If carried out as currently proposed, Florida’s new plan to build golf courses and pickleball courts on state park land could have devastating consequences on native species, which some experts say could spur litigation.
The Florida Department of Environmental Protection’s Great Outdoors initiative, which has drawn mass criticism and uproar since its announcement on Monday, pitches significant modifications to nine state parks in the name of expanding outdoor activities, according to the DEP. Late Friday the agency said it would reschedule public meetings “due to overwhelming public interest.”
The three potentially impacted South Florida state parks — Dr. Von D. Mizell-Eula Johnson State Park in Dania Beach, Jonathan Dickinson State Park in Hobe Sound and Oleta River State Park in North Miami Beach — are home to a variety of flora and fauna, some of which the Federal and state government consider threatened.
Jonathan Dickinson State Park is made up of rolling scrub habitat — some of the last in Southeast Florida — and is at particular risk. The park is also home to threatened Florida scrub-jays and gopher tortoises. The DEP hopes to convert 1,000 acres of it’s wildlife habitat into three golf courses.
The Florida scrub-jay, listed as threatened on the Endangered Species list (and Florida’s only endemic bird), and the gopher tortoises, which the state lists as also threatened.
A threatened species is “likely to become an endangered species within the foreseeable future throughout all or a significant portion of its range,” according to the Endangered Species Act. Once a plant or animal is considered endangered, it is then in danger of extinction.
The state’s ambitious plans for Jonathan Dickinson and other parks raise questions about the impact of the development on threatened species.
Legal options
“There are numerous legal options that are on the table here,” said Jason Totoiu, an attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity. “From an environmental and wildlife standpoint, this implicates the Endangered Species Act in a multiple locations. … These projects threaten certain federally endangered species, really, at a kind of an unprecedented scale.”
Carlton Ward Jr./Courtesy
The East Loop Trail at Jonathan Dickinson State Park is an 9.8-mile trail that affords the opportunity to spot the endangered Florida scrub jay and endangered gopher tortoises. (Courtesy/Carlton Ward)
The Endangered Species Act includes provisions for threatened species, Totoiu said. He explained that under the act, a permit is needed to essentially alter an endangered species’ conditions, particularly in a way that could kill, harm or harass it.
In the case of Jonathan Dickinson, the DEP plan would require about 1,000 acres of scrub habitat to be transformed into three golf courses. That would result in the seizure of federally threatened scrub-jays, meaning the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service would have to issue a permit, Totoiu explained. But Totoiu said getting a permit would likely be an onerous task.
“I think that would be a great challenge because this is the largest population of scrub jays on protected lands in Southeast Florida,” he said.
Murky ‘process pieces’
When considering whether or not to grant a permit, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service considers how the proposed change could affect species’ survival and recovery, which includes how likely the plant or animal would be to get taken off the threatened or endangered species list, Totoiu said.
If, down the line, permits were granted, that could be reviewable in federal court, Totoiu said.
“It would be very likely you would see litigation if permits were issued for this. There’s such overwhelming opposition from environmental organizations and the general public statewide,” he said, adding: “Environmental organizations could bring suit to challenge issues of permits.”
The Environmental Defense Fund, which has historically taken legal action to create stronger environmental protections, could hypothetically be of those nonprofits to sue. But Florida director Dawn Shirreffs said a lot of steps have yet to be taken before potential litigation enters the picture.
She said the first step is employing feasibility analysis studies to understand not only the potential impact on threatened and endangered species, but also if the project would increase the risk from storm surge, sea level rise and hurricanes.
Shirreffs also noted how, if Great Outdoors is enacted, it would need funding, thus launching a legislative budget appropriation.
“There’s a lot of process pieces that are still really unclear,” she said. “But certainly if it is shown that there’s impacts to threatened and endangered species, water quality, flood risk, all of those things, then there’s potential that there’s risk there for that to be dealt with by folks who are interested in litigation, but it’s a little early to sort of go down that road.”
Relocation and displacement
The “Great Outdoors” plan could also affect threatened gopher tortoises, which have homes at state parks across Florida, including at Jonathan Dickinson State Park.
Leigh Ann Anderson, a wetland biologist certified by the state to work with gopher tortoises, said moving just one of these burrowing reptiles costs at least $6,000 because space at relocation sites is limited, which is one of her concerns about the initiative.
“The problem is we are rapidly developing all of these areas in Florida, and all of the gopher tortoises are being shipped to certain areas. So it’s definitely going to decrease the biodiversity in the park,” she said.
A gopher tortoise relocation often sets off a chain reaction of displacement. More than 300 species, such as the Eastern Indigo snakes, use gopher tortoise-made burrows, and are impacted if a tortoise is taken away, Anderson said.
“People go to state parks to enjoy wildlife, not pickleball or golf, that’s just not where it belongs,” she said.
Patrick Connolly/Orlando Sentinel
A gopher tortoise sticks its head out of a burrow. These reptiles are one of many species that could be impacted by the Great Outdoors initiative.
Local protection possible?
Local outcry over the plan has been sharp. But could a county or municipal government grant legal protection to a species or a place in Florida?
According to The Clean Waterways Act signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis in 2020, the answer is no: “The bill prohibits local governments from providing legal rights to any plant, animal, body of water, or other part of the natural environment unless otherwise specifically authorized by state law or the State Constitution.”
Florida International University College of Law assistant professor Alex Erwin, who teaches classes on environmental law, said that in countries like New Zealand, certain waterways and mountains have legal personhood.
In the U.S., the Endangered Species Act has been used as an “anti-development tool” in the past, Erwin said, but whether or not the Great Outdoors initiative violates it remains to be seen.
DEP announced Friday afternoon on X, formerly known as Twitter, that the public meetings for each of the nine affected state parks will no longer be held on Aug. 27 but rather during the week of Sept. 2 with official dates being “announced soon.”
This change came “due to overwhelming public interest,” DEP wrote in its post.
The agency also linked a webpage where people may submit comments about the Great Outdoors initiative.
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