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Park still has obstacles to overcome

The groundbreaking for a Spring Hill park is this week, though more money must be raised and gopher tortoises must be taken care of.

By CHANDRA BROADWATER
Published July 31, 2006

SPRING HILL - Hernando County is getting closer to having a place for tail-wagging only.

But not everyone is happy about the county's first dog park, including a dog owner who lives across the street from the site.

And even though there is a ceremonial groundbreaking scheduled for Thursday, there are still obstacles to overcome, among them what to do about a dozen protected gopher turtles living on the site.

For two years, the Rotary Club of Spring Hill Central has raised money and community support for Rotary Centennial Park. The 8-acre park, which will include a 3-acre section for dogs only, will be at Landover Boulevard and Sandlor Street in Spring Hill.

After the groundbreaking, the club will post signs to give residents a glimpse of what's to come when the $400,000 park is finished.

The club hopes construction will begin on the first phase of the project, the dog park, this fall.

The canine area will be fenced off into three sections, so small, large, and guide and other therapy dogs will have their own places to roam.

The rest of Centennial Park will include a playground, two basketball courts, sand volleyball pits, walking trails and event pavilions.

"During the Rotary centennial year in 2005, all clubs wanted to do something extremely community-oriented," said Laurel Predmore, the Rotary Spring Hill Central park director. "So we came up with this and approached the county about it."

The site had been zoned for a park area since the Deltona Corp. began developing Spring Hill in the 1960s. Centennial will be the first park in the neighborhood, which is made up of apartment complexes and duplexes.

So far, the group has about $40,000, or a tenth of its goal, in hand. Among other donations, the total will include $20,000 from Rinker Materials, which gave $100,000 over a five-year period to the park.

Building contractor Dennis Ferrara, who is president of Black Rock Construction Services of Florida, has volunteered to oversee the project.

County commissioners have agreed to give $50,000 to the park, contingent on money raised and services donated. County staff members have also surveyed the land and drawn up site plans for the project. Once the park is built, it will be handed over to the county for maintenance.

"We're making sure that all the permits are in place and that everything that needs to be there when the park opens is there, even in phases," said Hernando parks director Pat Fagan. "There is a lot of work that goes into this. But the community out there is getting more and more involved."

But Sandlor Street resident Michele Page doesn't consider herself part of the dog park hoopla. And she has a dog.

Page, 40, lives in a duplex that she and her husband built with her mother, who lives in the other half of the building. Their home is across the street from where the park entrance is slated to go.

Since planning for the park began, Page and her family have shown up at community meetings asking what they could do to get the dog park out of the picture.

But they were told it was a "done deal."

"We are the ones going to be hearing the dogs bark and smelling the poop from everyone else's dogs in the county," Page said. "They've just pushed this park on the community. We're not all happy about it; in fact, we've been shut down."

Page prefers to let her black and white border collie, Pepper, roam in her fenced-in back yard. Even if there were a park, she wouldn't use it, she said. To her, the idea seems unnecessary.

"Don't get me wrong; I'm not against the park, just the dog park," she said. "And I love dogs. I'm an advocate for them. To me, this is like going against Christmas. But there is a tremendous liability in putting little children next to dogs."

And then there are the gopher tortoises. That's what Page says really upsets her.

While surveying the property, crews found about a dozen of the state-protected species with dens on the site.

Because the endangered animals can't be moved without a permit from the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission, the Rotary and the county have been trying to figure out what to do.

The tortoises could be relocated to wooded 50-foot buffer areas that will surround Centennial Park. But testing on the animals still has to be done, to make sure they don't carry diseases that can be spread to other tortoises.

If they are infected, the animals can't be relocated.

"As of now we just know how many there are and where the dens are located," said Predmore, the Rotary park director.

"We haven't applied for any permits from the state since we're still in the beginning stages of this."

Dealing with the tortoises could tack on anywhere from $10,000 to $50,000 to the park's cost and possibly delay construction.

The tortoises will stay in their current homes until everyone involved comes up with a good plan, Predmore said.

She added that much has been done to try to alleviate concerns of the community. That includes providing proper lighting and setting park hours to make sure the area stays safe.

The Rotary can also look into finding special receptacles for the dog portion of the park to address the waste problem.

"Everything that needed to be done has been done, or will be done, and the county is satisfied with having those issues resolved," Predmore said.

"It will be a true county park like any other."

Chandra Broadwater can be reached at cbroadwater@sptimes.com or (352) 848-1432.

[Last modified July 30, 2006, 21:58:58]