Media Release

October 26, 2007

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

CONTACTS:

Marcy LaHart, Esq.
Counsel to Pelican Island Audubon Society and Friends of St. Sebastian River
561-655-9537
Cell Phone 561-358-5436

Richard Baker, President
Pelican Island Audubon Society
772-567-3520
Cell Phone 772-532-2489

WATER MANAGEMENT DISTRICT OPPOSES CONSIDERATION OF ITS OWN REPORT REGARDING CONTROVERSIAL SAND LAKES TRACT

Conservation groups and Indian River County, all of whom have asked the Governor and Cabinet to reconsider the exchange of a 1,265 acre parcel of public land, have encountered an unexpected hurdle from the District. The District is trying to prevent the consideration of one of its own reports from 2001 concerning the environmental value of the parcel in question.

On September 11, 2007, the District's Governing Board approved the exchange of the Sand Lakes Tract for a smaller parcel owned by the Pat Corrigan Family Partnership and Hugh Corrigan Family Partnership. As part of the land swap the District will also pay $657,300 in cash to the Corrigan family in exchange for not pursuing a threatened lawsuit that claims that the District's operation of the Blue Cypress Water Management Area is making the Corrigan's land wetter.

After that meeting, Kathy Wegel, a member of the Friends of the St. Sebastian River, which joined Pelican Island Audubon Society in filing the petition for review, discovered the District's own report, Technical
Publication SJ2001-3, entitled ASSESSING THE POTENTIAL OCCURRENCE OF RARE, THREATENED, AND ENDANGERED SPECIES IN THE UPPER ST. JOHNS RIVER BASIN written by the District's own scientists, Marc C. Minno, Ph.D., Steven J. Miller, and Kimberli J. Ponzio
(http://sjr.state.fl.us/technicalreports/tpubs1.html#2001).

The report found that although the Sand Lakes tract is relatively small in comparison to other areas that were examined, because of the variety of different types of habitat, the Sand Lakes Tract could be very important for
some wildlife species. "The report should have been provided to the Governing Board before they were asked to vote on whether the Sand Lakes Tract was needed for conservation purposes," said Richard Baker, President of Pelican Island Audubon Society, whose group filed one of the two petitions asking the Governor and Cabinet to review the land swap that transferred the 1,265 acres to private ownership. "Instead, the Governing Board was told that the Sand Lake Tract was not environmentally unique. That is simply untrue."

Because the report was not discovered until after the Governing Board meeting, the environmental groups acting on behalf of the public and Indian River County, which also filed a petition for review, filed a joint motion to supplement the record that will be provided to the Governor and Cabinet, asking that the technical report be included. "Clearly the report has relevant information that should have been considered" said Marcy LaHart, Esq., the West Palm Beach Attorney representing Pelican Island Audubon Society and Friends of the St. Sebastian River. "And given that it is the District's own document, we are somewhat surprised that they are so adamantly opposed to it being provided to the Governor and Cabinet. The St. Johns River Water Management District not only opposed our request to supplement the record, they even opposed us attaching a copy of the report to the motion. My clients want the best available scientific data regarding the conservation value of the Sand Lakes Tract to be taken into account. The stakes here are very high as the decision to divest the public of its ownership of the Sand Lakes Tract places all our public lands in jeopardy."

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