The Volusia County Council took no action Tuesday to advance a proposed mechanism for controlling the county's growth. Council Chair Jeffrey Brower was the only council member who supported the idea.
RELATED: Volusia staff explore rural boundary idea
Tuesday's discussion was prompted by Brower’s interest in exploring the potential for rural boundary protections in Volusia County. But the proposed growth control mechanism described by staff Tuesday is not a rural boundary, which is now preempted by state law, according to the county's legal experts.
Instead, county staff said, the council could move to update its governing charter with an amendment outlining the process for voluntary annexations. A voluntary annexation refers to when unincorporated county land gets added, or annexed, into a municipality.
Annexations and preemptions
Normally, a county’s input on voluntary annexations is limited to objections, according to county staff. But a Florida statute allows for charter counties, like Volusia, to include “an exclusive method of municipal annexation” in their governing charter. That means the Volusia Council could outline requirements for how the process of annexing county land into a municipality would work. For example, the county could require that annexations be approved by a supermajority vote of council members.
“All of that must be done in a charter amendment that goes to referendum, and must be voted on by the entire Volusia County,” Senior Assistant County Attorney Paolo Soria said.
In preparing for Tuesday’s discussion, county staff were specifically trying to avoid proposing anything that could conflict with a preemptive land use planning law that took effect in June.
Senate Bill 180 began as an emergency management bill, but toward the end of last year’s legislative session, it evolved into a law with provisions effectively halting local planning efforts in some jurisdictions.
RELATED: Orange County lawmakers: We'll revisit law that hurts local planning
SB 180 enables legal challenges against local governments that enact “more restrictive or burdensome” land use planning changes. The law doesn’t define what exactly is meant by that “more restrictive or burdensome” clause. Some land use attorneys call it a “vague legal standard.” In one ongoing lawsuit, developers are using SB 180 to try to repeal Orange County’s voter-approved rural boundary.
“Under the current law, you cannot do the same rural boundary as Orange County or Seminole County,” Soria told council members Tuesday.
The alternative, “exclusive method of voluntary annexation” was outlined by county staff in meeting materials provided to council members ahead of Tuesday’s discussion:
“We argue the Charter can require an exclusive method of voluntary annexation, but not more restrictive or burdensome comprehensive plan amendments or land development regulations under state law. That is not to say it would not be contested but we think that it is allowed.”
‘Just let the people vote’
Brower said he’d support placing the proposed annexation question on this year’s ballot in order to try and give residents living in unincorporated Volusia County more of a voice.
“Just let the people vote,” Brower said. “First, let's do a charter amendment, let the people vote on it and see if they agree with it. But ultimately, let the people of unincorporated Volusia — wherever the annexations are occurring — allow them to have a vote on that one narrow thing: do you want this annexation?”
But Brower’s colleagues on the council didn’t budge. Several voiced their concern about potentially infringing on landowners’ property rights.
“I do feel it's a preemption from the county to the city, to limit them,” said At-Large Representative Jake Johansson, who’s running to represent Florida Senate District 8. “I think it's restricting the rights of landowners to make that decision to annex if they like.”
District 1 Councilman Don Dempsey said, the way things are right now, county residents already get to have a say on voluntary annexations.
“There's public hearings,” Dempsey said. “If you don't want your neighborhood changed, you can go to the city meeting and argue and bring everybody with you to object to it.”
Council members also heard from several members of the public Tuesday on the agenda item, described as a discussion on the potential “placement of (a) charter amendment question regarding elements of a rural growth boundary.” While some opposed to the idea, others were supportive.
James Clayton, a former judge who retired in 2024 from the Seventh Judicial Circuit, said he wouldn’t support a rural boundary — even as someone who would personally benefit from one. Clayton said he owns more than a hundred acres of unincorporated county land right next to DeLand.
“Think about why we're here. You're proposing this because of Senate Bill 180,” Clayton said. “Now, you are basically doing to the cities, the 16 municipalities, what Tallahassee has done to you. You're telling them how to control their property.”
Protecting Volusia County land
Suzanne Scheiber of Dream Green Volusia, a local environmental group, said she’d love to see the county adopt rural boundary protections. But her more immediate concern is the fate of Volusia Forever, the county’s voter-approved land conservation program.
“I'm not going to speak against a rural boundary, because obviously, I want one,” Scheiber said. “But how do we reach a rural boundary when we can't even get what we voted for for 25 years?”
Scheiber sits on Volusia's charter review commission, which recently advanced a proposed charter amendment that would restructure aspects of Volusia Forever. Scheiber was one of two votes against the proposed amendment, she said.
If approved by voters, that proposed amendment would allow conservation lands acquired through Volusia Forever to be used for other public purposes. It would also establish a registry for conservation lands, and give council members the ability to remove lands from the registry with a supermajority vote. Volusia County voters will see the proposed amendment on their ballots this fall, Scheiber said.
Initially approved by voters in 2000, Volusia Forever was renewed in 2020 for another 20 years, earning nearly 76% of the vote.
“I want what I voted for. And I know a lot of people … want what they voted for,” Scheiber said.
While the specifics vary somewhat between jurisdictions, generally, a rural boundary is a planning tool some counties use to control growth, by making it more difficult for large development projects to be approved in rural areas.
In Central Florida, Orange and Seminole counties have rural boundaries in place. Seminole County’s rural boundary has existed since 1991, with residents voting in 2004 to formally establish it in the county charter and, in 2024, to strengthen its protections.
Orange County’s rural boundary was approved in 2024, earning 73% of the vote. It is now the target of an ongoing lawsuit filed on behalf of developers, citing SB 180.
A proposal that would mitigate some of the concerns local governments have with SB 180 just made its way over to the Florida House, after being approved unanimously by the Senate.
