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Plan for Cracker-style community met with resistence
By JAMES THORNER, Times Staff Writer
LAND O'LAKES -- Plans to create a Florida Cracker style community in the heart of Land O'Lakes got a hostile reception from property owners who would have to conform to the plan. At a meeting Tuesday night that drew about 50 people, merchants complained that the plan, which could dictate architectural standards in central Land O'Lakes, would deprive them of freedom to develop their property as they would like. The most vocal person was Jerry Cirasuolo, who owns a used car lot on U.S. 41. Cirasuolo argued that the free market, not Pasco County planners, should dictate the appearance of the community. "Am I the only one here?" Cirasuolo asked others around him at the meeting in a plea for support. "No," shouted a crowd of like thinkers around him. "I just want to make sure I'm not the only air bag," Cirasuolo said. The plan, the product of two years of community meetings, would require homes and businesses in a still undefined heart of Land O'Lakes to adhere to standards such as metal roofs, front porches, columns and shade trees. Drawings of what some of the buildings in a future Land O'Lakes might look like drew the ire of Yvonne Henley, owner of a styling salon on U.S. 41. "Crackers didn't live in a house like this, honey," Henley told the planners running the meeting from the Tampa Bay Regional Planning Council. "They lived in shotgun houses." The complaints brought County Commissioner Pat Mulieri to her feet in an attempt to sooth emotions. "I feel a great deal of hostility in this room," Mulieri announced before proceeding to push her vision of a Land O'Lakes that doesn't look cluttered like west Pasco. Planners assured the crowd that property owners wouldn't have to meet every architectural standard. They would have to meet only a minimal number to abide by the proposed rules. Existing buildings would be grandfathered. "Nobody's going to jam this down anybody's throat," Mulieri said. The opposition seemed to surprise Brad Arthur, one of the leading proponents of new standards for Land O'Lakes. He has spent two years trying to craft a homier style for Land O'Lakes in the face of fast suburbanization. The main part of the plan is to create a town center on lakefront property somewhere near Bell Lake and School roads. Arthur accused opponents of coming in after two years and trying to "usurp" the process. Residents have until Friday to add to or criticize the proposed standards. After that, the plan goes to county commissioners, who could incorporate it into the county's comprehensive land-use plan by next fall. Not if Henley can help it. "It's our community," she told the planners Tuesday. "It's not Johnny-come-lately's."
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From the Times |
