The Split Oak betrayal: Will Florida ever change? | Commentary

Two months ago, the likely final chapter of a long-running battle played out when state and local leaders voted to plow a toll road through environmentally sensitive lands that were supposed to be protected forever.

The story was patently absurd. You don’t preserve land by paving it.

I’ve thought about those votes a lot in the weeks since and concluded they represent a bleak, defining moment for Central Florida.

It was proof that, as much as progress as Orlando has made through the years, we’re still a community run by people like the good ol’ boys who were in charge generations ago — willing to sell any land or valuable amenity to any hustler with a shiny nickel.

“Florida is still the same state that it was when people could buy lots from the back of a catalog,” said Orange County Commissioner Nicole Wilson, one of the few local officials who steadfastly defended the Split Oak Forest Wildlife and Environmental Area. “Nothing is sacred. If our public parks can be hacked away and sliced by destructive toll roads, nothing is safe.”

Wilson’s words may sound dire. But they’re also accurate. To understand why — and why this story is worth revisiting — you first must understand how Split Oak came to be.

It was the 1990s, and developers were doing what they’d long done, chasing quick and easy bucks in the form of strip malls and cheaply built subdivisions. But decades of rapid growth and sprawl were threatening this community’s natural resources and long-term sustainability. So there were laws and protections in place that basically said developers couldn’t foul pristine pieces of land and clean bodies of water for every Walmart and apartment complex they wanted to build.

To usurp those rules, the politicians teamed up with developers to create a clever con. They would allow developers to bulldoze land, pollute wates and destroy gopher tortoise habitats in exchange for protecting lands elsewhere.

That’s what Split Oak was — a promise of protection. State and local governments purchased 1,700 acres of unspoiled land straddling the Orange and Osceola county line where they vowed to forever protect wetlands and wildlife.

As the Sentinel wrote in 1995 , Split Oak was “a place where land developers can pay for their sins of environmental destruction.”

But then came a new generation of developers less interested in past promises.

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Specifically, the Tavistock Corporation and a company controlled by the Mormon Church, with their campaign checks and political ties, want to turn hundreds of thousands of acres in eastern Orange and Osceola counties into a sprawling development so large that it could one day house 500,000 people — a population the size of Miami.

And they need a road to help accommodate that growth, a stretch of the Osceola Parkway that’s less about meeting existing traffic needs than it is literally paving the way for more growth. The planned route will run right through Split Oak — land that was specifically purchased to be forever protected as a trade-off for previous development.

The proposal obviously represented a betrayal. So, to sweeten the pot and muddy the waters, the developers and toll road authority offered to buy more land — land that, this time, they really, truly promised to protect.

They would promise to protect 10 times more land than they were paving and choking off. But the upshot was clear: Nothing would ever truly be protected. Only until the next group of developers with shiny nickels comes along. It would be a never-ending shell game.

One hunter from Polk County told the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, which was supposed to forever protect this land, the pitch sounded like “a really good deal” that “sets a really bad precedent.”

Yet one public board after another agreed to set that bad precedent and OK the betrayal.

Even though all but one of the 40 citizens who attended the fish and wildlife meeting in May pleaded for the group to keep its promise to protect Split Oak, the gubernatorial appointees voted 6-1 in favor of the toll road.

Toll road approved to cut through Split Oak Forest

“Florida has always been the land of get-rich-quick schemers and politicians who are always ready to sell our ecosystems to the highest bidder,” said Chuck O’Neal, an environmental defender who was in the audience that day. “The bears and deer can’t match the political donations of a Tavistock.”

But the public officials who voted to run a road through conservation land didn’t just betray wildlife. They betrayed 86% of Orange County voters who, four years ago, voted to ask local officials to keep their word in protecting Split Oak.

86 percent?? Orange County voters send strong message about environmental protection | Commentary

When the expressway authority voted to run its road through this protected land, Orange County Mayor Jerry Demings cast the lone vote of opposition. The rest of the toll-road board members — Orlando Mayor Buddy Dyer, Orange County Commissioner Christine Moore, Osceola County Commissioner Brandon Arrington, Lake County Commissioner Sean Parks and three appointees of Gov. Ron DeSantis — did as the developers wanted.

Toll authority approves Split Oak Forest road — and a timeline

“This really speaks to the power of development interests relative to the interests of the existing residents of Central Florida,” said Valerie Anderson, the founder of Friends of Split Oak. “Even when they are vocal, organized, and well-informed.”

The betrayers had their excuses, saying they were making the best of the bad situation and noting that more land would (theoretically) be protected in the long run. But nothing changes the fact that this was a story of broken promises.

And that’s the real takeaway here. Central Florida leaders had a chance to prove they cared about integrity and promise-keeping. Yet just like the politicians decades before them, they sold out.

There are things we can do. We can stop electing the people who betray us. We can support those who keep their word. (Wilson, who valiantly tried to defend Split Oak, already has deep-pocketed interests trying to kick her out of office in next month’s election.)

We can also stop thinking that growth must always mean sprawl. Building up is often better than out, even if it means there may be a seven-story building on a street corner you think looks quainter with only two stories.

There’s still a sliver of chance for Split Oak. The Friends of Split Oak say they may have legal options if they can raise the funds to continue a legal fight that has already exhausted their finances.

But it shouldn’t take lawsuits for people to do the right thing — to do what was promised.

This isn’t just about the environment. It’s about integrity — which, much like this state’s clean water and pristine land, is in increasingly short supply.

smaxwell@orlandosentinel.com