BY MARK J. CRAWFORD
Telegraph Editor
STARKE — Citizen activist Carol Mosley says she and other phosphate mining opponents still have plenty more to say, even if it means taking the county commission all the way back to the beginning of the fight.
Speaking to stoic commissioners monthly and repeated communications with the county attorney have only peaked her frustration as some questions go unanswered, if not ignored.
On May 2, Mosley suggested the board hire outside counsel, saying it’s time “important details stop falling through the cracks.”
“You should also be concerned about the statute violations I bring to your attention. Failure to address violations once you are made aware of them, even by me, should be frowned upon,” she told commissioners Monday.
One example she pointed to was the exclusion of a public records clause from the contract with Onsite Environmental Consulting, which was hired to provide an environmental impact statement after studying the master mining plan submitted HPS Enterprises. Then there is the time limit for approving or denying a development permit imposed by Florida statute — 180 days.
The HPS plan has been around since 2016.
“Why does the county legal team feel it is okay to ignore such violations?” Mosley asked.
While Mosley has discovered that there were no written requests for additional information submitted to the mining company by the consultant, she has been unable to get information about a supposed verbal request for additional information.
“We now know that there were zero written RAIs (Request for Additional Information) submitted to HPS but yet we are supposed to believe this “RAI that was not reduced to writing” is somehow real. I’m still waiting to know, and so are you, what is the question, who asked it, and why can’t HPS answer it?” she asked.
The request supposedly dates to 2019 and has not been answered, leading Mosley to wonder if there aren’t ethical as well as legal violations involved. That was behind her suggestion that the commission seek counsel outside of county attorney Will Sexton.
“Strangest of all is that Mr. Sexton will not give us an answer. It’s suspicious. You really should demand to know,” she said.
“And, how about Kleinfelder/HPS submitting documents to hydrologist Schreuder that were titled Response to RAI even though there was not really any RAI submitted to HPS at all! They just didn’t like Schreuder’s reports and so tried to act like they were responding to questions. That’s why Schreuder was so careful to mention that in his final report submitted January 2020. Tricky, tricky.”
By the end of her presentation, Mosley promised that she and the commission, with the help of other activists, are going to have “fun” moving forward.
“I’m so angry about this game playing that I’m going to start from the beginning, when we were deceived about an actual application from HPS being filed and denied a promised workshop. With a little help, we may read transcripts of Mr. Hazen and old BOCC meetings that some of our commissioners are not even aware of. We can relive it all in the sunshine while we wait for Mr. Sexton to bring the mysterious “unwritten RAI” out of the darkness. Sunshine is the best disinfectant, and this mess needs a good cleaning,” Mosley said.
Note veterans service office schedule
The Bradford County Veterans Service Office will be closed May 2–6. It will reopen May 11.
Normal hours are Monday and Thursday from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m., Wednesday from 2–6 p.m., and Friday from 8 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Tuesday hours vary. Call Barbara Fischer at 904-966-6385 or 904-263-0647 for an appointment.
