Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis on Thursday signed new legislation directing hundreds of millions of dollars to environmental initiatives, including approximately $750 million in revenue shares his office estimates will come in annually from the Seminole Gaming Compact of 2021.
For this upcoming fiscal year, the new law, Senate Bill 1638, dedicates $100 million each for land management and land acquisitions within the state-designated Florida Wildlife Corridor, which DeSantis described Thursday as “if the state of Florida had a Central Park.”
Moving forward, after the upcoming fiscal year, SB 1638 dedicates ongoing, annual funding to both purposes: either to the tune of approximately 26% of compact revenues, or $100 million, whichever is less.
The $100 million confirmed for land acquisitions Thursday brings the upcoming fiscal year’s total state budget for land acquisition to at least $300 million. The General Appropriations Act also sets aside $100 million each for two flagship state land conservation programs, Florida Forever and Rural and Family Lands Protection.
That $300 million still falls short of the $500 million a year for conservation land protection recommended, as a minimum, in Agriculture 2040/2070, a report recently published by 1000 Friends of Florida and the University of Florida’s Center of Landscape Conservation Planning.
According to that report, farmland accounts for about a third of the land within the Florida Wildlife Corridor, or 5.8 million acres, and right now, most of it isn’t protected from future development.
In a statement, The Nature Conservancy in Florida’s executive director Greg Knecht celebrated the new legislation, writing that “Florida owns and manages more than five million acres, and with focused funding, the state can best steward that land for generations to come.”
Besides setting targets for the compact revenues, SB 1638 also provides $150 million for the South Florida Water Management District to study water quality in Lake Okeechobee and make necessary repairs and upgrades to the decades-old Central & Southern Florida (C&SF) Project.
A press release from the Governor’s Office provided this breakdown of compact revenue shares for the upcoming fiscal year:
- $100 million for land acquisitions within the Florida Wildlife Corridor to create crucial linkages for wildlife habitat
- $100 million for the management of uplands and the removal of invasive species, which includes:
- $36 million to the Department of Environmental Protection (FDEP)
- $32 million to the Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services (FDACS)
- $32 million to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC)
- $100 million for the Resilient Florida Grant Program, which will guard inland and coastal communities against the impacts of storm damage, surges, hurricanes and flooding
- $79 million for the Water Quality Improvement Grant Program
