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Parkway planning to pop into gear

Long-stalled by a lawsuit, review of a Suncoast extension will proceed with greater public participation and published notices.

By JUSTIN GEORGE
Published April 25, 2005

After stalling out last summer, planning for the possible $200-million Suncoast Parkway extension through Citrus County can now move ahead.

The Florida Department of Transportation and two tollway opponents reached an agreement last week to make the planning process more transparent and increase opportunities for residents to comment on the possible extension.

Florida's Turnpike Enterprise, a DOT division, is studying whether the existing tollway, which stretches between Tampa and U.S. 98 near the Hernando-Citrus county line, should be extended north and connect to U.S. 19 near the Citrus-Levy county border.

The review has been at a standstill, partly because of the lawsuit Citrus County property owners Bobby Roscow and Teddi Bierly filed in 2003 against DOT.

They claimed the state DOT shouldn't have barred the public from a series of meetings with an entity known as the Environmental Resource Regulatory Agency Group, which included representatives from several state and federal agencies.

Circuit Judge Janet Ferris ruled that the closed meetings violated the state's Sunshine Law. When Roscow and Bierly demanded that all plans on the project revert to where they were before ERRAG met, the state challenged the motion.

The state contended that it could hold a meeting where the public could be told about what took place during the ERRAG sessions.

The judge recommended mediation. Those sessions resulted in last week's agreement, in which the state agreed to:

--Host a public ERRAG meeting, which will be advertised in quarter-page advertisements in the Citrus County Chronicle , Citrus Times , and on the state's parkway extension Web site (http://www.suncoastparkway2.com) Officials will inform the public about ERRAG and the mediation agreement reached.

--Provide similar public notices in newspapers and on the Web site that would explain each government agency's role, responsibility and conclusions or analysis in regards to Suncoast Parkway planning. State officials also would post a written, in-depth explanation of what they had already done and post them on the Web site.

--Present these same explanations at future ERRAG meetings in Citrus County.

--Wait 45 days at the conclusion of the presentations before beginning any further action on Suncoast Parkway extension planning to allow each state agency to respond to public comments about presentations.

--Pay the entire cost of mediation services and Roscow and Bierly's attorney fees at an hourly rate of $50.

Roscow and Bierly declined to comment until a judge signed the agreement, Roscow said. Joanne Hurley, Florida's Turnpike Enterprise's spokeswoman, declined to comment, too.

--Justin George can be reached at 352 860-7309 or jgeorge@sptimes.com

[Last modified April 25, 2005, 01:04:14]