Orlando Sentinel – Looking out his back window, John Gembecki often watches eagles, hawks and sandhill cranes soar over the grassy expanse that once was the Deer Run golf course. Once in a while, a coyote will pop up on his security camera at night.
It’s a view that Gembecki and his neighbors in Deer Run no longer worry about being lost to homes, driveways and cars.
Seminole County — which now owns the old golf course property near Casselberry — recently unveiled plans to turn the old fairways and putting greens into a quiet public park surrounded by wetlands and ponds, where visitors can walk along trails and boardwalks to enjoy the wildlife and learn about water quality.
“We need to restore some of that natural hydrology and ecology if we want to present this new vision,” said Pete Sechler, of GAI Consultants, an environmental consulting firm hired by Seminole for the project. “We think that there could be student projects out there that give opportunities to learn about biology and water quality in Seminole County and Florida.”
