In the recent opinion in Broward County v. G.B.V. International, Ltd., Case No. SC93115 (Fla. June 7, 2001), the Florida Supreme Court referred the following question to the Rules of Judicial Administration Committee of the Florida Bar for study:

Whether the Court should implement a rule requiring written final decisions with detailed findings of fact in local land use actions that are subject to review in the courts.

     Since this question is important to many members of the Section, the Executive Council created an ad hoc committee to address the Rules of Judicial Administration Committee. The membership of the ad hoc committee is intended to represent landowners, developers, public interest groups, and local governments. In addition to the co-chairs, the ad hoc committee membership is: Terrell Arline, Joni Armstrong Coffey, T.R. Hainline, Gary E. Oldehoff, Karl Sanders, and Susan L. Trevarthen.

     The ad hoc committee has written and submitted a memorandum to the Rules of Judicial Administration Committee. All of the members of the ad hoc committee recommended that a judicial rule should not be promulgated, because local governments are not courts that are subject to the Supreme Courts’ rulemaking authority. The members of the ad hoc committee recognized that the Supreme Court could declare that the Constitutional guarantee of due process requires written final decisions with detailed findings of fact for local land use actions. The members of the ad hoc committee disagreed on the necessity and the wisdom of such a ruling, and the remainder of the memorandum sets forth three viewpoints on the subject: applicants’, local governments’ and citizens’. The ad hoc committee’s memorandum can be viewed on the Section’s webpage, www.eluls.org, under “Special Projects."