Private property rights and governmental subsidies

One of my pet peeves that plays out all over our society - those who claim they alone built their wealth and resist tyrannical governmental encroachment while failing to realize or acknowledge that so much of what they have came from public funds.

This is a great categorical if not a specific example - the beautiful Pinellas barrier island beach municipalities. There are many, and historically they have been hotbeds of petty corruption and graft in municipal governance, many scandals over the years, many of those prosecuted.

This is more silly and abusive local ordinance, banning beach umbrellas. But this passage, among others, caught my eye.


“They refused to make any concessions for us. And so they gave us no alternative but to sue them and defy,” Yoli Redero said. “I mean, that’s what America is about.”

On a recent Friday, Belleair Shore’s beach was almost empty — a mile of sand and water fronted by 57 properties, including multimillion-dollar mansions adorned with terraces, gated courtyards and rows of palm trees. At the town’s northern boundary, where Belleair Beach begins, a thicket of umbrellas, tents and canopies sprang up.

In 1995, Belleair Shore earned national notoriety for prosecuting a mother and daughter sipping iced coffee on the beach. A year later, then-Mayor Robert Clayton flashed a gold-plated badge at two beach visitors and told them to leave, shouting, “I am the police.” And in 2018, the town debated removing turtle nests from the beach.

Today, according to the U.S. Census, 76 people live there.



Neighbors throw shade over beach umbrella ban - Tampa Bay Times

This is valuable property, and I love the Pinellas barrier islands. Here now for a week (in North Reddington), have been going all my life. It’s cultural.

And I am sympathetic to those that have built their lives and businesses here on the not unreasonable assumption the beaches would remain. But they would have been long gone, along with the value they bring, without the US Army Corp of Engineers regular renourishment, which is happening less often since Bill Young died. He used his position to het the Pinellas beaches higher priority and more regular subsidized renourishment than other beaches in the nation.

Like subsidized flood insurance, this is a subsidy that almost exclusively benefits upper income brackets. And yet they grumble when asked to acknowledge any public purpose to “their” beaches. Like allowing public access or protecting turtle nests.

Sic transit Gloria mundi.

 

That is an accurate summation of this particular umbrella issue, but they also love the massive subsidies while looking down at those with less that pay rather than benefit from the subsidies

 

More on it today - all the Pinellas beaches may fail because some won’t grant limited public access to obtain subsidized benefits. Sign of the times. So perverse

Beachfront slips beneath the lapping waves - Tampa Bay Times

 

That new battleground is what the linked piece is about. Especially the second one. And there was a great letter to the editor today in the Times. I was going to post it but it did not seem like anyone else had the interest in the issue I did. That's fine, but I wasn't going to just keep posting the same thread by myself.

I'm out on my evening walk now. I may try to post the letter later.

 

I don't know about Portugal, but along the Costa del Sol, many of the small villages have other nationality personalities. By that, I mean that there are tons of second homes usually from one nation, such that one small town we'll have a British newspaper and television channel, another one will have German equivalent, and so on. It's the vacation destination for Northern Europeans, and you end up having your own culture transplanted a bit. There's a much lesser version of that on the Pinellas beaches. Some of the resorts that are timeshares have a substantial Canadian patronage and will actually put out Maple Leaf flags

 

Letter I was referring to


Your beach, your problem

It’s normal for most — myself included — to stand up for property rights. However, in the case of the beachfront owners suffering from beach erosion, my sympathy stops at the water line. Their million-dollar properties are worth the exorbitant premium in their value because of the beach. I think it’s unconscionable that some of them have the arrogance to demand that significant public dollars be spent maintaining their slice of heaven for their exclusive use. I understand they place a high value on protecting their property from public access, but the minute they lobby to replenish their beaches with sand dredged at public expense, their selfishness must give way. If they won’t agree to public access, I say we replenish the public beaches and let those with private beachfront fend for themselves.

Your beach, your problem One of them is not like the others Who is their teacher? - Tampa Bay Times

 

I posted on this before but cannot find the thread through search. Essentially, the Pinellas barrier islands rely on regular renourishment though federal dollars (ACE) to have actual beaches. Bill Young, when he was alive and headed Appropriations, made sure Pinellas had priority.

The new hitch is that the ACE requires that the property owner grant a perpetual easement granting public access in exchange for renourishment. Most agreed. But there are holdouts, believing they should receive public dollars for personal benefit, proving that they have the true American business mindset. So it’s not going to happen, and Anna Paulina Lima is hopping made at the federal government’s disrespect for property rights.

Lower level ACE was willing to waive, but not at the top, and I don’t blame them. The very definition of nation and community is at issue.


Last month, U.S. Rep. Anna Paulina Luna blasted the Corps in a letter, calling the easement rule “an ill-intentioned attempt ... to strip property rights from homeowners.” She’s drafted language, which Levy shared with the Tampa Bay Times, that would require the Corps to move forward without easements as part of a funding request for the project.




The Army Corps of Engineers has denied a waiver that would have let a massive, already-behind-schedule beach renourishment project move forward in Pinellas County.

The thumbs-down from the Corps’ headquarters signals that it’s digging its heels in amid a yearslong standoff with the county over the replenishment of sand on a critically eroded stretch of coastline. It may also mark a turning point, with county officials turning their eyes toward other potential sources of money so they can do the project without the Corps.



Pinellas needs a new solution to beach renourishment
Pinellas needs a new solution to beach renourishment - Tampa Bay Times

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