Please help!

Published April 13, 2009 @ 07:35AM PT

Friends and supporters,
 
It is, once again, time to fight to stay in existence.  Haven Acres' application for a special use permit to continue operations at our residence in High Springs is again coming up for review.
 
To recap what has happened before:
 
We were granted a special use permit in 2007 by unanamous vote of the
Alachua County Commissioners even over the protests from High Springs.
Alachua County was then sued by the City of High Springs because of this.
Our permit was rescinded and we were able to re-apply at no additional charges ( the first time cost about $1500).  Alachua County rewrote some of the codes and separated dog kennels from cat facilities.
 
Our first hearing is coming up 4/15/09 Wednesday evening at 6 PM in the Alachua County Admin building in front of the Planning Commission.  The Board of Alachua County Commissioners will probably hear our permit request sometime next month.
 
We are still located on over 8 acres and are still in an agriculture status.  This still means we can have an unlimited number of cows, chickens, hogs, horses, sheep, goats, etc, but to have more that 20 cats, we have to have a permit.

High Springs is still complaining about our contaminating the city well even though several wells have been tested in the area (including ours) with no contamination.  Residents in Edgemoor subdivision complained at the last hearing about the smell even though none of the numerous county staff that has been here could smell anything unless they were very close to the cats.  We still rake the pens and bag the solid waste for the dumpster.
 
We need all the support we can get.  County staff has said this time that they are not recommending approval.  This is different from last time.  Please forward this to anyone you might think would be interested and please email the county commissioners your thoughts.  We will need as many people as possible to be at the hearing that will be held before the Alachua County Commissioners.  If we do not get the approval this time, I am not sure what will happen to the cats. The email address for the commission is: bocc@alachuacounty.us.
 
If you wish to see what happened at the last county commission hearing on this and have approx. 4 hours to spare, you can go to the Alachua County website and find the "video on demand" tab and watch the August 30, 2007 hearing.
 
We sincerely thank all of you for your support.