Representative Government on Longboat Key

Representative Government: a form of government in which the citizens delegate authority to elected representatives.


A large percentage of our residents do not in fact enjoy representative government, because they are  non-residents or foreign nationals. These people cannot vote. They have no say about taxes or town codes or vision plans.


We are told by our representative government that this is the price one pays for having a second home in paradise. Yet the disenfranchised group pays a large percentage of our taxes. They are forcibly a part of a silent majority without voice or political power. No one asks them how they feel. A few individuals write letters. One or two attend town commission meetings. But in large part this group of unrepresented taxpayer residents go unheard.


Now we have a few commissioners who say over and over that the great majority of residents have approved the previous vision plan. Of course we do not know how the unrepresented taxpayer residents feel about the previous vision plan, or the new improved vision plan, because no one will ask them how they feel.


No matter that very few residents were given an opportunity to express their views about the old vision plan. No one really asked any taxpayers if they wanted to spend 100 thousand dollars on a piece of paper that will never see the light of day.


Only a few chosen people are being included in the new vision plan process. The old vision plan process at least included a few hundred business and real estate people and a smattering of regular residents of which I was one. The makeup of the new vision plan committee includes representation from the chamber of commerce and seems to be oriented mostly towards the business community on Longboat. I feel any vision plan should focus mainly on the residents who after all pay over 95% of the taxes.


I suspect we will be informed that since the previous vision plan was overwhelmingly approved by the residents, which it was not, because no one ever saw the old vision plan, the new vision plan need not be approved by anyone save the chosen group. After all isn't one vision plan is just like another vision plan?


I am amazed at what is now being created out of whole cloth.


I am wondering where representative government enters the picture. A sizable part of the residents have no representation at all, and now the residents who are able to vote are also being left out of the vision plan process.


The highly paid expert, who was hired to moderate the old vision plan process, told the town that the plan was not valid without carrying out a legitimate survey of the community. His words went unheeded.


Commissioners are now saying that the community approved the old vision plan, and by extension they approve the new vision plan.


What do you think?


I have been an active advocate of community participation in local government. That cannot happen if the government is not willing to engage the community.


Our current set of commissioners seems to ascribe to some sort of  "Noblesse oblige".

I cannot imagine that any sort of unvalidated vision plan, that may severely affect the fortunes of our residents, would be legislated into power without asking the people how they feel.


I believe we need a through examination of any proposed vision plan by the community at large. To me to have four or five commissioners impose some sort of illegitimate vision plan on the community is the antithesis of the spirit of representative government.