PASCO COUNTY, Fla. — It might be challenging to convince anyone to store thousands of live mosquitoes inside their home — unless you're an entomologist in the Pasco County Mosquito Control District.
There's a good reason why workers in the district agreed to take their work home with them. Their insectary is undergoing a remodel because of mold. That's one reason why Adrian Rogers, Executive Director of the Pasco County Mosquito Control District, said they need to build a new state-of-the-art campus.
"It's taking up their garage space," Rogers said with a smile. "One has it in their spare bedroom. It is true dedication from a very passionate staff."
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Rogers told ABC Action News reporter Michael Paluska that the district's current campus needs to be updated and more space. To raise awareness and educate the public about the services provided to the community, they gave Paluska a tour of their current facility.
"This is our laboratory space. It is very small," Rogers said. "Our entomologists are doing identifications at their desks. We need more room. We need to be more efficient."
The district outsources mosquito samples to another lab to identify whether they're carrying potentially deadly diseases like Malaria. A process Rogers said can take weeks.
"By that time, you could have a very, very serious situation where a lot of mosquitoes become infected. And that bleeds into your human population and affects everyone. In a new campus, our goal is to be able to do that in-house; we have plans for a biosafety laboratory to level 2. We also have thousands of sites that our inspectors are checking every day. And as the county is expanding and new developments are coming in, our staff are stretched pretty thin."
The district plans to sell its current location in Odessa and move to a more central part of Pasco County in Spring Hill to cover the area's rapid population growth.
"We are the fourth fastest growing county in Florida," Michael Cox, the Pasco County Mosquito Control District Chairman, said. "The district was created in 1951 as the West Pasco Mosquito Control District. And so it was based on the coast, and the district was in a small facility over on Washington Street in Port Richey. Then, in 1987, after the third expansion of the district, they built the facility that we're in today. And then since that time, the district has expanded to more times to encompass all of Pasco County."
"What are your challenges if you had to continue working in this location?" Paluska asked.
"You spend a lot of time behind the windshield, going from one side of the county to the other," Cox said. "And, (helicopters) flying here out of Odessa, say over to East Pasco, takes a lot of time and fuel. And it's a lot of money to operate those helicopters."
"What would you say to some critics who think you don't need a new building?" Paluska asked.
"Well, I think that they need to come out and visit the district to see exactly what it is that we do here," Cox replied.
The estimated cost is around $35 million. Cox said they plan to sell their current campus for about $10 million, use $15 million from their reserves, and finance the rest.
"Because of how efficiently we run the district, this expansion will not require a tax increase; it will absolutely not require a tax increase," Cox said.
The Pasco County Mosquito Control District is in a special tax district. Recently, special tax districts have come under the scrutiny of legislators. That's a concern for the future of how they protect the public from mosquito-borne diseases. In 2023, for the first time in 20 years, Florida and Texas confirmed their first cases of Malaria. And, scientists say with our changing climate, mosquito-borne diseases are rising.
"There's always a chance that the legislature could dissolve us," Rogers said. "It does worry me because, as I said, the incidence of mosquito-borne diseases on the rise, globalization, and urbanization across the globe are the driving factors behind these mosquito-borne diseases' increasing. And some are moving to areas we never thought would happen."