When the Florida Water and Land Conservation Initiative first made it to the 2014 ballot, I would've bet my last dollar that by nowit would be about as popular as earthquake insurance.But, boy, would I have lost that bet.
By all accounts, Amendment 1 is beloved across the Sunshine State. Voters of all political stripes, all demographic categories, break in favor of the measure that will require no less than 33 percent of net revenue from the existing excise tax on documents be spent on conservation for the next 20 years.
How did such a fiscal powder keg win so much approval? Even a poll by the Florida Chamber of Commerce, which opposes Amendment 1, gives the amendment 78 percent approval.
In more than a year, the only question a curious voter asked me is, "Is this initiative a tax?" When I said no, it's not, his reply was, "OK, then, I'm good with it."
Where the amendment had the force of 1 million signatures in a petition drive to get it on the ballot, it had absolutely no organized opposition. None of Florida's cooler heads ever launched a "No on 1" campaign -- or formed a committee to talk to editorial boards around the state about the rest of the story. The lofty ballot language evokes images of something that will save us from ourselves, save us from future growth, save the creatures we love and the life forces in the land.
I wish it would do those things. I might be a little more disposed to vote for it.
The amendment tells us the money must be spent to "acquire, restore, improve, and manage conservation lands including wetlands and forests; fish and wildlife habitat; lands protecting water resources and drinking water sources, including the Everglades, and the water quality of rivers, lakes, and streams; beaches and shores; outdoor recreational lands; working farms and ranches; and historic or geologic sites."
Who doesn't love the good, clean sound of all that? When I read it, I feel as if I just took a bath.
But the small print isn't there.
This amendment can provide the money, but unfortunately it doesn't wave a magic wand so we are somehow oblivious to political pressure and make wise land-buy and land-use decisions. The more money we have to spend, the easier it is to mishandle and misrepresent our needs. I believe that.
If I know anything after living more than 30 years in Florida, I know how many times I've seen government spend money on land only to have it "repurposed" through political change on the local level. I saw millions of dollars in oceanfront property in Martin County bought specifically for a state park that never materialized because politicians decided if we build it, they will come.
I've seen hundreds of acres of land bought to help create a path for animals to move through otherwise developed land in Central Florida -- instead repurposed by squabbling local politicians and complicit legislators.
Most recently, I saw Treasure Coast residents with a fouled St. Lucie estuary and Indian River Lagoon who think sewage runoff in their drinking supply either isn't a problem at all, or is somebody else's fault and somebody else's problem. If this amendment passes, where will the resolve come from for communities to help solve problems partly of their own making?
I also fear that so much money available for land purchase -- according to state revenue estimates, $650 million in the first year, growing to more than $1.2 billion by the 20th year -- presents finger-lickin' opportunities for all kinds of get-rich-quick scoundrels to engage in fraudulent practices. No need for the Land Acquisition Trust Fund to budget more than roughly. All it has to do is stay within its hundreds of millions allocation for 12 months, then the slate is wiped clean again.
This isn't the way government is supposed to work.
Florida has a budget process. Good times or bad, the state anticipates its revenue, assesses its shortfall and shortcomings from the previous year, and through legislative committees and subcommittees, priorities for spending take shape. Those who believe they belong higher on the priority list do their homework, get off their backsides and get to Tallahassee to push their case.
Force-feeding the Florida Constitution with a single priority among dozens -- among hundreds, no doubt -- is the consummate unbalancing act. It demeans the Constitution and shortchanges the people of Florida.The Constitution is Florida's framework for governing. It is not meant to circumvent the lawmaking process.
One percent of the state budget sounds harmless. It isn't. It represents money for many programs that will go begging, sending legislators to raid other trust funds. In bad times, those programs could even be killed, because one thing is sure if Amendment 1 passes: The Constitution will require one-third of doc-stamp proceeds to be spent on land purchase. Money can never be diverted from the Land Acquisition Trust Fund.
During the petition drive in 2012, Sen. Joe Negron, R-Stuart, about to be named appropriations chairman, called the budding Amendment 1 "the wrong way for government to work."
Negron told Sunshine State News, "A constitution grants authority to the government and sets out how it will operate. It isn't there to be used as a budgeting tool. The last time we did something like this petition drive calls for was when we put the classroom-size amendment in the Constitution and made it the law of the land and ended up building schools we didn't need.
"To be honest," he said, "if we hadn't put the class-size amendment in the Constitution, there might have been more money for land buys and environmental programs."
There are so many trouble-intangibles with Amendment 1. There's the amount of land in 20 years that will come off the tax rolls. There's the glut of property in state ownership today -- much of it, as in Jacksonville, that the city doesn't want. There's the lack of budgeted funds to maintain and manage what we've got already. And there's the possibility it could all backfire -- that legislators could turn their backs on environmental needs with the weight of other issues, saying the Land Acquisition Trust fund is taking care of conservation needs.
Yes, we do need to focus on the quantity and quality of water in Florida's springs, lakes, rivers, lagoons, estuaries and the Everglades, on which one in three people depend for drinking water. But honestly, Amendment 1 isn't the way to do it.
Reach Nancy Smith at nsmith@sunshinestatenews.com or at 228-282-2423. Twitter: @NancyLBSmith
