Bill that would have saved Keys from being hit with billions in damages dies in session
A bill died in the Legislature that would have set in stone the state’s shared liability in all the takings lawsuits in the Florida Keys that are anticipated after county and local officials are expected to stop issuing building permits in the island chain in 2023.
With less than a week to go in the legislative session, the bill was sent back to the state House’s appropriations committee, and Senate counterparts did not meet in time for their version to be discussed, said state Rep. Holly Raschein, R-Key Largo, the bill’s sponsor.
“It’s a battle to be fought another day,” Raschein said Monday.
For now, the bill’s chances are over for this session, and with Raschein not returning next year because of term limits, it’s not clear it will be brought up again, let alone pass, before 2023, when new building permits are expected to halt because of a 1972 state law aimed at controlling development in the environmentally vulnerable Keys.
Without the bill, Monroe County and Keys municipalities may be on the hook for up to $1 billion resulting from lawsuits brought against the county and local governments by owners of between 6,000 and 10,000 properties, most of which will likely go undeveloped if the deadline holds.
What’s more concerning to some Keys leaders and environmentalists is that a new version of the bill could emerge that aims to stave off the lawsuits by doing away with the deadline, or pushing it back. That could allow a building boom, stressing already taxed Keys infrastructure and hurting evacuation efforts ahead of hurricanes.
That almost happened this session, when Naples Republican Sen. Rob Rommell, chair of the Civil Justice Committee, added language that would have extended the mandated 24-hour evacuation time to 30 hours, which would essentially allow the state extend the building permit cap deadline for years.
House leaders said they would only support Raschein’s bill if it contained language lessening the state’s risk from takings lawsuits, and one way of doing that is by kicking the deadline down the road and allowing many more property owners to develop their land.
“Given the income of the House leadership, who had opposed this legislation and introduced the 30-hour evacuation time, combined with the junior status of our reps, I’m not hopeful for the next few years,” Monroe County Mayor Heather Carruthers said in an email Tuesday.
House Bill 587 was written before the 2019 legislative season by county legal staff to ensure that county and local governments don’t get stuck with the entirety of awards and settlements form the impending takings lawsuit.
Monroe legal staff said that counties and municipalities usually defend such cases in partnership with the state with the understanding there will be a 50-50 apportionment at the end of the litigation. The bill, they said, is meant to ensure that deal continues.
The state also has a history of delaying payments because of appeals. This causes the damage awards to affected parties grow because of interest accruals, leaving county and local governments with a heftier bill, Bob Shillinger, Monroe County attorney, said in early February, when Rommell introduced his amendment.
County legal staff also wants the state not to be able to back away from sharing the legal costs if the lawsuits pile up after 2023.
Although Raschein introduced her bill twice already, and struck Rommell’s amendment in late February when she reintroduced into the House Judiciary Committee, she now says she’s not as concerned as she was that the state won’t pay its share of the awards and settlements from the takings cases.
“Right now, we’re in a good spot,” she said.
Raschein said that as her last legislative session ends, recent developments give her confidence the state will continue to split liability in takings cases.
She said the state Department of Economic Opportunity this month budgeted more than $230,000 to pay half of two jury awards to Keys property owners who sued over not being able to develop their land. The county had already paid the owners the full $460,363 to avoid interests accruals, and asked the state for reimbursement.
Raschein also expects the estimate of the potential takings liability, which is more than $900 million, to actually be significantly lower when the building permit deadline is reached. She said new estimates she’s seen are around $325 million.
“That will be split in half between the state and Monroe County,” she said. “That’s not such a bad thing.”
This story was originally published March 11, 2020 at 9:16 AM.
