Approval of office building for downtown Palm Harbor sets off a furor

CLEARWATER County commissioners have approved a change to development rules that clears the way for the construction of a three-story office building in Historic Downtown Palm Harbor.

Though growth in a down economy might normally be celebrated, the 5-1 decision sparked outrage among the standing-room-only audience at Tuesday's County Commission meeting. Most of them had come to object to the change, and many who signed up to speak came from outside Palm Harbor, including St. Petersburg, Seminole and Indian Rocks Beach.

"I find this entire process tonight to be a perversion, an obscenity, to what purports to be a representative republic in Pinellas County," Palm Harbor resident John Treskovich said. "Very poorly done."

The decision also revived interest in incorporating Palm Harbor into a city. Before the commission vote, Palm Harbor fire commission member Norm Atherton said he was neutral about the idea of incorporating.

"After tonight, I'm going to be for it 100 percent," Atherton said. He referred to a petition with 536 signatures opposing the development rule change. If those people "each get 10 people to agree with them, we'll have the city of Palm Harbor," he said.

Commissioner Ken Welch, who was chairing the meeting, said he understood the anger and disappointment.

"I know for a lot of you this was not the decision you wanted or were hoping for," Welch said. "This board has listened to the community for some time. The decision is not what many of you wanted but we have listened."

The furor centered around a request by Geographic Solutions, a software company with 130 employees, to build a three-story building on Georgia Avenue in the Palm Harbor historic district. When the county originally granted approval, the proposed building was slated to have offices on the first two floors and a residential area on the third.

Last year, the company wanted to substitute office space for the residential area on the third floor. That was not permitted by the 2001 Historic Palm Harbor Master Plan. County staff members recommended amending the master plan to include transferable development rights, or TDRs.

A TDR allows an owner to adjust the development density allowed on his property. For example, if the owner has two parcels and each allows 100 units, but the owner wants to build a project with 150 units, he can take 50 units from one piece and add it to the 100 on the other. The remaining parcel would then be limited to 50 units, so that the overall density of the area remains the same even though it changed on one parcel.

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Approval of office building for downtown Palm Harbor sets off a furor