Reflections on appointment to Planning, Zoning, Historic Resource Preservation Board

This past Thursday the City Commission had a special meeting to conduct applicant interviews for various boards. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to make it but I understand that person chosen for the open Alternate #2 (P&Z) was Lynda Mahoney Ms. Mahoney hails from a "compound" on North O Street. She is no stranger to the P&Z as she has attended many meetings through the years and made applications for demolition of a structure on her property. Once approved, County money was used to take the contributing historic structure down and a time extension was needed as well. She was also Jo Ann Golden's campaign manager and Treasurer for Suzanne Mulvehill's campaign - so we know how her bread gets buttered. I only mention the demolished structure since hers was one of the historic homes demolished while I was on the board and the opposition made a point of using that in their negative campaigning when I ran.

During my time on P&Z, one of the major "structural" weaknesses of the board (not referring to the questionable structural integrity of those few demolished structures) was the proportion of people residing east of Dixie Hwy to those that didn't. During my eight years on the board, we never had even ONE person who lived outside of College Park, the downtown or North/South Palmway/Lakeside area. Living outside of those areas is a different experience entirely in the city of Lake Worth. In my experience on the board, and with others I bump into in my profession, it is best to have as much geographic diversification and representation as possible.

Planning and Zoning is a very physical and visual realm. I am convinced that if the board had representation from the southwest part of the city when we reviewed the legendary Sunset property annexation/land use/rezoning, we would have made a more informed recommendation to the City Commission. It may or may not have been a different one, but it would have been a higher quality one. If we did have representation from that area, that person or persons could have helped explain the decision to their neighbors and then the affected neighborhood would be better informed as well.

While Chairman, I always urged the Commission to appoint people from west of Dixie Hwy. to help address this imbalance. The only time that has happened is with Ron Exline - current Alternate #1 on the board.

I am disappointed that the Commission did not act to address this imbalance in this appointment and instead made a decidedly political appointment. Not taking anything away from Ms. Mahoney's skills and abilities, but her appointment is in essence a political payback. I hope that in practice, Ms. Mahoney can see around that and treat all applications and applicants equally - as she claims in her application.

Let's see if we can address this geographic imbalance on the Planning and Zoning Board in the next series of appointments in June.