State: FSU considers trade with huge landowner

FSU considers trade with huge landowner

It may give a marine research station, for which it dredged a public channel, to the St. Joe Co. for land elsewhere.

By JULIE HAUSERMAN

TALLAHASSEE -- Two years ago, the state spent $2.5-million to dredge a deep channel for research boats at a Florida State University marine station on a wild stretch of Panhandle coast south of Tallahassee.

Now, FSU is considering turning that waterfront research station -- with one of the few deep channels in the gulf for miles around -- over to the St. Joe Co., which would convert it into a valuable marina to enhance a nearby waterfront the company plans to develop.

In exchange, St. Joe would give FSU land for a new, larger research station somewhere else.

Talks between FSU and St. Joe are "very preliminary," said Raymond Bye, vice president for research at FSU. In late May, St. Joe whisked FSU President Sandy D'Alemberte and other FSU officials away for a private helicopter tour over the Panhandle coast to look at St. Joe's holdings. FSU also set up a faculty committee to review the idea.

"I think it is mind-boggling that a developer can basically snap up a public channel that we spent millions to dredge," said Jack Rudloe, an author and outspoken environmentalist who lives in nearby Panacea, a coastal fishing town. "St. Joe would never in a million years be able to get a permit for a deep channel like that dredged through seagrasses and oyster bars. The only reason FSU got it was because it was for research and education."

But officials for the company defend the idea. "FSU's not just giving it to us. They want something in return," said St. Joe spokesman Jerry Ray. "Remember: FSU may end up with something better here, and the taxpayers may come in on the top end. In fact, I'm sure it will have to work out that way for the deal to go through."

St. Joe owns a million acres in Florida, making it the state's largest private landowner. The company is also a "significant" donor to FSU, said Jeff Robison, president of the FSU Foundation. Besides cash gifts, St. Joe has had a standing offer during the past several years to donate land so FSU can build its new medical school, Ray said.

The Legislature finally funded the medical school this year, but the university hasn't decided where to build it.

St. Joe owns tens of thousands of acres around Turkey Point, where FSU built its marine research station in the 1960s. It is wild, undeveloped coastal land, home to rare sea turtles and bald eagles.

After acquiring real estate giant Arvida, St. Joe has shifted its focus from tree farming to real estate.

The marina that St. Joe wants to build at Turkey Point could one day be the centerpiece for an exclusive waterfront community just an hour's drive south of Florida's capital, but the company hasn't yet released details about its development plans.

"Right now, the ball is in the state's court," said George Willson, a former Nature Conservancy land buyer who now works for St. Joe. "We own many many miles of rivers and bays. If they (FSU) come to us and tell us there's a site they are interested in, I assume we'd be willing to seriously discuss that."

FSU is not too cramped at its 75-acre research facility, said FSU's Bye. "Are we busting at the seams? No," Bye said.

But the university would like to add a dormitory for researchers and maybe some sort of educational center for the public, Bye said.

Bye said the research station also needs clean, pure water nearby -- something that might not be guaranteed once houses begin to sprout on the surrounding coastline.