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Proposed Roads Lead To Groups

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By SUSAN M. GREEN, The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 7, 2007

LITHIA - It wasn't exactly the road map to success that Pam Prysner was looking for.

But a county graphic showing proposed long-range road improvements for south Hillsborough County has fueled a major growth spurt for the fledgling nonprofit group she helped found, Rural Lithia Area Neighborhood Defense. At a public meeting last week, Prysner said 225 people have joined her organization, dubbed R-LAND for short.

That's more than a tenfold increase from the group's 20 members in mid-September, when R-LAND kicked off a membership meeting at Bloomingdale Regional Public Library. Most are from rural areas, Prysner said, but not necessarily Lithia.

Also seeing a surge of interest is United Citizens' Action Network, nicknamed U-CAN.

Billed as an umbrella watchdog organization for a chain of community associations, U-CAN formed early this year and has a membership of about 600, said U-CAN chairwoman TerryFlott of Seffner. Some of those members represent homeowner or civic groups that carry hundreds more voices, she said.

County officials argued in vain at meetings Oct. 23-24 that the South County Transportation Plan was simply a way to preserve corridors for roads needed for growth and that none of the projects was funded.

Flott and Prysner credit the proposal with fanning the flames of residents' discontent with a government they see as catering to development interests at the expense of residents.

"I think it's phenomenal, and certainly it is an indication of the sentiments of people and ... the pressure they're feeling in losing their rural culture," Prysner said.

Meanwhile, Mike Peterson, an Apollo Beach land-use lawyer who sat on an advisory committee that helped draft the transportation plan, has sent an e-mail appeal to local chambers of commerce to show support for the plan. He also serves on the SouthShore Roundtable, which endorsed the road plan.

Peterson could not be reached for comment last week, but he and others have said booming growth is coming and it's foolish not to prepare for it.

Prysner and others with R-LAND and U-CAN say they're not antigrowth, but they want better control over where it goes.

Chief among the projects opposed at the October public meetings was a high-speed, limited-access highway that would slice through rural south and east Hillsborough. Opponents for years have said such a road would degrade county preservation tracts and promote urban sprawl. Supporters say it would free up traffic lanes on Interstate 75 and other highways.

Alternately known as the Brandon bypass or beltway, the road has been endorsed in other plans by various organizations in the past few years. But opponents at the October meetings said they were angered that county planners included the beltway in a proposal that was to be considered early next year for inclusion in Hillsborough's Comprehensive Growth Management Plan, which they believe is more binding than previous endorsements.

County officials decided to postpone the proposed plan amendment in the face of public protest.

Opposition wasn't limited to the bypass. Residents from Riverview, Gibsonton, Bloomingdale, FishHawk Ranch, Lithia, Ruskin, Wimauma and Sun City Center aired concerns about proposed new bridges over the Alafia River, extensions of multilane roads into lesser-developed areas and new two-lane roads across rural turf.

Although officials insisted the proposals came about through an open process, some residents said the projects represented a development-industry wish list. They pointed to an advisory committee made up mostly of people associated with the development industry and said they received misinformation when they met with county staff members.

County Commissioner Al Higginbotham, whose district includes many of the protesting constituents, said Monday that he will ask County Administrator Pat Bean for an "expanded investigation" of how the transportation plan advisory committee was selected and why the plan was on a fast track for inclusion in the county's comprehensive plan.

He said he has met with members of R-LAND and U-CAN and welcomes the promise of added resident involvement.

"I think it's a positive thing," he said.

Prysner said she and other residents want the state attorney's office or some other "neutral agency" to investigate how the county's staff handled the proposal.

Flott said U-CAN was born of informal meetings among neighborhood and civic leaders across Hillsborough who met at county meetings and discovered they were concerned about similar issues.

She said U-CAN offers a way to share information and expertise and guide newcomers to government through the bureaucratic maze.

"The whole process is just totally overwhelming," she said. "It's overwhelming the amount of time you have to spend with it."

Of the 10 U-CAN leaders listed on the group's Web site, all but one are from south and east Hillsborough. Flott said the leadership banded together after spotting potentially controversial issues on the county commission consent agenda and seeing recently defeated projects pop up again after a short time.

County officials "try to slide a lot through, and they bury it," she said. "It's just wrong."

The organization proved effective during summer, when residents successfully protested the proposed gutting of Hillsborough's regulatory program for wetlands, she said. Those hearings drew a crowd that spilled out of the commission chamber. "We're tired of going to meetings and standing before the commission, and the commissioners are making decisions based on campaign promises," Flott said, referring to campaign donors.

Reporter Susan M. Green can be reached at (813) 865-1566 or sgreen@tampatrib.com.

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