Orange planning to put Split Oak road question on ballot
Orange County Supervisor of Elections Bill Cowles said Monday he plans to move forward this weekend with printing the November ballot, including a question for voters about a controversial toll road through Split Oak Forest, despite a challenge from Osceola County.
Osceola officials, who last week started a legal fight with Orange County in an effort to strike the question known as Charter Amendment 2, filed an emergency motion on Monday to ask a judge to keep the Split Oak protection amendment off the ballot.
A hearing is scheduled for Tuesday morning.
Cowles, who has said he will follow the judge’s ruling, said his office plans to send away mail and precinct ballots including the Split Oak measure for more than 800,000 registered voters for printing over Labor Day weekend. He said he must weigh the possibility of the losing party filing a successful appeal
“If I take it off, I can’t put it back on at this point,” he said of the charter measure and the timing of the Nov. 3 election.
Federal law requires election officials to mail ballots to voters overseas or serving in the military no later than Sept. 16.
If courts ultimately decide to strike the amendment, voters will be directed to disregard the question, Cowles said.
Two environmental groups opposed to building the road also want to join a legal proceedings.
Representatives of Speak Up Wekiva, best known for fighting to halt the state’s bear hunt in 2015, and the Friends of Split Oak Forest hope to be part of the virtual hearing Tuesday with Circuit Judge Patricia Strowbridge who will hear arguments from Osceola lawyers.
Both environmental groups lobbied for the Split Oak amendment to be added to the ballot by a citizen’s Charter Review Commission, an appointed panel which meets every four years to weigh changes to the document which serves as Orange County’s Constitution.
The measure would give Orange County voters a say over the Central Florida Expressway Authority’s plan to extend the tolled Osceola Parkway from State Road 417 south of Orlando International Airport about 9 miles east across the forest’s southern tip.
About a mile and a half of the road would go through a portion of the forest in Osceola County.
The proposed toll road would open the door to urban-style growth in a nowunpopulated part of Osceola.
Two land titans support the highway, Tavistock Development Co., which created the city-sized Lake Nona development in southeast Orange County, and the Suburban Land Reserve, the development arm of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Osceola contends that elected officials of Orange and Osceola counties have already agreed to support the Expressway Authority’s preferred path. But the Florida Communities Trust can reject the route through the wilderness area, bought with public money.
Chuck O’Neal, president of Speak Up Wekiva, said the groups asked to intervene to protect the forest, concerned that county commissioners who endorsed the paved route through Split Oak might not “vigorously” defend the charter amendment.
He said Friends of Split Oak and Speak Up Wekiva represent the unnamed parties in the case: Orange and Osceola County citizens who oppose the highway and other development in Split Oak, a serene oasis for hikers, nature lovers and 700 species of animals.
The state Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission manages restoration efforts of the forest.
Lawyers for Osceola County, who did not return a call for comment Monday, argued in court documents that the title and language of the proposed charter amendment are misleading. They also allege, if approved by voters, the charter change would interfere with contractual rights agreed to by Osceola County, Orange County and the Florida Communities Trust a quartercentury ago when they pooled money to buy the forest.
More than a third of the preserve is in Osceola and the rest is in Orange.