(NSF) — Five years after Florida voters approved a constitutional amendment aimed at land and water conservation, environmentalists on Monday urged the state Supreme Court to wade into a battle about how money can be spent. Florida Defenders of the Environment and other plaintiffs filed a brief asking justices to decide a long-running dispute that centers on how state lawmakers …
State Completes Wakulla, St. Johns Land Buys
(NSF) — The state Department of Environmental Protection has completed the acquisition of a pair of Florida Forever sites in Wakulla and St. Johns counties that Gov. Ron DeSantis and the Cabinet agreed to buy for $10.7 million in July. The department announced Friday the $4.2 million purchase of 717 acres within the Wakulla Springs Protection Zone Florida Forever project …
Florida NRCS Holding State Technical Committee Meeting
USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) in Florida will conduct a State Technical Committee Meeting this Tuesday, May 21 from 10 a.m.-12:30 p.m. at the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, Doyle Conner Agriculture Building Auditorium in Gainesville. The meeting is open to the public and will give an overview of the 2018 Farm Bill programs and conservation easements. NRCS will solicit recommendations …
DeSantis, Cabinet Look at Land Buys
Gov. Ron DeSantis and the state Cabinet next week will be asked to spend $2.54 million in the Florida Forever conservation program to buy land in Lake and Hamilton counties. The proposals, which the Cabinet will take up Feb. 26, would lead to paying $540,000 to acquire 83.4 acres in Lake County and paying $2 million for 316 acres in …
Fast Track Rejected in Conservation Funding Case
An appeals court this week turned down a request by environmental groups to quickly move a major conservation-funding case to the Florida Supreme Court. Attorneys for the state House and Senate last month appealed a Leon County circuit judge’s ruling that said lawmakers did not properly carry out a 2014 constitutional amendment that requires spending on land and water conservation. …
State Appeals Conservation Funding Case
Legislative leaders are appealing a Leon County circuit judge’s ruling that the state has not properly carried out a 2014 constitutional amendment that required spending on land and water conservation. Attorneys for House Speaker Richard Corcoran, R-Land O’ Lakes, and Senate President Joe Negron, R-Stuart, filed a notice this week of taking the case to the 1st District Court of …
Lawmakers Funnel $100 Million to Florida Forever
Neglected for nearly a decade, the Florida Forever conservation program would get $100.8 million in a proposed $88.7 billion budget that lawmakers are expected to approve Sunday. Rep. Ben Albritton, a Wauchula Republican who chairs the House Agriculture & Natural Resources Appropriations Subcommittee, said most of the money would go for land preservation. “We started at a much lower number …
Negotiators Settle Florida Forever
Florida lawmakers have agreed on spending plans for the Florida Forever conservation program during negotiations for a new state budget. According to a story from the News Service of Florida, in a deal announced late Friday, House Appropriations Chairman Carlos Trujillo, R-Miami, and Senate Appropriations Chairman Rob Bradley, R-Fleming Island, said the state will provide more than $100 million in …
Florida Commissioner’s Spotlight: Rural Farmlands
On this week’s Commissioner’s Spotlight, Florida’s Commissioner of Agriculture Adam Putnam speaks on the importance of Florida’s farming families, and the efforts to preserve Florida’s rural family lands and conserve our natural resources. The Rural and Family Lands Protection Program is an agricultural land preservation program designed to protect important agricultural lands through the acquisition of permanent agricultural land conservation easements. View …
Lobbyist Backs Away From Florida Forever Comments
From: News Service of Florida Eric Draper, executive director of Audubon Florida and a prominent environmental lobbyist, released a statement Tuesday walking back concerns about a House measure that would alter the distribution of money for land conservation. Draper said he was wrong Monday to link a House bill (PCB GAC17-06) that would change the state’s Florida Forever land-conservation program …