Lee County may relocate gopher tortoises to county land

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Lee County may relocate gopher tortoises to county land

By JULIO OCHOA

Originally published 02:26 p.m., January 7, 2008
Updated 02:26 p.m., January 7, 2008

Gopher tortoises kicked out of their homes by developers may find new homes on county land.

Lee County leaders commissioners gave direction to its staff Monday to look into the possibility of relocating the threatened species from private land to public land.

The concept would involve developers paying a fee to the county to accept the tortoises after all other options have been exhausted.

The fee, which could be upwards of $5,000 per tortoise, would pay for the maintenance of the land.

County staff will look into all lands that would be acceptable habitat for gopher tortoises, including, county-owned land, Conservation 2020 preservation land and Department of Environmental Protection land.

First, however, leaders will have to determine if the county can legally use Conservation 2020 land for mitigation of gopher tortoises. The problem, said George Wheaton, a member of the committee that oversees the Conservation 2020 program, is the land was purchased by and belongs to taxpayers.

“The idea is the land belongs to the citizens of Lee County,” Wheaton said. “It was bought with their tax money ... it was not bought for private mitigation.”

Without the option of using county lands developers would have to either relocate the tortoises on their development site or pay to relocate them somewhere else.

The county could allow the relocation of the tortoises onto county-owned land, commissioner Frank Mann said. But purchasing new land to relocate gopher tortoises on is out of the question, especially given the current budget situation, he said.

“We've had people in front of us in recent weeks telling us we cant afford to send a handicapped person to get dialysis. Now we're talking about spending millions of dollars on gopher tortoises,” Mann said. “Whatever we do needs to be sustaining itself with cost.”

http://www.naplesnews.com/news/2008/jan/07/lee-county-may-relocate-gopher-tortoises-county-la/