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FOR
IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August
27, 2015
Contact:
Manley
Fuller, President, Florida Wildlife Federation
(850)
656-7113 or (850) 567-7129
Injunction Seeks to Restore Money to State's Conservation
Land-buying Fund
TALLAHASSEE
- In a legal filing today, the Florida Wildlife Federation and three other
citizen groups are seeking an injunction to stop state officials from
diverting the state's conservation land-buying fund to pay for other state
functions.
"The
voters who approved the Water and Land Conservation Amendment 1 last November
are clear - by a 75 percent majority - that they want this tax money to buy
conservation land," Florida Wildlife Federation president Manley Fuller
said. "In our court filing today, we point out that the
Legislature took the land conservation money and earmarked it for a variety
of things it isn't supposed to pay for, including worker's comp claims and
executive salaries."
The
suit asks a Leon Circuit Court judge to order the Legislature to return
monies back to the state's Land Acquisition Trust Fund. Earthjustice is
representing the Wildlife Federation and three other groups -- Sierra Club,
the St. Johns Riverkeeper, and the Environmental Confederation of Southwest
Florida in the lawsuit. Today's action is an amendment to a legal complaint
the groups filed in June.
According
to today's legal complaint, the Legislature has diverted funds from the
state's Land Acquisition Trust Fund to pay for various appropriations,
including:
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$1,222,158 for risk management insurance for the Department of Environmental
Protection, the Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, the
Department of State and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation
Commission, covering liability for, among other things, damage awards for
Civil Rights Act violations, damage claims against the agencies for negligent
injuries to people and for property damage, and worker's compensation claims;
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$623,043 to pay for executive leadership and administrative services to
wildlife programs in the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission;
-
$21,697,449 to the Department of Agriculture ($5,000,000 of which was vetoed
by the Governor) to pay for implementation of agricultural best management
practices on non-conservation, privately owned lands;
-
$174,078,574 for salaries and overhead for personnel within the Florida
Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, the Department of
Environmental Protection, the Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, and
the Department of State;
-
$838,570 for wildfire suppression vehicles for the Department of Agriculture;
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$5,000,000 to the Department of Agriculture to pay agricultural operations to
keep their pollution on their own land;
-
$38,575,538 to the Department of Environmental Protection that can be
used to build sewage treatment plants and storm water treatment systems.
"We
understand that many of these programs are important state programs, but they
should not be funded by the conservation amendment funds," Fuller said.
"They should be funded by other state revenue sources."
The
Water and Land Conservation Amendment that voters passed in November, 2014
requires that, for the next 20 years, 33 percent of the proceeds from real
estate documentary-stamp taxes go for land acquisition. It did not impose a
new tax; the documentary-stamp tax has long funded Florida's conservation
land-buying programs. For the upcoming year, the share of the real-estate tax
is projected to bring in more than $740 million.
Because
the case seeks an injunction to transfer surplus budget money into the
Amendment 1 fund instead of invalidating existing appropriations, it would
not stop any project that the Legislature has already funded.
"We
are hoping the court will correct the Legislature's mistake, and return money
to the conservation land-buying fund, because that is what the voters
directed," Fuller said.
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| About Florida
Wildlife Federation
The Florida Wildlife
Federation is a private, statewide, non-profit citizens' conservation
education organization composed of thousands of concerned Floridians and
other citizens from all walks of life who have a common interest in
preserving, managing, and improving Florida's fish, wildlife, soil, water,
and plant life.
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