Indian Hills

City of Maitland Dumps on Indian Hills!

Jul 01, 2001

Dear Neighbors,

Did you know that the City of Maitland intends to build what amounts to an industrial complex in your back yard? If you are not aware, Indian Hills and the neighborhoods surrounding us are in the middle of a battle to save our tranquil life style and property values.

When Indian Hills was originally built in the late 60?’s & early 70?’s, a wastewater treatment facility was also built to handle the effluent created by this growth. This facility was utilized up until the early 80?’s when our sewer system was hooked into the Iron Bridge system and then this site was abandoned. (For those of you who don?’t know where this property is located, it is across the street from the brand new Kewanee Trails Park and what was referred to for many years as just the ?“Duck Pond?”. This property is zoned A-1 Agricultural & low density. It sits 4,200 +/- feet from the nearest arterial or collector roadway and 1.9 miles from the nearest collector roadway in the City of Maitland.) This site was eventually bought by the City of Maitland for the paltry sum of ten dollars! That?’s right, $10.00! For many years, it sat neglected and unused, or so we thought. Apparently over the last 20 years this site has been used as a dumping ground for who knows what and most recently as a vehicle storage depot. None of the old facilities were ever demolished and in fact a mobile home has been erected on the site and appears to be hooked into the old waste tanks. We have no clue as to what type of contamination may be on this site, petroleum from equipment storage or something worse from when it was used to treat wastewater, but we are aware of numerous code violations that Seminole County has allowed over the years. Only recently have any of these violations been addressed and only in an effort to clean up the site before the public meeting which was held on-site on the 28th of June.

In 1999, the City of Maitland submitted a development plan for the construction of an 8,400 square foot (s.f.) public works structure with 32 parking spaces. Since a "Public Utility and Service Structure" is a non-permitted use on A-1 zoning, the City of Maitland requested a Public Hearing before the Seminole County Board of Adjustment for a special exception to the A-1 Agricultural zoning. The request was granted and a public hearing was held on December 20, 1999 for item number BA99-12-35SE. At the hearing, Seminole County staff recommended against the project and the Board of Adjustment denied the request for a special exception. The Board told the City to resubmit a plan to the Board that had the approval of the surrounding landowners, and was compatible with the residential character of the neighborhood. At that hearing, representatives from the City of Maitland pledged before the Board of Adjustment to work with the neighbors to develop and resubmit a revised plan. Rather than appealing the Board's decision, or meeting with surrounding property owners to address their concerns, the City met with Seminole County staff, and argued that the proposed development should not require a Special Exception and would be allowable within the current A-1 zoning thus avoiding another public hearing on the project. County staff made an administrative decision that the City of Maitland's intended use did not fall under the definition of a "Public Utility and Service Structure" and was therefore compatible with A-1 Zoning. Satisfied that they would not need to seek the approval of the Board of Adjustment through a public hearing process, the City of Maitland prepared new development plans almost doubling the size of the building. The revised plan calls for a 15,000 s.f. Public Works structure on the site (DRC Project # 00-600150). Parking was also increased from 32 spaces in the old plan to 42 parking spaces for 30 employees on the site.

After much public outcry and adverse publicity, the Mayor of Maitland and the City Council at a January 22, 2001 Council meeting reviewed this issue and ordered that this site be phased out and we were all assured that Maitland would not develop this site. On January 24th we received copies of a letter from Anthony Leffin, to the Seminole County Development Review Committee, formally withdrawing their application for this Public Works development.

However, on June 17th, an article ran in the Sentinel, which indicated that Maitland was again moving forward with their plan to redevelop this site. Again, after much outcry, a public meeting was scheduled for June 28th at the proposed site. Of course it was scheduled for 5:30PM when most people are still at work, on their way home, or at the day care picking-up their children. Maitland?’s excuse for the renewed interest in the site was that they couldn?’t come to terms with Seminole County to buy the site and that it would be too expensive to buy and build elsewhere. What they failed to tell anyone was that they were asking $250,000.00 for the land and that who ever bought it bought it ?“As Is?” and would have to pay at least an additional $350-750K to clean up the contamination and demolish the existing infrastructure (Remember, they bought this land for $10!). This meeting was supposedly to listen to what ?“WE?” wanted, instead it was a ruse, used not to hear that ?“WE?” do not want this development, but rather to determine what we would accept. No matter how many times or how many different ways we said ?“NO?” and ?“GO AWAY?”, they refused to listen. We were told it would take two weeks to write a one page report with two letters on it that spell the word ?“NO?” and another week before we could have another meeting on the issue. It is obvious that this will be used as a stall tactic to get additional bids and permitting in place, as well as a chance for tempers to cool and hopefully for people to forget.

I am asking all of you not to forget; in fact I am asking all of you to take action! Everyone needs to get involved like we did when the Bedding Store tried bulling Casselberry and Indian Hills into granting them a cut-through to our front entrance. We need to begin calling, e-mailing, and going to see not only our elected officials at Seminole County, but also the elected officials in Maitland. We need to present them with petitions to be placed into public record and we need to be present at both the Seminole County and Maitland Council meetings. If they won?’t allow us to speak, we need to come with signs & banners to silently display our contempt. Finally, we need to look at starting a legal fund and we need to seriously consider hiring legal council, unless one of our neighbors is willing to volunteer their time and talent to help. I realize that these efforts will require sacrifices and time away from work and family, but if we don?’t act now, we could very well loose everything we have worked so hard to attain.


P.S. ?“Thank you?” to all who took the time to attend Thursday?’s meeting! It was time well spent, no matter how obstinate Maitland officals seemed. Please do not loose interest on this issue, as we face a long and hard battle. If we stand united and do not give in, we will prevail! We put these officials in office and they have a fiduciary duty to listen to their constituents and to do what the voters ask of them. If they ignore us, then we must act swiftly to remove them from office and to replace them with a candidate who will listen!