Sand Mine Special Master Approved
Hope everyone had a great weekend!
Today, we are going to talk about the special master hearing for the Lecanto sand mine that happened on Friday.
For me, this is not necessarily about stopping a sand mine from happening. The area that they are doing this has historically been mining type operations. Even the property they own had mining occurring on it going back to the 70's and 80's.
For me, it is about following proper processes. When I was first told about this site and started to look into it, I found that they were operating a mine without the proper permits. The county for whatever reason was turning a blind eye to it.
The tried to tell me that it was operating properly under vested rights and non-conforming use, but had no documentation on file to show that nor applications for those uses, as required by the Land Development Code (LDC).
I pushed back on that a bit and now the county agrees that there is merit to those complaints and that they will require a permit for mining, as the code compliance case moves forward. However, this process will solve that problem.
If the site is approved for the expansion and mining, the code case will go away.
At the hearing, the special master recommended approval, but tied some conditions to it. Let's take a look.
The first condition is that they have to follow section H of Chapter 4 of the LDC. This covers development standards for mining operations.
They do follow most of this, however, there is Section 10 that has not been followed.
Specifically 10(h).
This means that they have to pave the road that they use to access the mine. This was a condition of approval going back to 2006 and 2008 when the county approved a vegetative grinder for the site.
Also, since this is creating a new mining district on Low Density Residential land, they may have to connect to a collector or arterial roadway (like Homosassa Trail). However, the special master said that the county can decide to waive some of these provisions.
Which created an interesting exchange. When asked by the special master why the mine would not be required to do the paved road access, as the LDC requires, staff answered that engineering has decided that it was not necessary.
Say what?
Staff can just decide NOT to require someone to follow the law? The LDC is essentially county law when it comes to development. Staff can just say "Nah, we won't require that".
In what situations is that allowed? Only on projects that staff clearly has a desire to approve? But not on projects they do not want to approve? Who decides that?
Side note... this was completely left off of the staff report. Zero mention of this policy anywhere. Interesting.
Another condition was the requirement for 500ft setbacks since they abut residential properties. This is also required by the LDC in this same chapter.
The mine had been asking for 100ft and 200ft setbacks and said that the 500ft requirement would limit what they could do on the property.
I expect to see them ask the BOCC for a variance to allow the 100/200ft setbacks.
Another condition was to require them to provide proof of financial responsibility. This is considered liability insurance for the mine site. The owner had submitted a letter stating he would be responsible for paying for everything, but did not submit liability insurance as required by the LDC. This condition would require them to provide that policy.
The last special master condition was for them to provide a full reclamation plan. The plan that was filed stated that they would turn the property into a field with grass... however, the owner kept saying the end goal would be to sell it to the landfill to the south as they needed to expand... so the site may become a landfill.
No solid plan was provided and details were sparse. The special master wants them to file a detailed reclamation plan as part of the condition for approval.
This now heads to the BOCC in August I believe. They will have final say over these conditions and ultimately the approval of the site.