Judge throws out challenge to Fla. beach driving

ASSOCIATED PRESS

ORLANDO, Fla. - A judge has thrown out an environmental challenge to beach driving in Volusia County but said a new version of the lawsuit could be filed after the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service rules on the county's 25-year permit request.

"It's a huge legal win," Volusia Assistant County Attorney Jamie Seaman said after Tuesday's ruling. "There has been constant kibitzing on how the county runs the beach. We're constantly under scrutiny and attack."

Sea turtle activist Shirley Reynolds and New Smyrna Beach condominium resident Robert Godwin, who claimed beach motorists were harming five species of endangered sea turtles and a protected shorebird, have not decided whether to appeal the 35-page ruling by U.S. District Judge Gregory A. Presnell.

In the sharply worded order, he rejected some of the claims as invalid, decided some were outside his jurisdiction and ruled others should be decided by the federal wildlife agency.

The plaintiffs "seem to believe that what is 'necessary' for (endangered) species is procedural quagmires, uncompromising administrative oversight and scorched-earth litigation," the judge wrote. "That is not so, if for no other reason, because Congress has not mandated such an utter waste of resources."

Cars have been driving on the sands of Daytona Beach and others in the county for more than a century, and the tradition of beach racing helped give birth to NASCAR.

After Reynolds filed a similar lawsuit in 1995, Volusia created a turtle rehabilitation center, agreed to monitor nesting beaches and tightened enforcement of beach lighting rules.

Flagler County settled a similar lawsuit last year rather than fight.

Fair Use Disclaimer

The Pelican Island Audubon Society web site, www.pelicanislandaudubon.org, is a nonprofit, noncommercial web site that, at times, may contain Copyrighted material that have not always been specifically authorized by the Copyright owner. The Society makes such material available in its efforts to advance the understanding of issues related to Florida’s natural environment in hopes of helping to find solutions for those problems. It believes that this constitutes a “fair use” of any such Copyrighted material as provided for in Section 107 of the US Copyright Law. Persons wishing to use Copyrighted material from this site for purposes of their own that go beyond “fair use” must first obtain permission from the copyright owner.

All articles are copyrighted by the respective newspapers.