PINELLAS COUNTY, Fla. — Last summer, the Florida Department of Environment Protection considered adding amenities like golf courses, pickleball courts, and hotels to certain state parks across the state.
Nine parks across the state, including Honeymoon Island and Hillsborough River State Parks, were selected for proposed upgrades. However, the changes sparked fierce protest and backlash, and Gov. Ron DeSantis shelved the plans.
It’s still hard for residents like Michael McGrath to believe. “Like many folks across the entire state, I was flabbergasted,” McGrath said.
WATCH Florida residents rally to protect state parks from development plans
“A lot of that stuff was just half-baked and not ready for prime time,” the governor said last August.
The public U-turn came after intense public outcry and protests. “We saw, very clearly, that Floridians were not going to take this,” McGrath said.
But the fight isn’t over. Right now, lawmakers in Tallahassee are debating a pair of companion bills known as the State Park Preservation Act, which seeks to protect state parks from future development.
McGrath, lead organizer of Sierra Club Florida, supports the concept. The bills would require public hearings before significant land-use changes at state parks and aim to ensure that the parks are used for “conservation-based public outdoor recreational uses.”
“This is really an all-hands-on-deck moment for Floridians to protect our state park system,” McGrath said. He and the Sierra Club, however, have some problems with the bills. They think the bills need more teeth and more specific language.
“We need to make sure that there are not any loopholes in there that can allow for what we saw with the Park-gate scandal last summer to ever occur again,” he said. “If we want this truly to be a State Park Preservation Act, we need to make sure there is actual language in there that ensures preservation.”
He said the legislation should be amended to clearly define prohibited uses and remove other instances of what he described as vague language. To emphasize its opposition to the bills, the Sierra Club Florida has planned more than a dozen rallies at state parks across the state.
Rallies are set for this Saturday at Weeki Wachee Springs, Oscar Scherer, and Honeymoon Island State Parks. Another rally is set for April 13 at Hillsborough River State Park. McGrath hopes the rallies will send a loud and clear message to lawmakers in Tallahassee.
“We need to listen to the voice of the people, right?” McGrath said.
Learn more about the upcoming rallies here.
ABC Action News reached out to the sponsors of both the House and Senate bills but has yet to receive a response.
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