Which Areas Will Be Developed?

SEBRING - One of Highlands County's most important meetings will be held at 9 a.m. Tuesday in the Highlands County Government Center.

But here's the problem: it's about urban services boundaries and comprehensive plan amendments and neighborhood commercial nodes.

If you're bored and already moving to the next story, stop. Read a little further.

Remember Hometown Democracy, where the people want to make decisions about whether a strip mall is located in their back yards, or whether another used car lot replaces an orange grove?

At this workshop, says Highlands County Planner Don Hanna, the board of county commissioners wants to hear from people who will be directly impacted by land that will be developed over the next decade.

"This is going to be an issue which is really hot," said Hanna. "It will include where schools, roads and houses will be located."

With a few exceptions, the urban services boundaries will be the land that borders U.S. 27 from north of Avon Park, throughout Sebring, to south of Lake Placid.

Here's the upshot: the boundaries that Highlands County officials feel should be included on the map will be submitted to the state Department of Community Affairs, which manages growth in Florida.

In reality, Hanna knows, the DCA won't approve Highlands County's version. The state likely will throw out many of the requests to be included in the development map.

However, what remains will be pre-approved by the DCA, so Highlands County planners and the planners for Avon Park and Sebring won't need to make more requests for comp plan amendments until years in the future.

For the past three years, the state had held up about four dozen comp plan amendments until the county came up with a way to deal with traffic problems on U.S. 27. Those comp plans delayed approval of the proposed Crossroads Mall at U.S. 27 and S.R. 66, and a 300-acre Wal-Mart distribution center at Skipper Road and U.S. 27, according to Tampa developer Harry Lerner, president of Maxcy Development Group in Tampa. The Wal-Mart deal never closed, Lerner said.

For more information, contact Hanna at 402-6650.