Longtime residents of Florida have been lamenting the development that's hijacked the state for decades. While it's mostly affected beach communities, sprawling malls and cookie-cutter residential communities have recently begun encroaching onto the state's rural interior and historic communities. Environmental writer and documentary filmmaker Bill Belleville noticed this firsthand when he bought a 1920s "Cracker" house near Seffner in 1990. By the time he sold it in 2005, huge shopping centers abutted his property and his longtime neighbors had moved out of state. He talks about unrestrained growth and the book he wrote about his experiences (Losing It All To Sprawl: How Progress Ate My Cracker Landscape) when he visits the Weedon Island Preserve this Saturday as part of the Florida Humanities Council lecture series. Sat., Nov. 18, 3 p.m., 1800 Weedon Drive N.E., St. Petersburg, free admission (registration required), 727-453-6500, pinellascounty.org/environment.
This article appears in Nov 15-21, 2006.