Issue link: https://newsleader.uberflip.com/i/100825
Sarasota News Leader December 28, 2012 JULY 11 Jim Shirley still does not have all the documentation the Sarasota County Commission chairwoman requested, but the executive director of the Arts and Cultural Alliance of Sarasota County comes away from the County Commission���s regular meeting with all the $1.3 million in grant awards a panel had approved for Fiscal Year 2013. Chairwoman Christine Robinson casts the lone ���No��� vote on the awards. Robinson, who represents South County interests on the commission, queried Alliance Executive Director Jim Shirley at length during the commission���s June 26 meeting about his efforts to encourage more South County organizations to apply for funding. Because Shirley did not have all the information she asked for during that session, the board agreed to call Shirley back for a follow-up presentation. During his opening remarks on July 11, Shirley points out he and his staff had contacted 38 individuals representing 25 South County organizations during the current grant process, ���and most of these were contacted on multiple occasions.��� In 2011, only one South County organization won a grant; this year, three organizations were recommended for funding, he points out. Those three were among six in South County that began the application process; five of those completed it, Shirley says. ��������� With Chairwoman Christine Robinson and Commissioner Jon Thaxton voting ���No,��� the Sarasota County Commission approves notto-exceed millage rates for advertisement in advance of public hearings on the 2013 fiscal year budget. The biggest increase in the rates this year will be for mosquito control, with the rate climbing from 0.0277 mills in FY 2012 to Page 44 0.0805 mills in FY 2013, an increase of 290.61 percent. The other rates proposed for FY 2013 are 3.1530 mills for the general operating fund ��� an increase of 2.56 percent over FY 2012 ��� and the debt service rate, which was set tentatively at 0.1577, a decrease of 33.26 percent from FY 2012. The total proposed millage is 3.3912, up 1.58 percent from FY 2012. ��������� Given the continuing fluctuations in the housing market, the Sarasota County commissioners agree it is too soon to put a price on any transfer of development rights from lands the county owns. Nonetheless, they also agree unanimously to authorize staff to develop a pilot program for the potential sale of publicly owned TDRs and to bring that back as soon as possible for their review. With a potential 10,000 TDR units that could be developed, commissioners say they want to get a program under way shortly. Commissioner Joe Barbetta points out, ���In reality, we���ve been about this for six or seven or eight years.��� Moreover, by his calculations, with a 5 percent cost for a TDR, the county���s property could bring in about $50 million, he said. Barbetta also requests staff check out the best practices of pricing TDRs in programs throughout the United States and report back on their findings. Chairwoman Christine Robinson asks Tom Polk, general manager of planning services, to include in the report information staff already has obtained about pricing of successful TDR programs. The TDR policy applies to the county���s 2050 Plan, which involves development east of Interstate 75. It would allow developers to increase density on parcels by paying a percentage of the cost of the extra dwelling units. The revenue would be used to preserve more environmentally sensitive lands in the county.