April 4, 2025

Environmental bill updates from the fifth week of Florida's Legislative Session include:

• Carbon sequestration
• Auxiliary Containers
• Mitigation Banks

We’ve reached the half-way point of this year's legislative session. The subcommittees in the House have been granted one more week to meet, due to the volume of bills that still have to be heard. Budget discussions begin in earnest as there is a $4 billion gap between the Senate and the House proposals. 

CARBON SEQUESTRATION

HB 1063 by Rep. Lindsay Cross is a bi-partisan bill that passed this week by a vote of 15-2 in its first committee of reference, the Natural Resources and Disasters Subcommittee. This bill, scaled down from past versions, creates a state-wide study and develops a two-year task force to evaluate the role of natural and agricultural lands, as well as our waters, in storing carbon. It also will examine the benefits of the ecosystem services provided by lands serving as flood mitigation and water storage and filtration. An amendment was added to codify the protection of private property rights in that participation in the study by landowners would be voluntary. 

The majority of the committee members agreed that a study of this kind was necessary and would strengthen Florida’s long-term stability and land management strategy, and that specific data would highlight the positive role that our farmers play in our diverse economy.

The Governor has spoken against this bill, but the Senate passed a similar version of the bill, SB 1148, by a unanimous vote in its first committee, Environment and Natural Resources. The Senate bill is headed to Appropriations on Agriculture, Environment and General Government next.



SCCF supports this bill and the data it would provide as we continue to look for innovative ways to address our changing environment.

AUXILIARY CONTAINERS (WASTE MANAGEMENT)

CS/SB 1822 by Sen. Jonathan Martin passed its second assigned committee by a vote of 5-3 in the Senate Community Affairs this week. In a meeting that went two hours over time, this bill, the most contentious on the agenda, was amended to add an entirely different component of incinerator placement in the Miami-Dade area, in addition to the original intent of the bill – to preempt local governments from regulating their own rules regarding plastic bags and auxiliary food containers. Sen. Martin referred to his bill as the “Food-Truck” bill, but then formally changed the bill title to “Waste Management” to include the new incinerator issue.

The comparable House Bill, HB 565, was scheduled to be heard this week in the House Intergovernmental Affairs Subcommittee, but due to a packed schedule, the bill was not heard and should be scheduled next week in the same House subcommittee.

SCCF opposes these bills because they impede and prevent local solutions to address Florida’s growing plastic pollution problem. SCCF will work for pollution control measures to be implemented state-wide rather than preventing local communities from addressing the problem themselves.

MITIGATION BANKS

CS/HB 1175 by Rep. Wyman Duggan passed by a vote of 17-6 in House State Affairs, advancing through the second and last of its assigned committees. This bill allows for mitigation to occur outside of a projects watershed basin, and for unfinished mitigation banks to award up to 60% of their credits before the ecosystem function has been certified. 

This leaves certain areas overdeveloped without all of the protections provided by wetlands. It also creates an uneven balance of destroying wetlands before the ecosystem function or the mitigation bank has been completed. This bill is counter to the foundational concept of mitigation credits.

Citing the 9 million acres of wetlands lost across the state of Florida, an amendment was presented to increase the multiplier of credits required when purchased out of area, requiring more wetlands be created than the ones that were destroyed. The amendment was rejected by the bill sponsor, who went on to say that any changes to the bill would not work because he has diligently negotiated the components of the bill with developers and the mitigation bankers — leaving public interest out of the equation.

The comparable Senate version, SB 492, has passed its first committee and was referred to the Appropriation Committee on Agriculture, Environment and General Government for its second stop.

SCCF opposes this bill as bad environmental policy that creates an imbalance of protections and incentivizes unsustainable overdevelopment.

BILL OF THE WEEK

Vessels ("Boater's Freedom Bill"): SB 1388/HB 1001

From hindering law enforcement's ability to protect our waterways and coastal ecosystems, to potentially opening protected areas to noise pollution and disturbance, HB 1001/SB 1388 ("Vessels") is not the positive "Boater's Freedom Bill" it's proclaimed to be.

Learn why SCCF opposes this bill below.

SCCF is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) founded

in 1967 on Sanibel Island, Florida