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Strategies & Market Trends : The Residential Real Estate Crash Index -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: MoneyPenny who wrote (34811)	7/3/2005 9:21:47 AM
From: shades	Respond to of 306849

Florida has lotta empty swampland. They can live in the swamps with the gators - kill 2 birds with one stone - gators eat new homeless, new homeless eat gators. stpetetimes.com Where can mobile home dwellers go? The county is looking into "suitable and adequate" housing if the Golden Lantern or other parks close. By ANNE LINDBERG, Times Staff Writer Published July 3, 2005 PINELLAS PARK - The County Commission turned down a developer's request to change the zoning on the Golden Lantern Mobile Home Park so condominiums could be built on the property. But the victory for the park's 350 to 500 owners and renters is likely to be temporary. State law requires that mobile home owners have "suitable and adequate" alternative housing before a park can be closed. Pinellas County has no policy for determining what is suitable and adequate, and commissioners wanted to create rules before deciding the Golden Lantern's fate. They told the developer, Rottlund Homes, that it could come back once a policy is in place. That is likely to be later this year, Assistant County Administrator Gay Lancaster said. County staff members have been working on the policy and expect to have it to administrators by the end of this month. That could put it in commissioners' hands in August. The Golden Lantern, 7950 Park Blvd., is in the unincorporated county across from the Wagon Wheel Flea Market on the edge of Pinellas Park. Its description depends on whether a mobile home owner or the developer is doing the talking. Clearwater lawyer Tim Johnson, who represents the park's owners, told commissioners of many dilapidated trailers and a high crime rate - 233 sheriff's reports in 2003-04, including aggravated assaults. "Given the condition of the park, it's impossible to attract new or even used mobile homes to be located in this park. . . . In short, this park is in an irreversible death spiral," Johnson said. "These residents are one hurricane (or) flood away from being destroyed." The only economically feasible solution, Johnson said, is Rottlund's proposal to build 162 townhomes, fewer than the 179 mobile homes that are there now. Johnson said he understood the residents would have sad stories, but urged the commission to ignore them. "There are inevitably sad stories," Johnson said. But "we're going to take care of a problem that is a health, safety and welfare problem." Sandra Short said she has lived at the Golden Lantern for a year with her husband and child, both of whom are disabled. Short told commissioners she liked living there. "The neighborhood may not be the very best, but you have to look at who was living in those homes when those (sheriff's) calls were made," Short said. "We're working poor. We've got a lot of disabled people, a vast number of disabled people. We've got elderly people." Forcing residents out of the Golden Lantern would "just be a catastrophe," she said. "It's a really good community, regardless of what the owners think," Short said. Under Florida law, owners whose mobile homes can be moved would receive $3,000 for a single-wide and $6,000 for a double-wide. If a home cannot be moved, the owner would receive $1,375 for a single-wide, $2,750 for a double-wide. Many of the Golden Lantern homes cannot be moved. Short's is one of those. She paid $20,000 for it a year ago. Even if it could be moved, the carport and other attachments would have to be left behind. The state-approved compensation would not cover her for her losses, she said. Residents of Harbor Lights and Bay Pines mobile home parks, which owners and renters fear will be sold, added their pleas to those of the Golden Lantern residents. Commissioners listened. As Commissioner Ken Welch said, "What I don't want to see happen . . . is (for) some of them to end up homeless."