LAKEWOOD RANCH — After listening to Joe McClash and Jon Thaxton debate Hometown Democracy for an hour Tuesday night in Town Hall, an audience of 64 seemed split.

"I’m against it,” said Joycene Harwood, of Parrish. "If you look at the way people vote, they come in unprepared to vote on the amendments. They vote for presidents but they don’t vote on amendments.”

"I support it,” said Larry Miller, of Lakewood Ranch. "To me, the people ought to be given the final say on issues impacting them.”

Perhaps the split was also a credit to McClash and Thaxton, Republican county commissioners from Manatee and Sarasota, respectively, who seemed to capably defend their positions on Amendment 4. If approved Nov. 2, Amendment 4 would alter the Florida Constitution by requiring any change to a local government’s comprehensive land use plan to be put to a vote of the people.

There would be roughly 10 comp plan decisions put before voters, McClash and Thaxton agreed.

The debate was hosted by the Lakewood Ranch Democratic Club.

Thaxton said he thinks Amendment 4 is wrong because it will force the public to make decisions at the ballot that they haven’t really had an interest in researching. Most of the comprehensive land use changes are highly technical, he said.

He called it "force-fed democracy.”

To drive home his point, he asked the three or four in the audience from Sarasota County what they could tell him about the six recent changes proposed by Sarasota commissioners to Sarasota County’s comprehensive plan. None could come up with even one.

Thaxton acknowledged that if one of the six had been a controversial issue it might be different, but all six were technical. Thaxton believes this is the flaw in Amendment 4, that every single comp plan change would have to go to referendum, not just ones that may impact many people.

McClash’s stance was that, in the end, giving the residents the final stamp of approval is a safeguard.

"I can’t see what harm it would cause to allow you, the citizens, to put a stamp on a comp plan,” McClash said. "Amendment 4 finally allows Floridians to cast the final vote on whether a comp plan is right or wrong for the community. It’s all about what is good for the place we call home. It provides protections for our quality of life.” More