After being rebuffed in federal court, an environmental group has filed a lawsuit in Leon County to overturn a provision of a new state law that bans local governments from recognizing “rights of nature.”
The lawsuit filed by Speak Up Wekiva on Aug. 11 seeks to overturn a section of the Florida Clean Waterways Act that preempts local agencies from granting rights to plants, animals, waterways or other elements of the natural environment, with the exception of people and political subdivisions.
A previous lawsuit filed in a federal court concluded the case was in the wrong venue. The Aug. 11 complaint, which was filed in Florida’s Second Judicial Circuit, names Gov. Ron DeSantis and Noah Valenstein, secretary of the state Department of Environmental Protection, as defendants.
“We are optimistic that the preemption provision of SB 712 will be struck down by the courts,” Chuck O’Neal, director of Speak Up Wekiva, told the Florida Record in an email. “We’ve built a pretty darn good rack for a judge to hang his hat on.”
The complaint argues that the statute violates the Ninth and 14th amendments of the U.S. Constitution, infringes on the home rule provisions outlined in the state constitution, lacks preemptive authority and violates the “single-subject rule” in the state constitution.
The lawsuit seeks to invalidate Senate Bill 712 so that an Orange County measure on the November ballot which grants rights of nature to certain waterways won’t be declared invalid.
“I would predict that they’ll have as little success in state court as they had in federal court,” Mark Miller, senior attorney for the Pacific Legal Foundation, told the Florida Record.
The arguments in the lawsuit, which are similar to those made in the federal complaint, likely won’t prevail, according to Miller.
“They’re trying to argue that there’s some federal right for a local community to make its own laws,” he said. “That argument, at least in this context, is dead on arrival.”
Ultimately, the environmentalists supporting rights of nature in civil litigation may seek a statewide vote on a constitutional amendment to advance their ideas, according to Miller. A better way to address environmental concerns is by electing leaders who will work to protect the environment, he added.
“The better way is to work within the system we have and elect officials who will make sure our waters are handled in ways that won’t allow them to be polluted and corrupted,” Miller said. “... In Florida, we just need to do a better job of making sure we elect officials … who work within the law to protect the rivers, lakes, the Everglades and of course the Atlantic and the Gulf.”