Florida Republican officials are challenging rural boundaries within the state's counties.
Orange County voters decided to limit overdevelopment in rural areas in 2024, which has led to a major court challenge by builders there.
"Developers have long hated this idea of a rural boundary because it pushes back on them," said David Bear, an attorney and president of the nonprofit Save Rural Seminole.
Voters in Seminole County approved of their rural boundary back in 2004, and they reaffirmed it last year at a margin of 74%.
Forests store or sequester a lot of climate-warming emissions, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture's website.
"Nationwide, USDA Greenhouse Gas Inventories indicate that forests, urban trees, and harvested wood account for the majority of natural sinks of carbon dioxide," the USDA says.
Letters on letters
As a long-time resident, Bear said folks in Seminole want this boundary, but state Sen. Jonathan Martin, R-Fort Myers, doesn't agree.
He sent a letter to the state's attorney general, James Uthmeier, asking about the legality of the rural classifications in Seminole and Orange counties - over 200 miles away from the area he represents.
We reached out to Sen. Martin via email and phone, but his office hasn't answered. Bear questioned Martin’s motives.
"Why is a Lee County State Senator going out there and meddling with us in Seminole County?" he asked.
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Greg Slemp, general counsel for the Attorney General’s Office, responded to Sen. Martin with his own letter, saying the localized limits may go too far under federal and state laws; therefore, he thinks they’re likely unconstitutional.
“The property restrictions on rural landowners in Seminole and Orange counties could very well constitute a regulatory taking under the Federal and Florida Constitutions,” Slemp’s letter said. “In addition, it is the opinion of this office that the charter amendments of Seminole County and Orange County in designating certain large portions of land as rural likely violate the Bert Harris Act.”
A “regulatory taking” is when a government rule is so restrictive that it takes away economic use or value, potentially leading to "just compensation” from the government. And Florida’s Bert Harris Act involves the protection of private property rights.
Bear responded to the original penman, Sen. Martin, with – surprise – a letter challenging the opinion of the Attorney General’s Office.
“Neither Seminole nor Orange’s Rural Boundaries took any rights from the landowners,” Bear’s letter said. “Neither Rural Boundary changed the land use rights which the owners had at the time they were enacted. Each landowner can still build to the same density they could at the time the Rural Boundaries were enacted.”
He also pointed to a few failed lawsuits by developers against the boundary.
Florida’s preemption trend
Bear said he has no doubt these boundaries are legal both statewide and federally.
"What I do have doubt about is whether politicians can convince legislators in Tallahassee to preempt what our citizens and our local officials have done," he said.
The attorney general's letter doesn't take action, but Bear fears this could pave the way for preemptive legislation down the line.
“For 30 years, the legislators in Tallahassee and the Republican Party … told us that home rule was a really good idea and that we should allow counties and cities to manage local issues,” Bear said. “Now that Republicans are in charge in Tallahassee, they've forgotten all about that, and they've decided that their donors and friends, they can use their power to help out.”
There are currently six bills this legislative session that Bear said aim to “preempt local conservation and growth regulations.” Those are:
- SB 208 would prohibit local governments from denying or delaying residential development based on whether the location is near an existing residential property.
- SB 354 says 10,000 acres or more could override existing land-use or zoning designations.
- SB 548 could make local governments prove extraordinary circumstances before raising impact fees.
- SB 588 would prohibit local governments from taking arbitrary or unreasonable enforcement.
- SB 686 would allow areas designated as agricultural enclaves to develop single-family homes and can be approved with no public input.
- And finally, SB 718 would prohibit local governments from passing laws or regulations for wetlands, water quality, pollution control, and discharge prevention.
Conservation easements
Dean Saunders, a current land broker and a former state lawmaker, said when restrictions on development are done at the local level, it's a temporary solution.
"Philosophies, and emphasis, changes ... that can happen in these county commissions ... so suddenly I've gone from anti-development to now I'm super pro-growth," Saunders said.
In his opinion, state and federal conservation easements are more permanent – it’s when landowners volunteer to limit future development on their property through legally binding agreements.
Saunders was actually behind Florida’s legislation on conservation easements back in the ‘90s.
“Seminole County does have a land acquisition program, so it'd be great see them focus on buying some conservation easements,” Saunders said. “The landowner continues to own the land ... the public gets it protected … and it stays stimulating the economy.”
Bear said locally designated rural boundaries and conservation easements are both good tools for land management.
“It's sort of like saying, if you like chocolate cake, and you like steak, you can only have one or the other. That's not true,” Bear said. “You can have steak for dinner and then you can have chocolate cake … they're both good things to eat.”
