In the past, the St. Johns River Water Management District (“District”) considered on an ad hoc basis requests for the amendment or release of regulatory conservation easements, which are commonly conveyed to the District as wetland mitigation during the environmental resource permitting process, in conjunction with the permitting of mitigation banks, or to satisfy another entity’s regulatory program, such as the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The District has now proposed Rule 40C-1.1101 to establish procedures and requirements for the amendment or release of such easements.
The six categories of amendments or releases addressed by the proposed Rule are on-site adjustments, easements not needed to meet regulatory requirements, public projects, way of necessity claims, single-family lots, and legal errors. The proposed Rule establishes the conditions applicable to the category of a request that must be met, including the requirement that the ecological value of the amended easement be equal to or exceed that of the existing easement, that a permit has been abandoned or modified to eliminate the impacts to be addressed by the easement (no longer needed to meet regulatory requirements) and that the request must include a comparison of the monetary value of the amended easement to the prior easement. Notice of the request must normally be provided to owners of adjacent properties and to interested persons. All costs of meeting the conditions will be borne by the party requesting the amendment or release.
The District has received a number of comments addressing the purpose and conditions of the proposed Rule. Since the District has long planned to address by rule the conditions necessary to amend or release regulatory conservation easements, approval of a rule in some form is likely, though not guaranteed. Certainly, amendment of the terms of the proposed Rule is possible.