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These days, Fred Coyle is the sort of person who looks a gift horse in the mouth.

Especially if the horse is from the state and the mouth is full of teeth.

Last week, Florida Department of Transportation officials offered an idea to jump-start the widening of Davis Boulevard with $20 million.

It was just a year ago that FDOT withdrew funding for Davis Boulevard improvements, citing escalating costs of road work throughout Southwest Florida.

But, on Wednesday, Don Scott, Collier County transportation planner, told Coyle and other members of the Metropolitan Planning Organization, that the state DOT had proposed that Collier County come up with $20 million toward widening of Davis from Santa Barbara to State Road 951 from two lanes to six and the state would repay the money in five years.

The plan would get Davis Boulevard back on track to be completed in five years.

That’s the problem, as Coyle sees it.

Under new growth management laws just passed by the Legislature, development is more likely to occur along a road slated for improvement within five years. If road construction is to begin in the first three years of a five-year plan, development can proceed as long as the developer pays his portion of road improvements. The payment, called Proportionate Fair Share, allows development to proceed, regardless of whether the road actually is going to be finished before the development.

Coyle has been the Collier County Commission’s chief critic of the Proportionate Fair Share concept, saying it takes away the county’s ability to control the pace of development along busy road corridors. If a road is slated to be under construction in three years, and it takes two years to build, a developer could get close to five years of use out of a congested road before the improvements are in place, Coyle points out. Plus, there’s always a chance permitting or budget troubles will prevent the county from keeping to its schedule, adding more years to the road capacity deficit.

Coyle suspects the state’s change of heart regarding funding Davis improvements comes as a result of recent commission decisions. In one case, commissioners refused to renew development rights for a project in the corridor that didn’t get under way before its original permits lapsed. In another case, the commission refused to grant a developer an entrance onto County Road 951 until road improvements are complete.

Coyle is convinced the state bureaucracy is intent on allowing growth in Collier County to proceed apace. He relates a tale of how he lobbied in Tallahassee this past legislative session for tougher growth management laws. Administrators and representatives seemed agreeable, he said, but ultimately the changes Coyle advocated weren’t approved. Coyle believes the Davis Boulevard offer is more of the same. The hidden bureaucracy imposing its will, regardless of the wishes of local elected leaders. “You won’t get anyone to tell you that,” Coyle said.

He’s correct. FDOT spokeswoman Debbie Tower says the state interest is nothing more sinister than helping the county get a needed road project done sooner. Key from the state’s viewpoint is getting landowners along the corridor to donate right of way for the road. Then money the state had planned to spend for right of way several years from now might be used to pay the county back for actual construction, Tower said. She stressed that the county and state are still only in discussion about the idea. “Nothing finalized by any means,” she said.

When the state pulled its support for Davis Boulevard, the project fell off the county’s five-year road-building plan. Without the state offer, Scott says, he doesn’t know when it might work its way back into the plan.

It will be up to Coyle and his fellow commissioners to decide if the risk of developers taking advantage of Proportionate Fair Share is worth getting the road widened earlier.

With so many details still to work through, the question probably won’t come before commissioners before September.

Until then, Coyle continues to be suspicious. “This is certainly an interesting dilemma for the county,” he said.

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E-mail Brent Batten at bebatten@naplesnews.com.