On Aug. 21, a group opposed to an extra 1,300 affordable and workforce housing building permits for the Florida Keys announced a victory. In a press release, the group said “the state is supporting several of their concerns about an administrative law judge’s recommendation … in support of lifting the current ROGO limits in the Florida Keys.”
In May, an administrative law judge rejected a petition to oppose the 1,300 building permits given to the Keys after Hurricane Irma by former Gov. Rick Scott. The 1,300 are above and beyond Monroe County’s existing, yet declining, number of new building permits before it reaches buildout in 2023.
Now, the state Department of Economic Opportunity has reviewed the judge’s favorable order, but asked for clarification on one point: how the municipalities will implement the early evacuation.
The 1,300 building permits will be divided among the cities and counties of the Keys, each receiving about 300 except for smaller communities like Key Colony Beach and Layton. As part of the agreement submitted to the state DEO, the renters of these units will need to evacuate 24 hours before the rest of the local community. In Marathon, the comp plan and land development regulations say that will be part of the required rental agreement, enforced by an onsite manager. The only exception would be for renters who are also first responders.
The Keys are divided on the extra building rights: Those in favor of the units cite them as a possible solution to the dire housing situation Keyswide. Those who oppose the move say it will be impossible to evacuate so many residents in a reasonable time should another hurricane head for the Keys.
According to the opposition’s press release, the DEO asked the judge “to analyze and address issues her recommendation has improperly ignored.”
The opposition is leaning on the hurricane evacuation issue.
“Adding more development increases the evacuation dangers even more,” said Richard Grosso, lead attorney for the petitioners in the legal challenge. “Hurricane experts tell us the Keys has already reached legal build-out – the maximum number of residences under the law which can be safely evacuated. The lead regional evacuation planner on the state’s team which made that determination came down to the hearing on his own time to testify that we’ve actually exceeded the 24-hour safe evacuation time by 2.5 hours. To add even more development on top of that is dangerous and violates local and state law.”
Earlier this year, Marathon’s planning director, George Garrett, said the core issue is the lack of workforce housing in the Keys. He said, “At this point, we have very limited additional workforce housing allocations and we have a significant workforce housing deficit.”
This dearth is what prompted the issuance of the 1,300 permits in the first place and motivates the municipalities’ argument. While hurricane evacuation, water quality and carrying capacity must be considered, the cities argued that each of their decisions to accept their 300 units was not only legal, but necessary in order to keep workers in local businesses. Garrett said, “It really is a workforce issue, and at that point, it becomes an issue of sustaining the economy.”
The administrative law judge in Tallahassee is required to provide findings of facts and conclusions of law regarding the hurricane evacuation implementation within 30 days.
