In April 2017, the Broward County Land Use Plan was updated and adopted to state “Broward County shall discourage land use plan amendments which negatively impact hurricane evacuation clearance times and/or emergency shelter capacities.” Based on interpretation of this policy, Broward County has encouraged cities adding density or making other alterations to land use plan to provide municipal employees as hurricane shelter volunteers. This policy has required a municipality to agree to provide city staff as shelter volunteers during a hurricane if density is added to an evacuation zone.
At the January 24th meeting of the Broward County Planning Council (Exhibit 1), an item was presented and discussed (Exhibit 1) regarding the expansion of the Diplomat Hotel on Hollywood Beach. The new activity center would add 350 permanent dwellings as well as 1,500 hotel rooms and additional space for convention, commercial, and residential activities. The intent is to turn the Diplomat into a prime space for large conventions, which require more capacity than the Diplomat currently has. The item is supported by the City of Hollywood. At the January 24th meeting of the Planning Council, the Broward County Emergency Management Division stated that additional residents and visitors would create additional shelter capacity and require more staff, and that it is the policy of Broward County to require cities to provide additional shelter staff to compensate for this increase. The applicant and City of Hollywood dispute this interpretation of policy, and state that critical economic redevelopment should not be contingent on providing shelter staff.
We currently have an existing agreement in place with the Broward County School Board regarding staffing of hurricane shelters that is currently in the process of being improved (Exhibit 2). In addition, Commissioner Furr reached out to municipalities in Broward County last year regarding staffing assistance and received a diverse variety of responses. Based on context from Hurricane Irma and historical shelter data (Additional Material), we can analyze and assess our needs for hurricane shelter staffing throughout the County. Combined with our previous outreach to municipalities and our agreement with the School Board, it is possible to develop an equitable shelter staffing process that does not make redevelopment contingent on shelter staff.
Hurricanes impact all of us - not just the cities on the coast. People evacuate to shelters all around the county for a multitude of reasons. The entire burden of providing shelter staff should not fall only on cities in the evacuation zones. The intent of this item is to discuss ways we can encourage cities to provide shelter staff without making it contingent on land use or density changes, including the possibility of an Interlocal Agreement. The goal is to create an equitable process where every city in Broward County provides their fair share of shelter assistance, not just a few cities in the evacuation zone that must carry the entire burden.
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