complete agenda - Florida Department of Environmental Protection

ARC Summary August 13, 2010
would be more than happy to work on this with the guidance from the Department of State. Mr.
Stroh said that his department would be more than happy to provide that guidance.
Mr. Ballard inquired whether ARC wanted any more discussion before he asked for public
comment. Mr. Green wondered why it didn’t get included in the legislation. Was there just not
enough representation from the Department of State for doing this originally? Dr. Brock said he
didn’t know who from Department of State looked at the legislation, but when the Division of
State lands looked at it, it didn’t rise to a level of attention or significance because of the
inclusion of the word “consider,” it was believed that ARC could have the opportunity to do
multiple things including create an Impasse category. The Division felt as though there was
flexibility and that the law was giving general guidance and that the decision would rest with this
Council in terms of what categories to have and how to divide them. He went on to say,
however, that legal counsel said that was not an accurate representation of what could be done.
The work plan has to include those categories that were described in the law. ARC can add to
that, but can’t change the criteria established for existing categories.
Mr. Stroh asked about the next steps to accomplishing this, for bringing it forward for action. Do
the two departments work together to come up with a proposal? Dr. Brock responded that he
would consult with Mr. Wisenbaker and they would try and identify projects and the criteria to
establish the list of projects. At the next meeting, perhaps that list could be presented to ARC
for potential ranking in December. Mr. Stroh said that would be great and that he and Mr.
Wisenbaker were there to help.
Mr. Ballard said it sounds like ARC is going down a particular path and that more information
will be available at the next ARC meeting. He asked for any other comments from ARC so that
staff could be sure they were going down the correct path. Mr. Reecy responded that as ARC
considers this at this next meeting, he thought it important to vet the criteria itself for how the
projects are picked for the category balancing what Dr. Brock had already mentioned about the
other attributes. Mr. Ballard summarized by saying staff would work with the Department of
State and come back with an agenda item in October.
Public Comments and ARC Response on Spreadsheet
Mr. George Willson spoke and said that like Dr. Brock he had been involved in this program for
a long time dating back to the mid 70’s and the Environmentally Endangered Lands Program.
He had seen many numerical models tried. When the CARL (Conservation and Recreation
Lands) Program began in the late ‘70’s, the Department had a new secretary who was an
engineer and architect and an attorney who tried to come up with a numerical model but nothing
has really worked as well the knowledge of the individual voters. Dr. Brock called it a bias; he
thought it really is site knowledge, especially the agencies that have field staff. He said in
numerous ways he’s worked with private lands and knows most of these projects. If you know
most of these lands, you realize there are apples and oranges issues – the amount of
knowledge known about each of these places. Florida has one of the best heritage programs –
natural areas inventory – in the country. It always has been since its creation in 1980 but they
have not been funded to get out on a lot of these tracts. The analysis on each of these tracts
varies greatly. If you are a worshipper of known data and take that data to come up with a
numerical ranking system, it is, as Dr. Frederick said, an apples and oranges [analysis] for all
these places. Where a lot of data is known is from public lands.
He said he guaranteed that there were private lands with an amazing array of special natural
areas, species and habitats that are not on our heritage list. They are known to some agency
staff because he sees them out on these properties all the time but they are not turning over
private data. He said in about two months ARC should get an example of that in regards to a
very large area in the Panhandle because of a lawsuit and discovery. One will get an amazing
array of site data – an inventory, an archeological study. It will be one of the best examples of
what is still out there. He just cautioned ARC whenever they used any of these ranking
systems, even one as good as Dr. Brock has gotten this one and this is an amazing outcome
using existing knowledge, to ask a lot of questions about each of these sites.
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