Preservation 2000 to Amendment 1: The Fight Over Florida's Land Conservation Money
For more than three decades, Florida has paid to buy and protect natural land through a series of state programs. In 2014, voters wrote a funding guarantee into the state constitution. What counts as proper use of that money has been fought over in court ever since.
Preservation 2000
Florida's modern land-buying effort traces to the Conservation and Recreational Lands program, set up in 1979, according to a 2008 Florida Senate interim report. In 1990, the state launched Preservation 2000, a 10-year, $3 billion program paid for with about $300 million a year in bonds. Debt payments came from documentary stamp tax revenue, the tax collected on real estate deeds and other documents. The Senate report says the program acquired more than 1.7 million acres.
Florida Forever
Lawmakers created Florida Forever in 1999 as the successor program, authorizing up to $3 billion in bonds, the Senate report says; the first bonds were sold in 2001. The Florida Department of Environmental Protection says the program has protected more than 1 million acres over its first 25 years, with an investment of $3.8 billion.
Amendment 1 in 2014
Supporters of the 2014 Water and Land Conservation Amendment argued it was needed because the Legislature had cut conservation funding, WJCT reported; opponents said it would make the budget too rigid. Ballotpedia notes appropriations to the Land Acquisition Trust Fund, created in 1963, had dropped sharply after 2009.
On Nov. 4, 2014, the measure passed with 74.96% of the vote, or 4,238,739 yes votes, according to Ballotpedia. It required at least 33% of net documentary stamp tax revenue to go into the trust fund for 20 years. The state's fiscal estimate projected $648 million in the 2015-16 budget year.
The fight over spending
Environmental groups argued lawmakers used the money for items such as agency salaries and other expenses rather than new land, WUSF reported. Suits were filed starting in 2015 and consolidated in 2017, Ballotpedia says.
In 2018, Leon County Circuit Judge Charles Dodson sided with the groups. A legislative brief said his ruling declared 185 appropriations worth more than $420 million unconstitutional. On Sept. 9, 2019, the 1st District Court of Appeal reversed him, ruling the money was not limited to land bought after 2015, and sent the case back for trial.
On Jan. 3, 2022, Judge Layne Smith dismissed the case, WUSF reported. He said the plaintiffs had not pursued it with urgency and that the disputed appropriations had already expired. The Sierra Club called the decision a technicality.
How we reported this: This explainer was drafted with AI assistance from the sources linked above, and every fact was checked against those sources. See an error? Contact us and we'll correct it.
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