By Adam Kaufman
Legal Analyst
October 20, 2019
The administrative agency charged with reviewing Administrative Law Judge E. Gary Early’s Recommended Order sustaining the City of Fernandina Beach’s approval of changes to the future land use map designation of a parcel on Citrona Drive has upheld and adopted that ruling.
The designation by the City of that 6.4 acre parcel from Conservation to Low Density Residential would permit the proposed 30 home Amelia Bluff development to proceed.
In a 17-page Final Order issued on October 16, 2019, the Florida Department of Economic Opportunity denied each and every exception to Early’s Recommended Order raised on behalf of the Tree Conservancy and the Sierra Club.
The 15 exceptions proffered by the Tree Conservancy and the Sierra Club reiterated and are based upon allegations made in public statements and pressed on social media that had been argued before and ruled upon by ALJ Early. Each of the exceptions was found by the Department to be without legal basis, statutory foundation or support in administrative law.
The Department of Economic Opportunity determined that Early’s findings of fact were “based upon substantial evidence in the record” and that the proceeding before ALJ Early “complied with the essential requirements of law.” The Department’s consideration of Early’s ruling concludes: “The Department has reviewed the ALJ’s conclusions of law and finds that the conclusions of law … are reasonable. The Department does not have any substitute conclusions of law that would be as or more reasonable than the ALJ’s conclusions of law.”
The Amelia Tree Conservancy and the Sierra Club may initiate judicial review of the Department’s Final Order within thirty (30) calendar days of the Order’s October 16, 2019 filing.
Editor’s Note: Adam Kaufman, has been General Counsel, labor negotiator, and lobbyist for the Rochester City School; he was appointed by Governor Mario Cuomo as Counsel, Associate Director and First Deputy Attorney General to a New York State Special Commission; he served as an Administrative Law Judge, mediator and Regional Director of the New York State Public Employment Relations Board; now retired, for the last 13 years he was a labor arbitrator and mediator. A graduate of the Northwestern Pritzker School of Law, he is a city resident.
Time to move on.
Exactly.
AMEN!!
What would be the issues on appeal, given the standard of review? Would a bond be required?
Both these groups have shown their real agenda with their delaying tactics; they are anti- development, not conservation. Meanwhile development is going on all around the Island at a record pace adding tax revenue to the City and County.
I guess I am left wondering why issues of a community’s zoning, planning and land use as it relates to conservation and preservation of land are left in the hands of a committee called “The Department of Economic Opportunity”?
Good point Elizabeth. Up to now, the shills for paving over the entire island couched their building blitz in terms of “affordable housing”. Now they don’t bother, it is called economic opportunity, a euphemism for plunder. Unfortunately, the damage done to both the environment and to the living standards of those who reside here cannot be financially assessed. The city manager notes individual housing costs more for services provided; those in the land development business say development is an economic benefit. To whom? Perhaps the increases in taxes to support these “benefit developments” should be passed on solely to those who yearn for them.
Lastly, one thing the administrative judge’s decision made clear: even if a city official not empowered to make changes to the land zoning without Commission approval to do so does make changes, it can be papered over. So, why have any zoning if that is the case? In Federal Contract Law, if a person acts beyond his contract authority, the contract is void. There is no consideration to be made to a contractor who did not establish the officer’s authority to bind the government. Why is state contract law different, or is it??
Progress is the force of life….stagnation and regression only leads to decay.
Conservation has its place, so does development. Time we have a City Commission that understands these facts and acts on them.
The State of Florida just passed HB-1730, which is 43-pages long. In this bill, it means that if the Amelia Tree Conservancy and the Sierra Club lost this battle against the developer, they would have to pay all the attorney fees and court costs afterward.