One more picture. This is a straight back view from our lanai. The way the drainage easement slopes, our back fence is much lower than the sides.

I like lots of citrus so I would plant citrus, but that's just me. :)

Dahoon holly (Ilex cassine) is a nice evergreen tree. Some others that come to mind are Simpson stopper (Myrcianthes fragrans), loquat, and Eastern red cedar (Juniperus virginiana).

Floridayards.org has a database where you can plug in your plant needs and it will show you a list of plants with your search criteria - http://floridayards.org/fyplants/.

Many of our native hollies and viburnums will sucker profusely so keep that in mind if you are looking at any of those.

Have you thought about some cold hardy bamboo varieties, podocarpus, or pineapple guava?

Pineapple guava would be a good candidate ... forgot about that one.

Clumping bamboo keeps spreading out creating a larger clump and it is labor intensive to dig out to keep it where you want it. It may become a problem with your fence later on down the road. I, personally, would not do bamboo next to a pvc fence. Seriously, you'd need an electric saw that would work in the soil to get it cut out and keep it in bounds. I know this first hand. I have both clumping and running. The running is the easiest to cut to keep in bounds. I can cut through it with lobbers. The clumping gets so densely packed it is pretty much impossible to cut through ... or at least I have not found a way. Just my two cents, but with your type of yard I would avoid bamboo.

Clumping Bamboo is actually very very easy to control. You just have to know what you are doing with it. It requires about 3 seconds a week for each clump... New shoots are easy to see popping up and you literally knock them over with your foot and the new shoot stops growing. No need for loppers or chainsaws or extreme maintenance needed, just a little bit of knowledge.

I had a feeling you were going to insult my intelligence since you're a 'pro'. lol

Yes, you can most certainly knock over the new shoots if you keep up with it, but sometimes that's easier said than done. I think it depends entirely on ones situation.

No insult intended... Just a little bit of advice to pass on. Another idea for the area may be some Livistonia Decipiens Palms. They grow pretty slow but you can purchase them already to the height that you are looking for... I have heard of them being grow as far north as Central Georgia with no issues.

We ended up going back to the hedge with podocarpus. We planted in front of the easement.

Wow those are some big podocarpus. Were they 7gal material?

These were 15 gallon

I am sure that was quite expensive.