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Dear Mr Knight,
I am writing to you in your capacity as Citrus County Director of Water Resources with the hope that there may be a way for you to alert the County Commissioners to this information in time for the meeting next Tuesday, 25 October, 2011.
After I had addressed the City of Crystal River Council on 13 June 2011, the Amy H Remley Foundation was asked to research into a matter which had caused several County property owners to protest their stress, anxiety and anger to the meeting.
At a public meeting held on 26 July, 2011, I learned that there were two principal sources of distress affecting property owners impacted by the Interlocal Agreement (ILA) between the County and the City dated 11 August, 2009.
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Their most egregious concern was the City of Crystal River being enriched by many hundreds of thousands of dollars at the property owners' expense without just cause.
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The next most egregious was their feeling of having been abandoned by their Board of County Commissioners, under threat of lien on their property.
The words quoted below appeared at the head of the County's Crystal River Sewer Assessment document sent to property owners in the County's unincorporated areas described as Areas 112 and 113, and were variously declared to be fact in recitals to both the ILA, and. the Ordinance 2010-04;
"Based upon environmental testing done in 1999, it was determined that installation of a wastewater collection and disposal system was necessary for the public health, safety and general welfare the County and its citizens in the Fort Island Trail corridor and other unincorporated areas of the County bordering and/or in close proximity of the Crystal River and Kings Bay."
During our research we had been unable to trace any local record of the environmental testing having been done, and in particular:
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The application for a Disadvantaged Small Community Grant submitted on 22 July, 1999, by the City of Crystal River to FDEP had made no mention of any such environmental testing.
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Telephone discussions with both state and district levels for the Florida Department of Health’s Bureau of Onsite Sewage Programs, and similarly with the Domestic Wastewater Section of the Florida Department of Environmental Protection had failed to yield any reference to such testing.
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Confirmations of searches and personal recollections of staff present at the time were received by e-mail yesterday.
Albeit but a small part from the tens of pages both of research narrative and the supporting documentation, we thought it important that you and the Commissioners should be informed without delay as the said ILA and Ordinance would appear to be less safe in the absence of such a a major premise.
Sincerely,
Norman Hopkins.
Director
To:
Robert Knight
Director of Water Resources, Citrus County
3600 W. Sovereign Path
Suite 202
Lecanto, Fl. 34461
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