EcoAction Alert


Overview of the 2024 Legislative Session

Release Date: 2024-04-01
Action Deadline: 2024-06-30

The 2024 Legislative Session concluded on March 8. As is the case after every session, the final results make for a mixed bag of wins and losses. They also provide some direction for goals we want to pursue during the 2025 session. If you want more information about any of the bills we discuss below, you can find the actual text of the bills, the analyses conducted by legislative staff, and the vote tallies by going to https://www.flsenate.gov/Senators and/or https://www.myfloridahouse.gov/Sections/Bills/bills.aspx . Each webpage includes a window at the top of the page where you can insert a bill number and then click on the “search” or “find” button. Find final summaries at: https://www.flsenate.gov/Committees/BillSummaries/2024/#EN

The Policy Committee appreciates the support FNPS members provided as we fought the bad bills, and expressed support for the good ones. We know the phone calls and emails our members shared with legislators in response to our action alerts made a difference, and extended the reach and influence of our FNPS Lobbyist, Travis Moore.

Wins

It is unfortunate that the most meaningful victories we can claim from the session are the successes we achieved in stopping bad legislation. We must also acknowledge that in most cases, FNPS spoke in unison with other conservation organizations. It’s easier to be heard when we all speak with one voice.

HB/789/SB 738: Environmental Management

  • Would have required that anyone who challenges a Department of Environmental Protection or Water Management District permitting decision pay the legal costs of the “prevailing party” upon losing the challenge.

  • Existing legal protections against frivolous lawsuits already allow a judge to require the reimbursement of legal fees in such cases.

  • The bill was a transparent attempt to prevent public participation in agency regulatory decisions by making it too cost-prohibitive to risk a loss in court.

  • Conservation groups were united in their opposition. FNPS submitted a letter to Senator Rodriquez, Chair of the Senate Environment and Natural Resources Committee, and issued an Action Alert.

  • The offending “fee shifting” provision was removed, and what remained of the bill eventually died.

The clincher to removing this provision from the bill may have been a letter submitted to FDEP by a coalition of conservation organizations – including FNPS - that warned the so-called “fee shifting” proposed by the bill would violate requirements of the federal Section 404 Clean Water Act Permitting Authority that had been awarded to the state several years ago. Section 404 permitting requires an opportunity for public participation, and “fee shifting” is considered an unacceptable barrier to participation.

FYI, in mid-session, a federal judge invalidated Florida’s Section 404 permitting authority due to failures to adequately protect endangered species through the Clear Water Act permitting process, and restored the authority to the US Army Corps of Engineers. You know Florida has descended into an ugly place when we must count on the ACOE to be a better protector of Florida’s wetlands, and wetland dependent endangered species, than our own state agencies.

SB 664/HB 527: Land and Water Management

Talk about a hodge-podge of wrong-headed ideas. This bill would have:

  • Mandated local governments that require the protection of buffers around wetlands to BUY the buffer from the landowner;

  • Preempted any local government authority to control dredge and fill activities;

  • Ended land management reviews on lands owned by water management districts.

The bill sponsors submitted a similarly horrendous bill last year, and it went nowhere. This one did not win any support and suffered the same well-deserved fate.

SB 1620: Surplus Lands

Surplus sales of conservation lands are, and should be, a difficult and contentious issue in Florida. State agencies can make a case that some of the lands they have purchased for conservation no longer merit protection, and can then sell the lands back into private ownership. The money generated by these sales must go back into the trust fund that finances the purchase of conservation lands to be used for new purchases. SB 1620 would have:

  • Allowed FDEP to sell conservation lands in the Florida Wildlife Corridor and retain a conservation easement that would allow the lands to be used for a variety of agricultural uses.

  • Money generated by the sale of fee title ownership would go to the Florida Department of Agriculture to fund the purchase of Rural and Family Lands Protection Program (RFL) easements designed to accommodate and perpetuate agricultural usage.

  • SB 1620 was a back-door approach to funding RFL by selling off lands already owned by the state

  • FNPS submitted a letter to the Senate Appropriations Committee on Agriculture, Environment and General Government that explained the basis for FNPS opposition, and coordinated a number of last-minute phone calls to members of the committee on the day it was to be heard.

  • FNPS Lobbyist Travis Moore put a face to our opposition in conversations with pivotal legislators and staffers, and the bill subsequently died when the committee refused to take it up for formal consideration.

Important context: FNPS is a supporter of the RFL Program because it is an effective complement to – not a replacement of – the Florida Forever Program. We advocated for awarding RFL $300 million in funding this year (more on conservation land funding later). A rigorous, science-based process is used by FDEP to vet the lands acquired through the Florida Forever program. The process ensures we are purchasing the right lands for conservation. SB 1620 would have bypassed any such process. Selling off conservation lands rich in natural resource values to finance the purchase of easements designed to perpetuate agriculture would corrupt both the Florida Forever and RFL land conservation programs.

HB 1641/SB 1126: Regulation of Auxiliary Containers

  • Would have prohibited local regulation of auxiliary containers and preempted such authority to the state.

  • “Auxiliary Containers” include bags, cups, bottles, cans and other containers made of cloth, plastic, glass, aluminum, polystyrene and cardboard.

  • Include containers made for transporting, consuming, or protecting merchandise, food or beverages from public food services or retailers.

  • Retroactive, so would preempt any existing regulations.

  • State Park and other locally-enacted rules, like those that prohibit taking single use containers (e.g., soda cans, water bottles) on rivers, would have been negated.

FNPS opposed this bill, which was apparently submitted by, and for, the manufacturers of such containers. Most of our partners in conservation also actively opposed it. The next time you kayak or hike in a state park or natural area where such containers are prohibited, take a moment to appreciate the absence of beer cans and soda bottles littering the submerged grassbeds and fringing wetlands. For now, the authority for public and private landowners to adopt such restrictions remains in place.

HB 1075/SB 1772: Soil and Water Conservation Districts

  • Would have dissolved 49 of the state’s soil and water conservation districts, and transferred all assets to the Florida Department of Agriculture.

  • Would have dissolved the other 9 soil and water conservation districts, and transferred all assets to the counties in which they are located.

  • Would replace the elected councils with Governing Boards appointed by the Commissioner of Agriculture to oversee a regional collection of similar districts.

  • The consolidated entities, under appointed leadership, would be responsible for developing BMP manuals, and advising on water management and BMAPs.

Some soil and water conservation districts are inactive or nonfunctional, so some degree of dissolution and/or consolidation may be justified. This legislation proposed an extreme, one-size-fits-all solution rather than a thoughtful realignment, and would have replaced the local representation and authority the districts provide with top-down Department of Agriculture control. Another example of legislative preemption of home rule authority.

CS/CS/HB 165: Sampling of Beach Waters and Public Bathing Spaces

  • Enhances provisions related to bacteriological sampling of beach waters and public bathing places.

  • Includes provisions for rule adoption and enforcement,

  • Addresses the issuance of health advisories and closure of beaches and public swimming areas.

  • Addresses notification and signage requirements.

FNPS Lobbyist Travis Moore played an active role in supporting this legislation, and its passage was a good thing for anyone who likes to visit our beaches and other surface water shorelines for swimming, fishing, or other recreating. It may help increase the attention required to rein in water pollution, which would benefit Florida’s aquatic and wetland plant communities. And inclusion of this bill in our report allows one of the “wins” we have listed to include an actual good bill that passed, as opposed to a bad bill that we helped stop.

Losses

HB 1581/SB 32: Mangrove Replanting and Restoration

FNPS was enthusiastically supportive of this bill, which would have required FDEP to adopt rules for mangrove replanting and restoration, including in:

    • Areas of Critical State Concern (e.g., Florida Keys and Indian River Lagoon).

    • Barrier islands and spoil islands.

    • Biscayne Bay as part of revitalization efforts.

    • An analysis to assess the potential for mangrove replanting to reduce homeowner’s insurance premiums was also an element of the bill.

Mangroves are effective at reducing coastal erosion and increasing the resilience of coastal ecosystems to sea level rise and storm-induced impacts. This bill would have complemented ongoing resiliency projects by promoting the “living shoreline” protection afforded by mangroves. Although the bill did not pass, we believe the support FNPS expressed helped set the stage for it to be considered again in 2025, and to be passed into law. That result would turn this loss into a win next year.

HB 1079/SB 298: Local Government Coastal Protections

This bill would have:

  • Allowed coastal counties to use Resilient Florida Grant funds to conduct saltwater intrusion vulnerability assessments.

  • Required DEP to update the statewide flood vulnerability and sea level rise data, and make all data and info available to the public.

  • Preempted the authority of local governments to regulate certain development seaward of the Coastal Construction Control Line.

This is another bill that we liked – except for the provision to preempt local government authority to control coastal development. The title of the bill was based on the offending provision. We supported the elements that would have promoted saltwater intrusion vulnerability studies because saltwater intrusion threatens not only our public water supply, but also brackish and freshwater wetlands along the coast and other native plant communities that are intolerant of salt. Demonstrating the vulnerability of our water sources to salt water intrusion would also have helped demonstrate the need for Florida to become proactive in addressing the causes of sea level rise – the greenhouse gas emissions that are at the root of climate change! FNPS issued an Action Alert expressing support for the elements we liked, while lobbying legislators to remove the “poison pill” provision. By the end of the session, we had succeeded in our efforts to remove the coastal development provisions; however, it was too late for final action to be scheduled, so the bill died. This is another bill that we believe is poised to be reintroduced, and passed, next year. In other words, this is another loss that may presage a win next year.

HB 1187/SB 1258: Carbon Sequestration

Florida has done very little to mitigate the impacts of climate change by addressing the CO2 emissions that serve as the main driver. This bill would have represented a small, positive step by exploring the potential for our agricultural industry to sequester CO2: It would have:

  • Created a Carbon Sequestration Task Force in FDEP and required reports to the FDEP Secretary, Governor and Cabinet.

  • Identified and inventoried agricultural lands capable of sequestering carbon.

  • Considered methods to increase the carbon sequestration potential of agricultural and silvicultural lands.

  • Identified funding mechanisms to encourage sequestration practices.

We are hopeful this bill, or something similar, will be submitted for consideration next year.

CS/CS/HB 1645: Energy Resources

Another bill universally reviled by our brothers and sisters in conservation, this bill passed easily through both the House and Senate, largely on “party line” votes. It has been sent to the Governor, and FNPS has submitted a letter asking Governor DeSantis to veto it. Among many other things, this bill would:

  • Enshrine into statute a fundamental re-framing of Florida’s approach to energy production and management by deleting references to climate change and any recognition of the need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

  • Delete current direction to state agencies, universities, colleges and local governments to consider fuel efficiency when procuring fleet vehicles under state purchasing plans.

  • Ban any future development of wind energy in Florida’s coastal waters or within 1 mile of any coastline.

  • Preempt local government authority to regulate the placement of liquified natural gas storge and distribution facilities (i.e., “resiliency facilities”) or promote inclusion of electric vehicle charging stations in future development.

This bill is another major power grab by the Legislature to preempt the home rule authority of county and municipal government, and to remove any recognition of the reality of climate change from the Florida Statutes. Even though there has been no meaningful development of wind energy in Florida, this bill would unilaterally bar if from ever being considered in Florida’s offshore state waters or within 1 mile of the coast. And when state agencies spend your tax dollars on new fleets of vehicles, they won’t be asked to give any thought to fuel efficiency. Huh? That is a small taste of a truly horrible bill that deserves an emphatic veto.

CS/HB 87: Taking of Bears, aka “Self Defense Act”

If you or a loved one are ever threatened by a black bear in Florida, current law allows use of lethal force to protect yourself. This bill would exempt individuals from any kind of penalty for using lethal force against a bear when under imminent threat of death, injury to persons or pets, or substantial damage to property, provided the bear was not intentionally lured with food. In other words, this is a bill in search of a problem. Motivated by a prevalence of nuisance bears in Franklin County, the actual problem is mismanagement of residential solid waste across most of the County. A more effective solution would be to simply ensure homeowners in Franklin use bear proof containers for their refuse. Coincidentally, the budget includes a line item that would award $683,500 to Franklin County to address this problem. FNPS is asking the Governor to veto this unnecessary bill, and to leave the funding for Franklin County in the budget.

Some Budget Items of Interest to FNPS

Florida Forever Program

$100 million

Rural and Family Lands Protection Program

$100 million

Florida Communities Trust

$15 million

Florida Recreational Development Assistance Program

$14.2 million

Florida Endangered Species Grants

$217,000

U of F Assessment of Ocklawaha restoration

$500,000

Franklin County Bear Resistant Refuse Residential Containers

$683,500

Resiliency Grants (Planning & Flooding/Sea Level Rise Projects)

$145 million

FNPS advocated for “full” funding of both the Florida Forever and Rural and Family Lands Protection programs. We submitted a letter to the members of legislative leadership, and issued two action alerts, in support of the funding. We consider full funding to be $300 million annually for each, based on the traditional amount allocated to Florida Forever every year from 1990 through 2008. The table above summarizes the amounts approved in the final budget. Note that one of the bills we celebrated from last year requires a minimum allocation of $100 million per year to Florida Forever – exactly the amount requested by the Governor and approved by the Legislature. So the approved funding can be described as legal, but not exactly generous or reflective of a sincere support for land conservation..

FNPS believes Florida must act with greater urgency to protect the most important remaining natural areas, particularly those parcels that are essential for maintaining functional connectivity within the Florida Wildlife Corridor. We believe Florida can afford to invest in conservation at a much higher level. More than $1 billion is deposited annually into the Land Acquisition Trust Fund from the excise taxes collected on sales of real estate. We believe, and will advocate for, additional staffing in FDEP’s Division of State Lands to ensure that staffing levels are sufficient to successfully complete approved Florida Forever land conservation projects in a timely fashion while still complying with the intensive vetting process and accountability measures required by statute. We will also advocate for more funding for endangered plant research grants.