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In town's turmoil, opinions run deep

By ANDREW SKERRITT
Published June 25, 2006

After I drove 90 miles north to Yankeetown last week, I stopped to ask for directions to Town Hall. Folks suggested I turn around. Town Hall was the last place I wanted to go, they said. On my way there, though, I couldn't miss the "Save Yankeetown" signs on the front lawns and utility poles.

As I walked into Town Hall on Wednesday afternoon, one of the few remaining municipal employees was hanging a framed picture of radar maps of the four hurricanes - Charley, Frances, Jeanne and Ivan - that struck Florida in 2004.

If that picture were more current, it would have shown Yankeetown in the path of all that trouble.

Minutes later, as I sat in the tiny office talking to Mayor Joanne Johannesson, two Florida Department of Law Enforcement agents walked in and asked to interview two of the other people in the office. Hours earlier, word had spread quickly that the FDLE had launched a full scale investigation into the town's affairs.

This is the new normal in once quiet Yankeetown, where the town's handling of a developer's proposal to build a hotel and condos along the Withlacoochee River has pitted neighbor against neighbor, those who see growth as progress against those who favor the status quo.

The thin veneer of civility that used to reign in this waterfront Levy County community has cracked. In its place is a lot of anger and frustration. Rumors and accusations abound.

As one person said, Yankeetown needs a good chiropractor for all the people who have strained their necks trying to avoid looking at their neighbors.

In many places in the news, locals are media shy. Not in Yankeetown. You stop by the public library, the Yankeetown General Store or the point where folks launch their boats, and everyone has an opinion on what's wrong in this town of charming Florida Cracker cottages and old moss laden trees.

This town west of U.S 19 is the setting of a real Florida drama that seems perfect for television: arrogant we'll-build-whatever-we-want developers, secret negotiations, pliant town officials, neighborly animosity and a state investigation.

You spice up the development battle with threatening phone calls, resigning town employees and council members, lawsuits, a mayor recall petition drive, town documents being shredded on a Sunday afternoon, Dumpster diving FDLE agents, and the mayor's stolen garbage, and you have a real page turner. A local Web site has almost hourly updates of the plot.

The biggest question is this: If the hotel and condo are built and new residents move in, will the animus that has dominated this town fade? Even at this stage, will tempers cool if the developers take their hefty checkbooks and their blueprints and sail off into the Gulf of Mexico?

Some folks don't think so.

"Some people are going to put their homes up for sale after this is done," said Lee Parker, a friend of the mayor who was volunteering at Town Hall on Wednesday.

Some feel bitterly betrayed by those who were seduced to sell their property to wealthy developers. Others think that the town charter and local codes are out of date and can't cope with the demands of modern development. They see this controversy as an opportunity for real progress.

To appreciate the passion of folks in Yankeetown, it helps to visit the place. The biggest tourist attraction is the now closed Izaak Walton Restaurant and Lodge, the property where the development is proposed. The only place to fill up is at the Yankeetown General Store, with its 1950s era gas pumps and the best fried chicken around.

Sometimes, the place makes you feel like you're in the middle of nowhere 30 years ago.

No wonder some are fighting so hard to keep Yankeetown that way.

Andrew Skerritt can be reached at 813 909-4602 or toll-free at 1-800-333-7505, ext. 4602. His e-mail address is askerritt@sptimes.com.

[Last modified June 25, 2006, 04:02:43]