A little more than a year ago, the Florida Department of Transportation informed Milton-based Bill Salter Outdoor Advertising of its intent to “take all appropriate steps” to ensure the company was adequately punished for removing more than 2,000 trees along Interstate 10.
Not long after, the DOT quietly settled its dispute with Salter’s company for $100,000, significantly less than the $1 million to $4 million in penalties and $110,000 in administrative costs the company could have faced for breaking state law.
Read the DOT’s resolution document settling the case. >>
“They just rolled over and made it all go away,” said Bill Brinton, the attorney for Citizens for a Scenic Florida, the group that told the state about the company’s actions.
News of the settlement in July 2012 was made public for the first time this week.
“The department analyzed all factors in the case and determined the settlement was in the best interest of the public,” agency spokesman Dick Kane said Wednesday in an emailed response to a phone call from the Daily News.
Kane offered no explanation why the settlement was announced only recently, and did not respond to more attempts to reach him.
Citizens for a Scenic Florida first claimed that Salter’s company cut down more than 2,000 trees along I-10 in 2011.
The trees were cut to make room for billboards. The group, which has a history of opposing outdoor advertising, alleged the new billboards were constructed without providing mitigation for trees taken down and without removing out-of-date billboards.
In January 2012, a grand jury found that Salter Advertising assisted “in flagrant violation of the law” by DOT employees and received permission to cut down the trees without going through the required permitting process.
The grand jury found that then-state Rep. Greg Evers, now a state senator, had been duped by Salter Advertising into speaking on its behalf to then-DOT Secretary Stephanie Kopelousos.
Evers, R-Baker, had to respond to a subpoena from the grand jury.
In a letter dated Feb. 22, 2012, Brian Blanchard, the DOT’s assistant secretary for engineering and operations, told Salter that after reviewing the grand jury’s report, the DOT would seek compensation.
The DOT “must insist that Salter Advertising come into compliance” with state statutes governing vegetation removal and the erection of billboards, Blanchard’s letter said.
The cost of implementing a vegetation mitigation plan and obtaining the permitting Salter would have needed to remove the trees would have cost an estimated $1 million to $4 million.
Brinton said the state calculated that estimate. Citizens for a Scenic Florida estimated that Salter Advertising would pay a minimum of $2.1 million.
Blanchard also threatened to impose $110,000 in administrative penalties — $1,000 each for 110 illegally granted permits.
Blanchard’s threats never were acted on.
The final cost to Salter Advertising was $100,000, according to a resolution document the DOT provided Wednesday. The company paid $10,000 in October and will pay another $18,000 for five years.
Salter Advertising also must surrender 35 permits over six years for billboards that no longer conform to state standards.
The DOT resolution document notes that the grand jury requested only that the agency “urge Salter to compensate for the loss of trees.”
It states that its District 3 office “approved and fully inspected the tree removal,” and claims some of the cutting would have been done as routine right of way work, anyway.
“The Department has not historically revoked or otherwise gone against permits errantly granted,” the resolution statement says.
The agreement also states that the DOT conducted training after the Salter permitting debacle and “has centralized the function of vegetation management permitting.”
Managers at Salter Outdoor Advertising did not return phone calls Wednesday.
Brinton said he is trying to find out why the DOT so suddenly and decisively backed off its tough call for compensation.
“We asked what the fine was for and they said, ‘that’s for mitigation.’ They threatened an administrative penalty of $110,000 and they got zero,” he said.
“They went off track. They were very deeply involved and they went off track. We’re trying to figure out how they went off track and who was involved in creating the document to justify this BS settlement,” Brinton said.
Contact Daily News Staff Writer Tom McLaughlin at 850-315-4435 or tmclaughlin@nwfdailynews.com. Follow him on Twitter @TomMnwfdn.