Public comment by citizens
What the county recorded
This item is not from the published agenda
It is a stretch of the recording that this archive identified as a separate matter — a call to order, a recess, or something taken up that the agenda does not list. There is no official title, no staff recommendation and no disposition, because the county never recorded one. Everything below is inferred.
The source document
The county’s agenda for Board of County Commissioners, Mar 26, 2024
The published PDF. Its text could not be extracted — it is an image-only scan — so nothing in it is searchable here, but it reads normally.
The county’s minutes for Board of County Commissioners, Mar 26, 2024
The published PDF, as served by the county. This item is one entry in it.
What was said
Machine transcription of 11m of recording, with speaker names inferred from voice matching. 53% of 51 lines carry a name. It shows what was said, not what was decided, and both the words and the names can be wrong.
And for the two commissioners not here, they've had illnesses, so maybe they're excused. Now is the time for public comment. Citizens are given an opportunity to comment on any current or future agenda item coming before the board or on other business under the board's purview. Today's public comment will be handled as follows. First, we will take public comment from those who are here in person. Then we will take public comment for those who have pre-registered for a WebEx link and are currently on queue. We request that when you address the board, comments are not directed personally at a commissioner or team member, but rather are directed
at the issues. This provides mutual respect between the board members and the public. After stating a name and address for the clerk, a three-minute timer will be activated. After two minutes, a single beep will indicate you have one minute left. When your time is up, two beeps will sound and you should close your comments. WebEx participants will be disconnected automatically when their time is up. Mr. Clerk, I know we have a few people signed up. I know uh tax collector Mike Fassano is here. Mr. Fassano, rejecting forward.
Good morning, Mr. Chairman Members. Thank you. Just be a couple of minutes this morning. Uh there's something on the consent agenda that will allow us to purchase a piece of property. It's now been platted, if you will. Just a few people I'd like to thank for making this happen. Um boy, it's it's what your staff has to deal with is amazing, and I learned a lot through this whole process, but people like Yeah. Uh Ratke, I'm sorry, uh Lisa Kroll, uh Bill Williams, uh Kelly Bernard,
and I'm not sure if you're Uh Dennis Wobble, Matt Matt Cook. um very, very helpful in making this come to fruition. Special thank you to our uh uh county attorney, uh Mr. Steinsnyder and his staff. Along with two people that you have in your uh on your staff. Uh Denise Hernandez. And and Heather Wolf. Heather і was just Has been extremely helpful in helping us find this piece of property and uh hopefully we'll be able to close now in about 45 days and then shortly
after that uh start building our our Angeline office. So thank you so very much. God bless you.
Thank you very
much.
Appreciate
it. That's your consent. Twenty-nine. Okay. Tax collectors.
Uh Linda Martell.
If you would please give your address for the record, please.
My name is Linda Martell. I'm at [address removed].
Um, good morning. Um I have started a petition on Change.org against the plan to build a restaurant at Anclote River Park. We have over 5,300 signatures that are opposed to this restaurant. This should be making a difference because it should be about what the people want and not about money. Not only would this disrupt sacred land, but also nature, with taking down our trees and disturb marine life, Dolphins and manatees swim through the river on a daily basis, and I have been a regular th at the park
for many years. Lots of people I've talked to are unaware of the restaurant plan in the first place. When I pass out flyers and talk to the locals, the sadness, disappointment, and anger is overwhelming. I wish you could see the looks on their faces when I tell them the restaurant plan, because then maybe you would find it in your heart to do what's best for Anclo Park. We like our peaceful and relaxing park after a hard day at work, and it should remain the way it is. I bought my home in nineteen ninety eight, and Anclo Anclo Park is the main reason I bought my house. If
you want to make changes to the park, our bathrooms and changing rooms could use updating, also new picnic tables, benches, and nice landscaping to add even more beauty to the park. If there are fights happening at the boat ramp now, what do you think will happen with the restaurant that serves alcohol? Since there are more people living in holiday area, crime rates have gone up. What we really need are more deputies, along with better roads in our neighborhoods. A restaurant taking up three thousand square feet is not what we need and is still unacceptable. We
are happy with the food trucks and prefer helping the small business owners. We also have Miss Vicky's restaurant located right next door to the park. It's not fear that uh we have about this restaurant, it's frustration because we want what's best for Anclo Park. Thank you for your time.
Linda, before you go, we we generally don't respond to public comment, but this is a very big issue within 5,000 petitions. I know Commissioner Starkey probably would add something to that.
Yeah, um, so we've done a new um park plan. Um no one no one here wanted to see a 40,000 square foot anything. Uh-huh. Um and so I'm very pleased with all the trees that will be saved and the new design. And if you go out here into my office you can get a copy of the new design and we'll be having a meeting The seventeenth, fifteenth. Okay. Uh out at Holiday Wreck to talk about it.
Okay, good.
Thank you. Thanks.
Next question. David Cruz.
Your address for the record, please. [address removed].
Thank you.
Good morning. I have a prepared statement that I'd like to read. My parents moved here to Port Pasco County, Port Ritchie in nineteen seventy seven. At that time, my dad's retirement, living in New York and staying in their home in New York would have put them $400 a month in the hole. Moving here, my parents would not be in debt. They purchased [address removed], the first house in the neighborhood. My father was the s second youngest of seventeen brothers and sisters, which all chose to move in the Tampa Bay area, with the exception of two that
stayed in New York. They stayed here and mostly stayed to themselves except for family. I stayed in New York, volunteering in fire rescue on Long Island. Every year coming to visit my parents, I had a chance to watch the n other homes being built in the area and the changes that happened here in Pasco County. I never saw myself moving here. As a matter of fact I moved moved further north to New Hampshire, working as a police officer in Conway. I stayed deeply involved in volunteering in fire and rescue and with the Red Cross and in
Disaster Services and Training. In two thousand five my mother uh with missed medical care and treatment, developed cancer and died at eighty three. Uh this was during the time of Katrina hit New Orleans. My dad at ninety was left on his own. and started thinking of where he was going to live. He still was driving, which wasn't a very s very smart thing to do or safely. When it warmed up I would bring him to New Hampshire from April to the end of September. This continued
until 2009. His home here in New Port Richey was broken into. Because of my past training w we knew to back out of the house and The Sheriff's Office was able to get a good set of prints which tied the individual that broke into the house to forty-five other home break-ins. Uh th the individual spent seven years in prison. The decision was made I had to move here. My mom died after sixty-four years of marriage to my father, and my dad wanted to die here also to
be with her. This meant I had to give up a lot. I was deputy director of emergency management working for Raymond Ambulance. I had to short sale my house in New Hampshire to move here to Pasco County. My dad wanted to make the home better for the two of us. He put up a better fence and a shed at the end of a driveway on the Robo Way side of the home. This was put uh as a gate to the backyard, having both door doors on both sides of the shed, making it a pass through. My dad wanted to make things better. Unfortunately due to poor medical
care, Shortly after moving here Damit cracking his hip, he became septic and died on December fifth of the same year. Over the next year, according to the will, the property was left to my sister and I and we had to split it. At this time the property values were at their lowest here in Pasco County. Uh my sister had to obtain a lawyer and it took a year for the two of us to settle And then during this time I had to obtain a job. To get on with my my life. So I also wanted to kin continue
in volunteering.
Um I know you got a problem wi with your house and the fence and also um Roy
Actually Pat Patrick
is right back
there and I called him about this yesterday.
Okay. Okay. So Pat, would you raise your hand and he'll meet you in the back? Yeah. Thank you.
So we've got to wrap it up. I'll talk to them. Thank you very much. I appreciate it. And I hope I can stay in my house. All right. Thank you.
Jacqueline Thackeray.
Hello. My name's Jacqueline Thackeray, [address removed]. And I have a letter, which is my thirst third letter in the last five months or so regarding.
Second.
Thank you.
All in favor say aye.
Aye.
In this regards our roads which are determined to be class A, which we thought did not know until recently. and uh they have not been paved in forty years and our particular road is Bush Lane. is a hill downward to the north, uh that yeah, I know that makes sense, uh that seems to uh be crumbling more than some of the rest. There
are other places also that are in distress. There are homes that are being threatened by the water that comes surging down that road every time it rains. And there is a very big dip in that road, as well as a drainage site in the road behind us. So there are issues that need to be looked at as well. We did get an appraisal before we knew we were class A, and we have Someone willing to do some of this maintenance and
it was significant money that we thought we were going to expend ourselves. I have been a taxpayer for twenty years, we've resided there for that long, and we visited for four years prior. uh intermittently. So I just wanted you aware of our situation. This is my third letter. I got no responses from the first two, so I wanted to make sure you received it. And I thank you for your time and please reference this to the appropriate department
with some attention. Thank you.
Thank you. Before you go, Brainford, would you mind spending some a few minutes with her and just kind of review? Thank you.
Uh that concludes those that have signed up, uh Mr. Chairman.
Okay. Anyone on WebEx?
None on WebEx.
Mm. Address the board. Okay.