Using taxpayer money, Osceola County has paid outside attorneys up to $635 an hour to try to stop Orange County from thwarting plans to build a developer-backed toll road through the Split Oak Forest nature preserve.
After the Orlando Sentinel told Osceola County officials that it was planning a story about the prices the county was paying, a spokesman for the county said that Osceola and the law firm it is using have verbally agreed to new, lower rates that will “be effective on the next billing cycle.”
The bill is already substantial. Records show the law firm Nelson Mullins billed Osceola County more than $55,000 for its first two weeks of work on the lawsuit, which began in late August with an attempt to prevent residents in neighboring Orange County from voting on a ballot measure to strengthen protections for Split Oak, which straddles the line between the two counties.
The tab for Osceola taxpayers will continue to grow as the county continues litigating, with a goal now of persuading a judge to invalidate the charter amendment — which Orange County voters approved Tuesday with 86 percent support.
Supporters hope the amendment will alter or even block a controversial plan to build a nearly $800 million extension of the Osceola Parkway that would cut through the southern portion of Split Oak Forest. The expressway is a top priority for Osceola County leaders, developer Tavistock and the giant landowner Deseret Ranches because it could start to open up huge swaths of land east of Orlando for the development of more than 200,000 new homes.
The Central Florida Expressway Authority and county commissioners in both Osceola and Orange signed off on the Split Oak route late last year. But state environmental officials have yet to approve it, and the COVID-19 pandemic and recession have forced local officials to delay the start of construction.
Opponents say Osceola County is wasting its taxpayers' money on a crusade to save an unpopular toll road.
“It’s crazy,” said incoming Orange County Commissioner Nicole Wilson, an environmental attorney who campaigned in part on her opposition to the toll road through Split Oak. “We’ve seen national newspaper stories of people in Osceola County living in hotels with no power, and this is where they’re going to spend their money?”
And Osceola County has paid a premium so far.
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