Mining Operating Permit and Conditional Use Amendment Request (Regular) – K&M Mine Expansion – Mining Operating Permit and Conditional Use Permit Amendment for an Existing Sand and Limerock Mine with No Blasting in A-C Agricultural and AR-1 Agricultural-Residential Zoning Districts- Northwest Pasco County, on the South Side of County Line Road Approximately 3,200 Feet West of the Suncoast, Containing Approximately 149.80 Acres. File Number PDE25-CU06
What the county recorded
Staff recommendation
Approval with Conditions
No disposition in the minutes
The approved minutes do not say what became of this item. That is a gap in the record, not a decision. It is the normal state for 24% of items. Most of those are regular business and board reports that the minutes do not dispose of in writing. This archive never infers an outcome from the fact that someone called a vote.
The source document
The county’s agenda for Planning Commission, Nov 21, 2024
The published PDF, as served by the county. This item is one entry in it.
The county’s minutes for Planning Commission, Nov 21, 2024
The published PDF, as served by the county. This item is one entry in it.
What was said
Machine transcription of 36m of recording, with speaker names inferred from voice matching. 71% of 195 lines carry a name. It shows what was said, not what was decided, and both the words and the names can be wrong.
P seven. E seven.
Clark.
Good afternoon, Chairman, Members of the Plan Commission, Commissioner Yeah. The virtual visit reply and development department here for uh P7. It's uh mining operating permit and conditional use amendment requests. Okay, and then mine expansion. This is a mining operating permit and a conditional use permit amendment to an existing Uh sand and lime rock mine with no blasting in AC agricultural and AR1 agricultural
residential dis uh zoning districts. Uh the north west Uh Pasco County on the south side of the county line road approximately Three thousand two hundred feet west of the Sun Coast, contain about a hundred and forty-nine point eight acres. Uh would you like to see a presentation?
Yes.
Okay.
Uh
Was that a maybe or was that a yes? Maybe
I'm not sure. We're having some technical difficulties right now, but we'll pull up the PowerPoint in the in a moment.
So in the meantime there is uh Scribbner's error that we identified On condition number thirty eight. Uh it should read Conditions um i i it should it should reference conditions fifty six and fifty seven, not fifty four and fifty-five. And I believe
What do you think?
Thanks.
We have also received some expertise communications uh from some commissioners, uh planning commission and also uh I believe uh BCC commissioners, so those will be eh part of the record. They're not part of the paquet. Uh in civic clerk. So the expertise will be forwarded to the clerk's office.
So Can we just hold up one second? The Chair has told me that he's gonna have to recuse himself on this one. So before we take any motions to receive and file, if we can just get the chair to hand the gavel to Mr. Gerardi to handle the rest of this item.
Yeah, you
learned.
have to do it.
Just get it back. You already need to take a break.
Okay.
So we're
back on the presentation. So I I but you probably need to take a motion to receive and file this information. Love.
Some Motion to receive and file is there a second? Yeah.
Yes,
second.
Motion and a second to receive and file. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Opposed. Motion carries.
Thank you.
Um
so this is
So we have uh item P7, PDE twenty-five, uh CU06, which is the operating permit and conditional use amendment. Request for K M Pasco. Uh we have the proposal for the conditional use amendment and the operating permit. This is future land use REST one, zoning AC and AR. The applicant is requesting amending the uh current conditional use permit PDD twenty-two CU01
in the name of K and M Pasco 130 Holdings LLC and the mining operating permit. Uh again this is on the south side of the County Line Road. Uh it says here approximately sixty eight hundred feet west of the Sun Coast Parkway. So it it depends how you look at because the the mine uh land does extend on the southern uh on on the boundary of the the mine cell, but the actual entrance road is farther to the west. And and I'll can show
you that. Uh again the site location is in the northwest portion of the county. Uh and and and there it is. Um is this the pointer right here? Yes.
So as you can see there's the there's the mine right there. Uh i if you measure from here to here it's a lot closer than if you measure from the uh actual entrance. Uh so that's that's where the discrepancy is. Uh there's the song codes right here. Uh there's a county line road. And that's where we're at. Uh here's the aerial. And the request also includes for adding uh this portion which
is the the HAMO property This is this is part of this uh amendment to add that portion of land right here, uh which is uh wooded. And this is the existing mine with a conditional use permit. There's again there's the entrance uh on on this parcel right here and there's county line road.
And the future land use Uh res uh res one. And the Sonning uh this is the Soning uh portion of it is uh A C and a portion is A R.
So this uh project is uh requesting Adding the twenty acre on the western end of the Soya property mine, which is again the Hamlock parcel. Create a hundred foot buffer on the Hamlock parcel and remove the four hundred feet setback that was previously required along the existing mine. Modify the allowable quantities of excavated material which shall not exceed five. Uh Five point four million approximately cubic yards
of sand and Approximately fourteen point uh three is fourteen point four million cubic yards of limestone. Do I do I need to say the the full numbers or or am I okay with that? No, would you uh and uh this is accumulated for all previous and this proposed conditional use requests. Also, they are uh planning to excavate to a death of uh minus negative one hundred feet NAV D eighty eight. And extend
the terms of the mine until december thirty-first, twenty fifteen. And update the site development plans to reflect the same and update the conditions of approval uh approval to reflect uh the same. Oops, I think I'm back. All right. This is the concept plan. Again, this is the existing uh portion. And uh this is the new Hamlo. Ham Hammel property. Being added? And
with that, uh the recommend approval of the conditional use amendment and the operating permit as re requested uh from the Plan Commission and the Plan Economic Growth Department.
Thank you, Roberto. Thank you, Roberto. Um Mr. Chairman and Planning Commission David Engels. Planning and Economic Development Director. I just wanted to al alert you that staff went out and they they performed an on-site inspection of the mine. took detailed photographs and analysis of the surrounding land use and potential impacts. And this is a wet mind, so The the typical dust and vibration that you would normally associate with a mine was not evident during operations. Thank you.
Thank
you, David. Roberto, you didn't
Yeah.
One more one more thing. One more thing before you comment. I apologize for that, sir. We we did receive a uh uh uh a person who had concern. Uh she sent like three different uh emails and she asked us to uh let her let let let the commission know. Uh Vicky Bryan Uh [address removed]. Uh she she was complaining about the uh vibrations, uh shaking my home
uh it seems like an airquake treatment. Here I already I'm a senior and oxygen can't move around much. I receive a letter that they want to dig deeper Then permitted. Please I called the Mine Pit in on County Line Road and two different times because they uh they was shaking my home vibrating like earthquake. Tremors, booth, uh times they had stopped. I can live in fear of uh to the unknown. If sink holes open up as well. I don't even know the committee one to Race
they own known as well. They won't give up. They need to buy an earthquake monitor put in my yard to provide it and their ex expense that my yard does not shake or vibrate like earth trimmers because it does. And I'm unable to go to the meeting. Can you forward my email who uh in charge so my concern be heard? Please help me. I enclose the pick of the letter. Thank you, Vicky Bayon Brian. uh a second email uh the same
person, uh similar issue. The manager came to my home today, have a nice he's a nice person, but I But it really don't stop the fear of me living next to mines. Every day is really scary to the unknown. If a sinkle opens up or even scary sinkle might open up, just uh walk in my yard. It takes it makes me feel sick mentally. Please uh put you in my spot and you I'm sure feel the same way as me. Please put this in consideration and not let an Span
uh dig uh dig uh dig deeper. Please let my voice be heard for consideration. The meeting is November twenty first at one thirty at the West Government Building. Thank you. Biggie Brian, uh [address removed]. And my address thank you. And the third communication. Similar. Hi, my name is Vicky Bryan. I live at [address removed]. I'm in Oxygen. I am not well. I have had a hard time going to the bathroom and
not able to make it uh to the meeting, please consider my statement. It is scary for me to live next to a mine. I'm scared of the gnome which affects me mentally. They had shook my home for a couple of days like earthquake tremors. uh and other times but times I call Pasco mines and they stop. I wore it just to walk In my yard is my yard going to open. And so uh shallow one swallow one of us. Please put yourself in my living situation as UB Scar too. I am as I
I am against the mind to expand And dig deeper. Uh for the fear of my family and Says the fear of the unknown, wondering what the mind had already done, Damage to the underground activities caused from then mining. There is so many land has not one living. Why can't they buy land? in one of those areas we are so we are on social security, we recently got a mortgage payoff. We don't want to sell co seed won't be enough and we don't want another mortgage payment.
Totally crazy, live here thirty years, I only for neighbor get hair up. Uh and do His neighbor doesn't even care as long as he makes these millions. Please take my email to the core hearings for consideration and allow my email to be heard. Thank you, Vicky Bryan. Uh with that said. Uh we wanna pay a side visit.
Before we leave that, um did she want us to her statement to be received and filed or just read?
Uh she just said um Take for consideration. Allow my email to be heard.
They're part of the agenda, right? Yeah, they're they're part of the agenda.
I didn't realize it was already in there. Okay.
Did you tell her that she could attend virtually? She said she couldn't attend because of her health concerns if she Was she aware that she could attend virtually?
I did not tell her that and I don't know that she was aware of that. But I did go and pay a visit with her and I told her that we were gonna Well
bring this up. When it goes to the board if she contacts you again, if you could just let her know that That's an option. for her to attend virtually. That's one of the reasons we have virtual Set up is somebody else a health condition. And they can't attend, they can attend virtually. Okay, we'll we'll do that.
If she's technologically able to
Uh again as we pay the site visit, uh the operation for K and M does not have a um uh does not have uh uh vibrate vi vibratory operations So uh we we talked to KM and they can expound more of what was what what happened uh at the time. Um so anyways, those that was the only comment, uh the negative comment that we received. Can you
Thank you. You didn't talk about the vision road and I was confused in reading the Memo about the Vision Road. Where is that?
So the vision road for this permit uh request will not be touched. It'll remain at the same location. And division road
It's uh it comes in on Rigsby Road, which is right here. Uh huh.
It goes north on the on their property, right? Just uh east of the Halmo property. Uh it goes back Uh actually uh
It goes back and then it goes up north.
So I g I
guess supposed to connect to Linden Road, right?
Yes. Yeah
but
Linden Drive. It does come up, make a jog, go through the mine and make a jog back.
We but let me pull up Pasco that way we can make sure that we uh
You I don't know that the what you're gonna see on Pasco Mapper is gonna follow the exact alignment you're seeing on the plan. But they do have the ability to on a vision road to modify the alignment within their side.
So that's gonna go to my question. Why can't we just route Division Road around the mine rather than through it?
Uh I will let the applicant uh Talk about that.
It just
It seems to me.
That even though it's a private mining operation. It's a public resource. We need the material. for the construction of the development projects we approve, new roadways. We need limrock. We need sand. And it just seems like we're wasting part of that property already to create a raised road bed and slopes all the way down.
when we could use that material You know, when this place is mined out, someone else is gonna wanna open another mine somewhere else, 'cause I don't see the demand for sand or limerock going anywhere any time soon, so why not maximize the use? I thought maybe if it was critical that the road go straight or something, but you're already showing me it goes and makes a turn, comes over here, makes a turn and comes back. Why not just turn it over to the edge of the property? and go around the mine so that we could
maximize the use of the mine. and get get all the materials out before we have You know, that that just extends the life of
the mine. I was under the impression it was going straight as well until I saw that. So
if it goes
north it just
gets to the Halmo parcel, but who'll let
Well that's why I couldn't tell when I looked at the plans how this was supposed to work.
I sorry, we can't see that from here.
And then uh
And then it yogs to the west.
Yeah, it's Yeah, it's it's on right there. It says ro roadway W.
Mr. Chairman, the uh county engineer is here and can address these questions. Yes. He's talking about.
Thanks, David.
Yeah, I see the dotted line.
It's highlighted in the L.
Yeah.
But that would tend to indicate that it would go along the western boundary of what you're calling is that the Halmo? Parcel
boundary.
What would stop it from going further west and then coming up and jogging back to the east? You already got a change in alignment east and west anyways, what would be the difference?
Did you want to go ahead and address that? Sure. Good afternoon, Nick Uren, uh County Engineer.
You're suggesting that the road should just travel along the southern and then western boundary of the proposed mining operation to its northwest corner and then come back east on the northern boundary? Yeah,
is there something that would stop us from doing that or
Candidly, the alignment that I've m that I've been presented with in our comp plan is a difficult alignment to construct for a through road in its current alignment. Um What we've chosen to do with this application is to say that the least amount of work needed at this point in time to evaluate alternatives is to just write the conditions to accommodate the future corridor as shown in the comp plan. I I think the applicant would be amenable to saying if we can come up with an alternative, the question operable
question Would be who is the we in that sentence. Well, okay. Because I don't want the applicant to say, Hey, I want to move a road and then I have to run around to do a route study for a road. I want to do that.
Would your department be a minimal to doing that?
It just is a good idea. Sure. Your question is, would a realigned quarter with additional ninety degree bends in it function similarly or provide a similar public purpose?
Probably yes.
Okay.
We already as you noted, we already have two ninety degree bends in the corridor. Right. And that's right. Your suggestion would be to add two more so that we could shift it further west. The I I want to make the caveat that the two ninety degree bends make the road a less than ideal corridor to construct and use already and adding more problems to it doesn't necessarily make it so substantially less useful. But it it does make it a little more complicated to construct.
Well does the county already have right away Like south of the mine for the Vision Road?
In other words, I'm seeing all these streets that go up and down north and south and they all look like they're spaced roughly equidistant apart. What would stop us from just moving the vision road over to the next block? Instead of the one that it's at. They all go to the same street to the south. And then you're back to two ninety
Instead of one. And to me it's a vision road. It'd be one thing if we'd gone out and bought an acquired right of way and or if there were plans that have been produced already. But it's not a good idea. And like I said, in my line of thinking, and that doesn't mean the rest of the board thinks like me But it just seems I'm just trying to figure out how can we just m This is a type of project that no matter where you put it there's always gonna be somebody that doesn't want it there, right? W uh if uh mines,
sewage treatment plants, landfills, these are things that society has needs for, but are not desirable to be in anybody's backyard anywhere. So they gotta be somewhere. So I'm trying to figure out how do we Get the best use. out of the property. and extend its life because eventually you're gonna have more of these that proliferate to which there will be objections. So why not try to maximize the use of the resource you have? But
So I we probably need to let the applicant speak to this. I don't know I think to them the big loss is probably just the the ability to mine wherever that road would be.
Well yes, but I mean it they really don't need to install any of that until they're done mining anyway. So I mean it to me the real loss to them is the loss of the ability to excavate where that road would be. So I don't know that Moving it. to the edge of the property It may help, I don't know. I mean,
the plan showed you'd be digging a pit and it'll have slopes and then you're gonna have this road. It's got slopes, so you're losing all of that area which could potentially be mined.
One slope instead of two.
Right. Yeah. To go around the p to go around the property. Like I said, I would understand if we already had purchased a corridor and there were the right of way was in place and there were plans, but right now it's a conceptual line on a piece of paper somewhere that It just doesn't seem and and and I know normally when we come in with MPUDs, the applicants give the right away for the Vision Road and they agree to construct portions of the Vision Road and
that's kind of the normal thing. But it just seems in this case it's Something that Inhibits the public benefit to the mine. And the public's benefit is that we have these materials available for our own local roadway. And the count the county's the one of the biggest purchasers of these materials. So I
Yeah, I but I still think we need to let the Apple go.
I just don't know if they're gonna be willing to move it again. So but let's let's
I have to move this down after Nick was speaking. Got me by a few inches. Clark Hobby, Hobby and Hobby PA 109, North Brest Street, Tampa, Florida, have been sworn. Uh just let me speak just generally first, just for a sec. Um so we've been operating this mine, uh my client Biat Collie and his partners for about ten years now. It was approved about fifteen years ago. And um we are I believe the only mine in the county that mines limestone and lime rock that
doesn't blast. And so I think as a result of that and some other good neighbor policies we've had, you really don't see a lot of citizen objection. Uh Mrs. Byron had concerns that I believe were caused entirely about um a couple of years ago, we had to resurface. Our paved drive coming in there, and they used a vibratory compactor. And I think it did some shaking a couple of days, and I think that's what got her worked up. But we have sound
and vibration experts here, and we can answer any questions about that, but I'm convinced that's not a real issue. As to the uh the the issue that Mr. Moody's raising, we We would, of course, love to have the Vision Road move to our western boundary instead of bisecting the mine. It really does inhibit the amount of volume we can extract from the mine, and it would make the mining process a lot more difficult. However, I did work this out with the county engineer
in advance, and I understand his concerns, and I'm willing to honor what we agreed to. I think what I would suggest is if maybe we add a condition to the approval subject to Nick's approval that would say something like. If the county through a route study or another approval of the county engineer determines that the road can be rerouted to the western boundary, we can modify our mining plan and our conditions of approval on a non-substantial staff-approved
basis. To move the Vision Road over to the western boundary. That would help us tremendously, and hopefully that would leave the county engineer with what he needs to make sure that the road could get built if it ever is built.
I want to try I mean we I shook hands with Nick, so I don't want to pull the rug out from under him, but it would help us tremendously to move the the the road if it's possible.
Yeah and that's
just the
way I see it too. Trying to get the maximum benefit out of something that I know is
It could be a very long time out before that vision road happens.
For the commissioners to be clear, I I think what we're suggesting is if someone were to do a study in the future that determined that an alternative alignment was as beneficial to the public transportation system, to the roadway network, as this corridor, then these folks would be allowed to utilize that alternative alignment once it is formally established through the proper channels. uh without having to go through a substantial administrative process to modify their approved plans. I I have no objection to that
Nick, what's the process to do such a study? A route study.
Well and that's where I started down the path of the the the important question is who's the we doing it? If the applicant really wanted to move the road, they could have done the route study for us, presented content for our consideration, and then we could have re have interacted with that content as a part of this application.
So
but I don't want to be placed in a position of having to do that study for them in response to a mining application.
I understand your position, but if they were to present you with a study, then that's something you would give consideration to?
Certainly.
Okay.
We we have criteria for about studies and if they wanted to perform a a study compliant with the criteria and submit that for our consideration, we would absolutely interact with them on that point.
That way you wouldn't be beholden to when the county would decide to do this route study if they ever decide to do it in the future. So if you feel like it helps your mining operation tremendously, then you can have the impetus to go and conduct that route study yourself.
That that would be great from our perspective. Again, you know, I I I I shook hands with Nick and I want to honor what his concerns were. And so as long as I'm doing that, but we have a a possibility to make a better mouse trap somewhere down the road, that would be great for our clients because we do know we lose a tremendous amount of volume leaving the road and the right-of-way. up against it. So we would love to have the possibility to do that. Other than that, we don't have an um I'm I know the Chairman hasn't
called for public uh comment, but if there aren't any other comments, I'll answer any questions you might have and I'm happy to step aside and ask if there are any other Comments from the public.
Anything else from up here?
Yeah.
Damian was
gonna ask.
Richard, go ahead.
Correct. No, no, there has not. And that's why so what happens in this scenario, it's more or less like a marker line on the map and it's not really set at this point.
So if there's ever actually going to be a vision road there, there's going to have to be right away acquired by the county at some point. So in my mind it's a fairly speculative road, but I also understand the purpose of the highway vision map is for the county to maintain its options in case these kinds of roads are needed over time.
So that answers the question of there is no timeline essentially for that for that road.
Not to my knowledge. I have not heard anything. The only thing I've heard that's occurring is I believe Hernando County is pursuing uh putting in a signal at Linden. That is a major intersection on the north side of County Line Road. There's no question
So just by way of background, I think our vision network that's adopting adopted in our climate plan I believe is based on a Build out plan of like twenty sixty or twenty sixty five?
Yeah, it's the LRTP twenty sixty-five plan. So what they what they do for for everyone's benefit is they take all of the potential entitlements that could be built out in the entire of the entirety of the county and they try to create a roadway network that could distribute all the trips. So There's a l probably a lot of roads that won't get built that are on the highway vision map over over a you know, intermediate period of time for sure.
Yeah,
we'd hate for it to hurt your mining operations off of something that might not materialize ever and if it does it might be thirty years down the road.
Well we'd we'd love to be able to work with Nick and his team and maybe do our own route study and if we can move it, that's great.
Is a separate condition required for that or they just have that right no matter what by the code?
Well I think I think I think
that's the right-of-way.
These conditions are so specific that I think we probably need uh to add a the type of condition I was talking about, Mr. Jordy, because right now they're very specifically telling me what the condition I have to leave along this particular location. So I think we probably do need the ability to have a non substantial modification approved at the staff level. um that would allow the the uh right of way and the uh That condition to be removed at the
western boundary. After conducting your own route study. Right.
Would would we need to draft that condition today with our approval or can that be something that develop before we approve the
staff and the applicant to draft it after this meeting? Like we did with the park condition earlier.
Very good.
Okay.
And Clark, just real quick, just to confirm for the record again. So Ms. Bryan's comments are regarding two different times. I'm looking at a letter. Specifically, so you're you're saying on the record that that was the vibrary com pin compactors that you're using?
That is my understanding from my client that that was solely a result of us resurfacing the entry road. And by the way, that where she lives is approximately eight hundred uh feet from the closest portion of the mine itself. And I don't think there's been any allegation that the actual mining activity caused any vibration or noise exceedances. We uh interestingly, we we
had
an update to our NORS study done and and Jeff Straw with Geosonics is here about that in case there were any questions, but we don't, even without any noise attenuation what through berming or trees or anything else, we don't exceed the daytime or nighttime levels. During daily operations during the day. So it we don't go over the noise levels. So
Has there been any vibration monitoring down on the north side of that?
I'm not aware that we've had like a perpetual monitoring up there. I think this was a one time event, and I understand it probably scared her. because those vibrators when they're when they're using uh them to compact roadway beds can you know be a little bit disconcerting. But we've been out to meet with her several times now. We have a good on-site mine manager and I'm confident it won't happen again.
Okay.
No, absolutely not. But I'm just saying just kind of to head off the head off the issue potentially in the in the
drag line operation. Yeah, I don't that's I don't know.
I don't believe the drag line's creating the
vibration. I I don't I don't see that happen. But it's a it is a drag line mine. Right.
Okay. All right. Thank you very much. Thank you. So can I ask Nick a another question? Sure.
Nick? He has a question for Nick, I think.
Question Has to do with the a route study when we're looking at a Ms. Clark referred to it a marker line. on a map. What level of information is needed to justify one route over another? How what are the like the considerations that go into that?
Generally speaking, you want to minimize adverse impacts and ensure that the selected alternative for the corridor meets the functional purpose of the corridor. So when If you know, we were we were just speaking on the side. If if the alternative alignments are completely contained within the mining operations boundary, but but relegated to its perimeter. And they get back to the alignment in our comp plan. without prior to going off site, then
that becomes a very simple answer. There's only one impact at par property. They like the alternative better. We find that the alternative is compliant with our expectations for the corridor. It gets to be a very easy yes. When the question starts to involve adjacent parcels and increasing impacts to some at while decreasing impacts to others, that's when we get into more stringent criteria for the evaluation of the impacts and the benefits of the alternatives.
Thank you, Nick. All right, is there anybody uh here to give public comment on this item?
Okay. Seeing none. Anything else from up here? More motion?
Um What item are we?
P seven? P seven? So I move approval of uh P seven with the condition uh modification to the condition that we discussed that would allow for the future study. Uh
Route study. And a non substantial modification. And a non substantial modification. Yeah. Correct. I would second that.
Wait, is a motion and a second. Any further discussion? All in favor?
Aye. Aye.
Opposed? Motion carries.
Oh, yeah. Very good.
And also I didn't vote either because it's not a residential project.
Because
he's not interested.
He doesn't think there's gonna be any kids coming out of the mine. I don't think so. Not mining any children. Even though they are digging them.
It's not gonna affect schools, huh?
And let the record reflect that I'm uh proudly handling this gavel back to Chairman Greg.
Mr. Chairman Mariano.
Take a five minute