As a Petitioner in a case that was assigned to you late in the process; I feel it important to write to you regarding what it was like to be an objector to a government project and later the subject matter of this Administrative Law Hearing.
It all started innocently enough when I received a beautiful notice from the Army Corp. of Engineers in September 2006. It was nineteen pages long complete with maps and diagrams of a much need dredge project in Hernando Beach. Great I thought, we really need this, but where is the dredged material going to go? Certainly it was a logical question but the answer was conspicuously absent from the notice. After investigation I found that it was going on an empty lot on my street. My heart sank. I knew that the lot was the worst place in Hernando Beach to put a dredge spoil site. You can see my concerns in the Petition for Administrative Hearing. Later I found that there are a dozen or so county ordinances that the project would also violate.
I sent concerns to the Army Corp. right away and they sent them to Hernando County. I received no information from the County for seven months. The County was busy though. Staff filled the other residents of Hernando Beach with false and misleading information about the project through monthly meetings of the Hernando County Port Authority. They included claims that “wetlands have been carefully delineated and are not allowed to be impacted,” “we are merely using the site for TEMPORARY spoil disposal. The spoil will be pumped onto the site, allowed to dewater, & then be hauled away,” the Eagle Nest site is “the most economical site that we could possibly use” and “the property must be back to the way it was;” all of these statements and more were completely false.
In May of 2007 at the Hernando County Port Authority meeting several email messages 1a and 1b were read into the record. These emails served to “prime” the group for their participation in a Home Owners Association meeting the very next day. In those emails I am described as a selfish “complainer” and “disgruntled resident.” They asserted that my selfishness and audacity to ask questions would cause delay thus “jeopardize the project funding.” I attended that homeowners meeting the next day and was greeted by some very hostile people. Now I know why. Also in attendance were two County Commissioners and staff. Staff provided the same false information that they had been spreading all along.
Feeling that there was something wrong with the project, a group of neighbors and I decided to educate ourselves about dredging, investigate the project and other disposal options. We spent thousands of hours and thousands of dollars of our own money. In the next six months we came up with several dredge disposal options. Our alternatives were cost studied, shown to be less expensive than the County’s choice, would have taken less time to complete, and were neutral or good for the environment. We even offered to pay for the duel permitting of an alternate spoil site during a meeting with the Project Manager and our County Commissioner on October 31, 2007. The county rejected our offer. For the $9 m project our alternatives ranged in price from $4 m to $5.5 m. Hernando County refused for four years to do a simple cost study on spoil site options. It was perfectly clear after that Halloween meeting that we were never going to get honest service from our county government and it got worse.
Beginning in December 2007 lasting for about six weeks Hernando County pretended to change to another spoil site. After being discovered by the local newspaper 2, the county switched tactics claiming that they were bound by an easement agreement with the property owner to pursue the Eagle Nest site. At the same time that the County was making the easement claims, the easement was determined by the Florida Department of Environmental Protection (FDEP) to be invalid and required the County to redo it. Avoiding public scrutiny, our Public Works Director and the property owner signed an agreement to change the easement when FDEP finished its’ review process 3. Our county officials and attorneys continued to claim that the easement was binding 4 while staff agreed to change it. These tactics gave the County the six additional months needed to finish the FDEP review.
The Eagle Nest Petitioners officially formed at about this time. I am still in awe of the strength and fortitude that these homeowners demonstrated. They never wavered from what they knew was right and true. Despite the bullying, slander, misinformation, lost business, and insurmountable odds the Petitioners persevered. As you may already know, the County did finally do a cost study and officially found what we knew two years ago; the Eagle Nest spoil site is the most expensive option by $2.5 m 5. It is important to note that our County Commissioners were ready, willing, and able to waste $2.5 m of taxpayer money to use the Eagle Nest site. The Eagle Nest Petitioners along with a common-sense County Administrator saved that money.
Much of the rest you know or can see in the docket of our case. I hope that my letter gives you some insight into the abuse county governments can heap upon their own citizens long before a matter ever comes before you. Maybe if you have a case like this one again, where it is clear that the Respondents hugely out gun the Petitioners; you will remember the Eagle Nest case and the honest and strong Petitioners in it.
Respectfully and sincerely,
Lisa Bambauer
Petitioner Eagle Nest Spoil Site
Attachments:
1. Emails dated May 2, 2007 Hernando County Port Authority
2. Public Needs Plain Talk About Dredge Decisions, St. Petersburg Times, January 13, 2008
3. Letter to FDEP dated February 28, 2008 from Hernando County Public Works
4. Email Garth Collier, Hernando County Attorney and Doug Bambauer, Petitioner: Beginning March 10, 2008
5. Halcrow cost estimate: Eagle Nest site and Shoal Line site 2 pages March 20, 2009.
