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THE SUNCOAST NEWS

Published: February 12, 2008

There are people in the Palm Harbor area who appear dead serious about exploring whether to turn all or a portion of unincorporated North Pinellas into a city. The Palm Harbor Coalition, the group exploring the incorporation question, is seeking people willing to lend a hand. The panel needs, among others, people with experience in areas of local government such as planning and budgeting, according to Lesley Klein, one of the founders of the coalition.

People with skills that would come in handy while assessing whether turning Palm Harbor – and maybe Ozona, Crystal Beach and East Lake, if the people there are in favor, coalition leaders say – into a city should consider signing up.

The standard argument against incorporation is a municipal government will just add another layer of taxation without providing services any modern metropolitan county could provide. The counterargument from many pro-incorporation people is that Pinellas County is not giving the Palm Harbor area its "fair share" of county services or revenue from the Penny for Pinellas sales tax.

According to Klein, the coalition's goals include getting that "fair share of tax dollars" and lower taxes. Those goals might not be as contradictory as they seem on first hearing. Nevertheless, sorting the pros and cons of incorporation will be no easy task, so the more people involved the better.

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