North county annexation: Gardens, North Palm battle to add 4 communities in March election (2024)

It may be a first for Palm Beach County: Two governments trying to annex the same neighborhoods in the same election. Voters will decide who wins.

PALM BEACH GARDENS — A year ago, annexation was nothing more than a 10-letter word to the residents of Hidden Key, Pirate's Cove and two other pockets of northern Palm Beach County.

Today, it’s a choice, one that has been marked by angry words about tax bills and possible lawsuits at information sessions with residents in the unincorporated communities that the cities want to annex.

Annexation happens when a city extends its boundary to add land currently governed only by Palm Beach County. The city would then provide the residents with services ranging from public safety to code enforcement and tax those properties to help pay for it.

Palm Beach Gardens wants to annex a large swath of land totaling 1,316 acres, and North Palm Beach wants four neighborhoods out of that area that include 182 homes. In a move election officials say may be unprecedented, voters will cast ballots on the competing proposals in the March 19 election.

Voters can approve both, reject both or choose one over another. If they vote to approve both, the matter will become one for the courts to decide, Wendy Sartory Link, Palm Beach County’s supervisor of elections, said last week.

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North Palm Beach’s ballot questions are in place, and Palm Beach Gardens likely will soon follow them. The Gardens' city council on Nov. 2 gave first approval to five ballot questions regarding annexation, but not before hearing from area residents, the vast majority of whom said they don’t want the city to annex their properties.

Hidden Key residents went so far as to say they have hired an attorney and are considering legal action. They say the size of the annexation area that includes their 70-home community may violate the compactness required by state law, which means that the concentration of property in each area must not create pockets of unincorporated land within it or boundaries that are too winding.

Some residents say they like things the way they are, without any government annexing them.

The City Council tried to assure speakers at Thursday’s meeting that the choice to have Palm Beach Gardens annex their communities was theirs to make and that the city would respect the results of the March 19 vote.

“This is not a hostile thing. It’s an invitation to come into the family. If you don’t want to come into the family, then don’t vote for it,” said council member Carl Woods. “I don’t understand why Hidden Key has an attorney. It’s a simple vote.”

What is annexation, and why do local governments do it?

Annexation comes in two forms. Voluntary annexation happens when either a property owner or all landowners within a subdivision petition a city to include them, usually to obtain public services such as water or sewage.

Involuntary annexations, the type that Palm Beach Gardens and North Palm Beach are pursuing, happen at the city or town’s initiative. They require a municipality to receive 50% plus one of voter approval.

Annexing entire neighborhoods can add hundreds of thousands of dollars to a local government’s tax base. The competing plans come at a time of soaring property values across Palm Beach County.

Absorbing land in key areas also can give a city control over how that area grows, as Palm Beach Gardens did this spring when it took in 300 acres fronting western Northlake Boulevard.

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Florida International University professor Dario Moreno has taught political science for more than 35 years and worked directly with local governments on annexation issues in Miami-Dade County for eight years. He calls the competing annexation vote a “land rush.”

Moreno said state law changed in 2010 to no longer require cities to get state approval for annexation. The move placed annexation fully in the hands of the voters, making it easier and quicker for cities to add land to their boundaries.

Once land is annexed, there is no going back, said Moreno, who said he has never heard of two cities appearing on the ballot for annexation at the same time in the same areas before this.

“An annexation land rush is sort of like when you see your neighbor is painting their house and you think it may be a good time for you to paint your house, too,” Moreno said. “It becomes a kind of race. Cities view it as an opportunity.”

Palm Beach Gardens' proposal put annexation into play

Palm Beach Gardens was the first to push toward this opportunity when it announced in September it would seek to annex five areas now totaling 1,316 acres and 8,352 residents.

Officials have said that the proposed annexations are part of a larger strategy that has been identified by its City Council and staff to round out Palm Beach Gardens’ boundaries and provide more representation and control over development and redevelopment in those areas.

Hidden Key is in Area 1, the largest of them. Set between Alternate A1A, the Intracoastal Waterway, PGA Boulevard and Donald Ross Road, it also includes Cabana Colony, Crystal Point, Frenchmen’s Landing and Captain’s Key. Extending more than 2 miles at its widest points, it covers 1,244 acres, 3,607 homes and 7,760 people.

As it stands now, these neighborhoods would become part of Palm Beach Gardens if a simple majority of all the area’s voters — 50% plus one — cast ballots in favor of the move, even if entire communities vote to oppose it.

The other areas in Palm Beach Gardens' proposal that North Palm Beach also wants to annex are more targeted. Pirate’s Cove and six homes along Canal Road are in Area 3, which lies south of PGA and east of Prosperity Farms Road. The final 25 homes are in Area 2, which is east of the Intracoastal near the Ritz-Carlton Residences. The homes lie south of what’s called the “flag lot.”

Officials in North Palm Beach and Juno Beach say some of those neighborhoods were in their long-term annexation plans and that Palm Beach Gardens’ move to absorb them now caught them by surprise. Conversations at recent meetings about the Palm Beach Gardens plan quickly became heated.

“I don’t care about Palm Beach Gardens at this point because they’re not being a good neighbor to us,” Deborah Searcy, a North Palm Beach council member, said on Oct. 17. “I do not want Gardens any more in our backyard than they already are.”

North Palm Beach also is pursuing the annexation of 18 homes in the Portage Landing North and Portage Landing South neighborhoods along Jack Nicklaus Drive, an area unaffected by Palm Beach Gardens’ plans.

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One community targeted by Palm Beach Gardens in Area 1 already is negotiating with Juno Beach for a voluntary annexation. Captain’s Key, a neighborhood of 30 homes along U.S. 1, expects all its property owners to consent to the move, which Juno Beach’s Town Council could vote on as early as December.

Juno Beach also is open to considering a voluntary annexation of Pleasant Ridge, a neighborhood across U.S. 1 from Captain’s Key that Palm Beach Gardens also has included in Area 1, but has put those conversations on hold for now.

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People who have turned out at Palm Beach Gardens' meetings on Oct. 26 and Nov. 2 have expressed tremendous skepticism about the merits of voting to annex.

Some residents from Hidden Key, Pleasant Ridge, Frenchmen’s Landing and Cabana Colony have said they worry about rising property taxes and having less freedom to do what they want with their homes.

“My neighbors and I like the freedom and anonymity that being unincorporated gives us,” said Shanna Walker of Cabana Colony. “We don’t see a big pull toward Palm Beach Gardens because we feel it would be more oversight.”

In a presentation by Palm Beach Gardens planning manager Martin Fitts on annexation to the Palm Beach Gardens City Council on Nov. 2, there was no mention of how property taxes would change for residents. The city has said it will work with homeowners to help them determine how their tax bills would change.

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Council member Marcie Tinsley also attempted to alleviate worries over stricter code enforcement at the meeting.

“We are not trying to do anything different than what they have there,” Tinsley said. “We already promised that.”

Some also said Palm Beach Gardens could have spent more time talking with residents about the proposal before moving it toward the ballot. The city met with Cabana Colony residents on Oct. 12 and has said it plans to have several more public information sessions prior to the March vote.

“I’m really concerned and disappointed. I might have been in favor of annexation if it was presented in an open way,” said Fred Brandt of Frenchmen’s Landing, a gated community of about 200 homes off Prosperity Farms Road.

“It’s not until I came here tonight that I realized that this is being forced on me. I can’t support this at all.”

Melissa Wiegand of Pleasant Ridge submitted more than 150 signatures from residents of the unincorporated areas declaring their opposition to annexation.

Only one of about 30 of the residents in the proposed annexation areas spoke in support of joining the city at the Nov. 2 meeting, whose noise level grew so loud at one point that Mayor Chelsea Reed advised people about order.

“This is the day I’ve been looking forward to,” said Peter Banting, a resident of Monet Ridge Road, in Area 5, which is surrounded by Palm Beach Gardens on all sides. “I support this thing fully. I’ve heard a lot of negativity tonight. . . . There are more benefits for these annexations than people seem to realize.”

Gardens officials say annexation offers benefits to communities

The 70 homeowners of Hidden Key wrote to Palm Beach Gardens on Oct. 24 asking that it remove their neighborhood from the annexation proposal.

Residents asked that their neighborhood be added into a new zone of its own if the city is unwilling to remove it from Area 1. That way, its votes would stand on their own and not be blended into all the other communities in the zone.

The law requires an area to be annexed “must be contiguous to the municipality and reasonably compact” and not part of any other local government.

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Palm Beach Gardens officials are confident the courts will find their ballot questions legal, and council members unanimously approved all ordinances Nov. 2 to move the annexations forward.

In their comments that night, council members highlighted the benefits of annexation, ones that city officials say they will continue to spell out to affected voters and homeowners as the March election approaches.

Anyone with an assessed property valued at less than $411,250 can expect to pay lower taxes, council members said. They’ll have access to community policing with three-to-five-minute response times and to Palm Beach Gardens Fire Rescue services. There also would be street and canal maintenance, sports recreation programs and storm response plans.

“We are building fire stations, have police presence and have expanded our public services and recreation areas. Now we are to the point where the city is so strong,” said council member Bert Premuroso.

“The services are excellent and the things we do here will be a benefit to the residents. There’s no hidden agenda here.”

Maya Washburn covers northern Palm Beach County for The Palm Beach Post, part of the USA TODAY Florida-Network. Reach her at mwashburn@pbpost.com. Support local journalism: Subscribe today.