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Anonymous call puts brakes on condo builder

By ANNE LINDBERG
Published January 21, 2007

Citing environmental concerns, Seminole building officials ordered a construction company to stop work at the site of the former Women's Hospital.

The stop-work order will remain in effect until the contractor gets a permit to grade and clear the property at 9575 Seminole Blvd.

The city also wants an official statement from Pinellas County and the Southwest Florida Water Management District, or Swiftmud, that there are no environmental violations occurring.

City officials had been concerned that the contractor might have destroyed protected vegetation and/or dumped dirt or other construction debris onto protected wetlands without permission.

As of Friday afternoon, Swiftmud saw no reason to cite the owner, according to Michael Molligan, the group's spokesman.

A Swiftmud investigator visited the property Friday and found no violations, Molligan said. However, the agency is considering sending owner Enterprise II of Florida LLC a letter about best practices.

Richard A. Robertson, agent for Enterprise II of Florida LLC, did not return calls asking for comment. Harold D. Robertson, manager of Enterprise II, could not be reached for comment.

Officials were alerted to the possibility of problems at the site Wednesday when an anonymous caller contacted Pinellas County to report an "excavation of dirt from former Lake Seminole Hospital property into Lake Seminole. She observed work at night - workers are dumping dirt into Lake Seminole."

Kelli Levy, the environmental program director for the county's watershed management division, had an investigator visit the site.

A worker on the property told Levy that the contractor had taken out "aquatic vegetation," was crushing concrete on the land and was bushhogging the property.

Because the land in question is in Seminole, Levy contacted the city and passed along the information to the county's water and navigation authority.

Mark Ely, Seminole's community development director, visited the property with the city's code enforcement officer. They took pictures and placed the stop-work order on the gates. The order cited several potential problems, including dirty streets, lack of silt screens to protect the lake from debris and fill falling in, and the lack of a permit for grading. Enterprise had permission to remove some cattails and other vegetation, but it was unclear if other, protected plants had been removed.

Ely said it was also impossible to tell, on first glance, if the debris had been removed from the property as required by the city's demolition permit or had simply been spread around.

Ely said he would contact Swiftmud and county officials to make sure they had no problems with the work site.

Once cleared by those agencies, Enterprise will have to get a grading and clearing permit from Seminole to start work again.

County records show that Enterprise plans to build condominiums on the property.

[Last modified January 20, 2007, 23:03:20]