Residents lost the battle to prevent Matlacha from being divided between House Districts 76 and 77. The final legislative debate is today and no amendments are being allowed. Despite email pleas from well over 100 Pine Islanders as well as special pleas from Lee County Commission Chair John Manning, not a one of our Senators or Representatives did anything to help us—you might want to remember that come election time.
Please ignore those Cape Coral labels of East Matlacha as “Unincorporated Cape Coral.” Today's action does not mean Matlacha is divided or that the Cape has annexed any part of Matlacha. Of course it does not help us either.
Some related efforts also have not gone well. Matlacha continues to share a zip code with NW Cape Coral, which results in lots of mischief. Not only does it confuse mail and such, but it also renders meaningless demographic data and frustrates government collection and distribution of funds.
Pine Island supplies water and fire service to areas east of Matlacha that the Cape has also repeatedly tried to annex—in fact the intended site of the new Matlacha Fire Station as well as the Greater Pine Island Chamber of Commerce are in those areas. In 2009, Cape Coral asked Lee County to sign an Interlocal Service Agreement that would give the Cape control over city services in those areas, specifically including Matlacha Isles—ironic when you consider Matlacha Isles (as well as all of Matlacha) already has city services (water and central sewer) while the adjoining Cape areas are still on shallow wells and septic systems (some also say outhouses, but I have not seen any). Lee County declined to sign the document.
A new twist arose on Tuesday when at least one Matlacha resident was not allowed to vote in Matlacha--they told him to go to Cape Coral to vote. I'm told the problem perhaps only affected some 10 houses.
Despite all these things, the Cape is a long way from taking over any part of Matlacha. Under current Florida law (which Cape Coral has asked to be changed), areas cannot be annexed without a vote of the residents of the affected area, and there is no way the residents of any part of Matlacha will do that. How the voting would be conducted is specified by some very convoluted and confusing Florida laws with lots of loopholes—for a copy see Appendix D of the 2011 Edition of the Nature Lover’s Guide to Pine Island.
One bright note. Cape Coral has several new council members, and they are definite improvements over the last bunch. One even stated the other day that he has no intention of voting to approve annexation of Matlacha. Maybe this issue will go away for a while--if it does, be assured that the reason will be that Pine Islanders have spoke loud and clear that want no part of annexation.
Phil Buchanan
email: coolcherokee@comcast.net
