Many homeowners in the Bay Arbor neighborhood thought the trees behind their homes were a preserve. It was a utility's right of way.
By MEGAN SCOTT
Published July 16, 2003
OLDSMAR - Carl and Jennifer Newcomb were sold on the four-bedroom, two-story home on Arbor Woods Circle when they saw the woods behind it.
The tall trees and underbrush provided a buffer between the Bay Arbor neighborhood and the Gardens of Forest Lakes condominiums. The area was home to rabbits, alligators, frogs, wild boar and deer.
So when the couple came home last week and found that their backyard forest had been cleared to a swamp, they felt cheated.
"It was a shock to come home and have no warning and find a field in our back yard," said Jennifer Newcomb, 29, who moved in last year. "It's what sold a lot of us on the homes we bought. It was private. It was beautiful."
But Newcomb quickly learned that the forest behind her home wasn't part of a preserve. It is a Progress Energy 100-foot-wide right of way for power lines that carry high-voltage electricity. There are about 15 homes that back up to the woods.
During a flyover two weeks ago, company officials noticed that some of the trees in the right of way were so tall they touched the transmission line. The 5.7-mile transmission line runs from Bay Arbor to a substation on Tampa Road.
"It was very densely overgrown from the substation all the way to the corridor," said John Pinney, senior forester for the Suncoast region of Progress Energy. "It can be dangerous, which is why we took immediate action to clean up the area."
The razing appalled Sandra and Thomas Texley, who said they paid a $1,000 premium for their lot because of what they thought was a preserve. The couple moved to Bay Arbor four years ago and said no one told them the brush would one day be cleared.
Sandra Texley used to sit outside and watch the rabbits hop through the grass. Now she is looking at a field of mud and branches through a green wire fence. She can also see the construction workers at the Gardens of Forest Lakes.
"It's really upsetting the way the whole thing was done," said Sandra Texley, 52. "Animals have lost their homes now. It's horrible."
Pinney said the company usually does a flyover every three years to determine if a cutting is necessary. The transmission line has been there since the 1950s and the woods have been cleared before, he said.
Still, Oldsmar Mayor Jerry Beverland said Progress Energy officials should have warned city officials and residents they were going to clear the right of way.
"They had the right to go in there; now did they have to take everything down?" Beverland said. "No, they didn't. What's more important than anything, they didn't come and talk to anyone."
Pinney said residents weren't notified because of the "nature and immediacy of what was there." The underbrush was so thick that a 4-by-4 could not drive through there in case of an emergency, he said.
Maybe so, but Cheryl Abiaad said the company didn't have to cut down every tree.
Abiaad paid a premium to have a house on the woods. She used to weed her garden in her bathing suit and sit in her lanai. Now it makes her sick to go out back.
"I keep my drapes closed," she said. "I don't want to go into my lanai. I'm just accustomed to having my privacy. I'm sick to my stomach."
Some residents are also complaining about the sewage smell and the increase in snakes. Susan Kubler said her husband killed two water moccasins last week. Pinney said neither the snakes nor the smell are the direct result of the clearing.
Pinney said residents can plant other material on their side of the property, such as certain species of oleanders, crepe myrtles and wax myrtles. Those plants don't grow tall enough to be a problem for the wires, he said.
That is no consolation though for the residents who say they were duped into thinking the "preserve" in back of their homes would be preserved.
"It was a very private tree line that was back there," said Elizabeth Loomis. "They've left us nothing."
