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Details Bog Down Florida's U.S. Sugar Proposal

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The Associated Press

Published: September 11, 2008

WEST PALM BEACH - A giant land deal for an area larger than the city of Chicago, intended to help the dying Everglades, has been slowed as both sides work out details of the proposal for the state to buy about 300 square miles from U.S. Sugar Corp., officials said Wednesday.

The final plan also will likely mean some of the land will remain for agriculture, leaving less for restoration.

Declaring the proposal "as monumental as the creation of our nation's first national park," Gov. Charlie Crist made the announcement about the planned deal in June, standing on the edge of the Everglades.

The initial announcement said the state would buy about 300 square miles of U.S. Sugar's holdings in the Everglades south of Lake Okeechobee, including its cane fields, mill, refining facilities, citrus groves and railroad line.

U.S. Sugar would be allowed to farm the 187,000 acres for six more years, after which it would go out of business, leaving about 1,700 workers unemployed.

The state would then protect the land from development.

Officials said in June that they planned to sign a contract on the deal by November.

It likely won't happen now until sometime in 2009, according to officials with U.S. Sugar and the South Florida Water Management District, which oversees Everglades restoration for the state.

The district had planned to borrow the money through bonds for the deal and pay off the debt with property taxes from its 16-county region.

Officials now say they are hoping to negotiate simultaneous sales of some of U.S. Sugar's assets, such as its mill and railroad, before completing the sale. They also say they are seeking partners in the purchase.

"The word is out on the street, and they know that we will not be holding on to these assets," Ruth Clements, the district's director of land acquisition, told board members Wednesday.

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