First day on the job for two, and two commissioners gone – and they already delivered some surprises.
By Johannes Werner
Original Air Date: November 20, 2024
Host: Yesterday, two new Sarasota County Commissioners were sworn in. Soon, a new chair will take over from Mike Moran. Moran was termed out after leading the last county commission with an agenda of culture wars, a complete makeover of social service funding — including substantial cuts — and enthusiastic support for development projects. Johannes Werner has a close look at the dynamics driving this “new” commission, and how it might be voting on controversial proposals.
Johannes Werner: Teresa Mast and Tom Knight gave their oaths of office yesterday morning, as the first order on the agenda of the Sarasota County Commission. The two are joining the board with contrasting credentials. Mast has been heavily backed by developers, and is married to the executive director of the regional builders association. Knight beat a candidate like Mast in one of the most expensive and nasty primary elections. On the campaign stump, Knight said that he will not be owned by developer’s interests.
Teresa Mast
The two are joining a board that opened the floodgates to a new development east of I-75, by allowing changes to the comprehensive plan and giving little scrutiny to big proposals. That board also wanted to allow hotel development on Siesta Key, but that was slowed down by the courts.
The only skeptical voice — and occasional no-vote — has been Mark Smith.
Two development issues were on the agenda yesterday – in the first case a request to cut down 14 grand trees, the second to build a new structure in a frequently flooded area on Siesta Key. In both cases, the developers were facing a level of scrutiny and opposition that was rarely seen by the past commission. In both cases, Mark Smith voiced his opposition. That was not surprising. Rather surprising was the fact that Teresa Mast asked tough questions. Both developers withdrew their requests, to submit new proposals at a later date.The commissioners only granted one of them the chance of a repeat.
Tom Knight
We talked to Lourdes Ramirez, the Siesta Key-based activist who spoke at the meeting against one of the two projects. She said she detected some tension in the morning session, but she concedes that may have been due to inexperience. She was pleasantly surprised with the commissioners during the first of the two test cases in the afternoon.
Lourdes Ramirez: I was pretty surprised to be honest. There’s two county commissioners who are new. I had trusted that Tom Knight is friendly to the neighborhoods and understands the concerns about the environment. And I still was surprised that overall, they were all concerned about the elimination of 14 grand trees on that particular property.
JW: Ramirez said the commission’s allowing the developers to withdraw their requests and return with new proposals is unusual.
LR: In the previous commission, I didn’t see that happening frequently, especially since that request to continue the meeting happened after the public portion of the hearing was closed, technically. There should be no opportunity for anyone to have any input into a county decision once the public portion of the hearing is closed. But they opened it up for the attorney and then let him — because he saw where it was going — let him revise the proposal and say that they want to continue it so they can look at, say, preserving most of those grand trees. So I thought that was also a very different way of the county commission handling a development.
JW: The second vote, about building a mansion on the beach at Siesta Key, was even more surprising to Ramirez.
LR: That was the most shocking. I had no anticipation that we were going to win, much less win that fight unanimously. The developer proposed, they purchased a property on the beach, and they wanted to use our public beach access as their driveway. And I didn’t anticipate that the county commission would be favorable to that. I mean, I thought they would be favorable to allow it, especially when some of the conversations was that he could use beach access as his driveway. But it really shocked me to see that they not only denied it, but when the developer wanted to continue the hearing, just like the previous developer did in the morning about the Grand Trees, they refused and they decided, “No, we’re going to take this vote and this vote’s to deny.” And it was unanimous. And that took me by surprise.
JW: The first meeting of the new commission was chaired by Commissioner Joe Neunder, but the most likely next chair will be Ron Cutsinger, who was re-elected without opposition to represent District 5.
Ramirez is cautiously optimistic about increased scrutiny for development proposals going forward.
LR: Although I believe he tends to be developer friendly, he’s also very measured in his thought. I think he thinks things through. I felt the previous chair had one motivation and that’s whatever he felt. He was more authoritative, the previous chair, and whatever he felt was right is the way it has to be. And he was not compassionate or empathetic to all of the nonprofits, but the current chair, I think would be still more leaning towards the developers, but I think he would actually be more thoughtful in his decisions. I did. I actually anticipated that it was always going to be a 3–2 going forward. And, I have a lot of faith in two of the commissioners, Commissioner Mark Smith and the new commissioner Tom Knight. I wasn’t sure about the others. So I’m happy to see that they are coming around to the possibility that they should be looking at the concerns of the environment and concerns of the people.
JW: Johannes Werner, WSLR News.
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