BY MARK J. CRAWFORD
Telegraph Editor
STARKE — The beginning of a new year is a good time set goals and priorities, but Bradford County commissioners are still having trouble getting started.
Time set aside for strategic planning during Monday’s commission meeting never moved past the discussion on where to begin.
Having encouraged the city of Starke to do the same for years, Commissioner Carolyn Spooner wants a fresh start, assembling all the stakeholders to assess the county’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. With that information, or SWOT analysis, in hand, she says they can map out the future.
Commissioner Chris Dougherty says he doesn’t want to reinvent the wheel, pointing out that the county has been through that process several times. They bring together public officials, business and community leaders, representatives from the school district and college, as well as the public. Working with a variety of partners, several reports have been published and then sat on a shelf without any further action being taken.
That is where he would like commissioners to start, by reviewing the work already completed. Spooner believes they need more current information.
At some point, Dougherty said, the commission must set some goals.
“My number one goal is economic development and growth in this county, because, as I’ve said, before, without the additional revenue, we’re going to be faced with the same problem we’re faced with every year,” he said.
That problem is an inability to adequately fund services despite maximizing the tax rate. They can’t keep up with rising costs without generating revenue from new development.
Spooner continued to push for further input and analysis. The two most recent reports were completed in 2018 and 2019. The first contains a full SWOT analysis, like Spooner spoke of. The most recent, Dougherty said, brought together experts for a study that would have cost thousands of dollars but was performed for free. The county hasn’t done anything with them, he said.
Dougherty wanted to move past discussion of the challenges to setting goals, and he said he was open to suggestions, whether it’s recreation and ecotourism, or manufacturing and warehousing. A lack of utility infrastructure north and south of Starke is impeding growth, he said, saying the bypass was discussed for decades with no local planning. Now properties at either end remain undeveloped and aren’t capturing the traffic.
“I can tell you right now, we can’t continue to go down the same path that we’ve been going down, because we all know that that’s not working,” he said. “When I was in high school, they were planning that bypass, and nothing was done. And it’s now sat out there for two years without any growth on that bypass.”
Even starting to engineer infrastructure improvements now, the work will take years to complete, he said, with more time needed to attract development.
Dougherty said the real weakness is that the county doesn’t know what to do with the information it has. In the meantime, they are losing opportunities to surrounding areas.
North Florida Regional Chamber of Commerce President Pam Whittle said there is more interest in Bradford County than people realize. Dougherty agreed but said that interest is lost because the businesses don’t want to fund the infrastructure improvements. They want the city and county to do it.
“I think it’s incumbent upon us to take what we have and start moving that forward. And then, as (Commissioner) Andrew said, let this be a living, growing document that we continue to update as we move forward,” Dougherty said.
The county attorney is working on setting up a joint meeting of the city and county commissions to talk more about planning for the future.
