The Citrus County Commission today voted unanimously to allow rezoning of a rural parcel off Cardinal Street in Homosassa to allow construction of two food warehouses to store food for the county's homeless agencies.

The property will be located on Premiere Avenue.

The decision to change county zoning and land-use regulations to accommodate the project came over the objections of residents who live on Premiere, or close by.

Resident Jolene Alpers, who has just retired as a county auditor in Indiana, said she did not receive notice of the project until her new home was 90 percent complete.

Lorna Davidson of Sugarmill Woods said the project was the wrong thing to put on just 4.7 acres.

And Charles Alpers, a 14-year Premiere Street resident, said that putting the warehouses at that location would cause a bottleneck when parents pick up or drop off school children at the stop sign at the end of the very narrow street. He said he was also against it because he thought the facility belonged in an industrial park.

Premiere Avenue residents were outgunned by representatives from the homeless agencies who showed up en masse to tell county commissioners how the project was a good thing for Citrus County. None, however, said that why the Cardinal Street location was chosen as a prime location, or what other properties in Citrus County had been considered for the warehouses.

Spearheading the project is Homosassa resident Diane Toto, homeless activist and member of the Homosassa Civic Club. Although she also did not say why Cardinal was selected, she did tell commissioners that neighbors would not notice truck traffic, since her agency only has one truck. She also said there would not be much noise, either.

"This will be minimal impact," Toto said. "Neighbors are not going to be disturbed at all." She said the warehouses will have a 300-foot buffer, and the area around the warehouses will be enclosed with a chain-link fence. She also noted there are about 15 commercial businesses on Cardinal Street right now.

The location will store food for "Feed Citrus County," an organization of churches, agencies for the homeless and Citrus County United Way. She noted that although homeless feeding facilities serve food, they don't have a way to store it. The two new warehouses will each be 7,200-square-feet apiece and have coolers and freezers to store food.

Food will also be put on pallets, and there will be a loading dock attached to the back of the building. The facility will also have a well and septic system, since the county has not yet run central water and sewer to Cardinal.

Toto also said the warehouses will only be for distribution of food, and that there would not be any foot traffic from streams of people coming to pick up food. She said use of the land was only to be used to store food.

After hearing from Toto and public comments, the county commission decided to allow the construction of the warehouses at that location, and the entrance will be off Cardinal Street, rather than off Premiere Street.

The project, which was previously approved by the Planning and Development Review board by a vote of 6-0, had been disapproved by county staff because of the proposed project's potential violations of current land-use codes.

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