The Political Whore

Photo credit: DRB62 Flickr.com

By Kelly Cornelius
PoHo contributor and R-LAND activist

Just when you thought that renaming the Moral Courage award after their shuga daddy (and pardoned ex-felon) Ralph Hughes was the low point, the Hillsborough County Commission, led by Chairman Ken Hagan, floats an idea that is starting to smell worse than the reclaimed sewage that some officials want to dump into our aquifer.

Sell the preservation land that is Cone Ranch to private developers … in order to save it!

Chairman Half Truth Hagan thought it might be a good way to preserve Cone Ranch (by subdividing and selling it it private investors). Ever think the day would come when you wished for someone more reasonable like say, Ronda Storms? I watched the presentation made to the Board of County Commissioners on this and I have to say it made Buddy Johnson look prepared (the day he didn’t show up). They slapped up a few nature slides that didn’t even appear to be of the ranch itself. See for yourself here is the video of that meeting. Oh, and in case you haven’t followed this until now, the group pushing the idea to the Commissioners is laden with a bunch of big time Republican donors. Uh-huh.

Here are some quotes from our stellar board during that discussion on May 6th, 2009. (my thoughts are in bold)

>>KEN HAGAN:  THANK YOU, MS. BEAN.
COMMISSIONERS, TODAY I’M GOING TO INTRODUCE WHAT I THINK IS
AN INNOVATIVE APPROACH TO ADDRESSING A CRITICALLY IMPORTANT
ISSUE IN HILLSBOROUGH COUNTY, AND THAT IS PREVENTING CONE
RANCH FROM EVER BEING DEVELOPED BY PERMANENTLY PRESERVING
AND RESTORING IT. (restoring what?)

……..and then later Hagan says

FIRST AND FOREMOST, THERE ARE OVER 600 WETLANDS ON CONE
RANCH THAT ARE NOT BEING RESTORED, AND WE CAN DO THAT — WE
CAN RESTORE THESE WETLANDS WITH THIS PROPOSAL.  (now he worries about wetlands?….hmmm…maybe a lucrative wetland mitigation bank in store for these “conservation” buyers?

And later Hagan makes this comment:

THERE’LL BE SOME, YOU KNOW, EXTREMISTS THAT WILL MAKE
SIMPLISTIC STATEMENTS LIKE, WELL, THE COUNTY OWNS THE LAND,
THEREFORE, IT IS PRESERVED, OR, YOU KNOW, WHY CAN’T WE JUST
SIT ON IT,   (I made the suggestion during public comment that the county already owns the land if they really want to preserve it…….Half Truth Hagan thinks that is extreme and simplistic)

then comes the presentation… here are some excerpts from Ken Jones who doesn’t really identify who exactly he is but does give his address like it was public comment.

WE WOULD SUBDIVIDE IT INTO SIX PARCELS, POSSIBLY LESS IF WE
HAD ONE CONSERVATION BUYER THAT WANTED TO BUY 6,000 VERSUS
JUST 2,000.
WE WOULD LEAVE OUR PLAN OPEN TO BEING AMENDED TO ACCOMPLISH
THAT.  (kinda makes ya think they already have the buyer/s doesn’t it?)

IT WOULD BE PREQUALIFIED TO ONLY CONSERVATION BUYERS.  (how does one qualify?)

WE WOULD SET ASIDE 800 ACRES FOR A PUBLIC USE PARK. (it is almost 13,000 acres in total and the public would get 800 while the brokers and the County stand to make millions on this deal) But wait there is more…..

WE’VE HEARD A LOT OF DIFFERENT PROPOSALS OVER THE YEARS
FROM EVERYTHING FROM MOVIE STUDIOS, WHICH IS ONE I DON’T
THINK ACTUALLY EVER SAW THE LIGHT OF DAY, BUT THERE WAS ONE
TO BUILD A MOVIE STUDIO ON CONE RANCH.
THE OTHER THING, OF COURSE, IS TO BUILD 10,000 HOUSES OUT
ON CONE RANCH. (the land is on future county plans at PRESERVATION but good try)

after the presentation Hagan makes this suggestion

MY THOUGHT IS TO ASK EACH COMMISSIONER TO APPOINT ONE
ENVIRONMENTAL LEADER TO SERVE ON THIS PANEL,

Commissioner Kevin Beckner cuts to the chase and the answer he gets is disappointing

MY FIRST QUESTION IS HAVE YOU DISTRIBUTED TO STAFF OR MADE
AVAILABLE TO THE PUBLIC A WRITTEN PROPOSAL YET OF WHAT YOU
ARE PROPOSING — PROPOSING TO BRING FORWARD TO THE BOARD?
>> I THINK THE PROPOSAL THAT WE PRESENTED TO PAT BEAN AND
SOME STAFF EARLY ON, AS I MENTIONED IN MY PRESENTATION, HAS
SORT OF CHANGED AS WE’VE GONE ALONG BECAUSE WE HAVE
CONTINUALLY SOUGHT FEEDBACK FROM THE ENVIRONMENTAL
COMMUNITY, BUT NO, WE HAVE NOT SUBMITTED A FORMAL PROPOSAL
TO ANY GROUP YET BEYOND WHAT YOU SEE HERE TODAY, WHICH WILL
NOW, OF COURSE, BE PART OF THE COUNTY RECORD.
>>KEVIN BECKNER:  OKAY.
AND THAT WAS ONE OF MY LARGER CONCERNS BECAUSE I KNOW WHEN
STAFF ORIGINALLY STARTED LOOKING AT THIS AND I STARTED
ASKING THEM QUESTIONS WHY THERE WASN’T A LOT OF MOVEMENT ON
THIS IS BECAUSE THEY SAID THEY HAD NOT RECEIVED ANYTHING IN
WRITING, AND I WAS ALSO A LITTLE CONCERNED ABOUT NOT HAVING
ANYTHING IN WRITING, ALTHOUGH I HEARD — I HEARD A VERY
GOOD PRESENTATION.
YOU KNOW, I CERTAINLY WANT TO MAKE SURE WE’VE HAD AN
OPPORTUNITY TO REVIEW THE DETAILS, SO I AM CERTAINLY OPEN
TO YOUR MOTION, MR. HAGAN, PROVIDED THAT BEFORE WE –
BEFORE THE COMMENCEMENT OF ANY MEETINGS THAT MR. JONES
PROVIDES A WRITTEN PROPOSAL WITHIN TEN DAYS TO STAFF, TO
THE PUBLIC, AND TO THE COMMISSIONERS SO WE HAVE AN
OPPORTUNITY TO BEGIN TO REVIEW THE DETAILS OF THE PROPOSAL,
AND AGAIN, AS YOU POINTED OUT, MR. CHAIRMAN, I THINK
TRANSPARENCY IN THE PUBLIC — TO THE PUBLIC IS
EXTRAORDINARILY IMPORTANT, SO I’M OPEN TO SUPPORTING THE
MOTION WITH THAT FRIENDLY AMENDMENT.

and then Commissioner Al “The New Blair” Higginbotham worries that the group won’t have enough time to put something together in writing (earlier in the presentation they said they “have been working on this for the better part of two years” and yet they don’t have any written material….uh-huh) Hey, wouldn’t that timeframe have conflicted with Norman’s ill-fated plans for this land?

Higginbotham: IS TEN DAYS ENOUGH TO COME BACK WITH SOME THOUGHTS?
BECAUSE I KNOW THIS WILL — PROBABLY OVER THE TIME IS GOING
TO CHANGE SIGNIFICANTLY AS WE GET INPUT FROM FOLKS, BUT IS
TEN DAYS ENOUGH, MR. BECKNER AND MR. JONES?

and Norman worries about appointing ..gasp..only environmental people to the board

JIM NORMAN:  YEAH.
IN YOUR MOTION, WHAT YOU BASICALLY SAID IS WE WOULD APPOINT
SOMEONE WITH ENVIRONMENTAL OVERSIGHT.
WHY ARE WE LIMITED TO THAT?

And Commissioner Sharpe weighed in with some common sense
>>MARK SHARPE:  SO LET’S JUST SAY THAT ELAPP — AND LET’S
GET TO ELAPP AS WELL.
I’D LIKE TO HAVE ELAPP — I THINK ELAPP NEEDS TO BE PART OF
THIS DISCUSSION.
I WOULD LIKE TO KNOW — I UNDERSTAND MANY — ELAPP HAS NOT
EXPRESSED AN INTEREST OR MAYBE THEY DIDN’T EXPRESS AN
INTEREST BECAUSE THEY THOUGHT IT WAS ALREADY PROTECTED AND
SO THEY WEREN’T WEIGHING IT IN AS A TOP PRIORITY, BUT I DO
THINK WE NEED TO — BECAUSE TO DO THIS RIGHT WE DON’T WANT
AT SOME POINT ELAPP CHARGING AT THIS PROJECT, SO I THINK WE
NEED TO BRING ELAPP INTO THE CONVERSATION EARLY.

Beckner later added this:

KEVIN BECKNER:  THANK YOU, MR. CHAIR.
AND JUST TO CLARIFY OUR CONVERSATION ABOUT PRESENTING
DOCUMENTATION AND A PROPOSAL — I MEAN, FOR ME THIS SLIDE
SHOW DOESN’T SATISFY THAT.

and Hagan weakens with the environmental appointments by the end of the discussion stating:

AT OUR NEXT — NOT OUR NEXT BOARD MEETING, AT THE JUNE 3rd
BOARD MEETING, STAFF WILL COME BACK WITH THE NAMES OF THE
INDIVIDUALS THAT WE — THAT WANT TO BE OUR REPRESENTATIVES.
WE’RE NOT GOING TO NECESSARILY LIMIT IT TO ENVIRONMENTAL
LEADERS, ALTHOUGH THERE CERTAINLY SHOULD BE AN EMPHASIS ON
THAT.

By the end it was decided that they would each appoint someone to the panel and have other agencies and departments involved as well and this will be done at their meeting today. Their picks should be very interesting. My next post will include some of the questions and concerns that several local activists have already voiced to local officials.

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