Politics

Low land prices lure Cabinet

Despite a deficit, it wants Florida Forever to snap up environmentally sensitive acres.

By JENNIFER LIBERTO, Times Staff Writer
Published August 29, 2007

TALLAHASSEE - After years of paying top dollar for environmentally sensitive land, Florida wants to jump into the buyers' real estate market.

The Florida Cabinet signaled on Tuesday a willingness to take advantage of low land prices, despite the budget crunch that's crippling incoming revenue.

"If there are other innovative ways that we can make these purchases while the land's a little less expensive, in the long term it's good for Florida," Gov. Charlie Crist said.

The program, Florida Forever, buys environmentally sensitive land with $300-million funded by the Legislature each year. Recently, the Legislature had been unwilling to commit more dollars to the program, ignoring Crist's request for an extra $100-million for the program this year. With a $2.5-billion deficit looming over the next two years, more funding for anything could be a big fight.

Yet, Crist, Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink and Attorney General Bill McCollum all said they think the state should take advantage of the buyers' market. On Sink's suggestion, the Cabinet unanimously voted to direct the Florida Board of Trustees staff to look into "creative" and "financially prudent" ways to buy more land.

Agricultural Commissioner Charles Bronson was the only skeptic. He said he is concerned that the budget crunch will mean less money available to manage the land that's already been acquired, much less new acres that might be acquired more quickly.

"I know a lot of people want to buy more and save more," Bronson said. "If we can't take care of it, then we're not doing ourselves any justice by that."

However, McCollum countered that he thought it was better to buy now and "figure out how to manage it later."

The Florida Department of Environmental Protection has already committed most of the land purchase dollars it expects to receive over the next three years.

So far, the program's largest purchase is the Babcock Ranch, which was purchased with an extra $310-million allocated on top of the Florida Forever's usual $300-million. Babcock Ranch is 73,000 acres of cypress domes and pine forests in Charlotte and Lee counties.

Jennifer Liberto can be reached at jliberto@sptimes.com or 850 224-7263.

[Last modified August 29, 2007, 01:37:10]