On Thursday, July 8, the Citrus County Board of County
Commissioners, the city councils of Inverness and Crystal River, and
the Florida Department of Transportation signed an historic document
for the whole county. They created the Citrus County Transportation
Planning Organization (TPO), which will give the county as one
entity more clout in regional transportation planning issues and
highway project funding.
Attending the ceremony were, front row from left: John Siefert,
executive director of the Citrus County Economic Development
Council, which led the effort; Ron Lieberman, chairman of the
Citizen Advisory Committee of the Tampa Bay Area Transportation
Authority (TBARTA ; John Thrumston, Citrus County commissioner and
county representative on TBARTA; Don Skelton, Secretary of FDOT
District 7; Jacquie Hepfer, Inverness councilwoman; Joe Meek, Citrus
County commissioner; Dennis Damato, Citrus County Commission
vice-chair, who signed the TPO for the county commission; Brad
Thorpe, Citrus County administrator. Back row, from left: Frederick
Busack, attorney with Pennington, Moore, Wilkinson, Bell & Dunbar,
P.A. who assisted the EDC with the TPO; Frank DiGiovanni, Inverness
city manager; Andy Houston, Crystal River city manager; Bob Plaisted,
mayor of Inverness; Ron Kitchen, mayor of Crystal River; Paula
Wheeler, Crystal River councilwoman ; and Winn Webb, Citrus County
commissioner.
