Tag: Lands Assessment

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DEP Conducting Public Lands Assessment

As you may recall, we recently posted about Florida’s water management districts (including the South Florida Water Management District (SFWMD) – which owns most of the CREW) conducting assessments of their lands to determine if there are any that could be sold off/surplused to other entities to generate revenue for the state.

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Now, the Florida Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) is doing a similar assessment of other public lands bought with taxpayer money. Many of these lands are within state parks and wildlife management areas (WMAs). Proceeds from lands surplused and sold through this process will be used to fund the Florida Forever program (up to $50 million) to purchase other, more critically needed conservation lands. CREW is not on the DEP list, but there may be other sites of interest to our members and visitors.

DEP is holding three public meetings this week – today (8/21) in Tallahassee and two webinars on 8/22 and 8/23)  – to get public comment on the process and the parcels being considered for sale/surplus. Many of the parcels are small (<5 acres) and a full listing can be found here. If you’d like to make comments or just want to find our more about the process and plans, you can visit the DEP website.

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SFWMD Land Assessment Draft Recommendations Ready for Review

As you know, most of the CREW lands are owned by the South Florida Water Management District. The District is currently conducting a Lands Assessment of all the lands they hold within the 16-county region they govern. The assessment is to determine if there are some parcels that could be surplused.

Back in May, we told you about the opportunity to provide public comment on the Lands Assessment. You all did a fabulous job of submitting comments. You can see them here. You can also download additional documents from here.

Today (July 30), the District is holding another public hearing for comment on the DRAFT staff recommendations which resulted from your earlier public comment. The meeting will be held at the SFWMD West Coast Service Center Office on McGregor Blvd. in Ft. Myers at 10 AM this morning (July 30). If you cannot make the meeting, additional public comment will be accepted online between now and August 12th.

Thank you all for your participation in this important process and for submitting your thoughts about CREW. It takes everyone’s participation to make sure sound decisions are made.