Governor Signs HB 829, a Blow to the Environment

TALLAHASSEE, FL — Today Governor DeSantis signed House Bill 829 despite calls from environmentalists to veto this terrible bill. Amended in the waning hours of the legislative session and without the opportunity for public input, HB 829 uses the threat of awarding the prevailing party attorney fees and costs to coerce local governments into acceding to broader constitutional or statutory preemptions than may actually exist in law. 

 

"Now law, HB 829 imposes these expenses on non-prevailing parties even if initial presentations to the court were good faith arguments regarding whether the scope of an express preemption extended to the subject of a local ordinance," said Sierra Club Florida's chapter director Frank Jackalone. "A general exemption from monetary sanctions for good faith behavior already exists in law."

 

Deborah Foote, director of government affairs for Sierra Club, commented, "Neither party can control what the other's fees and costs will be. This law serves to discourage both parties from entering the legal arena to challenge or defend. The inability to budget within one's means is a strong disincentive to participation in a challenge or defense of an ordinance."

 

The law also includes a preemption of regulation of Class B biosolids to the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP); all local ordinances regulating Class B biosolids will be null and void once DEP adopts its administrative rule. 

 

"Residents of communities are the ones who have to live with water pollution and must be able to adopt regulations strong enough to do the job of protecting their water resources. Also, it is the local community that is on the hook for violations of the Clean Water Act, not the state. Localities must be able to adopt regulations, up to and including bans, that work effectively and must not be saddled with a halfway measure that a statewide regulation is very likely to be," said Jackalone. 

 

"Water quality regulation should be done on a watershed by watershed basis as soils, vegetation, impermeable surfaces, and sources of pollution vary throughout Florida. HB 829 will no longer allow that. Governor DeSantis, by signing this bill, has shown his support of the environment is very selective; if it impacts developers, it goes out the window," said Foote.