Split Oak Forest dispute headed to court later this month
Defenders of Split Oak Forest insist Orange County can’t agree to anything that harms the conservation land — arguing that should nix a plan for a toll road to slice across 60 acres of the preserve in neighboring Osceola County.
More than two dozen Split Oak defenders, some holding signs that read “Save Split Oak” or “Land Swap = Trickery,” urged the board to fight the road and reject a development group’s offer of 1,550 other acres in exchange.
But whether Orange County can stop the road is unclear as an hourlong board discussion revealed Tuesday.
“It may be out of our control to stop the expressway,” Orange County Mayor Jerry Demings said, noting the route preferred by the Central Florida Expressway Authority travels through the southern part of the forest, all in Osceola.
The 1,684-acre forest was acquired jointly in 1994 by the two counties and the Florida Communities Trust, a state-funded land acquisition program. About 1,000 of the forest’s acres are in Orange, but the other 685 are in Osceola.
Their disagreement will be argued in front of a judge Feb. 19.
Orange County Attorney Jeff Newton said Osceola wants to cut Orange out of the road decision.
Orange County voters approved a charter amendment in 2020 to protect the forest.
Osceola, which favors the route through the forest to serve growth, argued in a court filing last week that Orange voters were duped by being told nothing about the acres offered by Tavistock Development Co., which built Lake Nona, and the Utah-based Suburban Land Reserve, the real estate arm of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
“The county win-win of constructing a project beneficial for the community while also conserving more land than would otherwise be available was completely left out of the language of the proposed charter amendment, leaving voters unaware that voting for the charter amendment was anti-conservation,” Osceola’s filing argued.
Does saving Split Oak Forest doom other nature preserves?
The court dispute weighed heavily on Orange County’s discussion, but so did the land exchange.
“The developer-touted benefits for this swap land have been way overstated,” said Valerie Anderson, president of the grass-roots advocacy group, The Friends Of Split Oak Forest, whose members staged the pre-meeting rally.
She said many of the acres are protected wetlands or already have conservation protections covering them.
