Lake Worth petition ruling closely watched

By Nicole Janok

Palm Beach Post Staff Writer

Friday, October 13, 2006

lakeworth — As the legal battle over a hilltop area slated for a townhomes continues here, cities around the county and state are watching.

Palm Beach County League of Cities general counsel Trela White said a ruling in favor of residents who filed a lawsuit against Lake Worth, asking that the city hand over to elections officials a petition seeking a voter referendum for land-use and zoning changes, could affect all Florida cities.

"A lot of cities are watching this and they're all interested," White said.

Such a ruling could change the way all cities deal with development and comprehensive plans. Allowing residents to vote on every development that affected where they live might cloud the state's land development process, which relies on developers adhering to certain standards rather than winning over residents, White said.

"The whole idea is that zoning follows certain standards that must be met; it's not a popularity contest," she said.

According to state statute, citizens cannot challenge land-use and zoning changes for a development that affects five or fewer parcels of land.

But the lawsuit filed through the political action committee, Save Our Neighborhood, argues that a proposed 40-unit townhome development located near Lake Osborne would affect neighboring homes through increased density and traffic, and therefore residents should be allowed to vote on the issue.

Save Our Neighborhood attorney Lesley Blackner points to the city's charter, which allows residents to put ordinances on the ballot if at least 2,600 signatures are collected.

"Our theory was many parcels are affected by this ordinance, not just the property," Blackner said. "It's really a legal question as to how you interpret the statutes."

But White and City Attorney Larry Karns disagree.

"It goes against the state statute, which was developed to bring some objectivity to zoning and land-use cases," Karns said.

This week, city commissioners learned the city was granted another hearing in the case, which set aside Circuit Court Judge Edward Fine's decision in August that required the city to hand over the 2,600-signature petition to the county Supervisor of Elections Office.

A hearing is tentatively scheduled for the first week of November, where Karns will argue that the residents challenging the land-use changes are not property owners and therefore cannot argue that a development will affect their property.

"If you don't own land, how can you be affected by it in any way?" Karns questioned.

But Blackner said the new hearing will do nothing but delay the judge's decision to uphold Save Our Neighborhood's petition.

And she questions why the city is fighting so hard to protect a developer.

"Land-use power retained by local governments is to keep the developers happy," she said.

Minneola has gone and done it now

Lauren Ritchie
COMMENTARY

October 13, 2006

Farewell, Minneola.

Whatever you may be at this point in history is about to change beyond recognition.

This is simply Sociology 101.

Perhaps it is good to blow up Minneola and start anew. Or not.

But those who approved this monumental change have no clue what they did on Tuesday night. They were -- and always will be -- tangled in trivialities. Minneola council members voted to approve a subdivision that will double the city's current population.

Council members thought they were soooo smart, extracting $7 million from developers to help pay for the cost of growth. That's too pathetic to be funny.

The truth is that the city has a $17 million sewer plant under construction, and it must attract customers to pay for it. C'mon, subdivisions.

This time, however, the city really outdid itself.

The usual companions of growth -- crowded schools, jammed roads, destruction of wildlife habitat, depleted water supplies and degradation of lifestyle -- all will come with the Hills of Minneola and its 9,500 residents. That's the good news.

The bad news is that the city is destined to lose whatever sense of community it might now possess.

Places that have dealt with runaway growth longer than Lake County has are highlighted all over the Internet in studies about the effects. The common theme is regret that their essence was buried in the tumult of construction.

These communities failed to calculate the intangible troubles that come with rapid growth. The loss of a sense of identity tops the list.

When people from a single culture -- say, Puerto Ricans -- come to one area, as they have in Kissimmee, sociologists have a word for the process: acculturation. It's the exchange that goes on when two defined cultures are thrown together. Theoretically, the best attributes of each are adopted by the other.

But the Minneola situation is messier. It's like throwing humans into a Cuisinart set for "puree." These folks will come from a variety of cultures. They'll have their own ideas for education, what the grocery store should carry, how fast the police should come and how often garbage should be picked up. Simply put, in such quantities, newcomers do not assimilate. They take over.

Consider what happened to Lady Lake when The Villages arrived. It's an unhappy marriage. But perhaps Minneola has nothing worth saving and starting over is a good thing. Time will tell.

The amusing part, however, is what will happen to people such as David Yeager, Joe Teri and Ed Earl -- the three Minneola councilmen who voted for the Hills. The demographic shift that they've created will turn against them. They'll be gone, just like County Commissioners Catherine Hanson and Bob Pool.

Those pro-growth commissioners were tossed unceremoniously in August by the very folks who moved into all the subdivisions they approved. The newcomers came looking for a quieter life, and when they found their peace threatened, they struck back.

That process took a while because Lake is so big geographically. Minneola is smaller. Let the countdown start.

Lauren Ritchie can be reached at Lritchie@orlandosentinel.com or 352-742-5918.

How will our region look in year 2050?

Let's build near highways but protect environment, residents tell myregion.org.

Kevin Spear
Sentinel Staff Writer

October 13, 2006

Where would you put the extra 3.6 million people coming to Central Florida by 2050?

Thousands of residents who answered that question picked Orange City, Altamonte Springs, St. Cloud, Minneola, Cocoa and the University of Central Florida area, among others.

Now their choices may help shape the region's future growth plans.

Today, regional planners will unveil a preliminary map outlining where residents want new homes, shopping centers and parks to be located as the region potentially booms to more than 7 million people by 2050.

The sketch calls for concentrating growth along major highways including Interstate 4 and Florida's Turnpike while preserving wild spaces along the St. Johns, Wekiva and Kissimmee rivers as well as near the Green Swamp and Ocala National Forest.

The map is the consensus of more than 7,000 residents who participated in a series of workshops hosted by myregion.org during the past nine months.

The planning group is trying to develop a coordinated strategy for growth in the seven-county region that will limit sprawl, preserve environmentally sensitive lands and design communities served by mass transportation.

Upcoming steps

Creating a preliminary plan for where to concentrate growth was one of the first steps. Next, the group will develop more detailed maps that show how communities could be built. Some are to emphasize preserving land while others will focus on developing transportation corridors or designing communities where people can live and work.

In January, myregion.org will ask residents to vote online for what they like best.

From that, myregion.org workers are to develop by June a 50-year vision for growth and then deliver the report to leaders in Orange, Seminole, Volusia, Polk, Brevard, Lake and Osceola counties and 86 cities.

"What we will have is the moral authority of 7,000 people, whatever the number turns out to be, saying, 'Yes, this is the plan for how we want to grow,' " said myregion.org director Shelley Lauten. "It sets the framework to help people move through the decisions they will have to make for the next 50 years."

Such a growth scenario may never have legal backing but nonetheless could be a potent growth guide for city and county leaders, say myregion.org officials.

Hundreds of people are expected at today's presentation at the Renaissance Orlando Resort at SeaWorld, where they will be asked to begin strategizing about how to encourage local government leaders to take the vision seriously.

The sketches scheduled to be unveiled today were synthesized from comments at the public workshops that were digitized and run through computer programs to find common themes.

One surprise: The region's most identifiable city, Orlando, wasn't targeted for heavier growth in coming decades. The reason isn't clear, Lauten said, explaining that things could change as the maps are fine-tuned and finalized in coming months.

Another finding: People prefer more public transportation, said MetroPlan Orlando executive director Harold Barley.

"When we look to the future, it's got to be more than highways," he said. "That's been a loud and clear message."

Biggest challenge

The toughest task ahead will be to decide how to concentrate growth in certain areas. That could mean choosing whether and where to put high-rise apartment buildings, more town homes and housing developments on smaller lots coordinated around town squares.

"I'm a big believer in urbanism," said Carmen Dominguez, president of Homes by Carmen Dominguez and vice president of the Home Builders Association of Metro Orlando, who supports the growth strategy. "I used to just build big houses on big lots. Now I build houses on 35-foot lots, 40-foot lots and 1-acre lots. We need to utilize less acreage."

In some respects, it will be difficult to marry the myregion.org map of preferred growth patterns with what's really happening.

For example, major developers in recent years have begun to pursue plans to carve out massive subdivisions along the east shore of Lake Tohopekaliga, priming central Osceola County for one of the largest local population explosions ever.

So far, that potential growth in Osceola is not on the myregion.org map of preferred growth.

Lauten said the myregion initiative is not meant to stymie or otherwise derail city and county growth plans currently in place but rather to provide developers, environmental activists, government planners and citizens with a vision.

The preliminary results already are shaping opinions that the region has an alternative to continued sprawl as the population doubles.

"I'm not going to be here in 50 years," Lauten said. "If we're going to have a vision, it's got to be perpetuated beyond any one group of citizens."

Kevin Spear can be reached at kspear@orlandosentinel.com or 407-420-5062

Billboard deal rescues oaks, palms

After a public outcry, about half the doomed trees will stay on Kissimmee's busy U.S. 192 tourist corridor.

Daphne Sashin
Sentinel Staff Writer

October 13, 2006

KISSIMMEE -- Clear Channel Outdoor and Osceola County reached a preliminary agreement Thursday to save more than half of the 38 trees that were scheduled to be chopped down to clear the view of billboards on the West U.S. Highway 192 tourist corridor.

"I'm totally happy with that," said Hector Lizasuain, coordinator of the West 192 Redevelopment District. "I was going out there with the mind-set that we were going to lose all of them, and I was pleasantly surprised."

Most of the crape myrtles in the highway median will come down, but Clear Channel agreed Thursday afternoon to spare the tall palms and oaks on the side of the road. The state Department of Transportation said it would honor the billboard company's request.

"We just needed something in writing, and I understand that they were working on that," DOT spokesman Steve Homan said late Thursday. "In the meantime, we're not going to be removing anything."

The Orlando Sentinel reported Saturday that the DOT planned to remove 38 trees by Oct. 17 because they partially blocked the view of four Clear Channel advertising signs. The trees were planted about five years ago as part of a $29 million beautification project paid for by property owners along the tourist corridor.

Clear Channel and county officials had debated about the trees for years. County officials thought they had honored the state's 1996 rule requiring that drivers be able to see billboards for a total of 500 feet as they rode by. The billboard company said the trees had been planted illegally.

In July, Clear Channel demanded that DOT remove the trees, backed by a new law that says signs must have uninterrupted visibility for 500 feet. The law also gives billboard companies the right to retroactively order the removal of highway-beautification plantings that obscured the signs.

News of the trees' pending destruction sparked a public outcry. All week, Clear Channel was flooded with angry calls and e-mails from people who demanded that the company spare the trees, while petitions circulated in Osceola urging people to boycott the businesses that advertised on the company's billboards.

"Clear Channel Outdoor want the trees to come down! Shame on them!" Kissimmee resident Jim Spell wrote in an e-mail to the company and several elected officials Thursday.

Lizasuain had a crew begin cutting back the crape myrtles Tuesday in preparation for their removal the next day. The county was to have sawed down the flowering trees, while state road crews would have removed the larger oaks and palms.

But Wednesday morning, Lizasuain opened the Sentinel and read an editorial in which Craig Swygert, general manager of Clear Channel Outdoor's Orlando division, was quoted as saying he was willing to compromise on the number of trees to be cut down. Lizasuain then called his tree crew and halted their work order.

Swygert visited the site Thursday with Lizasuain and decided that the palms and oaks could stay if the county agreed to remove the cluster of 16 crape myrtles in the median. Five crape myrtles will remain.

"A compromise is better than no compromise," Spell said when told about Clear Channel's decision. "Tourists who visit Osceola County . . . are not going to remember they could see billboard signs across the street. But they might remember the beautiful flowering trees."

Daphne Sashin can be reached at dsashin@orlandosentinel.com or 407-931-5944.

Oh, there you go. If you think the flood maps are too restrictive just appeal. And when those business eventually flood and the insurance companies have to pay huge claims then raise their rates by 70% we'll wonder how it all happened and who was to blame.

Sort of like how we allow all of those million dollar homes to be built on the coastline right in the path of hurricanes and storm surges whose insurance the rest of us are all basically subsidizing. If you want to build where it's going to flood assume your own risk. If you can't afford it. Don't do it, but don't make the rest of us pay for your decision.

Flood map appeal is official
Impact on planned commercial projects concerns council

BY CHRISTOPHER CURRY
STAR-BANNER

OCALA - The Ocala City Council unanimously voted Tuesday night to appeal the proposed Federal Emergency Management Agency flood maps for all 13 FEMA flood zones in the city.

The FEMA maps would increase by 500 percent the acreage in the city that is in the floodplain. For homeowners, that could mean shelling out more money for flood insurance. But the city's appeal deals more with the impact that the maps could have on a series of planned commercial developments.

"The biggest problem we're running into right now is commercial developments," said City Engineer Bruce Phillips. "There are several commercial developments that are on hold because of this."

One of them is the 200,000-square-foot Wal-Mart Supercenter planned on 24 acres off North Pine Avenue near Northwest 28th Street. But Wal-Mart appears to have a backup plan in the works.

Delcala Properties Inc., an Orlando company which had owned the property near Northwest 28th Street, has an application going to the City Council in two weeks to change the land use on 37.8 acres between the 3500 to 3800 blocks of North Pine Avenue to the city's retail services category.

Ocala Planning director Tye Chighizola said Wal-Mart may go there if the flood map issue is not resolved. Wal-Mart representatives could not be reached for comment Wednesday afternoon.

The city paid engineering firm Black & Veatch approximately $44,000 to study several areas of the city added to the FEMA floodplain in preparation for an appeal.

While the process relies on technical data and FEMA methodology, City Manager Paul Nugent said the city believes Black & Veatch's data will show that the FEMA maps do not accurately reflect drainage retention areas the city has constructed to alleviate flooding.

Christopher Curry may be reached at chris.curry@starbanner.com or (352) 867-4115.

Water district, flood expert settle whistle-blower suit

By Robert P. King

Palm Beach Post Staff Writer

Friday, October 13, 2006

Last year, a Palm Beach County Circuit Court jury ruled that the South Florida Water Management District had improperly fired Jeff Dudey for questioning its handling of floods.

On Thursday, the district's board voted to pay Dudey and his attorneys $378,000 to go away.

The board unanimously approved a legal settlement that ends a decade of friction with Dudey, a former flood-control operator who had accused the district of ignoring mistakes that wiped out crops and caused canals to overflow into homes. He also complained that some co-workers viewed Internet pornography or were rumored to take naps on the job.

Neither side had much to say after Thursday's vote.

"We're very happy with the way it turned out," said Barry Silver of Boca Raton, one of Dudey's attorneys in his whistle-blower lawsuit. "Jeff was vindicated and he was compensated, and hopefully things will be fine over at the district."

District lawyer Scott Glazier read a one-line prepared statement, saying the parties had settled the case and "agreed that any further discussion of this matter would no longer be productive."

Dudey, who worked for the district for nearly 17 years before his firing in May 2002, had filed repeated complaints with officials as high as Gov. Jeb Bush. His bosses, in turn, described his questions as "frivolous, malicious and self-serving."

Region gets 'F' for evacuations
Among 37 U.S. metro areas, South Florida ranked low in a study of capacity to evacuate during emergencies, but the state's emergency management chief was skeptical.
BY PABLO BACHELET
pbachelet@MiamiHerald.com

WASHINGTON - South Florida ranked 34th among 37 major U.S. urban centers for its capacity to evacuate its population in the face of an emergency, the American Highway Users Alliance, a group that lobbies for more highways, reported Thursday.

The study said only the New York, Chicago and Los Angeles urban areas fared worse than South Florida. Overall, 20 U.S. metropolitan areas with a population of one million or more -- including South Florida -- got an ''F'' grade. Only the Kansas City, Mo., area obtained an ''A'' grade.

But Florida's emergency management chief expressed skepticism over the study's findings.

''You ever notice how there seems to be all these groups that will do these studies that will justify what their association wants to have done?'' asked Craig Fugate, who heads the state's emergency operations.

Fugate said the study assumes an extreme scenario in which an entire major urban area is evacuated, something he said was unlikely to occur even in a worst-case hurricane. He said that's because vulnerable coastal populations are moved to shelters within the counties, and building codes allow homes to withstand strong winds.

In a remote total evacuation case, he acknowledged, ``it would not be pretty.''

The American Highway Users Alliance brings together groups like bus companies, truckers and RV enthusiasts.

The study looked at an urban area's ability to evacuate its population in a 12-hour time period. For the study, South Florida included the inhabitants of Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties. With an estimated 5.3 million inhabitants, it is the nation's fourth-highest populated area in the study -- behind the New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco-San Jose metropolitan areas.

The Tampa-St. Petersburg area also received an ''F'' grade, although it obtained a score of 58.9, far better than South Florida's 36.9 score. Last-place Los Angeles received a 25.6 score. Orlando's urban area notched 74.1 -- a ``C.''

The final score -- called the ''evacuation capacity index'' -- combines three grades: the road capacity at the edge of the urban area, or the ''exit capacity''; the traffic flow within the urban area; and the percentage of people with access to cars.

The study factored in the real-life behavior observed during last year's Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, which showed that most people would use their cars to bail out. ''We're basically saying, we've got five million people here. If in an emergency we need to move them out, how many of them are we going to get out in 12 hours?'' Wendell Cox, an urban consultant and the study's author, told The Miami Herald by phone from Bangkok, Thailand, where he was traveling.

The answer is not many, he said.

South Florida ranks low in the study's exit capacity category: Roads leading out of the urban area can evacuate only 20 percent of the population over a 12-hour period, the third-worst in the nation. By contrast, the outer exits have the capacity to evacuate 98 percent of Kansas City's population over the same time period.

South Florida's low grade is partly because of geography: The region is hemmed in by the ocean and the Everglades. People in places like Orlando have evacuation routes located in all four directions. South Florida also has a high-population density: With 4,400 inhabitants per square mile, it ranks sixth among the 37 areas in the study.

South Florida obtained the sixth-worse score in the internal traffic flow, which uses the Texas Transportation Institute's indicator of traffic congestion in urban areas.

The region did well in automobile access, but so did the rest of the country: only New York got a ''B'' grade in that category.

Gregory Cohen, president and CEO of the American Highway Users Alliance, urged cities to engage in *''creative thinking'' to improve evacuations, noting that automobiles will ''always'' be the primary mode of evacuation.

He said the group decided to commission the study because state and urban evacuation plans did not explore ``these issues in any kind of consistent way.''

In June, the Department of Homeland Security issued its own assessment of disaster preparedness plans, of which evacuations were one component. Homeland Security concluded that cities needed to improve their plans for catastrophic events, such as a terrorist strike or a Category 5 hurricane, and noted that evacuation needed ``special attention.''

The alliance's report recommends more road capacity, increased auto accessibility through government or community-based programs, and better planning and coordination for mass-transit-dependent populations. Cohen said Homeland Security should establish a national evacuation reporting standard.

Fugate said adding more highways would be ''nice'' but is not likely to happen anytime soon. And he said the group's recommendations for more coordination have already been implemented.

Fugate also faulted the study for not addressing the question of how to fuel thousands of fleeing cars.

Residents demand action on insurance

The Associated Press

LARGO - About 200 homeowners demanded aggressive action to curb Florida's soaring insurance costs Thursday at a state meeting on insurance reform.

"When your CEOs are making $26 billion a year, we need to make some changes," said Ginny Stevans, president of Homeowners Against Citizens, a group protesting skyrocketing insurance costs at the state-created insurer of last resort.

Citizens Property Insurance Corp. has become the state's largest insurer as private companies fled in the wake of the back-to-back storms of the 2004-05 hurricane seasons.

During the seven hour meeting Thursday, the state's Property and Casualty Insurance Reform Committee focused on increasing ire against Citizens.

"If Citizens is not going to function as the insurer of last resort, we need to look at getting rid of it," said state Rep. Kim Berfield, R-Clearwater.

The committee also discussed lengthening the amount of notice an insurer must give before dropping a policyholder.

"The governor is very interested in any solutions we come up with," said Lt. Gov. Toni Jennings, the committee's chairwoman.

Cedar Key fired up about taxes Protest uses bonfire to draw attention to hikes

By KAREN VOYLES

Sun staff writer

CEDAR KEY - Before Oliver Bauer moved to this island city six years ago to become a small business owner, he was a chemist. On Thursday night, standing around a bonfire built to protest property tax hikes, Bauer became a philosopher, of sorts.

Bauer joined about 80 or so people who had gathered around the fire, many trying to draw analogies between the bonfire and tax disputes involving Levy County officials. Some residents claimed their property taxes had increased 400 or 500 percent in less than a decade.

"The only thing we can hope to gain with a bonfire is enough visibility for the state Legislature to take notice," Bauer said. Without some kind of legislative tax relief plan, Bauer predicted that "Cedar Key will end up looking like every other community along the coast" because only large corporate tourist businesses would be able to afford the taxes.

Bauer and his wife Doreen bought the 12-unit Faraway Inn in 2000, when the property taxes were $6,000 a year. Before they bought, The couple "tried to plan for everything with our business plan, even things like plane crashes and this was all before 9-11," Bauer said. "What we never even considered was a big jump like this in our property tax bill. It's gone up to $24,000 in just six years."

The idea of a bonfire to gather support to protest rising tax bills came from Bill Phillips, owner of Cedar Key Bed and Breakfast for the past five years.

"We are trying to get the attention of our county commissioners and property appraiser, but the ultimate goal is not this year," Phillips said, "it's at the legislature next year. We want tax reform," Phillips said. "The old formula doesn't make sense anymore."

Since the mid-1990s, Florida has limited annual increases in appraised values to 3 percent for those who have a homestead exemption. Department of Revenue officials said there is no cap on property tax increases for weekend and vacation homes, empty lots, rental property and other real estate that is not a primary residence which could be considered a homestead.

Levy County Property Appraiser Francis Akins said what many property owners don't understand is how little local control there is over property appraisals and how significant the consequences can be for failing to meet the Florida Department of Revenue's standards.

"We must be within 85 percent of market value on the homes we appraise according to the formula the state gives us," Akins said. Appraisals in all 67 counties are spot checked at least annually and in a worst case scenario, full-time residents in counties that fail to meet the 85 percent requirement could lose their homestead exemptions.

Levy County's 48,000 parcels of real estate had an appraised value of $947 million a decade ago, according to state records.

This past year, the value had more than doubled to $2.27 billion. "Coastal property prices have just gone up like you can't believe," Akins said. "We saw a sale down there this week for a small marina that was $1.8 million dollars. It's expensive to own land on the water."

Jimmy "Frog" Statham, who has owned property off and on in Cedar Key for years, said he agreed to host the bonfire on his bare, 10,000-square-foot lot next to the fire station so that people could see what a piece of property looks like that generates $7,000 a year in property taxes for the county.

Plans for Land Used for Mining Varied

By Tom Palmer
The Ledger
LAKELAND -- Thousands of acres of mined land stretching from southwest Polk County to northern DeSoto County will have other uses after the draglines leave, but some major property owners aren't ready to disclose what those uses will be.

One reason is that some landowners haven't completed a complex analysis of a good chunk of the land and another is because development and environmental protection strategies for this part of the state are unclear, Parker Keen said at the 21st annual Regional Phosphate Conference on Thursday at The Lakeland Center.

"Everyone is making plans for our property," said Keen, land manager for Mosaic, the company that was formed from last year's merger of IMC Phosphates and Cargill.

That's why doing its own planning makes sense for Mosaic, he said.

The potential outside influences include state and local highway officials, who have planned a variety of new toll roads through the area to promote various economic development plans; environmental agencies, which want to preserve land along river corridors and other prime habitat to protect water quality and endangered species; and major adjacent landowners, whose plans could affect the future of mined lands.

Keen said another factor will be the results of the Century Commission for a Sustainable Florida, which is scheduled to issue its first report in January outlining its initial recommendations on growth management.

"Steve Seibert, the chairman, told me they're going to put out a map and he told me I may not like the map," Keen said.

By January, Keen said, Mosaic officials will have completed an internal analysis of the company's land holdings, which total more than 250,000 acres in five counties, using a sophisticated analysis that includes maps and 142 data layers depicting everything from the locations of wetlands and bald eagle nests to the location of schools and fire stations.

Two other major landowners in the phosphate region have been researching their future land plans as well.

Jura Zibas, president of Clear Springs Land Co., talked about how her company is planning to use the 18,000 acres it purchased from IMC in 1999, 11,000 acres of which has been annexed by Bartow.

She said Clear Springs is pursuing development under what's called a sector plan, an option for developing large tracts of land that was added to the state growth laws in 1998.

"This is an alternative to the development of regional impact process," she said, referring to development review of megaprojects that had been a fixture of Florida's growth law for decades.

Zibas said the current conceptual plan calls for dividing the developable land on the property, a former phosphate mine, this way: agriculture, 6,000 acres; residential, 4,700 acres; industrial, 1,600 acres; retail/office, 470 acres; and employment center, 200 acres.

Some of the agricultural land is being planted with blueberries and sod. She said the sod will be used to supply turf for the landscaping in the project's later development phases.

Zibas said Clear Springs, along with other developers, faces numerous issues, including finding an adequate water supply as tighter restrictions are placed on water use in this part of the state and dealing with traffic, school capacity and other growth-related concerns.

Clear Springs' property lies on both sides of the Peace River and state environmental officials will be working with the company to increase the buffer zone along the river as part of what is called the Integrated Habitat Network.

The IHN is a plan to protect and, in some cases, reconnect waterways and other natural systems that were disrupted by mining.

The core of the IHN is 6,250 acres along the Peace River and some of its tributaries that were deeded to the state in 1987 in a legal settlement between the state and some phosphate companies over ownership of the land beneath and along the Peace River.

Kevin Claridge of the Florida Department of Environmental Protection's Bureau of Mine Reclamation said state officials acquired additional land for the corridors since 1987 through conservation easements or mining permits.

He said the challenge for the state is land management, which involves habitat and hydrologic restoration, development of recreational facilities and control of exotic plants and animals.

In addition to the Peace River, the work includes areas along the Alafia and Little Manatee rivers, Claridge said.

Tom Palmer can be reached at tom.palmer@theledger.com or 863-802-7535.

2 Local Agribusinesses Named Environmental Leaders

By YVETTE C. HAMMETT The Tampa Tribune

Published: Oct 12, 2006

BRANDON - In a state that depends on underground aquifers for much of its drinking water, conservation is key.

Two local agricultural businesses will receive the Florida Department of Agriculture's Environmental Leadership Award on Friday for doing their part to conserve water on a massive scale.

Riverview Flower Farm, best know as the growers of Florida Friendly Plants sold at Home Depot stores across the state, has come up with a system of drip-tube "fertigation" that is a more efficient way to feed plants and save money. Fertigation is irrigation using nutrient-rich water.

Growers Rick and Dave Brown draw water from their irrigation pond and filter it three times to prevent particles from clogging the drip lines. The lines, according to the Brown brothers, use 95 percent less water than overhead irrigation systems.

Riverview Flower Farm also uses clove-based products to repel leaf miner insects, which feed on and destroy plant leaves, and garlic-based products to repel white flies - both organic methods safe for the environment.

Using organic mixtures is safer for the customers who purchase the plants and for the employees at the farm, grower Kevin Hearne said in a statement issued by the Department of Agriculture.

The Browns also developed a growing medium that holds moisture longer than traditional soil to help the Florida Friendly Plants withstand harsh conditions at retail outlets.

"Perennials have always been something that people have struggled with, and a lot of people don't know what a perennial in Florida is at all," Rick Brown said. "We took plants that people were successful with in Florida and over the years combined them into some cohesive packaging."

Steve Davis, owner of Tampa Wholesale Nursery in Dover, is another innovator and conservationist being honored by the Department of Agriculture for water conservation.

Since early 2005, Davis' nursery on McIntosh Road has been using processed water from nearby Tampa Bay Fisheries to irrigate plants.

"I'm going to say there are probably several million gallons of water we didn't have to pull from the aquifer," because the reclaimed water was available, Davis said.

He said he had spoken with the owners of the processing plant years ago about using their effluent, the wastewater left over after the processing and packaging of seafood. However, the money for a sophisticated reverse osmosis system that would remove salts from the water was not available.

When the Southwest Florida Water Management District and the Hillsborough County Environmental Protection Commission offered grant money for such a system, the two companies joined forces.

Tampa Bay Fisheries pumps its treated effluent to Davis' nursery, where it is held in a retention pond until needed.

"There are a few plants we don't use it on, because they tend to be more sensitive," he said, referring to those that can't tolerateeven the low amount of salt left in the water. "But, for the most part, we use it on everything."

Both businesses are examples of innovation and environmental leadership, said Agriculture Department spokesman Terry McElroy.

"Both operations are very efficient and very environmentally friendly," he said.

The Environmental Leadership Awards have been presented for the past 13 years to growers in many facets of agriculture, McElroy said. "They've been given to operations involving everything from wildflowers to citrus, fruits and vegetables.

"The idea is to shine a spotlight on innovative farming that protects Florida's natural resources," McElroy said.

Agriculture Commissioner Charles Bronson will present the awards to the two companies and to the Lightsey Cattle Company in Lake Wales during a breakfast ceremony at the Florida Farm Bureau Federation's annual meeting in Daytona.

Reporter Yvette C. Hammett can be reached at 813-657-4532 or at yhammett@tampatrib.com

Building Activity Setting Records

By DAVE NICHOLSON The Tampa Tribune

Published: Oct 7, 2006

PLANT CITY - Construction continues to roll on in the city.

September was another strong month for building permit activity, and it added to a record-setting pace. During the first nine months of the year, builders pulled permits for more than $129 million in construction.

The previous record was $75.9 million in 1999.

Building permit activity is considered a key indicator of economic health.

Mayor John Dicks said the statistics reflect that Plant City is a "great place to live, work and raise a family."

Most of September's activity was for single-family homes, with 60 permits pulled for a total of nearly $9 million. The biggest commercial project was a $1.4 million expansion at Plastipak, 4211 Amberjack Blvd.

Plant City's building boom has been fueled by annexations as more property owners outside the city seek to develop their properties. The city can offer water and sewer service, which is needed for higher density developments, officials have said.

Experts expect a downturn nationally in the real estate market, and Dicks said he doesn't think Plant City can escape that trend. But he sees the market cooling in six months to a year.

"Planners are telling me that this Central Florida corridor is remaining the strongest area in the state," the mayor said.

The city's permit activity is partially attributable to a permit for $39 million in improvements at the city utilities plant. But even without that project, 2006 is one for the record books.

BUILDING ACTIVITY

Plant City building permit activity in recent years.

Year Cost (in millions)

1996 $60.9

1997 $54.4

1998 $30.3

1999 $75.9

2000 $49.7

2001 $64.4

2002 $42.2

2003 $42.3

2004 $51.5

2005 $57.7

2006 $129.4*

* Through Sept. 30

Reporter Dave Nicholson can be reached at (813) 865-4432 or at dnicholson@tampatrib.com.

Fancy Farms Up For State Review

DAVE NICHOLSON and RAY REYES The Tampa Tribune

Published: Oct 7, 2006

PLANT CITY - One of the area's best-known strawberry farms could move one step closer to development Monday.

City commissioners will vote on sending a request for a land-use change at Fancy Farms to the state for routine review. Mark Hudson, a principal planner with Hillsborough's City-County Planning Commission, said he expects the city to have the proposal back in its hands for action by February or March.

The specifics for development haven't been worked out on Carl Grooms' 188 acres on County Line Road, but tentative plans call for up to 12 residences per acre, with 15 percent to 35 percent of the property used for stores or other commercial ventures.

Grooms said this week that several developers have expressed interest and that he is entertaining offers. But he is taking his time deliberating over the one that's right.

Grooms said he hopes a "nice development" will take the place of his fields.

"Maybe something that would have the Fancy Farms name somewhere, so people can trace it back 100 years from now and know it was a strawberry farm," he said.

Grooms and a neighbor to the north, JL Ventures with 62 acres, asked this year for annexation into the city.

Grooms said he has heard some dismay from other farmers that he is selling out, but, "You can't stop change. This is my land. I have the right to change it."

This year, Grooms is planting and harvesting his 33rd strawberry crop.

Grooms said he is undecided on his plans once he sells out.

"Depends on what the price is. I'll do all the things I've never done before. I just want to sleep as long as I want and not answer to any regulatory agencies."

Grooms and JL Ventures are among many landowners who have asked for annexation in recent years. City officials say more than 9,000 homes have been proposed or developed. Hudson said landowners surrounding Plant City are asking for annexation so they can get water and sewer service from the city. Land inside the city generally can be developed with more homes per acre.

The city commission will vote Monday on sending the Fancy Farms proposal to the state for review. The commission meets at 7:30 p.m. at city hall, 302 W. Reynolds St.

Reporter Dave Nicholson can be reached at (813) 865-4432 or dnicholson@tampatrib.com. Reporter Ray Reyes can be reached at (813) 865-4433 or rreyes@tampatrib.com.

Fla. orange crop hits low point

The Associated Press

ORLANDO - Last year's Hurricane Wilma and a cold stretch this past February will leave Florida with its worst orange crop since 1990, when the state saw freezes that crippled production, the federal government said Thursday.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture predicted 135 million boxes of oranges will be picked in the 2006-07 season, down from an already-low 148 million boxes last year. Before two nasty hurricane seasons blew through, the state was averaging about 220 million boxes, each of which weighs 90 pounds.

Futures prices for frozen concentrated orange juice on the New York Board of Trade rose 22 cents to $1.87 per pound by midday.

"I think it caught us a little off guard," said Mike Sparks, executive vice president and CEO of Florida Citrus Mutual, the state's largest grower's group. "I think most people in the citrus industry were thinking closer to 150 million boxes of oranges, but the 135, it is what it is. Everyone is rethinking everything."

Orange juice prices have already increased about 9 percent over last year, and wholesale price hikes in the past few months have observers expecting further jumps. Florida has fewer acres of trees than any time since 1988, when several years of freak freezes hit.

The state is second only to Brazil in global orange juice production, and puts out more than 90 percent of all juice consumed in America.

Besides hurricanes, three diseases that kill trees and damage fruit continue to spread, with droughts over the past year further trimming production.

Bob Norberg, deputy executive director of research and operations at the Florida Department of Citrus, said last October's hit from Hurricane Wilma left southwest Florida with extremely small numbers of fruit per tree.

But even without the storms, Norberg said, the state was unlikely to immediately return to previous production levels.

"I think most of the people in the industry think 200 million, based on the number of trees we have in the ground, is a stretch," he said. "With an average yield, the yield that we saw prior to the hurricanes, we would be looking at a crop size from 180 to 190 million boxes." However, the small crop means growers could see their best returns in 10 or 15 years, Norberg said.

despite higher per-acre costs because of low numbers of fruit on trees.

The forecast for the No. 2 orange state, California, was 46 million boxes, a 20 percent drop from last year, amid declining acreage and a long and wet spring.

Storms, Cold Sour Citrus Crop

By Kevin Bouffard
The Ledger

LAKELAND -- Florida citrus growers always worry about prices, but in the wake of the lowest projected orange crop in nearly two decades, they're worried more about the prices consumers pay for orange juice than the price they'll get for their fruit.

The initial estimate for the 2006-2007 citrus season, presented Thursday by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, said Florida growers would produce only 135 million boxes of oranges this season, down 8.7 percent from 147.9 million boxes in 20052006 and the lowest crop since 110.2 million boxes of oranges harvested in the freeze-damaged 19891990 season.

If that proves accurate, the 2006-2007 crop would be 44 percent smaller than the 242 million boxes in 2003-2004, the last season unaffected by hurricanes or other catastrophic weather.

Bob Stallings, an Alturas grower and president of Stallings Crop Insurance Corp. in Lakeland, hosted a breakfast for about 80 Polk County growers to hear the radio broadcast of the estimate.

Grapefruit growers fared slightly better with a projected 2006-2007 crop of 26 million boxes, a 34.7 percent increase from 19.3 million boxes last season. But that's still down 36.4 percent from the crop of 40.5 million boxes in 2003-2004 season.

The USDA estimate also projected Florida tangerine growers would produce 4.6 million boxes this season, down 16.4 percent from 2005-2006. The state would produce 1.1 million boxes of

tangelos, down 27 percent from 1.4 million boxes last season. About 95 percent of the state's orange crop and more than 60 percent of grapefruit go to juice. The remainder, along with most tangerines and tangelos, are sold on the fresh fruit market.

Dick Fort, general manager of Peace River Packing Co. in Fort Meade, shared concern about the rising retail price of orange juice.

He worried that retail OJ sales would see the same double-digit percentage declines experienced by grapefruit juice. That happened after hurricanes wiped out most of the Florida grapefruit crop in the past two seasons and sent farm prices for the fruit to record highs.

"My theory is (OJ) prices may get to that point," he said. "(Then) people will stop buying it."

The past two seasons of hurricane-shortened citrus crops pushed the farm price for juice oranges up nearly 91 percent, USDA statistics show. Prices went even higher in the past several months following pre-season orange crop predictions as low as 123 million boxes.

Before Thursday's forecast, Florida processors were offering $1.70 per pound solids for early and mid-season oranges, which are harvested from October through March. That represented a 45 percent increase from last season's average early-mid price.

Processors were offering

25 percent more for late-season Valencia oranges, harvested from March through June, to $1.85 per pound solids.

Pound solids is an industry standard measuring how much juice with a specific sugar content is squeezed from the fruit. A gallon of orange juice has roughly one pound solids.

The USDA forecast would send farm prices "up a little," said Fort, who declined to state a specific farm price.

On the retail level, Fort said he hoped the major OJ brands had already factored in this year's short crop when they announced another round of price increases recently.

Juice companies had largely held the line on retail OJ prices during the 2004-2005 season because they were sitting on record inventories from previous years.

But retail OJ rose 5.4 percent during the past year to an average $4.63 per gallon on Sept. 2, according to the most recent figures from the Florida Department of Citrus in Lakeland.

That was before Tropicana Products Inc. in Bradenton, the state's largest juice processor, announced 7 percent across-the-board hikes in OJ prices, said Bob Norberg, the deputy director of research and operations at the Florida Department of Citrus in Lakeland.

Minute Maid, the nation's second largest juice company, also announced OJ price increases of 3 percent to 6 percent, depending upon the product, later in September, he said.

Norberg doubted those would be the last retail price increases following the USDA forecast.

"I don't know that anybody factored in this low of a crop," Norberg said. "It doesn't look like 7 percent was enough."

In a presentation at the Citrus Expo in August, Norberg said the profit margins at major juice companies had not caught up with higher farm prices and other rising costs, including fuel and distribution expenses, despite last season's retail price hikes.

A 135-million-box orange crop likely will not put any downward pressure on farm prices this season.

"If nothing else, it will keep (farm) prices stable," said Stallings, who has 165 grove acres in Alturas.

But that may not be in the growers' long-term interests if high farm and retail prices lead to continuing OJ's declining share of the competitive beverage market, he added.

"This could hurt growers and the industry," Stallings said. "It may not happen this year. It may happen next year or the following year."

In the broadcast of the USDA forecast from Washington, Bob Terry, a statistician at the agency's Orlando office, attributed the decline to recovery from hurricanes and a cold snap in February, when citrus trees begin blooming.

The cold held down the number of blooms, which later become fruit, Terry said.

The 2006-2007 orange crop is even smaller than Thursday's numbers suggest because of a change in the USDA's procedures.

In past seasons, the USDA projection included a separate count for Temples, an orange-tangerine hybrid usually sold fresh. Florida growers produced 700,000 boxes of Temples last season and 650,000 boxes in 2004-2005.

Now the USDA has included Temples in the count of early-mid and Navel oranges.

Kevin Bouffard can be reached at kevin.bouffard@theledger.com or 863-802-7591.

Farmers need to save water, officials stress

By Robert P. King

Palm Beach Post Staff Writer

Friday, October 13, 2006

Water managers are urging farmers around Lake Okeechobee to reduce irrigation, and warned Thursday that even sterner measures might be necessary if skies remain dry.

Employees of the South Florida Water Management District said they remain concerned about low water levels in the lake, which are fueling a modest ecological revival while raising worries about drought.

One cause is the hurricane season, which has proven to be a dud so far instead of the powerhouse meteorologists had predicted. While the tranquil tropics have allowed Floridians to keep their roofs and their electricity, the lack of storms also has brought an unusually dry rainy season.

The 16-county district has averaged less than half its normal rainfall in the past 30 days. Palm Beach County and the Treasure Coast are 60 percent and 70 percent below normal, respectively.

"I have a bad feeling," said district board member Mike Collins of Islamorada.

For now, the district isn't proposing any water restrictions, Deputy Executive Director Chip Merriam said, but it has urged growers to adopt voluntary cutbacks.

One farming representative said growers will try, but she couldn't predict how much they can conserve beyond what they normally do.

"We're going to use water as judiciously as possible because we know it's in our best interest," said Barbara Miedema, spokeswoman for the Sugar Cane Growers Cooperative of Florida. "If there's a water shortage, it's going to be severe.

"Can I point to one single thing I'm going to do differently? No."

She said sugar growers are in the middle of their August-to-January planting season. And she said they can do nothing about the biggest cause of water loss from the lake: When the weather is dry, water evaporates.

The timing of the district's plea might be somewhat fortunate, said Darrin Parmenter, an agent with the Palm Beach County Cooperative Extension Service. He said sugar and sod are the primary crops in the ground right now.

"If this were to happen in springtime after a long drought of a winter, then there's going to be a lot of crops in the fields," he said.

Water managers said they're not sure what to expect for the next few months. One possibly hopeful sign is the return of El NiÒo, the global wind pattern that helped quell this year's hurricanes and often brings a rainier-than-usual dry season.

In another wrinkle, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is about to impose new rules for managing Lake Okeechobee in hopes of keeping it lower year-round.

The rules mean the lake could drop an extra foot before the district would have to declare a shortage.

The lake was at 13.16 feet above sea level Thursday, more than 2 feet below this time last year. The lake is just inches above the elevation that could prompt a shortage under existing rules.

Septic systems scrutinized
County panel wants 'performance-based' systems

By Bruce Ritchie
DEMOCRAT STAFF WRITER

An advisory committee is recommending that "performance-based" septic tank systems be required in southern Leon County to protect Wakulla Springs.

The springs have become choked with weeds and algae in recent years. Scientists say nitrogen in groundwater from septic tanks and Tallahassee's wastewater spray field are likely feeding the plant growth.

Performance-based septic systems can reduce nitrogen by 75 percent, according to state health officials. The Septic System Advisory Committee, which was established by Leon County commissioners in 2004, says the new systems can cost up to $2,000 more than conventional systems.

The committee's recommendations are intended to break the "blame game" over who is responsible for problems at Wakulla Springs, said Alex Mahon, environmental manager at the Leon County Health Department.

"We know the spray field puts nitrogen out and we know the septic tanks put it out," Mahon said. "The thought was if you reduce something, it has got to be helpful."

The recommendations are not as strict as some of those contained in new growth policies adopted last week by Wakulla County.

Wakulla County will require failing septic-tank systems to be replaced with the new systems. The Leon County committee recommendation doesn't require the replacement of failing systems.

There are an estimated 4,300 septic tanks in southern Leon County, the report says. A 2002 study estimated there were 1,300 septic tanks within the Wakulla Springs drainage area of Wakulla County.

Jim Stevenson, coordinator of the state's Wakulla Springs Basin Working Group, said those existing tanks in the region remain a problem.
Members of the Leon County committee were concerned about the expense of replacing septic tanks in a region with more low-income homeowners, Mahon said.

The Wakulla County Commission also voted to require the performance-based septic systems countywide for new homes. The Leon County recommendations are only for the area south of the Cody Scarp, where scientists say the sandy soils make groundwater more vulnerable to contamination.

The advisory committee also recommends requiring operating permits for new systems. Such permits cost $100 for two years and require a maintenance contract with a septic-tank company, Mahon said.

The committee raised the possibility of establishing a septic-tank utility for Leon, Gadsden and Wakulla counties. A draft report included that recommendation, but it was taken out of the final report.

"We didn't want to lock ourselves in if folks said we are not ready for a utility," said Anthony Gaudio, an advisory committee member and owner of Apalachee Backhoe & Septic Tank Inc.

Mahon said he wasn't sure when the Leon County Commission could take up the recommendations.

Stevenson said the recommendations show progress is being made even though existing septic tanks are not addressed.

"This is a sensitive issue," he said. "We have to bring the public along with us on this journey so we can make even greater progress."

There are an estimated 4,300 septic tanks in southern Leon County and 1,300 in the Wakulla Springs area of Wakulla County.

An advisory committee recommends requiring "performance-based" septic-tank systems for new homes in southern Leon County.

Operating permits costing $100 every two years would be required for the systems. The committee suggests the possibility of establishing a regional septic-tank utility.

Could outsiders help define road plight?

Denise-Marie Balona
Sentinel Staff Writer

October 13, 2006

At rush hour, Saxon Boulevard can get so backed up, it takes 20 to 30 minutes to drive just a few miles from Orange City to neighboring Deltona.

County officials want to extend a parallel road -- Rhode Island Avenue in Orange City -- over Interstate 4 into Deltona to relieve some of the traffic on Saxon, one of the county's busiest thoroughfares.

But there's a big problem: an $8.2 million shortfall. Originally slated to begin in the next year or two, the project has been pushed off until 2014 at the soonest thanks to soaring construction costs and falling revenues.

A number of county road projects have been pushed back or put off, and county officials worry that the traffic situation in fast-growing Volusia will eventually become so unbearable it will drive away residents and shoppers.

County Manager Jim Dinneen called city leaders together for a transportation summit Thursday to discuss what to do and to urge them to help him gauge the problem.

While the group's members still aren't sure where they would get more money -- Dinneen discouraged them from focusing on that for now -- he rallied support for pursuing an independent study of county and city road needs.

Officials said the public would be more likely to accept that information if it came from a scientific study done by university experts.

A county survey showed residents don't think the traffic problem Volusia is generally that bad. But the county is growing. And Volusia can't keep up because impact fees and other revenues have dipped while gas-tax revenues remain flat.

"We know the public doesn't perceive Volusia County has a problem with traffic yet," South Daytona City Manager Joe Yarbrough told his colleagues. "It's how you package the message."

Dinneen said the information would be used to inform the public. He stopped short of saying how he might use it to encourage residents to support any plan the county and cities might come up with to raise revenue.

Dinneen also said officials will need to be creative in the search for new money, possibly even asking the school district for help since school buses have such a big impact on roads. He told city leaders to review the county's road construction list and make sure they agree with the county's priorities.

The county uses impact fees, one-time charges placed on new developments, to help pay for new roads. But about half of the $10.7 million the county projects it will collect this fiscal year will go toward paying debt on money it borrowed previously for roads.

The county can't dip into its general fund because, thanks to sweeping cuts recently to property tax rates, budget reserves will be depleted. Some city leaders brought up the idea of a new sales tax, though they realized residents likely wouldn't support the idea.

But some, including Michael Booker, city manager of Daytona Beach Shores, who supports a sales tax, think a university study will add credibility.

County Council member Dwight Lewis said such a study will help sell whatever new revenue stream the county decided to pursue. The County Council has discussed introducing a new sales tax, but the plan hasn't moved forward.

"I think government and builders have a credibility gap when it comes to the public, so it's important we have an independent group look at the problem and validate it one way or another," Lewis said.

Dinneen plans to pursue the study later this year after a series of meetings among cities. By then, he hopes to get information from the cities about their road building and maintenance needs.

An independent study would add credibility, leaders say at a summit.

Denise-Marie Balona can be reached at dbalona@orlandosentinel.com or 386-851-7916.

Landfill Gas Could Save County Big Money

By CHRIS BUTLER
cbutler@highlandstoday.com


SEBRING — It’s a way of thinking outside the box that might save Highlands County taxpayers hundreds of thousands of dollars every year.

It’s a relatively new concept, but Highlands County officials said Tuesday that its landfill might contain enough gas to fuel county vehicles. The vehicles could be fueled without the use of gasoline or diesel fuel.

Highlands County Landfill consultant Joe Miller said at this week’s Highlands County Commission meeting that the particular form of gas is produced in landfills after its solid waste decomposes.

Landfill gas is a combination of methane, oxygen, nitrogen and carbon dioxide, he added.

Highlands County Solid Waste Director Ken Wheeler said county vehicles are already using up almost 1,500 gallons of diesel fuel each day. The county used 319,000 gallons of fuel during the 2004-05 fiscal year, he added.

Three Different Concepts

Wheeler and Miller both presented commissioners with three concepts to pursue:

 

• Electrical generation gas – About 40 U.S. landfills are taking methane gas from their facilities and using it for electricity. Right now the landfill has enough to generate electricity for about 600 homes, Miller said.

   

• Clean alternative fuel – Landfill gas can be processed to make natural gas for use in vehicles. Such a facility already exists in California, Miller said.

   

  Highlands County currently doesn’t have any vehicles that run on that particular type of fuel, and would either have to buy vehicles that do or spend at least $30,000 converting existing vehicles.

  “If we have a crisis in the Middle East and our fuel is cut off then this will be a great system to keep our vehicles running,” Miller said.

   

• Asphalt plant concept – Wheeler said this concept is Highlands County’s “most feasible.”

“Currently the quality of gas is there, but the concentration is not,” he added. He also said the county would have to begin investing in landfill gas collection systems that increase methane levels.

Commissioner Barbara Stewart said the county might have to purchase more asphalt to make the idea a reality, perhaps three times the 40,000 tons of asphalt the county purchases annually. She said that estimate comes from her conversations with those in private industry.

Commissioner Edgar Stokes said the idea could serve as a “win-win” for the county, while other commissioners said it could help save money for greatly-needed projects.

Meanwhile, Highlands County Commission Chairman Bob Bullard said the county should “aggressively” begin pursuing grants to help fund the idea.

“We don’t know how much the county will have to spend on fuel throughout the coming years. This is the appropriate move at the appropriate time,” Bullard said.

Preservation Changes Postponed

By ELLEN GEDALIUS The Tampa Tribune

Published: Oct 13, 2006

TAMPA - Preservationists and some city council members disagreed Thursday over how to change Tampa's historic preservation ordinance.

After more than four hours of debate and public comment, the council postponed a decision for two weeks to give an absent council member an opportunity to watch tapes of Thursday afternoon's proceedings.

At issue is the city's attempt to change the historic preservation ordinance, an outgrowth of a three-year debate over whether to label some cigar factories historic.

Owners of some of the cigar factories don't want the designation, arguing that the historic label could come with a price because building changes are regulated by preservation review boards that often require owners to use expensive materials when making renovations.

Under the existing ordinance, the council cannot consider whether the owner of a property consents to the historic designation. The council only can consider whether the building is associated with historic events, people or architecture.

City Attorney David Smith suggested that the council add other factors, including whether the owner supports the designation, whether the owner has an economic hardship, and whether economic incentives are available to offset an economic hardship.

Preservationists crowded council chambers and argued against that approach, saying that would dilute the historic preservation ordinance.

"We are pleading with you today to &hellip save our legacy," said Fran Costantino, president of the East Ybor Historic and Civic Community Association. "Owner consent should not be an option."

Councilwoman Rose Ferlita was unable to return for the afternoon portion of the discussion because, as public safety committee chairwoman, she chose to go to a firefighter's memorial service.

The council voted 3-3 on Smith's recommendation, with John Dingfelder, Linda Saul-Sena and Gwen Miller voting in favor of it and Mary Alvarez, Shawn Harrison and Kevin White voting against it.

The matter was deferred to the night meeting, but Ferlita said she wanted to review the tapes before voting. The council agreed to discuss the matter again in two weeks.

In other action:

•The council approved an agreement with the county that will provide $5 million to fix the roof of the Tampa Convention Center. The money won't be available until August because of a condition the county put upon the city. In the meantime, the city is spending its own money to do preliminary work.

•Council members said they want to review the city's charter with an eye toward putting any changes on the ballot in March 2007 or November 2008. Dingfelder said he wants to consider changing the charter to allow for staggered terms for council members and the mayor.

Reporter Ellen Gedalius can be reached at (813) 259-7679 or egedalius@tampatrib.com.

Commuter rail splits commission candidates at forum

By B ILL VARIAN
Published October 13, 2006

TAMPA - Hillsborough County Commissioners Mark Sharpe and Tom Scott sounded similar notes on most issues during a political forum Thursday, though both are competing for the same job.

They did, however, stake out opposing roles on one issue gaining increasing buzz during this election season - commuter rail.

At a forum with the Tiger Bay Club of Tampa, Scott said he would support at least asking voters whether they would be willing to spend tax dollars to build some form of commuter rail system. Sharpe, while attempting a more nuanced answer, said he would not support new taxes for rail. At least not yet.

Sharpe's response to a question on the topic, confined to a minute, left room for interpretation. He said rail represents a tremendous challenge that is very expensive and would take decades to pay off, while adding, "That doesn't mean we should ignore it."

Asked for clarification afterward, he said he believes rail represents one potential solution for easing traffic, along with roads and bus rapid transit. But he wouldn't approve using tax dollars for it until he sees a detailed plan showing how the money would be spent and that the system would be a success.

Besides, he said, any rail plan should be drawn on a regional level, not by Hillsborough County alone.

Scott said he has twice supported proposals to ask voters if they would agree to spend additional taxes on rail, though both failed. He said he would do so again.

In a post-forum interview, Scott noted that millions were spent crafting the proposals that failed to gain commission support - both before Sharpe joined the board. And he said the county has lost its place in line to draw on hundreds of millions of dollars in federal support.

Sharpe is seeking a new term as the District 7 at-large commissioner. Scott, who now represents central and eastern Tampa as the District 3 commissioner, must leave that seat because of term limits and is challenging Sharpe.

The two were joined by some candidates for the District 4 and 5 seats during Thursday's forum.

Yamel Christina Arronte, a teacher running without party affiliation for the District 5 at-large seat held by commission Chairman Jim Norman, voiced support for a circular rail route, possible running along Fowler and Florida avenues, Kennedy Boulevard and West Shore Boulevard. Strip club owner and Democratic District 5 candidate Joe Redner said Tampa should emulate other cities that have rail systems that work.

Norman was not at the forum. He said he was attending a meeting of the Katie Marchetti Foundation Advisory Board, which is seeking ways to promote seat belt use by young drivers.

Al Higginbotham, a Republican seeking the District 4 seat that takes in much of southern and eastern Hillsborough, emphasized his ability to get along with others and his desire to see lower taxes. Democrat Lisa Rodriguez likewise sounded a desire to work with other commissioners and governments to build consensus on important issues, particularly the county's growth.

Buyers, best of times; sellers, worst of times

It's truly a tale of two housing markets. Last year, home sellers were riding high. This year, it's buyers who may benefit from market adjustments.

By BILL COATS, Times Staff Writer
Published October 13, 2006

A year ago, Hillsborough County's housing market was hyperventilating. Now it's sighing.

"The people who are selling are very fortunate," said Vince Arcuri, a real estate agent based in Odessa.

Why? Because everywhere Arcuri looks, he sees overpriced houses. One's $50,000 too high here. Another's 30 percent out of whack there.

"They're all overpriced," he said.

Statistics from the Hillsborough County Property Appraiser indicate that the number of home sales in April, May and June had dropped noticeably from the same period last year. But prices were 11 percent higher countywide and 25 percent higher in some neighborhoods north of Tampa.

They won't stay there, home sellers say.

"Inventory has quadrupled,'" said Brad Monroe, the New Tampa-based president of the Greater Tampa Association of Realtors. "Sales are off by 40 percent. There's downward pressure on prices."

"It's getting very, very slow," said Yuly Vazquez, a Tampa real estate agent who has held four-hour open houses where only two or three people strolled in.

A year ago, few home sellers needed open houses. Buyers were snatching up homes within a week of their appearance on the market.

A fever had been building.

Years of low interest rates had lured thousands of first-time home buyers out of their apartments. Tampa Bay's hearty job market kept drawing new residents from other towns.

Then, two additional accelerants sent prices into overdrive. First, home builders began running out of big buildable land tracts in Hillsborough, and started bidding up the acres that remained.

With prices heating up, investors realized they could buy a new home before the foundation was dug, and sell it at a profit before the roof was shingled. They swarmed into the market, making houses a hotter play than stocks.

In Monroe's 26 years in the business, he considers last summer to be the first serious seller's market he has seen. He contends the frenzy peaked in October, when the supply of houses began to grow.

Newer factors turned the tide. Home buyers faced higher mortgage interest rates as the Federal Reserve sought to keep a lid on inflation. Two busy hurricane seasons, coupled with the rising home values, sent insurance costs soaring.

Now, with all those barriers to buying a home, it's a buyer's market.

"They've never had as much product to choose from," Monroe said. "Sellers are going to have to be more aggressive."

"This is the best buyer's market I have ever seen, and I've been selling houses for 15 years," Arcuri said.

The speculators are gone, yet the building boom they encouraged is still evident.

"There's a whole bunch of brand-new houses that have never been lived in that aren't selling," Monroe said.

Arcuri contends the new houses are soaking up the scarce buyers, leaving older houses with fewer takers.

Many buyers are from out of state; locals are balking, Arcuri said.

Vazquez said his last home sale was to a buyer from New York, who had 95 percent financing. He paid $185,000 for a new house near Busch Gardens.

"Houses $200,000 and up are real hard to sell," Vazquez said.

Arcuri and Monroe advise sellers not to peg their homes' prices to sales during the past year. That was too high, they agree.

"We need to go back to about mid 2004," Arcuri said. "That's where the market is now."

Last year, Arcuri invested an average of eight hours selling a house, he estimated. Now it's more like 40 or 50, plus extra advertising expenses.

Monroe's Realtors association predicted last week that it would lose 10 percent of its members next year.

His statewide association reported Monday that August home sales in the Tampa Bay area had dropped 42 percent from the prior August. These exclude sales of new homes or those not involving a Realtor.

Yet experienced Realtors aren't distressed by the changes. They see them as a return to normalcy.

Monroe said last year was his association's best ever, but this year should be the third best.

"The market was out of control," Arcuri said. "We needed this adjustment."

Bill Coats can be reached at coats@sptimes.com or (813) 269-5309

Residents lament plan for 216 homes

By ANDREW MEACHAM
Published October 13, 2006

RIVERVIEW: As agricultural land continues to sprout houses instead of crops, neighbors of a proposed development south of Simmons Loop Road last week mourned a vanishing way of life.

Dave Middleton of Gray Slip Road said plans for Highland Summers Ranch smell worse than his two cows.

Delores Wadsworth of Simmons Loop Road said that she and her neighbors are "literally fighting for our lives" against development.

Several other residents complained of the potential for flooding, traffic and the threat to wetlands. But none offered much legal ammunition against the 216-home development to be located between U.S. 301 and Interstate 75.

Property owner Ha-Len Simmons Ranch is requesting a change from agricultural zoning to a planned development.

Attorney Keith Bricklemyer, representing the developer, said the property would not damage wetlands and would not directly affect residents of Simmons Loop. The application goes to the County Commission on Nov. 14. PETITION 06-1147

BRANDON: A zoning hearing master last week heard from county officials and neighbors of a proposed subdivision east of John Moore Road and south of Bloomingdale Avenue.

D&J Southern Properties wants to rezone 14 acres from agricultural to residential and build 21 houses. Lot sizes would start at a third of an acre.

Several residents of the Hidden Lake neighborhood spoke against granting the zoning, saying that building the new houses at a higher elevation would create water runoff into their properties.

The Planning Commission signed off on the request, as did the county's Natural Resources agency within Planning and Growth Management.

However, a Natural Resources report asks that the developer make a priority of preserving several mature trees and nearly 3 acres of wetlands as a condition for the zoning change. The County Commission will hear the request on Nov. 14. (PETITION 06-1802)

BRANDON: Morse Operations, which owns two car dealerships, wants to modify its planned development zoning for the property on the northwest corner of Brandon Town Center and Causeway boulevards.

The company bought 3 acres north of Ed Morse Cadillac and Saturn of Brandon, bringing its total property to 9 acres. The dealer would expand the total building area to 60,000 square feet, with 35,000 square feet devoted to vehicle service.

The developer appeared before a zoning hearing master earlier this year but returned last week to request an amendment to those recommended conditions. The conditions Morse came to contest prevented access from the dealership onto Brandon Town Center Drive, which Morse says it needs.

The request goes to the County Commission on Nov. 14. (PETITION 06-0413)

Andrew Meacham can be reached at 661-2431 or ameacham@sptimes.com.

[Last modified October 12, 2006, 07:41:40]

120 condos slated for U.S. 41

By MICHAEL D. BATES
mbates@hernandotoday.com

BROOKSVILLE — County commissioners Wednesday gave their blessing to a developer’s request to build 120 condominiums on 14 acres on the east side of U.S. 41 near Oliver Street.

Project engineer Nicholas Nicholson said the condominiums will sell for about $180,000 per unit and should satisfy the demand for affordable housing. He envisions teachers, police officers, firefighters and others as target customers.

Plans call for 12 three-story buildings with a clubhouse. Part of the property will include commercial activity.

Planning staffers had earlier recommended denial of the project because there was no second entrance into the site. The developer modified the plan and included a commercial parcel along U.S. 41 and a second access.

Nicholson said he is working with the school district to finds ways to ease the space crunch. The development is expected to add 40 students to local schools, according to Ken Pritz, executive director of facility and support operations for the school district.

Once built, the project would generate up to $362,000 in school taxes.

County Commissioner Diane Rowden worried that the project was essentially an enclave, because the project is within the boundaries of the city of Brooksville. The city is likely to annex the property anyway, Rowden said.

Nicholson said it was in the county’s best interests to address the main concerns now before annexation to satisfy both governmental entities.

County Engineer Charles Mixson said the development will need a frontage road when it becomes necessary. The developer will be required to pay a proportionate share of that road.

This is the latest in a series of multifamily projects to hit Hernando County, which a study determined had been underserved by apartments and condominiums.

Work crews have already broken ground on Treiman Oaks, a 288-unit upscale condo project on 42 acres off State Road 50, one-half mile east of the new Brooksville Regional Hospital.

A Miami developer is planning 408 “workforce” apartments on the west side of Cobb Road and the north side of Fort Dade Avenue, across from Flagstone Pavers, a cement products company and near Florida Crushed Stone.

The apartments would rent for $700-$1,100 at today’s prices.

The project cleared planning and zoning last month. At the developer’s request, county commissioners Wednesday postponed discussion on the project until their Nov. 8 land use hearing.

Reporter Michael D. Bates can be contacted at 352-544-5290.

Condo project tiff set for Round 3

Residents won the first round, the developer the second. The third round begins next month.

By CHUIN-WEI YAP
Published October 13, 2006

DADE CITY - Residents of Carson Drive in Land O'Lakes were dealt a setback Thursday, when Pasco's development review committee voted to green-light a 13-acre, 58-unit condominium project in their old and tightly packed neighborhood.

In March, the residents won Round 1, when the county's planning commission threw the project back to the drawing board.

At the time, the condominium project's entrance was proposed for Carson Drive, a narrow dead-end road just northeast of U.S. 41 and State Road 54.

No way, residents said.

Seven months later, armed for Round 2 with a design for a new entrance directly on U.S. 41, the developer, Mobley Homes, regained its momentum.

The development committee voted unanimously to let the development project proceed to its final stages of approval. The county planning commission will consider it on Nov. 6, then the County Commission on Dec. 5.

But residents still fear the project would clog up their neighborhood.

At Thursday's meeting, Carson Drive residents challenged the county's traffic study that supported the project, zeroing in on a statistic that estimated traffic in the area would grow by 2 percent a year.

"Two percent is ridiculously low and purposefully slanted," said Lynne Picou. "I do not believe these numbers are credible."

County officials defended the 2 percent figure, saying it came from the U.S. Census Bureau.

The study also said the project would add 389 daily trips onto U.S. 41.

Picou pointed out that the study never highlighted certain dangers. For instance, drivers exiting the condominium must cross three lanes of 50-mph traffic on crowded U.S. 41 to make a southbound U-turn once they leave the condominium's sole exit.

Residents also decried the condominium's strain on Carson Drive's 30-year-old septic lift station.

"Alarms go off constantly," said Judy Jayne.

In May, the septic station broke down and spilled 3,000 gallons of sewage. As it turned out, a tripped circuit breaker was at fault, and residents' calls to a toll-free distress number put up at the station went unrecorded.

After the incident, Pasco utilities director Bruce Kennedy promised to install a new distress system, an automatic dialer and a backup generator.

On Thursday, he told the Times only the new dialer had been put in.

County Administrator John Gallagher told Kennedy to disallow Mobley's condominium from going ahead until the septic station issue was resolved.

Tonja Stewart, Mobley's development manager, offered to help Pasco reconstruct the station.

The only other concession residents won on Thursday was 25 feet of right of way from Mobley to potentially widen a portion of Carson Drive.

Chuin-Wei Yap covers growth and development in Pasco County. He can be reached at 813 909-4613 or cyap@sptimes.com.

Report attacks impact fee hike

A consultant for builders blames inaccurate numbers in county data for a planned 171 percent increase.

By CATHERINE E. SHOICHET
Published October 13, 2006

New impact fees proposed by a county consultant are too high, according to a report the Citrus County Builders Association released Thursday.

The draft analysis, prepared by consultant Kirk Sorenson of Government Solutions, recommends that the impact fee for an average single-family home increase by 12 percent, from $6,464 to $7,262.

That's $10,244 less than the 171 percent increase proposed by county consultant Tindale-Oliver & Associates of Tampa.

The difference, Sorenson says, stems from incorrect assumptions and overstated numbers in the county report.

His report's release came four days before the county Planning and Development Review Board's final hearing on impact fees. At a meeting at 9 a.m. Monday, members of the seven-member group will evaluate the county consultant's report, listen to comments from the public and issue their final recommendation.

At a workshop last month, several board members said they were worried that increasing impact fees too much would have drastic economic implications for Citrus.

Impact fees, which are levied on new construction, are designed to pay for the infrastructure needs generated by growth. Citrus County has eight impact fees to help fund schools, libraries, parks and recreation, emergency medical services, public buildings, transportation, fire rescue and law enforcement.

The amount of impact fees a builder must pay depends on the size and type of project.

Sorenson's report recommends fees ranging from 30 percent to 45 percent lower than the county consultant's proposals in all eight areas.

Those numbers are "realistic and equitable," and adopting high fees will hurt the county's economy, the report says.

Rather than adopting particular figures from the builders' analysis, the report suggests that county officials could choose to adopt 40 percent of Tindale-Oliver's recommended fees.

"Impact fees are most harmful to the small business and the startup company, often owned and managed by long-term county residents," Sorenson's report says.

The analysis claims that numbers in the county's report are based on incorrect population estimates and overstated construction costs.

Tindale-Oliver, for example, says purchasing neighborhood parks costs $50,000 per acre, whereas Sorenson's report says it costs $25,000.

The report also says increased costs for constructing an operations building and new Emergency Operations Center are "excessive and unsubstantiated."

A major difference between the two reports lies in the estimated cost of building 1 lane mile of a road - a key figure used in calculating transportation impact fees.

The county report says it costs $4.26-million, but Sorenson's report says it costs only $2.47-million.

Sorenson told members of the county's planning board last month that he would send them the report in seven to 10 days. County officials received his report 20 days later.

Director of Development Services Gary Maidhof said Thursday that consultants from Tindale-Oliver were worried they would not have time to thoroughly analyze the report before Monday's meeting.

"I think he's done an admirable job of reflecting what his clients have paid him to do," Maidhof said. "He utilizes methodologies that are more friendly towards keeping fees low."

At last month's planning board meeting, many builders were vocal in their opposition to Tindale-Oliver's proposed fees. Representatives from the Citrus County Council urged officials to adopt the recommended fees.

County commissioners will not take up the contentious issue until after the November election.

They will have a workshop on impact fees Dec. 7 and vote at a hearing Jan. 25.

For most candidates, impact fees have become a hot topic on the campaign trail.

In a recent letter, Rusaw Homes president George Rusaw urged others in the home construction business to register to vote and take action.

"We have a negative imbalance of votes on our current Citrus Board of County Commissioners who intend to STOP growth in our county by tripling our impact fees and that will take our jobs away," he wrote.

The letter recommends two candidates for County Commission: James Holder in the District 2 race and John Thrumston in the District 4 race.

Catherine E. Shoichet can be reached at cshoichet@sptimes.com or 860-7309.

Builders rebut impact fee study

By Jim Hunter

A consultant for the Citrus County Builders Association is recommending the county adopt revised impact fees at less than half the levels recommended by a consultant for the county.

The county’s consultant recommended fees would mean more than $17,000 for a new 1,500-square foot home. The county has eight impact fees — transportation, schools, law enforcement, fire, EMS, libraries, public buildings and parks. They are designed to help pay for the costs of new growth.

A 66-page draft study by Government Solutions, of Stuart, delivered to the county Thursday, pointed out that if the county imposed a revised impact fee schedule as being recommended by Tindale-Oliver & Associates, more than 41,000, or 73 percent, of the families in the county would have to dedicate at least 71 percent of a year’s income to pay the impact fees if they bought a 2,000-square foot home.

According to Government Solutions: “The additional fiscal burden of impact fees on families in Citrus County would force many families to continue renting homes and force others, having outgrown their existing homes, to remain due to the additional cost of a new home and the increased price of previously owned houses, resulting from excessive regulatory government costs, such as the proposed impact fees.”

The report also cites considerable impact on new businesses and existing businesses that are planning to expand. The recommended fees would be most harmful to the small businesses and start-up companies, the report said — companies often owned and managed by long-term county residents.

“These companies not only employ local workers, but reinvest their earning back into the community,” the report said, adding, “Small business is the backbone of the Citrus County economy.”

The report said if growth occurred, it would likely be only large companies like big chain stores. These companies would create a stagnant effect because they wouldn’t see a profit for a number of years because of the high upfront investments.

“Without adequate economic growth and diversity,” the report said, “Citrus County would experience stagnation, high unemployment, more and longer travel demands, less affordable housing, and a higher cost of living.”

Government solutions said its own proposal levels for impact fees — which were 30 percent to 45 percent less than Tindale-Oliver’s — would not reduce impact fees from existing levels, but would provide what it said was “a realistic and equitable impact fee schedule, based on the existing level of service, cost data and other revenue sources available to Citrus County.”

In Tindale-Oliver’s fee schedule, a 1,500-square foot home would incur $17,506 in fees. Under the schedule offered by Government Solutions, that fee would be $5,821. The current fee is $5,293.

A home of 2,500 square feet or greater would incur a fee of $19,388 under the Tindale-Oliver schedule. Under Government Solutions’ recommendation, that fee would be $8,054. The current fee is $6,890.

A 1,000-square foot fast food restaurant with a drive-through would incur impact fees of $130,470 under the Tindale-Oliver schedule and $48,215 under the Government Solutions schedule.

An office of 50,000 square feet or less would incur fees of $16,724 under Tindale-Oliver and $$6,388 under Government Solutions’ fee schedule.

The Government Solutions report pointed out that the impact fee proposed by Tindale-Oliver would increase residential impact fees by nearly 200 percent in less than two years, “while the 2005 indexing procedures called for an 8 percent increase per annum.”

The proposed fees for commercial buildings were even worse, it said, increasing by more than 200 percent and even going up as much as 500 percent in some cases.

Government Solutions said its methodology in developing its revised fees, as opposed to Tindale-Oliver’s, reflect the most accurate and current data available. In addition, some assumptions made by Tindale-Oliver were changed based on industry standards and local conditions in Citrus County, the Government Solutions report said.

The county’s planning advisory board is now considering the recommended a revised impact fee schedule and will make its recommendation to the county commission, which is expected to take the issue up around the end of the year or shortly after the New Year.

More join the fight against red tide

By CATHY ZOLLO

H-T SCIENCE WRITER

cathy.zollo@heraldtribune.com

SARASOTA -- Scientists, environmentalists and ordinary beach lovers have been clamoring for stricter regulations on pollution that finds its way into the Gulf as a way to combat outbreaks of red tide.

Now it looks like some in the business community -- prompted by hits to their wallets as a result of the outbreaks -- are also getting on board.

A group of local business leaders attending a Sarasota County Economic Development Corp. meeting Thursday broke out into applause after a local restaurant owner said pollution into the Gulf, especially from fertilizer runoff, needs to stop.

"Isn't it time to get serious about mitigating the amount of (pollutants) that are going into the environment?" asked Ed Chiles, who owns three waterfront restaurants and co-founded Solutions to Avoid Red Tide.

"Yes" came the response, in the form of thunderous applause.

The informal outcry was a first from business leaders who, though worried about red tide, don't like to call attention to the tourism dampener.

In recent years, local businesses have seen profits plummet when red tide fouls the coast.

A recent University of Florida study of its economic effects in the Panhandle showed that hotels and restaurants there saw a more than 30 percent drop in revenues during blooms. Chiles answered the applause by urging his audience of nearly 100 to pressure policy makers to step up cleanup efforts and provide more research money.

On the red tide panel with Chiles were Fish and Wildlife Research Institute red tide expert Cindy Heil, Mote Marine Laboratory's head ecotoxicologist Richard Pierce and JoAnn Burkholder, an internationally respected algae expert from North Carolina State University.

Burkholder, who co-discovered the toxic alga Pfiesteria in 1991, was in town to lecture on nutrients and harmful algae at New College.

She said when Pfiesteria hit North Carolina, the state faced woes similar to Florida's red tide plight.

But heavy flooding brought by hurricanes in the 1990s washed most of the algae out to sea.

Until then, periodic spills of waste from factory hog farms and other agricultural runoff into North Carolina rivers had helped indirectly feed the alga that was early on dubbed "the cell from hell."

Burkholder fended off professional and personal attacks for her work, especially for studies showing that Pfiesteria is toxic to people.

Independent, repeat studies have since vindicated her.

The North Carolina blooms sickened some people for up to six months and eventually killed a billion fish.

Burkholder warned Florida to watch for players trying to exploit the red tide problem by offering solutions that might be profitable for them but harmful to the environment.

She said it happened in North Carolina and recommended the book "Killer Algae," which outlines parallel problems in the Mediterranean Sea.

A controversial potential treatment in Southwest Florida is clay, and some want to use clay slurry sprayed on red tide to sink the algae.

Burkholder and Sandra Shumway, a marine science luminary and editor of three marine science journals, recently wrote an opinion column that argued that such efforts should be greeted with "extreme caution."

But even a safe and effective red tide killing agent poses a problem for anyone who might use it.

Pierce said trying to smother last year's bloom when it was first discovered and 500 square miles in area would have taking a year with existing methods.

"Within a month, it had expanded to 5,000 square miles," he said.

Though there has been contentious debate recently about scientific evidence that pollution fuels harmful algae, all three researchers said cleaning up such pollution would cure myriad ills on the coast.

Heil said a $4.7 million National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration grant that Fish and Wildlife and Mote were awarded this week will focus on answering questions about nutrients and red tide.

Handy guide to citizens groups

By MARK LANE
FOOTNOTE

Forget Iraq, Foleygate and the tax revolt, the big election issue in Ormond Beach is the proposed building height limit and fear that the town is poised to look like Daytona Beach Shores -- only without the charm.

There are so many competing groups now arguing about the height limits and various related planning and political issues that nobody can keep track of them all.

So as a public service, here is a handy glossary. Clip and save.

CANDO -- Citizens group supporting the height limit.

CANBE -- Citizens group founded by developers to fight the height limit.

FACTS PAC -- Another citizens group fighting the height limit.

ABC PAC -- Yet another citizens group fighting the height limit.

Citizens United To Put Up More Yard Signs PAC -- A citizens group that doesn't advocate anything regarding the height cap. It was formed after a few people felt left out because they were the only ones in Ormond Beach without signs in their yard.

Citizens For Leveling Everything Now On The Peninsula And Then Building To The Moon PAC -- A citizens group formed to promote smart growth and sensible flexibility in city planning.

No Really, A 100-Foot Wall Next To The Beach And Get The State To Build A Big, Honking Bridge To The Peninsula So Even More People Can Move Here And Then Arrest Any Tree-Hugger Who Tries To Slow Down City Meetings By Whining -- A citizens group founded to promote smart growth and sensible flexibility in city planning.

And While We're At It, Charge For Off-Beach Parking To Keep The Riff-Raff Away From The Beach Near Our Condos -- A citizens group founded to promote sensible beach planning and smart growth.

Save The Loop -- A group founded to preserve what's left of the scenic drive known as The Loop.

Save The Loop's Scenic Beauty -- A group founded to remove all those trees that pose a safety hazard on The Loop and make it hard to play a decent game of golf.

Save The Loop's Scenic Beauty Through Smart Growth -- A group founded to encourage construction of a high-rise bridge across The Loop, the six-laning of Old Dixie Highway and the sale and high-rise development of Tomoka State Park. Promotes smart growth and sensible flexibility in city planning.

Citizens For Smart Growth -- A group advocating mandatory IQ tests for anyone coming to Florida.

Citizens For Super-Smart Growth And Scenic Beauty -- A group founded to encourage Volusia County to use carefully controlled nuclear explosions to clear the way for the largest condo and shopping mall development on the planet. A bio-dome, monorail and full-size replica of the Leaning Tower of Pisa are depicted in the architect's gorgeous drawings.

Promotes smart growth and sensible flexibility in both city planning and nuclear test-ban treaties.

Citizens For Dumb Growth -- Eco-terrorists and performance artists who infiltrate governmental meetings and make rude noises, honk bicycle horns and activate whoopee cushions any time a public official uses the phrase "smart growth."

Citizens Against Citizens Groups -- A citizens group founded after it was determined that Ormond Beach had more citizens committees than actual citizens. Members can be spotted by the blank signs in their yards.

mark.lane@news-jrnl.com

Rural Activist Sisters Threatened In Notes

By JULIA FERRANTE The Tampa Tribune

Published: Oct 13, 2006

BLANTON - Michael Cruz walked outside Thursday morning to find a note on his fence, with a threatening message about causing trouble "where you sleep."

Cruz called to his sister-in-law, Dorothy Wood, who was training her horse in her yard next door. He told her to check her fence.

Wood walked toward the edge of her property at Spring Valley Road and made a gruesome discovery, she said. Large bull testicles, apparently recently severed, were attached to her fence with barbed wire, along with another obscene and threatening note. Hundreds of little, black drywall screws were scattered across her driveway.

Wood and her sister, Carol Cruz, Michael's wife, called the Pasco County Sheriff's Office, and a deputy responded to file an incident report, sheriff's spokesman Kevin Doll said. It was the second time deputies have been called about a dispute involving the Cruzes. The sisters are vocal advocates of rural protections in east Pasco, putting them at odds with some larger land owners and developers.

After Thursday's incident, Carol Cruz called Eric and Wendy Jacobson, her neighbors at Tranquilview Lane.

The Jacobsons secured a county permit for a helipad on their property after a contentious public hearing Tuesday night in Dade City. Wood and her sister were among a dozen people who spoke against the permit. An equal number spoke in favor of it.

Cruz had organized a petition drive to stop the helipad, arguing that Eric Jacobson's helicopter was disturbing the rural tranquility of the neighborhood and would usher in commercial business.

At the end of the hearing, Cruz and Wendy Jacobson both said, they told each other they wanted to put the dispute behind them and discussed the possibility of a neighborhood barbecue.

Wood says she shook Eric Jacobson's hand.

"I told him, 'Enjoy your helicopter. Just remember you have a lot of good neighbors,'" Wood said. "Then I heard someone say, 'You better watch yourself, because you could be in big trouble now.' I have no idea who said it."

Jacobson said Thursday that he did not think the threatening notes were related to his helipad hearing, and he questioned whether the incident was "manufactured." He said the notes and gruesome gift may have been delivered because of another neighborhood dispute or conflict.

"I think somebody's mad at her," he said. "I don't think it has a thing to do with the hearing."

Jacobson said some of his neighbors complained to him that Cruz had misrepresented the helipad issue to get more signatures on the petition.

"In my opinion, I think someone manufactured this whole incident to perpetuate the issue. I hope I'm wrong," he said.

Wendy Jacobson said she hoped to "bury the hatchet" on the helipad dispute and move forward.

"I have no idea who would do something like this," she said. "As far as I know, after this is over, I just want peace and quiet. I'm not around people who would do something like that."

A neighbor filed a complaint with the sheriff's office in March against Michael Cruz, saying he allowed his unleashed dog to defecate in her yard, sheriff's spokesman Doll said. Cruz told investigators at the time that the complaint was part of a feud about the structural safety of the neighbor's house. Cruz also said the neighbor shoveled feces onto his property in retaliation.

Wood and Carol Cruz said they have never been threatened because of their involvement with Northeast Pasco Concerned Citizens. That group has been at odds with another civic organization, East Pasco Agricultural Landowners, which is suing Pasco County. The lawsuit says the rural protections violate large landowners' property rights.

"I have never had anybody give me a harsh word," Wood said. "This [helipad hearing] happened two days ago."

Reporter Julia Ferrante can be reached at (813) 948-4220 or jferrante@tampatrib.com.

Regulator: New dike plans should be finished earlier, cost more

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) -- Although a plan to reinforce Lake Okeechobee's aging, leaky dike could cost millions more than expected, it should be made a priority, a water regulator said.

The cost of buying additional land for a project to strengthen the 143-mile Herbert Hoover Dike could range from $20 million to $50 million, Carol Wehle, executive director of the South Florida Water Management District, said Tuesday. Construction once planned to take decades should be done in five years, Wehle said.

District officials plan to ask the Florida Legislature for help and call on Congress to prioritize additional money for construction.

A report released in May said the levee around the lake has eroded from age and hurricanes and is in imminent danger of failing in another hurricane, putting about 40,000 people in the direct path of danger.

Army Corps of Engineers contractors began work in December on a 25-year, $300 million effort to shore up the dike. Those repairs halted indefinitely this spring after sand contaminated a concrete wall that the contractors were trying to embed within the dike.

The corps agreed to dramatically redesign its repair plans last week, and the new plans require more land.

---

Information from: South Florida Sun-Sentinel, http://www.sun-sentinel.com

Sell of Tillman Acres falls through; Tillman family will continue developing

HIGH SPRINGS – Since recent plans for the sale of Tillman Acres fell through, Amy Tillman said, her family will continue with phases two and three of the development.

The family had placed Tillman Acres up for sale, she said, but a buyer cancelled at the last minute.

“That sale fell through,” she said. “They didn’t call, didn’t show up at the closing – no call, no nothing.”

The sale would have included the remaining nine phases of the 10-phase development.

But instead of selling, for now, the family will continue the development, starting with phases two and three, Tillman said. They originally had planned to start that process last February, she said, but the time got extended.

Since they are still working on engineering and preconstruction planning, she said, the actual construction probably won’t be underway until next year.

“We’re going forward with it, the family is,” Tillman said. “If somebody comes along and wants to make an offer, that’s fine, too.”

The 696-acre development, which has been controversial at times, is projected to have 800 homes, starting at $150,000.

Developers work together on local roadwork project



WINTER HAVEN - Instead of competing against each other, a few local developers are banding together on at least one local project to meet an area growth need.

The developers have joined forces to improve the roadway around the intersection of County Road 653 and Old Bartow/Lake Wales Road. This intersection is southwest of Lake Myrtle and northwest of the point where Old Bartow/Lake Wales Road connects with State Road 60.

The project group currently consists of three developers. At one point, there were four developers, but one left the group and made some improvements to the area on his own.

Mark Bennett, the principal planner for the Polk County government, said most of the development near the intersection is within Winter Haven's city limits, which currently stop on the north side of Old Bartow/Lake Wales Road.

Harold R. Baxter, the owner and president of H.R. Baxter & Sons Enterprises Inc., said the public/private improvement of the intersection and adjoining roads is a sensible way for companies to keep housing development in the area moving forward.

"There's no way we're going to ever catch up and meet concurrency on the roads we currently have by expecting the state and the county to pay for it," Baxter said.

A traffic study that predicts the impact of development on the intersecting roads has been prepared, along with a list of needed improvements.

"This isn't something that is commonly done, and we're supporting it and trying to make it happen," said Bennett, the county planner.

One of the primarily needs is to extend the width of C.R. 653 from 19 feet wide to 24 feet wide, Bennett said, adding that the intersection with Old Bartow/Lake Wales Road, which is currently curvy, also needs to be improved to include turning lanes.

"Instead of having incremental improvements that are disjointed or don't mesh together or fit, the intent here is to have a coordinated, well-planned set of improvements so that, first and foremost, 653 is a safe road, and the impacts of development, specifically traffic, are addressed," Bennett said.

"I think it can be a win-win for everybody if it all works out," he added.

He said additional funds will be used to add turn lanes and possible lighting at the intersection of C.R. 653 and Thompson Nursery Road, and there also are plans to provide additional right of way for McClean Road's link to C.R. 653.

The three developers are considering building approximately 1,201 housing units and some commercial structures in the area of the road improvements. Another developer who might join the private road improvement project is considering the build-out of another 445 housing units.

Bo Bentley, the co-owner of Bentley Investment Group LLC and part of the joint road improvement team, said the intention is to make the area safer.

"It's a very challenging issue," he said. "There's a tremendous amount of work involved, and we're trying to figure out a way to do it in a fair and equitable way for everyone involved."

By improving the roads, the developers will meet the transportation concurrency requirements they need to get their housing projects improved.

A development agreement currently is being put together, and that agreement should come to the Polk County Planning Commission for approval in the winter.

Bryan Hunter, vice president of High Mark Development Inc., said the road improvement project marks the first time he has been involved in such a public/private effort.

"The county will get their road improved," Hunter said. "It will make it safer. It will improve traffic flow - all in advance of development - and that's the positive side. And, it will be done with private dollars."

danielle.depari@newschief.com

Florida hopes to grow its timberland

A new state program aims to help landowners learn how to manage forest land.

Jerry W. Jackson
Sentinel Staff Writer

October 12, 2006

Florida loses about 1,200 acres of forest to development per week, but a new program launched Wednesday is designed to slow the loss by helping private landowners become aware of the benefits and opportunities for managing forest land.

The Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services calls the initiative the most comprehensive outreach in the Division of Forestry's 79-year history. The program is designed to help Florida's 45 county foresters connect with landowners in the 15 districts they serve.

The centerpiece of the campaign is called OAK -- for Outreach Action Kit -- and includes a new interactive Web site, a comprehensive landowners manual, brochures and promotional material in English and Spanish.

"We're hoping to increase awareness," said Sean Gallagher, county forester for Seminole and Brevard counties. Many landowners are unaware of the various programs available to help them manage small parcels of forest land, for either fun or profit, Gallagher said.

Agriculture department specialists said that more of the state's estimated 14.5 million acres of forest land is being sold off in smaller parcels and many newer landowners need tools to help them make sound decisions about the property.

If more people take advantage of existing programs, many of which are free or have cost-sharing aspects, Gallagher said, they may be more inclined to hold onto their land for longer periods of time rather than sell it off for development.

In Seminole County, Gallagher estimated, at least 10,000 acres of forested land are in private hands, and perhaps another 15,000 acres in Brevard. Hundreds or thousands of individual owners control the property, but probably less than 5 percent are participating in any kind of forest-management program.

One such program, he said, is called Forest Stewardship, and is aimed mainly at new landowners. A free custom-designed five-year land management program is developed for participating landowners. It not only explains what the property owner can do to enhance wild life or timber production, but "explains why it's a good thing. It's soup to nuts," Gallagher said.

Another free service is called the Tree Farm program and is designed for more experienced landowners to help them become "certified" forest owners and operators, for profit. Relatively few small landowners of 10 acres or more take advantage of logging opportunities, but they are options even in relatively urban areas, Gallagher said.

The outreach program, called "Your Forest. Managed," is still being developed and the new interactive Web site was only partly functional on Wednesday. But the site, designed to help landowners locate the county forester for their region and learn more about various programs, is at yourforestmanaged.com.

Jerry W. Jackson can be reached at jwjackson@orlandosentinel.com or 407-420-5721.
Local advocates of slow growth criticize Myregion.org's plans

Joshua Davidovich
Staff Writer

ORLANDO - More than 7 million people may call central Florida home by 2050, double today's population. Where to put all those people has become one of the hottest issues facing area citizens.

Tomorrow, about 600 people are expected to gather at the Renaissance Resort in Orlando to unveil where one group says citizens want those newcomers to go.

Myregion.org, a consortium of citizens, planners, governments and business interests, has been going county to county to find out where people say growth should occur.

In Lake County, though, the group has come under fire from some slow-growth proponents who say the project has been hijacked by developers who are trying to force growth down citizens' throats.

"They came in here telling us how we're going to grow," said Linda Stewart, who is running for Lake County Commission on a slow-growth platform.

Stewart said she and her slow-growth allies contend myregion's methodology does not take into account Lake County's current anti-growth sentiment.

"They based it on the amount of growth from when we had a County Commission that did nothing but approve growth," Stewart said. "There will be new commissioners that want to change that."

Myregion has been gathering citizen input by asking residents to place "growth dots" around their county to represent the new citizens. Large numbers of low-density dots take up more room for large tracts of land, while smaller high-density dots represent intense urban development. The goal is to create a balance of the two to avoid repeating past mistakes of unbridled growth.

At a recent meeting in Groveland, several participants complained that they could not decrease growth by withholding dots or moving them to other counties.

"I am not about to agree with the assumption that we must build to support the projected population increases," Lake County resident Leanne Brubaker wrote in a Myregion.org blog about the event. "That's just poor thinking. If you take that assumption to its logical conclusion, then we should continue to build and build and build until there is nothing left, because that's what we'll logically have to do to support the projected population of 7.3 million people."

However, Shelley Lauten, director of myregion, said her organization only represents the democratic wishes of the citizens of the area, even if they may be developers or other business interests.

"Who is a citizen and who's not?" she asked. "If you have an environmental passion, are you an environmentalist posing as a citizen?"

Lauten said myregion is bound by the BEBR University of Florida population projections, and that the group is only following the law in having citizens use those numbers.

Catherine Hanson, whose commission seat Stewart is campaigning for, sits on the myregion board as a representative for Lake County.

"Anything that's regional, we need to be involved with," Hanson said. " All predictions indicate that (7 million people) will be here in central Florida."

Stewart said that if she is elected, she will not work with myregion, who she says is run by special interests. She said she will instead work one-on-one with leaders and planners from other counties to create a regional plan for growth.

"I would rather talk personally," she said.

Lauten stressed that nobody is bound by myregion's findings; rather, they are a framework with which to plan for growth on a regional scale.

Tomorrow's meeting will feature the first unveiling of a composite map of what myregion says are the wishes of 7,000 citizens for how the region should look in 50 years.

"What we hope to do is a create a shared vision," Lauten said. "It's that simple. It's not evil or duplicitous."

Will new rules hurt the river?

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency this week approved a lower standard for the level of dissolved oxygen required in the St. Johns River in order to keep it healthy, and to protect animal life. It affects the marine portion of the lower basin of the St. Johns River, which extends from Jacksonville to parts of Volusia and Putnam counties. The new rule is effective now. Local and state officials explain the change.

Q: Why is the level of dissolved oxygen important? Fish, crabs and shrimp and other animal life are dependent on dissolved oxygen for survival. Excessive amounts of nutrients can lead to algae blooms, such as those that occurred last year, according to state Department of Environmental Protection officials Greg Knecht and Vince Seibold.

Q: So why did the EPA change the standard for dissolved oxygen in the river? The DEP asked for the change after it discovered in 2003 that the dissolved oxygen levels were dipping below the nationwide standard which was a daily average of 5 milligrams per liter.
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DEP officials attributed the dip to natural causes and sought a new standard that was approved by the EPA Tuesday. Under the new standard, daily levels fluctuate but a minimum standard of 4 milligrams per liter remains in place.

Q: What do critics of the new standard say? St. Johns Riverkeeper Neil Armingeon said he thinks the EPA's ruling is a disservice to the river. He said more pollution will go into the river and allow JEA and other agencies that dump nutrients into the river to spend less money on upgrades to their systems because a lower standard has been adopted. An EPA spokeswoman did not return phone calls seeking comment. Jacksonville University marine biologist Quinton White said he was disappointed with the EPA's decision, saying the river's health will suffer. White said the scientists looked at the ability for animals to survive in the lower level of oxygen. But he said if the water is too hot or there's too much metal in the river, the animals could be at risk.

Q: What does this mean for The River Accord, the 10-year plan local and state agencies signed in July to improve the health of the river? JEA's Paul Steinbrecher said the ruling doesn't change JEA's plan to spend $200 million to close six smaller wastewater treatment plants, upgrade five regional plants and other projects.

Mary-Kelli Palka/The Times-Union

State faces new setback in battle over water

By Bruce Ritchie
DEMOCRAT STAFF WRITER

A federal judge in Alabama has rejected Florida's request for a hearing on a water-sharing agreement reached between Georgia and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

Alabama, Florida and Georgia have been fighting in court since 1990 over water from the Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint river system. Alabama and Georgia want water for future growth while Florida wants water to maintain the estuary and support the seafood industry in Apalachicola Bay.

The agreement, reached in another federal court case that didn't involve Florida, allows Georgia cities to draw up to 537 million gallons of water daily from Lake Lanier near Atlanta.

Florida said the agreement provides an advantage to the Corps of Engineers and Georgia in court-ordered mediation in the 1990 lawsuit involving Florida.

District Judge Karon O. Bowdre issued an injunction blocking the agreement in 2003. But an appeals court in 2005 ruled the injunction was improper.

Alabama and Florida said in February that the judge legally can throw out the agreement. They said she should rule that the Corps of Engineers violated a 1990 court order staying litigation involving the river.

In an Oct. 4 order denying Florida's request, Bowdre said taking action would result in more litigation and would detract from court-ordered mediation among the states.

"As this court frequently has stated," Bowdre wrote, "the parties need to direct as much of their efforts, focus and energy as possible into good-faith efforts to resolve this conflict through mediation."

State agency gets $4.7M grant to study red tide

By KATE SPINNER

N.Y. Times Regional Media Group

By tapping into a $4.7 million federal grant, nine researchers hope to discover whether pollution fosters red tide.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association announced its decision Tuesday to award the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission the multimillion-dollar grant.

The award funds five years of research meant to get to the heart of the relationship between nutrients and red tide.

"The blooms are essentially plants, and how much plant is out there is controlled by nutrients," said Cindy Heil, a red tide scientist with the Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.

Heil will lead the research team in trying to pinpoint the conditions that cause red tide cells to multiply into blooms.

The research also aims at advancing red tide prediction and determining whether cutting back on nutrient pollution in the Gulf will slow red tide.

"One of the main reasons we're focusing on nutrients is the potential it might have to stimulate blooms," said Rob Magnien, director of the NOAA Center for Sponsored Coastal Ocean Research.

"If nutrients are determined to be a significant contributor, that is something we could potentially control."

Red tide algae naturally grow in oceanic waters, but certain conditions cause them to manifest into deadly blooms. The algae emit a toxin that, in high doses, kills fish, dolphins and manatees; the toxins can cause beachgoers to cough and asthmatics to suffer more severe breathing problems.

Nutrients, such as nitrogen and phosphorus, also are naturally present in the air, soil and water. But sewer outflows, septic systems, over-fertilized lawns, pet waste and the by-products of industry and agriculture have dramatically increased the amount of nutrients in the rivers and canals that pour into the Gulf of Mexico.

Scientists have argued for years over whether red tide is getting worse and whether increased pollution has caused the blooms to return more frequently and stay longer.

A giant red tide bloom lingered off the coast from Pinellas to Collier counties for 13 months beginning last year, from January 2005 to February 2006.

This year, a bloom that started causing problems in late June continues to kill fish and scare away tourists.

Just as red tide started to reappear in Southwest Florida this year, NOAA sponsored a red tide workshop at Mote Marine Laboratory.

There, scientists turned repeatedly to questions about how red tide uses nutrients to grow.

Members of the public attending the workshop pointed fingers at pollution and urged scientists to get to the bottom of the problem.

Magnien said the questions raised at the workshop underscored the importance of the research into the relationship between red tide and nutrients.

He said that nutrient pollution nourishes harmful algae blooms, similar to red tide, along coasts worldwide.

Stuart DeCew, the Sierra Club's red tide point person in Sarasota, said communities should not wait to reduce nutrient pollution.

"The money is important because it gives scientists the necessary funds so they can continue to explore the connection between coastal pollution and harmful algal blooms, but that's no excuse for community inaction," DeCew said.

Back to nature on the Kissimmee River

Mountains move for wildlife-rich marshes

Daphne Sashin
Sentinel Staff Writer

October 12, 2006

ON THE KISSIMMEE RIVER -- Back and forth, all day long, mammoth yellow dump trucks take on loads of dirt from the 10-foot-high mound that's been sitting next to the Kissimmee River for 40 years, left behind by dredges that turned the once-meandering river into a straight-walled canal.

One by one, they drive to the river's edge and dump the soil so bulldozers can push it into the water.

Meanwhile, just upstream, a dredge sucks out mud and decayed plant matter from the original riverbed, spewing a brown fountain of muck into the canal where the earth is being dumped.

This is the latest phase in a $578 million federal and state project to return the river's midsection back to the way it used to be, before the Army Corps of Engineers turned the winding, 103-mile river into a 56-mile canal for the sake of flood control.

The goal is to fill in almost two miles of the artificial canal near the Avon Park Air Force Range and create four miles of curving pathway for the river water. By the end of next year, crews will have moved enough earth to fill a train of dump trucks stretching from Orlando to Washington, D.C.

"The average person can't comprehend how much earth work is actually being done," Corps engineer Chuck Wilburn said. "Most people talk about leveling their home site or getting it ready to build a house. That stuff takes a half a day or a day's worth of earth work."

The 13-year river restoration requires the Corps of Engineers to fill in 22 miles of the canal with dirt that has sat beside the river since the agency dug it out in the 1960s. Construction crews must also dredge and reconnect nine miles of the river's original curves, which went stagnant and filled with decaying plant matter when they were cut off from the main channel.

In allowing water to flood the old bends, water-management officials expect to turn 26,500 acres of pasture back into habitat-rich marshes. Where the mountains of dirt once sat, seeds that have been buried in the ground for 40 years will come back to life.

"We're not planting one single piece of vegetation," Wilburn said. "As soon as you take that material off and get the water back on it . . . the grass comes back."

Besides providing habitat for hundreds of species of fish and wildlife, the wetlands that are re-created along the river will help filter out pollutants now carried to Lake Okeechobee.

Engineers spent decades trying to figure the best way to reverse the ecological damage the Corps caused when it gouged a massive drainage ditch through the river's shallow maze. They knew they couldn't fill in the entire canal because that would flood the communities above and below the river, Kissimmee and St. Cloud to the north and Okeechobee to the south.

"It's not just a matter of putting it back the way it was," said Stuart Appelbaum, chief of the planning division for the Corps' Jacksonville district. "It was a long process to figure out what needed to be done."

The first phase of the restoration, completed in 2001, plugged seven miles of the channel with dirt and returned flow to 15 miles of the river's historic, meandering path.

Biologists with the South Florida Water Management District were amazed how quickly wildlife returned to the flood plain. Scientists this year observed three times the number of wading birds and 10 times the number of ducks they expected based on their understanding of conditions in the 1940s and '50s.

"It's a tremendous response," district biologist Joe Koebel said.

In July, construction crews returned to the river for another round of earth moving. For now, the contractor has about three dozen employees working 10-hour days to get the job done.

"It is kind of counter-intuitive, because it looks so mechanized and manmade," said Bill Graf, a spokesman for the South Florida Water Management District. "It's almost like you have to mess it all up again to get it back to nature."

Two excavators scrape truckloads of earth from the mountain, with an inspector from the Air Force Range on hand to check for unexploded bombs that may have fallen into it. Half a dozen dump trucks drive back and forth across the mound, hauling loads of dirt to the river's edge where bulldozers push the piles into the water.

A mile up the river, in one of the old curves, another contractor sits inside a barge. The machine sucks muck and weeds into a pipe that runs across the mountain of dirt and spills into the canal.

If everyone does their job, years from now, no one will know a canal was ever there.

Daphne Sashin can be reached at dsashin@orlandosentinel.com or 407-931-5944.

State forestry agency using bio-diesel in equipment
Associated Press

TALLAHASSEE -- Some tractors, loaders and other heavy equipment used by the state Division of Forestry will begin using bio-diesel, part of a push by state Agriculture Commissioner Charles Bronson to promote the use of fuels made out of vegetation.

Bronson's office said Wednesday that the forestry agency will test a mixture containing 20 percent bio-diesel and 80 percent regular diesel, known as B20 in several of its heavy vehicles and equipment. The agency said that the fuel can be burned without modifying the equipment.

The mix is expected to cost about the same, or slightly less, than regular diesel, but burns cleaner and is partly made from crops.

Bronson has advocated for research and use of more bio-fuel, which he sees as a viable alternative for Florida farmers to growing food crops when that market doesn't pay. It also is seen as a way to save money when gasoline prices spike as they did earlier this year, and to reduce the nation's dependence on foreign oil

Power plant sparks debate

Officials, neighbors fear heightened pollution danger

BY JIM WAYMER
FLORIDA TODAY

Reliant Energy's Indian River power plant exceeded hourly limits for heat input into its boilers 140 times in the past five years, increasing pollution from burning oil and gas.

Fines and letters from state regulators, however, have done little to clean up the aged plant's smokestacks, which still account for about a quarter of the county's chemical emissions.

Instead of reducing emissions, the company now wants changes to its permit to make the increased emissions acceptable. It says the heat input limits originally were set only because of equipment capacity, not air quality issues.

The company hopes to keep exceeding them, which state regulators say causes more pollution.

State and local officials want assurances that more heat from burning oil and gas for electricity won't mean more soot and sulfur dioxide for local residents to breathe.

"It's basically the fuel they're burning," said Debbie Coles, special projects coordinator for Brevard County's Nature Resources Management Office.

Reliant's plant, like Florida Power and Light Co.'s about two miles to the south on U.S. 1, burns a mixture of heavy oil high in sulfur and natural gas.

Smokestacks at the two power plants spit out most of the county's sulfur dioxide and about half its overall chemical pollution. They spew air pollutants over Brevard that studies show can increase rates of heart and respiratory problems, ranging from mild symptoms to hospitalizations and premature death.

The FPL plant has kept clear of fines in recent years.

State fines

But the state has fined the Indian River plant several times since 2000 for emissions and thick smoke. The fines totaled more than $22,000.

The state fined plant co-owner Orlando Utilities Commission twice in recent years for times when water injectors failed and turbines burned too hot, causing excess emissions. The first fine was $9,000 in August 2002, the second was $11,400 in January.

Reliant, the other co-owner, was fined $2,150 in February 2001 for emitting thicker smoke than allowed.

Pat Hammond, a spokeswoman with Reliant, said many of the past emissions violations stemmed from old operational policies from when OUC ran the plant, before late 1999.

"Since we were able to implement our own operational policies at the plant, the number of exceedences has been reduced dramatically," Hammond said.

While Reliant's requested permit change may result in increased air emissions, they won't be beyond current pollution limits, she said.

The change would allow the plant to increase by 6 percent to 7 percent the output of megawatt hours of electricity, she added.

Voluntary changes

Hammond said Reliant has undertaken voluntary measures to reduce fine particles and other pollutants and is willing to meet with state and county officials to address concerns about the plant.

But Reliant officials also assert that the state has no authority to limit the plant's hourly heat input because the three generating units were under construction before the 1970 Clean Air Act took effect. They want the heat limits removed from the plant's permit.

The existing limits, they say, were the result of the original boiler manufactures' conservative predictions of the plant's performance and were not intended as operational limits.

Which permit?

The plant also hasn't had any major changes that would require more extensive permitting for new construction and more air quality assurances, Reliant officials assert.

"The Indian River units have not undergone any physical changes or changes in method of operation," Derek Fustenwerth, Reliant's manager of air resources division, wrote in a June 20 letter to Alvaro Linero, program administrator in the state Department of Environmental Protection's Bureau of Air Regulation.

"The revision request will simply allow the units to operate at a level at which they have always been capable of operating," he wrote.

Linero disagrees.

"We think this at the very least requires a construction permit," Linero said. "This kind of a request is not something you handle via the operations permit.

"They're asking us to authorize or recognize what they consider to be the capabilities of that equipment," he said.

No deadline

Linero said no specific deadline has been set on resolving the permitting issue and the state is simply seeking more information before deciding how next to proceed.

"We're really talking about their peak usage," Linero added. "Would they have a significant increase . . . during the time they're in peak usage?"

The back-and-forth between state regulators, the power companies and Brevard officials continues a decades old struggle with both power plants. Residents and local government want cleaner air while the power companies make promises of incremental improvements.

The plants are operated by Houston-based Reliant Resources Inc. and Miami-based Florida Power & Light Co., which owns the Canaveral power plant a few miles south of Reliant's plant.

An environmental consultant hired by the county will take two years to complete a study of air pollution caused by the two plants.

Meanwhile, people such as Leo McInnis keep breathing sulfur dioxide and other harmful pollutants. He rents a house on Capron Road, just across Kings Highway from the Reliant plant.

He worries as much about the noise as the smells. A loud bang from the plant one recent day startled him to his feet.

"My house shook," McInnis said. "It's just noisy. The wind's always coming this way."

Contact Waymer at 242-3663 or jwaymer@brevard.gannett.com.

A super plan for smart growth

By Times editorial
Published October 12, 2006

Smart growth management.

The term is used routinely to substantiate the positions of bulldoze-and-build, as well as grow-slow, advocates.

A proposal now before the Hernando County Commission - a law that would require a supermajority of the commission to amend the Comprehensive Growth Management Plan - provides an opportunity for sincere advocates of smart growth to prove it by raising the bar for significant land use debates.

The comprehensive plan is the county's guiding light for growth. It is a document that was carefully crafted and approved by the state almost 17 years ago. Other than the routine matters that bring it into compliance with state laws, it has been changed sparingly over the years.

With the population surge in recent years, requests to amend the plan have increased. The most notable recent one is for Hickory Hill, a gated 1,700-home subdivision with three golf courses in the Spring Lake area. (It is important to note that even if the proposed supermajority requirement becomes law, it will not affect Hickory Hill; a simple majority vote will decide that project.)

This proposal, first suggested by Commissioner Jeff Stabins more than a year ago, and now supported by Commissioners Chris Kingsley and Diane Rowden, would ensure that any change to the comp plan would be the result of an overwhelming consensus - four of five - elected representatives. The first of two public hearings on this topic will be held Tuesday in Brooksville.

Setting a higher standard for altering that essential rule book makes sense.

Hillsborough and Collier counties, for example, have worked with it as a matter of law for at least 15 years. One key difference is that those counties require only a simple majority vote to transmit a comp plan amendment to the Department of Community Affairs, but a supermajority of commissioners must approve the final proposal after it has been scrutinized by the state. Hernando County should copy that stipulation.

In those counties, the condition of a supermajority vote has not been detrimental to their growth management plans. It has not created a logjam of proposed comp plan amendments. It has not spawned a wave of partisan disagreements. And it has not made the counties more vulnerable to lawsuits from developers.

It simply has given this vital document another layer of protection from those who might try to compromise its purpose, and it has insisted that commissioners be in almost unanimous agreement that changes are consistent with the public's interest.

The supermajority vote requirement would apply only to changing the comp plan. All other matters, with the exception of raising or lowering the local option fuel tax, would still be decided by a simple majority vote.

Critics' primary argument against the supermajority requirement is that it enables a minority of the commission to overrule the majority. They have attempted to characterize it as an assault on democracy and the tenet of majority rule. It is unfortunate they have resorted to that sort of demagogic debate instead of examining the proposal on its merits and its potential to strengthen the county's land use planning.

Most votes on comp plan amendments have passed by a supermajority. According to research provided by the county's planning staff, all amendments that have been adopted by the commission since 2000 passed with at least four votes. There is no indication that suddenly would change to a spate of 3-2 votes if the supermajority requirement becomes law.

Also, the proposed ordinance would not take effect until Jan. 1, 2007, which means that any applications to amend the comp plan between now and then eventually could be passed by a simple majority.

This measure, like the fuel tax, provides a means to set the comp plan apart from ordinances about yard sales or licensing pets. It is that important and it deserves a chance to succeed. If it does not, the commission can always repeal the law - with a simple majority vote.

[Last modified October 11, 2006, 22:35:09]

Supermajority vote would start Jan. 1

By MICHAEL D. BATES
mbates@hernandotoday.com

BROOKSVILLE — A draft supermajority ordinance, which would require a 4-1 county board vote on comprehensive plan amendments, would go into effect Jan. 1, 2007.

If approved, the ordinance would not affect any comprehensive plan amendment applications already filed, including the proposed Hickory Hill development proposed for Spring Lake.

Only developments filed after Jan. 1 would require the supermajority board vote.

County commissioners are scheduled to vote on the ordinance at Tuesday’s board meeting. At that time they could adopt it as is, make changes, or discard it entirely.

They could also remove the grandfather provision that would make the 4-1 voting system binding on Hickory Hill and six other pending comprehensive plan amendments in the hopper.

Assistant County Attorney Jeff Kirk said he believes the draft ordinance he released this week is legally defensible and would caution the board not to remove the grandfather provision.

County Commissioner Jeff Stabins, who first broached the idea of a supermajority vote last month, is also against making it retroactive.

“We’re going to see a mad rush of people filing to beat the January date if this goes through, which would defeat the purpose,” County Commissioner Nancy Robinson said.

Robinson on Wednesday reemphasized her opposition to supermajority vote.

“I think the democratic principles of majority governance are fine,” she said.

Robinson said most changes to the comprehensive plan have been government-related and do not pertain to land use issues.

And most of those land use amendments have passed by a supermajority vote anyway, according to County Planner Jim King.

King is also concerned his staff is not equipped to handle the rush of developers who would likely file before Jan. 1.

Commissioner Tom Hogan Sr. said a supermajority on a five-member board would require an 80 percent vote for passage.

“To me, it’s completely ridiculous and I don’t know why it’s being promoted,” said Hogan, who favors discarding the ordinance entirely.

Attorney Jake Varn, representing Sierra Properties LLC of Tampa, the developer of Hickory Hill, said he sees nothing in the proposed ordinance threatening to his project.

However, should commissioners choose to remove the grandfather clause and make all amendment filings retroactive, the question of due process for his client would come into the equation, he said.

Hickory Hill would contain 1,750 homes and three golf courses. There would also be a smattering of commercial activity. The homes would range in price from $500,000 to $1 million.

Proponents of the supermajority believe that the comprehensive plan should be difficult to change because it provides the blueprint for long-term growth in Hernando County. Others, especially developers, believe the plan should be more fluid and allow them the flexibility of developing some of the more rural areas of the county.

County commissioners have been guided by their current version of the comprehensive plan since June 1989.

Reporter Michael D. Bates can be contacted at 352-544-5290.

Minneola embraces the Hills

Developer's next step is to win blessing of state, regional planners

Robert Sargent
Sentinel Staff Writer

October 12, 2006

MINNEOLA -- The Hills of Minneola has cleared the first of what may be several big hurdles for the colossal project.

City Council members voted late Tuesday to annex and rezone the sprawling 1,800 acres straddling Florida's Turnpike. They also approved a preliminary agreement to allow the proposed community. Now the Hills must go before state and local planners, some of whom already have concerns about the development's effects on south Lake.

Representatives for Minneola, the county and landowner Family Dynamics Land Co. LLC -- formerly known as the Gregg Family Land Co. -- will discuss some of those concerns Friday with staffers of the East Central Florida Regional Planning Council. The planning-council board is scheduled to vote Wednesday on recommendations for the project.

Among the biggest effects will be the extra vehicles the development would put on area roads. The Hills project is proposed for nearly 4,000 homes plus 3 million square feet of offices and commercial and industrial buildings centered on a new interchange for Florida's Turnpike.

When completed, possibly in 15 years, the community is expected to generate 105,000 vehicle trips a day, according to the planning-council staff. Reports show that roads would require more than $887 million in improvements to handle the volume.

The Hills developer may be required to pay only a portion of that -- about $127 million, staff said. The rest could come from public and private funding.

The traffic load could require major changes to already busy roads.

The state Department of Transportation is widening U.S. Highway 27 in south Lake to six lanes. The agency also has plans to expand State Road 50 to six lanes.

The Hills of Minneola could require eight lanes for parts of those roads and others -- widening that may not be likely. The planning council urges other options to minimize traffic, such as buses and other public transportation.

On Tuesday night, residents expressed both concerns and support for the Hills during the City Council meeting.

Some argued that the huge development would have too much impact on schools, roads and wildlife.

"You have a treasure up in those hills," Patricia Donahue said.

Others said they welcome the jobs, businesses and a turnpike interchange that the Hills could bring to Minneola.

"I would really like to see us become a city -- not a town," Joe Emanuele said.

The council voted 3-2 to support annexing and rezoning the Hills property and to approve the project's development agreement.

"I voted yes after weighing the pros and cons," council member Joseph Teri said. "This sets the foundation for the long-term prosperity of the city."

Mayor David Yeager: "It is good for the town -- good for the businesses."

Council members Sue Cordova and Shane Perreault dissented on both votes.

Said Perreault: "I don't think this is smart development."

Minneola approved an agreement with the developer that would provide the city more than $7 million in contributions on top of municipal taxes and fees to help cover the effects of growth on public facilities, parks, and police and fire protection.

Cordova said the developer needs to offer more. She suggested nearly $10.5 million as well as assurances that the turnpike interchange would be completed in the first phase.

Yeager also asked for more. After a brief break, Family Dynamics representatives offered to pay $250,000 to help pay for an ambulance.

Family Dynamics president Bruce Duncan said he was pleased with Tuesday's vote, although he said the project still has a long way to go.

"We had a baby -- now we have to raise it. We have a lot of work ahead of us."

Robert Sargent can be reached at rsargent@orlandosentinel.com or 352-742-5909.

Hills of Minneola approved
Council votes 3-2 to annex, rezone land for development that could double city's size

Joshua Davidovich
Staff Writer

MINNEOLA - The city annexed and rezoned 1,800 acres Tuesday, paving the way for a development that could more than double the population of Minneola in the coming years.

The council voted 3-2 to annex land where Hills of Minneola, an almost 4,000-home development, is proposed. The plans also call for 3 million square feet of commercial, office and industrial space as well as an interchange with Florida's Turnpike.

City leaders have expressed concerns over the number of homes to be built, which could add almost 10,000 new residents, but say the economic benefit from new jobs and the turnpike exit outweighed the population increase.

"I don't like all the homes, but with all the other amenities and this council badgering commercial development, what are the other options to get business into the city?" Vice Mayor Ed Earl said.

The 1,800-acre project is estimated to bring more than 5,000 new jobs to the area. By annexing it, the city poises itself to also annex the adjacent Sugarloaf Mountain, a 2,200-home community already approved by the county. The city signed a contract with the developers of Sugarloaf to provide utility services to that development.

However, Councilwoman Sue Cordova expressed concerns over the city's ability to provide services to these areas.

"If a body is found out there, it's our sheriffs that are assigned to our city that are going to go investigate, instead of being in the city where the residents need them," she said. "We don't have the staffing to increase right now."

A negotiated settlement calls for the developer, Family Dynamics Land Co., to pay the city nearly $7 million to mitigate extra costs associated with bringing services to the development.

The city was anxious that if Minneola did not annex the property, it would be developed anyway, possibly under the umbrella of Clermont, which also borders it. Minneola would still feel the effects of extra traffic and school crowding, but without the billion dollars of estimated tax revenue the development may bring, officials said.

"Clermont didn't get to be the biggest city by saying 'no' to development," Earl said. "I wanted to be able to control it."

City Manager Bruce Behrens said that with South Lake growing at the pace it is, Minneola has no choice but to join in.

"Had the city not annexed, they would be surrounded and be a small town with development all around them," he said. "Something is going to be built there; they wanted to at least have a say on the development of the property."

Mayor David Yeager and councilman Joe Teri also voted in favor of the annexation. Cordova and councilman Shane Perreault voted against it.

'Vision thing' is needed, candidates agree

Candidates seeking mayoral and council seats say Crystal River needs to do more to determine its identity and destiny.

By ELENA LESLEY
Published October 12, 2006

CRYSTAL RIVER - Beyond the bickering and divisiveness, aside from the unwieldy budget and duplicative services, Crystal River has one major problem: It doesn't know what it wants to be.

At a political forum Tuesday night, candidates for city office emphasized the need for a vision and long-term planning in Crystal River.

"We keep putting out fires every year, badly," said Mayor Ron Kitchen, who is seeking another term.

During the event, which was sponsored by the Citrus County Chronicle, the four mayoral candidates and three City Council candidates praised the city's potential but criticized the lack of action by officials.

Kitchen, former council member Mike Gudis, current council member Roger Proffer and political newcomer Bruce Garrison are facing off for the mayor's seat. Former council member Phil Price, current council member Robert Holmes and the wife of a former council member, Lynn Wallace, are running for the open council seat. The election is scheduled for Nov. 7; early voting begins Oct. 23.

Crystal River suffers from "paralysis by analysis," Gudis said.

Numerous scientists have studied cleaning up Kings Bay, but it's still dirty. Officials have discussed balancing the city budget for years, but are still dipping into reserves.

Crystal River has never even done a master plan, Kitchen said, so there are no overarching guidelines for how the city will grow.

And, due to infighting, the city has been demoralized, Garrison said.

"I will make you proud to be a resident of this city again," he said.

Echoing similar claims, candidates hashed out the best ways to first stabilize Crystal River and then determine its future direction.

All agreed that the city's budget must be cut. But some were more forthcoming with their ideas than others.

Kitchen chastised some mayoral candidates after they said they'd need to further study the fire department before deciding whether to turn it over to the county.

"The data is in," he said, and Crystal River can't afford to run its own fire department.

While there may not be savings in the short term, during upcoming years, the city will have to replace expensive equipment.

So far, Crystal River hasn't saved much money for this purpose. Thus, the costs of sustaining the fire department will be higher if it remains under the auspices of the city, Kitchen said.

"It may not be a pretty campaign promise," he said, but "if you vote for me, I will fight for every dime."

Along with balancing the budget, the city needs less turnover of city managers, many candidates said.

"Looking back, I think I made a mistake," Price said of his vote to oust a manager during his previous stint on the council.

But, candidates said, it's not enough to make Crystal River financially sound and politically mild. There needs to be a plan for the future, a cohesive vision of the city's development.

It starts with the bay.

People say "they think it's great they weren't here 20 years ago," said Lynn Wallace, "so they don't know about how clear the water was."

Study after study has been produced, but it's time to coordinate agencies and implement strategies, candidates said.

"We never seem to get the party started," Garrison said. If elected mayor, he said he'd set up a meeting with all agencies involved with the bay to develop a concrete plan of action.

"We're the ones who have the most at stake," he said, so Crystal River needs to take the lead.

The city also needs to determine the course of its development, or others will make those decisions.

Most candidates said they wouldn't favor building high-density projects in coastal areas, but some, like Price, said such construction could generate much-needed revenue.

Other sources of revenue could stem from creating a more community-oriented atmosphere in Crystal River, Garrison said. The city should promote a downtown, walkable community and bring in more events and festivals, he said.

In other words, candidates said, Crystal River needs to be more proactive in molding its own destiny.

Each candidate claims he can lead the effort, so the decision is up to voters.

"You do need a cheerleader to make things happen," Gudis said.

Elena Lesley can be reached at elesley@sptimes.com or 564-3627.

Land deal draws more criticism of Deltona mayor

By SARA KIESLER
Staff Writer

DELTONA -- He's done it again.

In office less than a year, 28-year-old Deltona Mayor Dennis Mulder has found himself embroiled in numerous scandals.

First, there were campaign finance accusations. Then, he suggested revisiting the issue of holding a "moment of silence" at the end of a city meeting in March, which made residents say they felt left out of the process. And now he has purchased a property that some say should be handed over to the city to be used as a park.

Both supporters and critics are torn over Mulder's part in a $250,000 land deal involving 13 acres, property which formerly belonged to the nonprofit Deltona Youth Soccer Club.

Supporter Leslie Pearce, who says she remains close to one of Mulder's loudest critics on the issue, former Mayor John Masiarczyk, says she stands by the mayor because she believes he has a vision the community hasn't seen before.

"I've lived here for 20 years and I've been highly active, and I feel like with Dennis we've all been given a breath of fresh air and we have hope for the city," she said.

But others, like resident Susan Collins, say Mulder is a walking contradiction because he says he stands for smart growth, but he recently applied for permission to rezone the property for up to six houses per acre.

"Him and (Commissioner Janet) Deyette seem to be on the page that they don't want densities to increase anywhere, but then he turns around and asks (that) his property be rezoned six per acre," she said. "It's like a parent, 'do as I say not as I do.' "

Mulder, however, decided Tuesday he's not going to develop the property for at least a decade because he doesn't want to give misperceptions that he's acting inappropriately. But he plans to make it a "smart-growth pilot project."

However, it still appears fishy to Collins and others that one board member of the corporation he formed to purchase the property happens to be Jayne Vance, wife of Charlie Vance, who contributed to his campaign and helps run the soccer club.

Mulder swears there is no ethical problem with the relationship and says he just wanted someone on his team who had owned land before.

"I didn't want to go it alone, and a couple of family members turned down the investment," he said.

Charlie Vance would not comment on the relationship, only saying "more information will be revealed at the commission meeting on Monday."

But Masiarczyk insists a "gentleman's agreement" was made while he was mayor that said the land was going to become part of the city of Deltona, though nothing was ever voted on by city commissioners, according to public documents from 1999 to 2004.

Commissioner Michael Carmolingo, whose district includes the property, and Jamie Jessup, who plans to run for commissioner in that district come 2007, both also say the land should become a park. "We don't have enough parks up here in District 6," Jessup said.

sara.kiesler@news-jrnl.com

Mayor Dennis Mulder's troubles:

· In October 2005, Mulder was accused of violating campaign finance laws such as accepting cash contributions of more than $100.

· In March, Mulder caused a stir when he suggested revisiting the issue of a "moment of silence" versus an "invocation" at the beginning of meetings.

· In July, Mulder said he might resign due to a family illness, though he said it was unlikely and did not provide specifics.

· Mulder missed a prepaid city conference in August that cost taxpayers roughly $700, though he paid it back.

-- Sara Kiesler

Council Delays Action on Homes

By Donna Kelly
The Ledger
DUNDEE -- Developers will have to wait a bit longer to get the final go-ahead to build subdivisions in Dundee.

Town Council members voted Tuesday to delay decisions on comprehensive plan amendments that would put five developers one step closer to putting homes in Dundee. Instead, the council will discuss development-related issues and other concerns at a retreat Saturday from 8 a.m. to

5 p.m. at the Future Farmers of America Training Center in Haines City.

This is the second time voting has been postponed.

Council members want to make sure they have all the information they need to fully understand the developers' plans. They are particularly interested in reviewing the minutes from the last Zoning and Planning Board meeting.

"We've had some bad subdivision experiences, so we are taking extra care and caution," Mayor Linda Riner-Mizell said.

Discussion on the comprehensive plan amendment ordinances for the subdivisions -- known as the Tea Groves Property, the Lindsay Raley Property, the Southern Citrus Nurseries-Thayer Property, the Holmes Gardens Property and the William Warren Trust Property -- will be continued at 6:30 p.m. Nov. 14.

At their retreat Saturday, council members will discuss development regulations, the appearance of subdivisions and making sure there are consistent procedures to deal with development requests.

The council approved on first reading a planned urban development request by Feltrim Development for the Kenmare Subdivision that would be built along Scenic Highway.

But it was approved with restrictions and the PUD must be presented to the council again with a preliminary subdivision plan, Riner-Mizell said.

General reactions to the plan were favorable.

"I applaud the layout here," said Councilman Rick Johnson of the fan-shaped subdivision that is wider along the highway and narrows closer to Lake Annie. "It's not a cookie-cutter thing."

But council members expressed concern about the appearance of houses backed up along Scenic Highway, flood plain areas and the number of docks to be built on Lake Annie.

"It's a good design, but it's too close to Scenic Highway," Johnson said.

The vote was 4 to 1, with Johnson casting the opposing vote.

In other business, the council approved an agreement with four developers on issues involving proposed subdivisions off Swan Road and Lake Marie Boulevard, roads that are owned in part by the city and the county.

According to Town Planner Doug Leonard, the agreement specifies who will pay for road projects made necessary by increased traffic from the new subdivisions.

The road projects will be paid for by county and city impact fees and other transportation funds.

The funding source depends on whose jurisdiction in which the road is located, Leonard said.

"Developers pay the entire amount of the project up front, but will be reimbursed (in part) by the town with impact fee credits," Leonard said.

A quarter of the total cost of the road projects -- $500,000 -will be reimbursed to developers with impact fee credits, he said.

Donna Kelly can be reached at donna.kelly@theledger.com or 863-401-6969.

Insurance costs rattle condos

Increases pushing many owners to consider leaving state, poll shows

BY WAYNE T. PRICE
FLORIDA TODAY

Many Florida condominium owners, longtime staples in the Sunshine State, are seriously considering relocating because of high property insurance rates, according to an online poll released Wednesday.

The poll results are not scientific, but real estate experts say the general findings do reflect the situation in the Florida condominium market.

The condominium survey comes as lawmakers seek to find solutions to skyrocketing insurance costs.

Rising insurance premiums -- some of them triple-digit percentage increases -- are forcing property owners across the state to reassess their living situation, and investment portfolios, experts say.

For some property owners, it could mean moving to another state where insurance costs aren't as high. For investors, it could mean shedding properties, like condominiums, and putting the money elsewhere.

"Insurance costs are making a big difference," said Steve Miner of Port St. John, who is trying to sell his Titusville condominium, where the association's insurance premiums are going from $35,000 annually to $125,000.

"How can they more than triple rates?" Miner asked.

Rising insurance costs come as the nation's home-selling market is stalling, illustrated by rising inventories and slower sales.

The local condominium market seems to be taking the brunt of the softening market.

In August, Brevard recorded 36 condominium resales, compared with 248 a year earlier, according to latest-available Florida Association of Realtors data. That's a decrease of 85 percent.

"The condo market does seem to be extremely soft right now,"said Dan Quattrocchi, a broker with Quattrocchi Real Estate on Merritt Island.

George McChesney, who lives in Lake in the Woods condominiums in Melbourne, found out about two months ago that the State Farm Insurance Cos. dropped its policy for the property, forcing the owners to get coverage from Citizens Property Insurance Corp. -- commonly known as the state-run insurer of last resort.

Each owner in the 106-unit complex has to pay $1,600 by Jan. 2, plus an additional $135 a month.

Already, 13 units have gone up for sale, McChesney said.

"I don't know where they're going, but they're moving out of the condominium," he said. "I know one woman is moving to Virginia."

McChesney said another increase like the most recent from Citizens probably would force him out of the state.

"People just can't afford it," he said.

Contact Price at 242-3658 or wprice@flatoday.net.

Traffic concerns not enough to stop condo project

By DOUG SWORD

doug.sword@heraldtribune.com

SOUTH POINTE -- A $130 million bayfront condo project and an adjoining large commercial development narrowly won approval Wednesday.

Sarasota County commissioners approved the development on a 3-2 vote after a contentious, seven-hour hearing despite concerns that further development would worsen traffic along a stretch of U.S. 41 that is unlikely to be improved for at least 15 years.

The commercial development, near the U.S. 41 and Beneva Road intersection, is on the same site where the county has nixed a number of large projects, including a Home Depot five years ago.

Dozens of neighbors lobbied for and against the development.

The biggest group in favor was the Holiday Harbor Neighborhood Association, which won concessions from the developer, including the cost of extending county sewer lines to an area mainly served by septic tanks.

"We got everything we could think of to ask for," said Dan Lobeck, the association's attorney.

That rankled some neighbors from nearby Pelican Cove Condominium owners, who worried that the project would be bigger than advertised and clog U.S. 41.

It's not surprising that Holiday Harbor and another neighbor that will get a sewer hook-up, the Presbyterian Church of the Covenant, spoke in favor of the development, said Pelican Cove resident Jim Schoener.

"We had to pay in Pelican Cove to get our sewers," said Schoener, noting that the cost to extend lines to the 700-plus homes was more than $200,000.

Dubbed "Shoppes at Grande Bay," the commercial and office development will be 210,000 square feet -- about the size of a large department store -- but no shop will be larger than a small neighborhood market.

The 18-acre commercial area will also include 68 condos with a minimum price of around $300,000.

The 152-condominium project, with prices ranging from $500,000 to $2 million, will be called "Residences at Grande Bay."

The developer will start construction first on the 13-acre condo project, which will cost "around $130 million," said Dave Babel of Residences at Grande Bay.

Babel said he couldn't immediately provide an estimate of the cost for the commercial project.

Supporters pointed out that the developer's plans were more appealing than past proposals and that something would eventually be built on the prime spot.

To David McJunkin, a "sixth-generation native Florida cracker" who owns a nearby commercial property, opponents were "small-minded." Opposition to the project from neighboring condo owners amounted to "I'm on board, pull up the ladder," he said.

The project split county commissioners, with David Mills, Shannon Staub and Nora Patterson voting in favor and Paul Mercier and Jon Thaxton voting against.

"This isn't a perfect development and it sure isn't a perfect place," said Patterson, who still voted for the project.

But with a mix of residential, commercial and office space, it's likely the best development the area will get on property that is destined to be developed, she said.

"If Home Depot was too big, this project is equally intimidating," said Mercier, who worried that the development would disrupt traffic flow on that stretch of U.S. 41, which isn't expected to be widened to six lanes until well after 2020.

Bradenton sued over decision on Riviera

By ANTHONY CORMIER

anthony.cormier@heraldtribune.com

BRADENTON -- Twenty-five million dollars couldn't get Riviera Southshore off the ground, but the man behind the proposed development is hoping a lawsuit might do the trick.

Frank Maggio, the St. Petersburg developer who gobbled up dozens of homes in east Bradenton in an area known as Old Manatee, filed suit this week in circuit court to reverse a city decision that nixed the 28-acre condo project.

The lawsuit -- which says the City Council was "arbitrary and capricious" in rejecting the Riviera Southshore project -- is separate from a mediation request, which would have the developer and the city work through a special magistrate.

The lawsuit asks for a circuit judge to sort through the yearlong dispute over Riviera Southshore, which saw Maggio invest $25 million in the neighborhood only to be denied by councilmembers wary of 10- to 14-story condos right next to single-family homes.

The developer bought about 70 homes in the riverfront community, which is beset by poverty and crime. First platted in the 1920s, most of the homes there were built in the 1950s and 1960s. The city's comprehensive plan calls for sweeping redevelopment in the area, although some residents and city officials were uncomfortable with the size and scope of the project.

The council voted 4-1 to reject the project in mid-September and, about a week later, Maggio requested a special magistrate hearing. That hearing is open to the public but has not been scheduled.

The lawsuit, filed Tuesday, was not unexpected, city officials say. Bradenton's attorney, Bill Lisch, said the city had not been served as of Wednesday afternoon. He declined comment.

Maggio and his St. Petersburg attorney, David A. Bacon, did not return phone calls seeking comment.

But Councilman Bemis Smith, perhaps Riviera Southshore's most vocal critic, said he was not surprised by the lawsuit or the developer's drive to get the project off the ground.

"Nothing about this surprises me anymore," Smith said. "He's got a lot of money tied up in that thing, so I guess he has to do what he has to do. It's my hope that we don't have to spend a bunch of taxpayer money to have it figured out."

C&K SAND PIT ON CR 25
A line in the sand
Homeowner upset about Belleview sand pit
BY SUSAN LATHAM CARR
STAR-BANNER

OCALA - Construction on Michele Kirk's new home off County Road 25 just east of Belleview is nearly completed. But she said she probably would not have built it if she had known that the Marion County Commission was going to permit a sand mine to be developed on agricultural land behind her property.

"It's depressing to have a brand-new house built and have the property value go down because of the sand pit in the back," Kirk said. "I would like the sand pit to go some place else."

She and her husband, Ted Kirk II, moved to Marion County from Miramar after last year's final hurricane struck.

The county has said Kirk's home is next door to a car salvage yard, and it is, but Kirk said that her husband is going to build a wooden fence to shield her property from that.

Kirk and other members of her family, who also have land abutting or near the sand mine, have been at odds with the County Commission since March 21, when it voted 4-1 to give C&K Investment Inc. a special-use permit for the mine.

The county's Zoning Commission and planning staff both recommended denial. Commissioner Andy Kesselring dissented.

Kirk took the county to court because, she claimed, it did not give proper notice of the public hearing. The court sided with her.

The county asked for a rehearing, saying it now has information that substantiates its claim that it mailed public hearing notices. The court denied the rehearing.

"I think this office is going to recommend appeal at their next meeting," Assistant County Attorney Tom McNamara said about the council's Oct. 17 meeting.

In the meantime, the sand mine continues to operate, and that has the Kirks up in arms.

"You can turn around and win after suing the County Commission, but you still don't win," Ted Kirk II said.

Tallahassee attorney William R. Waters Jr., who represents Kirk in her lawsuit, said C&K, which is owned by road builder Steven Counts and developer Harvey Vandeven, should not be operating.

"The judge's order says that the county's permitting was done wrong," Waters said. "The county has, apparently, allowed them to go on about their business when the county should be working expeditiously to comply with the court order and with their own requirements."

Counts, who speaks on behalf of C&K, could not be reached for comment.

McNamara said C&K can operate. He said the court's conclusion is that the county did not fulfill its requirements.

Asked if the court order voids the special permit, he replied, "No, it doesn't." He said the suit only was between Michele Kirk and the County Commission.

"There would be more public hearings, more notification and, ultimately, the same decision," McNamara said.

Waters said he found McNamara's statement "arrogant."

"Why not even make all the commission meetings to be private without the public in attendance?" he asked facetiously. "It probably will be all right. It probably will work out the same."

Waters questioned why the county would spend taxpayer money to appeal the court's decision when all it has to do is mail out notices and conduct public hearings.

Circuit Judge Jack Singbush said, because there still is time to appeal his decision to deny a rehearing, he was limited in what he could say about the case.

"All I am legally allowed to tell you is that the orders speak for themselves," Singbush said. "When I granted the writ, that was pretty explicit." And he said the order denying the rehearing also was explicit.

"I believe I lawfully ruled," Singbush said. "It's up to them to either work out their respective differences, which I hope they can do. If not, that's what the court is for."

But Singbush said that, right now, there is nothing else before him to consider.

"We are considering our options, which will probably be petitioning the court for injunctive relief," Waters said. "Months have gone by and they haven't even begun the notice processes."

Other things, besides the noise and dust, have the Kirks upset.

C&K has installed a deceleration lane but has not installed the acceleration lane the county required.

They say the 10-foot berm the county required C&K to have is not 10 feet. And the berm is not completed, yet the work is continuing.

Another property owner, Robert Moran, also owns land abutting the sand mine. The property does not have a 25-foot setback or a completed berm.

But Moran, whose wife, Marilyn, works for the county, is not complaining.

"I will have to wait and see," Moran said. "I don't think it will affect me as much. I don't live on C-25," he said about the two-lane road that leads to the mine.

Susan Latham Carr may be reached at susan.carr@starbanner.com or (352) 867-4156.

Amendment 3 strips power from the people

BY FRED GRIMM

fgrimm@MiamiHerald.com

Voters will find the ballot language of Amendment Three misleading. The real intent is to stop Lesley Blackner.

''Maybe the powers-that-be aren't happy with the idea of citizens fighting back,'' ventured Blackner, arch-enemy of a cabal of builders, landowners, lenders and land speculators who have long had their way with this state.

Amendment Three doesn't mention the West Palm Beach lawyer. Or the cause she champions -- the Florida Hometown Democracy Amendment. But her initiative terrifies developers used to bulldozing through comprehensive growth plans like rubbish on a vacant lot.

Her amendment, if she can find the 610,000 signatures need to place it on the 2008 ballot, would require voter approval before cities and counties can alter their growth plans. Heretofore, a little grease from a well-connected lobbyist, a bundle of campaign contributions, a selection of Godiva chocolates have been enough to convince a city or county commission to cast aside nettlesome growth restrictions.

POLITICAL PLOY

But developers know that if citizens are ever given a say, their days of willy-nilly to-hell-with-what-the-people-want building are over. Amendment Three, also known (for those who cherish misnomers) as the Save Our Constitution Amendment, would preempt the Florida Hometown Democracy Amendment. It may sabotage the whole notion of citizen initiatives in the process, but if it stops Blackner, who cares?

Amendment Three raises the threshold for approval of a constitutional amendment from a simple majority -- 50 percent plus one vote -- to 60 percent. But maybe I'm being paranoid on behalf of Blackner. Maybe the real intent is to stop Bob Graham.

The former senator and governor, an unassailable political icon in Florida, feels downright assailed by Amendment Three. Graham led the 2002 initiative to undo political meddling in higher education. ''I can tell you that if we had started that effort knowing we had to get 60 percent of the vote, it would have been much more difficult to find volunteers.'' Graham said just the perception of difficulty created by a 60 percent requirement would keep worthy amendments off the ballot.

MONEY TALKS

The initiative system gives citizens the opportunity to circumvent powerful special interests who, Graham said, ``have a stranglehold on the Legislature.''

Voters bypassed Tallahassee to create universal pre-kindergarten (which passed with 59.2 percent of the votes) and cap class sizes in public schools (52.4 percent). Neither would have passed under the rules imposed by Amendment Three.

Voters managed an electoral end-run around the state Legislature to ban smoking, approve slots machines (51 percent), regulate net fishing, mandate term limits, create the Everglades Trust Fund (57.2 percent) and limit tax increases on homestead property (which passed with only 53.6 percent.)

Those amendments would amount to minor irritants compared to Blackner's revolutionary initiative. Which probably explains why the National Association of Home Builders has anteed up $300,000 toward the $3 million ''save our constitution'' campaign fund. ''Compared to that, I can tell you the opponents [of Amendment Three] throw a dim shadow,'' Graham said.

Graham, who was in Tallahassee Thursday, said he could have guessed the content of the initiative just by driving through the capital city's office district.

'The Florida Homebuilders Association, the state Chamber of Commerce, all the big lobbyists all have gardens sprouting `vote for Amendment Three' signs, raising the question: 'What are these people really interested in?' '' Graham asked.

Maybe I was being too paranoid on behalf of Blackner and Graham. The real intent of Amendment Three is to stop you.

Mike Thomas Orland Sentinel

Special interests want you to vote against yourself

Published October 10, 2006

Here is the executive summary of this column if you don't have time to read the whole thing: Vote NO on Amendment 3 next month.

It is a scam pushed by special-interest groups who hope you are stupid enough to vote away your rights.

Florida has created a safeguard against politicians who do not do the will of the people. Voters can override them by amending the state constitution.

For example, when politicians would not ban smoking in public buildings, voters overrode them by putting a ban in the constitution. There would have been no amendment required if legislators listened to people instead of tobacco lobbyists.

The reason there is a class-size amendment in the constitution is because Jeb Bush and Republican lawmakers reneged on a deal to lower class sizes through usual legislative procedures.

The amendment process involves gathering enough petition signatures to put the proposal on the ballot. Then everyone votes on it.

Amendment 3 would require that any such future amendments receive 60 percent support from voters rather than a simple majority.

Supporters say this is reasonable. But the practical effect, and they know it, will be to shut down the amendment process.

Gathering enough signatures to put a measure on the ballot already is prohibitively expensive and time consuming. I can't envision what group would take on that task knowing the odds of prevailing at the ballot box -- even with seemingly popular measures -- are stacked against it.

This is designed to have a chilling affect on citizen input into state government. Eliminating that input strengthens those special-interest groups who control the political process with their money and influence.

Amendment 3 supporters include a who's who list of industries that profit from plundering Florida's beauty and your wallet.

Among them are the sugar growers, which pollute the Everglades and just spent several million dollars trying to buy a gubernatorial election on behalf of Rod Smith.

The home builders are pumping big money into the campaign because they fear an amendment cracking down on urban sprawl might get on a future ballot. Giant agricultural corporations also are kicking in serious money. It's no secret some of them are looking to cash in on their land values by selling to developers.

Naturally, the Florida Chamber of Commerce, still chafing that voters dared boost the minimum wage, is helping lead the charge.

These groups are amassing a war chest that will be spent on slick advertisements designed to trick you into voting your rights away.

I almost could support Amendment 3 because it favors the constitutional status quo. It would protect the class-size amendment because foes never would be able to get 60 percent of voters to overturn it.

It would guarantee a woman's right to choose in Florida -- even if Roe v. Wade is overturned -- because abortion is protected by a state privacy amendment. You'd never get 60 percent of voters to ban abortion.

But if the price of locking in these provisions is shutting people out of the process, the price is too high.

Mike Thomas can be reached at 407-420-5525 or mthomas@orlandosentinel.com.

Amendment has democracy facing off against 'clutter'

By MARK LANE
FOOTNOTE

In politics as in life, I'm mostly unmoved by pleas to be tidier.

So when Florida voters are criticized for being constitutional slobs, I'm unembarrassed.

Florida's constitution, we are told, is getting "cluttered up" with amendments that are beneath the notice of the state's governing charter.

Messy, messy, messy.

To stop us before we clutter again, the Legislature presented us with Amendment 3. It would require constitutional proposals to get at least 60 percent of the vote to go into law.

Currently, a simple majority is enough for something to go into the constitution. So, if this gets 51 percent of the vote, it will be part of the Florida constitution. But if voters want to repeal it, they'd need to win by at least 60 percent.

As it is, 60 percent is not an insurmountable barrier to getting something in or out of the state constitution. Just an undemocratic one.

It's already hard to get an amendment before voters. You need 611,009 signatures to put one on the ballot, and the names must come from half of the state's congressional districts. Or the Legislature must approve a ballot measure by a 60 percent majority. Amendments that can meet those requirements usually are popular enough to win.

Of the amendments put on the ballot by petition, 81 percent passed. And they passed with an average of 60 percent of the vote.

But a few measures passed by less. The Save our Homes Amendment won with a bare 54 percent of the vote. The class-size amendment got 52 percent of the vote and the universal prekindergarten amendment by 59 percent.

So why are legislators suddenly interested in an uncluttered state constitution?

One is they're sick of being told what to do. Competitive legislative elections are largely a thing of the past thanks to the magic of computerized micro-gerrymandering. The initiative process is one of the few ways left for voters to be heard. And voters have been enthusiastic about passing things their representatives don't like.

The other reason is to head off troublesome amendments coming down the pike.

A really big one is the Hometown Democracy Amendment. This would require a popular vote for cities or counties to amend their comprehensive land-use plans. No more quick votes to amend because a guy showed up with a PowerPoint presentation and lovely architectural drawings for the Scrub Jay Phase III Condo Development or the Oak Forest Wetlands Park Strip Mall.

Development interests became more passionate about an uncluttered constitution right after the Florida Supreme Court allowed this proposal on the ballot.

Big Sugar, for instance, which has come up with some creative anti-tax constitutional clutter in the past, has been a donor in Amendment 3's war on constitutional clutter. The National Association of Home Builders has kicked in big-time to support Amendment 3 and fight clutter.

But as I said, I'm not impressed with the clutter argument. If the thing passes, it would be actually harder to repeal some of that clutter.

And clutter is not all bad. A state constitution is designed for a lot more hard, daily use than the U.S. Constitution. It is part fundamental law and partly a collection of super-statutes -- things like the legal description of county lines, bond authorization language, budget rules, special districts, election rules and a little bit of this and a little bit of that.

In life and law, clutter happens.

The real issue is whether voters will continue to have a real say in things.

Blue Spring minimum flow set over manatee protest

By DINAH VOYLES PULVER
Staff Writer

PALATKA -- The St. Johns River Water Management District approved a minimum long-term flow for Blue Spring Tuesday, vowing to restore the spring's flow to its long-term average.

District officials say they will use the measure to convince local utilities to develop more sources of water in addition to groundwater, such as using the St. Johns River for drinking water. District officials said they are scheduled to meet with leaders from four West Volusia cities on Friday.

Board member Ann Moore voted against the proposal, saying she was uncomfortable with the possible impacts to the Orange City spring and the manatees that use it as a warm water refuge in the winter. "I believe the potential for significant harm is real," Moore said.

The district, required by state law to set the flow, will phase it in by five-year increments until it reaches the long-term average of 157 cubic feet per second in 2024. That allows for a 15 percent decrease in the spring flow until 2009. But, district officials say that won't have negative impacts on the manatees, even though their numbers are expected to continue rising.

Some spring advocates, including the Save the Manatee Club, wonder if district officials will be able to force utilities to increase the spring flow.

Any potential water user that applies for a new or renewed water use permit will be required to show it won't delay the ultimate goal, district officials said. Other options also are available, they said, such as moving up the goal or imposing emergency water shortage orders.

Several board members asked probing questions about the science behind the proposal and the possibility of lawsuits.

General Counsel Kathryn Mennella said she is confident the district can successfully defend any challenges.

Board member Susan Hughes said she has concerns about the computer modeling that shows manatees won't be harmed.

"I have seen models and predictions that defy logic of the most brilliant modelers," Hughes said. "This year's hurricane season is a perfect example."

She said the district should be as "nimble as necessary" and ready to make changes if necessary to ensure the spring and the manatees are protected.

When asked whether the manatees could be affected if too many of them crowd into the spring when the flow is low on a cold day, the district's manatee consultant Graham Worthy compared it to humans going to a hurricane shelter for a storm. "It's not how you want to live your life but it's not going to kill you for a couple of days."

dinah.pulver@news-jrnl.com

Felling an uprising
Attorney: Builder complying with Dunnellon tree permit

BY FRED HIERS
STAR-BANNER

DUNNELLON - Many Dunnellon residents feel they are in a race to save the Rainbow River. They say they are racing against developers sending men with chain saws to cut down trees along the water's edge, resulting in the death of area wildlife.

After Monday night, most said the chain saws were winning.

City Attorney Ted Schatt told City Council members and about 100 residents at Monday's council meeting that Rainbow River Ranch LLC is complying with its Dunnellon-issued tree-cutting permit.

That effectively put an end to the council's debate, which began during last week's workshop when residents and elected officials turned to Schatt for legal advice. They wanted to know whether the developer was cutting too many trees in an area slated for a 450-home subdivision and going beyond the limits of his city tree permits.

"Consequently, as long as the property owner complies with [Dunnellon's tree ordinance and permits], the city of Dunnellon has no reason to disrupt the lawful actions of the property owner," Schatt said.

Frustrated residents and environmentalists said his advice was a partial death knell for much of the wildlife along the river near the County Road 484 bridge and East Blue Cove.

"If you don't feel they've crossed the line, what would they have to do to cross the line?" said Audubon Florida official Charles Lee to the council. "As the hours tick by and the blades of that equipment continues . . . more trees will be lost."

Burt Eno, of Rainbow River Conservation Inc., said the council failed the river and those wanting to protect it.

"As far as this council is concerned, it's over," he said. "[Uncontrolled development] is going to happen. They want it to happen."

If residents are to change Rainbow River Ranch's course now, their last chance lies with the Southwest Florida Water Management District.

Until late last week, Swiftmud said the developer was complying with the state agency's limits for clearing vegetation along the river.

But that changed Monday when Bobby Lue, Swiftmud director of regulation, said the developer hauled heavy equipment into an area of the development that agency officials told him last week was off limits to that kind of equipment. They said operating bulldozers there would do too much damage to vegetation and potentially cause dangerous runoff for the river just a few feet away.

"We will treat the additional clearing as a violation and will pursue enforcement activities," Lue said.

Rainbow River Ranch owner Gerald Dodd said Swiftmud was mistaken and he planned to meet with the agency today.

"Once [Swiftmud] sees how we're using the equipment, they'll see it's in compliance with our permit and their rules," Dodd told the Star-Banner.

Under the city's Comprehensive Plan for the 260-acre site, Dodd would be allowed to build as many as 450 homes in the subdivision, 16 of which can be along the bank.

Dunnellon's tree permit allows Dodd to remove underbrush and non-native trees. In addition, the city's tree ordinance also allows the removal of trees less than 24 inches in diameter, but no cypress trees of any size. He is required to leave an average of 16 trees per acre.

The council agreed Monday the city needs an updated tree ordinance.

"I'm begging now to write some ordinance to protect our trees and river," said Councilwoman Mary Ann Hilton. "It's the only asset we have. Let's stop this from getting any worse."

Councilman Charles Grant said the city needed tree-cutting standards that the council and residents can agree on.

"It is important we do not have to go through this every time a piece of land that touches the river gets developed," he said. "We have to get beyond this. It has been divisive, to say the least."

Fred Hiers may be reached at fred.hiers@starbanner.com or (352) 867-4157

Apalachicola River, vegetation to breathe easier
By Bruce Ritchie
DEMOCRAT STAFF WRITER

A massive pile of sand dumped along the Apalachicola River will be removed as part of a state restoration project.

The area consisting of 337,000 cubic yards of sand was used by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, who dredged sand for decades to maintain the shipping channel.

The Northwest Florida Water Management District will pay Gulf County $1 million to remove the sand on barges. The county will use it for road projects, district officials said.

Removing the sand will allow trees and wetland vegetation to grow and will allow flooding that benefits fish and wildlife, district officials said.

"We are going to take the material out, then let the vegetation naturally come back in itself," said Douglas E. Barr, executive director of the Northwest Florida Water Management District.

The restoration site is one of 124 disposal sites used by the corps along the 106 miles of river. There are six to 10 larger sites that contain more than 100,000 cubic yards of sand, according to the district.

The Corps of Engineers dredged sand to maintain a shipping channel until 2004, when its state permit expired. In 2005, the state denied the agency's request for a new permit because of environmental concerns.

State biologists say dredged sand destroys wetlands or blocks river floodplains and sloughs. Flooding of those areas is essential for fish reproduction and for maintaining the cypress and tupelo forests along the river.

The sand piles, when they are placed within the river banks, also are blamed for creating sand bars that push the river flow against the opposite shoreline, causing river bank erosion.

A corps spokesman in Mobile, Ala., was not available for comment on Tuesday.

The Apalachicola Riverkeeper group has resolved initial concerns and supports the project, said Dan Tonsmeire, the group's executive director.

"We are on the same page with them," he said. "There could be as much as 15 to 20 acres of floodplain restored. That's a lot of floodplain."

Restoration of the area known as Site 39 has been one of two priority restoration areas, said Ted Hoehn, a biologist with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.

The other is called Sand Mountain on the west side of the river across from Site 39, Hoehn said.

The district is starting with Site 39, Barr said, because it owns the property and received enough money from the Legislature for restoration. Barr said that in comparison, Sand Mountain could contain about 600,000 cubic yards of sand, almost twice as much as Site 39.

The Site 39 project also could demonstrate that restoration of the disposal sites can be done in a cost-efficient manner, Barr said.

"This is the first big step in restoring one of these sites," he said.

Toxin holds lagoon in dangerous grasp

Poison may have spread through algae

BY JIM WAYMER
FLORIDA TODAY

A toxin that has sickened 28 people who ate puffer fish since 2002 has spread south from the northern Indian River Lagoon into shellfish and other marine life.

Scientists aren't sure why or whether it could contaminate other sea life in the lagoon. They know only that the poison, called saxitoxin, emerged in the lagoon four years ago and is here to stay. Funding for more research is needed to figure out why.

Scientists believe it spreads through an algae species that has been around for decades but, for unknown reasons, is blooming in much higher concentrations.

"We're starting to see a spread in the way of bloom activity and toxicity," Jan Landsberg, a biologist with the Fish and Wildlife Research Institute, told a group of about 30 scientists and government officials Tuesday in Palm Bay.

"Saxitoxin's killed people," Landsberg added. "This is a nasty toxin."

The toxin has only been found to be dangerous in several species of puffer fish, especially the southern puffer. However, biologists worry about its presence in hard-shell clams, the digestive organs of blue crabs, and more obscure species such as dwarf razor clams. The toxin builds up in fish and shellfish, poisoning people who eat them.

"These days, you can never be quite sure what someone's going to try to make soup out of," Landsberg said.

The scientists and officials from local and state agencies met Tuesday as an advisory committee to the St. Johns River Water Management District, which manages habitat restoration in the Indian River Lagoon.

Jane Provancha, a biologist with Dynamac Corporation, an environmental consultant to NASA, gave an overview of a $30,300 study of lagoon toxins that she conducted for the water management district.

"It is a huge problem nationwide," Provancha said of harmful algae blooms. But her study found most lagoon fish unaffected.

"Less than 1 percent of the fish have shown any signs of not being healthy," she said. "There is evidence that these things have been going on a long time."

Biologists at the meeting speculated that lower water circulation, cooler temperatures and higher nitrogen content in the water might be among the reasons the saxitoxin problem is more prevalent in the northern lagoon compared to its southern reaches. Leaking septic tanks and excessively fertilizing lawns also can cause excess nutrients such as nitrogen to flow into the lagoon, which can trigger algae blooms.

Puffer fish made 28 people sick, most of them in 2002 and 2003, when they ate puffers they caught in or near Titusville. But saxitoxin might have been emerging before the time biologists began seeing spikes in algae called Pyrodinium bahamense.

Some scientists suspect the algae and its saxitoxin could be linked to about 120 dolphin deaths that occurred in the lagoon between the summer of 2000 and the summer of 2001. About forty died between U.S. 192 and State Road 520 in one month. Saxitoxin may suppress dolphin immune systems, making them susceptible to disease, said Greg Bossart, a veterinarian at Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institution.

"I don't think we can rule out whether there's a biotoxin component here," Bossart said.

In recent years, he has documented diseases thought to be rare or nonexistent in dolphin, such as herpes virus, hepatitis, heart disease, meningitis, pneumonia and central nervous system disorders, including some caused by fungi and protozoa. He also has found dolphin with bacteria that are resistant to antibiotics, which some suspect have leaked from septic tanks along the lagoon.

Duane De Freese, a biologist with Hubbs-SeaWorld Research Institute, said scientists who study the lagoon should emphasize to the public the economic and human benefits of spending taxpayer money on long-term studies of lagoon wildlife diseases, as well as the environmental benefits.

"We're going to have to see a significant increase in funding," De Frese said.

Contact Waymer at 242-3663 or jwaymer@flatoday.net

Report: Beach goo is decaying matter

By Bruce Ritchie
DEMOCRAT STAFF WRITER

A sticky goo found along the shoreline at Wakulla Beach last month is decaying organic matter that includes sea grasses, according to a state report issued Tuesday.

The foul-smelling material found in the St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge doesn't appear to be sewage, as some residents and one water-quality expert suggested, according to the Florida Department of Environmental Protection report.

"While the size and volume of this event was unusual, we feel it was a natural occurrence," DEP spokeswoman Sally Cooey told the Democrat in an e-mail.

A DEP waste inspector who visited the site Sept. 15 said the material didn't appear to be sewage. A DEP biologist later said the material was a die-off of microscopic algae called diatoms, Cooey said.

But Sean McGlynn, a water-quality specialist from Tallahassee, said the material he collected contained few diatoms. He said it contained high bacteria levels that were more consistent with sewage.

The disagreement led Democrat readers to speculate on various theories including the possibility that a septic-tank service had disposed of waste. DEP scientists visited the site Sept. 28 and Sept. 30 to collect new samples for analysis.

Cooey said Tuesday the new report supports the earlier conclusion by the DEP inspector. The report said the material contained some unidentifiable organic matter and diatoms in addition to decaying sea grasses.

The samples didn't contain metals or a cholesterol byproduct called coprostanol, both of which are present in city of Tallahassee sewage sludge, the report said. The report also said high bacteria levels have been found in coastal sediment elsewhere in the St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge.

McGlynn said Tuesday that it may take more time to determine what caused the material to wash up on shore - even if it is a natural phenomenon.

"The fact is nobody has ever seen anything like that or anything that smelled so foul anywhere around here," McGlynn said.

Fighting the channeled apple snail

New pests pick up destructive pace

Robert Sargent and Ramsey Campbell
Sentinel Staff Writers

October 11, 2006

For years, biologists thought they had identified the channeled apple snail as the ravenous monster attacking lakes across Florida.

Now a South Florida researcher says they have discovered a nearly identical twin that is bigger and badder.

"They are both bad news, but one is worse," said Timothy Collins, an associate professor of biology at Florida International University in Miami.

The finding comes as the destructive snails have started showing up in Lake Apopka, posing a new threat to one of Florida's most-polluted bodies of water -- one that has already undergone millions of dollars in restoration efforts.

"It could take years to eradicate, or it may not be possible," said Jim Peterson, a St. Johns River Water Management District field supervisor for Lake Apopka who heads out twice a week to find and destroy the exotic snail eggs. "But we can try to limit how they spread."

Plotting the battle could change now that researchers, using techniques similar to those of police crime labs, try to learn more about the threat from the invasive snails and how they spread, devouring most aquatic plants in their path.

Next month, a newly formed joint task force will meet in Tallahassee to allow top experts to discuss the new information and how it may affect their coming war against the enemy.

"A few weeks ago we thought we could identify them -- now we're not sure," said Sherman Wilhelm, director of the state Division of Aquaculture. "It's very confusing."

The channeled apple snails are different from their smaller relatives, Florida's native apple snails. The native snails are considered an important part of the state's waterways. They provide food for birds and animals, while their numbers are controlled by predators.

If the golf-ball-sized apple snail is the good guy, the baseball-sized channeled apple snail is the villain. The huge snails reproduce quickly and can destroy aquatic plants at an alarming pace. But in addition to the common channeled apple snail, Collins has discovered a separate variety, the island channeled apple snail, in several Florida water bodies.

Though the adult island snail is a bit bigger, its eggs are smaller, allowing it to reproduce faster.

Both are awful news.

"It's a little like the difference between knowing you have a slow-growing cancer and a fast-growing one," he said.

Word of the new adversary has unnerved state officials, who have watched the spread of the channeled apple snails in horror.

Biologists thought the common channeled apple snail had spread like crazy throughout Florida in the past decade -- sometimes removing virtually all signs of other life from infested lakes. However, the new research shows the more exotic island snail should take most of the credit.

The channeled apple snails have long confounded experts.

The first channeled apple snails were discovered in Florida in West Palm Beach in the late 1970s, but that was a subspecies that never spread beyond the area.

The channeled apple snails have few, if any, predators. They're also tolerant to changing environmental conditions and are difficult to control with chemical pesticides.

Channeled apple snails have affected several Central Florida lakes, including Lake Brantley in Seminole County, Lake Tohopekaliga in Osceola County, Shingle Creek in Orange County and Lake Linda in Lake County. They've been found in most parts of Central and South Florida, and are turning up around Jacksonville and Tallahassee.

Attention to the island snails started recently when Collins presented information to the National Park Service about slimy critters taking hold in the Everglades. Collins linked that species to water bodies across the state.

Collins has been conducting two years of federally funded research with snail experts Robert Cowie and Ken Hayes at the University of Hawaii. They took samples of channeled apple snails in South America as well as those found in Florida's natural-history museum collections and different water bodies in the Sunshine State.

The group used tissue samples, analyzing their genetic makeup through DNA to identify them. That showed that Florida, for a large part, is dealing with the island snail.

"Once we have the genetic data in hand, it is easier to discriminate these things," Collins said. "What we called channeled apple snails are really three distinct things, and we have been treating them as one."

Knowing more about their enemy could help the state study them. "This might have implications to trying to stop the spread of these things," Collins said.

Collins and others say that even though the different types of exotic snails all have certain effects on the environment, knowing exactly which ones they are dealing with can help to understand what they eat, how much they eat and how quickly they can reproduce.

"We don't need an uncontrolled aquatic-vegetation eater out there," said Scott Hardin, exotic-species coordinator with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.

Wilhelm said Collins, as well as other biologists and state agencies, are all doing their own studies of the problem. He hopes that next month's task-force meeting will be the first of many where they jointly work toward finding a solution.

"They all have pieces to this puzzle. This will bring all the people together and put those pieces together," Wilhelm said.

Robert Sargent can be reached at rsargent@orlandosentinel.com or 352-742-5909. Ramsey Campbell can be reached at rcampbell@orlandosentinel.com or 352-742-5923.

Residents want county to clean up H-Canal

Merritt Island homeowners weigh options

BY REBECCA ADAMUS
FLORIDA TODAY

-- Bob Bret has a bad feeling.

If more fish die or pungent odors continue to rise from the canal his property abuts, he will hear about it from 50 other homeowners.

As director of the East Merritt Island Homeowners Association, Bret fields complaints and works to find a solution to the problems with the 31/2-acre canal, problems he says are worsening.

Last week, Assistant County Manager Ed Washburn denied Bret's request for help, either by cleaning up the canal or rerouting the canal's waters.

Bret's attempt was the latest to get the county involved.

A plug and dam at the base of the canal, called H-Canal for its shape, prevent homeowners from easy boat access to the adjoining Banana River. Also, the algae -- a recurring, flowering plant that likely takes root in the canal through wind or bird carry -- is so thick boaters can't navigate the muck. And there are the occasional fish kills and odors.

Bret and the others must decide the next step: clean the canal or take the fight higher in the county and seek support from county commissioners.

Unincorporated Brevard County has more than 100 miles of canals, with 80 percent on Merritt Island. The H-Canal at Ridge Manor Estates was carved out in the 1960s.

The developer also put in the plug, a small strip of land separating the H-Canal from the nearby Sandpiper Canal and designed to prevent water flow and boat traffic.

Later, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers added a concrete dam between the Banana River and the H-Canal that allowed the canal to serve as a stormwater retention pond. That's why homeowners believe it is not too much to ask for the county's financial help to clean the canal, a cleanup estimated to cost several thousand dollars.

"(The county is) using us for their purposes," said homeowner John Huber, who lives on Queen Anne Street, on the canal's east side. "The drainage is for a larger area, not just here."

A longer-term solution proposed by Bret would lift the dam and plug, allowing seawater to mix with the canal's freshwater to naturally kill off the algae. But that request is not as simple as it sounds.

In the 1990s, the homeowners fought an unsuccessful three-year battle to get the Corps to remove the dam. The Department of Environmental Protection and Save the Manatee Club protested, citing pollution to the Indian River Lagoon and increased manatee deaths from speeding boats.

The Corps decided against removing the dam, so the homeowners formed a nonprofit organization -- the H-Canal Defense Fund -- pooled their money and bought a boat lift to get river access. The nonprofit fund maintains the boat lift and the plug.

On their own

The county empties inlet baskets along the canal that collect sediment, but beyond that, the canal is not the county's responsibility, according to Assistant County Manager Ed Washburn.

It has never cleaned the H-Canal, and the county typically does not maintain stormwater ponds. When a new subdivision gets built and has a stormwater pond, the homeowners must maintain it.

And what about lifting the dam and plug for a mixing of freshwater and seawater to kill off the pesky algae?

It's not likely, says DEP administrator David Herbster. He sees a lot of cases in Florida where residents want retention ponds connected to larger waterway systems. The DEP makes these decisions based on water quality because of the pollutants in stormwater. Even many newer retention ponds in the state don't meet water quality standards, he said.

Local solutions

At this point, Bret and the homeowners are willing to talk about paying to monitor water quality and keep the canal water safe should it mix with lagoon water.

While the homeowners decide what to do, there are other measures they can take to ease runoff from entering the canal.

They can construct berms -- dirt mounds that act like dikes -- or plant mangroves and other vegetation to help soak up nutrients from lawn chemicals that spur algae growth.

They also can pay for a private company to dredge once or twice yearly like other canal-front property owners on Merritt Island have done.

The bottom line though, according to Bret, is that homeowners need the county's help to work with the Corps and DEP to get the dam removed. But it's unclear whether they can get that support.

In denying the homeowners' request, the county's Washburn noted the county in the past had spent "considerable" time and effort to get the agencies involved to allow the dam to be removed.

"It was ultimately denied," he wrote.

Contact Adamus at 242-3618 or radamus@flatoday.net

Meadowlea residents urged to conserve water

DEBARY -- Meadowlea residents are being asked to increase their water conservation efforts for the next three weeks while county utility engineers figure out how to increase water supplies.

Lightning is being blamed for collapsing one of two wells Saturday in Seminole County that serve the 257 homes in the manufactured home park along the St. Johns River.

Residents should boil their water for more than a minute before using it for drinking, cooking or ice-making. Residents can help by not watering lawns or washing vehicles and limiting showering and clothes washing.

County utility engineers determined Tuesday that the collapsed well cannot be reopened. Instead, they installed a submersible pump into the remaining well to increase water flow, but that is still not enough to meet the neighborhood's demand, said Tom May, utilities operations manager.

A short-term alternative may be in place within a week, a county spokesperson said. Meanwhile, 250 gallons of bottled drinking water was delivered today to the Meadowlea's homeowners association for distribution to residents who are unable to travel to a store

Sensitive land buy scrubbed but quest for others plotted

By Jason Schultz

Palm Beach Post Staff Writer

Wednesday, October 11, 2006

STUART — County commissioners put the final nail in the coffin of efforts to buy environmentally sensitive land in Hobe Sound on Tuesday after several years of negotiations.

But the demise of efforts to buy at least 30 acres of scrub land from Edward Hamm opened the door for Martin County to use the money it had saved for that land to buy more wetlands in the southern part of the county and more public beach access on Hutchinson Island.

County officials have been trying for years to buy up to 52 acres from Hamm because the land provides habitat to rare species such as the scrub jay and the four-petaled paw paw, said Chuck Barrowclough, environmentally sensitive lands administrator for the county. The county got a $1.5 million grant and saved $1.3 million of its money from impact fees to pay for the land. But Hamm had asked for as much as $12 million during negotiations, Barrowclough said.

The county had to give back the grant this year because the two sides couldn't agree on a price and because Hamm could not get Jupiter Island officials to remove several easements on the land that the town uses for its water wells. The county also used some of the money it had saved this year to buy other pieces of conservation land, leaving it with about $800,000.

Commissioners voted unanimously to spend that money on other conservation projects.

"I think it's a pretty good conclusion that the Hamm parcel is dead," said Commissioner Lee Weberman, who often has voiced frustration with Hamm changing asking prices during negotiations. "He never dealt straight with us."

Hamm could not be reached for comment.

Commissioner Sarah Heard voted to end the negotiations but said giving up on Hamm was a mistake because the scrub land is too important.

"A great deal of the blame for Martin County not acquiring this land is that we botched it. Our negotiations didn't work," she said.

Weberman disputed that and called Hamm a "development speculator" trying to get as much money as he could for the property.

"His offer changed almost every day," Weberman said.

Jeff Wittman, an activist who has tried to get the land preserved for years, said he was saddened by the demise of the Hamm deal.

"It's an environmental treasure that should have been preserved," Wittman said. "It's a loss for the people of Hobe Sound."

Commissioners decided to use $375,000 of the money to buy land in the Pal-Mar area, a maze of thousands of small, individually owned lots in the middle of a wetland in Martin and Palm Beach counties.

Both counties and the South Florida Water Water Management District have been trying to buy the wetlands for years.

Commissioner Michael DiTerlizzi said some of the property owners were trying to band together their small lots to build 20-acre ranchettes on the wetlands, and the county needs to buy it for conservation before that could happen.

"It's time to put Pal-Mar to bed," DiTerlizzi said. "I'd hate to see any of those rumblings come true."

The Trust For Public Lands, a national nonprofit group, also is buying a 0.88-acre parcel with beach access on Hutchinson Island for $1.4 million, Barrowclough said.

But that agency will buy the land only if the county agrees to buy it from the nonprofit within three years.

Commissioners voted to use the last $425,000 it had saved for Hamm's land as a down payment on the beach land.

Sometimes the, uh, letter of the law is not enough

By HOWARD TROXLER, Times Columnist
Published October 10, 2006

Here is a parable for our times. It involves a house in Tarpon Springs, located at 139 E Spruce St.

I quote from a description of the house written by St. Petersburg Times reporter Robin Stein earlier this month:

The gray clapboard eyesore stands empty now, nearly eclipsed by the tangle of brush covering the front lawn and veil of vines creeping down from the roof. Between the holes pock-marking the screened-in porch and gaps eating away the walls, the house itself seems to be moldering into the earth.

A house like that will be cited, and rightly so. It is a health and safety hazard.

In 2002, the city's Code Enforcement Board began imposing a $50-a-day fine for the unkempt grounds. In 2003, the house also was cited for structural and electrical problems and slapped with a $75-a-day fine.

The fines have been building since. So far they total about $140,000.

The city has sent at least 10 letters to the property owner over the past four years. None was answered. Finally, the Code Enforcement Board unanimously recommended that the city foreclose.

The matter of 139 E Spruce St. first went before the Tarpon Springs City Commission in July.

One of the commissioners, Peter Nehr, raised a question. He was worried that the property owner never answered any of the city's letters.

"Do we have an obligation, a moral obligation to do a better search for the owners of this property or their heirs?" Nehr asked.

The city's staff replied that every avenue had been exhausted. "Short of hiring a private investigator," a lawyer opined, "I don't know what else we can do."

The matter was delayed and delayed again, while the staff produced evidence that 10 letters were sent, some by certified mail. The city also sent letters to a second address where the owner was getting her county tax bill.

Still, when the commission took up the case for the third time Sept. 19, Nehr was unsatisfied. Was it enough just to send letter after letter? "Can we not just go to this person's house," he asked, "and knock on the door?"

This inspired Stein, the Times reporter, whose account of the case I have been summarizing here.

She searched high. She searched low. She searched relentlessly, day and night.

Well, okay, she didn't.

She just went to the address listed on the property tax bill and knocked on the door.

And found the property owner.

Actually the owner's brother-in-law came to the door. Yes, his sister-in-law and her two children live there, he confirmed. She's been ill for a while, unable to work. The brother-in-law has been trying to take care of things, but it's a struggle, he said.

He even paid some of her back taxes, he said. But he said he didn't know anything about the foreclosure or $140,000 in city fines.

He said he was surprised to hear it. His sister-in-law pays the city $35 for water every month, he said: "They never say nothing!"

By the way, they live about five blocks from City Hall.

* * *

I am not criticizing or making fun of Tarpon Springs, because this could be anywhere. Besides, even if the owner was sick and had a caretaker, that doesn't get her off the hook, or make life any better for the neighbors of the rundown house.

Mayor Beverley Billiris told me the city's first preference is not to take people's houses or rack up fines; the best result would be to just get the house into compliance. The city can reduce or waive fines, but there has to be improvement. The case is pending.

Still, I keep thinking about Nehr's question. Here the bureaucracy was perfectly willing to move ahead on the basis of unanswered letters. When is there a higher obligation?

It seems like a useful question for our public affairs, applicable in circumstances far, far beyond municipal code violations.

Leesburg turns to Beaufort for development ideas
Small South Carolina community has dealt with many of the same issues

Joshua Davidovich
Staff Writer

LEESBURG - Area leaders are looking north to see how the Old South became the New South, and hoping they can apply those lessons as they develop their own cities.

A group of 27 Leesburg residents recently took a trip to Beaufort, S.C. to see how the seaside city has tackled problems similar to those facing Leesburg.

"In a lot of respects Leesburg is similar to Beaufort in that it is an old town that developed around industry," said Joe Shipes of the Leesburg Partnership.

Beaufort's successful creation of several historic districts, as well as a plan to create a community around Boundary Road - a commercial corridor much like U.S. Highway 27/441 - make it a useful model for Leesburg.

The partnership has been running annual trips to different cities for leaders to tour and learn about for 11 years. A trip to bed and breakfast-rich Thomasville, Ga., years ago led to city codes allowing B&Bs in Leesburg, according to Shipes.

Beaufort survived the Civil War mostly intact and its antebellum buildings remain an attraction. The city created a historic development review board to govern any changes made to buildings within the historic district.

While Leesburg doesn't have as lengthy a history, the preservation of historic sites may become a priority, if the visit to Beaufort is any indication.

Leaders also looked at Beaufort's recently completed Boundary Street Master Plan, which aims to create a standard of development for the city's main highway and give it a distinctive entrance.

"We hired a famous town planner - Victor Dover - to come and look at what we might do and take this heavily trafficked area and make it a business address that would enhance the city," Beaufort Mayor Bill Ranch said.

Shipes said he hoped Leesburg would be able to learn from their process in creating a similar plan along U.S. highways 27 and 441.

"Beaufort has a similar situation with old shopping centers and commercial districts," Shipes said. "They encouraged their developers to come in and group these properties together to create new commercial areas that are more what people are looking for."

Shipes said the group also looked at Beaufort's main street and the city's plans to develop a waterfront area similar to Leesburg's Venetian Gardens.

Leesburg isn't the only town looking around for ideas on how to develop. As Tavares has worked to create design guidelines for its downtown area it has looked to Savannah, Ga. and South Beach in Miami for ideas.

Phil Laurien of the East Central Florida Regional Planning Council is guiding Tavares' visioning process.

"I used Savannah and South Beach as places that redeveloped themselves from their historic theme," Laurien said.

He said the city might lean toward a Spanish style to reflect the fact that Tavares is Spanish for hub.

Poll finds residents more concerned about issues that hit wallets

By DOUG SWORD

doug.sword@heraldtribune.com

SARASOTA COUNTY -- Pocketbook issues like housing, taxes and jobs are growing concerns for residents, according to a new survey commissioned by the county.

These worries are also reflected in a political season that seems to have become "the homeowners' wallet election," because voters are worried about rising property taxes and insurance costs, said University of South Florida political science professor Susan MacManus, who oversees the annual poll.

A new part of the county survey measures the price squeeze on Sarasota County residents.

Rising home insurance costs were cited as the "greatest stress" on family finances by 24 percent of the poll's respondents. Property taxes were second at 18 percent, then gas prices at 15 percent, and health care costs and personal debt at 6 percent each.

That's in line with polls across Florida, MacManus said.

The annual survey is used by the county to probe the opinions of residents who don't have the time or inclination to come to public meetings. This year's survey also delves into views on extending the 1 percent sales tax and looks at how opinions differ among residents living in different parts of the county.

The 15th annual survey was based on a random sample of 800 Sarasota County adults taken July 25 to Aug. 10. The margin of error is plus or minus 3.5 percent.

While the area's rapid growth and the strain it puts on roads and schools is still the top issue of concern, residents now see affordable housing as the second-biggest local problem.

Meanwhile, taxes and the economy grew the most as local concerns, the survey shows.

That doesn't surprise Rita Wentzel, owner and manager of Pinecrest Arms Apartments on Beneva Road. Rising property taxes and skyrocketing insurance rates are putting a squeeze on apartment owners who can't raise rents enough to compensate for the cost increases, she said.

"You can only pass along just so much; otherwise, you price yourself right out of the market," Wentzel said. "You're in a Catch-22."

For county officials, one of the most important questions in the poll asks about support to extend the 1 percent sales tax dedicated to building roads, libraries and other public infrastructure. By the time it expires, the surtax is projected to have paid for more than $300 million in county projects from 1999 to 2009.

While the poll shows overwhelming support for extending the surtax, the trend in that support could be worrisome to the county, MacManus said. Two years ago, 87 percent supported extending the tax, but that figure dropped to 84 percent last year and to 81 percent in the most recent poll.

The survey also underscores differences between residents living in the northern half of the county versus the southern half.

If the sales tax is extended, the money should be spent on roads, said nearly half of those surveyed who live south of Osprey in the unincorporated parts of the county.

Spending on parks, libraries and public transportation were much more important to residents north of Osprey.

Missing from this year's survey is a question that was featured in each of the previous eight years: Would you say as a place to live, Sarasota County is better now than it was five years ago, or would you say it is worse or about the same?

Last year, most people thought the county had become a worse place to live. That was a first.

Removing the question seemed a little shady to Bill Earl, chairman of Citizens for Sensible Growth, who has pushed for measures to slow development in the county.

"You might get the answer you don't want, so you phrase your questions differently," said Earl, who was "amazed" the county would eliminate the question after eight years.

"I guess sometimes officials get nervous," MacManus said of the county's decision to not ask the question. There probably was no need, though, since last year's poll could have been an aberration. After all, seven previous polls showed that most people thought the county was becoming a better place to live, she noted.

Friday night lights may be too bright

Residents close to the Wiregrass High School stadium are dreading the day 120,000 watts start beaming.

By CHUIN-WEI YAP
Published October 11, 2006

WESLEY CHAPEL - Linda Craddock woke up two weeks ago to find an 80-foot stadium light at the back of her Morningmist Drive home.

Within a day, five more would go up.

Eventually, 18 would light the proposed Wiregrass High School's football, baseball and softball fields just behind Craddock's neighborhood.

"I call them Raymond James lights," she said, referring to the Tampa stadium. "That's what they look like. ... I'm all for schools. We need more schools. My concern is the noise and the lights."

The high school is scheduled to open in January.

The lights are about 200 feet from Craddock's back yard. From her living room, the poles are stark against the sky, replacing a large part of what used to be oaks, pines and cypresses in a meadow where cows, deer and sandhill cranes used to wander.

Craddock, who is trying to sell her home, said some prospective buyers were visibly turned off after seeing the lights from her back yard.

School officials say they tried their best to design the school and its stadiums to limit the impact on residents, but failed to alert neighbors early on what to expect.

The lights won't shine directly into homes, said John Petrashek, the Pasco school district's director of new construction. But some "hue" or "spillage" would result, he said.

He is offering to plant trees to buffer the homes from the lights, but acknowledged the trees would take many years to reach a level where they might actually screen the lights.

These are not your average street lights. Each pole carries between seven and 30 lamps. Each lamp is 1,000 or 1,500 watts.

The football-and-soccer field, which will be closest to Craddock's home, will have four poles with 30 lamps each. This means the stadium will beam at least 120,000 watts of light - that's about 300 to 500 streetlights put together.

The baseball and softball fields flanking the football field have six and four poles, respectively, each carrying between seven to 12 lamps.

It is too late now to take the lights down, school officials said.

"There's nothing we can do to make them disappear," Petrashek said. "What we are trying to do is lessen the impact on the surrounding community."

Why not talk to neighbors before the lights actually went up?

"I'm not involved in the land acquisitions department, so I didn't know what was communicated with the neighbors," Petrashek said.

Residents say nothing was communicated to them, though they say Petrashek has been helpful since they began pressing for answers.

Petrashek is now asking the affected residents to get together and give him firm ideas on what they want.

But Morningmist Drive may never be the same as it was when Craddock moved in nine years ago.

For one thing, Friday night lights will be a new reality.

"Most Friday nights, 11 p.m. would be a rule of thumb," Petrashek said when asked when the lights would be shut off.

The lights may be used three to five times a week, he said. Dr. John Long Middle School will also use the fields.

Petrashek is also proposing a 6-foot chain-link fence to separate the school and the community, but Craddock wants a higher wall.

He thinks the fence would be enough to stop students cutting through the residents' yards as a short cut. She thinks it will not be enough.

"A wall would serve no purpose of stopping spillage," Petrashek said. "A wall's not part of the budget."

At an estimated 1.4 miles costing $115 per foot, according to Petrashek's figures, a wall could cost the district an additional $850,080.

But Petrashek said the district has tried its best to pay attention to neighbors' needs when designing the school. That's why it is the fields, and not the building and parking lots, that abut the neighborhood, he said.

"If the school building and parking lots were next to them, there would be an uproar," he said.

Bread and milk deliveries would arrive from 3 a.m. in semitrailer trucks. Custodial staff arrive at 5:30 a.m.

"It would have been a catastrophe to design it any other way," he said. "It would have been much, much worse."

Still, it's not just the lights that bother the residents.

JoAnn Boser now has a pile of dirt butting right up to her back yard. She has since learned from officials at the Southwest Florida Water Management District that this area, between the stadium and her yard, is supposed to be an artificial wetland area created to compensate for the school's environmental impact.

She cannot understand why no buffer has been created around the flattened area. She has no idea why the area appears to keep growing in size.

"I don't want my yard to flood," she said. "I want a tree line all the way across. I would like to see those lights reduced 15 feet."

The relevant Swiftmud officials working on the case were not available Tuesday, spokesman Michael Molligan said.

But Molligan said the artificial wetland is a school district creation, ruling out one theory among residents that Wiregrass' developers were also trying to increase the area to compensate for their environmental encroachments elsewhere.

As for fear of flooding, Molligan said the new wetlands would create more stormwater storage, which would lessen the risk of flooding rather than increase it.

Petrashek said the district plans to put a black vinyl chain-link fence around the artificial wetlands, designed to blend in with the environment.

Chuin-Wei Yap covers growth and development in Pasco County. He can be reached at (813)909-4613 or cyap@sptimes.com.

Hickory Hill vote unclear until election

By MICHAEL D. BATES
mbates@hernandotoday.com

BROOKSVILLE — The county’s planning and zoning staff got their marching orders from county commissioners: Start preparing now for Jan. 17.

The board agreed not to push up the public hearing date so as to give Planning Director Ron Pianta and his staff time to draft a development order that would serve as the blueprint for Hickory Hill, the 1,650-home community proposed for Spring Lake.

If commissioners vote to adopt the comprehensive plan amendment at that hearing, the matter once again goes to the Florida Department of Community Affairs for a compliance review. At that same hearing, the board would also have to delve deeper into the development order and tweak the project as they see fit. However, commissioners could also vote not to adopt the comprehensive plan amendment at that hearing, which would essentially kill the project. No sending off to the state for review. No development order. Nothing.

Could it happen?

With the current makeup of the board, it is not likely. This current crop of commissioners voted 3-2 in June to send it off to the DCA for review. That was more or less tacit approval of the project. However, this board could be drastically different in January and it is unclear what support the Hickory Hill project would have.

Republican Commissioner Nancy Robinson voted in favor of transmittal.

If her Democratic opponent, Rose Rocco, wins Robinson’s seat in November, it is unclear how Rocco would vote on adopting the comprehensive plan amendment.

“If you’re looking for a yes or no answer, I can’t give you that,” Rocco told Hernando Today Tuesday. “I have to look at what’s best for the community. There are too many unanswered questions at this point.”

Rocco said commissioners in January should only consider not adopting the comprehensive plan if it doesn’t have the merits to go forward and if it would impact the county negatively. Commissioners Diane Rowden and Chris Kingsley, both Democrats, voted not to transmit the amendment to the state.

But Rocco said people should not believe that just because she is a Democrat, she will vote with her fellow party members on the board and deny the comprehensive plan amendment.

“That should not be a partisan decision,” she said.

Robinson said the Jan. 17 adoption hearing is crucial. She is also adamant that any and all concerns addressed by the state and the planning council be worked out by that time.

“If they’re not addressed or resolved, I won’t support it,” Robinson said of the comprehensive plan adoption. “I would vote against it.”

Republican David Russell and Democrat Jamie Wrye, who are running for the District 4 seat left vacant recently by Robert Schenck, are also being cagey about how they would vote. Russell promised to consider all sides of the issue. Wrye would not say how he would vote. However, he did say that Hickory Hill is a nice development “for people with lots of bucks who like to play 54 holes of golf.”

Wrye also has concerns about the developer’s promise to help pay for infrastructure improvements near Hickory Hill and wonders if it would create a too-heavy burden on the local economy.

Last month, the DCA issued a critical review of the Hickory Hill project and listed 13 reasons why the proposed development is not consistent with the county’s comprehensive plan, which deals with land use issues and planned growth.

Also last month, the Withlacoochee Regional Planning Council (WRPC) identified several areas of concern and summed up by saying the project would have “an unfavorable impact on state and regional resources and facilities.”

The Hickory Hill developer had been seeking an earlier hearing date. However, county commissioners opted to stay with Jan. 17.

I would rather have staff ready to answer any and all questions that arise,” County Commissioner Jeff Stabins said.

Reporter Michael D. Bates can be contacted at 352-544-5290.

Mulder to delay building on land

The Deltona mayor says he won't develop a lakefront plot until after he is out of public office.

Etan Horowitz
Sentinel Staff Writer

October 11, 2006

DELTONA -- Mayor Dennis Mulder said Tuesday that he is putting the brakes on plans to develop a 13-acre lakefront property because he does not want people to think he is using his position as mayor for personal gain.

Mulder's announcement came after an Orlando Sentinel article raised questions about the land deal. In August, Mulder paid $250,000 for land that several former city officials and residents say was destined to be donated to the city for a park.

The Deltona Youth Soccer Club, whose board includes a political supporter of Mulder's, sold the land to a corporation formed by the mayor, his wife and the wife of the soccer-club board member.

Mulder planned to use the property as a "smart-growth pilot project" and filed for a land-use change last week that would allow him to build up to six homes per acre on the property. The property is currently zoned "recreational" and restrictions in the land's deed prohibit the construction of homes, potentially blocking Mulder from development.

Mulder said Tuesday that he was withdrawing the land-use-change request.

"With all of this coming up and with all of the history, I am someone who thinks it is very important that I have the public's trust," Mulder said. "I will keep the property [and not develop it] until I don't have an elected post with the city. Not because there was anything legally or ethically wrong, but because I can see where it could create a perception problem. I don't want to lose the public's trust over something that had no ill intentions."

But although Mulder's decision will likely please some critics, it does not placate those who insist the land was to be donated to the city for a park.

The mayor also said Tuesday that he thinks questions about the purchase may be political payback for endorsing the opponent of former Deltona Mayor John Masiarczyk. Masiarczyk was quoted in the Sentinel article as saying that that the land Mulder and his associates purchased -- through a corporation called Intrinsic Investments -- was slated to be donated to the city. Mulder recently announced his support for Pat Northey, who is facing Masiarczyk for the District 5 County Council seat in the Nov. 7 election.

"I am not sure why for months the former Mayor knew exactly what was happening and only waited until two days after I endorsed his opponent to have an issue with the parcel I bought, but it doesn't surprise me," Mulder wrote in an e-mail Tuesday to the Sentinel.

Masiarczyk rejected Mulder's suggestion and said that shortly after Mulder announced the land deal in August, he confronted the mayor at City Hall and warned him that he should rethink the sale because it could "come back to bite him."

"I have no ax to grind with him," Masiarczyk said. "I am not vindictive. I don't think what he did was right. As a gentleman and as the former mayor, the minute I found out about it over a month ago, I told him, "You are treading on thin ice.' "

Mulder said he remembers the conversation differently. He said it lasted about four seconds as one man was leaving the building and the other was entering.

"He didn't tell me there was a problem," Mulder said. "All he said to me is 'I think there is some history with that land and you should probably look at that.' "

The next day, Mulder asked city staff for information about the property and after reading it, determined that there was not a problem with buying the land.

Wayne Gardner, who was on the City Commission from 1995 to 1999, said Tuesday that like Masiarczyk, he thinks the soccer club was supposed to donate the 13-acre property to the city in exchange for the city spending money to build the six-field soccer complex where the soccer club plays its games.

"I think they should have went through with what they said, which was giving the land to the city," Gardner said.

Soccer club officials have said that the land was not owed to the city and that they even offered to donate it to the city -- under certain conditions -- but the city turned it down.

Mulder said Tuesday that after looking into the issue further, he feels more certain that the property is not supposed to be donated to the city. If there was a "gentleman's agreement" about the land -- as Masiarczyk has said -- he questioned how many other agreements like that might be out there.

City Commissioner Michael Carmolingo, who said his district includes the property, did not criticize Mulder for planning to develop inside the city but said he was "bowled over" when he learned that some people thought the land was meant for a park.

"I think the right thing is for it to remain as a city park," Carmolingo said.

Commissioners Michele McFall and David Santiago both said Tuesday that they needed more information before making a judgment on the land deal. McFall asked the city manager and city attorney to provide the commission with meeting minutes, land documents and all the information they can find related to the property. Calls to other commissioners were not returned Tuesday.

McFall said that she specifically wanted to know about the restrictions that run with the property. In 1986, Deltona Corp. -- the company that developed what is now the city of Deltona -- sold the property for $100 to the soccer club. The plan was for the soccer club to build soccer fields on the site so that the community could benefit. A former Deltona Corp. official said the intent was for the site to be used only as fields or a park, and restrictions were included with the deed to make sure that happened.

The restrictions say that only a "successor or assigns" of the Deltona Corp. can terminate the restrictions before 2016. About a month after purchasing the property, Mulder tried to terminate the restrictions on the property. He said his lawyer told him that his company is the successor and is allowed to terminate the restrictions. But it is unclear whether the company was designated the successor in writing.

Mulder said he is thinking about waiting until 2016 to develop the site so there are no questions about his right to terminate the restrictions.

Etan Horowitz can be reached at ehorowitz@orlandosentinel.com or 386-851-7915.

County Bids To Cut Insurance On Homes

By JULIA FERRANTE The Tampa Tribune

Published: Oct 11, 2006

DADE CITY - Pasco County leaders are following in the footsteps of the Florida Keys to reduce homeowner insurance rates, which for many residents have increased exponentially in recent years.

Tuesday, county commissioners agreed to pay Jacksonville lawyer Timothy Volpe and an actuary $100,000, plus $4,000 for travel expenses, to investigate insurance rates and advocate for lower rates on behalf of Pasco homeowners. Volpe is charged with working with local legislators and builders to determine why sinkhole claims are so numerous and costly in Pasco and to argue on the county's behalf for lower rates.

County Attorney Robert Sumner said that if the effort is successful, insurance rates could drop at least 40 percent, possibly as much as 60 percent.

Volpe's contract was approved in a 4-0 vote. Commissioner Pat Mulieri, who two months ago recommended hiring an actuary as Monroe County did, was absent because of a family illness.

Monroe County, home to the Florida Keys, hired Volpe and actuary Allan Schwartz of Freehold, N.J., to investigate why the county's wind insurance rates were so high. The actuary found that Citizens Insurance Corp., Florida's insurer of last resort, overestimated the risk of hurricanes and underestimated the strength of Monroe's building codes.

Volpe and Schwartz convinced the state Department of Insurance Regulation that Citizens was charging too much. Citizens has challenged that ruling.

Volpe met with local legislators and Pasco building officials Monday to discuss their concerns. Citizens filed a rate-change petition last week, and Volpe intends to help the county challenge the increase.

"I think we're off to a great start to getting a substantial decrease in rates in Pasco County," Sumner said.

West Pasco legislators, Sen. Mike Fasano, R-New Port Richey, and Rep. John Legg, R-Port Richey, are working to change laws related to sinkhole claims in Florida, the only state that provides and requires sinkhole coverage, Sumner said.

Possible changes include making sinkhole insurance deductibles higher or making sinkhole coverage optional. However, many problems are believed to lie with fraudulent or exaggerated insurance claims.

In other matters Tuesday, commissioners:

•Delayed consideration of changes to the way they spend tourism tax dollars until they resolve cost issues with the Pasco National Tennis Stadium. Construction of the stadium has been delayed because of permitting issues and now because construction costs are expected to be much higher than they were three years ago when the commission allocated $5.7 million for the project.

The Tourist Development Council is recommending the change in hopes of having more flexibility to spend tourist tax dollars. One idea is to hire a sports marketing specialist. Commissioner Ted Schrader was reluctant to dedicate money to sports marketing when the county's sporting leagues are clamoring for space to hold their events.

•Agreed to pay its transportation consultant, Tindale-Oliver & Associates, an additional $25,000 for expert testimony at an administrative hearing to challenge Pasco's amended comprehensive growth plan.

•Delayed action on a request to buy barricades for special events so its staff does more research on the issue.

•Directed its lwto investigate possibly offering a double homestead exemption, $50,000 instead of $25,000, to qualified senior citizens with extremely low incomes. Commission Chairman Steve Simon, who is running for re-election, suggested the move. He said most counties offer the tax deduction.

•Added a 28-acre portion of the Tierra del Sol development west of U.S. 41 in central Pasco to the county's preservation list.

The developer's representative, Frank Valente, nominated the property, which sits just outside the so-called Five-Mile Creek Corridor; the property is inhabited by gopher tortoises, bobcats and wading birds, according to preservation program officials.

The county created an Environmental Lands Acquisition and Management Program in 2004. It is funded, in part, by proceeds from the Penny for Pasco sales tax increase. Tax revenue is to be used to leverage state and federal matching grants.

Reporter Julia Ferrante can be reached at (813) 948-4220 or jferrante@tampatrib.com.

Yankeetown projects require good-faith debate

By Peter Spittler
Published October 11, 2006

As someone who has been in the thick of the controversy in Yankeetown for nearly a year, I am pleased that the debate in the town appears to be taking a milder tone. Having previously been called an instrument of the devil, I am happy for whatever breaks I can get.

I have spent a great deal of time in Yankeetown, and I found with only a few exceptions that the people have been exceedingly polite to me, my family and my colleagues.

So I am hopeful that we can attempt to reach consensus with Yankeetown's leadership on a plan to redevelop the town's waterfront into viable businesses that will benefit the town.

I believe a reasonable discussion has to start with a clear statement of the facts, so I would like to clarify some issues that repeatedly are mentioned in relation to the plans to redevelop Yankeetown's waterfront.

First of all, Izaak Walton Investors is no longer seeking to rezone residential property in Yankeetown. As of our last development submittals in May, and subsequent applications in September, all of the plans we are asking the town to process are designed in accordance with current zoning.

We have also included "sustainable development" design principles, and will continue to pursue certification in every aspect of the project. Yankeetown and the Withlacoochee River deserve it.

We had previously requested the rezoning of a piece of residential property - the so-called "Speck parcel." We thought our reason for originally seeking the zoning change was sensible and offered more benefits to the town. Since both properties surrounding the "Speck" parcel were commercial, we felt combining all three would offer better boating facilities, smaller scale buildings, public amenities and more access to the river.

However, rezoning of any kind, for any reason, is a continuing hot button, so we are proceeding with the current zoning.

In the past, we also sought to enter into a development agreement with the town, which would have offered financial and technical assistance from us to help the town meet its well-documented infrastructure needs.

An agreement is still possible from our perspective, but there are some who still think it would be unacceptable to "negotiate" with us. So we will have to leave that on the table and proceed with our plans as submitted.

Here, in a nutshell, is what we think is possible on our property. As always, we are open to a discussion with Yankeetown leaders who think they see a better way. All we are asking is to be treated fairly.

The initial aspect of our plan is called the Izaak Walton Lodge and Marina, and is planned to include the current Izaak Walton Lodge and the Riverside Marina. The current zoning of these parcels is commercial, which allows us to renovate the Izaak Walton restaurant and rebuild the bed and breakfast lodge, which burned down in 1999. It also allows us to include a general store, galleries, resort residential units and a marina.

The second aspect of our plans is the Yankeetown Boat Company and Fish Camp, incorporating the Speck parcel, Yankeetown Marina and B's Cypress Marina.

As stated above, Izaak Walton Investors is no longer asking to rezone the Speck parcel. Therefore, our submitted plans call for the Speck property to include only eight single-family residences on 5 acres, and eight boat slips. The Yankeetown Marina, which is zoned commercial, will include 36 resort residential units on 2 acres, and 24 boat slips. B's Cypress Marina, which is zoned commercial, will include 54 resort residential units on 2½ acres, and 31 boat slips.

The third aspect of our plans is called the Anchorage Boathouse and Preserve, which is along Cormorant Canal.

This property is currently zoned commercial as a "Special Marina District," and is the only property in Yankeetown that allows for a dry dock marina. Appropriately, this project will consist of two 88 slip storage buildings, and two buildings with 24 resort residential units each.

As in any development in Florida, there will be many details that have to be resolved as we move forward. Fortunately, town ordinances provide for ways to amicably resolve these details.

A give-and-take process to find a middle ground is the best way, but some in Yankeetown have in the past expressed a confrontational "bring-it-on" attitude, all but inviting us to sue over our development.

We have already been forced to litigate some contractual and other issues in Yankeetown, chiefly based on the actions of individuals who were not acting in good faith. I remain optimistic because I do not believe these individuals are representative.

We consider litigation to be a last resort in any situation, and prefer to engage in good-faith negotiations conducted with honesty and respect by all parties.

Peter Spittler is the project architect for Izaak Walton Investors LLC. Guest columnists write their opinions on subjects of their choosing, which do not necessarily reflect the views of this newspaper.

[Last modified October 10, 2006, 22:15:42]

Sharing Their Plane Views

By KEVIN WIATROWSKI The Tampa Tribune

Published: Oct 11, 2006

LAND - O' LAKES - Lennar Corp., one of Pasco County's busiest home builders, will ask the county today to rezone land for development under the flight path of Pilot Country Estates airport.

Residents of Pilot Country say they'll challenge the proposal when it goes before the Planning Commission.

"We don't want people moving in here, then complaining about us being here," said Ken Roberts, a retired commercial airline pilot who owns two planes.

Pilot Country lies north across State Road 52 from Lennar's corner of the massive Connerton project. The community has about 45 residents, most of whom fly their own planes.

Lennar plans to build 1,250 houses on about 1,100 acres near the junction of U.S. 41 and State Road 52. The land is part of the massive Connerton project at the heart of the county. Pilot Country's north-south flight path bisects Lennar's property.

Lennar plans to build town houses under the flight path but will have to go through several regulatory hoops in the coming years to do so, said Mahdi Mansour, operations manager for Lennar's land division.

Last month, the county's Development Review Committee expressed concern that Lennar could put its residents at risk from low-flying planes or, at the very least, subject them to noise from the planes' engines.

The dispute is the latest conflict between new development and old airports. Similar conflicts have arisen in recent years between Tampa North Aero Park in Wesley Chapel and its neighbors to the north.

In both cases, pilots have watched suburbia spring up around their formerly isolated airports. Pilot Country residents worry they'll eventually face curfews and other restrictions as houses sprout around them.

"We want to be good neighbors," Pilot Country resident Ken Myers said. "But one of the reasons this airport was established here was because it was in the middle of nowhere."

Sitting in the office attached to Robert's enormous airplane hangar last week, Roberts and Myers recalled flying airliners into Tampa over the lightless "black hole" of central Pasco.

"To find the Pilot Country beacon, you looked in the middle of that black hole," Roberts said.

As development marches north through Pasco, county officials are ignoring state laws that require land near airport to be zoned for compatible uses, Pilot Country resident Steve Voras argued recently in a letter to the county.

County officials require developers to notify homebuyers if their planned houses lie under an airport's flight path, one provision of the state law governing development around airports.

Mansour said his company has talked with Pilot Country residents about their concerns.

"We're very sensitive to all these issues," Mansour said.

IF YOU GO

WHAT: Planning Commission hearing on Lennar Corp. development south of Pilot Country Estates

WHEN: 1:30 p.m. today

WHERE: West Pasco Government Center, 7530 Little Road, New Port Richey

Reporter Kevin Wiatrowski can be reached at (813) 948-4201 or kwiatrowski@tampatrib.com.

Commissioners vote for runway expansion

An environmental study must be done before the Crystal River airport runway can be lengthened to about 5,000 feet.

By CATHERINE E. SHOICHET
Published October 11, 2006

INVERNESS - County commissioners took the first step toward extending the runway at the Crystal River airport Tuesday, voting unanimously to approve a new master plan for the facility.

That means eventually the runway could be 5,000 feet - about 500 feet longer. And construction and development could cost at least $1.4-million.

But there are no building plans on the table yet.

First, consultants need to evaluate how a runway extension would affect the environment.

Eventually, commissioners will need to decide what to do about North Golf Course Lane, a road east of the runway. A longer runway would encroach on that road.

Doug DiCarlo, a consultant from Hoyle, Tanner & Associates, told commissioners that the airport is feeling the pressures of increased leisure, business and training air travel.

"There's a lot of demand," he said. "If we build the facilities, they'll come."

Already, he said, there are 30 people on a waiting list for hangars at the airport.

"If you don't build this, you're going to continue to have demand that's not met ... and you're going to turn away people that want to do business in the county," DiCarlo said.

DiCarlo told commissioners that 95 percent of the funding needed for the project could be provided by the Federal Aviation Administration. The remaining costs would be split between the Florida Department of Transportation and the county, he said.

Commissioner Dennis Damato said he was "very supportive of lengthening the runway," a project that he said would comply with the county's comprehensive plan, address safety concerns and help the county's largest taxpayer: Progress Energy.

After his comments, several dozen members of the Citrus Aviation Association in the audience applauded.

Several commissioners said they supported the idea of extending the runway, but worried about affecting nearby residents.

"What I don't want to do with the runway is create more problems with the neighborhood," Commissioner Vicki Phillips said.

That concern was echoed by Ron Neal, president of the neighboring Seven Rivers Golf and Country Club.

"We are opposed to this airport expansion, only because we fear that the water's got to go somewhere, and it's going to go on us," he said.

But county engineer Al McLaurin said county and state regulations would prevent that from happening.

Morris Harvey, representing the fiscal watch committee of the Citrus County Council, said commissioners need to discuss the way the county funds its airports before voting on any more specific plans.

But Commissioner Jim Fowler and commission Chairman Gary Bartell said Harvey should limit his comments to the issue at hand.

"You don't want to pay attention to the citizens that you're forcing to pay for this upfront," Harvey countered.

Several people spoke in favor of the extension, including airport operator Tom Davis and members of the county's Aviation Advisory Board.

"It really needs to happen," said Troy Colson, 46, of Citrus Springs. "Let's act now to get things rolling."

In other news:

- After a resident complained about code enforcement at the Margueritagrill restaurant in Homosassa, commissioners said they wanted to keep the teeth in the county's nuisance ordinance.

Mark Hanish of Homosassa said that despite a notice from code enforcement officials declaring a boat shed on the restaurant's property an "unsafe structure," the problem persists.

"It seems this piece of property just gets certain privileges," he said.

Director of Public Safety Charles Poliseno said the county sent the property's owners a notice in April, giving them 30 days to fix the problem. But he said they were granted an extension in order to secure permits.

"If this order means anything, why didn't we follow through on that?" Fowler asked.

Bartell said it was also a larger issue, noting that the county should speed up its cleanup efforts of nuisance properties.

Assistant County Attorney Michele Lieberman, who authored the county's nuisance ordinance, said the idea behind it was "if you don't do it, we will."

But limited funding for cleanup makes that difficult, she said.

"If you're going to have an ordinance and not enforce it, what's the point?" Commissioner Phillips asked.

Fowler said commissioners would find the funding.

- County staffers passed out the first issue of the county's new Senior Club magazine. Director of Community Support Services Cathy Pearson said the success of the Senior Club TV show on WYKE-TV Ch. 47 inspired the free magazine, which will come out four times per year. The magazine "will educate, entertain and highlight the most wonderful people we have," she said.

- Commissioners discussed a proposed 450-home project on 75 acres off County Road 491 and south of County Road 486. The project is just south of the 810-home Allen Plantation project.

Catherine E. Shoichet can be reached at cshoichet@sptimes.com or 860-7309.

Commission zeroes in on airport issue

By Terry Witt

Small- to mid-sized business jets fly into Crystal River Airport every week, even though technically the runway is too short for aircraft of that size. Many of the jet owners are unable to get insurance with a runway of 4,555 feet.

But Citrus County Commissioners on Tuesday took an action that could someday solve the problem.

Commissioners voted unanimously to update the Crystal River Airport Master Plan and accept a consultant’s recommendation to extend the runway to 5,000 feet.

Commissioner Vicki Phillips made it clear they were not approving construction of a longer runway, but rather updating the airport’s master plan. The construction project is not yet in the airport’s five-year construction program.

However, the move starts a planning process that eventually could lead to the runway extension and its real value in the short-term has more to do with planning for the airport’s future.

“All this does is save air space for the future,” said Public Works Director Glenn McCracken.

Members of the aviation community, several rows of the audience, supported the move.

Extending the runway would allow small to mid-sized jets to obtain insurance for landing at the airport. Many can’t now because the runway is too short. But it also would allow a larger space between the paved runway and the taxiway, a requirement that must be met before the Federal Aviation Administration would allow instrument landings.

The airport currently is equipped for visual landings. In other words, the pilots have to be able to see the ground to land. With a longer runway, they could land at the airport even in bad weather conditions using instruments in the cockpit of the airplane.

Resident Troy Colson, whose father was a charter member of Seven Rivers Golf and Country Club, which is near the airport, reminded commissioners that one of the biggest corporate clients using the Crystal River Airport is Progress Energy, which also happens to be the county’s biggest taxpayer.

Ron Neal, president of Seven Rivers Golf and Country Club, said the organization opposes the runway extension, only because the extension would be built in a swamp and could result in worsening the already bad drainage conditions in the community.

“We can’t take any more water,” he said.

Doug DiCarlo of Hoyle, Tanner & Associates, the county consulting firm developing the airport master plan, said the Southwest Florida Water Management District will require the county to contain all stormwater on the airport property. His statement was confirmed by water district official Jimmy Brooks who said the district doesn’t allow one landowner to build something on his property and dump water on a neighbor.

In other business:

n County staff was given the green light to proceed with demolishing the roof of a boat slip area behind Margarita Grill in Old Homosassa because of code violations that had not been remedied by the owner. The owner had been given 60 days to repair loose tin on the roof, but had not complied. The case had dragged on for four months without being resolved.

Commissioner Jim Fowler said he could not understand why the county was not following through with its ordinance and demolishing the dock roof that was in violation. Public Safety Director Charles Poliseno said the owner had hired a lawyer and asked for an extension of time, but had not corrected the problem in time to meet the deadline during the first week of July.

Neighbor Mark Hanisch complained to commissioners that the property appeared to be getting special treatment.

- Catherine Pearson, director of community services, announced that the first issue of Senior Club Magazine had been published. Pearson and Jessica Lambert, the county’s public information director, are co-editors. Pearson said the first publication cost the county nothing because of community donations. She said the magazine netted the county $2,700 profit.

- The board approved a proclamation declaring Nov. 19, “Am I My Brother’s Keeper Day” in Citrus County in recognition of the 500 homeless people who live in the county. Joe Monroe, the county’s housing director, estimated about 30 to 35 are chronic homeless who actually live in the woods.

Commission Wants Looser Interpretation

By CHRIS BUTLER
cbutler@highlandstoday.com


SEBRING -Nothing's official yet, but the likelihood of builders not paying impact fees in Highlands County may have gone up substantially Tuesday, provided they complete their building applications before Dec. 31.

But the approval process for new buildings is sometimes lengthy.

Under a strict reading of the county’s ordinance, certain builders who had their applications in before Dec. 31 would have still paid impact fees, regardless. Under that different reading, their applications would not have been approved until after Jan. 1.

The difference in interpretation could cost any one builder tens of thousands of dollars.

With the backing of at least three county real estate developers, Highlands County commissioners chose a different interpretation at their regular meeting Tuesday.

Commissioners said anyone submitting a stamped building application before Dec. 31 should also be exempt, regardless of whether county staff have already approved the application for a building permit.

Highlands County Administrator Carl Cool repeated the same plea he made last week, encouraging as many developers as possible to have their applications in before Dec. 1. That way the county can approve all building applications before the end of the year.

He said that’s consistent with his reading of the county ordinance, which he said “needed no change at this time.”

But Highlands County Commission Chairman Bob Bullard said commissioners should amend the ordinance to say applicants are exempt from impact fees if their applications are stamped and completed before Dec. 31.

Highlands County Attorney J. Ross Macbeth said he will present commissioners with language doing just that at next week’s meeting.

A Credibility Issue It was an issue of the county’s reputation for at least one commissioner.

“Our credibility is at stake here,” Commissioner C. Guy Maxcy said.

Maxcy and Bullard said doing anything other than allowing an exception for stamped applications before Dec. 31 is inconsistent with previous statements made by county officials.

Highlands County real estate developers Jeff Parker, Gregory Arnone and John Borgemeister said they agreed.

“I’m aghast that the dialogue during the initial impact fee discussions are totally contrary to what’s being discussed today. Please honor your request to exempt completed applications before the end of the year. It’s unconscionable to do otherwise,” Borgemeister said.

“The building department will probably be overwhelmed at the 11th hour if they have to meet a deadline to have everything approved before Dec. 3. Why put undue pressure on them? Having them do headstands sounds unrealistic to me,” he added.

Meanwhile, Martin County consultant Kirk Sorenson suggested Highlands County Commissioners talk to commissioners from other counties who have also confronted the question. Sorenson was hired last summer by the county’s real-estate interests to challenge the impact fee recommendations drawn up by Tindale-Oliver, an Orlando-based consulting firm.

Bullard said at last week’s meeting that a strict reading of the ordinance gives commissioners the power to collect even more revenue from impact fees.

And that would invite many false perceptions, he added.

“People are going to say that we’re trying to create as many opportunities to get even more money from them,” Bullard said at the time.

He also said the county should resolve the matter or else find itself embroiled in a lawsuit.

Miccosukee tribe says water regulators violated Public Records Act

MIAMI (AP) -- The Miccosukee Tribe of Indians of Florida have sued the South Florida Water Management District to obtain records it claims are public information, but water regulators refused to hand over.

The tribe is seeking an injunction to release records about what became of the Environmental Protection Agency's proposed amendment, Regulations Implementing the Clean Water Act, according to the lawsuit filed Oct. 5 in the 11th Judicial Circuit of Miami-Dade County.

The tribe issued the requests through regular mail and e-mail in August 2006, but water regulators said they were not required to release any of the records, the lawsuit said.

According to the tribe, water regulators violated the Florida Public Records Act, which states all state, county, and municipal records are open for personal inspection.

After hours telephone messages left at the offices of attorneys for the tribe and the water regulators were not immediately returned.

In 2004, the Supreme Court heard a case in which the Miccosukees and Friends of the Everglades argued that the South Florida Water Management District violated the Clean Water Act by pumping phosphorous-laden water into the Everglades without a federal permit.

The court didn't rule directly on the issue, sending it back to the lower district court for trial on the issue of whether one or two water bodies were involved.

Harris backs drilling off Florida

By SARA LUBBES and PAUL QUINLAN

STAFF WRITERS

sara.lubbes@heraldtribune.com
paul.quinlan@heraldtribune.com

LAKE MARY -- U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson has long been known as a leader in the fight to keep the eastern Gulf of Mexico off-limits to oil drilling.

Now Rep. Katherine Harris has weighed in on the opposite side of the issue, declaring her support for offshore oil drilling a centerpiece of her Senate campaign Monday and accusing Nelson of handcuffing the country to foreign imports.

Planted in a grease-stained gas station parking lot, Harris called for lowering barriers to oil drilling off U.S. coastlines and attacked Nelson for blocking a bill that would have opened up drilling in the eastern Gulf.

"This is a referendum on his lack of leadership," Harris said.

The move was a departure for Harris, who, unlike other Florida lawmakers, had not taken a strong stand on drilling in the past and even voted against the House bill she criticized Nelson for blocking with his threat to filibuster.

But trailing by as much as 28 points in the polls, Harris is likely seeking to capitalize on recent surveys that show a slight majority of Floridians -- 51 percent -- support allowing drilling 100 miles or more from the state's Gulf Coast beaches, a major shift in attitude attributed to the rise in gas prices.

Harris said Monday that domestic drilling is essential to end America's dependence on the Middle East and other countries for energy.

Though she calls for a 125-mile buffer, Harris' plan otherwise closely matches the stalled House bill, which would allow state legislatures to allow rigs even closer and guarantee states a larger share in drilling profits.

In June, she floated the plan in a bill that never reached the House floor.

The Senate bill, a compromise that Nelson and Republican Sen. Mel Martinez struck with drilling proponents in the Senate, would open 8.3 million acres in the Gulf of Mexico to drilling. It provides a buffer of 125 miles off the Florida Panhandle, 234 miles west of Tampa Bay, and more than 300 miles from Naples. The buffer would last until 2022.

Under Nelson's legislation, Florida would not share in lease revenues, though other Gulf Coast states would.

Nelson said his filibuster threat won guarantees from Senate leaders that they would only agree to the buffers Nelson and Martinez called for.

Harris said Monday that Nelson should compromise.

She said the Senate bill, which only addresses the Gulf of Mexico, leaves Florida vulnerable to lawmakers from other states who might want to put oil rigs as close as three miles from the east coast of Florida, where state-controlled waters end.

"It's just proof Nelson isn't in touch with what Floridians desire," said spokeswoman Jennifer Marks.

But Nelson's camp and offshore drilling experts said Harris isn't informed on the issue.

They said the Senate bill is far better for the environment and allows states the power they have always had to opt out of federal drilling protections.

It would also continue a ban on all drilling off Florida's east coast until 2022.

"She's a couple ants short of a picnic basket," said Richard Charter, co-chairman of the National Outer Continental Shelf Coalition. "I don't think she understands what the bill does."

Monday was one of the first times Harris has fired off complaints about Nelson's energy policy on the campaign trail.

Last November, she and Nelson appeared to be on the same side as she vowed never to vote in favor of offshore drilling. Later, she took a wait-and-see attitude.

Nelson on Monday defended his record, saying the United States should pursue alternative sources of energy and that Gulf oil deposits represent just a fraction of U.S. consumption.

"You can't drill your way out of this problem," Nelson said.

His campaign fired back at Harris, noting that, as a congresswoman, "she's been nowhere to be found on this issue until she decided to run for Senate," said spokesman Brian Gulley.

Monday's announcement was part of what Harris called a tour of Florida tracing the history of Nelson's "failed leadership."

Over the last two weeks, she's hosted several other events. At the Internal Revenue Service in Washington, D.C., she called for the end of income taxes.

In front of a Tampa immigration office last week, she criticized Nelson's stance on amnesty for illegal immigrants.

Her oil drilling proposal would offer incentives to companies to develop alternative energy sources, including clean-burning coal, she said.

Nelson supported legislation that would have required all states to get 10 percent of their energy from renewable sources. But Congress didn't pass the measure.

District Scrambles To Keep Classes Small

By Julia Crouse
The Ledger

DAVENPORT -- Some School District administrators will return to the classroom as the district scrambles to keep up with growth in eastern Polk County.

Additional teachers are needed immediately to comply with the state class size amendment.

A job fair will be held Saturday in hopes of filling dozens of vacancies, but these new teachers can't be brought in fast enough.

So the School Board on Tuesday agreed to a stop-gap measure to transfer about 10 administrators and resource teachers to Lake Marion Creek Elementary and Loughman Oaks Elementary. The district could lose funding for not complying with the class size amendment.

This year, the district hired more than 1,100 new teachers for a total of about 6,500 teachers. But at least 45 more teachers are needed in East Polk schools. With an unprecedented student growth rate of more than 20 percent in that area, the district is using a variety of tactics to comply with this year's stricter class size amendment, passed by Florida voters in 2002, said Superintendent Gail McKinzie.

All schools must have average class sizes of 18 students for grades kindergarten through third grade, 22 for grades four through eight, and 25 for high school.

Previously, the class size averages were districtwide.

To comply with the tougher standard, the district has paired teaching interns with teachers, used qualified substitutes for longer terms and recruited retired teachers.

But it isn't enough, McKinzie said.

She asked the School Board to approve transferring employees who now work in the district office to temporarily fill in.

Those transferring are certified teachers who oversee programs, train other teachers or work as resource teachers, said Jose Farinas, the interim assistant superintendent of Human Resource Services.

According to the teachers' collective bargaining agreement, the board must approve involuntary transfers. Also, no teachers will be transferred to a job that is out of their qualified teaching field, Farinas said.

The move is temporary, probably from four to six weeks, he said.

That's how long it will take to complete Saturday's new hires' paperwork and new teacher orientation, he said.

Until the new hires are ready, the transferred teachers' regular jobs will be secure and their work absorbed by their department, he said.

Farinas said the last thing he wants is for the transferred teachers to worry about work piling up, waiting for them when they return to their regular jobs.

To make sure the district doesn't go through this again, Farinas hopes for long-term solutions such as paying teachers an additional subsidy to teach at less desirable or struggling schools and providing nearby or on-site childcare for teachers with young children.

Julia Crouse can be reached at julia.crouse@theledger.com or 863-802-7536.

Titusville to send state amendments to plan

BY JESSICA RAYNOR
FLORIDA TODAY

The city decided Tuesday night to transmit to the state proposed changes to the city's long-range building development plan.

The plan -- called the comprehensive plan -- can be changed twice a year under Florida statutes.

The amendments to the comprehensive plan include changing the Miracle City Mall site from commercial high intensity to urban mixed use, in line with the U.S. 1 Corridor Master Plan, and a change of land use from commercial high intensity to medium density residential north of Garden Street and west of Interstate 95.

The urban mixed-use designation allows developers to redevelop the 31-acre site to include restaurants, small retail, and commercial and residential use, as well as providing open space and public use areas. Developers plan to build apartment buildings at the Garden Street site, previously considered as a possible site for a Wal-Mart.

Laura Ward said she was worried about condominiums that could be built at the Miracle City Mall site.

"The citizens voted to redevelop their malls as commercial projects, not condominium projects," she said.

Titusville lawyer John Evans said the project was planned according to economic viability, which requires a true mix of development at the site.

The amendments already have been transmitted to the Department of Community Affairs, who reviewed them and sent them back to the council for further review. Finalized amendments won't be decided until next year after extensive public hearings.

Contact Raynor at 360-1016 or jraynor@brevard.gannett.com.

Leesburg nixes concurrency
Vote throws wrench in plan requiring schools to follow growth

Joshua Davidovich
Staff Writer

LEESBURG - An agreement that requires signatures from all 14 Lake County cities as well as the School Board and county government to take effect may not happen, after Leesburg became the first city to say no thanks.

Lake County was picked by the state as a pilot for a program that would synchronize school construction with development.

But Leesburg's City Commission on Monday voted down the school concurrency interlocal agreement, which would have bound the city to a plan that gives the Lake County School Board final say on new developments as a means of reducing school overcrowding.

However, they said they would schedule a workshop to learn more about it and possibly agree to it at a later date.

City manager Ron Stock said before the meeting he was apprehensive about bringing it before the commission because he feared the vote would be too close. Stock said he had to work through various problems he had with the agreement and was able to find common ground with the School Board's lawyer on all but two sticking points.

One problem the city had was the lack of a formula dictating how much a developer would pay to alleviate school crowding. While the agreement does call for mitigation, it does not specify how much a developer should have to give or even if the School Board has to accept it.

Their second objection was that the agreement allows the School Board to accept money from one city and use it to build schools in another.

"The same people who failed to build us a school are going to be responsible for building houses," Commissioner David Knowles said. "There are a lot of holes in this agreement."

Stock said he was hoping the city would accept the agreement with the stipulation that it would pull out in 2009 if the commissioners' concerns were not addressed.

"We don't want to be obstructionist," Stock said. "We just don't want to give up on these two issues."

Mayor Bob Lovell, who called the School Board "The most dysfunctional body," said he was reluctant to give them control, but only voted against signing the agreement so he and the rest of the commission could have more time to be briefed on and digest it. Commissioner John Christian has suggested the workshop idea.

"We don't want to come back two years later and say 'why did we vote it in?'," he said. "It doesn't make a whole lot of sense."

The agreement was finalized on August 24. So far, four cities and the county have agreed to it. Planners are hoping to have it in place by the first of the year.

'Every little bit counts' when conserving
County urges residents to be energy efficient

By Jeff Burlew
DEMOCRAT STAFF WRITER

Doing your part to fight global warming can be as easy as switching off a light - or buying one of those curly, compact fluorescent light bulbs.

On Monday, Leon County highlighted alternative-energy technology and encouraged the community to reduce its use of energy. The event at Ponce de Leon Park included a stop by National Resources Defense Council members, who are touring the state to promote the use of hybrids and other oil-efficient vehicles.

Adam Schlachter, the county's recycling coordinator, said people help by doing little things, from turning off the light when leaving a room to walking or taking the bus instead of driving. The fluorescent bulbs, for instance, use far less energy than regular ones and last 10 times longer.

"One person can really make a difference," he said. "Every little bit counts."

In August, county commissioners voted to take steps to address energy conservation, including buying hybrid vehicles, making its buildings more energy efficient and exploring the possibility of tapping landfill gasses for fuel.

The county is spending $28,000 apiece on four hybrids, which are powered by gas and electricity. Commissioner Cliff Thaell, who attended the event, said he hopes the county will use more and more energy-efficient vehicles in the future.

The NRDC members arrived in Tallahassee in a hybrid Toyota Highlander SUV and a Chevrolet Impala that runs on ethanol, a fuel made from corn and other plants. They later traveled to the Inland Shell station at 3500 N. Monroe St., which offers the only ethanol pump in Florida.

Deron Lovaas, vehicles campaign director for the NRDC, said the use of such vehicles protects people from volatile gas prices, cuts down on global warming and reduces dependance on foreign oil. He said that some states, including Illinois and Minnesota, have lots of ethanol pumps, and that Florida needs more.

"There's a chicken-and-egg problem," he said. "We need to get over that."

Steve Urse, a member of the Big Bend Climate Action Team, participated in the event.

"I think it's a great step toward combating global warming and reducing our energy use," he said.

Groups press state on land conservation
But saving green spaces is going to cost a lot more greenbacks

By Aaron Deslatte
FLORIDA CAPITAL BUREAU

Florida environmental groups are asking the next governor and Legislature for a lot more green.

Specifically, they want $1 billion a year for conservation buys beginning in 2008, a dramatic boost in funding they say the state has to spend or risk losing much of its remaining open lands.

The Florida Forever Coalition made its pitch Monday in an ad in the Tallahassee Democrat, arguing the state is blowing through its annual conservation dollars and needs more money to keep endangered green spaces from being developed.

The groups said they were making their position clear now ahead of the elections to generate discussion with legislative and statewide candidates in the weeks before the Nov. 7 election.

The coalition, composed of 16 conservation groups including the Nature Conservancy, 1000 Friends of Florida and Defenders of Wildlife, "wants to make sure that they know that we see business as usual is not enough," said Eric Draper, a lobbyist with Audubon of Florida.

Florida has had a land-buying program in place for nearly four decades. Since 1990, Florida has spent roughly $300 million each year for conservation deals.

But the state's wish list has roughly $7 billion in potential purchases, a sign state environmental officials say demonstrates the widening gulf between needs and cash.

Florida Forever is set to expire in 2010, but green groups say the state can't wait that long to adopt its successor.

"We're trying to both be realistic and sensitive to the need we see," said Andy McLeod, with the Trust for Public Land. "Open land is disappearing, and once it's gone it's gone."

With that in mind, high-profile members of the coalition, such as environmental lawyer Thom Rumberger of the Everglades Trust, have met with Republican gubernatorial hopeful Charlie Crist and his policy advisor in recent weeks and expect him to get behind a broader land-buying program.

Organizers in those groups also say they've had encouraging responses from the incoming House and Senate leadership.

"We have an opportunity with some new leadership to look at new ideas," said George Willson, with the Conservation Fund.

Last spring, lawmakers set aside $310 million in addition to the program to buy the Babcock Ranch in Charlotte and Lee counties, and another $125 million for ongoing Everglades restoration work.

But three months into the fiscal year, the state Department of Environmental Protection is already negotiating enough purchases to exhaust its funding, spokeswoman Sarah Williams said.

Just last week, Bush and the Cabinet approved a $50 million deal to buy 5,500 acres of wilderness near Orlando for $50 million - $18 million more than its owners paid six months earlier.

The state has also had to slow negotiations on other projects in the pipeline, including one in Marion County to pay as much as $80 million for 4,000 acres from the development firm Avatar Corp.

This Friday, the advisory board that ranks state conservation projects will take up whether to stop accepting new proposals to the list or simply allow them to keep building up as a way to quantify the demand.

"The question now is, with the end of the program in site, what do we do?" said Mark Glisson, staff director for the state's Acquisition and Restoration Council.

"Do we focus the last remaining resources on the select few excellent projects or do we continue to add projects to the list to demonstrate the need for another program expansion?"

 

I-95 Boca bottleneck to ease (eventually)

By Chuck Mcginness

Palm Beach Post Staff Writer

Tuesday, October 10, 2006

By the time Interstate 95 is widened to 10 lanes through most of Palm Beach County, the highway will still be eight lanes on its busiest stretch in Boca Raton.

A study is under way to add lanes south of Linton Boulevard to Palmetto Park Road, build a new interstate exit near Spanish River Boulevard and put noise walls behind five neighborhoods.

Next year, state highway engineers will iron out details of the improvements and, in 2008, send the plans to the roadway designers. But no date has been set to begin the work.

That's because the state has not budgeted the entire $162 million needed for construction.

Some money has come in dribs and drabs. Gov. Jeb Bush included $7.9 million for the interchange in his 2005 growth-management package, and an $11.4 million earmark was tucked into last year's $286.4 billion federal transportation bill.

Things are expected to change soon.

The state is pumping more money into its Strategic Intermodal System - a network of the busiest highways, airports, seaports and freight lines - to boost commerce and economic development.

"I-95 is the lifeline in South Florida for trucks," said Randy Whitfield, executive director of the Palm Beach County Metropolitan Planning Organization.

And a new 40,000-seat football stadium at Florida Atlantic University hinges on a new interchange at Spanish River. But it's unfair to say the interchange is being considered just so FAU can have an on-campus facility, project consultant Craig Miller said.

"We have to justify it on daily traffic, not special-event traffic," Miller said.

The last of nine pieces to widen I-95 from Delray Beach to Palm Beach Gardens is scheduled for completion in 2009. That's a year before the most optimistic starting date for the work in Boca Raton.

On the section from Congress Avenue to Palmetto Park Road, an extra travel lane will be built in each direction. Auxiliary lanes will be added between interchanges north of Glades Road.

The interchange north of Spanish River will be built before the highway widening gets under way.

Florida Atlantic Boulevard will be extended northwest of where it now ends at Spanish River. Northbound traffic will enter and exit the highway on ramps branching off the extension. Southbound traffic will travel on flyover ramps above the highway.

"It would help a lot," said FAU student Jermaine Booth, who commutes from Lauderdale Lakes. "Traffic gets real bad in the morning."

Other FAU students share Booth's frustration. Making it through the crawl on Glades Road to get to class on time is a hassle, they say.

"It can take five to 10 minutes to get here from I-95," said freshman Emil Abdo, who drives from West Palm Beach. "And it's 15 minutes or more from the turnpike. Another interchange would definitely be good."

Improvements will be made at existing interchanges. At Yamato Road, two loop ramps on the north side of the road will be replaced with straighter ramps on the south side.

Getting rid of the loop ramps will eliminate a busy merge area on westbound Yamato.

Drivers who want to head south on I-95 mix with motorists getting off northbound I-95 and traveling west on Yamato.

Today, more than 180,000 cars a day travel I-95 at Yamato. It operates at level F, the state designation for a highway with the least-favorable driving conditions. The extra lanes will ease congestion but only slightly because traffic is projected to increase about 30 percent by 2030.

Even with 10 lanes, I-95 will still be an F-rated road, but instead of a 20-minute delay, it should be only about five minutes, Miller said.

Planners are looking at several ideas to get some cars off the road, by linking the Tri-Rail station on Yamato to the north end of the FAU campus.

One proposal under review is a bus-only ramp over I-95. Entry to the ramp could be controlled electronically - much like a SunPass lane on Florida's Turnpike - to keep other vehicles from using it.

Another idea is a greenway for bicyclists and pedestrians. The pathway may be a tunnel under the highway or a bridge over I-95.

"It's important to have access for students who don't have cars," said William Cross, planning director for the South Florida Regional Transportation Authority.

The project also includes the widening of Glades Road from six to eight lanes from Butts Road to FAU Boulevard.

Guetzloe got toll-agency money

Agency paid Guetzloe $107,500 for advice on increasing tolls

Christopher Sherman David Damron and Jay Hamburg
Sentinel Staff Writers

October 10, 2006

Central Florida's main road-building agency has steered $107,500 in public money since 2004 to a company owned by Doug Guetzloe, one of its most vocal adversaries, agency officials confirmed Monday.

The Orlando-Orange County Expressway Authority and Guetzloe said he was being paid to gauge opposition to future toll-road increases. But Orange County Mayor Rich Crotty, who sits on the agency's board and only learned of the payments Monday, derided the tactic as a troubling move to buy Guetzloe's silence.

"To pay someone money to minimize opposition doesn't make any sense," Crotty said. "The staff and leadership of the Expressway Authority didn't advise, at least this member, of that fact. That raises a concern for me."

Board Chairman Allan Keen confirmed that he approved the payments.

"I respect Mayor Crotty's opinion. However, there are decisions made at the authority, as in any major business enterprise, that none of the board members are going to have knowledge of," Keen said late Monday. "That's why we have competent managers . . . to make those decisions."

Anti-tax activist Guetzloe called any suggestion "absurd" that the payments were to silence him.

"I have been to every public hearing that has recommended a toll increase to oppose it," he said. "My opposition to toll increases has been adamant and in writing.

"If I could get paid to not do work, I could retire," Guetzloe said.

The issue of increasing tolls on Expressway Authority roads has became a public issue in the past couple of months. The agency hasn't raised tolls in 15 years.

Authority officials said they paid Guetzloe's political-consulting firm for public-opinion research, specifically to tap into Central Florida's toll-road opposition, which Guetzloe has led for years.

Checks to company

The checks to Guetzloe's company, Advantage Consultants, were written by the authority's public-relations firm, Pecora & Blexrud. That firm then billed the Expressway Authority, which gets its money mostly through toll collections.

Guetzloe said Monday that he was paid to help craft strategy and float trial balloons "on what will play and what won't" among toll-road opposition.

The only documented product the $107,500 bought was a recently provided 21/2-page "executive summary," according to the agency.

This is the second time in one week that payments to Guetzloe's company have made news.

The Orange-Osceola State Attorney's Office is investigating Guetzloe's involvement in a Winter Park election. Guetzloe has been charged with 14 misdemeanor counts for sending out an anonymous mailer attacking a candidate for Winter Park mayor.

Prosecutors released documents last week showing that the prestigious Orlando law firm of Lowndes, Drosdick, Doster, Kantor & Reed had paid Guetzloe more than $470,000 at a time he was embroiled in controversies in Winter Garden and Winter Park where the firm was pushing major development projects. Included in the documents was a copy of a $25,000 check from Pecora & Blexrud to Guetzloe's Advantage Consultants.

Questions surfaced

This isn't the first time that questions have surfaced about whether Guetzloe was paid to withhold opposition.

In 2002, former state Rep. Dick Batchelor, chairman of a campaign for a proposed school-tax increase, said Guetzloe asked for $20,000 through an intermediary to stay out of the fight. Guetzloe denied the allegation.

In 2004, Maitland officials and Guetzloe traded testy accusations, with each side saying the other had suggested a $30,000 payoff as a means to end a potentially lengthy and expensive legal battle over the city's plans to build a new City Hall and public-safety building. Guetzloe denied he had asked for any money.

The most recent payments for Guetzloe's consulting services came out of staff meetings at the Expressway Authority in 2004 after Mike Snyder came on board as the new executive director.

The idea was to reach out to all communities in Central Florida, including those opposed to toll roads and toll increases, said Bryan Douglas, spokesman for the authority.

He described Guetzloe's role as providing marketing strategy and opinion research. "It was to promote discussion in his [Guetzloe's] community and to bring what the community is thinking back to us."

Tolling scenarios

Most recently, Guetzloe has been researching a question of how drivers would respond to raising tolls for cash customers, Douglas said. It was one of several tolling scenarios that the Expressway Authority is considering in an effort to increase revenues to meet future road-building needs.

After identifying Guetzloe as the person who "has the pulse of that community," Snyder ran the idea past Chairman Keen for approval, Douglas said.

It was not brought before the full board for approval because it was seen as one of the many decisions that Expressway Authority staff make in the course of doing normal business. There was no attempt to keep that information from the full board, Douglas said, but the staff did not want the board "bogged down" in its day-to-day decisions.

Crotty said the reasons behind payments didn't make political sense, but more importantly, he was "troubled" that none of the Guetzloe consulting information was shared with him as a voting member of the board.

Crotty said that the authority had a sufficient public record of accomplishment and that if any argument for an increase in tolls was merited, it could have been made on those merits. He said the authority didn't need to pay for "disappearing opposition."

"Doug Guetzloe's tactics are less of an issue than who's feeding the beast," Crotty said.

Mark Schlueb of the Sentinel staff contributed to this report. Christopher Sherman can be reached at csherman@orlandosentinel.com or 407-650-6361. David Damron can be reached at 407-420-5311 or ddamron@orlandosentinel.com. Jay Hamburg can be reached at jhamburg@orlandosentinel.com or 407-420-5673.

Water district set for aquifer vote

Environmentalists worry that manatees will suffer if the flow rate at Blue Spring is reduced by aquifer pumps.

Ludmilla Lelis
Sentinel Staff Writer

October 10, 2006

A controversial tradeoff on the water supply between man and manatee is poised for approval today -- and the fate of the critical manatee habitat at Blue Spring is at stake.

St. Johns River Water Management District officials could pass a proposal allowing more water to be pumped from the aquifer that feeds the spring in Orange City until an alternative source of water is found.

Environmentalists have warned that a lower spring flow could harm the manatees.

The district's governing board postponed a final vote on the measure in August, after realizing that this year's manatee count was much higher than expected.

But with a few adjustments that account for a bigger manatee population, the district board is set to vote at its Palatka meeting this afternoon.

"We made some changes to account for growth projections, but the purpose of this is to protect the manatee and this does do that," said Hal Wilkening, resource-management director for the district.

Faced with tremendous growth pressures in southwest Volusia, utilities there need more water to satisfy demand. However, aquifer pumps can affect the water flow at Blue Spring -- and the nearly 200 manatees that take refuge at the spring each winter.

As one of Florida's largest springs, Blue Spring flows at an average annual rate of 1,174 gallons per second, or 157 cubic feet per second. That abundant flow of aquifer water, at a steady temperature of 72 degrees, keeps the manatees alive during the coldest winter days.

District officials are required by law to establish the minimum average flow rate for the spring. However, scientists have spent several years trying to design a plan for the flow rate that provides enough spring water for a growing manatee population.

The latest version of the plan could allow the average flow rate to drop to 132 cubic feet per second from now until March 2009. Then the flow rate would gradually rise back to 157 cubic feet per second in 2024.

What that allows is a short-term window for Volusia utilities to pump more groundwater. However, to make sure that the spring never drops below the projected rates, the utilities must cut back the pumping once they can tap into a different source of water. Volusia utilities have already started discussing construction of a plant that would convert the St. Johns River into drinking water. District officials want to require them to have that plant in operation by 2018.

Environmentalists have several concerns about the plan, including whether a lower spring flow could harm the cold-sensitive animals, and whether the utilities would really cut off the pumps if manatees are being harmed.

"We still think it will have negative impacts on manatees and put manatees in the middle of a water war," said Sandra Clinger, with the Save the Manatee Club.

Other government agencies, including the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, had also questioned whether the district could guarantee that the spring flow will return, but many of those concerns were addressed in an action plan that will require intense monitoring of the spring flow and the manatee population.

Officials with the federal wildlife service, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission and the Florida Department of Environmental Protection have written letters that back the action plan, and promise to cooperate with it. However, all three letters note that the action plan still will need to be refined and changed to be sure that manatees are adequately protected.

Clinger remains uncertain whether that plan will be enough to protect the animals.

"Can you just turn off the spigot once you let people hook up their hoses? No one has given us a good explanation of how they would do that," she said.

Ludmilla Lelis can be reached at llelis@orlandosentinel.com or 386-253-0964.

Tampa May Ease Its Limits On Water

By NEIL JOHNSON The Tampa Tribune

Published: Oct 10, 2006

TAMPA - You may have a cleaner car this winter, but your lawn will remain on a once-a-week water diet.

The Tampa Water Department might lift some elements of water restrictions imposed May 4, but the rules limiting lawn watering to one day a week will remain.

If the Tampa City Council agrees, restrictions on these activities will be lifted later this month: cosmetic pressure cleaning, charity car washes not held at commercial carwashes that recycle the water, and the filling of decorative fountains.

But flow of the Hillsborough River, the city's main water source, remains too puny to allow a return to watering lawns twice weekly, said Brad Baird, director of the city's water department.

"We're going into the winter and dry season, and we need to continue with the once a week restrictions," he said.

The city's rules apply only to Tampa residents, including those on private wells. Residents outside the city who receive water from Tampa can water twice a week, as can customers of Hillsborough County's water system.

The water restrictions saved about 14 million gallons each day that lawn watering was curtailed, or about 14 percent of the city's typical daily use.

Most of the savings comes from cutting lawn watering. Restrictions on other water uses account for 5 percent or less of the savings, Baird said.

Even the slight relaxation of the city's water rules may not last if the coming dry months produce less rain than normal.

"If we get into a severe dry season, we'll go back to them," Baird said.

It all depends on an El Nino, warmer than normal water in the Pacific that usually increases rainfall during the typically dry winter and spring.

Last month, scientists said an El Nino had formed and should last until early next year.

The unusually warm water across a vast stretch of the equatorial Pacific from the International Dateline to the coast of South America alters Florida's winter and spring weather.

Changes in the flow of the jet stream produce storms over the Gulf of Mexico that move across the state.

The jet stream shift also blocks many cold fronts trying to work their way south across Florida.

The El Nino may dampen hurricane formation for the end of this year's season. The shifts in the jet stream create conditions that make it difficult for storms to form.

Forecasters expect this El Nino to be weaker than that of 1997 and 1998, which was one of the strongest on record.

Rainfall that winter and spring set records in Tampa for December, February and April.

There is no way, though, to predict exactly how much more rain this El Nino will bring, said state climatologist David Zierden.

"A stronger El Nino doesn't necessarily produce more rainfall, and a weaker El Nino doesn't necessarily produce less," he said.

Using rainfall records going back to 1950 comparing winter and spring rain during El Nino years with years when water temperatures in the Pacific are normal gives a rough idea of how much more rain we might expect.

Increased rainfall from an El Nino usually begins in December and lasts through March.

On average, an El Nino can bring an extra 6 inches of rain from December through March, when rain usually totals just over 10 inches.

Any extra rain will be helpful, Zierden said.

The spring was the driest in five years, which prompted Tampa to impose the restrictions five months ago.

And though summer rains were above average in Tampa and September rain was nearly twice the average, the rain was pinned near the coast and did not reach far inland.

"The interior was very dry through most of the summer," Zierden said.

Reporter Neil Johnson can be reached at (352) 544-5214 or njohnson@tampatrib.com.

TAMPA'S CURRENT WATER RULES

Outdoor watering is limited to one day per week for water customers in the city.

•Addresses ending in an even number or the letters A through M may water on Tuesdays only. •Addresses ending in an odd number or the letters N through Z may water on Sundays only. •Watering on the designated day is allowed once between midnight and 8 a.m. or between 6 p.m. and midnight. New lawns and landscaping: For the first 15 days, watering is not restricted. For the next 15 days, watering is limited. Even-numbered addresses may water on even-numbered days of the month. Odd-numbered addresses may water on odd-numbered days. Hand-watering: Low-volume irrigation and hand-watering of nonturf landscaping is not restricted. Low-volume hand-watering of lawns is. Car washing: Personal vehicle washing is not restricted. A hose with an automatic shutoff nozzle must be used. Charity and fundraising car washes are prohibited unless held at a commercial carwash that recycles water. The washing performed by the fundraising group must use the commercial facility's recycled water. Pressure-washing: Buildings, sidewalks, driveways, patios and other paved areas should not be pressure-washed. Pressure-washing in preparation for painting or necessary maintenance is not restricted. Swimming pools: Filling pools not using filters and recirculating systems is prohibited. Decorative fountains: Outdoor aesthetic uses such as water fountains are prohibited unless they recirculate water and are necessary to provide water-quality benefits. Fountains using reclaimed water are not restricted.

TAMPA'S CURRENT WATER RULES

Outdoor watering is limited to one day per week for water customers in the city.

For city water information, go to www.tampagov.net/dept_water or call (813) 274-8032. To report violations, call (813) 274-8036. For city water information, go to www.tampagov.net/dept_water or call (813) 274-8032. To report violations, call (813) 274-8036.

Intracoastal algae bloom reportedly dissipating

NEW SMYRNA BEACH -- The rank smell of decaying algae that colored parts of the Intracoastal Waterway pink last week seems to have cleared up, a U.S. Coast Guard official said.

Trichodesmium erythaeum , a bacterial algae that resembles sawdust when it is alive, has not been spotted in the area since Saturday, said Scott Schmoele , a training chief with the Coast Guard. Residents have not phoned in to report it since Friday.

"We don't have any today," he said. "It's been pretty nice."

Fish and Wildlife Research Institute officials confirmed it was trichodesmium erythaeum last week after a sample was shipped to a lab in St. Petersburg. Jennifer Wolny, a research scientist for the institute, said the lab would not be testing the water again for this algae bloom in the near future, but added that water samples from the area will continue to be sent to the lab on a regular basis.

The bacterial algae, common to the west coast of Florida, causes the water to turn purple to pink in color as it begins to decay and clears up with the tide flow, Wolny said.

The lab is set to receive a water sample from the Sebastian Inlet area to confirm whether the bloom has also appeared there.

Drowning in taxes
Hundreds of county residents have seen their property tax bills skyrocket

BY SUSAN LATHAM CARR
STAR-BANNER

OCALA - Diana Klemencic knows her property value has gone up, but that does not help her pay her high property taxes.

"I fell into the doughnut hole with taxes," said Klemencic, of Rainbow Lakes Estates. "We missed about five months of being able to get under the homestead exemption that would have put us in for the 3 percent cap."

West of Ocala, Douglas Davis, too, has been hit har*d with property taxes.

"My taxes went from $2,500 to $7,000 on a bunch of dirt I own," he said, referring to the increases he has seen over two years. "The place where I live - there's no roads, sewer, no trash pickup."

Klemencic and Davis are not alone.
There were 626 Value Adjustment Board petitions filed with Marion County Clerk of Circuit Court David Ellspermann by the Sept. 15 cutoff date, compared to 108 filed last year.

"In my 10 years as clerk, I don't recall such a large number of applications," Ellspermann said.

Marion County Property Appraiser Villie Smith said that about 400 of the 600 applications were requests for homestead exemptions from eligible homeowners who filed late.

Smith said about 100 of the applications came from commercial tax representatives seeking lower taxes for their clients.

The property appraiser assesses the value of property but does not levy taxes. That is done by the taxing authority - whether the county, city or School Board.

"Technically, there were only about 200 filed on the value issue," Smith said. And that, he feels, is a small number of requests when one considers that there are 260,000 parcels in Marion County.

"We certainly had a large increase in value this year which, in turn, produced a higher tax bill," Smith said. "We put $4 billion of new taxable value on the rolls this year, a 33 percent increase."

He said taxes could be kept down if the taxing authorities rolled back the millage rates to generate the same amount of money as last year.

"That never happens," Smith said. "The cost of services, naturally, goes up."

The Marion County Commission in September adopted a total budget of $571.85 million for fiscal year 2006-07, up from the current $532.2 million.

Because of the higher valuation, the commissioners were able to cut the countywide property tax rate, called a millage rate, to 4.57 mills, down from 4.87 mills.

Even though there was a slight cut, it was not near enough to bring the taxes down for most property owners. In fact, some, like Klemencic and Davis, saw large increases.

Having a $25,000 homestead exemption helped many Marion County taxpayers as did Amendment 10's 3 percent cap. But not Klemencic.

Klemencic, whose 91-year-old mother lives with her in Dunnellon, built a new 2,000-square-foot home but had not moved in before the deadline to qualify for the $25,000 homestead exemption.

And, because she did not have the homestead exemption, she was not eligible for protection under Amendment 10, the "Save Our Homes" law, which caps the value for homesteaded residential property to the lower of 3 percent of the previous year's assessed value or the percentage change in the Consumer Price Index.

So, Klemencic could not take the $25,000 homestead deduction nor could she cap the value of her home. And, as everyone who owns property in Marion County knows, property values have gone up, up, up.

Klemencic also got caught in another way. In addition to her home, which sits on 2 acres, she bought an additional 2 acres of land.

TAXABLE VALUES RISE
Even if she were eligible for the homestead exemption and the 3 percent cap, only homesteads, not undeveloped land and commercial property, is protected by the "Save Our Homes" amendment.

As Assistant Property Appraiser Mike McVey will tell you, the cost of land in Marion County has soared. He uses the price of lots in Marion Oaks and Silver Springs Shores as an example.

"They maybe had a value of $5,000," McVey said. "They are now selling anywhere from $30,000 to $50,000."

And those market changes are reflected in the assessment used for tax purposes.

Klemencic said she is being taxed $4,000 for her 2,000-square-foot home on 3 acres. She owned a bigger house with a pool up north and paid $3,500 in taxes.

In addition, the tax on her 2 additional acres went from $400 to $1,200.

"I didn't buy it to make money," Klemencic said. "I bought it for privacy. Now I have no choice. I can't afford to keep it. I about flipped."

Davis got a large tax bill, too.
"My property taxes went up 500 percent in two years," Davis said. "I don't mind paying my fair share, but a 500 percent increase?"

Two years ago, Davis' taxes were $2,500. Today his taxes are $7,000.

Davis built his house about 15 years ago. Three years ago, he built a second house. He took the homestead exemption off the older house and put it on the new home, where he now lives. He uses the older home as investment property.

Taxes on the older home have risen from $600 to about $2,400.

He also owns four vacant lots. Taxes on that went from about $130 to $650.

"All this property is on dirt roads," Davis said. "There are no services provided."

He said he understands that he has to pay for schools, and fire and police.

"It's criminal, in my view, that they throw up property value that much with absolutely no substantial increase in services," Davis said.

"OUR HANDS ARE TIED"
McVey said the property appraiser has no choice but to raise the values.

"We are audited by the Department of Revenue," McVey said. "We raise value to get the roll approved."

He said the DOR looked at 2006 qualified sales and the property appraiser's roll must be within 90 percent of that.

"It was over 20,000 qualified sales DOR actually looked at for roll purposes," McVey said. "Our hands are tied. We have to raise values according to the market."

There was a "tremendous" change in the real estate market in 2004/05, McVey said. In 2006 the prices of property did not fall, but there was a slowdown in sales.

"Things are not selling as fast," he said. "We don't see a decline in the market as far as value."

That is little consolation to Klemencic, who currently is looking for work.

"If people are making $8 an hour, how are they supposed to live?" she asked. "It's a travesty."

Davis agrees.
"Insurance rates are up 400 percent, health care 30, 40, 50 percent. Gas is up 200 percent since 2003," he said. "Now you have county government sticking a gun to your head."

He said if the road by his home gets paved, he will be charged $10,000 after he has paid taxes for all these years.

"I am frustrated," he said. "They have made the rules so you can't do anything about it. Your choice is: pick up your marbles and go home. They are taxing people out of their homes."

Susan Latham Carr may be reached at susan.carr@starbanner.com or (352) 867-4156.

A little longer wait for Wal-Mart

The groundbreaking for the Dade City Supercenter has been delayed by a year to January 2008.

By MOLLY MOORHEAD, Times Staff Writer
Published October 10, 2006

DADE CITY - The planned groundbreaking of a celebrated 187,000-square-foot Wal-Mart Supercenter has been pushed back a year, city officials said Monday.

In March, when the supercenter announced its pending arrival, officials touted it as a boon for smalltown Dade City in a district ripe for commercial development. Unlike some other areas where the giant retailer is shunned, Dade City welcomed a newer, bigger Wal-Mart with open arms. Business owners hoped it would bring new clientele to the area. The groundbreaking on the store at the corner of Clinton Avenue and U.S. 301 had been slated for January.

Now, the timetable is 2008.

City Attorney Karla Owens met with Wal-Mart's attorney last week. She said the company assured her the store will be built and wanted to make sure its site plan approval would not expire.

"They're just deferring breaking ground on it until January 2008 because they have too many stores nationwide under construction," Owens said. "He has confirmed that they without question will build here. It's just that they want to complete some of their other obligations."

A Wal-Mart spokesman did not return a message Monday.

The supercenter is set to include a grocery, garden center, and oil and lube shop. It would be built on 30 acres at the southeast corner of U.S. 301 and Clinton Avenue, behind an existing SunTrust Bank.

Wal-Mart tagged Dade City for a supercenter despite operating another 205,000-square-foot megastore just 6 miles south on U.S. 301 in Zephyrhills. A spokesman said early this year that there was enough demand to support both stores. The Dade City supercenter would replace the city's existing Wal-Mart, an older 45,000-square-foot store that the company plans to sell.

News of the delay coincides with evidence of a slowdown in the area's real estate market. Just a few months ago, city officials said the area could see 2,500 homes in just one to two years. Now they're saying five years.

"They will be built because they got plans approved and everything," Owens said. "It's just a matter of when."

Mayor Hutch Brock said the delay may not be such a bad thing.

"It really could just be a benefit that allows us to spend the time to make sure we've got things properly planned," he said, citing road improvements and an expansion of the sewer plant.

"It allows us to take a breath."

Glen Lakes shopping center inked

By MICHAEL D. BATES
mbates@hernandotoday.com

BROOKSVILLE — It’s been rumored for many months that Glen Lakes residents would get a major shopping center in front of their subdivision.
Those rumors moved closer to certainty Monday when planning and zoning commissioners voted 4-1 to approve revising the community’s master plan to allow for a 65,000-square-foot commercial development.
Alan Asendorf, the attorney for Glen Lakes Partnership, told commissioners that Publix would anchor the center, although there have been no firm commitments from any tenants.
The shopping center would be located on the north side of Glen Lakes Boulevard, west of U.S. 19. A portion of that site has already been developed with the Glen Lakes welcome center and a storage area for RVs and boats.
The developer is proposing to develop the commercial parcel in two phases, the first phase including 101,550 square feet on 13.23 acres. The shopping center would be built in the first phase and include several outparcels.
The second phase will include the remaining acreage to be developed with 70,450 square feet of commercial space.
To accommodate the project, commissioners approved extending Outer Banks Drive to U.S. 19 on the north side, which will give people two separate entrances into the center.
The board also acted on Commissioner Anthony Palmieri’s suggestion that the stores only be open between 6 a.m. and midnight.
County commissioners, the final authority on rezonings and master plan revisions, will vote on the project at their Nov. 8 land use hearing.
Also at Monday’s planning and zoning meeting:
— A developer’s request to build 392 condominiums on 24 acres on the west side of Croom Rital Road, north of State Road 50, was postponed until Nov. 19 to give him a chance to tweak the plans.
Priced at $150,000 per unit, the “workforce housing” condos will be geared toward teachers, firefighters, police officers and others who are looking to own instead of rent, said Engineer Nicholas Nicholson.
Planning staffers have recommended the board deny the project because it is inconsistent with the county’s comprehensive plan.
— Even though several Preston Hollow residents spoke against it, planning and zoning commissioners voted 5-0 to approve the building of two office buildings on 3.9 acres on the north side of County Line Road, west of Preston Hollow Drive.
An 8-foot wall on the north end of the property will separate the Preston Hollow subdivision. The developer will also be required to pay his proportionate share of roadway improvements, including the possibility of a traffic signal near the entrance of the offices.
Residents said the buildings would be an eyesore and contribute to traffic congestion in the area.

Reporter Michael D. Bates can be contacted at 352-544-5290.

Zoning panel opposes project

The county Planning and Zoning Commission votes 4-0 against rezoning acreage described as a flood-prone area where a developer would put 307 attached homes.

By DAN DEWITT
Published October 10, 2006

BROOKSVILLE - The 121 acres where a Miami developer wanted to build 307 attached houses was in a rural area on Mondon Hill Road, across State Road 50 from the entrance of Spring Lake Highway.

Further, the development, bordering a large retention pond dug for SR 50, would be partly submerged by a large flood, according to a new floodplain study.

For both of those reasons, the county planning department recommended denying a rezoning request from the developer, James Kern. The Planning and Zoning Commission backed that recommendation Monday, voting 4-0 against the rezoning. One commissioner, Ken Smith, abstained.

Attorney Joe Mason, who represented the developer, said the land was designated for residential development in the county's comprehensive plan and that Kern had reduced the number of units he planned to build from 462.

The county's chief planner, Jerry Greif, said he wasn't convinced by those arguments.

"Smoke screen aside, the development is not consistent with surrounding uses," Greif said.

Planning director Ron Pianta said the county comprehensive plan calls for low-density development in flood-prone areas. Kern's project "would be more appropriate for an urban area, and there's not transition" to the larger lots surrounding the land.

But Alan Garman of Brooksville's Civil-Tech Consulting Engineers said residents often complain that developers attempt to change the comprehensive plan to allow development.

Kern, on the other hand, "found a parcel that allows residential development on the comp plan, and it's not approved," Garman, who helped design the subdivision, said after the vote.

The county planners said in their report that the county and the Southwest Florida Water Management District are updating flood maps for the county.

"Any development would have to comply with the new mapping," the planning recommendation said; the new maps show that the southwest corner of the property would be submerged by a large flood.

If his developers must rethink the development, Garman said, the state has larger concerns: The new maps show that the flood would also inundate some nearby stretches of SR 50.

Smith said he withheld his vote because he is not opposed to developing the parcel, which is across the street from a cluster of stores. He encouraged Garman to resubmit a plan "with less density, something we could go with."

Dan DeWitt can be reached at dewitt@sptimes.com or (352) 754-6116

Not even an empty shell is left

In the wilds of Wimauma, off a road that runs through farmland and jungle, there sits a modest double-wide inhabited by 29 turtles and tortoises, four snakes, one bearded dragon and a very big dog.

By BEN MONTGOMERY
Published October 10, 2006

WIMAUMA - In the wilds of Wimauma, off a road that runs through farmland and jungle, there sits a modest double-wide inhabited by 29 turtles and tortoises, four snakes, one bearded dragon and a very big dog.

Living precariously among them is a quiet lady named Kim Inzerillo, who has happily tended to her kingdom for quite some time.

Until May.

That's when it all fell apart, when Kim's eyes filled with tears and her mind was flooded with awful thoughts of turtle soup and roadkill and a mysterious silver SUV.

* * *

Kim met Sally in 2001. Sally looked bad back then. Unhealthy.

Her shell was turning bumpy from malnutrition. She refused to eat collard greens and arugula unless Kim sprayed them with strawberry flavoring.

She came from Turtle Homes Rescue, a nonprofit that helps mistreated pets. The rescuers found Sally living in a 10-gallon tank somewhere in New Jersey. She had grown so big she couldn't turn around.

Apparently the woman who owned Sally didn't know Sulcatas - African tortoises - can grow to be 100 pounds.

At first, Sally wanted only spaghetti. It took weeks of training for Kim to get her on a healthy diet.

She lived in Kim's back yard, and any time the door swung open, Sally raced in. If Kim wasn't watching, she'd turn to find Sally eating the cat's food.

Sally had a blackish-green shell and it seemed like she always had a piece of grass hanging out of her mouth.

Kim didn't have her kingdom back then. She lived with only one other turtle, her first, Spartacus.

He was bigger than Sally and a shade lighter. The two hit it off.

"He liked to mount her," Kim said. "A lot."

Kim took the two to the Great American Teach-Ins at the elementary schools in Ruskin and laughed as the kids shrieked when she took them out of the box.

Not long ago, Kim brought home another, smaller male. She couldn't decide on a name, so she's been calling him The Boy.

As Kim's kingdom grew pet by pet, Sally and Spartacus spent their days walking the perimeter of a big grassy pen in the back or lying in the shade of their little turtle home.

In the evenings, when the sun set, Kim would come outside with greens and the tortoises would scoot close and grunt and burp as they enjoyed dinner.

And all was good.

* * *

It happened on a Sunday. Kim and her boyfriend, a computer programmer named Mark Illum, returned from an overnight trip to find a tortoise in the yard, near the road.

At first, Kim was excited. She thought another tortoise had simply wandered up. But her excitement soon turned to fear.

It was Spartacus!

They scooped him up and raced to the back yard, past the boat and the barn, to the tortoise pen. The gate stood open, the rope loose.

The Boy was still inside, thank God. But where was Sally?

They scoured the property, parting tall grass and calling her name. Then they jumped in the car as the questions came: How long was the gate open? How far could a 30-pound tortoise go? Did someone steal Sally?

They checked the woods and ditches along Carlton Lake Road. They searched for hours. Kim began to cry. Mark put fliers at the end of the road.

Before long, word started to trickle in. A neighbor said she saw a silver SUV in the driveway that night. But who owns a silver SUV? Could it have been Kim's sister's husband's ex-wife?

Then came a call from another woman. She said she saw Sally in front of the house that Sunday morning. Moments after she stopped, a man in a pickup pulled up.

"Them make good eatin'," the woman recalled the man saying.

The woman told them she put Sally in her car - for protection, really - and was chatting later with a neighbor at the nearby Winn-Dixie when a man overheard them. He said he could provide a good home for the tortoise.

She didn't know his name. Nor did she know his address. Just Tampa.

Mark and Kim plastered the Winn-Dixie with fliers thinking maybe the man would return. They took out a classified ad in the Tampa Tribune.

Weeks turned into months. Last weekend, Mark taped fliers on the front doors at Tampa Reptile Mania at the State Fairgrounds. He thought for sure the Tampa man would be there, or someone would know something.

Lost Large Sulcata, it said. Reward.

Nothing.

* * *

Kim prays for Sally. She thinks about her every day. Sometimes she thinks about the worst.

"I just hope that the guy who took her isn't a turtle-eater," she said, standing in her kingdom the other day. "I just hope she's okay."

Ben Montgomery can be reached at bmontgomery@sptimes.com or 813 661-2443.

Titusville ponders land-use changes

Meeting slated for 6:30 tonight

BY JESSICA RAYNOR
FLORIDA TODAY

The city council will review several changes to its long-range plan for development and could approve an interim city manager at its regular meeting tonight.

The council also will discuss a proposal to regulate off-road vehicle use, providing penalties for those who ignore property and environmental laws.

The meeting will begin at 6:30 p.m. at City Hall, 555 S. Washington Ave.

The amendments change future land use and zoning for land parcels across the city. According to state law, the city can amend its comprehensive plan twice each calendar year and is required to transmit proposed changes to the Florida Department of Community Affairs for review.

The changes then go back to the city council for final approval.

The first set of proposed comprehensive plan amendments already have been reviewed and sent back to the city to finalize. Amendments include changing land use near San Mateo Village to planned unit development and changing the land-use map to include annexed enclaves.

The next set of proposed comprehensive amendments still require city review before being sent to the state for approval. Those amendments propose changing the Miracle City Mall site from commercial high intensity to urban mixed use, in line with the U.S. 1 corridor master plan.

In other business, if the city follows City Manager Tom Harmer's recommendation, Mark Ryan will be named the city's interim city manager. The current economic development director, Ryan -- who worked 25 years as West Melbourne's city manager -- would step into Harmer's spot when he leaves Dec. 1.

And off-road vehicles might be regulated under city code, following the lead of state and county law. A proposed ordinance has received little debate after being brought forth when residents complained of nuisance riders.

Contact Raynor at 360-1016 or jraynor@brevard.gannett.com

Vacation-home builders go for more affordable

High costs fuel shift toward condos, town homes

Jack Snyder
Sentinel Staff Writer

October 10, 2006

Rising land costs have some developers of vacation homes in the Walt Disney World area focusing more on condos and town homes to entice buyers with lower prices.

The market clearly has cooled, but single-family vacation home prices are still high enough that the rents owners can get pale in relation to their mortgage-carrying costs, according to several developers.

The answer for many, they say, is a lower initial investment.

"The run-up in single-family [home] and land prices has been significant," said George Glance, KB Homes' Orlando Division president.

To bring in lower prices, KB Homes is developing Paradise Cay, a town-home community with a resort feel off U.S. Highway 192 west of Kissimmee. Glance said the development has a resort feel -- such as a guest arrival area.

About 75 percent of the sales so far have been to vacation-home buyers, Glance said. The average sales price for the three-bedroom town homes has been less than $260,000. A second KB town-home community, Crestwynd Bay, also is under development in the same area.

In contrast, KB's Bella Toscana off County Road 54 in Polk County is a single-family subdivision with short-term rental zoning. But the single-family houses start at $320,000.

Anthony Crocco, Central Florida director of MetroStudy, a national real estate research firm, said he thinks as much as a quarter of all future vacation homes developed will be town homes or condos.

"Costs are driving that," Crocco said. "Single-family detached homes will be the preferred product, but town homes will provide an attractive pricing option."

Garrett Kenny, president of Feltrim Development Inc., said there has been a strong shift to higher density condo and town-home development in the past year.

"Rental income hasn't kept pace anywhere near buying costs," Kenny said.

Kenny is developing a vacation-home condo project near ChampionsGate and said most of the sales were completed before the market slowed sharply.

"The market from the U.K. has really slowed down" Kenny said. "You have to be priced right these days."

But, while there will be a lot more condo and town-home development, Kenny said the single-family vacation home isn't going away.

"There are some buyers who aren't dependent on rental income, and they want a single-family home," he said.

That's absolutely true, said Jim Bagley, president of Park Square Homes. The Orlando company is developing both single-family and town-home communities for the vacation-home buyer.

In some communities, such as Bella Vida off U.S. 192 near Kissimmee, the company offers both products.

Other developers, such as Lexon Homes of Orlando, are still focusing on single-family vacation homes.

"The British like single-family homes and lots of amenities," said Joe Kantor, president. "We're watching prices and believe we're in a range a lot of buyers can afford."

Lexon Homes' two big developments have prices ranging from $350,000 to $460,000.

Kantor said he plans to develop an on-site rental operation to help owners maximize rents and occupancy.

The company is developing Calaby Parc at Tower Lake, a single-family development, near Haines City, and Sereno, a single-family subdivision near U.S. 17-92 and C.R. 54 in northeast Polk.

Kantor thinks the vacation-home market will bounce back from the current doldrums.

"We are going through a period of inventory adjustments between the resale market with those who are trying to cash in on the gains of their home value and the builders making an effort to sell houses," he said.

Kantor said he expects that to continue for another six months with new sales then picking up.

"I'm still bullish," he said.

Jack Snyder can be reached at 407-420-5094 or jsnyder@orlandosentinel.com.

Development Planned For Ranch

By KEVIN WIATROWSKI The Tampa Tribune

Published: Oct 9, 2006

ODESSA - While the land around it sprouted homes and businesses, South Branch Ranch sat untouched off the northwest corner of State Road 54 and the Suncoast Parkway. That's not the case anymore.

Plans pending at Pasco County's growth management office call for building 700 homes on 300 acres bordering Tower Road at the northern end of the ranch owned by Richard K. Behnke of Dade City.

The development would be a mix of houses and town houses.

The rest of the 600-acre ranch is split between a county-designated employment center and a wildlife corridor connecting the state-owned Starkey Preserve north of the ranch with another habitat in Hillsborough County.

In many ways, the South Branch project mirrors Ashley Glen, another Standard Pacific development east of the Suncoast.

In its proposal, Standard Pacific Homes says it aims to build affordable housing for people who might work in the adjacent 600,000 square feet of commercial property.

As it goes through county reviews, the South Branch Ranch project seems likely to be the first property formally zoned as an employment center. That land designation was created by the latest revision to the county's long-range Comprehensive Land Use Plan to preserve land for job creation.

No developer has been chosen for the employment center land, Standard Pacific officials have said.

The comprehensive plan is on hold pending a challenge by landowners from northeast Pasco County.

Reporter Kevin Wiatrowski can be reached at (813) 948-4201 or kwiatrowski@tampatrib.com.

Plans for 62 townhomes on Oyster Bayou delayed

The company that planned to build the townhomes blames a soft real estate market.

By JODIE TILLMAN
Published October 10, 2006

NEW PORT RICHEY - A St. Petersburg company is putting on hold its plans to build 62 luxury townhomes on Oyster Bayou.

The Ballast Point Group cites the downshift in the real estate market as its reason for delaying construction of the waterfront Cottages of Green Key, which were priced at $500,000 and up.

None of the townhomes has been sold, and Ballast Point is temporarily closing its sales office.

"It is so disappointing," said Kim Liberty, vice president of marketing and sales.

The company said it was unclear when construction will resume. So far, crews had only started clearing the land.

Building was supposed to start by February, with an expected completion date of late 2007.

Cottages of Green Key is Ballast Point's first venture in Pasco County.

In early September, Liberty told the St. Petersburg Times that the company saw a strong second-home market in New Port Richey.

While potential out-of-state buyers were showing strong interest, they hadn't committed to buying any of the homes, Liberty said Monday.

The project featured Mediterranean-style three-story homes, each with its own elevator.

The development would also have a swimming pool and a boardwalk along Oyster Bayou.

The company has no plans to change anything about the project, including the upscale prices, Liberty said. She said Ballast Point is waiting to see when the market will improve.

"We know this is a wonderful product," she said.

Jodie Tillman covers business in Pasco County. She can be reached at 727 869-6247 or jtillman@sptimes.com.

Condos becoming castles in the sky

Plans for some of the condo and townhouse projects in Port Richey have stalled.

By CAMILLE C. SPENCER
Published October 10, 2006

PORT RICHEY - This little city is supposed to be bursting at the seams.

In the spring, officials expected five condominium and townhouse complexes with units priced around $200,000 to break ground by year's end, doubling the city's population of 3,200.

Another developer planned to replace the Port Richey Mobile Home Park with hotels and restaurants there's been talk of a Hilton or a steak house, trying to attract tourists to the city's waterfront.

City officials hoped the projects would provide jobs, increase the tax base and help a city working to find its image.

Two townhouse projects still aim to do that. Two others are still snaking their way through the city's approval process.

But one of the largest projects - the 170-unit Bay Point townhouses - has stalled. And two mobile home parks, ripe for redevelopment, remain on the market.

That's because a slowing housing market and skyrocketing insurance costs have left the city struggling to get developments off the ground. City officials now estimate just 700 new residents by year's end - a fraction of the roughly 3,000 predicted earlier this year.

Has the rebirth of Port Richey stalled?

"Everybody knows with the prices of flood and property insurance, we're struggling to make it," said Ed Winch, city building official. "It's affecting the market badly. It's slowed anticipated growth. With condos, there's not a market for it."

Among other things, oil prices, which affect the cost of petroleum-based building materials such as pipes and shingles, slowed construction, said City Manager Jerry Calhoun.

"I think people have a wait-and-see attitude," Calhoun said. "With things slowing down, it isn't just Port Richey, it's nationwide. We have to back off our projections."

The Port Richey Mobile Home Park at U.S. 19 and Grand Boulevard has been for sale since the spring. For months, residents have been bracing for eviction letters.

Another mobile home park, Moonlight Bay, at Grand Boulevard and River Gulf Road, has been on the market for two months. City officials haven't discussed plans for the land, but a Coldwell Banker flier advertising the property hypes "endless possibilities" for the land.

By law, mobile home tenants must be given at least six months' notice when there is a change in the use of land where a mobile home stands.

Mobile home residents have yet to receive those notices. The land beneath their homes, once lucrative for condominium development, isn't as attractive anymore.

"Condos was the thing, and they were selling like hotcakes," Winch said. But then, "the bottom fell out (of the market)."

Winch said that while the housing market appears bleak, he hopes things improve for a city with a waterfront.

"The only thing the city has is (some of) the only dirt that looks out on the Gulf of Mexico," Winch said.

"It's prime land. My opinion is, the market will correct itself."

David James, a member of the West Pasco Board of Realtors, said it doesn't take long for waterfront property to rebound after a housing slump.

"Generally, I find that the waterfront property market seems to be a little more volatile," he said. "It's the first to go into a slump and the first to come out. The great majority is vacation homes and people from up north and out of the country looking for a winter escape."

James said when those buyers notice the market heading south, they're the first to sell.

"But when everybody gets a positive attitude, (waterfront property is) the first area people go back to," he said. "I don't see it being any extended period of time. (The market is) showing signs of improving."

Camille C. Spencer can be reached at (727) 869-6229 or cspencer@sptimes.com.

WHERE THEY STAND

In the spring, city officials predicted these five projects would double Port Richey's population by year's end. Here's where they stand now:

- Avilla Bay townhouses by developer U.S. Home, on Old Post Road near Wal-Mart; 128 units; slated to break ground by year's end.

- Cotee River townhouses by developer U.S. Home, at Washington Street and Broadway Avenue; two buildings with 10 units each; slated to break ground by year's end.

- Banyon Cove on Oyster Bay condominiums by developer Florida Land and Development, at Limit Drive and Oelsner Street; 720 units; site plans in review with city building department.

- Snug Cove condominiums by developer Doug Markham, on Bay Boulevard, approved for 110 units; site plans in review with city building department.

- Bay Point townhouses by Kreyman Properties, at Old Post and Ridge roads; 170 units; plans stalled by developer.

Source: Port Richey building department

Helipad Question Returns

By JULIA FERRANTE The Tampa Tribune

Published: Oct 9, 2006

DADE CITY - A Tampa businessman and his wife on Tuesday will try for the second time to secure a county permit for a helicopter pad near their home at Lake Blanton.

The county commission, which in March 2005 denied a similar request, again will hear from Eric and Wendy Jacobson, who are seeking to use the helipad in an area designated for agricultural use. The county has granted four similar requests in the area since 1991, according to zoning officials.

The Florida Department of Transportation has registered no objections to a conditional-use permit for the helipad, but the planning commission by a 6-2 vote recommended denial in July. Pasco zoning administrators are recommending approval with some conditions.

Some of the Jacobsons' neighbors at Tranquilview Lane and Spring Valley Road have complained that the couple's helicopter is disrupting their quiet way of life. They also have said the Jacobsons are illegally storing the helicopter in a barn.

County rules require the Jacobsons to have a conditional-use permit to operate a federally sanctioned helipad, but even without the permit, the couple may fly the helicopter and park it on their 15-acre property, County Attorney Bob Sumner told planning commissioners.

Critics accused Eric Jacobson, owner of Bay-to-Bay Hardware, of ignoring the commission's recommendation last year and pouring a concrete slab in a clearing. The neighbors said Jacobson also built a shelter to store the helicopter. His lawyer said at the time his client was not violating local laws.

A public hearing is scheduled for 6:30 p.m. at the historic Pasco County Courthouse, 37918 Meridian Ave.

Reporter Julia Ferrante can be reached at (813) 948-4220.

Politics

Crimping citizens initiative, or not?

Amendment 3 makes it harder to change the state's Constitution and asks how direct our democracy will be.

By JONI JAMES
Published October 9, 2006

TALLAHASSEE - It's the most-expensive statewide political campaign in Florida you've never heard of: Amendment 3.

But with just a month to go before the Nov. 7 ballot and at least $1.2-million set aside by supporters for advertising, that's likely to change.

Amendment 3 will ask voters in November whether they want to make it harder to amend Florida's Constitution by requiring a 60 percent approval for future constitutional amendments.

It sounds simple, but it's not. The measure has created the oddest bedfellows seen in Florida politics for a long time. Consider for example Gov. Jeb Bush, who supports a 60 percent approval. He is on the same side as the state's biggest teachers union and its most powerful business interests.

But neither man vying to replace him, Democrat Jim Davis or Republican Charlie Crist, backs the measure. Joining them in opposition are groups from the environmental Sierra Club to Florida4Marriage.Org, which is pushing a 2008 ballot question banning gay marriage.

The rhetoric on both sides is the stuff of high school civics textbooks: representative government vs. direct democracy.

The representative side says the current system subjects the state Constitution to the dangers of an ill-informed electorate duped by ballot language funded by special interests. The direct democracy side argues the current system is necessary to counter an arrogant Legislature that kowtows to special interests at the expense of voters' will.

It's a showdown that has been years in coming.

* * *

No one paid much attention in 2001 when two new rural state legislators, one Republican, one Democrat, filed bills to make it harder to amend Florida's Constitution, which can now be done with 50 percent of votes cast plus one.

Rep. Joe Pickens, R-Palatka, and Sen. Rod Smith, D-Alachua, who recently lost his bid to be the Democratic gubernatorial nominee, both thought Florida's Constitution was being amended too often and with subjects, such as net bans and high-speed trains, that were better suited for state laws.

The pair's big plan: Make it harder to amend the state's Constitution but create a new system whereby citizens could propose and pass state laws through the ballot, rather than the Legislature.

Such a comprehensive scheme, endorsed by public policy groups, never got very far. The same business-backed groups supporting Amendment 3 wanted to block any new direct democracy measures, arguing that is what the Legislature is for.

And supporters of the current process worried lawmakers would ultimately rewrite any laws voters approved at the ballot, meaning voters would lose power.

But the Republican-led Legislature, at the urging of Bush and the business lobby, did eventually embrace three ideas sparked by Smith's and Pickens' push. The changes came after citizens initiatives on the 2002 and 2004 ballots added protection of pregnant pigs to the Constitution, forced a reduction in class sizes and required an increase in the minimum wage.

Lawmakers passed a new law requiring that ballot language for citizens petitions include statements saying how much they would cost taxpayers. And they successfully asked voters in 2004 to move up the qualification deadline for citizens petitions.

The result this year: Just one citizens ballot measure is on the November ballot, one that would require the state to dedicate millions each year to anti-tobacco education.

But lawmakers didn't stop there. In 2005, at the urging of the Florida Chamber of Commerce, Bush and others, the Legislature agreed to add Amendment 3 to the 2006 ballot to request the new 60 percent approval.

The reason is sound, even if it's not the comprehensive reform he and Pickens envisioned, Smith said.

"I do believe one of the reasons the U.S. Constitution has been so venerable is because it's been so difficult to change," Smith said. "It's protected minorities time and time again from the passions of any one given moment."

But supporters of Amendment 3, organized under the banner "Protect Our Constitution," take a slightly different tack, saying it's too easy in Florida for well-moneyed special interests to sponsor citizens initiatives that change the state's course.

Their examples: the 2000 proposal to create a statewide high-speed train, pushed at the behest of a Lakeland millionaire, C.C. "Doc" Dockery; or the gambling-backed 2004 amendment that allowed slot machines in South Florida; and the union-backed 2004 measure that raised the state's minimum wage.

Low voter turnout means just a few of the state's electorate can rewrite the state's supreme document, changing the course of history, they argue.

"This is about preventing future tax increases and protecting our state's Constitution," said Mark Wilson, executive vice president of the Florida Chamber of Commerce, who is overseeing the supporters' campaign.

But opponents of the measure argue many of Amendment 3's supporters are groups that have already accessed the citizens petition process and now want to close that door, such as the Florida Education Association, which supported the class size measure and has opposed legislative efforts to put another measure on the ballot to modify it.

Opponents, organized under the label "Trust the Voters," argue it's nothing short of a power grab by a Legislature that is already unresponsive to popular will.

Their evidence: Lawmakers for years rejected citizens' cries to ban smoking in restaurants, raise the state minimum wage and reduce class size. All three have since been added to the state Constitution through the citizens initiative process.

"We decided the leader of the free world with 537 votes, why should we require in most elections a 1.5-million vote (margin) for just a citizens initiative?" said Panama City developer Charlie Hilton, referring to Florida's razor-thin margin in the 2000 presidential election and a possible vote margin for a winning ballot measure. "That's a double standard."

Hilton is one of Florida's best-known Republicans and a founder of the conservative Club for Growth. He leads the Trust the Voters group, along with the chairman of the anti-gambling group No Casinos and former Democratic Gov. and U.S. Sen. Bob Graham.

No Casinos successfully thwarted multiple attempts by the gambling industry to expand gambling in Florida through the citizens initiative process, only to lose in 2004 when about 51 percent of voters agreed to allow slot machines in South Florida.

But that doesn't mean the system should be changed, said No Casinos chairman Bill Sublette, a former Republican state lawmaker from Orlando.

"Those same lobbyists and special interests that block popular measures in Tallahassee now want to make it harder for the people to petition for changes in the law," he said. "That's not what democracy is about."

Looking back

Currently it takes a simple majority of voters to approve an amendment to Florida's Constitution. Had the proposed Amendment 3 been in effect, requiring 60 percent approval, here's how amendments would have fared:

Would Have Failed

- Restructuring of state Cabinet from six jobs to three, 1998

- High-speed rail, 2000

- Voluntary, universal prekindergarten, 2002

- Pregnant pig protection, 2002

- Class size amendment, 2004

- Allowing slot machines in Broward and Miami-Dade counties, 2004

Still Would Have Passed

- Preservation of the death penalty, 1998

- Ban on workplace smoking, 2002

- Increase in minimum wage, 2004

- Parental notification of abortion, 2004

- Repeal of high-speed rail, 2004

[Last modified October 9, 2006, 01:22:14]

Rural residents set to vote on forming town

The issue: Will incorporation let Loxahatchee Groves block development?

By Mitra Malek

Palm Beach Post Staff Writer

Monday, October 09, 2006

LOXAHATCHEE GROVES — People here live by a creed: "Love it and leave it alone."

It's been Loxahatchee Groves' slogan for decades, and its 3,400 residents mean it, give or take a few. Most in this 12-square-mile, unincorporated area like the goats and llamas, the dusty roads and mismatched houses, the nudist colony and nurseries, the motor homes left to fade in front yards.

And if they don't, they respect those who do.

"I know that my car will get dirty here; I know there are chickens," said Sandi Schaper, whose ranch-style home sits on 5 acres next to a conservatory for rare plant species. "I didn't come here wanting to change anybody."

Instead, outside forces have hinted at changing those who live inside Loxahatchee Groves' borders, mostly developers keen on turning open land into humdrum subdivisions.

After years of watching the slash pines around them cede to stucco houses, a group of locals figured they'd better do something to stem the pressure. This spring they won state approval to become a town, if voters wanted, and on Tuesday Loxahatchee Groves' residents will decide whether to do just that.

Proponents say their neighbors can best ensure this century-old community is left alone. Opponents say a different layer of government might make it easier for outsiders to mess with it — and it's going to cost more.

Truth is, there's no way to guarantee an area will remain rural, said Michael Allan Wolf, chairman of local government law at University of Florida. Especially in the Sunshine State, with the lure of warm weather.

"It's this money thing," Wolf said. "Someone will show up that is going to make an offer that those landowners won't be able to refuse."

Incorporation is a good way to control the pace of development, though, he said.

The state legislature witnessed a raft of incorporation proposals in the past few years. Some communities sought self-determination to get better services. Others, like Loxahatchee Groves, wanted to map their own fate, and that usually had to do with growth patterns.

Not surprising in Palm Beach County, which has one of the largest land areas east of the Mississippi River. Plus, its county leaders serve single districts. That means communities often feel they don't get proper consideration, said Jim Murley, director of Florida Atlantic University's Center for Urban and Environmental Solutions.

A 2004 survey showed 60 percent of residents were interested in incorporation.

"Local government is the cornerstone of democracy," said Jamie Titcombe, executive director of Palm Beach County League of Cities.

He's tackled the skeptics. Several residents have criticized him for painting a rosy picture of Loxahatchee Groves after incorporation. The new board could cut deals with developers, they leveled. Titcombe said he couldn't predict decisions the town council would make, but the county commission hasn't necessarily acted in their interests, either.

"You have a far better chance of looking your neighbor in the eye and saying, 'I don't like the decision you made,'" Titcombe said.

Proponents say home-rule will offer Loxahatchee Groves more power to stop road connections, at E Road and 140th Avenue for example, not far from where Callery-Judge Grove plans 10,000 homes.

The town charter and proposed budget of about $1 million call for little change in services. The Loxahatchee Groves Water Control District would keep handling drainage and roads. Fire protection and garbage service would continue. The town would pay more for county police protection but have more officers. A five-person town council would oversee the city, with one term rotating every year.

Still, the skeptics hear things that make them nervous: incorporation supporters who claim suburban Wellington is a model municipality. And the naysayers think that the Loxahatchee Groves Landowners Association, which has a history of opposing nearby development, showed its true colors by refusing to oppose the Callery-Judge Grove project or the Simon project, a dense homesite at the edge of Loxahatchee Groves.

"They are preaching a rural community but they are not backing it up," said resident Doug Schaper, Sandi Schaper's husband. "I have suspicions that they have made deals behind my back."

Or, once they've run their course selling shrubs and flowers, dozens of local nursery owners could conspire to stack the town council and change zoning, resident Dave DeMarois said.

Resident Bill Louda was flat-out against incorporation at the outset. He changed his mind about a year ago, after watching the county commission bless project after project. The approvals made him feel vulnerable. Incorporation, he said, seemed the only way to ensure some control. Or, as the saying goes, to be left alone. 

Eustis races focus on downtown, growth policies

Challengers want to save open space, but incumbents call issue complex

Martin E. Comas
Sentinel Staff Writer

October 9, 2006

EUSTIS -- Planning for the city's future growth and revitalizing the downtown district are the top issues among the five candidates vying for two City Commission seats.

Incumbents Frank Royce and Gwendolyn Manning are seeking re-election in the Nov. 7 election.

Royce, aiming for a second full four-year term, is being challenged by Scott Ales, a political newcomer who owns several businesses, and Robert Scott Wilson, a retired business owner who lost a bid for a commission seat two years ago. Manning, bidding for a fourth term, is trying to fend off first-time candidate Karen LeHeup-Smith.

The contests are nonpartisan. Commissioners serve at large and earn $5,400 a year. The mayor, who is appointed by the commission every year, gets an extra $1,000. The new term begins Jan. 4.

Seat 1 candidate Ales, 44, said it's important for Eustis to plan for growth and make sure new neighborhoods are carefully designed. When he moved to Eustis in 1995, the city had about 13,780 residents. Today, more than 17,760 people live in the city, and the population is expected to continue to swell.

"We get only one chance to do this right," Ales said. "They [new subdivisions] have to reflect the character that has been here for years."

One of his main points is that the city should require at least 40 percent of new residential developments outside downtown be open space. That would not include lakes, wetlands or private yards. The city now requires developers to set aside at least 25 percent of the land for conservation or for nature trails and public parks.

For almost two years, Eustis has been trying to define open space. The issue began in March 2005, when a developer proposed building Meadow Walk, a community of about 300 homes on 132 acres near the northwest corner of County Road 44A and Estes Road. Residents said that many homes on that much land would spoil the rural character of the area.

Soon afterward, Ales became part of a group of residents that hired a consulting firm to review the city's land-development regulations.

Ales said he talked to hundreds of residents who felt that city staff and commissioners often are unresponsive when they voice their concerns about proposed developments.

"That bothers me," he said.

Regarding the downtown district, Ales said the City Commission should do as much as possible to lure more businesses including shops, restaurants and condominiums.