Print

Email story

Comment

Email editor

County, this land is your land - until December

The county has until Dec. 19 to do something with 8 acres or return it to a developer.

By DAVID DeCAMP
Published October 7, 2006

TRINITY - For years a small plot in this fast-growing community has been set aside for a public purpose.

Just what it will be - that's taken almost 17 years to determine.

In that time, thousands of houses were built. A YMCA went up. Trinity College minted new minds.

But just across from the college on Welbilt Boulevard, 8 acres set aside for "public service" just built up weeds and brush. And the clock is ticking down to a Dec. 19 deadline for county government to use the land - or give it back to the developer, Adam Smith Enterprises of Tarpon Springs.

Right now, all that's gone up is a rusty chain, 109 links across a gap into the property. County Administrator John Gallagher said the land will become a neighborhood park before the December deadline.

While no equipment is there, the county has mowed and cleared brush, said Rick Buckman, county director of parks and recreation.

"You can guarantee there will be a public use on it and it won't be reverted," Gallagher said.

If it reverts, the property could be used for retail or office space, county long-range planner Matt Armstrong warned Assistant County Administrator Dan Johnson in a July e-mail.

"Thank you for your reminder," Johnson replied, noting "P&R" was proceeding as planned.

Dan Aldridge, vice president of Adam Smith Enterprises, did not return a call this week about his company's interest in the land.

The 1989 agreement creating Trinity promised the county would get the land, vaguely described for "public service." The developer had to give a 5-acre site and the county had to start using it within 10 years. But in 1993, the deadline was extended another seven years - till Dec. 19, 2006, to be exact.

Gallagher said the property is limited because the spread of wetlands leaves only 2½ usable acres. County officials could not say whether the tract should have had 5 usable acres, without a deep review of numerous development records and agreements, said Barbara Wilhite, chief deputy county attorney.

At first, the property was a proposed library site. Another time, the county offered it as a potential site for a post office, said Commissioner Ann Hildebrand, whose district includes Trinity.

She said the property was not set aside to "languish on a shelf."

"It was just something that happened," Hildebrand said.

[Last modified October 7, 2006, 06:40:38]