Is Dan McKinnon Rolling Over in His Grave Seeing What His Step-Grandson Scott Boyd is Now Planning for Winter Garden & Lake County?
Citrus Grower and civil leader Daniel L. McKinnon passed away in 1995 at the age of 78.
As reported in an Orlando Sentinel story, the citrus business was in Daniel McKinnon’s blood. He was the son of Daniel M. McKinnon Jr., a west Orange County citrus grower who founded McKinnon Groves and passed away in 1967.
Dan spent his entire life running the groves that bear his family’s name. He was born in Tildenville and his mother Mable Tilden McKinnon — of the famed Tilden family, was the daughter of early area settlers. Dan was a 1938 University of Florida graduate and founded McKinnon Corp., in 1962 — a citrus caretaking and harvesting company.
McKinnon was appointed to the Florida Citrus Commission in 1948 and was a member of numerous citrus-related organizations, including the South Lake Apopka Citrus Growers Association, to which he belonged for 54 years — and led as President for 40 years.
The McKinnon — Tilden family indeed had a very long and prestigious history in the citrus industry in the Winter Garden area dating back to the late 19th century. If you might be wondering about the Boyd connection, the current President of McKinnon Corporation, Maurice Boyd — is a stepson and not a blood relative — who joined the McKinnon family by marriage when Dan married his first wife Anne McArthur Boyd, who died in 1987.
Former Orange County Commissioner, Scott Boyd is the son of Maurice Boyd and the step-grandson of Daniel McKinnon
In the Orlando Sentinel article, a childhood friend recounts how Dan McKinnon “was just a good, plain, down-to-earth guy” and many citrus industry old timers still around to remember Daniel McKinnon wonder if he is now rolling over in his grave as his step-grandson prepares to tear up the Flat Lake area jewel of Winter Garden that Dan McKinnon loved so much — all to now plant homes for profit.
You would think if the Boyd gang — who are now steering the McKinnon lottery ticket they inherited — were as committed to the citrus industry and preserving the legacy left behind by Dan and the long line of McKinnons and Tildens, they would be fighting to protect the rural character of the area and implement conservation easements to protect the lands for future generations.
Do you think Dan McKinnon ever thought the last crops to ever be planted on his McKinnon-Tilden family lands would be Toll Brothers homes?
Florida made conservation history recently by enacting a bill and securing $400 million in funding to help protect the state’s vast network of natural areas.
Known as the Florida Wildlife Corridor Act, the legislation unanimously passed the Florida State Senate and House in April and was signed into law by Governor Ron DeSantis on June 29, 2021.
The act formally recognizes the existence of the Florida wildlife corridor, an interconnected web of green spaces throughout much of the state that includes forests, swamps, fields, pastures, timberlands, and even the edges of suburbs. It provides funding and encourages large land owners to consider conservation easements to protect the land, wildlife and environment rather than destroying it all — just to plant homes.
Perhaps everyone should start contacting their political representatives and demanding they secure the funding allocated under this new law, to purchase and preserve the lands and the environment Scott Boyd and his family are now intent on tearing up to plant Toll Brothers homes.
The Florida Wildlife Corridor Coalition recently launched a new cause to protect the endangered Florida Panther and they are now looking into the McKinnon Groves lands as it has been reported by many locals, there is a Florida Panther that roams the area and lives in and around the 120 acres of State conservation land just to the west of the rural lands Scott Boyd and his bulldozers plan on tearing up if they get an approval on September 7th.
Map of the McKinnon Groves Florida Panther area
There are many posts on the STOP McKinnon Groves facebook page confirming multiple sightings of the endangered Florida Panther in the area and the incredible in-your-face irony is the very man who is planning on destroying 357 acres of endangered Florida Panther habitat — actually has a picture on his twitter account of the very same Florida Panther he plans on evicting — sitting under an Orange tree at one of his citrus groves.
You just can’t make this stuff up folks.
If that doesn’t make you absolutely furious to the point where you contact Tori Linder at the Path of the Panther project to complain and see if she can help — I don’t know what will.
So, while there are no government moratoriums for Florida Panther evictions and Scott and his father Maury dance around with glee planning the thousands of homes they’re going to plant throughout Lake County, other large landowners — who are not thinking of just themselves and their bank accounts — are doing something to save rural Old Florida lands.
The widow of Subway founder Fred DeLuca recently gifted 27,000 acres in the Everglades headwaters to the University of Florida and implemented a permanent conservation easement over the lands. The University of Florida will use the property as an ecological research station that includes education, outdoor engagement and working-lands conservation.
While many other large landowner-ranchers and citrus growers throughout Florida also answer the call of conservation by implementing environmental easements to protect their lands for the wildlife, the environment and future generations, the Boyds seem obliviously intent on paving paradise and planting homes at a frantic pace.
Maybe someone should ask the Boyd clan WHY they are not doing their part to give back like everyone else and consider conserving the panther habitat inherited lands that have already provided so much wealth and abundance to their family.
Maybe someone should issue a CONSERVATION CHALLENGE to Scott Boyd and his family and see if they have the moral courage to answer the call of conservation — like so many other large landowners are now doing in Florida.
For a family that inherited thousands of acres of producing citrus groves from Dan McKinnon, one might ask WHY the mad dash RUSH to get this housing hellscape approved to start planting several hundred homes so soon?
The dirt isn’t going anywhere and I’m sure they’re not desperate for money(?)
So WHY the big RUSH?
Let’s SLOW this thing down.
Let’s consider some alternative solutions that work for everyone in the area.
Before we tear up 357 acres of rural panther-habitat lands and citrus groves, let’s figure out the best balanced plan for the environment, the wildlife, the Flat Lake area property owners and all residents of Winter Garden and Lake County.
Those who knew Dan McKinnon say that’s what he would want and that’s exactly what he would do. He would talk to the people and come up with the best plan for everyone involved. Probably over a plate of country fried ham at his favorite Winter Garden restaurant.
Because Dan McKinnon was a civic leader and that’s what true leaders do.
But Scott Boyd is not Dan McKinnon — he’s actually not even a blood-related McKinnon — and it seems like doing what Dan McKinnon might do — is not how the Boyds like to play ball.
Many question whether they intentionally scheduled the final hearing for approval at 9am on Tuesday, September 7, 2021 — the day after one of the biggest holiday vacation weekends in the country — knowing FULL WELL that MOST PEOPLE will either be away on vacation or too tired to get up early that morning.
Do you think Dan McKinnon would ever do something like that?
Do you think scheduling the hearing at that time was just a coincidence?
There are no coincidences in dirty politics friends.
Opponents say it was by design. It was a plan to slide this thing through under the table, off the radar, to get a green-light from the Lake County commissioners by providing no opposition, political cover.
But that all changed with the STOP McKinnon Groves shit-storm that’s been raging in Lake County for the last several months and will continue to rage for years in appellate litigation if the Lake County Commissioners betray the people and vote to approve this development disaster.
So, even if the people lose on September 7th, rest assured knowing Scott Boyd and his property partners - won’t be breaking ground for years.
As you will see if you read the comments on the STOP McKinnon Groves Facebook page, there are now SO MANY angry red-pilled people in Lake County planning on attending this meeting, that the county commissioners have now scheduled a set time for later in the day at 1:30pm to accommodate the huge expected crowds.
It is worth pointing out, there are only 367,000 residents of Lake County who collectively determine the fate of the five Lake County commissioners. Political statisticians have very sophisticated algorithms to interpret mass public opinion and predict voting patterns based on small random samplings of data.
These experts will tell you that the huge, off-the-charts response to this Scott Boyd — McKinnon Groves overdevelopment issue, has literally cracked their code and broken the algorithm.
They say whenever you have near unanimous opinion on a single issue such as overdevelopment by home builders — like we have right now in Lake County — where thousands of Lake County residents are up in arms, unanimously angered and outraged to the point where they respond and post public comments and even plan on attending a hearing in person — that’s an eye opening, career-ending, political percentage that politicians ignore at their own peril.
(I hope you’re taking notes)
So, if you’re angry and outraged and want to do something to STOP home builder overdevelopment and the injustice to this land, to the environment, to the wildlife and the people of Winter Garden and all of Lake County, then plan on attending the hearing on September 7, 2021 at 1:30pm in the County Administration Building, Commission Chambers — 2nd Floor, 315 West Main St., Tavares, FL 32778.
Stop by the STOP McKinnon Groves truck to get a STOP BOYD flyer to show your support.
At the hearing, you’ll have an opportunity to see and speak with the “legend” himself — Scott Boyd — and tell him what you think.
I urge you to issue a CONSERVATION CHALLENGE to Scott Boyd and his family to honor the legacy of Dan McKinnon and HIS long and storied McKinnon-Tilden family ties to the area — by ACCEPTING the CALL to CONSERVATION and consider protecting his lands forever with conservation easements so future generations can benefit and children one day won’t wonder what a real, live Orange tree actually looks like — growing in the wild of Winter Garden…
But right on cue — Scott Boyd will probably launch into character with his “aw-shucks good ol’ boy” scripted political pitch about how he is just like you and really cares and how “his family” settled this land in the late 19th century blah blah blah...
And at least now… when he does… you’ll know the rest of the real story to call him out.
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