Public comment Oakes Park MSBU and Philly Lane flooding
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, Sep 15, 2021
The published PDF, as served by the county. This item is one entry in it.
The county’s agenda for Board of County Commissioners, Sep 15, 2021
The published PDF, as served by the county. This item is one entry in it.
The county’s minutes for Board of County Commissioners, Sep 15, 2021
The published PDF, as served by the county. This item is one entry in it.
The county’s minutes for Board of County Commissioners, Sep 15, 2021
The published PDF, as served by the county. This item is one entry in it.
What was said
Machine transcription of 27m of recording, with speaker names inferred from voice matching. 92% of 110 lines carry a name. It shows what was said, not what was decided, and both the words and the names can be wrong.
Now is the time for public comment. Citizens are given an opportunity to comment on any item coming before the board on And on the items to be in the future board agenda. or other other business other under their preview. 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 from those who have pre-registered on WebEx Link
and are currently on queue. This format does not waive the request that when you address the board, comments are not directed personally against a commissioner or a team member, but rather to the issues and is to provide and this provides mutual respect between the board members and the public. For WebEx and in-person participants, after stating your name and address for the clerk,
the timer will be activated and will start a countdown. After two minutes, a beep will sound letting you know that only one minute remains. After your time is up, two beeps will sound indicating that three minutes have passed and you should end your comments. WebEx participants will be disconnected automatically when their time is up. The following people have signed up to speak in public comment.
Um the first person's like
Go ahead.
The first person signed up is Pastor Troy Peterson. Please state your name and address for the record and then begin your comments.
Hallelujah. Troy Peterson, [address removed].
Thank
you. Thank you. First off, I want to thank all the commissioners and the staff for serving our community. Thank you, Nikki, for the Pledge of Allegiance, and I'm a veteran and I'm all about that and for the invitation. I'm also on the Board of Directors for the Continuum of Care for the Pasco County Homeless Coalition. I'd like to thank you, Commissioner Mirriano, for opening that door through giving me words of
wisdom and advice, which opened the door with Marcy from Community Development. And I'm also part of a group of pastors called Somebody Cares International and Commissioner Fitzpatrick thank you so much for coming to the Somebody Cares Tampa Bay Agala. We had a great time. She was able to see really what our mission is is to pray for our governing authorities and to
be ready for every good and perfect work. The backpack giveaways. We do have the CareFest coming up. I want to invite you all to that. That's September 25th, where we we take on projects in the community as the Body of Christ, working together with our governing authorities. We're doing this in Waterfront Park, your district there, Commissioner Mariano, working with the city of Port Ridge. And we have 19 projects
through Elderly, Nutrition, and Code Enforcement that we'll be going out to go and take care of. And so we want to invite you to that. That if you would like to adopt a POP project, maybe through your office or through your church or whatever you want to do, just get with me. Make that available to you. Also, the Word of God says in Colossians 1:3, we give thanks to God, the
Father of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, praying for you. And so I want you to know that there is a group of pastors in this region that are praying specifically two days a week. Tuesday morning and at noon, I got a Be at another prayer meeting. We're praying for you. We're praying for God's wisdom to rest upon you. We're praying for favor with your families. We're praying. The other thing is, I would like to present to you. The opportunity
to pray, to do the invitate invoc before the commissioners' meetings. Because, you know, yes, we pray to our Creator, but the only way that God is going to honor our prayers if they line up with the Word of God. And the Word of God says in John 14, now this is Jesus speaking to his disciples. He says, Let not your hearts Be troubled. Ye believe in God, believe also in me. Jesus said unto him, I am the way, the truth, and
the life. No man may come to the Father but through me. See, we do not have access to go to a holy God, the Creator, without going through Jesus Christ. He made that way for us. He is the way, the truth, and the truth. And the life and nobody come to the Father but through the Son. And so what I would propose to do is that I will hit it up. I'd be willing to come and pray before all your commissioners meeting. If I can't personally
be here to do that, I would pick and assign one, uh, a pastor or a leader in a community that I have a relationship with, that I trust. Is gonna pray according to the Word of God. Thank you. I present that to you. I appreciate your time in this matter.
Thank you for your time. Yes, sir.
Uh the next person signed up is uh Marlita Marty Lester uh Lester.
Good morning commissioners and all others present. Uh I come before you this morning.
State your name and address with the clerk.
Okay. My name is Marlita Lasseter. I go by Marty in my neighborhood. And I live at [address removed] Which is adjacent to the Oakes Park. on Amazon Drive. Um first of all, uh to give you a little history. An M S B U was signed uh Creating this park back in twenty fourteen at the June twenty
fourth, uh commission meeting. And we have not had that uh assessment implemented and there was some concern recently about the Property being considered for development. And I can tell you that My neighborhood and all the neighborhoods surrounding that piece of property would be severely impacted if that happened. Um I have the
history and also from my subdivision which is not uh an HOA. I have 134 signatures. that are in favor of that particular uh part being enacted and the tax assessment being filed.
Could I have a motion to receive and file, please? Second.
We could bring that bring that up here. Uh
We got a motion to say it. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Motion passed.
There is also a letter there from Jan Menfordi from um one of the HOAs she was not able to attend. Um the other concern I'd like to address is the fact that we do have severe flooding in our area. Um We have a main drainage right-of-the-runs behind my property and I have submitted copies of the um flooding to um Christina Fitzpatrick and uh been in touch with her
aide on that as well. And we have A lot of standing water in our neighborhood and If we if we were to
what does that mean like I think it's readable. If we were to um include the uh development of that area it would it would impact us all. And I appreciate your time and consideration.
Okay. Thank you for your comments. Next person.
It's so funny. The next person signed up is Robert Mitchell.
And then the um next person after um Mr. Mitchell is uh Tanya Slayer.
Thanks for making
it.
My name's Robert Mitchell. I live at [address removed]. I've lived there for 31 years and I don't plan on wanting a 285 unit going five blocks down the street from me. There's only two ways into that development, through Heritage Lake and Riverside Village. Right now, the people that come that exit the River Chase
subdivision go south through our exit now. And also now if you're gonna put that development in the back where it was already
The Oakes Park had an MSU on June 24, 2014, which you guys, some of you that are are still on the board, was finalized under Ordinance 1410, which created that park. And you were opposed to assessment for everybody for 135 hours for 15 years. We never fall through it. It's still sitting there. And we want it to fall through. There's
no way that there that traffic, you figure 285 units, that's at least 400 cars. Everybody's got two cars now, every family. going out in one street, which has been torn up twice from trucks and everything for being building in River Chase and Southern Oaks behind us. We're not the only ones that are affected by this. Heritage Lake is affected by it. River Village Estates was also
affected by it. And Southern Oaks. So we would like for you to continue with your plans in 2014 and not build that or that department complex. I'm sorry, I'm sorry.
Okay. Thank you, sir.
Tanya Slayer and after uh Miss Sla uh Sawyer, sorry, um is John Russell.
Hi, I'm Tanya Salier. I live at [address removed]. Um I'm back to address the flooding which has only gotten worse. This isn't the first, second, or even third time I've asked you guys for help, and I'm asking on behalf of our entire community. As of this morning, and I do intend to send all of you the pictures, as of this morning, Philly Lane is currently under about two feet of water. Our property is flooding massively.
On April 9th, 2020, I was told, and I have this in writing from one of the representatives, one of the engineers that was out there, while we're awaiting the results of the aforementioned watershed study, which will take five years. We stand ready to deploy a pumping system when and if the need arises. Then on April 28th, I was told we will be monitoring the situation and investigating. We will continue to monitor the monitor the water levels on and around Silly
Lane. If the levels, along with the forecast, become threatening, we will execute the pumping option. April or excuse me, August 5th. After repeated attempts, I finally received an answer stating we wouldn't consider cut um pumping until it's above 15. The water meter that you guys put in is above 15.5. It has been above 15.5 for a month. It is very, very close. If not, I couldn't check it today because I would have to go through mud and water
in order to do it. We can't even drive our cars out of our driveway. Um The gauge has been up there for over a month. I've been repeatedly asking, I've been repeatedly emailing. We ask for the same considerations that you give other developments, the ones surrounding Yellow Lake and on Yellow Lake Drive. I have friends over there. I've spoken to them. I want to know why the county was ready and willing to pump out there as soon as
their backyards flooded. And we received nothing.
I know that these communities attack uh contacted you guys ahead of time. I know you guys started pumping ahead of time. It's the same thing that we want. I've heard every possible excuse. I have a list of them actually, and some of them are are pretty funny if you guys want a good laugh. We've lived there for 40 years. This is the second time in that 40 years and in the last two years that this has happened. We started communicating with you guys back in April of
2019 asking for help. We're given promises, we're given assurances. and nothing has come of it so far. Now we did have a meeting um on Meridian Boulevard, but that was about Meridian Boulevard. um which is also a private road. Uh the outcome of that meeting is still kind of up in the air. Um, we don't want anything special. We just want what you're giving other communities and what you promised us. Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Um somebody may know the answer. I remember um when the the surrounding areas around Bass Lake is in that area. I think I don't know if that was Commissioner Mariano's or Fitzpatrick back in Wells's district. Okay. Um there was a pump there was a pump out there and there was one a pump that was out of one of the neighborhoods um that you worked on, Commissioner Mariano, that you eventually got a fix to it, I remember. Yeah. Um and there was a pump out there on a on a regular basis. Is is that a possibility at this location to at least make the roads
passable into the meantime?
Well I tell you, I'm gonna bring up one item on Meridian oh on the committee reports on Philly Lane. Um matter of fact if this lady wants to do it, I've got an old not the person who's volunteers only be a petition leader. I think if we take that road up and two feet might be the number to raise it up, put a coup coverts going through. At least the road's passable, but again it's gonna take a paving assessment to go forward from that point. uh it should alleviate. It's a bottom of a base and it's tough to go through. They are studying it and I hate to say it does take time to study these things. Don Carey is was out there with
me. Fig was out there as well. So they are looking at the area. It's going to take time to come up with a solution, Mr. Chairman, as you said on SwiftMid, you know. So it is going to be worked on. It is at the bottom of the hill. When I first was elected they used to pump up the hill and would come back down the hill. Um so I think the the first fix is to raise that road up a couple of feet, do a paving on it so at least you can s at least the road's passable. Um We can look to do a whole paving assessment for the whole neighborhood and do everything together too. So I plan to come back out there,
but again today's and my committee reports we're gonna look at at least fixing uh meridian and if you'll be one of the willing to lead this, please talk with uh Um I see Mr. Carbell is very easy, won't be here until later on, but if we get your name information, et cetera, we can reach out to you and if you want to be a petition leader as well to kind of get the neighborhood, I'd be happy to come out to the church that's out there or spoke there before and we can talk about what we think we can do out there at least now while the study's being done.
I just wondered if there's a way to pump now.
Don't carry the pump and address that?
Okay.
Let's have somebody do some do some work on that. Do you want to bring Don because Don't Philip? Let's look at that and when we get to our uh comments from each of the individuals and then we'll discuss it at that time. Okay. So give us some information and you reach out and find out some of that for us. Ms. Fitzpatrick, you have something you want to comment on?
I confirm, no mind. Okay.
We'll just point. All right. Uh next individual.
Oh, that's what we're doing with people.
John Russell, followed by Tim Gremwaltz. I
didn't see why so.
Name and
address. My name is John Russell. Live in [address removed]. It's in Heritage Lake community. And first time I've been to one of your meetings. So I didn't get too nervous. I just I'm gonna read what I want to say.
Don't worry about it, but
basically I'm on the Oak's Park M SPU. Um my wife and I have lived in District 4 for over seven years and for the last two years we've lived in Heritage Lake.
We know that uh there are approximately 1,600 residences that live within one-half mile radius of the Oaks Park. And those 1600 residents likely represent over 3,000 voters. And a majority of these voters are senior citizens. And the vast majority of those voters live on fixed incomes. I have personally attended five recent meetings of various HOA boards and committees. Wherein all attendees were asked to raise their hands if they supported the
MSBU. Each time there was a hundred percent. Raising of hands in support of this MSBU.
The um I have a few questions that kind of remained unanswered. The property is named the Oakes Park. There were promises made that this property is a park and will remain a park. If that is true, why is this property still zoned 5MF multifamily? Second question I would have is why hasn't this agreement been implemented? Why this six, seven-year delay in implementing this? Third
question relates to another claim made by county officials regarding the environmental concerns for this property. The property will remain a preserve forever, and the county will never sell it. Yes, I know that verbal claims are only worth the paper they're not written on. Has the board, has the board, as the legal owners of this property, ever considered setting it aside under your own E Lamp program?
This property is indeed a sensitive cypress swamp combined with a unique upland environment containing dozens of species of mammals, birds, and reptiles. There are at least five endangered or threatened species living there, and many photos and videos are in our possession to confirm these. My wife and I really want this sensitive property left alone and protected by law. Mm. And if for whatever reason you cannot make this happen We do strongly support our Commissioner, Christina
Fitzpatrick, and urge the Commission to move forward with the implementation of this MSPU. Thank you. Thank you
for your comments.
Um Mr. Chairman Mariano Mr. Files because um you know we're getting these comments this morning, do you think it would be okay if you explain just what you guys are doing so they have uh just a little information and Um let them know what's coming.
Yeah, we're working up the various options either for the MSBU or whether we ask
you have to go back to the microphone you can't
We're working up the various options for what various levels of park MSV would MSVU would look like from a cost perspective. Because this is not the type of park the county owns and operates. We do district parks or larger regional parks. Uh we also will as part of that will look at you know if if the county was more inclined to sell the property cons of what that would look like too. So we were working up those various options and we'll be contacting
homeowners associations and working through the the the various coolings that are part of the current MSB.
Right, so so each HOA is um gonna be getting a letter fairly soon and um and then w there'll be more discussion on it. So nothing's happening. Uh And Yeah. I don't you don't want to go any deeper into that. Okay. Well we'll we'll go into the ultimately
the board will have to take some action to do something.
Yeah, yeah. I mean something's gonna happen. It's just y'all will be included in that decision. And information is coming to you because some of the things that have been said here are not um not quite What's going on?
So I just don't don't worry. Okay.
Next individual.
Yeah.
Whoops. Okay. I would like to speak on this topic because last time I did mention I would like to move forward and I was going to receive letters from each of the five boards and I do have in my hand and also they presented it this morning From Riverside Village Estates Homeowners Association, Mer Miriam Butler for the president, they have stated they do want to move forward with the MSBU. Another community
in there has signed with 134 signatures that they want to continue to move forward with the MSBU. It was my understanding last time we were just going in to confirm to receive a letter from each of the HOAs so we can move forward in this process. Because I did attend the board meeting that Mr. John Russell had spoken of, one of them, and there was 100%, there was five HOAs that were there present that evening that wanted to move forward with the MSBU that was originally
set up in 2014.
Okay. Mr. Chairman Mariano. And I and I think if
you
don't forget
there's the public hearing,
I was gonna say I I think if she wants to talk about it more, we should talk about it more on under committee reports coming up. Right. But I think with the people there if they want to hang in for that that'd be great. But I think it should be done quickly as we finish the individuals.
Next individual, Tom Grimwaltz, and then followed by Bill Gillies.
Good morning. My name is Tim Gromlovitz. I live at [address removed]. And I just want to state that our community in Heritage Lake and 942 homes is 100% behind moving forward with the MSBU. I was on the committee in 2012 through 2014 when this whole issue was hashed out. I mean there was a there was all of the issues were covered and uh the conclusion was that the MSBU was the best
for this uh community. So I just want to state that uh our community and everyone I know around the entire area is in favor of moving forward with the MSBU and thank you, Ms. Fitzpatrick, for the support.
Okay. Thank you.
Very sure.
Uh Bill Gillies is the next up, followed by Penelope Russell. And that is the last person I have signed up, is Ms. Russell.
My name is William Gillis. I live at [address removed]. That's Riverside Village Estates known as Riverside No. 4. Riverside Village No. 4. I headed up in 2012, a group called 5533. We spent two years hashing over this particular piece of property and came up with a resolution thanks to Ms.
Starkey. It was signed by Mr. Mariano. And all the commissioners voted on it then. Why I'm back here I don't know. You guys made promises if you want us to stop being cynical about government. Keep your promises. This was settled in 2014. I shouldn't have to drive from Newport Ritchie back over here to
restate our case. I don't know what happened to this. M S B U and the interim. It says ordinance 1410, but then when I look it up on uh The Pasco County website here, it's uh supplement history table. It says omitted. I don't know what that process is, what your process is. But what whatever
it is, you need to get it moving. We're not going down this road again, I can promise you that. I've already been in contact with our attorney. And It's the same attorney that we had in 2014. He knows the history. Two of you sitting on this panel right now know the history.
Let the rest of 'em know and let's get this settled. We shouldn't have to do this. Community is not
That's enough. So thank you.
All right, the last person signed up, Penelope Russell.
Well we are also [address removed]. Um I think everything I wanted to say has already been said, so I don't want to waste anyone's time. I would like to personally thank and first time I've met uh Commissioner Fitzpatrick. I know she's been actively involved in attempting to resolve this in a manner and I Must say it feels as though it's genuine. And I will end as the last gentleman said. I think I'm enough said already. Do something.
All right, thank you. Is anyone else here to speak to any item at this public comment period? Anyone on Wad Bags?
No one's on WebA, so
Okay, so at this time uh we will close the public comment portion of the meeting and we'll move on to uh resolution one.