Welcome to TBO.com. Skip directly to: our Keyword Search, Section Navigation, Content.

TBO.com - TBO is Tampa Bay Online

TBO.com - Tampa Bay Online

Geoff Fox:

Since 2002, Geoff Fox has written about the offbeat and dynamic personalities that make Pasco County unique. He is now revisiting them, meeting new characters and sharing more stories. Email

Pasco Links:

Latest blog posts:

Most Recent Entries

Monthly Archives

Local News | Photos

Herb Green’s Big idea

Posted Aug 5, 2009 by Geoff Fox

Updated Aug 5, 2009 at 03:46 PM

He’s 82, believes in the benefits of ginkgo biloba and works tirelessly to transform Trilby from its current state as an impoverished, blighted rural community in northeast Pasco to the thriving center of commerce and industry it was in the 1920s.

Herb Green may be conservative politically, but he makes liberal use of his imagination when it comes to improving his adopted hometown just east of U.S. 98.

This week, I toured the area with Green, the president of the Greater Trilby Community Association who masterminded the association’s thriving Security Patrol, which was assembled a few years ago to combat prostitution and drugs.

The patrol started with a little more than a dozen volunteers. Now, there are more than 70, including some who patrol on horseback. As we drove down Trilby Cutoff Road, a dirt road that runs along the Withlacoochee Trail, Green had me stop the car to look between kudzu-covered trees. In the distance was a dried lake bed, overgrown with tall weeds and grass.

That’s where downtown Trilby stood until a May 1925 fire started on the second floor of Bradham’s Dry Goods Store, spread through nearby buildings and leveled the unincorporated community. Bankston’s Grocery, Pitts’ Meat Store and Hilliard’s Barber Shop were among the businesses that went up in smoke – along with the community’s identity.

As usual, though, Green, a North Carolina native and longtime member of the U.S. Coast Guard Auxiliary, has an idea.

“We want to rebuild it just like it was,” he said of downtown Trilby.

Green doesn’t know how much that might cost. While the area is near U.S. 98 and U.S. 301, and railroads tracks bisect nearby Lacoochee, Trilby hasn’t exactly been synonymous with economic development.

Still, Green and other members of his association recently had the ears of county officials during a well-attended redevelopment meeting at Lacoochee Elementary School. At the very least, he hopes the county will pave the community’s roads and install street lights.

Of course, Green has grander visions. The area’s train stations could be rebuilt, he said. One could be transformed into a family restaurant and the other could be a mercantile store.

“Everything would have to be done in phases,” he said. “If we can’t get it in as part of the county’s redevelopment plan, we can always pursue grants independently.”