Judge: Set up manatee havens

A court finds the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service violated its settlement with advocates, and orders a fix.

By CRAIG PITTMAN, Times Staff Writer
© St. Petersburg Times
published July 12, 2002

To protect the manatee, federal officials could be required to curtail boating in 14 areas around the state -- including three spots in Tampa Bay -- as a result of a ruling by a federal judge made public Thursday.

U.S. District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan decided that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has failed to comply with a settlement the agency made with manatee advocates last year. Among other things, that settlement called for setting up a network of manatee sanctuaries and refuges around Florida.

"It was very good news," said Save the Manatee Club biologist Patti Thompson.

Among the areas on the agency's list for potential sanctuaries, where no humans would be allowed to intrude, were three spots at Tampa Bay's power plants at Port Sutton, Apollo Beach and Weedon Island where manatees gather during the winter to bask in the warm water discharged by the plants. Those areas would have been off limits only during the winter. The Blue Waters area of the Homosassa River in Citrus County was also on the potential sanctuary list.

The federal agency was supposed to set up its network of sanctuaries by last fall. Instead, Sullivan found, the federal agency held back at the personal request of Gov. Jeb Bush.

In May 2001, Bush wrote a letter to regional wildlife service director Sam Hamilton that requested the federal agency back off so the state could take the lead with what the governor termed "a more comprehensive solution." That included boosting enforcement of current speed zones and setting up some new speed zones in certain areas of the state, a list that did not entirely match the areas where the federal sanctuaries would have been set up.

But a coalition of environmental groups led by the Save the Manatee Club cried foul. They argued that by bowing to the wishes of President Bush's brother, the federal agency violated the legal settlement it made in January 2001.

Sullivan agreed.

"Whatever the political ramifications," he wrote, "such a justification cannot excuse a violation of the agreement to designate areas throughout Florida by the date established by the agreement."

The judge has ordered the Fish and Wildlife Service to explain by Monday how quickly it can now set up those sanctuaries and refuges. The environmental groups have asked that the federal agency be required to set them all up within 30 days.

"We are eager to see what their proposal is, since their position all along has been that they were in compliance," said Eric Glitzenstein, the Washington, D.C., attorney who handled the case for the coalition, which included the Humane Society, Defenders of Wildlife and more than a dozen other national environmental groups.

Fish and Wildlife agency spokesman Chuck Underwood said officials had not yet seen Sullivan's ruling and thus he could not comment on it. The governor's press office could not be reached for comment Thursday.

Boating rights advocate Jim Kalvin, president of statewide boaters' group Standing Watch, said he hopes the service will fight the ruling by demanding a trial and challenging manatee advocates' push for greater regulations.

"There never should have been a settlement," he said.

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