New federal effort could help Everglades

(George Skene, Orlando Sentinel )
September 16, 2011

There's a lot to like about a new federal plan that could help save the Everglades by preserving as many as 150,000 acres between Orlando and Lake Okeechobee — many of them wetlands that feed the River of Grass.

The plan, costing at least $600 million, would make the federal government a more active partner in the Everglades restoration — a responsibility it has shirked since agreeing in 2000 to share the project's funding. The money would come from offshore oil leases.

By preserving the wetlands, forests and prairies, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service would be safeguarding habitats that several protected species call home: the Florida black bear, panther, scrub jay and Everglades snail kites, among them.

The preservation effort also should protect much of the state's drinking water by helping check or reduce the pollutants that otherwise would make their way to the Everglades.

The plan has the potential to do all that by having the government buy 50,000 of the acres, and the development rights to another 100,000 acres. Most of them are now owned by cattle ranchers.

But the plan also comes with wrinkles, common when the purchase of development rights, or conservation easements, are involved. The easements would allow ranchers to keep using the land, but not develop it. Potentially promising.

Governments resort to conservation easement deals instead of outright purchases of land when they encounter landowners who wouldn't otherwise give up their property. Or, when governments are looking to economize: Development rights are typically worth about half of a property's full market value.

But easements also can provide governments and environmentalists a false sense of security. In this deal, a rancher would give up rights to develop, say, a 10,000-acre tract made part of a conservation easement. But he might turn 'round and hang a great big develop here, develop now sign on his larger lot nearby.

Agencies that purchase conservation easements from landowners also sometimes give them up when there's a request to build a road or utility line across the land that the easement's designed to protect — so long as another easement somewhere else takes its place.

The plan could also flop because no funding has been allocated and Congress has yet to approve it. The plan's next step is a 45-day public-comment period.

The plan's potential to help rejuvenate the Everglades mustn't be ignored, however. It might just help restore a state treasure.

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