The Alachua County Board of County Commissioners (BOCC) voted Tuesday on carports and raises for sheriff’s deputies during a short regular meeting.  

The BOCC gave approval for Alachua County Sheriff Chad Scott to raise the salaries for sworn law enforcement officers, certified detention officers and certified detention deputies effective Feb. 1, 2024. The move would raise the starting salary to $55,000.  

Scott said wages are one of the biggest factors to draw and retain talent. The office currently has 106 vacant positions.  

The sheriff’s office will fund the raises within its already-approved budget for this fiscal year. According to staff, the raises will cost $1.4 million. The money to pay for the raises will largely come from other spots within the sheriff’s office along with $484,000 that the BOCC designated in the current budget for raises.  

However, the BOCC stopped short on Scott’s request to commit to funding a raise of up to $57,500 for these same positions in the next fiscal year, which starts Oct. 1.  

Commissioner Anna Prizzia said the BOCC can’t commit to a budget it hasn’t seen. The county’s budget season will start later this spring and early summer before wrapping up in September with a millage rate decision.  

“Being asked to commit to something before we’ve even gone through that process is also very frustrating to me,” Prizzia said.  

She said she wants to make ACSO wages competitive and deal with salary compression but added that the current ask, outside the budget season, is more than the BOCC has ever done or would think about doing.  

She said the former sheriff also came to ask for similar support outside of the budget season. Prizzia said the county has a lot of front-line workers, from fire to public works to animal services, and can’t try to negotiate all these salaries all the time.  

Commissioner Mary Alford made a motion to have the sheriff’s office work with staff to look at the budget and prepare a proposal for the budget season. She asked that ACSO create a five-year plan for salaries that the county could view instead of rediscussing the issue each year.  

Commissioner Ken Cornell said he had two major concerns: the ad valorem market and pressure from Tallahassee.  

As a realtor, he said he sees early signs of a downturn that could impact local tax revenue. Plus, he said he was concerned about statements Gov. Ron DeSantis made recently concerning changes to taxes. 

“I would like nothing more than to say, ‘Yeah, let’s do this and get us to $57,500 and get us to $60,000 and then keep going as the competition and the marketplace calls for that,'” Cornell said.  

He said he’s not sure what the next budget will look like and if hard choices will need to come like during the 2008 recession.  

The BOCC voted unanimously, with Chair Chuck Chestnut absent, to support the increase to $55,000 from existing ACSO funding and to have the sheriff’s office work with staff on future salary plans.  

Alachua County staff brought forward a series of changes to the Unified Land Development Code for the commissioners to consider and then schedule final votes. The changes concerned carports, surveying monuments, parking minimums and paved and unpaved roads.  

While staff went over most topics without concern, carports drew attention from commissioners.  

Currently, Section 407.02 in county code prohibits building an accessory building (including a carport or ground solar) in the front yard or even overlapping into the front yard, unless within agricultural zoning. 

Angeline Jacobs, a planner with Growth Management, said the county has gotten a lot of feedback on the carport issue, with residents wanting to place one on an existing driveway.  

The new code would allow accessory buildings in front of houses on one-acre or more lots as long as those buildings are more than 25 feet from the front property line. Carports would be allowed in any lot with certain standards (no more than 400 square feet, must be installed on concrete or asphalt, must be within the parcel’s buildable area).  

Prizzia said the carport addition seems to go against everything the county has worked for and out of character with the overall comprehensive plan that has goals to downplay the roles of personal vehicles.  

“I really do worry about the property values of adjacent properties and the overall look and feel that we’re trying to achieve for Alachua County as a place that’s really about a welcoming culture of porches on the front and walkability and non-auto-oriented neighborhoods,” Prizzia said.  

She said carports seem like the antithesis of what the county has tried to achieve.  

Alford agreed and said she also worried about safety and if carports could withstand Florida wind loads. She said neighborhoods might have flying sheets of metal to contend with before long.  

However, Cornell and Commissioner Marihelen Wheeler stood on the opposite side.  

Cornell noted that the county’s code wouldn’t override the bylaws for homeowners’ associations, protecting those neighborhoods’ character as already established.  

Wheeler said she’s concerned about aesthetics but thinks of the carports as something practical to protect vehicles, not just from falling debris by also the constant Florida sunshine. 

She said she had no problem with a properly permitted carport.  

Alachua County staff also addressed a concern about more impervious surfaces caused by building carports, saying the county calculations already include the entire buildable area of a parcel.  

Prizzia said it feels like the county is opening up a can of worms with the allowance. She said carports could turn front yards into parking lots and that people would use them as general storage areas.  

The BOCC approved the staff’s recommendation to advertise the changes in the Unified Land Development Code. That advertisement will happen only on the county’s website and social media page following its new regulations on legal notices.  

The commissioner added that county staff consider changes to the carport allowances in areas with small parcel sizes.