Why is the BCC's Consulting Team Working against the BCC: Part III--A Tremendous Push for Housing on OLF 8

The apparently relentless push for housing on OLF-8 by DPZ, given what the public is saying, seems akin to the trope about a square peg and a round hole...

Housing on the OLF-8 property was always a NO for me and my vote.  I knew the majority of my constituents agreed with that one point---by an overwhelming majority.  They know what I know already as a 17-year resident of Beulah right on 9-Mile Road.  We have too much residential already and our infrastructure has not kept up---and so NO, these citizens DON'T want any more housing on the OLF-8 field, period, thank you very much!

Two automated, large-pool statistically-significant polls that have been run county-wide among registered voters confirmed this.  The first one was run in August of last year.  The last one was run less than one month ago.  What do they both have in common?  Two important things: First off-folks don't want housing on OLF-8 and secondly--folks want us to pursue high-paying, high tech jobs on OLF-8.  A huge majority of the respondents county-wide want this.

Now, there are some who do not understand statistics and polling and believe these surveys should not "be trusted" because these persons critical of the surveys, themselves individually,  were not called to give input.  Others attack the credibility of the firm that conducted the poll.  But to do so really, really spotlight's someone's ignorance.  These polls were automated, run by an auto-dialer with touchtone voting.  So-regardless of who runs the auto dialed telephone poll---it has no bearing on the outcome or the results.  The results are the results are the results--whether your best friend or worst enemy asks the questions via this sort of a computerized system. So to attack the results is simply a ridiculous, feeble, and disingenuous tactic that has no basis in logic.  The final feckless argument I hear is "The questions were leading!!"

Again--this is outrageous.  Look at a couple of examples of the questions:

"Should the majority of the OLF 8 land, by Navy Federal, be used for more housing and retail shops; or

companies that offer high-paying jobs?" (pretty straightforward question--and nearly 2/3 of the respondents chose jobs--not housing)

"Should Escambia County do more to support high-wage, light manufacturing and Information technology jobs, at OLF 8?" (again--a pretty straightforward question--and more than 2/3 of the respondents chose jobs)

So, assuming what these polls indicate and what I know as the elected representative of this district that went to 8,637 houses personally during my election knows---folks want jobs not houses--- why do our consultants continue to push the residential development narrative on the board? 

Is it because someone else wants residential and NOT jobs? 

In the email dump from late last week that I have discussed extensively on this blog-- I see emails where one member of the "DPZ team" on August 26th denies a copy of the Weitzman Economic study to our own Economic Development Partner Florida West's  Director Scott Luth.  This is after the county has already provided the report to board members and identified it as a public record.  Why say no to this reasonable request by a key stakeholder?  This led to a reply by Scott Luth of Florida West which now, given what has transpired since then, seems prescient...

"..because the document has now been leaked and or intentionally briefed to the local new paper [sic] ahead  of the public receiving and understanding your presentation, I now have to believe that your planning process is completely suspect and unfortunately cannot be completely trusted.  Everything from this point forward will now appear to be a biased process to fit someone's predetermined outcome.."

Meanwhile--a full two-weeks prior to this exchange, above,  between DPZ and our County Economic Development Partner--emails indicate DPZ spokesman Travis Peterson and NFCU Public affairs manager Bill Pearson (who indicates in an August 14th email he has already been provided the study) discuss this preliminary study report.  And DPZ spokesman Travis Peterson spotlights to Bill Pearson the pages in the report where residential development is apparently supported and encouraged by the data.  Travis Peterson writes "Again, remember this is DRAFT--- but check out p. 248-251 (per PDF pages, not the printed page numbers). Context on agrihood is neat...p.238 PDF)"

Read the draft study for yourself here--look at pages 238 and 248-251.  Housing information.

What's behind this consultant's tremendous push for housing on this field?