Neighbors complain after a county employee bought the site of a stormwater drainage project he was overseeing, then sold it at a profit.
By TIM GRANT
Published April 11, 2004
FOREST HILLS - Michael Hubbard saw a good deal.
His employer, the Hillsborough County government, was about to lay stormwater pipe for a flood-control project on a swampy piece of land.
What a nice spot to build a home, Hubbard thought. So, a year ago, he bought the waterfront lot on Noreast Lake Drive for $23,500.
He had to be careful. As design project engineer for the stormwater project, he had to avoid the appearance that he was profiting from a county job.
Now some neighboring homeowners are saying Hubbard did just that.
"We paid double what Mike Hubbard bought it for after the county did the work to fill it in," said Angela Allen, whose mother, Gail Carmody, is in the process of purchasing the land from Hubbard for $51,500.
What's more, neighbors such as Tina Johnson had long believed the vacant lot was an unbuildable wetland.
"It was always under water during the rainy season," Johnson said.
In response to the neighbors' complaints, the county's Human Resources Department launched an investigation that was inconclusive. But the county attorney wants the Consumer Protection officers to continue investigating.
"We felt we needed more facts to reach a conclusion," said James Lynch, a senior assistant county attorney.
Did Hubbard misuse his position by filling in a wetland and then making money from it?
Hubbard insists he did not.
Technically, he says, the overgrown lot on the bank of Pine Pond was not a wetland.
He acknowledges it was his job to coordinate engineering consultants to design the project. He had to be on site inspecting the progress and helping to solve problems.
But he said he was careful not to let his property ownership influence any aspect of the project, "especially not to my benefit. I wanted to be careful that, because I did own it, I wouldn't create the perception that I was benefiting."
Neighbors say that, over several months last summer, a county-paid contractor cleared the vacant lot of its thick brush and piled mounds of dirt on the property.
Hubbard said it was necessary to clear away the vegetation to lay the stormwater pipes, and that no fill dirt was added to elevate the property.
"A pile of dirt was put on the property, but it was removed," he said. "That property was used as a staging area."
Hubbard said he decided to buy the property before the work began after he contacted its owner to obtain a county easement for the stormwater pipes.
He said Ken Gibbs, a real estate agent for CCC Grove Inc., granted the county easement because he felt the project would make that property suitable for his company to build a home there.
Hubbard said he can't remember if he called Gibbs or if Gibbs called him later to say CCC Grove had changed its mind about putting a house on the lot. He said Gibbs asked him whether he knew of a potential buyer.
Hubbard said he contacted three neighbors next to that lot and gave them Gibbs' telephone number. When none of those neighbors expressed an interest in buying the lot, Hubbard said he decided to buy it himself.
"I started looking at it," Hubbard said. "It was a nice piece of property with big oaks and the way they were situated, you wouldn't have to remove them to build a house."
Hubbard said after he bought the land, one neighbor contacted him numerous times wanting to buy the lot. But at the time, he had a contract with Millennium Homes to buy the lot for $51,500.
When Millennium Homes did not close on the property, Hubbard said he contacted another neighbor, Gail Carmody, who had expressed an earlier interest in buying the property.
Carmody, who lives next to the vacant lot, said she had no interest in building a home there.
"We bought it so that nothing will be built there," she said. "We're hoping it will grow back the way it was and filter this lake system the way Mother Nature intended it to be."
