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Have you heard the rumor that Six Flags is going to build a theme park in Hernando County?
Have you also heard that the new Six Flags park may take over Weeki Wachee Springs, pumping vast stores of Six Flags money into the park and reviving it to its former glory?
The St. Petersburg Times has conducted an exhaustive investigation into this subject. (I must have consumed at least two cups of coffee while making phone calls to everybody I could think of who would know if this were true.) And here are the comprehensive results of the aforementioned inquiry.
Phooey.
It simply isn't true. Spread the word. Tell everyone you see. Six Flags is not coming. Six Flags isn't taking over Weeki Wachee. From what I have been able to tell, Six Flags may not even know we exist. They don't answer their phone.
Tell the rumormongers that anyone who gets caught spreading this lie will be punished severely - locked in jail or forced to attend Spring Hill Fire Rescue Commission meetings.
If you think this is some casual rumor that I give unwarranted attention to by addressing it in this forum, think again.
My editor heard the rumor from a restaurant server in Tampa. Property Appraiser Alvin Mazourek gets asked about it in restaurants. Real estate broker Buddy Selph heard it from a guy at a rental truck business, who heard it from a friend, whose third cousin has a sister who knows the secretary at the law firm where the secret papers were drawn up.
I have had heard it myself from friends who mentioned it in casual conversation over dessert, from anonymous callers. I seem to recall even hearing it at a church Bible study.
I'm waiting for my almost 5-year-old daughter to ask me about the Six Flags rumor, because this is a rumor with legs. It is a vigorous, insidious, growing thing that is not unlike kudzu, potato vines and County Commission candidates.
John Athanason, the marketing director at Weeki Wachee Springs, said he has never heard from Six Flags. He says the attraction's lease is not for sale, and business is as normal as it can get women don fishtails and dive 30 feet deep into into 70-degree water.
Athanason hears the rumor a lot, but then that is nothing new. In fact, he recalls hearing that Weeki Wachee was going to be purchased by Six Flags when he worked at Silver Springs in Ocala - a decade ago.
The rumor has lain dormant for about five years. But it resurfaced a couple of months ago, Athanason said, and has been making the rounds ever since.
"It's completely false. I've heard that rumor going back maybe 10 years," he said. "There is no truth to it, and I don't believe it only because it has been around for so long."
Swiftmud, also known as the Southwest Florida Water Management District, owns the property that the Weeki Wachee Springs attraction leases and would have to sign off on a sale to Six Flags.
And Swiftmud says there is nothing to the rumor. They've never talked to anyone from Six Flags. But they, too, have been hearing the rumor.
In many ways, the Six Flags/Weeki Wachee rumor is absurd. The mermaids live on a tiny little 27-acre property. The large tracts of nearby land that might be big enough to host a theme park are government-owned and set aside for preservation.
For that reason, one of my editors suggested that a new theme park planted in or near Weeki Wachee would only have room for two flags, not six.
In fact, there are only three tracts of privately owned land left in the entire county with more than 1,000 acres. Two of them are near Interstate 75.
People in the county Planning Department, who hear early on when folks are interested in doing big things, say there is no basis for the Six Flags rumor. Same goes for the people who issue commercial building permits in the county Development Department.
So everyone repeat after me:
Six Flags is not coming to Hernando County.
Six Flags is not taking over Weeki Wachee.
I will not spread rumors about Six Flags.
I will make fun of and scold people who do.
Now, on to other business.Have you heard that Paris Hilton plans to build a retirement home in Masaryktown?
Robert King can be reached at 352 848-1432 or rking@sptimes.com