Disputes fester at county border

Growth that binds Hillsborough and Pasco also divides.

By BILL COATS and CHUIN-WEI YAP, Times Staff Writers
Published September 4, 2007

ADVERTISEMENT [Times photo: Mike Pease] Aerial of County Line Road with Pasco in the top showing wall-to-wall homes and Hillsborough County with lots of green space. Hillsborough, in a nod to rural preservationists, considers most of Lutz and Keystone as part of Hillsborough's rural frontier. A few feet across the county line is Pasco's urban frontier, the swath of Pasco closest to Tampa.

LAND O'LAKES - For Jim Edwards, 1984 wasn't just a time of big hair and cold war.

That was also when Edwards, then a 33-year-old highway planner for Pasco County, worked on a $2-million project to link Livingston Road and Bruce B. Downs Boulevard.

It was called County Line Road. Officials said it was a product of two counties' cooperation. Hillsborough and Pasco split the tab.

But today, those 5 miles, along with nearly every other intersection on the county line, have become a theater of angry words and political postures.

For the two counties, it's a squabble line in the sand, where one county's rural frontier head-butts another's urban belt. Where politicians in one county threaten tollbooths to make the other county pay.

Edwards, now a road planner for planning consultants WilsonMiller, remembers a calmer time. "The pressure wasn't there," he said. "It was just technical person to technical person. It wouldn't escalate to elected officials."

Growth changed everything.

In the last 15 years, central Pasco County exploded from rural to suburban, sending more than 30,000 commuters a day into Hillsborough, plus occasional plagues of dump trucks. Pasco's total population nearly doubled.

Border disputes have erupted. A Pasco Super Target takes shape across the line from a rural-style Hillsborough neighborhood. A pair of New Tampa roads line up perfectly, ready to carry thousands of cars, yet barricades separate them at the county line. Hillsborough argues for $28-million to handle future cars from Pasco. Pasco's response: $0.

"We love our siblings, but every once in awhile we have a squabble or two," said state Sen. Victor Crist, whose district straddles the county line. "At the end of the day, we sit down at the table and break bread together."

Dueling visions

Some fundamental stuff has sparked many of the skirmishes along the county line.

For one, the counties apply nearly opposite visions to nearby regions. Hillsborough, in a nod to rural preservationists, considers most of Lutz and Keystone as part of Hillsborough's rural frontier. A few feet across the county line is Pasco's urban frontier, the swath of Pasco closest to Tampa.

The dueling visions explain the SuperTarget in Lutz, and Pasco's plans to four-lane Gunn Highway to the Hillsborough line in Odessa, where Hillsborough dictates Gunn will stay two lanes.

In New Tampa, the counties' busy suburban development styles are more compatible. Differences focus sharply on traffic.

The 2000 census found that commuters flowing into Hillsborough from Pasco each morning outnumbered people going in the opposite direction 5-to-1. That ratio has probably shrunk since 2000, as more jobs have sprouted in Pasco.

But so far, it has helped fill Hillsborough's roads with Pasco's taxpayers.

The state bankrolled most of the road widening as Pasco swelled with bedroom communities. Since 1995, the Florida Department of Transportation built the Suncoast Parkway and widened N Dale Mabry Highway, U.S. 41 and Interstate 275.

But Bruce B. Downs Boulevard is Hillsborough's headache. The county is planning to widen the northern half of Bruce B. Downs, reimbursed by the state for only $40-million of the $130-million cost. Which is why Hillsborough, with a smirk, is talking tollbooths posted at the county line.

The battleground

Leaders in both counties say relations are good.

Generally.

"I'd say it's been above average, to tell you the truth, over the years," said Bob Hunter, executive director of Hillsborough's planning commission.

"Things are immeasurably better now," said former state Sen. Jim Sebesta of St. Petersburg, who has a ringside seat for some of the wrangling as chairman of the Senate Transportation Committee. "Most of the leaders realize they must work together."

Pasco County Administrator John Gallagher praises Pat Bean, his Hillsborough counterpart, as "a great person." Jim Norman, the Hillsborough commission chairman, calls Gallagher and his staff "extreme professionals."

Norman notes that Hillsborough and Pasco have a long-standing agreement to solicit each other's opinion on any development proposed within a mile of the county line.

But is it sincere?

On March 7, 2005, Hillsborough received Pasco's packet about the proposed SuperTarget in Lutz. The deadline for response was three days later. Hillsborough replied, four days late, that the SuperTarget would be wholly incompatible with that part of Hillsborough. The store is scheduled to open next month.

Hillsborough retiree Bob Urban has viewed the Target property through his living room window for 33 years.

"I figured some day we'd have some decent homes over there, not commercial junk," he said. Pasco officials "don't really give a damn about us, because we're across the road."

The latest battleground is Wiregrass Ranch, Pasco's biggest development ever. A mall and 12,500 homes will feed cars onto Bruce B. Downs at State Road 56.

On July 17, things were already tense between Pasco and Wiregrass developers when Bob Campbell, a top Hillsborough transportation planner, asked for $28-million.

Pasco and Wiregrass were fighting over internal roads in the development. Resolving that could open Pasco to $89-million in future costs. Not resolving it could have stopped Wiregrass and started lawsuits. It was the last day in more than a month of meetings filled with public clashes and private entreaties.

Then Campbell stood up to argue that Wiregrass traffic would completely fill the extra four lanes Hillsborough plans to add to Bruce B. Downs. Pasco commissioners, staff and Wiregrass' attorney turned on him. Campbell left empty-handed.

Since then, Hillsborough has asked the state to stop Wiregrass, which could lead to an administrative hearing.

Hillsborough's other response drew laughs. Commissioner Ken Hagan invoked tollbooths on Bruce B. Downs.

"I'm not suggesting we do it, but I'd like to know if it's legally possible," said Hagan, who represents north Hillsborough on the commission. His colleagues voted 5-2 to find out.

Those in government may use guarded language.

Not Dennis Smith of Meadow Pointe.

If tollbooths go up, get ready for signs that say, "Hell no, Hillsborough." Smith said he's going to lead a Pasco boycott of Hillsborough businesses.

Keeping peace

Norman suggested that the Tampa Bay Regional Planning Council, which reviewed Wiregrass, should have done more to keep peace between the two counties, though officials there said it's up to the counties to devise solutions.

Hunter, of the Hillsborough planning commission, said other solutions could prevent such standoffs. Hillsborough could levy a payroll tax on people who work there but live elsewhere, he said. The state could authorize an impact fee that one county could levy on a development across a county line, he said. And the state could create a system of binding arbitration between counties with major disputes.

"I wouldn't mind going down that road," Norman, said of the arbitration idea. But he said the two counties can -- and do -- work together.

"We need to have a good coming together as much as possible on those borders," Norman said.

[Last modified September 3, 2007, 21:53:30]