Osceola County Commissioners Fred Hawkins Jr. and Michael Harford were on the right track when they voted Nov. 1 against buying the 370-acre Tohoqua site for the county’s land conservation program.

Our concerns mirror those of these two commissioners:

• The $9.2 million price tag was too high because of the nearly 160 acres of wetlands on the site – not the 30 acres originally discussed. Staff had recommended a lower price, but three of the five commissioners ignored that advice to instead vote for what the property owner wanted.

• This purchase pretty much broke the bank for buying any additional land for the SAVE (Save And Value Environment), program, including property on the west side of the county along Shingle Creek that would complete a corridor in that area protecting and providing access to what is often referred to as the “headwaters of the Everglades.”

• The high cost of making improvements to the Tohoqua site (from $2 million to $4 million, according to Hawkins) pretty much will deplete the SAVE program's reserves for property improvements and maintenance and could result in property the county already owns – and spent millions of dollars for – to go for years without improvements to make it accessible to the public. As Land Conservation Advisory Board Member Mary Carr said, we’re going to spend millions of dollars on improvements to Tohoqua and still not have any picnic tables there.

• There were misleading statements made at the commission meeting — either intentional or through misunderstandings — that the site had been recommended by the advisory board when it was not. The recommendation was for the commission to clarify certain issues related to this site. At least one commissioner used the supposed recommendation as part of the argument to buy the land.

• There was an expectation that there would be partners in the purchase (Toho Water Authority and the city of St. Cloud), which was never realized. Had there been partners, SAVE program reserves would not need to be depleted.

• And, like Hawkins, we wonder why the county would buy land that would have been preserved anyway as green space by the developer of the Tohoqua DRI.

The negatives of buying this property outweighed the positives.