Intersection: How will growth change in Central Florida?
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
By: Mark Simpson
June 29, 2010:Central Florida's approach to growth could be reaching a turning point. Last week the Orange County Commission blocked a housing development that opponents said would have encroached on the environmentally sensitive Econlockhatchee River.
Recent US census data show the state's growth rate at it's lowest point in a decade. So, with fewer residents to provide tax revenue, will Florida change its decades long pattern of urban sprawl?
Does the Orange County decision mean politicians are trying to stop potentially damaging growth? Or, are they turning their backs on development that could create valuable new jobs and revenue?
We talk about these issues and more with planning expert Bruce Stephenson of Rollins College.
Florida is in an economic slump right now, unemployment
rates remain high. State and local
governments have spent the last couple of years trying to do more with fewer
financial resources. So how should cities
manage what development they already have, and improve it for the future? Bruce
Stephenson talks with us about that very question. He’s a professor of
Environmental studies at Rollins College and he recently appeared in the PBS
documentary Imagining a New Florida
which aired on WMFE last month.
Click
here to listen to story
.
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