Wednesday night, after a quick “HOA” meeting at the Shed, Terry and I attended a “Meet and Greet” at the Homosassa Civic Center for JJ Kenney. He’s our county commissioner. Plus the chairman of the board.
We stayed for a little over an hour and there were only about 6 other people that attended. And one dog. One really nice therapy dog that helps out at the library and reads to the kids. (Well, maybe the dog really doesn’t read.) The dog was REALLY HAPPY to see all of us. Can you believe I didn’t get a picture of that adorable dog. Think it was a springer spaniel. So cute.
Anyhow, I’m off track. Commissioner Kenney took our questions and gave pretty good answers. Not necessarily the answers we wanted to hear but they were answers! He also took notes which is perhaps a good sign.
We are getting sidewalks. One driving force is for the local Old Homosassa residents to get to the library on Grover Cleveland Blvd. and use the many services available. One woman pointed out that there wasn’t a sidewalk on Grover Cleveland. Interesting.
The biggest concerns were unanimously the plight of the Homosassa River and the springs in our county. Of course, at least five of the other six people that were attending the meeting were from the River Alliance Club so that would be a topic of interest.
The commissioner mentioned that they are planning to build a boat ramp on the barge canal which could relieve some of the boat traffic on the Homosassa River. I don’t believe that’s going to help. My thoughts are who is going to go all the way north to the barge canal? Not scallopers. Maybe fishing people and they are already using the existing boat ramp there. The barge canal is just not “cool” like Old Homosassa. We have motels, restaurants, bars, and fun plus it’s not far from the Suncoast Parkway which makes it an easy drive from Tampa. That’s what brings the scallopers here.
The meeting was interesting and it made me give some thought to actually getting involved in some of these groups. I met Bill Garvin and Jim Bitters who are some of our local activists that I read about in the newspaper occasionally. And I plan to actually step up and take part. This is my home, I’m concerned about our waterways, and I should be involved.
There may be tirades in the future!
There are several observation decks to pull onto to admire the river and surrounding forest. It really is a beautiful view.
I love bridges–Maggie not so much. We did offer to let her down out of the basket to walk with us over the bridge, but she politely declined.
Our turnaround was at the trailhead in Marion County—equally as nice as the one in Citrus County with a lot of parking but again, no restroom. (And I didn’t even go near that porta potti)
While the ride was lovely, it was a little short even for us. The Gulf Junction trailhead on the Withlacoochee State Trail is just around the corner from the Dunnellon trailhead and Citrus County has approved a feasibility study to find the best connection for the two trailheads. No time frame yet, but I’ll be eagerly waiting for them to “close the gap”.
