In Hot Pursuit

In Hot Pursuit

By Sean Roth

Real Estate Editor

Florida Sen. Mike Bennett, R-Sarasota-Manatee, rarely minces words. He's that way about the Scripps Research Institute and Palm Beach County, selected as the Florida home for the institute.

"We funded the institute," Bennett says. "We put up the $310 million for Palm Beach County, and Palm Beach County has clearly screwed that deal up. I think it's time we give somebody else a shot."

Bennett thinks the 91,000-acre Babcock Ranch would be ideal.

He plans to introduce legislation for the next session that would transfer the $310 million that was designated to help fund the establishment and construction of the research center to be used to purchase 74,000 acres of environmentally sensitive land in Babcock Ranch. And then the plan would be to bring Scripps to Babcock Ranch.

"We were going to do that anyway," Bennett says, referring to the state purchasing those 74,000 for $300 million. "For us to put that up, I would squeeze the developer, Syd Kitson, for say 500 acres or 700 acres for the research portion of it. That would be the trade-off for him."

For Bennett, the legislation is first about preserving Scripps in the state - a situation that is tenuous at the moment. Earlier this year, state environmentalists prevailed in court from allowing Scripps to build a portion of its 1,919-acre campus on Mecca Farms north of Northlake Boulevard and west of Palm Beach Gardens in Palm Beach County. Environmental groups claim a major development at Mecca Farms and the surrounding properties would impact the Everglades restoration project and Loxahatchee River negatively and create urban sprawl.

To Bennett's surprise, Palm Beach County elected officials are receptive to Bennett's idea. "Palm Beach normally doesn't invite me to dinner," Bennett says. "[But] they recognize the fact that Palm Beach County has done a horrible job. They have irritated the entire environmental community. They have irritated the anti-sprawl community. I think they have irritated the Scripps community because they can't seem to get a decision done."

The saga begins

Palm Beach County's Business Development Board, the Governor's Office of Tourism, Trade and Economic Development and Enterprise Florida began discussing possible sites with Scripps in September 2003. Days later, Scripps officials narrowed the list of possible areas to Palm Beach and Orange County.

In October 2003, Gov. Bush announced that Scripps was planning a major science center for Palm Beach County. The governor said the new Scripps research center would generate more than $1.5 billion in income for Floridians, create 40,000 new jobs and increase the gross domestic product of the state by $3.2 billion in 15 years.

To help attract Scripps to Florida, the Legislature voted to give the institute $310 million in assistance but only if it met certain job-creation and development deadlines.

The county agreed as part of the deal to spend $137 million on Scripps' new facilities, but the county would own the 100-acre Scripps site for 30 years or until Scripps reached another job-creation threshold. Scripps planned to build a 365,000-square-foot facility by 2006. That schedule has proved difficult to meet.

In November 2003, Scripps announced it planned to develop on 1,919 acres at the Mecca Farms. A month later, Scripps and Florida Atlantic University reached an agreement for FAU to build a 40,000-square-foot science building on its Jupiter campus to serve as Scripps' temporary work space.

Four months later, March 2004, to speed up wetland reviews, the Florida Department of Community Affairs decided to review only the main Scripps piece, about 1,919 acres, and not the impact of the entire biotech village. Environmentalists contended the study should have considered the entire area, including expansion plans for the North County General Aviation Airport and 6,500 acres owned by Pratt & Whitney.

But under threats of lawsuits from environmentalists and neighborhood NIMBYs who opposed increased traffic, in June 2004, the Palm Beach County Commission voted to study alternative locations for the institute.

Two months later, the county commission asked Scripps' board of trustees to consider moving the development to Palm Beach Gardens or Jupiter. A week later, The Palm Beach County Environmental Coalition filed a lawsuit asking a court to reverse a permit by the South Florida Water Management District, mainly on the grounds that the district did not consider the impact of additional development plans on the Everglades or the Loxahatchee River.

A parade of lawsuits from other enviro groups followed - including from the Environmental & Land Use Law Center on behalf of the 1000 Friends of Florida, the Florida Wildlife Federation, the Loxahatchee River Coalition and Sierra Club.

In spite of this, the Scripps board unanimously voted to continue building on the Mecca Farms sites, principally because of its recruitment efforts in expectation of the building on the site.

While the lawsuits progressed, anti-Scripps protests increased.

On Dec. 20, 2004, the county purchased the Mecca Farms site for $60 million. And on Sept. 23, 2005, Scripps started construction on the first phase of its research center on the Mecca Farms site, which focused on building three laboratory and research-support buildings. The development was scheduled for completion in late 2007.

Last month, however, U.S. District Judge Donald Middlebrook, hearing one of the suits filed by the Environmental & Land Use Law Center, halted construction of Biotech Parkway, the sole thoroughfare into the development, and ruled that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers needed to re-examine plans for the development. With a review of the site entailing a multi-year environmental study, the ruling effectively stymied development on Mecca Farms.

On Nov. 22, the county stopped construction, and Scripps' search for a site began again.

This, of course, has attracted an army of suitors. In addition to Sen. Bennett, Florida Rep. Randy Johnson, R-Celebration, is considering creating a biomedical enterprise zone for Scripps in his district. Meanwhile, according to an article published in the Palm Beach Post, Palm Beach County commissioners have hired eight lobbying firms, at a cost of $385,000 this year, to stop legislative attempts to affect Scripps' development in Palm Beach County.

Babcock Ranch unique?

Meantime, Bennett has been refining his strategy. His sales pitch focuses on preserving the solvency of the Florida Forever Program - the state's $300 million-a-year land-buying program - while creating a new town on Babcock Ranch.

"They get a brand new town, with brand new schools," Bennett says. "Affordable housing, uncrowded streets. And they get to have an entire high-tech city built around the idea of education and research. It will be the most high-tech city in the United States if, in fact, we can pull it off."

Addressing the obvious interest from Orlando, Bennett points to the Orlando area's congestion.

"With Orlando, you get Mickey Mouse," he says. "You get an Orlando Airport that's already a zoo. Here we've got an uncrowded international airport. We've got the water, Orlando doesn't. There is no comparison."

Kitson's representative had no comment, but Bennett says the developer has indicated support for the idea to him. "What developer in the world wouldn't be," Bennett says. "It's like building a shopping center and having Saks Fifth Avenue. But Kitson to his credit is very much downplaying the idea. He doesn't want to upset anybody; he just wants to get Babcock bought."

Russell Schweiss, a spokesman for the governor's office, says site selection is being left entirely up to Scripps, and the office has no position as to any of the remaining sites. Asked about the financial penalties inherent in the Scripps' contract with the state, Schweiss says that none of the current difficulties has changed the amount of money available to the non-profit biomedical research group.

Similarly, Preston Robertson, vice president and general counsel for the Florida Wildlife Federation, was supportive of any site that is environmentally suitable.

"We just felt the [Mecca Farms] site they chose was highly inappropriate," Robertson says. "Our position was that the construction required a proper environmental impact statement on how [the Everglades] would be affected."

On the issue of Babcock Ranch, Robertson says, Florida Wildlife Federation is supportive of the Legislature's attempt to purchase the environmentally sensitive land. The organization's only criticism at the moment with the purchase is that it could gut the Florida Forever fund.

Scripps officials did not return calls.

"The number one thing is to keep Scripps in Florida," Bennett says. "We need that economic engine. That is my number one thing. After that, my number two is to bring them here. And I think we've got the best shot at it. It would be great for the whole West Coast. Can you imagine having that type of resource available?"

THE SCRIPPS RESEARCH INSTITUTE

WHO: The Scripps Research Institute is the world's largest, private non-profit biomedical research facility. Founded in 1961 by a small group of immunopathologists, the institute has become internationally recognized for its research into immunology, molecular biology, cell biology, chemistry, neurosciences, autoimmune diseases, cardiovascular disorders and cancer.

Diseases Scripps is studying: stroke and heart disease, cancer, neurological disorders, viral diseases, alcoholism and chemical dependency, diabetes, autoimmune diseases, and kidney dysfunction.

Where: Currently housed in laboratory buildings with more than 1,000,000 square feet of space near the University of California, San Diego in La Jolla, Calif. Scripps owns 14.7 acres of the 35 acres. Scripps owns 410,500 square feet of laboratory space and leases 573,500 square feet of laboratory space in 12 buildings and about 60,800 square feet of administrative space in three buildings.

Surrounding the Scripps main site is a collection of about 300 biotechnology companies.

Staff: 2,800, with 287 faculty members, about 800 postdoctoral fellows, 164 graduate students and more than 1,500 technical and administrative support personnel.