CRESTVIEW — Residents attending future events in Twin Hills Park may find more convenient parking. A former “Superfund” clean-up site could become a downtown parking lot.
Community Redevelopment Agency Director Brenda Smith told the CRA’s board of directors that Gulf Power has indicated a willingness to donate the site to the city.
“They said they would very much entertain that idea,” Smith said. “All they required is the City Council present a letter requesting the donation.”
Public Works Director Wayne Steele said that not only had the lot on the corner of Oakdale Avenue and Brett Street North been contaminated, so had the city’s water well and surrounding soil.
“It was contaminated with mercury that was leaking from the transformers,” Steele said. “They removed over 30,000 tons of dirt from the area.”
It was declared an Environmental Protection Agency Superfund clean-up site, and the contamination problem was solved, Steele said. It is no longer listed on the EPA’s list of Florida Superfund sites.
But if the city requests the donation from Gulf Power, Steele recommended the transfer be thoroughly vetted.
“Be careful of the terminology in the deed restrictions because we don't want to accept a liability,” he said.
Board members also expressed interest, but caution, in the opportunity.
“I just want to make sure the EPA, the DEP, the FBI, whoever, is good with this,” board member Doug Faircloth said, to chuckles. “I want to make sure this is researched to the hilt.”
Smith said because she only learned Aug. 19 that Gulf Power was willing to donate the property to the city, she had not included developing the lot in her proposed 2016-17 budget.
Because of its former contamination, the site’s uses are restricted, Smith said.
“The property, when it is donated to the city, can only be used for parking,” she said.
Providing additional downtown parking is included in the CRA’s plan for the district.
A site significant to Crestview’s early development may become a parking lot serving downtown and Twin Hills Park.
Historic Preservation Board member Cal Zethmayr told the Community Redevelopment Agency the lot — on the corner of Oakdale Avenue and Brett Street North — is the site of a water well and source for the city’s first municipal water system.
Former mayor and city leader Purl Adams Sr. credited a large pig named Calamity Jane with encouraging residents to approve a bond issue to start a city water system in the 1920s.
The pig had a penchant for knocking over outhouses. Adams encouraged her owner to release her at night during the days leading up to the vote.
When Calamity Jane tipped over several “shacks in the back,” owners saw the benefits of indoor plumbing and approved the bond issue.
A HISTORIC SITE
This article originally appeared on Crestview News Bulletin: Twin Hills Park, downtown may get additional parking lot (VIDEO)