St. Joe development plans hit federal wall

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St. Joe development plans hit federal wall

PANAMA CITY, Fla. -- Nov. 16, 2005 -- Opponents of the St. Joe Co. plans for development in Bay and Walton counties claimed a victory last week with a ruling that freezes a federal permit allowing development on part of a large chunk of Panhandle land.

 

In Jacksonville on Thursday, U.S. District Judge Timothy Corrigan issued a preliminary injunction against the use of a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' general permit for development by the St. Joe Co. on any of its 48,150 acres in Bay and Walton counties.

 

The ruling stops, for now, work on a 1,300-home golf course development -- WaterSound North -- in Walton County.

 

In June 2004, the Corps issued the permit providing front-end permission and guidelines for wetland destruction during development in the Lake Powell, Choctawhatchee Bay and West Bay watersheds.

 

The St. Joe Co., which acted as an intervenor in the lawsuit, owns about 75 percent of the permitted land, historically used for pine tree production.

 

The permit allows development on 30 percent of the area covered and limits wetland destruction to no more than 1,500 acres for the entire parcel.

 

The Sierra Club and the Natural Resources Defense Council, complainants in the suit, say St. Joe's plans to build commercial and residential developments under the permit violate provisions of the Clean Water Act. Judge Corrigan agreed.

 

Under the Clean Water Act, Corrigan wrote, the Corps must issue an individual permit to discharge dredged or fill materials into navigable waters unless the various developments are subject to a general permit and "similar in nature."

 

But the permit outlines too wide an array of allowable residential and commercial developments, Corrigan wrote, all falling under the catch-all description of "suburban development" -- and not likely similar enough, he said.

 

"The projects will include everything from housing developments to commercial and industrial operations," said Lesley Blackner, attorney for the Florida Chapter of the Sierra Club. "And the impacts of destroying many acres of wetlands at a time can hardly be called minimal."

 

The Clean Water Act also allows general permits only if they cause minimal adverse environmental impacts. Because the adverse impacts could not be determined prior to the permit's issuance but are assessed during a post-permit process, Corrigan wrote, the preliminary finding is that the permit does not comply with the Clean Water Act.

 

The important message the ruling sends is that the years-long "closeddoor" dealings between St. Joe and the Corps were deemed unacceptable to the public, said Linda Young of the Clean Water Network, a group that also opposed the permit.

 

"They could've saved themselves a lot of grief by not being so arrogant and thinking they could have their own little private arrangement and to heck with the Clean Water Act," Young said. "I hope the message they get is that this is not just about them, that the public has rights and we plan to exercise those rights."

 

The purpose and circumstances surrounding the permit were hardly sinister, according to St. Joe Co. spokesman Jerry Ray.

 

"The main goal of this was to protect the wetlands first," Ray said. "An individual permit by nature is piecemeal in its approach. If turning back a process that puts the environment first is a victory -- I just don't know."

 

Corrigan's ruling was on a "technical issue," Ray said, and the general permit was not a unilateral effort by the company and the Corps. The permit's framework, he said, was established after years of negotiations on a companion state agreement between St. Joe, the Corps, the U.S. Department of Fish and Wildlife, the Florida Department of Environmental Protection and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

 

"Those were the agencies involved who came up with the environmental framework that protected, out in front and ahead of development, roughly 33,000 acres," Ray said. "The regional general permit is one way to implement that framework."

 

Judge Corrigan, Ray said, noted in his ruling that the individual permitting process remains available.

 

"The judge is not talking about stopping anything, he's talking about how something is going to be permitted," Ray said.

 

Corrigan said in his decision that, while St. Joe and the Corps "espouse their good faith in trying to bring a cohesive environmental approach to the inevitable development of a large tract in Northwest Florida," the general permit's application does not "meet the requirements of existing law." Ray said the ramifications of the judge's ruling remain unclear.

 

However, the ruling will not prevent or delay the Corps from issuing a permit to relocate the Panama City-Bay County International Airport to West Bay since the proposed site is north of the regional general permit area, said Kevin O'Kane, chief of the north permits section for the Corps' Jacksonville District.

 

The ruling halts only one project in Bay County: a proposal by St. Joe to extend Pier Park Road northward, according to O'Kane. The Corps had not completed review of that request for compliance under the regional permitting terms.

 

In early October, the Corps had authorized a mixed-use residential and commercial development called Water-Sound North in Walton County, but the judge's ruling stops work on that, O'Kane said.

 

Although the Wild Heron subdivision in Bay County abuts Lake Powell, which is within the regional permit area, it predates issuance of the regional permit, so there is no effect from the injunction, he said.

 

The final phase of Wild Heron has received a development order, said Martin Jacobson, Bay County planning and zoning division manager. Wild Heron plat developments were reviewed individually, O'Kane said.

 

Conversely, the regional permit would have allowed St. Joe or another landowner in the permitting boundary to fill in wetlands under one set of guidelines. The landowner would avoid having to obtain federal permits on a project-by-project basis and gathering public comment.

 

In the Corps' defense, O'Kane said Tuesday, "We thought it was a well thought-out tool for looking at projects from a watershed perspective rather than a project-by-project basis."

 

The watersheds concerned in Bay County are Lake Powell and West Bay, he added. With comprehensive guidelines for filling wetlands, "you can mitigate on a larger scale."

 

Both sides of the issue were ordered to hold mediation sessions in December prior to a hearing for a permanent injunction scheduled for Feb. 16.

 

� 2005, The News Herald, Panama City, Fla., Ryan Burr and Valerie Lovett. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.