The Miami Herald

Moving UDB would promote urban sprawl

Posted November 20, 2005

By Carl Hiaasen

The usual suspects will be on hand Monday when the Miami-Dade County Commission considers taking the first step toward trashing the Urban Development Boundary and obliterating the vital green barrier between urban development and the Everglades.

Most of the 40-plus lobbyists hired by developers and building groups will show up to see if all their hard work has paid off. They've been slithering backstage for months, locking up votes from obliging commissioners and leaning on the reluctant ones.

Nine of 12 applications are on the table, and this week's decisions will signal what commissioners intend for the three remaining projects, the largest and most ruinous.

The meeting holds the promise for either drama or vaudeville, and if you're a Miami-Dade taxpayer, you ought to show up.

If you don't, they'll stick it to you. They might, anyway.

Sprawl is a huge and escalating burden upon South Floridians, the expense of new roads, sewers, schools, police and fire services falling largely on the public.

Taxes don't go down with overcrowding; they go up. A recent study by the Center for Urban Policy Research says that building westward in Miami-Dade is far more costly to government than building in developed areas.

Still, the developers who've been snapping up land west of the UDB insist it's the only place left for affordable homes in the county. In other words, they're not being greedy -- they're just performing a noble public service.

Nobody seriously believes the comic claim that Miami-Dade is desperately short of space for housing. The Department of Planning & Zoning reports that there's enough available land for new construction until 2018.

Other builders will tell you there are plenty of opportunities remaining east of the UDB -- including neighborhoods that can be profitably redeveloped.

But the really big money is in buying up raw land and slamming up instant sardine-can subdivisions of the sort you now see all along the Turnpike extension in South Miami-Dade.

The blight merchants are running out of green spaces to pave, and that's the sole reason that the county's development boundary is in jeopardy. Once the UDB is moved, not an acre of farmland or wetland will be safe.

A pushover

Commissioners can kill any project with a No vote. That would be decisive, and require an actual backbone.

The more cowardly (though safer) choice is voting Yes, which would send the development plan to the state Department of Community Affairs for review. The DCA would then ship it back to Miami-Dade for action some time next year.

If you're a commissioner who's sold out one way or another, the DCA option is appealing. You can explain your vote by saying you simply want the state's opinion, knowing full well that the DCA these days is a pushover.

The agency recently laughed off objections from both the South Florida Regional Planning Council and Monroe County, and said Homestead could add another 2,616 houses with no regard for the impact on hurricane evacuation.

Hurricane horrors

Gurgling with stupidity, a DCA official actually stated that Homestead isn't required to consider hurricane egress ramifications because it isn't located directly on the ocean.

The name ''Andrew'' apparently didn't ring a bell.

It's obvious why developers hoping to dislodge the development boundary would be thrilled if Miami-Dade commissioners punted the ball first to the DCA.

Ironically, the man responsible for that agency's empty-headed leadership is Jeb Bush, who certainly knows a thing or two about hurricane horrors.

The governor also has a stake in the battle over the UDB, having made Everglades restoration the centerpiece of his environmental agenda. For him to twiddle his thumbs while the county surrenders the last protective buffer would be politically problematic, to put it mildly.

Bush is said to have phoned some Miami-Dade commissioners to ask them to hang tough, but it's wishful thinking to believe he holds more sway than the lobbyists who helped get them elected.

Go to the meeting

They'll all be in the peanut gallery Monday, watching to make sure that promises are kept. If the smaller developments get approved, lobbyists for the Lennar Corp. -- which has a monstrous project planned for Florida City -- will be popping the champagne, too.

The vote has been inconveniently scheduled during the short holiday week, in the hopes of discouraging public attendance. The more citizens who show up, the more squirmingly uncomfortable it will make the sell-out commissioners.

That's why you should go to the meeting and speak up -- not just because you care about the Everglades, or because you don't want more traffic, more overcrowded schools and more dangerous chaos during hurricane season.

The best reason to be at the meeting is because the lobbyists and the politicians they own don't want you there. They don't want anybody spoiling their party.