Congress may weigh in on manatee rules - Boat U.S. Reports

As a May deadline looms on dock construction regulations intended to increase protection for Florida's manatees, one congressman says federal law should be changed to protect the state's boating economy.

New U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service regulations, critics say, could impose a de facto moratorium on dock building in southwest Florida and that doesn't sit well with Rep. Porter Goss (R) who lives on Sanibel Island. Goss says he wants to bring all sides together "to encourage a proposal that will not ban or unreasonably delay the granting of dock permits, yet protect the Florida manatee from unnecessary harm. The issue is not boats or manatees, it is boats and manatees," Goss says.

The controversial new rules would streamline the permitting process for dock and marina construction in all but 12 southwestern Florida counties where the number of manatee deaths from watercraft collisions spiked in 2001.

In those counties the rules require case-by-case review for each permit under the federal Marine Mammal Protection Act and that, opponents say, would halt dock and marina construction, hurt the boating industry and cut property values.

The rules are the result of an out-of-court settlement between the federal government and 18 environmental groups which sued in 2000, claiming the government failed to sufficiently protect the animals. Manatee population studies since then have determined that the stocks are stable or rebounding everywhere but in southwest Florida. As a result, federal officials say they cannot approve a streamlined permitting process there for at least five years.

But Goss, marine industry groups and local government officials say that's tantamount to a moratorium on construction and dock building is not the problem.

"That's like saying the building of garages is responsible for road kill," says Goss, who, accompanied by Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, has met with high-level federal officials in Washington, DC, in an effort to resolve the issue.

Goss has since said he may seek a remedy through changes to the Marine Mammal Protection Act, as well.

"The (Act) may be producing some unintended negative consequences that can be readily fixed by some minor language change," says Goss.

Watercraft-related deaths in Lee County spiked at 23 in 2001, well above the average of a dozen deaths yearly during the prior decade. The total dropped back to 13 in 2002.

Gov. Bush wants the new permit regulation put on hold while the Fish and Wildlife Service reviews the scientific evidence on which it is based.