INDIAN RIVER COUNTY — The Indian River County Board of Commissioners voted unanimously today to facilitate the transfer of 32 acres of land on the shore of the lagoon to the Indian River Land Trust for conservation.
The acreage in two parcels adjacent to Hobart Landing is known as the Block Property. It comes to the Land Trust via what Community Development Director Bob Keating called “an interesting history.”
Originally purchased for $600,000 in 1999 by a member of the Hobart family, the land was conveyed to the Nature Conservancy for protection and preservation. At a later point, the Nature Conservancy passed the property on to St. John’s River Water Management District without a formal conservation easement, meaning it could still be sold for development.
That possibility threatened in 2012 when, at the direction of Governor Scott, St. John’s formulated a Lands Assessment Implementation Plan to see what portion of the district’s 618,423 acres of land could be disposed of without endangering its core mission of preserving and protecting water resources.
The assessment concluded the 32-acre Block Property, which is located east of U.S. 1 in the vicinity of 79th Street, was not essential to its mission and should be disposed of.
The district could conceivably have sold the land to a developer but was willing to give property to someone who would continue to maintain it in a natural state.
Two hitches prevented a simple transfer to an organization such as the Land Trust however.
First, the district is prevented by law from giving the land to a non-governmental entity; it can give the land to a city, county or the state, but not to a nonprofit organization. Second, the district’s board wants to recoup $86,000 spent for surveys and closing costs when it took the land over from the Nature Conservancy
The workaround, devised by the county, district and Land Trust, was to have the district convey the land to the county for free, which is legal, while the Land Trust pays the $86,000 to reimburse the district, and then have the county convey the land with a conservation easement at no additional cost to the Land Trust.
That is the solution the board approved today in accordance with staff recommendation. Ralph Monticello, director of land protection at the trust, said the Land Trust will put together a management plan for the property in the next year or so, which likely will include trail access for the public.
The Trust will own and preserve the property in perpetuity, protecting another precious little corner of Indian River County’s riverfront land from development forever.
