After the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and Refuge staff and others did a lot of work, including much public input, the Interior Department has taken the next step towards getting the Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge on the UNESCO World Heritage Site list.
If approved by UNESCO, the Okefenokee will join its nearest neighbors, Everglades and Great Smokey Mountains National Parks in North Carolina and Florida, and Poverty Point Monumental Earthworks in Louisiana. Continue reading
Update 2025-01-05: Okefenokee NWR Minor Acquisition Boundary Expansion approved by USFWS 2025-01-03.
Here is the letter I sent to USFWS yesterday. I have added some images and links for this web publication, plus a few extra paragraph breaks to fit the pictures. See also the PDF.
December 13, 2024
To: U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
Okefenokee@fws.gov
Re: WWALS comment on Okefenokee NWR Expansion
Dear Fish and Wildlife Service,
Suwannee Riverkeeper for WWALS Watershed Coalition, Inc. (WWALS) files these comments in support of the proposed minor expansion of the acquisition boundary for the Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge (ONWR).
I further recommend that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, or the Department of Interior, or Congress, provide sufficient funds to make competitive offers to buy land.
![[WWALS Comments 2024-12-13, Proposed Minor Expansion of the Okefenokee, National Wildlife Refuge]](https://www.wwals.net/pictures/2024-12-13--wwals-onwr-expansion/fbmany.jpg)
WWALS Comments 2024-12-13, Proposed Minor Expansion of the Okefenokee, National Wildlife Refuge
I sympathize with concerns I have heard expressed by people living near the ONWR, perhaps most basically Continue reading
Update 2024-12-27: Final Report: Georgia House Study Committee on Navigable Streams 2024-12-01.
The Georgia House Navigable Streams Committee is meeting in Newnan on Wednesday morning, November 13, 2024, after the Nahunta meeting a few weeks ago was cancelled due to Hurricane Helene aftermath.
Instead of a whole meeting, we get this item:
And this subject of the entire meeting:
Meeting #3: Utilizing Mechanisms to Increase Public Access to Waterways
We don’t need fancy mechanisms. We just need a Georgia navigability law that matches what people actually use waterways for these days: paddling, motoring, fishing, and swimming. That’s a substantial part of the outdoor economy and recreation.
So if you want to continue to be able to paddle or motor on your favorite stream, you may want to show up and speak, or send written input to your state representative. You can ask them for a 21st-century update to the 1863 Georgia navigability law.
Here is the meeting notice and agenda (local copy): Continue reading
An old Civil War law in the way of paddling, motoring, fishing, and swimming,
on WKUB radio from Blackshear, Pierce County, Georgia,
starting at 1:10 in the audio:
https://wwals.net/pictures/2024-10-10–wkub-navigable/2000-thurs-am-news.mp3
A meeting of the Georgia House Navigable Streams Committee scheduled for Friday in Nahunta has been postponed due to the anticipated effects from Hurricane Milton.
It was set to take place at Strickland’s Lodge on the Satilla River in Nahunta.
![[Georgia House Navigable Streams Committee Postponed 2024-10-10 -- Suwannee Riverkeeper on WKUB radio]](https://www.wwals.net/pictures/2024-10-10--wkub-navigable/many.jpg)
Georgia House Navigable Streams Committee Postponed 2024-10-10 — Suwannee Riverkeeper on WKUB radioThat committee is currently taking public comment on the legislative efforts to name sections of some of the state’s 64 streams and rivers as navigable and open to the public for boating, fishing, and hunting.
Right now an old Civil War law prohibits a lot of that from happening.
Suwannee Riverkeeper John Quarterman, who was eager to see changes in the present laws, says that postponing the meeting was the right thing to do.
jsq: …which is all sensible, I think. I had thought of asking them, could you, at least, delay this? Because I’ve been asking county commission members and city council members, and naturally they’ve been telling me they’re kind of busy with still doing cleanup, and so this is a good thing, I think.
Continue reading
Tomorrow (Thursday) at 6 PM at the Brooks County Courthouse is a Town Hall for the county to hear from citizens about solar power.
According to a Brooks County Attorney, “At this time there are no active applications for solar in Brooks County. There is a moratorium on solar applications until February of 2025 (unless extended).”
Which of course does not mean there are no applications ready to go in February 2025.
Jason Kemp sent two responses yesterday to our open records request for presentation materials for the town hall and any board packet materials for preceding solar proposals in Brooks County. Continue reading
First they postponed the meetings for the attempt to put golf courses or pickleball courts in state parks.
And day before yesterday the Florida governor said “back to the drawing board.”
![[Plug Pulled on Park Plan, DeSantis claimed it leaked, Back to the drawing board, How about a bill to prevent it?]](https://www.wwals.net/pictures/2024-08-29--parks-plan-pulled-plug/fbmany.jpg)
Plug Pulled on Park Plan, DeSantis claimed it leaked, Back to the drawing board, How about a bill to prevent it?
Photo: DOUGLAS R. CLIFFORD, Tampa Bay Times,
https://www.tampabay.com/news/florida-politics/2024/08/28/florida-desantis-state-parks-golf-course-hotel-pickleball-plan/
But don’t trust them. The same or different developers behind this attempt will be back again.
Since state legislators of both parties were opposed to this bad idea, there is talk of a bill to stop this from happening again.
That’s good, and how about a constitutional amendment for Right to Clean Water?
https://www.floridarighttocleanwater.org
None of the nine parks proposed this time are in the Suwannee River Basin. But if they happened, how long before somebody wants to put a golf course or a lodge at Suwannee River State Park, or Manatee Springs, or Ichetucknee Springs?
Alex Harris and Ana Ceballos, Miami Herald, August 29, 2024, DeSantis pulls plug on controversial state parks plan after public, political backlash, Continue reading
Well, that didn’t take long! Today, Florida Parks postponed their proposal to commercialize state parks, “due to overwhelming interest.”
Keep showing them your interest in this bad plan not happening. Don’t wait for the meetings; go ahead and tell them.
Follow this link for a handy form by Waterkeepers Florida
to tell your statehouse delegation you don’t want these developments on top of vulnerable habitat and next to our waterways:
https://waterkeepersflorida.good.do/protectourparks/Email_State_Officials/
None of the current proposals are for parks in the Suwannee River Basin. But if these get implemented, they won’t stop.
![[Protect Florida Parks from Golf Courses, Hotels, apartments, Pickleball courts]](https://www.wwals.net/pictures/2024-08-23--protect-fl-parks/fbmany.jpg)
Protect Florida Parks from Golf Courses, Hotels, apartments, Pickleball courts
According to Rachel Tucker, wfla.com, today, Meetings over controversial Florida state park plans rescheduled due to demand, Continue reading
Update 2024-08-23: Postponed “due to overwhelming interest.” Keep overwhelming them!
This Tuesday, August 27, 2024, Florida Parks will hold eight public tellings about building golf courses, hotels, or pickleball courts in nine public parks.
None of those nine are in the Suwannee River Basin. But if they happen, how long until there’s a plan for a golf course in Suwannee River State Park? Or a “lodge” at Ichetucknee Springs or Manatee Spring?
Follow this link for a handy form by Waterkeepers Florida
to tell your statehouse delegation you don’t want these developments on top of vulnerable habitat and next to our waterways:
https://waterkeepersflorida.good.do/protectourparks/Email_State_Officials/
Protect Florida Parks from Golf Courses, Hotels, apartments, Pickleball courts
The nine are: Continue reading
Update 2024-09-25: Georgia House Navigable Streams Committee in Nahunta 2024-10-11.
Update 2024-08-15:
The livestream is here:
https://www.legis.ga.gov/schedule/house/AQIARgAAAxpEc5CqZhHNm8gAqgAvxFoJAGeQLC1kSDdIixjC7EHFmfIAAAJaYAAAANZQGGA2fqFiaHBHrewZqJ2eET4ABFxyjiQAAAAuAAADGkRzkKpmEc2byACqACGGA2fEWgMAZ5AsLWRIN0iLGMLsQcWZ8gAAAlpgAAAA
A new Georgia House Study Committee was established March 28, 2024, on the fraught issue of navigability of waterways: HOUSE STUDY COMMITTEE ON NAVIGABLE STREAMS AND RELATED MATTERS.
Maybe you’d like to contact your statehouse member before the meeting, since there seems to be no opportunity for public input during the meeting.
Update 2024-08-09: Georgia House Navigable Streams Study Committee 2024-08-15.
The Georgia legislature is trying to define which creeks and rivers are navigable. They are using an antique law to do so.
You can help keep Georgia rivers and creeks navigable by logging your river trips here:
https://survey123.arcgis.com/share/32bc9531a62e4c83971b162a58eb25f2
The goal of this mapping project is to document the upstream extent of recreational descents on as many Georgia rivers as possible. Paddlers documenting their descents through this survey could help protect access to streams for generations to come. We encourage paddlers to submit their earliest and farthest upstream descent on as many rivers as possible.
Maybe you’d also like to explain to the Georgia statehouse that the 1863 definition of navigable is outdated: “is capable of transporting boats loaded with freight in the regular course of trade either for the whole or a part of the year.”
Nowadays we fish, paddle, and motor in forms of recreational commerce that were not common in 1863.
Here is one way to contact your Georgia state legislators:
https://action.outdooralliance.org/a/protect-the-publics-right-to-paddle-in-georgia_7_24 Continue reading
![[Okefenokee NWR Nominated as UNESCO World Heritage Site, U.S. Department of the Interior, December 20, 2024]](https://www.wwals.net/pictures/2024-12-20--onwr-unesco-us-interior/fbmany.jpg)
![[Georgia House Study Committee on Navigable Streams in Newnan 2024-11-13: Law: Ownership, Property Rights; Passage: Recreation, Economy]](https://www.wwals.net/pictures/2024-11-13--ga-house-navigable-streams-study-committee/many.jpg)
![[Solar in Brooks County, Town Hall 6 PM 2024-09-12, Brooks County Courthouse, 100 E. Screven St., Quitman, GA]](https://www.wwals.net/pictures/2024-09-12--brooks-county-solar/igmany.jpg)
![[New Navigable Streams Georgia House Studay Committee 2024-08-15: Ownership, Property Rights, Recreation, Economy]](https://www.wwals.net/pictures/2024-08-15--ga-house-navigable-streams-committee/many.jpg)
![[Help keep paddle access to Georgia rivers, Contact your statehouse members, Record your paddle outings]](https://www.wwals.net/pictures/2024-07-22--ga-recreational-navigation-mapping/fbmany.jpg)