WINTER SPRINGS, Fla. \u2013 For decades, Seminole County residents have fought to protect the line between urban and rural, what\u2019s known as the rural boundary. Now, Winter Springs Mayor Kevin McCann is asking the city\u2019s Charter Review Committee to help make that line harder to cross.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is significant pressure,\u201d McCann said. \u201cIt\u2019s not only the attacks from the legislature \u2014 and developers carry a lot of weight in Tallahassee and with the legislature \u2014 but it also comes locally.\u201d<\/p>\n
A city on the front lines<\/p>\n
McCann brought two proposals before the Winter Springs Charter Review Committee this week, asking members to consider adding new supermajority protections to the city charter. Both measures would require at least four of the commission\u2019s five members to agree \u2014 a 4-1 vote \u2014 before taking action, compared to the simple 3-2 majority currently required.<\/p>\n
The first would apply before the city could sell, transfer or otherwise dispose of city-owned land, or release or materially weaken a conservation easement \u2014 a legal agreement restricting how land can be used to preserve its conservation value.<\/p>\n
[WATCH: Oviedo council weighs new rule requiring supermajority vote for rural land annexation]<\/p>\n
The second would require that same four-vote threshold before Winter Springs could annex any property within the Seminole County Rural Boundary, or extend city water, wastewater or other urban utility services into that protected area.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m asking for a supermajority to act more as a guardrail than to block things,\u201d McCann said. \u201cJust need to know that people understand the decision they\u2019re making \u2014 one that cannot be reversed.\u201d<\/p>\n
He described Winter Springs as uniquely exposed because of its proximity to the rural boundary, compared to other cities within Seminole County. <\/p>\n
\u201cPappy\u2019s Patch and Black Hammock \u2014 that is the beginning of the rural boundary that then extends east all the way out to the Brevard and Volusia County lines,\u201d McCann said. \u201cWinter Springs is on the front lines of those protections.\u201d<\/p>\n
McCann said the former Winter Springs Golf Course represents the kind of real, immediate threat \u2014 not just a hypothetical \u2014 that makes protections necessary for conservation easements too.<\/p>\n
\u201cMany times, different projects have come and entered into negotiations for large-scale developments on that property,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The property, located on the north side of West State Road 434, includes a public conservation easement that covers 133 acres. While the city does not own the underlying golf course property, it can decide whether or not to release any portion of the public conservation easement for development.<\/p>\n