Wellington Officials Roll Out the Red Carpet Treatment for Developers and Keep the Residents in the Cheap Seats.
From the beginning of The Wellington North & South application process the VOW Staff has exhibited blatant favoritism benefitting the developers, who are not even landowners or residents of this Village. The applications were submitted by Wellington Holdings LLC owned by Mark Bellisimo but the only faces we have seen at the hearings and public forums have been representatives of Nexus Luxury Collection, Global Equestrian Group, Wellington International, and applicant’s landscaping designer and attorneys….never the applicant himself. At some point along the way Wellington Lifestyle Partners emerged as the developers which is a fusion of Nexus and Tavistock’s Senior Managing Director, Doug McMahon and Wellington Equestrian Partners CEO, Mark Bellisimo.
Starting with two critical points of information:
- Condition 16 regarding R2011-73
This is a request by developer and agreed to by Staff to remove requirement for any Board or Council to approve site plans (in other words changing administratively versus legislatively). In addition, Comprehensive Plan changes must go to Tallahassee and be approved at the State level. It absolutely cannot be approved administratively yet our own VOW Attorney and Staff are trying to allow this Condition. Changing the Comprehensive Plan and FLUM is a legislative policy decision. It CANNOT be changed administratively, that is a flat out lie, and the Staff is hoping the average citizen would never know. And that is why us as residents are forced to hire lawyers to protect us from our own officials who we pay and elect to represent us, the residents of Wellington, not to be the mouthpiece and make life easy for developers. - The Mythical Showgrounds
This is the big one. The “Showgrounds” are the bait. This is the lynchpin for the developers to destroy Wellington because they desperately need the Global Dressage land (South Shore and Pierson) to put 278 condos five stories high and 22 single family homes to make their huge profit. They promise to build a showgrounds because the story is Wellington International has outgrown current space (meanwhile they haven’t spent a penny to improve current WI showgrounds) but they want to take 96 acres out of the EPA. That is so contradictory and hypocritical how can anyone even take this seriously. If they are out of space for horse activities how in the world can we be giving up 96 acres that are already dedicated for horse activities? It is mind blowing the blatant scam that VOW is endorsing.
There is absolutely no application submitted to the VOW for any showgrounds. The presenters of this project should NEVER have been allowed to have this open for discussion when it simply does not exist. The EPC got this one right. They did not engage in this sham spending an inordinate amount of time knowing it was not a legal agenda item, not in VOW active projects, unknown financiers, dubious proof of ownership et., etc. It does not exist for all intents and purposes when it comes to official VOW hearings. The PZAB spent nearly 90% of 16 hours of meetings solely discussing this mythical technically non-existent project and not one VOW official reined in the discussions and set the record straight. The opposition legal teams were very vocal about this breach in procedure but literally no voluntary actions were taken by VOW Staff to make it clear for the record this should not be on the docket.
Double Standards:
How Staff has supported developers and impeded making available information to the public or restricted public participation.
Staff Report is supposed to be a deep dive analyzing the application in order to forward recommendations to the Equestrian Preserve Committee, Planning Zoning Adjustment Board and VOW Council.
Most critically; the Staff has found the application compliant on all levels to allow for monumental changes to VOW Comprehensive Plan, Zoning, Master Plans and reducing acreage in the Equestrian Preserve Area. Therefore, Staff has recommended to all Boards and Council to go ahead with development.
Contradiction; At September EPC & PZAB Joint Workshop Planning Director Tim Stillings answered a direct question asking if Staff would look for deficiencies as well as compliance. The reply, “Absolutely yes”; time mark 1:54:40. At the June 8 EPC hearing Staff was asked same question. The reply from Tim Stillings said it was not our job, we look for compliance; time mark 5:19:54.
-Public efforts find many significant deficiencies which the Staff refuses to acknowledge or address or amend their recommendations.
They literally never find anything wrong with applicant’s irreversible community altering plans. How is it possible that building 278 five story condos plus 22 single family homes on Equestrian Preserve land where the only number of units allowed is six across the 96 acres….HOW CAN THAT POSSIBLY BE FOUND COMPLIANT?
-There is a South Florida Water Management District Conservation Easement on the Wellington South project that is shown by developer as all grass with equestrian amenities all across it. That Easement has very clear and easy to read requirements not allowing any building, is fenced in and is primarily 4-13’ deep water, in no way useable as an equestrian riding area. Not surprisingly, there is a long list of non-compliance issues as reported by SFWMD agents who visited the site last week. HOW CAN THAT POSSIBLY BE FOUND COMPLIANT?
-the further deficiencies of this project are too numerous to list in this post.
Hearings;
-To start, Village attorney tells the room there are Sheriff here to remove you or quiet you down should you get out of line. So you see, we are already classified as an unmanageable crowd despite zero indication of desire to break any rules.
-However, this is followed immediately by Mr. McMahon asking for double the time (40 minutes). Why did he not make this request to Village attorney in advance as he should have all the while knowing he would need time? EPC graciously allows and he proceeds to ungraciously run over and finally EPC chair asks for him to wrap up which he refuses. This happened every time Mr. McMahon stood at the microphone at every hearing. Zero respect for our time and the process however nothing said by Village attorney.
-Opposition attorneys rarely go overtime and public constantly reminded we only have 3 minutes and let me tell you VOW attorney cuts public comment speakers off every time at 3 minutes.
-PZAB hearings public is only allowed to speak for 3 minutes even though there were 3 agenda items. We should have been allowed 3 minutes per agenda item however Mr. McMahon was once again given double time to present.
-Staff continuously lobbying in favor of developers right before our eyes. They refer to Ms. Bellisimo on first name basis meanwhile everyone else in the room is professionally addressed by their sir name. They are cozy and in collusion with the developers.
-final night of PZAB we were told over and over no public comments, there were no public comment cards in the room to complete (a completed card is required to speak during a hearing) and a sign on the wall “no public comment on Wellington North South topic” at the sign in table where public comment cards are made available. Shockingly at midnight the meeting has been opened for public comment. Well 70% of the room probably cleared out at that hour so people who might have spoken have gone home considering the late hour. There are ways to discuss development in Wellington and important issues at hand without specifically referencing these specific applications. Very unfair to the residents to be denied the opportunity.
-representatives for applicant continuously either jumped up to the mic to push their point without even being asked a question and kept going up to Staff to whisper in their ears while the PZ Board was deliberating and discussing important issues meanwhile the Sheriff was walking up to residents in their seats to tell them to be quiet. UNBELIEVABLE violations in procedure allowed by developers but public kept under the thumb.
Burdensome:
Multiple times it has been expressed it would be burdensome for the for developers to go through EPC and PZAB etc. for site plan review and a site plan would be costly. Why is VOW trying to protect developer’s pocketbooks? They should be protecting our pocketbooks. This whole process has been expensive for citizens to spend time and money fighting to protect what is already protected in our Charter. AND only 7 years ago, voted on in 2016 in a Village referendum where 2/3 of this Village voted to further protect the EPA and equestrian community. This shouldn’t be happening at all.
-We have the asset; EPA land protected by the EOZD. We should not be asked to give it away and especially not to a self-serving developer.
All VOW public meetings and projects should be readily available to the public, Freedom of Information Act
-There are several important videos unavailable on YouTube
-the web pages to view all projects in Wellington is nearly impossible to navigate and at times does not even open.
Political Will
That is what we are looking at here. If this gets through it is a result of political will and not logic and doing the right thing and following our own policy and constitution.
