County Commission Picking Winners and Losers; Is It Time for Senior Board Members to Head Down the Road?

Commentary by Linda Cooper

Long-serving county commissioners John Meeks and Matt Brooks are up for re-election in 2024, and Rock Meeks is up in 2026. If the heated discussions and flaring tempers at the May 9th “composting” workshop were any indication, I’d say we’re ready for them to go. We need leadership that reflects the will of the people and the best interests of our citizens, not a select few. After almost four hours of heated discussion and public comments concerning the direction the county should go in drafting land use regulations for manure composting in the unincorporated areas of the county, we are no closer than we were in February of 2021 when the first land use workshop was held. Why is this taking so long?

The losses are already mounting up. Joe Morales, owner of a 107 acre approved RV Resort east of Williston, got word on the morning of the workshop that the project was dead if the county commission decides to approve a manure dump (manure composting facility) 600 yards from the resort site. Lost along with the RV resort would be the City of Williston’s approved infrastructure and 50 jobs. Another speaker said a potential land deal fell through when the prospective owners of the property learned that the same manure dump would be in close proximity to the property that was being purchased. The next speaker asked if the horse manure that was intended for the manure dump could be dumped at the county landfill instead. No answer was given.

Since February 2021, there has been a lot of activity regarding manure composting, some in front of our faces, and some less obvious. Emails were exchanged between powerful county staff and officials in the private sector pushing for the establishment of manure dumps throughout agriculture-rural residential areas of the county. The evidence of these behind-the-scenes communications is there but is difficult to find if you don’t know where to look. I attended the May 9th workshop with about 150 to 200 residents. I left the meeting frustrated again at the lack of direction provided by the three senior members of the county commission and was disgusted by their kick-the-can-down-the-road attitude. It doesn’t have to be this difficult. A select group wants to confuse the manure composting issue by redefining it as farming. Manure composting isn’t farming. The definition of farming: “The act or process of working the ground, planting seeds, and growing edible plants. You can also describe raising animals for milk or meat as farming.

Manure composting is manufacturing. It is the process of turning raw materials or parts into finished goods using tools, human labor, machinery, and chemical processing. Trucking in tons of horse manure and pine shavings and dumping it on rural Levy County fields is manufacturing, not farming. The right-to-farm Act, a state law protecting farmers from being run out of business by people moving in next door to them, is being tossed around by advocates of manure composting to confuse you. Beware, the Right to Farm Act applies to farming, not manufacturing. Another favorite term conveniently being thrown around is personal property rights. Is dumping piles of horse manure next door to your home going to improve your property or devalue it? Your investment or life’s work would be lost or devalued if something like bulk horse manure is piled high and deep near your home. Your property rights would be crushed under the weight of the horse manure.

Manufacturing of compost should only be allowed in heavy industrial zones if it has to be anywhere. Marion County’s ordinances, updated September 15, 2020:

See Sec. 4.2.28. – indicate manure composting can only occur in the Heavy Industrial (M-2) classification. The Heavy Industrial classification is intended to provide for those manufacturing activities which create some undesirable effects and are not compatible with other zoning districts. For more details go to Muni Code website.

Levy County’s senior county commissioners Matt Brooks, John Meeks, and Rock Meeks say they want to wait until the Florida Department of Environmental Protection rewrites its springshed protection rule before they adopt local manure composting regulations of their own. DEP lost a four-year legal battle that ended February 15, 2023, when a judge ruled the agency’s springshed protection regulations were weak and unenforceable. DEP was ordered to write new regulations. Long-time county watchdog Renate Cannon, in a statement at the workshop, said “You mean the Department of Environmental Pollution!”

Waiting for DEP to rewrite its springshed regulations seemed to be the direction the county commission’s senior members were headed at the end of the workshop, but who knows for sure. Appearances are, “Hurry up and wait, kick that can down the road!” The Florida Department of Environmental Protection regulates manure composting as solid waste but the agency doesn’t have the authority to govern the county commission’s Land Development Code or land uses in the unincorporated areas. The sole authority for regulating land uses in the unincorporated areas of Levy County rests with the commission. That begs the question – why won’t senior commissioners do their job and protect Levy County residents from manure composting? Why don’t they prohibit manure composting in Levy County and permanently halt the transfer of horse manure bedding, or any type of bulk manure, from across the county line into Levy County? What is the purpose of depositing Marion County’s horse manure bedding in Levy County’s rural residential neighborhoods? It defies logic. Levy County is a farm community. Why do we need Marion County’s horse manure? We don’t! Money and greed are the only possible reasons for pursuing manure composting as a land-use practice in Levy County when it doesn’t exist now. Nothing good can come of carpeting Levy County’s rural residential areas with horse manure or any other bulk manure from another county. Act now, commissioners. Stop the madness!

Campaigns for re-election are just around the corner. One thing is for sure, when the county commission decides in a final vote whether to trash rural residential areas of Levy County with manure dumps, the public will have a clear and definitive understanding of where each commissioner stands on the issue of “composting,” aka “manure dumping.” Members of the public can then find new candidates to lead their county and vote their conscience in elections and determine the future of Levy County. Will the county’s beautiful rural residential areas be covered with ugly manure dumps, or will the commissioners take the high road and save our county’s beautiful legacy for future generations?