Very Important Announcement about DFA

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Many have asked for more information as to what led to the temporary closure of DFA, here you go.

We have to go back to before when DFA opened over a year and half ago. Prior to opening the park we went to visit Land Development at Polk County to see what would be required for us to allow others onto our property. At that time we were led by (now a former) a Land Development Staff member to open as a Membership Only Park, similar to a Hunt Club. As you know this is exactly what we did. The next stop made was to the Department of Health as they govern our water and sewage needs. Through them we set a plan of action to be in compliance with them within a certain time frame. Once we decided to build the drag strip and new MX track we met with the county and explained what we wanted/have done. They said that we needed to permit those areas as High Intensity, so we hired an Engineer group to do exactly that. We started the permitting phase for 82 acres which includes Campground #1, the mud pit area (including the old truck mud pit area), drag strip area, zipline, main road coming in and the entire MX/Oval area (the entire grass field on that side of the ditch). We had a public hearing 6 months ago for the permitting on that 82 acres, we were unanimously approved to go further with the permitting. One of the conditions on that approval was that we would not continue commercial business until some simple forms were turned in for the application process and that the deadline to turn in the papers was October 6, 2011. Somehow our engineers as well as all of us missed that condition; at least we understood to have until October 6th to do so. Those papers could have been turned in within days of our public hearing as they once again were just simple application forms. Now we can get into the closure of the park.

Back in May of this year we leased our property to a group that has 14-15 races per year on large parcels of property. They have been doing this for 40 years now so we had no hesitation to lease the land to them. They are a great organization and are a great role model for the OHV community. Closure was in no way the fault of the group that leased the property. We leased the entire property and DFA should have reviewed planned course prior to race. We only have 7-10 neighbors including 2 churches and they are all located on one side of our property. When the race was held on Saturday and Sunday of that month the track was butted right up next to those neighbors and churches. Unfortunately for 2 days solid our neighbors had to deal with the noise from the race. The church service for both of the churches on Sunday morning were disturbed. All of the neighbors are friends with each other and most were at the church service when they decided they had enough. The following day a noise complaint went to the State Attorney’s office. Please note our neighbors are good people that had a right to complain. We have met with many of them in the last couple of weeks and they now understand what happened and are willing to work with us. Every property owner had rights, including our neighbors and also including DFA. Since a report was made, a State Investigation was started against DFA. They sent investigators on our property as well to all of the neighbors. What they determined was that we were operating outside of the permitted area (82 Acres) as well as operating without those above forms I mentioned being turned in. This means we were unlawfully operating a business since we did not turn those forms in prior to operating the business. We received a Cease and Desist Letter and were told DO NO OPERATE until resolved. We had no notices of noise complaints or any other violations until we received this cease and desist letter delivered by a sheriff’s deputy. We had a meeting set up the very next day for 3:30 with Polk County and the Assistant County Attorney. We learned all of the above that day, as well as we could not re-open until those forms were “ARROVED” not just submitted as they felt now they could not trust us. We had no choice with regards to temporarily closing as Colon and Wayne Lambert were threatened with criminal prosecution. In order to have those forms approved every State Agency and County Agency has to approve what we are doing. We also learned that the information we received about running the park as a club membership was not correct. We asked to speak with the person that gave us that information and was told he/she was no longer employed with the county. They also told us that we could not open that portion (everything except the 82 acres) until we permitted that area. I will go into detail about that in a moment. There are many agencies we deal with at DFA; SFWMD (which is the Water Board governing many things including wet lands), Polk County, Health Department and many others. So far Polk County and SWFMD are onboard with everything we want to do, both agencies have been very helpful working through the challenges. The Health Department is not currently onboard, but are working closely with us to be in compliance with all Florida health regulations for an RV park. This means until we satisfy them we CAN NOT re-open with camping. Here is what we need to do for them.

In order to re-open with camping we will need to do many things in order for the Health Department to approve us. The Health Department considers us (or anyone with more than 5 RVs on site) a RV Park and we need to follow the guidelines set for one. This means we need to install Showers with hot potable water, toilets (NOT port a jons), wash basins (sinks) and urinals. Yes there are many other facilities out there that will also have to follow the same classification and guidelines.

Now lets talk about camping. In order for us to comply with the Health Department regulations we are going to have to create a wash house and bath house (possibly both together) and create spots for our RVs. It is our plan to build 40 RV sites with Potable water ($7500) and a Septic System ($15,000). For our Tent campers we will build the Wash house ($20,000) up next to our check in shed. Please know that we can not allow camping to resume until we do what I just mentioned.

Let’s get back to permitting the rest of the property not including the 82 acres. In order for us to allow our members back onto the trail system we need to do several things. We may have to do a Wetland Delineation through SWFMD ($20,000-$30,000), an Environmental Study ($10,000), Land Survey ($20,000) Polk County Hearing ($10,000), Engineered Drawings ($10,000) and several other items. The above process for the approval of permitting will take around 3 months to complete. Spending the funds on all of the above does not guarantee that we will receive the approval on the permit, especially after knowing that we may have a few neighbors at the county hearing in opposition. We have spoken with our neighbors and formed a solution that will reduce/eliminate the sound coming from our park to that side of the property. We are going to fence off about 75 acres (1/4-1/2 mile) next to their property lines as well as reduce the noise coming from the OHVs. We will have to require your machine to pass a 96db sound rating prior to entering the trail system. We hope that this solution will get the backing of our neighbors.

We figured if we are going to spend all of this money we might as well add some to it and bring in electric ($30,000). This means that the RV sites will have full hook ups and that we will always have running water for the showers/restrooms.
19 hours ago · LikeUnlike · 6 peopleLoading....Dirty Foot Adventures If you are still with me I thank you for getting through all of the above. Let me try to break all the above down for you and give you our plan of action. In order to open quickly we are going to use the 82 acres mentioned in the beginning as a DAY USE (no camping) park. It is our plan to build (prior to opening) a LARGE MX Track ($30,000-$40,000) and an Obstacle Course (telephone poles, rocks, mud and tires) on those 82 acres. We will have the drag strip going every day with the lights, the zipline and pond will be open, the mud area, the obstacle course and mx track. Unfortunately for a few months we will not have camping or a trail system. This means that we can not charge our normal rates to come to DFA since the trails and camping are not open and we are discussing those rates currently. We are also creating a Spectator only price for DFA. We will have to make the best of the 82 acres until we get through all of the approval processes for camping and the trails. Once opened we will focus on the remaining projects that are required to open the trail system and camp area and get those back up as soon as possible. An estimation of time we plan on opening the “Front Area” (82 acres) is late October, early November and the camp and trail system sometime in January/February. This down time for our trail area will also allow time for maintenance, creation of the loop system, more one way trails, additional signage, etc. DFA will be a new and improved park when we finally get through this process.

As you can tell we are looking at around $150,000 to do everything required to open back up as normal. During the first few months of re-opening we will need ALL the support we can get from our members. This will help us a few ways, one is monetarily and the other is mentally. We need to know that we have FULL Support of our members or else we will not see the need to spend the additional $150,000 to open up.

There you are, COMPLETE FACTS of our situation and our action plan to get back opened. Who is on board with us?