GAINSWave Therapy in Keystone, FL

Homebuilder Taylor Morrison can keep developing a 194-home project in Keystone, but can’t sell individual lots to homebuyers until a court challenge is settled, a Hillsborough Circuit Court judge ruled Friday.

The written ruling from Judge Mark R. Wolfe followed a four-hour hearing on Jan. 18 in which area residents asked for an emergency injunction to halt the Taylor Morrison development between Patterson and McGlamery roads.

“The sale of homes to third parties ... would not be in the public’s best interest because the homes may be required to be demolished at the conclusion of the case,” Wolfe ruled.

The area of Keystone/Odessa in rural northwest Hillsborough is covered by a county-approved overlay district limiting home density to one home per 5 acres. Taylor Morrison plans 194 homes on just more than 200 acres it purchased in 2021, saying the zoning entitlements granted in the 1990s predate the rural protections adopted in 2002.

The residents sued Hillsborough County, contending the project violated the county’s own land use rules. They wanted construction stopped. Taylor Morrison joined the suit and its attorneys provided lead counsel during the Jan. 18 hearing.

During that hearing, Andrew Miller, vice president for land development at Taylor Morrison, said the company had invested $35 million in the project so far. He said grading and earthwork on the first phase is nearly complete and the company aimed to sell homes by the end of the year.

A stop-work order would cost the company $65,000 to remove heavy construction equipment from the site, $370,000 in monthly labor and other costs and $350,000 in monthly interest, he testified.

Wolf’s ruling noted that since construction has been ongoing since spring 2022 the damage the residents tried to prevent has occurred already. However, if they prevail at trial, state law allows a judge to order the development removed.

He barred Taylor Morrison from selling homes and lots on the property prior to resolving the case because “the court would likely be unable to order removal of development and construction on the non-party’s real property. Thus, plaintiffs would not have an adequate remedy at law to address the harm if they prevail.”

Wolfe’s ruling also noted the testimony from residents and stop-work order from Hillsborough County surrounding illegal tree removal from the site before the county issued a development order in May 2022.

That suggests Taylor Morrison “acted in violation of permits and ordinances in its pursuit of speedy development of the property. Plaintiffs, therefore, have established through evidence that they would be irreparably harmed and without an adequate remedy at law if Taylor Morrison were allowed to sell, convey, or otherwise transfer all or some of the property.”

Wolfe ordered nonbinding arbitration to try to resolve the case.

“We never said you can’t build in Keystone,” said Melissa Nordbeck, one of the lead plaintiffs. “Our position since the very beginning of this assault on our community was you have to build (according to county rules and the Keystone community plan) — an added layer of protection for our 36 miles of rural and agriculture land that is intended to preserve our chosen way of life.”

Workers could start building a 17-mile pipeline linking Clay County’s Black Creek to Keystone Heights by February, said officials for a water agency that awarded a $41.3 million construction contract Tuesday.

The St. Johns River Water Management District’s governing board approved the contract with Palm Beach County-based DBE Management LLC for the second phase of a three-part project to move creek water to an aquifer recharge area where lakes receded for years.

The agency approved a $15.9 million contract in July for a different company to build the first phase, a pump station to draw as much as 10 million gallons daily from the creek into the ductile iron pipeline DBE will install along a route that will follow Florida 16 and Florida 21.

The management district is still designing the project’s third phase, a “passive treatment system” to lighten the color of the tannin-stained creek water before it enters the Keystone area’s naturally clear lakes Brooklyn and Geneva.

The project’s three parts are scheduled to be completed and operating together by September 2024, Dale Jenkins, the management district’s director of projects, told the governing board.

Moving creek water to the recharge area is supposed to replenish an aquifer that’s Northeast Florida’s source of drinking water while also raising Keystone’s depressed lake levels as much as 10 feet.

The effort, called the Black Creek Water Resources Development Project, has received $112.6 million in cash and commitments since 2017 from the Florida Legislature, the water agency and Northeast Florida utilities. The final cost may be a good bit less, however.

The pipeline contract was estimated early this year to potentially cost $60 million, Jenkins told the governing board. He said the number was high partly because prices for iron were high early in the war between Russia and Ukraine, both important pig iron producers.

He said the 30-inch pipeline will be lined inside with cement so the water won’t affect the iron piping, and testing with a treatment system like the one planned around Keystone shows Black Creek water can be lightened reliably.

“The water that gets into Brooklyn and Geneva will be a better quality that won’t affect the [lakes’] color,” Jenkins said.

Following years of studies and permitting delays, board members expressed enthusiasm about seeing the pipeline take shape.

“I think we’ll have something that everybody will be excited about,” member Douglas Burnett said.

Some residents in the Keystone area of northwest Hillsborough County say they did not know a major housing development was about to encroach on their rural community until they saw survey sticks being placed in the ground in late February.

What You Need To Know

“There have been no meetings, no notifications of any kind that anything was going to happen,” said longtime resident Jeannie Holton. “Everybody said, ‘There’s not really anything that they can do.’ And of course, that’s hard to believe, isn’t it?”

Residents say they are confused and anger because the planned development of 194 homes on 209 acres bypasses the Keystone-Odessa Community Plan approved by the Hillsborough Commissioners in 2001 — which says that there should only be one unit built per five acres.

The planned development, though, was originally approved by the County Commission a full decade before, in 1991. That document, which allowed for the rezoning of the land from agriculture to planned development, says that the development “shall not exceed a density of one dwelling unit per gross acre.”

“When entitlements are made decades ago, even if they were made two years ago, those are permanent," said Hillsborough County Commissioner Pat Kemp. "They can never be changed. That’s why any land use decisions we make are extraordinarily critical.”

A Hillsborough County official adds that the county’s Land Development Code provides that the current standards in Keystone "do not apply to previously planned developments, which includes the Patterson Road Residential project."

Kemp, who was strongly opposed by the development industry in 2020 during her successful bid for reelection, said that the current board of county commissioners would never have approved a planned development like the one being built in Keystone.

But that’s of little solace for residents like Holton, who moved to the area in 2006 specifically for the rural lifestyle.

“I just wanted to have part of my life where I wasn’t in the city,” she said late last month while sitting on a chair on her backyard deck which overlooks Lake Echo. “Where I was away and could enjoy nature and could appreciate — well, just exactly what we have here. It’s just a rural lifestyle, less traffic.

"I didn’t want to take a half-an-hour just to get out of my neighborhood, and just really wanted to enjoy the water, (it's) cleaner. You know, all the quality of life issues that everybody really wants, you know? Some people like an urban lifestyle — and I did, too. But the rural lifestyle is something that everybody should have the chance to enjoy.”

“This is such a pristine gem for Hillsborough County,” added Clara Lawhead, a neighbor who’s lived in the community for 42 years. “We are very unique. We are a country community. And we don’t want to become suburban.”

The project is in the rural service area of unincorporated Hillsborough County and includes public water and wastewater service. County officials say that such infrastructure isn’t typically allowed in the rural service area, but the planned development includes a requirement that the development be served by public water and wastewater at the developer’s expense.

But residents like Holton don’t want that infrastructure, saying it would not be an improvement from the clean water they enjoy currently.

“I have brand new septic tanks," she said. "I have an air infiltration system on my water system, I have no chemicals in my water."

Residents also fear that the housing project poses environmental risks that the county has invested to protect in the region in recent years, including the purchase of 543 acres of land just east of the Brooker Creek Preserve for more than $11 million in 2020 through its environmental preservation program (ELAPP) to create a wildlife habitat corridor.

Jeff Bakshis, the owner of the Keystone Farmers Market in Odessa, said he was “blown away” when he learned about the new development.

“It’s an important part of this region in that a lot of the water being supplied to Pinellas County and Hillsborough County is coming from right here so," he said. "I just don’t understand how they’re weighing the consequences of destroying part of the headwaters of the Brooker Creek out here in the wellfields to make room for houses when we need that water for other people."

The development group building the new homes, Taylor Morrison, had a stop and desist order placed on them in late April by the county that lasted more than a week after it was discovered that they had cleared a number of trees before the final construction permit had been issued.

County officials did not say how many trees had been cleared without a proper permit, but said that the builder had removed 4,766 inches DBH (diameter at breast height) of trees on sight. The developers were informed that they needed to either replant those trees or pay a fine of $309,790.

“Although the work was briefly paused, no trees were cleared outside of the permit limits and the plan for the site meets all zoning requirements,” a spokesperson for Taylor Morrison Florida Operations told Spectrum Bay News 9.

Hillsborough County spokeswoman Hilary Zalla said on Monday that how Taylor Morrison ultimately would resolve the issue “is still pending.”

“The plans for the project provide for some replacement inches but not the full amount we identified,” she said.

Holton told Spectrum Bay News 9 on Monday that the citizens in Keystone remain upset.

"This is a failure on the part of our Hillsborough County Government to follow our rules, protect our environment, our water source, (and to) represent and inform us," she wrote in a text message.

Although today it is Keystone residents who are unhappy about a planned development that doesn’t conform to current local standards, Kemp warned that the issue could pop up in another community in Hillsborough County.

“This unfortunately won’t be the only area where entitlements were given decades ago that aren’t reversible,” she said.“We have growth coming in at an alarming rate. Alarming. And we’re doing everything we can to have smart growth and slow growth.”

Listed below is the full statement sent to Spectrum Bay News 9 from Taylor Morrison Florida Operations:

"Taylor Morrison is pleased to have the opportunity to develop a community in the Keystone area and we are working to ensure that it will complement the natural elements and beauty of the surrounding properties. We also hope to work with the civic association to ensure a successful relationship. We did receive a stop work order from Hillsborough County on April 26, 2022, in connection with this project. Prior to the site work starting, the County’s Natural Resources department had already reviewed and approved the permit plans, however, the final construction permit had not been issued. Although the work was briefly paused, no trees were cleared outside of the permit limits and the plan for the site meets all zoning requirements.

“We believe there is some confusion regarding zoning for this property which falls outside of the 2001 overlay zone. The community plans are in full accordance with zoning and it is being built based on the zoning that applies specifically to this site location. We regret the timing error on the site work and we are working with the applicable County authorities to ensure we timely address the matter. We have since received our full site permit from the County and have resumed our development activity with the County’s approval. Taylor Morrison will continue to closely coordinate with the County under their guidance and appreciates their diligence in this matter.

“We continue to work closely with the County on all details.”

KEYSTONE, Fla. — Some Keystone residents are trying to stop the construction of a new subdivision with nearly 200 homes.

“Some nights you cry. Some days we high-five each other for small victories,” said Elizabeth White, who is among those who have been fighting for months.

White and her neighbors have created a group called Protect Keystone, and they say the development violates the community plan calling for only one home per five acres.

“We want our open fields. We want our wildlife. We can’t stop people from moving here and building. But our Keystone community plan absolutely addressed one house per five acres. That tries to limit the sprawl. That’s what we want,” said White.

Developer Taylor-Morrison has plans for 194 homes on 209 acres off Patterson Road. They are clearing land to put in infrastructure for utilities.

The county did zone the land for one home per acre in 1991. The Keystone-Odessa community plan was put in place ten years later.

“It’s quiet out here. It’s what we want out here,” said Missy Nordbeck.

The new project is steps away from where Nordbeck’s property is big enough to keep her two horses.

“They just came here one day. No advance notice. No public hearings. No letter to residents to let them know what’s going on,” said Nordbeck.

The Protect Keystone group hoped Hillsborough County commissioners would issue a stop work order on Wednesday, but they did not. Only agreeing to have staff review all the permits.

Taylor Morrison was fined and did have to stop construction in April after the county said they illegally removed trees, but they were able to restart the project in May.

A group of residents even filed a lawsuit against the county to stop the project.

“At the end of the day, there’s a passion in the community that’s bringing a lot of people together to fight. And we know we are going to win,” said White.

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TAMPA, Fla. - Something special happens when these guys get together.

There’s usually a lot of laughing. But these baseball players don’t just have fun together.

They win together.

What You Need To Know

“Most of them have been together since they were eight years old and they’ve played together every season on the same All-Star team,” Coach Dan McCaffrey said. “So they’re cohesive and they’re friends most of all.”

This Keystone Little League team’s bond carries over onto the baseball diamond. And it have resulted in a lot of wins and back-to-back state championships.

Now they’ll be competing for the Southeast Region title for a spot in the World Series in Williamsport, Pa., the mecca of Little League Baseball.

“They’re having fun,” McCaffrey said. “They giggle in the dugout. And they come to play to have fun every day. I don’t think they realize the magnitude of it yet. But they will once we get there.”

Since 2001, only four Sunshine State teams have clinched the Southeast Region title. And no Florida team has ever won the Williamsport Little League World Series. Keystone wants to change that.

“We’re really happy about where we’ve gone,” first baseman Lee Melamut said. “But we still want to make it farther.”

Melamut has been playing baseball since he was three years old. There’s something about the sport that captured his heart.

“It’s just the sound of ball hitting the mitt,” he said. “It’s just the perfect sound.”

These young boys will be making their television debut this week. ESPN will be broadcasting their games. And these little leaguers are ready for their closeup.

Maybe because Keystone has been in the national spotlight before. Back in 2015, Keystone clinched the state championship to advance to the regional round and thanks to one of the parents sharing the good news, some of the biggest names in sports, including Tim Tebow and Derrick Brooks, were wishing the preteen players good luck.

The Keystone Little League hat took a sports world tour.

But now it’s this generation’s time to shine.

“We’re ready for it,” McCaffrey said. “The kids keep talking about it. So it’s a big spot for them. But I think once we get there and settle in, they’ll tune out the cameras and they’ll be ready to play.”