County, St. Joe battle over annexation

After Port St. Joe commissioners in March annexed about 113 acres along the Gulf County Canal, out of a plan to turn the land into a planned unit development. Gulf County commissioners have gone to court in an effort to reverse the division.

After a joint conflict assessment meeting between the two commissions, and a mediation session, each failed to resolve conflicts, County Attorney Jeremy Novak went to court last week to file a request to overturn the annexation.

Novak’s April 17 motion before Circuit Judge Devin Collier claims that the city failed to follow a whole series of state statutory requirements that surround a decision by a municipal body to voluntarily annex properties, everything from proper notification and timing to the provision of pertinent documentation. 

In addition, Novak’s motion argues that the city’s annexation would create “enclaves,” which it says would be pockets of unincorporated land surrounded by only city parcels and/or waterways that would be cut off from the county and be accessible only through city lands.

In making his case to the judge, Novak outlines a 2021 annexation matter, resolved amicably, that led to “discussions and dialogue between the two governing bodies…. where both bodies were encouraged and agreed that open communications would precede any future proposed annexations so to avoid any unnecessary waste of taxpayer resources and/or unfortunate procedural steps that could be addressed through open communications.”

The county attorney argues that none of that open communication took place in this 2025 case.

The background to the case dates back to a Dec. 16, 2024 filed before the city by The Serenoa Group, LLC, which is managed by Rick White. At that time, the land was zoned by the county as industrial, and White sought to have the vacant property changed by the city, to a proposed planned unit development, with no further specificity as to what its future use would be regarding residential housing.

Serenoa had obtained the property for $875,000 in February 2023 from Premier Chemical LLC, one of a series of owners dating back to 1968, all of which were businesses engaged in chemical processing or mining, or other industrial purposes.

The county has claimed since that time White has floated ideas such as creating a marina, a water park, perhaps condominiums, which would be subject to a much greater allowable density than the county’s current two units per acre. In addition, the county contends White had advertised for sale of the land for as much as $18 million.

At the April 15 meeting of the Port St. Joe commission, White took issue with what he called “fake news” discussed publicly at an earlier county commissioner meeting.

White said the property is not for sale, and that neither the “developer or its representative” wants to build homes adjacent to the city’s wastewater treatment site just south of the acreage. He said the developer does not want to build on a chemical site with toxic, contaminated soil, and is not planning a high-density residential development.

“It’s only me, just the guy who owns the land,” he said. “There has never been a proposal to do a high-density development. The property is not for sale. There is no active MLS (real estate listing).

“I am not trying to ram anything through, just following the proper process,” White said.

He said that the site has sat idle for years, a point echoed by Port St. Joe Mayor Rex Buzzett.

“How’s it going to hurt the count? It’s been empty for 25 years,” said Buzzett.

White contends that the site has produced basic materials, such as dolomite, a product of limestone, since the 1960s, and that dolomite is used as a base material for driveways and roadways, and even in toothpaste and in public drinking water throughout Florida.

Premier, White said, were the world’s largest producer of Epsom salts, a health and beauty product which is a blend of dolomite and salt.

“The county simply wants power and control over this parcel,” White said. “It is surrounded by city property and its future use should be decided by the city and not Gulf County.

“Gulf County has tens of 1000s of acres to use,” he said. “The city only has this 114.”

Novak said he took steps to advise the city to work with the county to prevent a court case that could lead to extensive legal fees. But he said, only Commissioner Brett Lowrey voted no on a motion to move forward without workshopping the proposed annexation, and that since then the two sides have been at a stalemate.

Novak contends that even if the city has a chance to remedy any possible problems with the annexation process, it still has a problem with the creation of enclaves, three parcels owned by the St. Joe Timberland Co of DE LLC, by Hollingshead Materials LLC. and by Duke Energy. This, he argues, could make the land ineligible for annexation. In addition, he said The St. Joe Company has voiced opposition to the annexation.

“The character of the area is industrial,” he writes. “All surrounding parcels have industrial uses. The parcel to be annexed itself has been used exclusively for industrial purposes and has been owned by companies engaged in mineral processing, chemical processing, and other industrial uses, since at least 1968, nearly 60 years.

“A drydock and shipbuilder recently began operations in the past decade approximately one mile away from the parcel, and additional industrial revitalization of the industrial park is active and ongoing,” Novak wrote in his motion.

The motion calls for the judge to rule that Ordinance 616, which enabled the annexation, be declared “void, invalid and of no effect,” and that the city cover all attorney’s fees and costs.