Flagler County’s Development Authority Board Wants to Wade Into Economic Development, Conjuring Grim History

Some of the members of Flagler County’s newly appointed Industrial Development Authority wants to be more than just an industrial development authority. They want to be the county’s economic advisory council–reviving the sort of council the county killed in 2020 after years of meager results. 

Just as IDA members have mixed feelings about that, so did the Flagler County commissioners who appointed them.

“Well, we tried it once before,” County Commissioner Greg Hansen, who’s been on the commission since 2017, said. “I would look at the history, Flagler County history, and it was a miserable one. It lasted a couple years, and then they were fired.” Hansen had been the lone dissenter in opposition to disbanding the advisory board. 

The county then went to its current model of having an economic development director on staff, “and that failed for a while because that person was fired,” he said. “So we have a history of trying to do this. I would be of a mind not to do that, not to let them do that. I think we’ve been down that road and it didn’t work.”

The seven-member Industrial Development Authority launched in July. It has one responsibility: to recommend the issuance of tax-exempt bonds to industry or to builders. Bonds would finance new projects and in turn presumably spur economic development. So the authority is already in that business. 

But it wants more. When it met in July, it discussed the possibility–if not the legality–of taking an active role in economic development, such as meeting with prospects and fostering potentially lucrative deals. The members got some pushback from the county’s economic development director, who reminded them that their mission–and their bylaws–are narrowly tailored to the issuance of bonds. 

“Unfortunately, I think that when we appointed them, their understanding was that they would be seeking and communicating and connecting with successful businesses and bringing their expertise here,” Commissioner Pam Richardson, who has attended the IDA meetings, said. “They were shocked and surprised from day one, not knowing what their duties are, their requirements and their understandings.”

They knew their duties with regards to the analysis and issuance of industrial bonds. But as IDA member Chad Raymond put it in an Aug. 25 memo to the county administration, “some Members expressed a desire to expand the scope of work for the IDA to include other economic development programs, incentives, and opportunities in order for the IDA to have a farther-reaching influence on economic development in Flagler County.”

Commissioner Kim Carney said they should have known what they were being asked to do, though she was critical of the 2020 disbanding of the economic development board. “ I saw them get unfunded at 10:30 at night at a board meeting, which I thought I felt was very unjust, very unfair,” she said. 

It did not happen at 10:30 at night. It happened during a morning meeting of the commission, well before a 1 p.m. budget workshop. But Carney was right about the commission’s motive–poor return on investment–and the cost of the economic development a the time, which was $534,000. “So if we do add any subsequent scope to this committee, I did hear the words conferences, I did hear the word travel, self-travel,” Carney said. 

All that would duplicate existing efforts. Rodriguez reminded IDA members of the difference between the policy-setting legislative responsibilities of a board and the administrative responsibilities of a staff member. 

“I don’t need five lobbyists lobbying for the county,” Rodriguez said. “I need them to sit down and put their brains together to determine what is the best course of action for the county, and then, once they achieve that consensus, to then go out and tell your administrator, go forth.” 

Nevertheless some members of the authority, chaired by Raymond Ricchi and stocked with Alpha males (seven white men, no women) to whom exercising authority is second nature, are not satisfied, though the panel as a whole had “mixed feelings” about changing the bylaws, according to minutes of the August meeting. 

On Monday, County Attorney Michael Rodriguez let the County Commission know that “some of the members have expressed their intention to try to increase the scope of the IDA in trying to come and enter into the realm of an economic advisory council.” 

Rodriguez needed the commission’s guidance: should the board have that responsibility? Can the council sit as both an IDA and an economic development council without violating the Florida Constitution’s prohibition on dual office holding. The county could also do what other counties do: partner with a non-profit that would itself be the economic advisory council. 

Flagler County did that, too, in the past. It was called Enterprise Flagler. Its board was a mixture of private business leaders and local government representatives. It required members to pay to play. It had an ignominious end in 2011 as local governments pulled out one by one. 

Right about then the County Commission appointed an economic development board of its own. That did not go much better, though it lasted nine years. Rodriguez just started as the county attorney and may not know the granular history of those boards, neither of which, beyond much talk and expensive overhead, including staff, had much of a track record to justify its existence. (See: “Flagler County’s Economic Development Farce Is Wasting Millions of Taxpayer Dollars to Beat Its Own Drum.”) 

The county and Palm Coast government now each have their own economic development divisions tasked with doing what IDA board members are talking about replicating.  

“I did attend one meeting,” Rodriguez said (the IDA meets once a month), “and I tried to explain to them that sitting as the IDA, they could not be an economic advisory board, because their roles were really limited to what the statute provides. Their roles are to be.”

He referred to Martin County’s non-profit board as an example of a separate entity that has the county’s delegated authority to explore economic development, “if you even have the appetite to take such a course,” he said. 

Commissioner Leann Pennington had been under the impression that Flagler’s IDA board would not have as tight a leash. 

“It would be a travesty to lose the opportunity of losing these people if they weren’t able to do what they felt they could do,” Richardson said. “I don’t know where we go from here.”

Carney hasn’t heard of any requests from the county’s economic development division for help, though she’s willing to give more money to that division “if it doesn’t mean a lot.” But there was not much clarity about where to go next, other than an interest in furthering economic development. 

At Commission Chair Andy Dance’s suggestion, the commission will hold a workshop on economic development to figure out what its division’s role should be, and what its IDA board’s role should be.