submitted by the Team At Keep Clermont Rural
Friends,
The Green swamp is facing its greatest threat yet and we need your help!
In two days, this Tuesday, February 23, 2021, the Central Florida Sand Mining Association will be back again in front of the County Commission asking to change our Comprehensive Plan in order to allow them to mine every square inch of land they currently own or acquire within the Green Swamp. Currently, they can mine anywhere between 10 to 40% of the land they own (unless grandfathered in before the current Comprehensive Plan was written), but the rest must be maintained in its natural state. Through a Comprehensive Plan Amendment, they would like to mine 100% of their land as long as they agree to only do it in increments of 10% at a time. With this change they could conceivably purchase and mine every square inch of the Green Swamp – the source of our drinking water!
Most of you already understand the importance of the Green Swamp – we have provided additional detail below for those that are not familiar with this issue. Suffice it to say that Mr. Ron Hart Jr., Director of our own Lake County Water Authority, stated that “Potential impacts to the Clermont Chain and their associated watersheds should be clearly identified prior to any major modifications to land use”.
We urge you to use your voice TODAY to encourage your elected officials to vote NO on amending the Comprehensive Plan to relax restrictions on mining in the Green Swamp by clicking on this link to email your County Commissioners! If you have trouble getting the link to work, you can send a manual email to:
Commissioner Shields – DShields@lakecountyfl.gov
Commissioner Campione – LCampione@lakecountyfl.gov
Commissioner Parks – SParks@lakecountyfl.gov
Commissioner Smith – KSmith@lakecountyfl.gov
Commissioner Blake – JBlake@lakecountyfl.gov
You may also attend the meeting where this will be heard on February 23, 2021 at 9 am:
In person at 315 Main Street, Tavares, Florida (the Round building – free parking garage across the street)
Online by clicking this link
Select the Zoom link if you wish to ask a question or make a statement, or the LakeFrontTV link if you want to observe the full proceedings
Here is the additional background information for those that wish to read further:
This is an incredibly dangerous proposal for the Green Swamp and the sensitive ecosystems it represents. The Green Swamp has been designated an area of critical state concern because it is the primary recharge area for our aquifer. The sand within the Green Swamp acts as a filter media for our water before it enters the aquifer. Allowing an industry to remove the entirety of such a precious resource simply because the land is cheap and the source is convenient would be an insult not only to our region but our children and future generations to come.
There are currently 8000 acres of mines in the Green Swamp which pre-date the limitations in the Comprehensive Plan. That means that those 8000 acres can be mined in their entirety under the current regulations. The pending application, if approved by the Commission, will allow them to fully mine the rest of their current holdings – PLUS the entirety of any future lands they purchase. Or to put it another way, this application makes land in the Green Swamp more valuable for sand mining than it is for people who want to raise a family or build a home – who would still be limited to responsible limits.
The Sand Mining Association will be presenting a parade of experts to portray their plan as responsible and sound. But are we really ready to believe that industry can care for sensitive ecosystems better than mother nature? We only need to look as far as the Everglades to see what happened there, or more recently to the floods in Houston that were caused by development and drainage systems that were also designed by experts who thought they could do it better than nature. The reality is that science constantly evolves, but once we realize that a mistake was made there will be no second chance or do-over for the Green Swamp. If we destroy our resources today they are gone forever.
We need your help to demand that our County DENY this application and protect the Green Swamp as the critical resource that it is. If the Comprehensive Plan is changed to allow broader mining, then any disputes in the future will become legal challenges as the rules will have been written, and the mining interests will have grounds to sue over any future attempts to stop them. Today, we are talking about a policy document rather than zoning and permitting regulations. That is an important distinction because policy decisions are human decisions. They are the kinds of decisions that are made by the people we put in office to represent us. We need to make sure that they hear us loud and clear – we don’t want the Green Swamp exploited by sand mines.
Thank you!
The team at Keep Clermont Rural
keepclermontrural@gmail.com
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