The Sawgrass Rebellion-- Article in Ft. Myers, FL News-Press- Property rights battle looms

Headquarters, The Sawgrass Rebellion | 09-04-02 | PAMELA SMITH HAYFORD

[backhoe]

 

----- Original Message -----

From: "Headquarters, The Sawgrass Rebellion" <sawgrassrebellion@getnaples.com>

To: <sawgrassrebellion@getnaples.com>

Sent: Wednesday, September 04, 2002 4:20 PM

Subject: Article in Ft. Myers, FL News-Press

> Property rights battle looms
>
> By PAMELA SMITH HAYFORD, phayford@news-press.com
> <mailto:phayford@news-press.com>
>
> Southwest Florida landowners are calling in the cavalry - farmers, ranchers,
> homeowners from as far away as Oregon, California and Ohio.
> They're called The Sawgrass Rebellion.
> Some environmentalists here call them ringers.
> Whatever these folks are called, thousands of them are forming caravans
> through 23 states to help property owners in Miami-Dade, Collier and
> possibly Lee counties fight to keep their land from illegal government
> takings, organizers say.
> State and local governments have environmental projects in the Golden Gate
> Estates area of Collier that The Sawgrass Rebellion says illegally take
> property.
> WHO TO CONTACT  Find out more about The Sawgrass Rebellion and its rally
> online at its Web site: www.sawgrassrebellion.org
> <http://www.sawgrassrebellion.org> There will be an entry fee that hasn't
> been determined.  The proceeds will go to the people in South Florida and
> Klamath Falls whose property is being taken, organizers said.
> The group is looking into another project in East Bonita that may be added
> to the group's list of causes.
> The Sawgrass Rebellion is backed by the Paragon Foundation of Alamogordo,
> N.M. Paragon touts itself as the largest property rights organization in the
> country.
> Some 700 other groups have pledged support, said J. Zane Walley of Paragon.
> Walley left his New Mexico home and shed his Stetson hat and cowboy boots
> for South Florida polo shirts and loafers to help with the protest.
> Property owners here invited him.
> After talking with a scientist and residents who oppose the Everglades
> restoration projects that will force some people from their homes, and after
> seeing Everglades destruction firsthand, Walley set up shop in a Collier
> developer's office just south of Bonita Beach to investigate further.
> "It seems like civil rights have been taken away here," Walley said with a
> cowboy twang. His speech is peppered with gollys and gals. "How can you not
> take on a fight like this?"
> Walley intends to give Collier County a new name to the rest of the
> country - "the unconstitutional zone of America."
> The South Florida fight isn't just a regional issue. Governments are taking
> land across the country, Walley said, and people are fed up.
> "This is not a small-time game down here," Walley added. "If they can do it
> to these folks, can they do it to anyone else?"
> Sharon Votaw, a farmer in Tracy, Calif., is organizing a Sawgrass Rebellion
> rally there for when the caravan passes through Sept. 29.
> "Their issues are very similar to our issues," Votaw said. "And we have a
> lot of the same playmates."
> Two caravans will start in Klamath Falls, Ore., and Columbus, Ohio, and wind
> through 23 states until they reach Tallahassee on Oct. 15 for the first
> Florida rally. There are more caravans in the works.
> After they arrive in Tallahassee, the caravans will head to Southwest
> Florida for an Oct. 17-18 rally.
> The last leg will be a parade across Alligator Alley to Homestead on Oct.
> 19.
> The organizers are still looking for a rally location in Collier.
> The pro-property group was trying to get permission to gather at the county
> fairgrounds but was denied.
> "We're being blocked at every move by Collier County," Walley said. "We're
> looking at two more locations right now."
> Paragon has intervened in other property fights, including Klamath Falls,
> where the group rallied for farmers when the government shut off irrigation
> water to protect an endangered sucker fish.
> Some 25,000 people showed up at a rally there and eventually the water was
> turned back on.
> "That's how desperate people have gotten," Walley said.
> Two projects targeted
> He said the property rights advocates don't want to destroy the Everglades
> and don't believe leaving the landowners alone would do that.
> The government is not only illegally taking land, Walley said, but for a
> project that won't save the Everglades. He cites scientists who have
> publicly spoken out against the project in a Washington Post article and a
> biologist who lives in the Everglades.
> The Sawgrass Rebellion is targeting two 'Glades projects. One is the
> restoration of water flow through southern Golden Gate Estates and the other
> is an area dubbed the 8.5-Square-Mile Area west of Miami.
> The group is also protesting Collier's Regional Offsite Mitigation Area in
> northern Golden Gate Estates and the county's program to transfer
> development rights in a 15,000-acre area west of that.
> The not-for-profit The 15,000 Coalition Inc. executive director Don Lester -
> who offered to share his office with Walley - is fighting for landowners'
> rights, including his, in the latter project.
> As CEO of a land acquisition company called Century Holdings of Collier
> County LTD, Lester buys land for groups of people.
> Lester said that after the state Land Acquisition Advisory Council's 1994
> decision that the 15,000-acre area wasn't suitable for a preserve, he went
> forward with purchases thinking he was buying land in an area safe from
> government takings.
> Then Collier County changed the rules, Lester said, to allow no more than
> one house per parcel up to 40 acres, meaning that an owner could build only
> one house whether the land was 2.5 acres or 40 acres.
> Although the county set up a program that allows owners to sell their
> development rights, Lester said it's a taking because there's no market for
> the rights.
> "Golly darn, he's a landowner, too," Walley said. "Yes, he is trying to
> develop the area." But he added, "if he wins that means the small folks win.
> That's why I'm here."
> 11th-hour effort?
> Cindy Kemp, who asked Walley to come to Southwest Florida, is one of the
> regular residents Walley is talking about. She formed the Property Rights
> Action Committee to protest the very same projects.
> "We just want to live our lives on our property that we've paid our taxes
> for," Kemp said.
> The rebellion might also end up rallying for Lee County's East Bonita
> residents who have been fighting the taking of their land for a wetlands
> restoration project by the South Florida Water Management District.
> Walley said he is talking with residents there.
> Water managers said their projects are imperative to Everglades restoration.
> "Certainly all the research that we've done indicates that restoration of
> this area is crucial to protecting the water resources of the Big Cypress
> and it's an important component to the Everglades restoration," district
> spokesman Kurt Harclerode said.
> The district has bought about 80 percent of the East Bonita area.
> Erin Deady of the National Audubon Society said she understands the property
> rights concerns but said Everglades restoration can't be done without this
> land.
> "You can't achieve Everglades restoration if it's only based on undeveloped
> land that people are willing to sell. Science doesn't work that way," Deady
> said.
> The rebellion hasn't been in South Florida long enough to understand the
> issues here, Deady said. "They're just swooping in at the 11th hour."
> The group represents only a small minority of landowners, Deady said, and a
> lawsuit by some of the Miami-area owners is bringing restoration to a
> grinding halt because it can't proceed without this part resolved.
> Walley's heard the criticisms, and he's been called a radical.
> "We don't hurt people. Do I look like a radical?" Walley said with a John
> Wayne smile. "We are hard-hitting."
> news-press.com <http://www.news-press.com> does not endorse external sites
> nor is it responsible for their content.
>
>

[MonroeDNA]

South Florida bump!

[backhoe]

Thanks for looking!

TripleA, I meant to flag you earlier...

[Darth Sidious]

Some environmentalists here call them ringers.

When environmentalists converge from distant points, they're called "conscientious".

When property-rights supporters converge from distant points, the environmentalists call them "ringers".

This is a fine example of what the Polish call "chutzpah".

[backhoe]

When environmentalists converge from distant points, they're called "conscientious".

Yes, the Spin Cycle never stops, does it?