And he wants to know from the business community on the islands how the chamber can help them be more successful.

“It looks like it’s going to be an interesting year,” said Miller, who is both co-owner of Big Pine Liquors and a part-time member of the staff at US 1 Radio and Conch Country Radio.

Miller says that for years, “The Lower Keys Chamber of Commerce has told you what they do for you. Now we want to hear from our members and the community as a whole what they would like to see from their chamber. How do we make things better?”

He has heard from various segments of the community that the chamber needs to be more of an advocate for the business community in the Lower Keys, that it needs to be more community oriented, “or do we continue to throw social parties for the business community.”

Miller said he wants to promote more of a sense of community within the Lower Keys by having the chamber partner with civic service groups.

“We have talked about pooling our efforts with the Lower Keys Rotary to enhance the annual July 4 fireworks celebration, getting more involved in things that bring the community together,” said Miller.

Miller said he took the chamber position to do what he could to make the Lower Keys a more attractive place.

“I want to give our visitors the best experience we can, and I want to impress them enough that they want to become locals. I think we do that by instilling pride in our area, by telling visitors how its great to live in the most affordable piece of paradise,” said Miller.

“We want to find a way to get people to stop along the highway and take a look at our pieces of paradise, see what we have to offer,” he said.

One of the ideas Miller has discussed with the new chamber board is the implementation of a grant program for island beautification projects.

A possible art grant to allow local artists to showcase their talents, and by default the feeling of the Keys, with murals on buildings is one of the programs Miller has bandied about. But there are others.

“Perhaps we can install welcome signs for each island, plant some landscape buffers, sponsor beautification contests. We want to hear from folks out there what we can do to make a favorable impression on our visitors with the intent to turn them into locals,” said Miller. “Everyone benefits from that.”

Miller said he knows the goals he has outlined for his year at the top are somewhat ambitious, “but sometimes if you get the ball rolling, momentum can be a wonderful thing.”

“Other chambers do a very good job of promoting their community while advocating for the best circumstances for their business partners. I want us to be like that,” he said.

“We’re ready to make a difference in our community and we need everyone’s help to make that happen.  The more voices we have, the easier it is to be heard,” he said.

Miller said he actually wants to her from people. He can be reached through his personal email of  bpkparksteve@aol.com, or folks can give their thoughts and opinions by calling the chamber at 872-2411 or by  emailing info@lowerkeyschamber.com.

In a deal brokered last week, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, overseer of the NFIP, has agreed to ask a federal court to extend Monroe County’s deadline to implement those regulations until July 1.

The county was supposed to have implemented the new regulations by last Thursday or have FEMA begin the process to place the county on probation from the NFIP, with a possible expulsion from the program down the road.

Following negotiations with county staff, however, FEMA relented on the Jan. 12 deadline.

In papers filed Wednesday, FEMA acknowledged that the timeline for implementing the regulations wasn’t attainable.

The new regulations are the result of a court settlement between environmental groups, FEMA and the US Fish and Wildlife Service. More than two decades ago, the groups filed suit against FWS claiming that the federal agency was abdicating some of its responsibility to protect endangered species that call Monroe County home by allowing FEMA to continue to subsidize development in sensitive species habitat by issuing federally backed flood insurance.

The courts agreed with that claim and first issued an injunction against human development on more than 40,000 lots in Monroe County while the sides worked out an agreement.

The agreement the three came to, without input from Monroe County, was to have Monroe implement a series of growth management regulations to protect the endangered species.

Under the Reasonable and Prudent Alternatives outlined by FWS, the county would be responsible to monitor development impact in sensitive habitat, keeping such development impact below a maximum threshold in acreage.

Once that threshold was crossed, the county was expected to deny development permits on remaining lots within special species focus areas.

That, said county officials, would put Monroe taxpayers in the cross hairs for potentially $65 million or more in land takings cases from private property owners unable to utilize their land for any economic purpose.

Aside from the potential takings liabilities, county officials also balked at the estimated $450,000 needed to establish the monitoring and review programs, as well as the estimated $250,000 needed yearly to operate the program.

Neither FEMA nor FWS offered to help defray any of that cost.

The settlement agreement was adopted by the court Jan. 11, 2011 and both federal agencies agreed they would have the safeguards in place, through the county, within one year, hence the original Jan. 12 deadline for implementation.

FEMA admits, however, that it didn’t get the county a needed set of species assessment guides until December 23, giving it less than a month to prepare and adopt the mandated regulations.

Under Florida rules, it takes nearly six months to legally adopt land use changes. Once the draft ordinance is written, it must go before the county Development Review Committee at least once, and the county Planning Commission at least once.

Rarely do those presentations fall within the same month as staff has to adjust the working to accommodate recommendations from the DRC before the planning commission sees the revised draft.

Once the planning commission has offered its revisions and recommendations, the proposal goes to the Board of County Commissioners for approval to transmit the language to the state Department of Economic Opportunity. DEO has a couple of months to review the language and can either accept it as is, ask for revisions, or reject it.

After a public comment period, the final document comes back to the county for final adoption.

FEMA sent notice to the county in April that it would be requiring the implementation of the RPAs, but without final assessment guides. The county replied with several concerns it had in late June, and got a letter from FEMA reiterating the need to adopt the regulations in early December.

In that last letter, FEMA told the county it would be placed on probation from the NFIP on May 10 if the regulations hadn’t been adopted. There wasn’t enough time for the county to adopt the ordinances under the current procedural rules.

“As of the date of this filing, Monroe County has not yet revised it floodplain damage prevention ordinances to reference the species focus area maps…..” wrote FEMA attorneys in the extension request. “However, these communities have represented to FEMA they are taking good faith steps toward revising their respective…ordinances.”

FEMA also admitted to the court that it knew Monroe County had drafted an ordinance that does reference the RPAs and planned to submit that draft to the Board of County Commissioners for direction at Thursday’s meeting.

“On that date, the commission will be asked to authorize staff to commence the legislative process which would culminate in a public hearing by the county commission on April 18,” wrote FEMA.

FEMA told the courts that Monroe County needed a five-month extension to accomplish the procedural steps needed to implement any land use changes relating to the RPAs.

What county staff was expected to present to the BOCC Thursday was a draft ordinance that requires property owners in the sensitive habitat areas to get approval first from FWS before the county would accept the permit for processing.

That, said Assistant County Attorney Bob Shillinger, is an attempt to meet the spirit of the FWS and FEMA mandates without the need to implement potentially devastating regulations.

County officials have also already agreed to take FEMA to court over the matter, claiming that the federal agency violated rule-making procedures and went beyond its authority in ordering the county to implement enforcement policies for the federal Endangered Species Act.

Shillinger had said the county’s suits would be filed upon notice of probation proceedings from FEMA, but it was unsure at presstime whether that had changed in light of the FEMA request for an extension.

County officials received notice from the FEMA Floodplain Management and Insurance Branch, Mitigation Division last week that the federal agency feels as though Monroe County has not made enough strides in a program to eradicate non-conforming downstairs enclosures.

“Following consultations with Monroe County…we have decided to extend the Pilot Inspection Procedure for Monroe County unincorporated areas,” wrote Major May, regional administrator for that division. “Based on discussions with your staff, we understand that the county has not made significant progress identifying and remedying unlawful enclosures and it requires an extension of the Pilot Inspection Procedure to complete the requirements…”

In 2002, the county agreed, under threat of expulsion from the National Flood Insurance Program, to enter into a pilot program whereby enclosures thought to be non-conforming would have to be inspected by county personnel before flood insurance on those properties could be renewed.

Known locally as the insurance inspection program, county staff was to identify properties where potential non-conforming enclosures existed that carried federally subsidized flood insurance policies.

Those policies are backed by FEMA and provide lower cost flood insurance for Monroe residents, an insurance required by mortgage lenders who use any federal agency to back the loans, such as Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac or Housing and Urban Development.

Once identified through a series of various property codes on the Property Appraiser’s record card, the property would be sent to FEMA. Those codes include almost all FLA or LL codes on the record card held by the appraiser’s office. FEMA would then notify the insurance carrier that an inspection would be required of the area below base flood before it would renew a policy, or grant a new policy in the case of existing homes sold.

The carriers sent letters to the property owners informing them of the requirement and giving them six months to have an initial inspection. The insurance could be renewed once if the property wasn’t in compliance but if it hadn’t received a clean inspection by the end of the renewal year, flood insurance would be cancelled.

Cancellations for homes with mortgages usually resulted in the lender force placing flood insurance at much higher rates than FEMA backed policies.

If the properties failed to come into compliance within a year of renewal, the county could, and often did, begin code enforcement proceedings to force compliance.

The original pilot program length was announced at seven years in the Federal Register Notice that implemented it, and was subsequently extended.

The reasons for the extension, according to Growth Management Director Christine Hurley are all based in the numbers.

County elected officials had been told by former growth management personnel that the county’s obligation would end when all insurance-carrying homes had been reported to FEMA.

FEMA officials are claiming in this latest notice that simple notification does not constitute community compliance with the mandates of the floodplain regulations.

“The county sent the last batch of letters under the pilot program to carriers in November 2011,” said Hurley. “Over 5,000 letters have been sent.”

Once FEMA was notified and it in turn notified the carriers, who then in turn notified property owners, those properties were in the pipeline for the pilot program inspection.

“The policy holders have to contact the county for the inspections of the downstairs enclosures,” said Hurley. “We know there are over 2,000 policy holders that have yet to contact the county for inspections.”

Once in the pipeline, opined FEMA officials, the property must received a compliant community inspection report of the lower level enclosure.

“It is imperative that the county complete the inspection procedure for all potential enclosure violations by the new termination date,” wrote May. “Failure to demonstrate substantial progress in the coming months will place the county in jeopardy of being deemed non-compliant with minimum NFIP floodplain management standards.”

And that non-compliant determination could put the county right back in the same predicament it found itself in when the pilot program was implemented in 2002.

Then as now, potential expulsion from the NFIP could be the ultimate penalty.

Under the terms of the pilot program, not only would expulsion mean that private property owners couldn’t get flood insurance from FEMA, it could also mean that FEMA mitigation dollars for pre-storm projects and dollars for post-storm debris clean up and restoration could be withheld should the county experience a hurricane event like a Georges from 1998 or a Wilma from 2005.

“We understand from previous discussions with FEMA that in order for FEMA to view completion of the pilot program, it means the county has inspected and enforced compliance with floodplain regulations for all of those policyholders that the county initially notified through the carriers,” said Hurley.

The reasons for properties not having complied with the inspection order are varied.

Once notified, some property owners who had no mortgage just decided to drop flood insurance rather than go through the inspection process, believing that the lack of flood insurance negated the need for the inspection. Still other property owners paid off existing mortgages and cancelled flood insurance, again believing that negated the need for the inspection. Even though the property may have been compliant with FEMA regulations, some property owners simply didn’t like the idea of being forced to pay several hundred dollars for an inspection, or being forced to have county inspectors on the property in general principle.

And some property owners able to afford the additional premium simply allowed the lender to force place flood insurance, again believing that negated the need for flood insurance.

Those beliefs, according to the newest FEMA notice, were inaccurate.

In the letter, May said FEMA expects Monroe County to continue to identify enclosure violations, inspect those potential violations and remedy the violations to the maximum extent possible.

The county is expected to submit a detailed plan on how it plans to achieve compliance with the pilot program mandates by March 1, and is also expected to submit quarterly progress reports to the FEMA Atlanta regional office.

Hurley said her office hasn’t yet taken any action on the letter.

“The letter says they will contact us and to date, to my knowledge, they have not called,” said Hurley.

She did plan to discuss this newest development in the controversial pilot program with the Board of County Commissioners during the Thursday meeting.

The Monroe County Planning Commission is slated to hear input on the Lower Keys Liveable Communikeys Plan January 24 at 10 a.m. at the Marathon Government Center.

Those familiar with the LCP process, now going on its fifth year, will see pretty much the same document they saw after the first series of island-specific meetings in the plan’s infancy.

“We made some tweaks to language after the November 2, 2011 public meeting based on some of the comments we received,” said Mitch Harvey, Monroe County comprehensive planner.

Throughout the course of the project, the most-sought language by residents was to not have county planners increase existing density regulations in any zoning district nor to have height limits increased on any islands.

The current building height limit in unincorporated Monroe County, with a few exceptions, is 35 feet from the natural grade.

“People wanted to make sure that our policies specified the 35-foor height limit,” said Harvey.

The LCP process has been ongoing in the county for nearly 10 years. The first LCP put in place was for Big Pine Key because of its unique and varied growth management requirements.

The LCP is a visioning process of what residents want in the way of future development for their islands. Once the plan works its way through the adoption process, it is adopted into the county’s comprehensive land use plan as a “guiding document,” said Harvey.

“Planners will use the LCP as a starting point for development applications to make sure the project adheres to the island’s vision before processing it for particular changes,” said Harvey.

The concerns of island residents differed depending on location throughout the process. For instance, residents of Lower Sugarloaf Key were more concerned with the potential future redevelopment of the commercial center at Sugarloaf Lodge.

The plan designates the commercial area as a city center concept where the services necessary to provide for the needs of locals and visitors can be handled in a centralized location.

“We made no zoning or land use changes in this document,” said Harvey.

There has been talk in recent years of a major redevelopment project at Sugarloaf Lodge involving additional hotel rooms and possibly a recreational vehicle park where the airstrip is now, but those plans are currently on the back burner.

Residents of Middle and Big Torch Keys wanted policies in place that would direct visitors away from the environmentally sensitive islands where there are no real attractions other than eco-tourism areas.

“They wanted to prohibit signs that directed people to those islands,” said Harvey.

Ramrod Key residents wanted to ensure that the existing commercial centers would remain pretty much as is with no significant growth.

Residents of Summerland Key wanted policies in place that would allow for intensified growth in the commercial centers along US 1 while directing it away from the residential areas nearby.

Cudjoe Key residents wanted limitations on housing intensity on the island’s few remaining large parcels and Little Torch Key residents sought development clustered with the existing commercial areas on Barry Ave.

In the plan’s initial stages, when the housing market was still booming, nearly all the island’s residents wanted policies in place that would direct affordable housing development away from existing single-family areas into the more commercial areas.

“But with the current state of the housing market, residents were happy to pare back the plan’s emphasis on affordable housing development,” said Harvey.

Once the planning commission has tweaked the current version Jan. 24, the Monroe Board of County Commissioners should approve the transmittal of the plan to the state Department of Economic Opportunity, which now encompasses the Department of Community Affairs, the land oversight bureau for the state on Feb. 13.

The state agencies will have about 60 days to review the proposal and offer suggestions for changes or accept the document as is after which the BOCC can approve the inclusion of the LCP into the county comprehensive land use plan.

“We hope to have the process finalized by May or June this year,” said Harvey.

The Monroe Board of County Commissioners is expected to approve a $150,000 grant to the Sugarloaf volunteers next Thursday to aid the group in renovating the aging structure.

It has taken about two years of negotiation between county and fire department officials to bring about the construction grant, even though the work has been needed for “many more years than that,” said Sugarloaf Fire Chief Mike Bowden.

The primary stumbling block to getting county aid for the aging station was ownership. The building is owned by the volunteer corporation, making it private property. Except in very narrow circumstances, the county commission is prohibited from spending money on private property.

As a prelude the grant, the BOCC had to declare the fire station a public use.

The station is used for a myriad of community meetings and is also a polling place for the Sugarloaf precinct.

The station is also number 11 in the county’s fire/rescue program, responding to all public calls in its coverage area as well as assisting the smaller Cudjoe Key station and larger Big Pine station from time to time.

“We hope this will mean (when completed) that we have a facility that will be viable as a fire rescue response station for the next 30 years or so,” said Bowden.

Most of the work that will be done is reconstruction for deteriorating concrete, said Bowden. The only outward change will be the demolition of the existing concrete stairs on the buildings east side and replacement by aluminum stairs.

All of the work will be limited to the annex portion of the station, the area where the volunteer’s annual fish fry is held.

Reconstruction of the front and back walls of that annex will occur and the roof will be reinforced.

The $150,000 the county has budgeted for this year won’t cover all of the work necessary for the renovations, says Bowden.

“We’ll need to come up with another $50,000 to $75,000 to complete the project,” he said. “We have secured a bridge loan from First State Bank to get the work started because the county pays on a reimbursement basis.”

The building was initially built entirely from local donations and grants, but the volunteers have found it increasingly difficult to raise enough money on their own to maintain the building, let alone pay for the needed renovations.

Money raised by the volunteers has for a long time been set aside to help pay for these renovations, in addition to paying for the costs of recruiting and training volunteers to man the station and operating costs not covered by the county.

The equipment housed at the Sugarloaf station is purchased by the county since it is part of the fire/rescue coverage program. The county also pays for maintenance of the equipment.

Once commenced, Bowden says he anticipates the work to take about three months to complete.

The station will remain fully operational during the renovations.

“The contractor is going to build us some wood bays in front of the building. We have purchased canopies to put over the equipment to protect them from the weather while the work is being done. We will be operational and call ready during the entire process,” he said.

“We’ve let this go as long as we could,” said Bowden. “It really was past time. The structure is becoming questionable. It will be a great relief to get this done.”

They didn’t.

And for that, they fully expect to receive a letter from the Federal Emergency Management Agency chastising them for not doing so, and informing them that the process has begun to potentially suspend Monroe County from the National Flood Insurance Program.

“I don’t know if we’ll get the notification today, or next week, but that starts the clock ticking on potential suspension from the NFIP,” said Assistant County Attorney Bob Shillinger.

Monroe County was told by FEMA and the US Fish and Wildlife Service, by virtue of a federal court order, that it would be the county’s responsibility to monitor and manage development inside the county’s borders that might potentially impact habitat for four endangered species.

The court order was the final outcome of a 20-plus-year lawsuit filed by environmental groups that claimed FWS wasn’t doing enough to protect species in Monroe County under its mandates in the federal Endangered Species Act because it allowed FEMA to continue to issue federally subsidized flood insurance policies in sensitive lands.

Federal Judge K. Michael Moore agreed with the environmental groups and ordered FWS to issue a biological opinion on possible jeopardy to the species and what could be done to alleviate that jeopardy.

The FWS opinion declared potential jeopardy for four species and gave the courts a list of Reasonable and Prudent Alternatives that could be used to ensure no significant impacts occurred from human development.

FWS and FEMA agreed that Monroe County should implement and manage the RPAs, the judge bought off on that plan, and the county was ordered to begin the process.

Claiming they had no chance to give input on the original suit, or explain the potential ramifications to the county from the RPAs, officials here have delayed implementing the recommendations.

FEMA and FWS were supposed to have the mitigation programs in place by Thursday, thus was the county supposed to have the program in place by Thursday to fulfill the federal agencies’ obligations to the court.

Last week county officials asked for more time. Last week FEMA staffers said no way, no more time.

And now the letter is either here, or on its way that says Monroe County will be placed on probationary status from the NFIP beginning May 10, 2012 unless it implements the mandates in the RPAs.

Under the probationary status, FEMA will asses each of the 18,000-plus property owners who carry flood insurance here an extra $50 surcharge, which the agency says is required to cover their costs in administering the probation program and setting up for the potential suspension.

Policy holders will pay that $50 at either their policy inception or renewal and the surcharge will remain in effect for a year. By then, if the county still hasn’t implemented the RPAs, it will be suspended from the NFIP and subsidized flood insurance will no longer be available here.

Flood insurance is a requirement to receive a federally-backed mortgage, and in some cases to keep a federally-backed mortgage in force. Suspension from the NFIP could also mean a loss of FEMA dollars to the county for pre-storm mitigation projects and post-storm debris removal.

County officials are taking a dual track in fighting the probation.

At next Thursday’s BOCC meeting, commissioners will be asked to allow staff to write ordinances that “Meet the spirit of the RPAs, if not the letter,” said Shillinger.

The draft ordinance currently under internal review will allow local permits to be issued on properties covered by the court ruling—about 35,000—if those properties are deemed to have no significant impact on species habitat.

For those parcels where that determination can’t be made locally, staff intends to have property owners seek a review from FWS on the potential impact before they accept the permit.

“Once FWS has signed off on the permit, we will accept it into our system and process it,” said Shillinger.

Under normal ordinance guidelines, the document would go to the Development Review Committee, possibly in late January, but more likely in February, and from there to the county planning commission, most likely in late February.

“Our target date for adoption of the ordinance is April 2012,” said Shillinger. “That makes it prior to the May 10 deadline for probationary status.”

Shillinger said the county’s hope is that the ordinance forces FEMA to take a step back and review whether the document crafted by county staff actually complies with the court’s order without the need to implement the detailed regulations contained in the RPAs.

Just setting up the programs to implement the RPAs could cost the county more than $400,000. Neither FEMA nor FWS will toss any money at implementation costs. Nor has either agency agreed to offset yearly program costs estimated to be about $250,000.

Under the RPAs, county staff would be forced to oversee development in sensitive habitat areas, as it does now, but would only have authority to allow development impacts up to a maximum set by FWS. Beyond that maximum, the county would be forced to deny permits for further development.

Those denials could lead to a host of land takings lawsuits by private property owners who could no longer build on land they owned due to the new regulations.

It is those estimated $65 million in settlement costs county officials hope to avoid by enacting the proposed ordinance.

“There would have to be other changes made to our code, such as time limits for permit completion and others,” said Shillinger.

Of course, no one is certain whether FEMA will accept the program being contemplated by county officials.

Summerland Key land use attorney Lee Rohe said he believes that the mandates being handed down by FEMA won’t stand up to a legal challenge.

“There are legislated ways to implement new rules under the Endangered Species Act,” said Rohe. “FEMA doesn’t appear to have followed any of those rules in this instance. This would bring into question the county’s sovereign rights as a governmental entity.”

“Normally, federal agencies don’t step into land use. That is typically a local function. This would seem to be stepping on the county’s ability to govern itself, something I have rarely ever seen.”

County legal staff agrees with portions of Rohe’s assessment and is preparing the second track of the fight against NFIP probation.

The BOCC has already given county legal staff carte blanche to seek any legal remedy available to avert the implementation of the RPAs because of the potential catastrophic cost of that implementation.

“Our legal action is being drafted right now. I expect the final documents by Friday (today),” said Shillinger.

The BOCC currently has an appeal in the case pending in federal court. Twice during the course of the lawsuit the judge denied Monroe County permission to intervene in the case, even after the two federal agencies decided to use the county as an enforcement agent.

That denial is currently on appeal.

Shillinger said legal staff is also preparing an independent suit against FEMA and FWS that will claim among others things that the agencies disregarded the federal rule-making procedures and are overstepping their authority under their own founding legislation to require a local government to enforce the provisions of the ESA or lose flood insurance.

The suits also ask for an injunction against allowing FEMA to place the county on probation or suspension from the NFIP pending the outcome of the actions.

“Monroe County has always been a good steward of its obligations to protect the environment and endangered species,” said County Commissioner George Neugent. “What FEMA and FWS are proposing is grossly unfair to the people of this county.”

“Most of the questions surrounding who has authority to do what to whom will ultimately have to be settled in court,” said Rohe.

County officials expect the legal action to cost in excess of $2 million.

In the other corner, we have Monroe County, with about 500 employees and an operating budget around $300 million.

In the middle are the requirements of the federal Endangered Species Act.

The fight will be over who will ultimately enforce those requirements on the property owners of tine Monroe County.

And the bell will ring soon.

Monroe County has agreed to go toe-to-toe in a legal fight to the finish with the two federal behemoths.

Following a court settlement last year in a 20-plus-year-old court case, the two federal agencies told Monroe County it would be responsible to monitor and manage human development impacts on sensitive endangered species habitats.

“That,” says County Commissioner George Neugent, “was unacceptable.”

The battle started more than 20 years ago when environmental groups sued USFWS claiming the agency wasn’t doing enough to protect species habitat here because it allowed FEMA to continue to write flood insurance policies for properties in sensitive habitat.

A federal judge agreed with the groups.

The answer from FEMA and USFWS was to force Monroe County to manage human impact in those areas.

The problem, says Neugent, is that the county was never given a seat at the table to say, “This is wrong.”

Monroe County has been given until January 12 to implement a series of Reasonable and Prudent Alternatives outlined by USFWS designed to minimize impacts of human development on species habitat.

The implementation of those RPAs could cost the county about half-a-million dollars immediately, with a quarter-million yearly to maintain the program.

And local officials have already been told that FEMA and USFWS would not contribute to the costs.

But it’s the long-term effects of the settlement in the protracted battle that have county officials most worried.

When development reaches pre-set maximums in impact, it is the county that is expected to deny permits for further development. That could open the county up to land takings cases by private property owners of upwards of $65 million.

And oh yeah, FEMA and USFWS have also said they will not contribute to the legal defense of those cases, nor will they contribute to the settlements.

“We feel that FEMA and FWS have been extremely unfair in what they’ve done,” said Neugent. “And we feel we have been extremely good stewards of the requirements of the Endangered Species Act.”

Monroe County officials say they have no intention of just rolling over and allowing the federal agencies to run roughshod over county taxpayers to enforce federal regulations.

Thus could bring on the starting bell for what promises to be a protracted and expensive fight.

“I think we’re looking at spending $2 million or more in legal fees,” said Nuegent. “Hopefully that gets us out from under the $65 million in settlement fees, but maybe we spend $2 million and still have to bite the bullet.”

What Neugent says he hopes most is that once the federal agencies see that Monroe County doesn’t intend to throw the fight, “they’ll blink. It’s been my experience that is usually what happens and cooler heads take over the battle, but we don’t know.”

Monroe County is already hedging its bets, however, and has directed its staff to begin writing ordinances that comply with the “spirit, maybe not the letter,” of the RPAs, says Assistant County Attorney Bob Shillinger.

County officials hope that by writing ordinances that address the various development restrictions in the RPAs, but making the federal agencies responsible to say that first it’s OK to go ahead with a particular project in sensitive habitat, “It will give them pause to think about whether we have complied and maybe come back to the table to work out something more equitable,” said Shillinger.

Aside from any monetary concerns, at stake in the fight is the county’s continued participation in the National Flood Insurance Program. Administered by FEMA, the NFIP supplies subsidized flood insurance to property owners in high-risk flood areas like the Keys. Flood insurance is a requirement for mortgages backed by any federal entity.

Also at stake is the potential loss of FEMA money to aid the county in pre-storm mitigation projects and post-storm debris clean up.

“We don’t expect either side to throw in the towel early,” said Neugent.

County officials took a trip to the capital to try and get some answers regarding financial help for the completion of the county’s largest wastewater project to date the Cudjoe Regional.

Department of Economic Opportunity Director Doug Darling told the local folks that he had little hope the state would step in with free money this year, and maybe not at all.

The Cudjoe Regional system is the county’s last major wastewater system that needs to get off the ground, and by far the largest. As the plans are written today, the Cudjoe Regional will eventually span everything from Lower Sugarloaf Key to Big Pine Key, minus some of the more remote areas like Middle and Big Torch Key, No Name Key and parts of almost every other island in the area deemed to far from planned services to be financially feasible. The planned capacity for the Cudjoe Regional is 10,000 EDUs (equivalent dwelling units, or roughly the average flow of a single-family home).

But while Darling told the county not to look for free state money, he did offer up the possibility of having the county tap into the state’s Revolving Loan Fund which makes low-interest (2 to 3 percent) loans to areas for major projects like the Cudjoe Regional system estimated to cost upwards of $150 million at completion.

“There’s nothing wrong with using state revolving loan fund money to do certain things,” said County Commissioner George Neugent, whose District Two encompasses all of the service area. “But the state’s not gonna loan us all of the money. They’re going to loan us a part of it, and we have to compete with other areas for that pot of money.”

Neugent said that the history of the fund doesn’t bode real well for Monroe County projects. “Last year there was more demand on the fund than there was supply.”

The reason for the visit to Tallahassee by county officials was a recent letter from Darling that demanded the county forward a local-only funding plan to complete the remaining wastewater systems by Dec. 31.

“Based on the state’s demand, our only solid option is the extension of the one-cent infrastructure sales tax,” said Neugent.

The county has collected an additional penny on sales taxes for more than two decades via a voter-approved referendum. That tax expires in 2018, however, and has been promised to pay off existing obligations all the way through to maturity.

If voters approve the extension in the November 2012 election, “Then we have a revenue stream to work with,” said Neugent.

He and other current commissioners have said they will not authorize more work on the Cudjoe Regional system until the funding is in place to complete the project.

“And I believe the commission will stand strong on that position,” said Neugent. “If we get no outside money, we don’t move forward.”

He said that the extension of the sales tax would be used “to complete the Cudjoe Regional in an equitable fashion with the other areas of the Keys.”

Some of that existing sales tax revenue has been poured into Key Largo, Big Copppitt, Baypoint and other areas.

The funding plan for the Cudjoe Regional has been to collect about $50 million from the sales tax, about $50 million from the $5,700 per EDU hook up fee and another $50 million from the state or federal government, both of whom have promised in the past to pony up dollars.

And while both have tossed money at Keys sewer projects in dribs and drabs over the last 10 years, the total falls far short of the figure needed to complete the projects.

“The one-penny sales tax is our funding plan. We would collect that until we can complete the Cudjoe Regional in an equitable fashion,” Neugent said.

But even if the tax is extended by voters, with the necessary 25 years to pay off projected obligations, the money wouldn’t roll in until 2019. And that’s four years past the deadline currently set by the state for completion of advanced wastewater in the Keys.

Darling also told county officials that it was too early to ask the state for another extension on the deadline as they just got one from 2010 to 2015.

County Administrator Roman Gastesi says that county officials might possibly restructure debt to get money into the Cudjoe Regional before 2019.

Local officials admit that even if work on the Cudjoe Regional began today, it couldn’t possibly be finished by the December 2015 deadline.

“Even if we get an extension to 2020, we’ll only just be starting,” said Neugent.

With hook up fees and the extension of the sales tax, Neugent said the revolving loan fund might come in handy to begin the process of building the treatment plant and possibly the collection systems for Cudjoe, Sugarloaf and Summerland keys until the tax revenues begin to flow to pay that back.

“There is also some money we have been setting aside for a rainy day that we might tap to come up with the seed money for those things first,” said Neugent.

Officials had said they might consider a plan where $50 million comes form the hook up fees, $50 million from the tax revenues and $50 million in loans to be paid back by a capital cost surcharge on users, asking local users to pay about $92 per month in basic fees, with more added by usage numbers.

Neugent said he doesn’t think that will fly.

“This commission isn’t going to move forward until guaranteed funding sources are in place. Right now that funding plan has to be the sales tax. We have nothing else,” said Neugent.

He said he’s optimistic that the extension will pass when placed before the voters in November.

“Anyone in the Cudjoe Regional area that votes against the referendum would be voting to pay the costs from their own wallets, either through capital assessments or property taxes,” said Neugent.

Some of those challenges are new to the playing field, but some have been dragging on for years, and in some cases, decades.

Even those that have simply risen to the top of the heap are usually based on circumstances that started years, or decades, in the past.

The eternal fight for electrification of No Name Key

After more than a decade of intra-island squabbling over the potential electrification of No Name Key, a remote island with 43 homes off the northeast shores of Big Pine Key, the latest attempt reached the Keys Energy Services Utility Board meeting in early January.

The board had been denied use of some of the county’s conservation lands for easements to build a commercial power grid to the island. Most of the homes on No Name are powered by a mix of solar arrays and generators. It was up to the KEYS board to decide if they should move forward with the project without the county’s blessing or put on the brakes.

At issue was a Board of County Commissioners decision to seek a declaratory judgment on the matter seeking answers to questions that concerned the BOCC members.

First, could the county deny use of the easements? Second, would the county have to deny building permits to allow individual homes to hook up to lines even if KEYS ran them? Third, did the county’s prohibition against commercial utilities on No Name hold up against KEYS’ statutory authority to run power on public rights-of-way?

The KEYS board agreed that it should wait on the outcome of the declaratory action before it spent several hundred thousand dollars running poles and lines to the island only to have the county be forced to shut the project down because of its land-use prohibitions.

No Name Key landowner Bob Reynolds tossed a potential wrench in the works when he filed to have the local court dismissed as the appropriate jurisdiction, claiming that it is actually the state Public Service Commission that has the authority to regulate where and when utilities get developed.

The local court was supposed to rule on that jurisdictional question in December, but it has since been delayed until Jan. 26.

Battling FEMA for flood insurance

Just over two decades ago, a group of environmental groups filed suit against the Federal Emergency Management Agency and US Fish and Wildlife Service claiming the latter wasn’t doing its job protecting endangered species by allowing the former to continue to issue federally subsidized flood insurance to human development in sensitive species’ habitat areas.

The courts agreed with the environmental groups. As a result of that agreement, the two federal behemoths got together and wrote a playbook for Monroe County, which wasn’t part of the lawsuit, to follow for monitoring and controlling development applications in those sensitive areas.

Called Reasonable and Prudent Alternatives, FEMA has demanded that the county implement a series of controls.

Monroe County officials believe that the playbook is neither reasonable nor prudent for it, and has balked for most of the year in implementing the RPAs.

At issue is which agency will eventually have to deny development permits on sensitive habitat lands that are privately owned, thereby putting itself in the cross hairs for potential land takings cases.

Those takings, claim county officials, could cost local taxpayers upwards of $65 million over the next 20 years or so, a burden the BOCC says it won’t ask local taxpayers to bear.

Because the county dragged its feet implementing the RPAs, FEMA in December sent a letter threatening suspension from the National Flood Insurance Program if they don’t implement the federal suggestions post haste.

As the new year dawns, county officials appear to be ready to go to court against FEMA for asking it to do things it simply believes it can’t afford to do with local taxpayer money.

Officials here expect to get a letter January 12 from FEMA authorizing probationary status in the NFIP, which supplies subsidized flood insurance to high-risk areas, with eventual suspension.

At last word, the county planned to meet that notice with a flurry of paperwork to the courts challenging the federal behemoth on several levels.

And just when flood insurance wasn’t so complicated…

In the 2011 Legislative session, Florida made it illegal for any government to require an inspection for other parts of the property not covered by a building permit when property owners apply for a permit.

That just knocked out one of Monroe County’s three downstairs inspection programs that have been in force for several years to aid in ferreting out below-base-flood enclosures that could be used as living space.

FEMA, again wielding the big stick at its disposal, has threatened to suspend Monroe County from the NFIP if it doesn’t do all it can to eradicate lower level enclosures that might someday be turned into living quarters.

With the inspection upon permit application program KO’d by the state as of July 2012, county officials, at the request of FEMA, have envisioned a different program to satisfy the federal agency.

The new proposal offers a certificate of compliance to homeowners who volunteer to have lower level enclosures inspected to make sure they adhere to FEMA guidelines. If property owners opt for the inspection, once they have come into compliance the county will give them the certificate that they can use to assure future buyers what is supposed to be downstairs of an elevated unit.

The program also requires new homes built to have a non-conversion agreement signed by the owner that stipulates they are aware of what can and can’t be done with a lower level enclosure.

That ordinance change will probably make its way to the county commission in early spring. It must be in place before July when the inspection on permit application program ends by state decree.

And still there is no sewer system for the Lower Keys

For more than a decade, county officials have been pouring money into building central wastewater systems throughout the Keys. The systems are necessary due to a state mandate, with of course, no money guaranteed for the endeavor.

But the well has run dry, so to speak, and Monroe County finds itself without a way to pay for the development of the last unincorporated county system, the Cudjoe Regional.

That system, estimated to cost $150 million and serve 10,000 units at its peak, is looking at a dry bank account.

The state last year gave the county a five-year extension to 2015, but no progress was made and then there will be just four years left in a few days.

The problem is that the county has either spent, or promised, nearly every dime of a one-penny infrastructure sales tax it got voters to approve back in 1998. While some of that money went for wastewater development, the lion’s share went for other infrastructure projects.

Plans are right now to begin charging system development fees to the eventual users of the system late 2012 or early 2013 and raise $50 million from the $5,700 per unit fee.

But that’s where the money ends.

To raise another $50 million, the county plans to ask voters in November 2012 to extend the one-penny tax. No one is taking bets on whether that referendum will pass.

But that last $50 million has been, shall we say, problematic.

The state promised $200 million in bonds over four years about four years ago, but hasn’t cut loose a dime of that money yet. The county is counting on that funding to pay the final third of the Cudjoe Regional.

But wait—state officials said in 2011 that the money was just a carrot on a stick and probably wouldn’t be forthcoming what with an expense slashing state Legislature and continually dropping state revenues—leaving Monroe County on the hook for potentially all of the $150 million needed to finish the Cudjoe Regional.

State officials recently asked for a local funding plan to pay for the sewers. Monroe County officials plan to tell the state they can’t come up with one, and hey by the way, how about cutting loose the $200 million you promised?

That stand off will come to a head January 18 when county officials go before the state Administrative Commission to plead their case for more time, more money, a perhaps more compassion.

The last-ditch funding effort has users of the Cudjoe Regional paying the total cost through hook-up fees, the tax and a capital fee on monthly sewer bills that could make monthly sewer bills ring in at about $200 per month for the average single-family household.

And the beatings will continue….

Citizens Property Insurance, the state-run insurer of last resort, and only insurer for windstorm in the Keys, tried a couple of times in 2011 to jack up local windstorm insurance rates as much as 100 percent. Both attempts were beaten back, but the fight isn’t over.

Homeowners can expect to see a 15 percent increase this year, with more the following years.

County officials, along with the grass roots organization Fair Insurance Rates for Monroe (FIRM), are trying to get the state Legislature to allow a different modeling parameter for the Keys that takes into account our stricter building codes, the water-to-wind loss ration, and the low claim history of the island chain.

Citizens has dropped all coverage on accessory buildings and wants to drop all coverage on commercial buildings. There are no private insurers who will write policies in the Keys.

Oh yeah, and FEMA has announced that it will begin to incrementally raise flood insurance rates, beginning with commercial and non-homesteaded properties to cover a shortfall of billions in its catastrophic fund balances.

Of mice, men and—oh yeah—cats

A long-planned start for a predator management plan by National Wildlife Refuge officials was supposed to kick off in 2011, but various delays forced that into 2012 possibly.

What the refuge did do was put cameras in remote areas to get a handle on just how many predators of endangered species there might be on federal lands. The results show there are feral cats running around, along with raccoons and opossums, and even some “wild natured people.”

The refuge plans to eventually trap feral cats on its land and has been trying to drag Monroe County into the fray for several years, but the county has yet to acquiesce.

In other top stories of 2011:

• The county finally budgeted some money to help pay for renovations of the Sugarloaf Fire Station.
•  Stand Up For Animals, the middle Keys animal control contractor, wanted extra money. The county balked and ordered an audit. The audit turned up things that didn’t sit well with county officials and eventually the two groups parted ways. Animal control was turned over to Safe Harbor Animal rescue of the Keys.
• The state Department of Transportation has at long last agreed to spend some money on fixing serious roadside drainage issues on Summerland Key.
• Monroe County won a long-running land takings case at Galleon Bay on No Name Key.
• The local crab season was a decent one, with bigger payouts, but smaller catches.
• Monroe County Schools have decided to end bus service for ninth and tenth grade students from Big Pine and the Torches to Key West High School, forcing those students to find their own transport or go to Marathon.
• Another hurricane season came and went without a landfall.
• Big Pine opened its first bark park for furry friends at Watson Field.
• A long-standing dump site on Middle Torch is finally cleaned up by Habitat for Humanity.
• County and state officials are still hammering out parameters for a model run that will determine hurricane evacuation clearance times. Those times must be under 24 hours for permanent residents.
• The number of endangered Key Deer remained stable for the year.
• A prescribed burn Sept. 15 got out of control and scorched 100 acres on Big Pine Key, forcing the evacuation of 42 homes in Pine Heights subdivision.

And thus we roll into 2012.

County officials are supposed to go in front of the state’s Administrative Commission Jan.18 to be judged on their annual work plan.

The work plan is a process that must be completed before the county could ask for removal from the Area of Critical State Concern designation it’s been under for more than 25 years.

Included in that work plan is the completion of mandated central wastewater collection systems by December 2015.

A deadline both state and local officials know won’t be met.

The annual Admin Commission report has already been written and gives Monroe County a satisfactory completion score for its assigned tasks for this year.

“We have to assume the report is accurate and will be accepted by the commission,” said Growth Management Director Christine Hurley.

The snag that has developed is a comment from the state Department of Environmental Protection that essentially says the county isn’t making enough progress on its mandated wastewater tasks because it hasn’t as yet proposed a concrete local funding plan for finishing the long-delayed Cudjoe Regional wastewater system.

“Monroe County’s local funding plan includes system development fees, user fees (to be financed and collected by the Florida Keys Aqueduct Authority) and sales tax revenues,” wrote DEP in its commission report comments.

But DEP says that only two-thirds of the total needed, about $150 million, will be available to the county after the hook up fees and sales tax money. The rest, according to county funding plans, is to come from a long-ago promise from the state Legislature of $200 million in bonds to aid the county in tackling the projects.

DEP says that money probably won’t be forthcoming, thus the county has to issue a local funding plan to complete the Cudjoe Regional, which would place the entire burden for that system on the users from Lower Sugarloaf to Big Pine, about 8,800 EDUs (equivalent dwelling units or equal to the average flow from a single-family home) initially and as many as 10,000 down the road.

“The department believes the county should provide a financial plan for completing its wastewater improvements from local sources, which could certainly be reduced if state or federal funds become available,” wrote DEP Community Planner Jeannine Kelsick.

She states that the county’s mandate is not contingent on external sources of funding.

And that is part of the mixed message Tallahassee appears to be sending south, says County Administrator Roman Gastesi.

“We’ve been told for years by the state that they understand we can’t do this on our own,” said Gastesi “Now, DEP says we should understand we may well be on our own.”

“We have to wonder if this is a crossroads in our relationship with Tallahassee,” he added.

But Gastesi says the county doesn’t plan to jump through any inordinate hoops to try and outline a funding plan by the Dec. 31 date set by DEP. The Admin Commission meeting is Jan. 18, 2012. That commission is made up of the Governor and the elected Cabinet.

“We’ll be standing there in front of the big dog and once and for all maybe we can get the state’s position on our wastewater needs,” said Gastesi. “We’ve been blindsided by them before and managed to work it out.”

The only secure funding source the county can offer at this point is the hook up fees for users. That fee has been set at $5,700 per EDU and is expected to raise about $50 million. Current discussion by county staff is that the fees will be assessed at the end of next year.

The sales tax revenue is dependent on approval from the county’s voters next year during the November Presidential election. If voters agree to extend a current one-cent sales tax beyond its sunset date of 2018, county officials can begin looking at ways to restructure debt to begin work on the Cudjoe Regional system. The tax revenue is expected to be about $13 million per year.

That still leaves $50-plus short from county coffers.

That money was promised by the state four years ago in a $200 million bond issue, but not authorized by any subsequent Legislature.

And thus begins the tale of mixed messages.

The state has been approving the county’s comprehensive plan changes for decades. Included in that plan is language that states the county will not be forced to provide wastewater infrastructure that isn’t within its ability to fund.

“Monroe County shall provide public facilities sufficient to maintain adopted levels of service standards that are within the ability of the county to fund, or within the county’s authority to provide others to provide,” is one section.

Another section says, “The estimated capital expenditures for all needed public facilities shall not exceed conservative estimates of revenues from sources that are available to the county under current law, and which have not been rejected by referendum.”

Another policy, previously approved by the state, says,”…ensure that the county is not required to construct improvements beyond its financial capacity,” while another states, “Monroe County should not be expected to bear the sole burden of implementing these policies without substantial financial assistance,” and yet another states, “Monroe County is not required to increase property taxes in order to provide funds necessary to implement this plan,” and still another, “…all plan policies are contingent upon funding.”

“We have several references to aid from the state or we don’t go it alone,” said Hurley. “But we also have the new DEP comment. They are using the 2015 extension language that doesn’t reference whether we get funding from the state. The county will go ahead and meet the mandate even if the state doesn’t pony up.”

“We expect to get some definitive answer from the Admin Commission middle of January,” said Gastesi. “Until then, we have to stick to our guns.”

A majority of members of the Monroe Board of County Commissioners have already publicly opined that they will not authorize the construction of the Cudjoe Regional wastewater system is the users are expected to pay for the entire cost.

That cost is currently estimated to be about $19,000 per user. Without out state money, the fall-back plan is to add a capital reimbursement charge to user’s bills monthly which would push the monthly sewer bill to between $92 and $208 per month depending on whether the hook up fee is financed through the yearly property tax bill for 20 years.