City of Clearwater Code of Ordinances
and Land Development Code
(This page last updated November 06, 2001 16:23
.)
Code of Ordinances
The City of Clearwater has had as their statutes,
a “Code of Ordinances” book containing 55 chapters of Code.
Until January 1999, it was the exclusive source of Code and Land
Development Code. Some chapters
dealt with the simple code and others dealt with the land development code.
When the new Community Development Code (CDC) was adopted in January 1999, many chapters were removed,
leaving the book of codes in somewhat of a Swiss cheese condition.
The Code
of Ordinances, is added, modified and deleted from via new legislation by the City
Commission through passage of ordinances. It
is maintained in Microsoft Word and is updated by the Municipal Code Corporation
in Tallahassee, Florida on a quarterly basis.
The hard copy updates and unabridged electronic copies are furnished
quarterly to the City Clerk.
A
copy of
Code of Ordinances, missing a number of chapters (e.g., Chapter 20, Nuisances),
is provided by the City Clerk and is available on line. Click here
to view it.
Land Development Code (Now called the Community Development Code)
When
the Community Development Code (CDC) was adopted on January 21,
1999, it caused the removal of a number of chapters of the still
current Code of Ordinances, leaving the book of codes with lots
of missing chapters. The
new CDC consists of eight articles of land development code,
which are numbered, in a completely independent fashion from the
Code of Ordinances. The full codified
(through Ordinance 6595-00) version of the CDC finally went
on line at the Municipal Code Corporation (MCC) in Tallahassee
on November 10, 2000. This was the first time since
it's adoption on January 21, 1999 that the official, full and
current version of the Community Development Code had ever been
available. Unlike the MCC version, the copy on our Website is downloadable.
On
August 19, 1999, the City Commission adopted Ordinance
6417-99 making numerous changes to most of the articles.
Another, Ordinance 6507-00, was
adopted March 2, 2000 to make a single change to Article 8,
Definitions.
Shortly
after adoption of the new CDC on January 21, 1999, the city set
up a process called the “Six Month Review”.
The idea was to come back in six months after having
experience with the new CDC’s operation and determine what
needs fine-tuning. In
reality, it was closer to 18 months before any so-called review
began. When the
review did begin, the city’s Planning Department, the
Community Development Workshop, Community Development Board,
City Commission, various groups such as our CCHA, the Clearwater
and Beach Chambers of Commerce, and numerous other professionals
all contributed. On
June 15, 2000, Ordinance 6526-00 was
adopted to implement the first of three major "six month
review" changes and to remove the sections of the Code of Ordinances that
were replaced with the new CDC.
Ordinance 6573-00 was adopted
on August 3, 2000 as the second of three major "Six Month
Revue" revisions. The third one, Ordinance
6595-00, was adopted September 7, 2000.
Obtaining Your Own Copy of the Code
Florida
Statute Chapter 119.083 states that keepers of public records (that includes
ordinances, statutes, codes and land development codes) must provide to
requestors, copies of such records for no more than the actual cost of reproduction.
It goes on to say that the fact that records are kept and maintained
electronically, shall not hinder such reproduction to the requestor. The
entire Code of Ordinance can fit on a single floppy disk. The cost of such
reproduction is so minuscule that the cost of collection exceeds the value of
the reproduction costs and is therefore waived -- per Florida Statute. For
copies of the City Code of Ordinances and Community Development Code, the City
Clerk's office is the place to go. They should be able to accommodate such
requests. For Pinellas Code, the corresponding office is the County
Attorney's office. Good luck! |