Commissioner Murman quoted in this Tampa Tribune article on BP settlement:

POLITICS

Hillsborough will save BP money for next year

By Mike Salinero | Tribune Staff 
Published: July 30, 2015

TAMPA — A move to strengthen Hillsborough County’s conservation lands program with BP oil spill settlement money was turned back by county commissioners Wednesday.

Republican Commissioner Stacy White and Democrat Les Miller had proposed that $23 million the county will receive for damages from the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill should go toward environmental programs. The bulk of that payout, $15 million, would go to shore up the Jan K. Platt Environmental Lands Acquisition and Preservation Program, or ELAPP, which is nearly out of money.

But the rest of the board fell in behind Commissioner Ken Hagan, who said the county should hold onto the money until commissioners look at county needs next spring while preparing the fiscal 2017 budget.

Hagan noted that no sooner had the settlement been announced than commissioners were looking for ways to spend it on ELAPP, transportation or economic development. A solid argument could be made for spending the money in any of those areas, Hagan said.

“However I’m going to recommend that we take a prudent and fiscally conservative approach,” Hagan said, “and the reason I say that is that there is absolutely no sense of urgency to spend the money. In fact, we don’t even have the money yet.”

Hagan’s motion was quickly seconded, and Democrat Kevin Beckner, who originally suggested the county file a lawsuit against BP, backed Hagan’s plan.

Beckner said the lawsuit was not filed because tar balls washed up on the county’s shoreline or coastal birds were slathered with oil.

“It was the loss of tourism tax dollars as well as other factors that created a direct economic loss to our community,” Beckner said. “So with that, I think it’s extraordinarily important that these dollars be invested in a way that strategically would help us rebuild and recontribute back into our economy.”

Beckner said one way to do that would be to invest in ecotourism, an area White and Miller had also included in their proposals. And, like Miller, Beckner said some of the money should go to the county’s Environmental Protection Commission to buy new equipment.

Other commissioners took up the theme that the money was a result of economic losses, not environmental damages, and should be spent on economic development. Victor Crist, a Republican, said he agreed that the protecting the county’s natural resources and conserving land were important goals. In the past, Crist has been an enthusiastic proponent of expanding ecotourism.

“But where I draw the line is … the monies came in for a specific reason,” Crist said, “and that was to cover the losses that we had from the BP oil spill, which were mostly economic.”

Commission Chair Sandy Murman, a Republican, suggested the county might want to spend the windfall on transportation she said is linked to economic development, an often-stated priority of this commission. That commitment, Murman said, paid off recently when local software company Accusoft announced it would be creating 125 jobs with the help of a $750,000 economic development grant, $150,000 of which was local money.

Accusoft president and CEO Jack Berlin is a member of the ELAPP general committee and a friend of Murman’s. Berlin said that because the Deepwater Horizon spill was an environmental disaster, it was a “no-brainer” that the settlement money should be used to protect the environment. What the county shouldn’t do with the money, Berlin said, is use it for things that are normally paid for with taxes.

“I think the criteria we should use would be to do something that would have a long-term impact and that we wouldn’t do normally,” Berlin said. “It would be something that made a difference in the Hillsborough River or additional land for ELAPP.”

In 2008, Hillsborough voters approved borrowing up to $200 million so ELAPP can buy land. But unlike two previous votes in favor of funding the program, the 2008 ballot measure did not include a small property tax to pay off bonds.

Just $3.5 million remains in the ELAPP fund from a $59 million bond issue approved by county commissioners in 2009.

In a March 8 article in the Tribune, Berlin said there would be a “revolt in the environmental community” if prime conservation land became available and ELAPP didn’t have the money to buy it.

In other action Thursday, the commission left the countywide property tax rate the same as last year: 5.7943 mills. For a home with a taxable value of $150,000, the owner would pay $869. Commissioners could still lower the tax rate before September.

The countywide tax is paid by everyone in the county. Residents of unincorporated areas — outside the cities — would pay an additional $656 on a $150,000 house. Cities and the school board also levy property taxes, as do other government agencies such as water management districts and the port authority.