Legislators advance referendum bill for single-member districts
Lee County voters could be faced with a referendum on whether to create single-member districts for the Lee County Board of County Commissioners.
Lee County’s delegation of state legislators voted on Jan. 9 to move forward a bill sponsored by Rep. Mike Giallombardo that would allow the vote.
The bill, language and specifics, of which are still being ironed out, would change the way residents vote for their commissioners. Currently, the five commissioners are divided by the districts they represent, but each commissioner is elected countywide by all voters. Under a single-member district system, only the voters in each district would be able to elect the commissioner representing them.
The bill would first need to be approved by the House and Senate and signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis.
The measure is one of three bills creating new referendums that were approved by the Lee County Legislative Delegation at the standing-room only meeting held at Florida Southwestern State College. The delegation includes all of the state representatives and senators that represent any part of Lee.
Giallombardo said the impetus for his desire to create single-member districts was to give residents more direct representation, including some unincorporated areas of the county who he said have told him they feel they “don’t have a voice.”
The all-Republican delegation approved moving the bill by a vote of 6-1, while calling on Giallombardo to flesh out more of the specifics of the legislation.
Rep. Jenna Persons-Mulicka, the lone vote against the bill, cited changing language in the bill as to whether it would create an elected county mayor or not. The bill would also add another county commissioner once the county’s census reaches over a million residents. The county’s population is currently estimated at more than 800,000.
Persons-Mulicka and Sen. Kathleen Passidomo both argued that a commission of six could lead to a divided board.
Giallombardo is also proposing staggered four-year terms for the commissioners, which could also present a timing issue, Persons-Mulicka said. Persons-Mulicka is married to David Mulicka, who was just elected to a four-year seat on the commission in November.
Commissioner Mulicka appeared in front of the delegation on Jan. 9 to oppose the bill. He said he won every precinct in the county in November and vowed to represent all of the county’s residents.
“I will vigorously defend the right of voters to elect all five commissioners,” Mulicka said.
Of those who spoke in favor of the bill from the public, many represented the northeastern section of the county in communities like Alva and Olga. They expressed feelings of disenfranchisement over the District 5 commission race last year in which Commissioner Mike Greenwell narrowly won a Republican primary against Amanda Cochran, despite Cochran receiving more than 60% of the votes in the district.
The residents from those communities were also present to oppose a bill that the delegation ultimately approved to create a special stewardship district known as the “Duke Farm Stewardship District” in the area around North River Road (State Road 78) in Alva.
Many residents expressed opposition to plans of Neal Communities to build more than 1,000 homes on land that has long been used for farming in the rural area.
Cochran said residents are concerned about “overdevelopment” in the area.
State legislators approved the bill that could create the special district that would help bring infrastructure to the development, though the legislators largely passed off responsibility by saying the rezoning of the land was in the hands of the county commission.
Cochran said that the vote by the commission to approve the rezoning of the property owned by Greenwell on nearby land “opened a Pandora’s box” to turn the rural zoning of the area into more commercial and residential developments.
Cochran said she supported the single-member district bill as a way to bring more local control to residents in the district.
“The comment I heard most when I campaigned was from voters who said ‘I can’t vote for you, I don’t live in your district,'” she said.
Cochran said many voters did not realize they voted for all of the commissioners, regardless of their district.
“That’s a problem,” she said.
Cochran said the county has grown so large, its population is greater than some states.
Giallombardo, who held four town halls throughout the county on the issue, said many of those who have come out to oppose his bill are those who work at lobbying the county commissioners.
The Lee County League of Women Voters has issued its support for single-member district voting.
Under Giallombardo’s bill, the earliest the single-member district voting could take place would be in 2028. The county has had single-member district voting in the past.
Commissioner Cecil Pendergrass spoke in front of the delegation and said he was not debating single districts, but asked the legislators to “identify the problem you are trying to resolve.”
“Local bills should bring the community together,” he said, adding that he “would be honored to get this done with you” if the delegation could identify what the problems were.
Under the rules set up by the delegation’s meeting chair, Rep. Tiffany Esposito, all members of the public were limited in their comments to 60 seconds, while those making presentations on behalf of elected government boards were limited to 90 seconds.
“I don’t think special interests should speak for me,” Cochran said.
Passidomo said that while Giallombardo’s bill has a lot of work to do, she said she supported putting the bill in the hands of voters through a referendum.
“It has to start somewhere,” Passidomo said.
Under the current proposal discussed on Jan. 9, a majority of voters in each district would have to approve single-member districts in addition to the majority of voters countywide.
Legislators also moved forward a bill that would merge the Fort Myers Beach Mosquito Control District with the Lee County Mosquito Control District.
The bill is sponsored by Rep. Adam Botana. The bill, which was opposed in 2023 by the Town of Fort Myers Beach Council and the board of the Fort Myers Beach Mosquito Control District, failed to get onto the agenda of a subcommittee at last year’s state legislation.
Legislators said on Jan. 9 they would support the bill, provided Botana changes the language to require that a majority of voters in the Fort Myers Beach Mosquito Control District approve the merger.
The Fort Myers Beach Mosquito Control District’s millage rate is half the county rate, which led to its board members strongly urging the legislators not to support the bill. The county’s millage rate is 0.22 per thousand dollars of assessed property value, compared to 0.11 per thousands dollars of assessed property value for Fort Myers Beach property owners in the district.
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