U.S. Sugar preparing to sell Everglades land

In a surprise move environmentalists call "breathtaking," U.S. Sugar Corp. plans to announce today a deal to sell the state 187,000 acres in the Everglades for $1.75-billion.

If approved, it would be the largest conservation purchase the state has ever made, helping restore the ecosystem's natural flow and providing a quantum leap to the effort to clean up the Everglades.

"It's like the Louisiana Purchase for the Everglades," said John Marshall of the Arthur R. Marshall Foundation, an advocacy group.

The effect on U.S. Sugar is also profound. A force in Florida's economy and politics for decades, the Clewiston company could cease to exist in about five years. (story here)

Comments

So now that George Carlin's dead, do we get to go through another two weeks of intense mourning a la Tim Russert? Or does the press just canonize their own?

[Brian]

$9,875.00 per acre? Are they out of their F'ing heads? That land is out in the middle of nowhere and there is no way in hell that land is worth that. Just another rip off of the taxpayers of Florida to benefit a Republican business owner.

[Bob]

Have they been paying real estate taxes anywhere near a 1.75 Billion dollar value, that has to hurt taking that off the tax rolls. 9K an acre are they thowing in a couple of bridges too????

[mike]

any amount of land preservation is great

[Dr_Dug]

Florida is broke and thier paying WHAT...? Get ready HIGHER TAXES!!

[steve]

This is great news. The everglades again can be one of the most buetiful places in our state.

[Kenneth]

I agree with Mike and Steve - tax dollars well spent in my mind.

[Marc]

Thank you State of Florida, once it's gone, you never get it back. Now if Pinellas County would just follow through and purchase that 80 Acre property on the Anclote River from WalMart, then things would be even better!

[Don in St. Pete]

We need to save every possible square inch we can! Great move, even at the high cost per acre.

[Marci]

Good thing Crist and Company cut so much from our education budget this coming year. Our top colleges can't keep their top researchers and our schools can't keep or hire qualified teachers. But it's ok, folks. He saved hundreds of thousands of trees and cute little gators.

When the Florida land development company Gulf American Land assembled around 300,000 acres in the late 1950's and early 60's in Cypress Swamp area, they paid maybe tops $10/acre.

[Joe]

Does Brian Ballard (Crist, McCain) represent U.S. Sugar?

[Ron]

Who were the other entities bidding on the property? I'll bet no one else wanted it and our leaders reached an agreement, without competition, and arrived at a fictitious value for the property. I think the times ought to do an in depth investigation by checking out the tax roles and checking to see if they were given tax breaks on the property. I'd be willing to bet that there was some under-the-table exchange of money going on with this deal.
This piece of property could have been protected with a change in zoning rather than shelling out a billion plus that the state doesn't have. Someone's palms got greased to make this unnecessary sale.

Now where are we going to grow sugar cane to make ethanol, a la Brazil?

[Jay]

Buy sugar futures now. We are going to be forced to import everything one day.

do they still get the federal subsidies for sugar???

where is the ?? coming from?

Cuba has lots of cane and the potential for even a lot more production. Cuba could make a killing with ethanol production.

[Brandy in Safety Harbor]

Wonderful news! I only wish that Governor Christ would take a stronger stand against oil drilling off our pristine coasts.

[townie]

great news ... 187000 acres of treasured land IS Florida's legacy to future generations

[Phil]

Import sugar? Why? Its practically poison with zero nutritional value. Good riddance!

[Tweety]

Did you know we are punished (as in higher prices) as Americans because of US Sugar. Farewell!

"If this deal proves to be true, it would be breathtaking in its significance and priceless in value," said Kirk Fordham, CEO of the Everglades Foundation. "If the plan comes to fruition, it would be a once in a generation opportunity that would move Everglades restoration beyond all expectations."
____________________________________

Yep! No doubt about it!

[Sugar drops]

US Sugar knows that when Castro dies we will begin trading with them again on a huge scale.

The price of Sugar would consequently take a big drop, as Cuba grows a tremendous amount of it.

The sugar subsidies will then be finished, thankfully.

[stacey fl native]

of course it is worth it, its the least we can do for the wildlife , we fkd everything else up on them

[Dan]

Well you can bet Jeb had a hand in it... How is wet lands that you can't build on any way worth $9,000 an acre.. Oh, ya these are the same people who were allowed to practice slavery with the Haitians, taking away green cards on arrival and using the state police to track them down when they escaped.

So, is Jeb on their board of directors too?

[Andrew]

Refined sugar is like tobacco - a public health hazard.

Maybe if retail sugar prices become prohibitive, we will move away from it as a society.

That's a good thing as our country battles obesity from candy, sodas and other sweets.

The only thing we listen to is the pocketbook.

[Dave W]

While I absolutely hate the idea of continued financial support to sugarcane companies, I will gladly pay my share of the taxes needed to preserve more of the Everglades. Keeping parts of the state wild is important- it is the true heritage of the state, plus, wetlands are incredibly vital to the ecosystem, so increasing the amount of protected wetlands is a positive development.

[Christopher]

So our children are in overcrowded classrooms and we are buying the everglades back. All of you "green" people need to go away. Quit neglecting our youth. That is our future, not a bunch of swampland.

[RJ]

Our educational system is suffering terribly because there is no money. How is it that we as a state can buy this land for A BILLION dollars??? SHAME!!!

[Kenneth]

Trust me - as a former educator, just dumping money into education isn't going to solve anything. You can double the per pupil expenditure in this state and it still won't change the fact that educational success begins and ends in the home. Good move Florida - thank you for protecting our most valued resource - the beautiful land God has given us.

[Connie]

Better on the Everglades than $450 Million Plus for a Baseball Stadium on the WATER FRONT OF ST.PETE.

[Dennis]

This is a wonderful purchase. Even if the price is higher than it should be, it's one of the most important things this state can do with the money. As for those fretting that we'll have to import sugar, so what? You do realize that because of sweetheart deals the U.S. sugar industry had with the government, the U.S. consumer has been paying MORE than the world market price for sugar from U.S. producers, that is in turn SUBSIDIZED by U.S. tax money, and then to add insult to injury, the tax payers have to pay enormous sums of money to help clean up their mess. We don't even get much in the form of jobs from that, as the sugar industry relies heavily on seasonal, often imported, labor during harvest time! This is a good thing in that we get rid of the parasitic sugar industry (or at least a large part of it) and we protect an extremely important piece of land. It's just a shame the government couldn't simply take the land away as payment for all the tax dollars spent on sugar industry welfare.

[Connie]

The future eco-system to some extent has now protection from those that would like to exploit the land for Corporate Greed and possible toxic contamination through heavy metals and other dangerous chemicals. I hope that Charlie on behalf of the taxpaying residents in the State, have a real thorough ENVIRONMENTAL study of the Lands Acreage. By doing an Environmental Study we may find out how environmentally clean the area contained is.

[shocked]

Swamp land for just under 10,000 an acre? Swamp land! Swamp land? and this paper just reports it and doesn't ask questions? Is this real or a movie? What the heck happenned to reporters? What the heck? so they announce it like its a good thing and so the reporters just eat it up and report a $$ give away? $10,000 an acre for swamp land! That doesn't raise a red flag for anyone?????

[Edward]

So when does the drilling begin? :O/

[Don't Look a Gift Horse in the Mouth]

Yes, but the article also says that the sugar company will lease back the land or similar wording - so what is the difference if they maintain their current operations? By leasing the land, they no longer pay property taxes so we lose in that respect. Lately, I've read that sugar cane might be a viable alternative to gasoline fuel production, so are we really ever going to see the last of the sugar company in Florida? If sugar is capable of producing a gasoline substitute, would not the state of Florida encourage the same land use (rather, abuse) and extend the lease? Already the state governor is talking about oil drilling and compromising our environment because it will help ease the financial burden of escalating gasoline costs.....so I don't think it's a stretch to think that Florida might also encourage sugar cane production if it eases our dependence upon gasoline. I don't trust our government. Money and economics fuel our society (pun intended).

[mike]

Yes, sugar is subsidized with import tariffs. That is why we have corn syrup in our soft drinks instead of sugar. Next time you go to a foreign country, read the ingredients of coke or pepsi, it will say sugar. if sugar prices were not artificially higher here ours would too.

[Dennis]

Those expressing shock at the cost of paying that amount for "just" swampland are extremely ignorant of the value and importance of that land. Land has value beyond what can be built on. Wetland functions provided by that land, over decades, will provide far more value than the one-time cost of the purchase. The water recharge, water filtration, improvements in the very degraded Florida Bay and the Keys downstream (and all of it's extremely valuable fisheries and tourism..this alone is worth the cost in the long term), habitat value for migratory birds (including many that are hunted for across the country by hunters spending lots of money), habitat value for other animals, sanctuary for threatened and endangered species, carbon sequestration, and on and on and on. People need to get over the archaic mentality of something being "just" swampland.

[Dennis]

Don't Look a Gifthorse:

They will be allowed to continue operations for a limited time under a phase-out plan under the lease. It's a way to allow them the opportunity to get out of the business over a short time period instead of just stopping cold all of a sudden. I'd imagine there would be no way they would have made a deal if they had to just immediately halt operations with no phased reductions.

[rick]

Getting land to go back to the restoration of the everglades is great but people look at the price its nuts even in these times ,for sure at least its 2 times over paid for.5OO,OOO -1,OOO,OOO,OOO is closer to the value. Thats like a billion less now we could of spent on other lands.Oh well someone got greased ,but we do have the land.

This is going to be a sweet deal for the middlemen. Would like to know who all is getting a piece of this money.

[Bruce]

All of you talking about "swampland" need to pay attention. This isn't swampland- its sugarcane fields.

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5hwwsvNZPeVERE_DtCJ5Y4x5xfiYQD91G27NG3

[RonH]

In a year the State would fritter away the money on double or triple dippers. The land is forever. Great deal for Florida.

Bruce's google post above is interesting in that the U.S. Sugar property must be the only real estate in Florida that has ballooned in value the last couple of years.

Real estate values have dropped in Florida like a rock I guess everywhere but in the Everglades.

[Brian]

Bruce is correct but the land which is centered around Clewiston and South Bay is still out in the middle of no where and there is still no way in hell that the land out there is worth almost 10 grand an acre.

[Tom D]

Great deal for some friends of politicians . We are lead by criminals in suits .

[Sim]

and next week Crist announces that they will explore the everglades for oil.

$1.75-billion sale.

I'd bet somebody is squeezing difference from $2-billion as "sales commission"...$250-million in their pocket. Nice, round, easy to figure numbers.

This is the best thing to happen to South Fla since AC.