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Escambia Planning Board Rejects Change To Loosen Regulation On Rural Growth
October 2, 2018
The Escambia County Planning Board voted unanimously Monday against recommending a change to the county’s comprehensive plan that would loosen regulation on rural growth.
The change would remove protections for agricultural and silvicultural (forestry) lands from new rural communities.
The portion of the comprehensive plan under review for removal states,”To protect silviculture, agriculture, and agriculture-related activities Escambia County will not support the establishment of new rural communities.”
“Removing this provision in the comprehensive plan to protect agriculture and silviculture lands in Escambia County, and increase density of previous farm land, may contribute to a cascading loss of available land to farm, less wildlife corridors, and recreational opportunities for the citizens, along with an increased cost of building and maintaining infrastructure far away from existing population density and county facilities,” Escambia County resident Jacqueline Rogers said. She addressed the Escambia County Planning Board Monday.
The planning board’s recommended denial will go the the Board of County Commissioners for final action. If the BOCC does not concur with the planning board and approves the change, it would still be subject to state scrutiny.
Silviculture is the art and science of controlling the establishment, growth, composition, health, and quality of forests and woodlands to meet the diverse needs and values of landowners and society such as wildlife habitat, timber, water resources, restoration, and recreation on a sustainable basis, according to the U.S. Forest Service.
Pictured: North Escambia farmland. NorthEscambia.com photo, click to enlarge.
Comments
15 Responses to “Escambia Planning Board Rejects Change To Loosen Regulation On Rural Growth”
REGARDING:
“Try eating Asphalt or concrete or construction materials David”
Too salty
Try eating Asphalt or concrete or construction materials David
Eat mo’ algae
At sone future time when many more trees are gone and farmland is used up for development. you will see the need for two precious commodities…. Oxygen and Food
All over the world trees, rainforests and jungles are under attack. Even the proliferation of the forests of America are being attacked. Our farmers are supposed to be “stewards of the land, yet even they are bulldozing down trees for another acre to plant. They take out fence lines, destroy habitat for game birds and animals with no thought of the dust bowl era that nearly broke this country. There has to be a plan to protect the future. We do not need to forget past mistakes and repeat them!
P trim ytrrs and take out some, but I also replace trees as needed.
Go out and Plant , build some habitat, see what the bible warns about Agriculture and land stewardship..
Seems to me I remember, a couple decades ago, Pensacola was cited as one of the worst examples of urban sprawl in the country. Developers should seek their profits in the many isolated undeveloped pockets close in. There’s not need to despoil farm and forest to line their pockets.
@Bonnie Exner regarding your comment “there will be enough food and infrastructure for all…”
According to reports from the United States Department of Agriculture and the World Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, by the year 2050 there will be over 9 Billion people on the planet. If the loss of forest and farm land STOPPED today, we would still not have enough land to feed 9 Billion people using current agricultural technologies and practices. This means, unless we figure out how to grow more food, on less land, using less inputs than we ever have before, we will see a skyrocketing price in food, food shortages, and possibly even mass starvations in developed nations as the year 2050 gets closer. The depelopment of farmland MUST stop and money must be spent to research new farming technologies and techniques if we have any hope of survival as a whole. So I guess the question is, what’s more important: everyone having a piece of paradise or everyone having food to eat?
This is a complicated issue..we who live out in the country pride ourselves in having our little piece of Paradise..so why can’t others want the same..then when farmlands are bought up and developed into subdivisions, will there be ENOUGH FOOD AND INFRASTRUCTURE TO ACCOMMODATE ALL.
A BALANCE IS NEEDED AND DEVELOPERS NEED TO BE HELD ACCOUNTABLE FOR INFRASTRUCTURE UPDATES!
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I appreciate their decision. Farmland is a precious commodity that one day we will wish we had more of. Housing needs to be built on nonproductive land, not fertile crop raising soil..
I agree with Patricia Rigel
Great Job Mrs Rogers and to the other citizen that spoke against lessening the restriction. I saw this at the regular meeting. The Comp plan and lifting restrictions and runaway growth DO NOT need to be encouraged by the commissioners.
In fact BUY up some conservation lands from Florida FOREVER.
Thanks for the citizen warrior’s tireless effort on these Land Use Decisions.
Duly Noted and appreciated.
Well, I have never been called a “tree hugger” but maybe I should. If you want to have neighbors who know your every move then by all means live in a subdivision. I like my privacy. I appreciate our hard working farmers and the BCC protecting our countryside.
I’m sure this isn’t about the farmers at all, but rather an attempt to keep the upper middle class in the greater Pensacola area. They already see people moving in droves to Santa Rosa Co.
Thank God, that is all we need a ton of new traffic and a bunch of wanna be farmers with 5 acres.
The world has turned upside down for farmers. First, after fifty years of farmers expanding their markets and commodity prices rising, as a nation we decide to start a trade war where the only real scapegoat for other nations is the success of the American farmer. American farmers are getting killed with commodity prices and the 15 billion welfare payment to farmers for this boneheaded move will only cover about three cents of every dollar lost as demand for American products has dropped off the shelf and another record crop, we may see three dollar corn when just five years ago it was seven bucks. If this continues farmers are going to go belly up, and when they try to sell their farm, the politiburo planning commission has said NOPE…..your property rights do not matter, and we will now restrict the free market on the sale of your farmland. Why has a war been declared on the American farmer who is feeding the world and losing their collective butts with farm tariffs and regulatory uncompensated confiscation of their property rights. I am praying for the farm families who represent the success of free trade and hard work to simply survive in this anti farm environment. Farmers vote.
The planning board can continue to bury its head in the sand, but “times are a changing” in Escambia County. This may be a short lived tree hugger win for now but this won’t stop growth in the longer term. Owners of large tracks of land will find an end-around in subdividing and selling off their holdings for ever greater profit. And since the BOCC is hungry for more and even more tax dollars to spend, it won’t be able to resist the greater tax revenue that it can cash in on.