BRIEFS

Industrial and commercial properties need protection from Legacy Trail mission creep

Christine Robinson

A referendum on the Legacy Trail is on the ballot for November. It seeks voter approval to borrow up to $65 million over 20 years to use — with a state grant and possibly other funds — to enable county government to extend the recreational trail from Culverhouse Nature Park, which is on McIntosh Road south of Stickney Point Road, to Fruitville Road near downtown Sarasota.

The Argus Foundation has not taken an official position on the referendum but is studying the numbers and the plans with the assistance of The Friends of the Legacy Trail. It is a significant investment for the county.

While we are wrapping our arms around and contemplating the project, we want to raise a very important issue for the economic future of Sarasota County that must be addressed ahead of any referendum vote:

How are we going to protect the industrial and commercial properties abutting the Legacy Trail from mission creep?

We ask this with good reason and an understanding of recent history. We recently saw a problem with a park and a property that cost a reputable local businessman a lot of money and shook the business community's trust in county government.

This turn of events happened despite the fact that the county commission invited businesses to invest in this property and the property was going to be rezoned to an industrial use consistent with the land use designation of a Major Employment Center.

This surplus county property just so happened to be across the street from a park.

The Celery Fields were created as a stormwater system to alleviate flooding and to filter water. It has turned into a park, with birds and other wildlife, close to a very busy interstate and also right next to commercial and industrial lands. Some of the lands have been planned to be commercial or industrial for decades, based on their location at an important highway interchange in a designated Major Employment Center.

But business people watched as a local recycling business that has a history of being a good neighbor in other areas of the county was attacked and vilified by local conservation and parks groups.

Typical comments were: “How can you put an industrial use next to a park?” and “We are opposed to change because of how it will affect the Celery Fields.”

It was even proposed that “any and all lands whose development would impact negatively on the Celery Fields” be obtained and placed in a preserve.

The faith of the business community was shaken and the possibility of co-existing with parks was placed in serious doubt. The conservation groups wanted to turn nearby properties into parkland and publicly denigrated the business.

Could the businesses and property owners around the Legacy Trail face the same fate?

The unused railway right-of-way that the county wants to turn into a bike trail runs through industrial and commercial properties. That makes sense because the railway served some industrial businesses on that land decades ago. Some of the industrial development along the former railway is very intense. Some property owners may want to expand or further develop those properties. Some of them might face special exception hearings due to their use, even if that use currently exists.

Will they face the wrath of parks and conservation groups in the name of the bike-riding experience?

What is the plan to make sure that these businesses and property owners are protected now and in the future?

Every year, we lose industrial light warehouse properties, both currently designated and those planned to be designated. Residential dwellings are being approved on or next to industrial lands. This is hampering owners' ability to use those industrial properties for what they have been intended.

Further loss of these lands would greatly inhibit economic development, narrow our tax base to mostly residential and cause citizens to bear more of the cost of services. It would keep our county from attracting entrepreneurs and businesses that could sustain us during recessions.

It could cause us to start becoming a bedroom community.

The county must take active and public steps to regain the business community's trust in its commitment to economic development. It must make a public policy statement that compatibility with the Legacy Trail will not be used as a weapon to stop developing or redeveloping nearby land or used to curtail existing industrial and commercial uses.

Christine Robinson is executive director of the Argus Foundation and was on the Sarasota County Commission from 2010 to 2016. Contact her at christine@argusfoundation.org.