We need a Super-Majority

Several years back, some of us in Lake Worth were advocating for a super-majority vote in order to change our comprehensive Plan.  Back then, we were battling the same people (the power grab bunch)  who are still for development at any cost today.  The Palm Beach Post endorsed the Super Majority vote here in Lake Worth. Because of a huge and expensive lobby against it by the Chamber of Commerce and other groups with oodles of money and boots on the ground, we lost that election by 119 votes.

Now the Town of Palm Beach has some sensible commissioners...read the Letter to the Editor--

Super-majority needed to protect town

 Congratulations to the Planning Commission and the Town Council for taking the first step in the journey to protect and preserve Palm Beach from the coming development onslaught.
The motion made by council member Bill Diamond to ask the town staff to prepare an ordinance that would require a super-majority, or four out of five votes of the Town Council, to make changes to our Comprehensive Plan, is long overdue and welcome.

This ordinance will take two readings before becoming an official part of our Town Ordinances but it will help protect Palm Beach from ill thought out and radical changes to the Comprehensive Plan, the document that has served us so well.

Palm Beach’s Code of Ordinances presently requires a super-majority, or four affirmative votes of the Town Council, to make zoning changes, or change zoning boundaries. Now with the added protection of the requirement of four votes to made changes to our Comprehensive Plan, Palm Beach will be well on the way to giving the teeth to our governing documents that will help preserve and protect the Palm Beach we all moved here to enjoy.

The planned addition of 40,000 dwelling units between Interstate 95 and the Lake Worth Lagoon in West Palm Beach and surrounds, will put development pressure on the island of Palm Beach the likes of which she has never experienced before.

As a result of those 75,000 to 100,000 new citizens moving into that corridor, demand for services in Palm Beach will increase, demand for parking in Palm Beach will increase and demand for beach access in Palm Beach will increase. We have to protect the Palm Beach that we moved here to enjoy from becoming just another seaside tourist town, overrun with T-shirt shops and bars.

Hats off to the Town Council and Planning and Zoning Commission.

WILLIAM O. COOLEY
Palm Beach