Print

Email story

Comment

Email editor

Guest Column

20 minutes could have resolved issues

By WINSTON PERRY
Published January 22, 2007

Editor's note: The following is addressed to the members of the City of Inverness City Council and is being reprinted at the author's request.

I have recently been made aware of some blatantly erroneous information presented to you by the city manager at a recent City Council meeting relating to my involvement with the building of the new City Hall project. I would like to present to you the true facts of what really transpired during that time period for you to consider.

In July 2004 during the final design and permitting stages of the new city hall project, I had some major concerns with the project which I felt were relevant, and wished to discuss with the city manager, since he was spearheading this project

In July and August 2004 on at least four occasions I made a telephone call to the City Hall switchboard stating my desire to discuss these concerns with the city manager, and I received absolutely no response to my requests.

I then hand delivered a written request addressed to the city manager requesting a meeting and, again, I received no response. I then sent a registered letter to the city manager, which was signed for as being received, with again no response from anyone.

As a major taxpayer in the city of Inverness I have a legitimate right to request a meeting with any city official to discuss any concerns that affect me as a substantial city taxpayer, but with all this being said, to date I have never received any return telephone calls from the city manager's office.

If nothing else, common courtesy demands some sort of response from a city employee. In hindsight, a simple 20 minute meeting with the city manager would have most likely resolved all of my issues.

Therefore when I received absolutely no response to my numerous requests for a meeting regarding my concerns with the ongoing downtown untreated stormwater runoff situation, which I felt was critically important to the health and well-being of the Tsala Apopka chain of lakes, I was left with no other option than to approach the Southwest Florida Water Management District with my concerns.

You may recall in April 2000 the city purchased a $150,000 Soil Decontamination Air Water Separator Cleansing System, and then paid to have it installed at the back of the Bank of Inverness building. This expensive Groundwater Remediation System was installed to clean up the contaminated groundwater caused by some leaking underground gasoline tanks at the old Amoco gas station where the Bank of Inverness parking lot is now.

Eight wells were installed around the site, one of which was in place below the building foundation footprint planned for the new City Hall. An environmental company by the name of Handex of Florida had been continuously monitoring the cleansing effect of the system to make sure that any storm water runoff generated in and around that whole area would not add any contamination to the already untreated storm water runoff system presently in place on North Pine Avenue, which in turn runs directly into Little Lake Henderson.

Due to the vast increase of impermeable surface created by the enlarged footprint of the New City Hall, and the greatly enlarged adjacent parking lot, during any major rainstorm there was a very real chance that this increased and untreated storm water runoff could co-mingle with the contaminated ground water and either poison the water in Little Lake Henderson, and/or flow over to the government annex or adjacent properties and flow directly into the Tsala Apopka chain of lakes, poisoning that whole lake system.

If this wasn't a recipe for a potential environmental disaster on a major scale, I don't know what was.

With this in mind, and with no response from my repeated requests to discuss my concerns with City Hall, I approached Swiftmud to bring this to their attention, so that they could address this issue in depth before issuing a permit for the project. This caused a slight holdup during the very important permitting process for the project.

In hindsight, I find it interesting to note that on Jan. 29 through Feb. 2 this year a large trailer will be placed in the Bank of Inverness parking lot to test the groundwater for sub-surface contamination to make sure that this contamination really has been removed from the soil.

I would have thought that this would have been determined, resolved and/or finalized prior to the City Hall project being built on this particular site.

It makes you wonder what's really going on.

As for council member John Sullivan's repeated and ridiculously mean-spirited and hateful accusations that I am, "an enemy of the city," I can only consider the source.

If I really wanted to be an enemy of the city, I would terminate all of the leases with all of the tenants that I have on the Historic Courthouse Square, and close and board up over 50 percent of the storefronts on the square. I do not plan to do that, even if that is what Mr. Sullivan and/or City Manager Frank DiGiovanni seem to want.

This is "the honest to goodness real story" of what truthfully transpired regarding my involvement related to the new City Hall project. Anything else is just smoke and mirrors.

Winston Perry of Homosassa is a business owner in downtown Inverness. Guest columnists write their views on subjects of their choice, which do not necessarily reflect those of this newspaper.

[Last modified January 22, 2007, 01:04:05]