Only one day left to cast votes for County Commissioners

Time to consider facts, for a change, in your choices

Believe it or not, facts DO count. A wave of voter emotion brought on largely by County Commissioner Sarah Heard’s constant drumbeat that over-development is causing today’s traffic congestion wipes out the facts. People are pissed, and Heard knows it.

Problem is the facts counter the claims. The county’s growth hovers around 2 percent or less every year, so look at a City of Stuart map to see where those boundaries lie. Contrast the county’s growth rate to St. Lucie County, where growth was a whopping 13 percent in 2023.

Many of those St. Lucie residents work in Martin County. We know this because around half of the City of Stuart’s employees, around half the school district’s employees, and more than a third of the county’s employees live outside Martin County’s borders. It’s certainly not because they enjoy commuting. It’s for cheaper housing.

At the same time, many Martin County workers commute to jobs in Palm Beach County for higher pay — or to find a good job in the first place!

Despite the growing number of commuters, Heard fought every proposed new road, including Green River Parkway, the Veterans Memorial Bridge and four-laning Central Avenue. She even returned funding already received for an extension for Willoughby Boulevard to downtown Stuart. No wonder our roads are clogged!

Yet, almost all of this election’s rhetoric claims the BIG issue is over-development. District 3 candidate Blake Capps blasted his opponent, Indiantown Mayor Susan Gibbs Thomas, for approving a major development in Indiantown. They’re both seeking retiring Commissioner Harold Jenkins’ District 3 seat.

Capps pointed to headlines about Terra Lago’s proposed 2,500 new homes in Indiantown with prices about half the cost of new Martin County homes. Even doubling their population, Indiantown still will be 5,000 fewer than the City of Stuart, but of sufficient size to attract retail stores like Publix, or Aldi’s, or Village Bootery. Residents have longed to see more than just McDonald’s, Burger King, and Dunkin’.

Capps likely knows that Terra Lago was originally approved by Martin County more than a decade ago as the Indiantown DRI (Development of Regional Impact), but is pretending it’s brand new. Thomas should be applauded for her common-sense approach to development, not vilified.

But common sense seems to be a commodity that Capps left somewhere on a Martin County rooftop. Just watch his decision-making logic in videos of old LPA (Local Planning Agency) meetings. He has fallen into Heard’s trap of putting her no-growth agenda as THE top priority, whether or not those decisions make sense for residents or the county as a whole.

According to his own mailers, Capps considers the property rights of landowners as his lowest priority. That’s exactly what Heard did during the four years she was commission chair with “newbie” commissioners. The disaster that ensued with multiple, major lawsuits and millions spent in court sanctions and attorney fees were all because Heard trampled property rights and ignored even our own Comprehensive Growth Management Plan rules.

Heard spent so many years saying “NO” that two years ago when the county commission LOWERED the millage rate, she STILL voted “no.” Interesting habit, don’t you think? It’s easy. Requires no thought.

Then there’s Michael Syrkus, an eager young history buff with sights set on Commissioner Ed Ciampi’s District 5 seat. He wants to eliminate what Syrkus considers unnecessary spending to keep taxes low. The tax rate was less than one percent this year. Not low enough, he says.

To Heard, that likely means cutting all contributions to non-profits, although they can turn one dollar into three because of their sway with granting agencies, and charging market rates for leases of county-owned buildings, such as The Children’s Museum, which could close their doors.

She also attempted to reduce the cost of public safety by changing the level of service from a 6-minute response time to 10 minutes. How far will Syrkus go to cut taxes?

We know that Heard attempted to eliminate the Community Redevelopment Area program in 2012. Syrkus stated that he does not ascribe to the “walkable community” philosophy. He said he wants to change the LDRs (Land Development Regulations) to lower density in the CRAs and to widen the roads leading into them. He seems to be a prime target to eliminate CRA costs altogether!

Heard’s previous attempts prompted incumbent Commissioners Doug Smith, Ed Ciampi, Harold Jenkins, and sitting-Commissioner Stacey Hetherington to memorialize the CRA program in a separate chapter of the Comp Plan. With “newbies” on board, though, it would take only three votes for it to go away.

Smith and Ciampi also committed to removing septic tanks along our waterways on a 10-year timeline, instead of Heard’s 25 years. Old-timers here will remember how fervently she fought the removal of septic tanks, saying the loss of drain fields would allow more land development and blamed the St. Lucie River’s pollution on agriculture — until DNA tests proved her wrong.

Although Smith gets no credit for it locally, he’s an avid environmentalist. He advocates for Martin County statewide and nationally for clean water, for our dying coral reef that shreds hurricanes and major storms, and for adding a swath of Martin County’s western lands to the state’s wildlife corridor, among countless other initiatives.

Ciampi also prioritizes the environment. The Palm City CRA that transformed Mapp Road into an oasis with an eco-marvelous “ripple” project, stormwater treatment area, and patio is a passion of Ciampi’s. Contrast that to Heard’s Port Salerno CRA. Now she wants to transform it as well, but not into the CRA’s vision, but that of a South American developer’s. Will the newbies be on board, too?

Ciampi is known best for listening to and responding to his constituents’ concerns by tackling their issues in creative ways. He’s a rare human being, as well as an astute commissioner.

It would be more honest to vote out Ciampi for keeping Costco out of Palm City, or vote out Smith for his gawd-awful mustache, than it would be to vote them out of office as the result of misleading campaign rhetoric.

Keep Ed Ciampi and Doug Smith in office, and elect Susan Gibbs Thomas. You can do it with your head held high, because now you’re armed with some facts.

–Barbara Clowdus