Palm Harbor Advantages And Disadvantages

PALM HARBOR, FLORIDA

THE COST AND BENEFITS OF INCORPORATION

The Palm Harbor community in Pinellas County is still unincorporated as of now. But it is not as if there had never been any effort to incorporate the community into a city. Palm Harbor would have been the 25th city under the Pinellas County in the state of Florida. There were bills before pushing for its incorporation but they did not get the support of the landowners. Thus, those bills died and for now, Palm Harbor remains a community of its own.

Palm Harbor is a largely residential community with a population of over 57,000 people. Being a large community, the U. S. Census Bureau has chosen this place as one of its Census-Designated Place to keep track of its statistics. There

Supporters of incorporation say that the advantages include access to additional and better public services such as police protection, trash and snow removal, sanitary sewers and wastewater treatment, street construction, and maintenance, schools, health protection, comprehensive land use planning or zoning, and utility services. They also say that being incorporated will increase the market value of their homes since it is part of a city and has access to public services. Supporters also maintain that being incorporated can help reduce the cost of utility rates since you are sharing the cost with a larger community or bigger population. They say that another advantage of being incorporated is having a local representation in the government aside from the county level. This way, their concerns as a community can be heard and acted upon whereas, at the county level, it may be difficult to have county officials focus on the concerns of a particular community. The disadvantages of living in an incorporated city or town are an increase in taxes to accommodate the additional public services and being subject more restrictive rules and regulations mandated by local, state, and federal