How GL Homes’ land-swap plan failed: Two commissioners detail why they flipped votes

People leaned forward in their seats, unblinking. They were eager to know, finally, whether Palm Beach County would allow 1,000 new homes on the Agricultural Reserve in a massive land swap.

Then came the county commissioners’ vote late Tuesday night: a narrow 4-3 verdict against developer GL Homes’ proposal — surprising many in the audience. When Palm Beach County Mayor Gregg Weiss cast the seventh and final vote, he and the rest of the commissioners sealed in the land swap’s fate as dead.

Weiss, who represents District 2, and Commissioner Mack Bernard, who represents District 7, opened up on Wednesday about their decision against the plan. They each shifted their stance on the land swap from initially backing the plan in May, during a comprehensive plan public hearing.

A day after the latest vote, Weiss and Bernard on Wednesday spoke with the South Florida Sun Sentinel and explained why they changed their minds, citing a lack of information about GL Homes’ related water project as a primary issue. Tuesday’s meeting was for the proposal’s final vote.

“This project did not even come close to meeting any of my expectations for us to make any changes,” Bernard said. “At the end of the day, enough is enough, we have to continue to preserve the Ag Reserve, and we need to put mechanisms in place to make sure that this type of effort to destroy the Ag Reserve doesn’t come up.”

During the May meeting, which mirrored Tuesday’s meeting in that hordes of supporters and opponents addressed the commission for several consecutive hours, the only two commissioners who had voted against GL Homes’ plan were Commissioner Marci Woodward and Vice Mayor Maria Sachs.

At the time, Commissioner Bernard said he was swayed by the promise of the proposal’s water project.

“Water is important, and water is life,” he said then. “Even if it’s miniscule, to be able to provide the water for the residents of West Palm Beach, that’s the risk that I’m willing to take. … We cannot lose this opportunity.”

But Bernard carried a different tone during Tuesday’s meeting, launching question after question to GL Homes president Misha Ezratti, vice president Kevin Ratterree and Len Lindahl, who was hired by GL Homes to help oversee the water-resource project.

“Did you do a cost-benefit analysis in writing to the city of West Palm Beach?” Bernard asked Lindahl, per a request the city had made to GL Homes.

“No, sir,” Lindahl said.

“The city asked, what analysis was performed to estimate the quantity and timing of these discharges,” Bernard continued. “Was analysis done in writing to answer this question?”

“No, sir,” Lindahl said again.

This back and forth persisted for several questions.

“The city of West Palm Beach had sent GL almost a seven-page questionnaire of questions that they had regarding the water project,” Bernard told the Sun Sentinel on Wednesday.  “I asked the questions in public to see whether or not the applicant had responded to the city. … The applicant did not take the time to address those concerns.”

Bernard said he’d been willing to vote on initiating the project in May because he wanted to see how the water project could benefit the residents in the area he represents. But after not receiving the answers he was hoping for from GL Homes on Tuesday, his vote changed course from where it had began more than five months ago.

The government should be addressing residents’ water needs, not a developer, he said.

“Anybody can throw any type of sweetener that they want,” he said. “But at the end of the day, we have to base every project on its merit.”

Bernard’s vote was not the only pivotal choice made Tuesday night. Ultimately, Mayor Weiss’ final vote shot down the land swap.

“This is a complicated issue, and unfortunately, sometimes complicated issues get boiled down to bumper stickers, and that’s not helpful,” he said during the meeting. “It’s not perfectly clear initially, but over time, the fog and the lack of clarity clears.”

Like Bernard, Weiss had been attracted to the land-swap deal because of the water project offering, which is primarily why he said he voted in May to move forward with the plan and see how it would develop.

Positive developmental changes have occurred in the Ag Reserve in the past several years, he said, citing the construction of the Bethesda West Hospital in 2005.

But when it came down to the wire, as it did on Tuesday night as the clock lurched toward 9 p.m., Weiss agreed with Bernard’s doubts about the lack of information surrounding the water project.

Too many unknowns abounded Tuesday, he said, to consider adopting the plan.

“Before you can consider making a change of unwinding 20 years of policy, for me anyway, you better be certain that you’re going to be able to deliver on that promise,” Weiss told the Sun Sentinel.

The commission’s dismantling of GL Homes’ plan does not mean the county will halt goals to address the region’s water issues, though, such as through the county’s C-51 Reservoir, both he and Bernard said.

With future proposals, Weiss encourages residents to gain a deep understanding and maintain an open mind.

“These policy questions are not always black and white,” he said. “It’s clear by some of the emails that we received people didn’t understand the Ag Reserve and how it was created. And it’s not just the Reserve, it could be another issue in front of us.”