Someone please tell me where I am.

Over the course of my life, I have claimed residence in well over a dozen different places in 2 countries.  For the last 15 years or so, I have called various locations in Charlotte County Florida my home.  Having traveled this earth, I have never seen so many people so utterly confused about where they live.  To quantify this, I think I may need to do a little explaining for my friends that do not live in my county.

Charlotte Harbor is where the Myakka and Peace rivers converge to empty into the Gulf of Mexico.  It is generally accepted that any area north of the harbor and between the two rivers is Port Charlotte, although Port Charlotte is not actually an incorporated town in the state of Florida.  (More on this in a bit).  South of the Peace River and the area eastward is loosely referred to as Punta Gorda, even though the area contains two separate incorporated cities: Punta Gorda and Cleveland.  West of the Myakka river is considered Englewood.   This all seems simple on the surface but it seems that some residents here work really hard to screw it up.

On the north side of the Peace River and east of Interstate 75 is a deed restricted community called Deep Creek.  For some reason, the folks in Deep Creek seemed to have made a community decision that they don’t want to be labeled as living in Port Charlotte or Charlotte County (where they actually are) and have taken to telling anyone who will listen that they live in Punta Gorda.  Despite the fact that an entire river separates them from the actual city limits of Punta Gorda.  Because of this, it is all too common to find some poor lost person wandering through Punta Gorda searching for an address that is 10 miles away on the other side of the bridge.

We also see this a lot in the Englewood area where addresses are listed as being in Port Charlotte.  This one happens mostly on business listings in advertisements and on the internet where a map program generally labels any residence in Charlotte County as Port Charlotte.  Although this is for the most part accurate, it can be extremely frustrating to realize you need to drive an extra 20 miles to get to something you thought was right up the road.   The residents of Englewood generally recognize where they live however and they do not seem to be causing the confusion here.

Now, heading south of the rivers, we find our only 2 incorporated towns in Charlotte County.  Punta Gorda has established city limits. They have their own taxes and their own government and police force.  There are 2 very easy ways to tell if you live in the city of Punta Gorda.  If you pay your property taxes to the City of Punta Gorda, congratulations, you live in Punta Gorda.  If you can’t remember who you pay your taxes too, that’s OK.  Walk outside and look at the street sign on the street where you live.  Is it blue or green?  If it’s blue, you live in Punta Gorda, if it’s green, you do not.  If it’s made out of concrete, you live in The Ranchettes.  If it’s missing, you may want to consider moving to a better neighborhood.

I promised that we would talk about incorporation.  If you want your geographical area to be recognized as a city in the state of Florida, you need to fill out an application with the state and become incorporated.  This allows you to establish a local government and collect taxes and such.   About a hundred years ago or so, the area in Charlotte County east of Interstate 75 petitioned the state for incorporation as the city of Cleveland.  The state accepted the application and the City of Cleveland was born, only to promptly fade away.  You see, as funny as it sounds, the fine folks of Cleveland quickly forgot that they had become a city, and over the years the idea all but vanished.  Just over a decade ago, the local newspaper rediscovered that Cleveland was incorporated.  There was a sudden mad rush for a few residents wanting to run for mayor, only to drop it once again.

Now, I live in Cleveland.  When I tell people that I live in Cleveland they almost always ask: “Where?"  I try to be patient and explain to them that Cleveland  is a town and where it is located.  A lot of residents who actually live in Cleveland do not realize that they live in their own town.  They too are guilty of telling people that they live in Punta Gorda, which only adds to the confusion.  Once again, go check the color of the street sign on your road.  And finally, to add insult to injury, some of the folks who do live in Punta Gorda can’t even decide what the name of their own town is.  While most of the populace will refer to the town as “poonta gorda”, you still get the occasional die hard who just won’t let go of the Spanish pronunciation of “punt-ah gorda”.  Maybe it’s time for a community meeting so we can all sit down and figure out where the hell we are at.