. It was
charged with analyzing hurricane evacuation in the Keys and developing
strategies to reduce the time it takes to evacuate the island chain
before a storm.
State officials in
December estimated between 1,000 and 2,000 new permits would be
available for residential construction if the county and Keys cities
agreed to adopt so-called "phased evacuation" as part of their land-use
plans.
Since that meeting, the
county and all Keys city boards have unanimously adopted the requested
addition to their land-use plans. And since then, there has been much
speculation about the actual number of new permits that could result
from the change. Some have estimated the number as high as 14,000. That
number is based on an additional 2,000 permits for each hour saved
during an evacuation by using the phased evacuation plan.
On Friday, Quinn said no
realistic discussion of additional permits could take place until
consensus is reached between the various governmental bodies on the
operational issues of staged hurricane evacuation. That's where phase
two comes in.
In addition, Quinn said
equity must be achieved in the method used by each government for
calculating a building unit. Currently, local governments use different
methods to calculate building units based on their use. For instance,
transient units and workforce housing units are calculated differently
from city to city.
Once those issues are
resolved, his agency can further consider additional permit allocations
for the county and its cities.
Affordable housing
proponents and the Key West Chamber of Commerce have asked that all
additional permits ultimately approved for the county be limited to
workforce housing.
At the same time, many
Keys' civic leaders and environmentalists claim the proposal to allow
more permits by using phased evacuation is a shell game that should be
separate from affordable housing issues.
The county has been using
a phased evacuation plan for 20 years, said Cudjoe Key resident Dennis
Henize, a former National Weather Service meteorologist.
And the county in 2000
adopted a plan to work with tourism officials to promote early
evacuation of visitors as a storm approaches. That, too, is part of the
phased evacuation plan.
Said Marathon councilman
Randy Mearns, "I think you'll find a lot of what we did is already in
place. We didn't reinvent the wheel."
DCA staff, too, admitted
that the phased evacuation plan "actually reflects what's already in
place."
That, said several
speakers at the Friday meeting, makes the issue of additional building
permits moot.
"You haven't accomplished
anything," said Tavernier resident John Hammerstrom. "We do phased
evacuation today."
But entrepreneur Ed Swift
said it was the environmentalists who are manipulating evacuation models
to control growth. He suggested building shelters, particularly in Key
West and the Lower Keys, would be a safe alternative to evacuation. It
also would reduce evacuation clearance times, allowing more permits for
workforce housing.
Other issues addressed at
the Friday meeting included:
* Unbridled growth in
south Miami-Dade County. Keys elected officials and residents urged
Quinn to enlist the help of state agencies and Miami-Dade County to
ensure evacuees from the Keys don't end up trapped in mainland traffic
jams as a hurricane approaches.
Keys officials also
questioned the safety of sending Keys residents to the mainland, where
they could find themselves facing a shortage of gasoline and shelter.
That was brought to the fore in recent months because thousands of
Floridians fleeing four different hurricanes last season found
themselves unable to fill their gas tanks or find space in already full
hotels.
As an alternative, Key
West and Monroe County officials asked for serious consideration — and
help — in building shelters in the Lower Keys to take care of thousands
of residents.
* Evacuation of the Keys
homeless population. The group unanimously agreed that the Florida Keys
Homeless Coalition should address that issue. It was recommended the
group work with emergency management staff to develop a plan for taking
care of the homeless when a storm approaches.
lkarnatz@keysnews.com
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