With incorporation off the table for now, Poinciana community leaders who rallied both for and against establishing a city government are looking for other ways to combat Poinciana’s major infrastructure and social problems.

“We pretty much found ourselves back at square one,” Keith Laytham, an advocate for incorporation, said.

Both the Osceola County and Polk County legislative delegations decided last month not to sponsor bills that would have brought the issue of incorporating Poinciana to Tallahassee in the upcoming legislative session. Only state Rep. Darren Soto, whose district 49 includes Kissimmee but no part of the proposed city of Poinciana, made a motion to put the incorporation on the ballot for Poinciana residents.

“It did give us a little scare,” Jeff Goldmacher, who acted as a spokesman for the opponents to incorporation, said. “But, as I understand it, he was just having some fun.”

Soto’s motion died without a second. The legislators who do represent Poinciana residents told their constituents during an Oct. 27 public meeting that they would not support incorporation, given that residents were so passionately divided.

Poinciana’s problems range from increased crime and prevalence of gangs to poorly maintained roads and neighborhoods without streetlights, landscaping or cohesive infrastructure, residents have said. Large portions of Poinciana also lack community facilities, like parks, supermarkets, retail stores and churches.

However, the condition of neighborhoods within the Association of Poinciana Villages, which makes up the heart of Poinciana, vary: from Solivita, whose residents pay additional fees for the upkeep of their community, to villages on the Polk County side without much infrastructure at all. Furthermore, most residents who live outside the association's area but were included within the proposed boundaries of the city are pleased with the state of their neighborhoods and the level of service the county government provides.

Lita Epstein – spokeswoman for Save Our Solivita, a movement against incorporation within the retirement community – said if residents still want to make Poinciana a city, they should “lower their sights and take out the communities that are not part of the APV.”

“They don’t share the same problems, nor do they share the same solutions,” she said. “We’re not giving up. We just think there’s a better solution than adding another layer of government.”

Common facility districts
One option Epstein and others have said could help communities in Poinciana would be establishing common facility districts, which allow neighborhoods to become government entities under jurisdiction of their respective county. The districts then could make infrastructure improvements with funds raised specifically from residents within that area.

It’s an option that has worked in Osceola County for the neighborhoods of Crescent Lakes and, most recently, Cypress Woods, Epstein said. Both neighborhoods were inside the proposed boundaries for Poinciana.

Cypress Woods became a district just this year. The residents of the 692 units off Cypress Branch Road, north of Cypress Parkway, pay $250 per year. In the current fiscal year, those special assessments are slated to raise $173,000, which is budgeted for services like landscaping of common areas, irrigation repairs and electricity at the main entrances as well as the financial and record-keeping services the county is facilitating.

The Osceola County Commission established an ordinance streamlining the process of common facility districts in December 2006. Before that, Crescent Lakes, which straddles South Poinciana Boulevard on the northern end of Poinciana, was classified as a “maintenance district.” The Crescent Lakes maintenance district, which operated in same way as the current common facility districts, was first established in 1995, Amanda Field, special assessments coordinator for the county said.

The county has three other common facility districts outside of the Poinciana area: Indian Ridge Villas, Indian Creek and Indian Point.

While there are no such districts on the Polk County side of Poinciana, Polk County government does have a similar concept, called a special street lighting district, which allows residents to pay special assessment fees in order to raise funds for streetlights.

Committee for the Advancement of Poinciana
Now that the incorporation battle is over, Goldmacher has said the Committee Opposed to Poinciana Incorporation, or COPI, which organized several neighborhoods and groups under one umbrella – will convert to the Committee for the Advancement of Poinciana.

“We’re looking at the seven or eight things that … they said were concerns of the residents,” he said.

Goldmacher, who’s acted as the spokesman for COPI, said the committee would be trying to work with local businesses, including the Kissimmee/Osceola County Chamber of Commerce’s Poinciana Area Council. He also said he felt that both the Osceola County and Polk County police departments were giving more attention to Poinciana. Addressing a growing gang problem in Poinciana, however, has to involve more than increased law enforcement, he said.

“When you have nothing for kids to do, they gravitate to gangs because it gives them some sort of activity,” he said.

The new committee would try to bring Boy Scout troops to Poinciana, Goldmacher said.

“I’m a big believer in the Scouting program, being a product of it. That’s one thing we can get the kids involved in (and) that requires very little money,” he said.

He also said local businesses could sponsor some little league teams, as Cypress Cove has done in the past.

“If we can get the kids involved in this sort of thing, they won’t get involved in gangs,” he said. “Slowly but surely, the gangs are going to die, and that’s going to help Poinciana.”

Goldmacher, who lives in Cypress Cove outside of the Association of Poinciana Villages, said the challenge would be in the perception of the new committee as outsiders.

“Eleven of the 13 communities that submitted (anti-incorporation) petitions were basically non-APV communities,” he said. “We’re not sure if we’re going to be accepted as outsiders to try to come and work with the APV.”

More attention for Poinciana
Any help for Poinciana would be appreciated, Laytham said, adding that he is optimistic that the attention the community has received through the incorporation battle has at least raised awareness.

“A year ago, there wasn’t a lot of hope within the community that they could do anything,” he said. “The community has become much more aware of the situation, the counties are much more aware of our situation. The residents of the APV have become more aware of potential of community.”

He said the residents would start exploring other possibilities, perhaps establishing special taxing districts and especially improving the existing homeowner’s association. To that end, the Association of Poinciana Villages board of directors will be voting in new members Feb. 9.

Even incorporating remains a possibility, though different boundaries that leave out the outlying communities that were so opposed to being included within a new city government would require a new incorporation study. The last study, started in January of 2009, took the better part of the year.

Overall, the best change for Poinciana has been in the increased participation of its residents, Laytham said. The best example came when almost a thousand residents showed up at the Oct. 27 meeting with legislators, he said. Committee meetings held before then to decide on a city charter for Poinciana garnered only about 100 people at the most.

“We blew the doors off the Liberty High School auditorium. For any type of community having that much interest I think is quite commendable,” Laytham said. “Since Oct. 27, there has been even more interest generated within the communities.”

That participation level can now be applied to changing Poinciana’s perception as a “crime-filled ghetto” to a nice place to raise families, he said.

“I think the community overall will be better off,” Laytham said. “I’m optimistic that we’ll come up with something that will help solve some of these problems.”