Teed-off community members and elected leaders have apparently convinced Florida officials to shelve a plan to build three golf courses on state park property in Martin County.
Discussions about developing three golf courses at Jonathan Dickinson State Park in southern Florida grew out of the state Department of Environmental Protection’s (DEP’s) launch of its 2024-2025 Great Outdoors Initiative. DEP described the effort in a news release earlier this month as a way to expand public access to the state’s outdoor recreation economy.
“In addition to increasing the number of campsites, cabins and lodges on park property, the initiative will increase the number of outdoor recreation opportunities available at Florida’s state parks, including pickleball, disc golf, golf and paddling,” the news release stated.
But an Aug. 23 letter signed by Martin County commissioners, Florida state officials and U.S. Sens. Marco Rubio and Rick Scott called the golf course project’s community outreach efforts “ridiculous.”
“The communities around Jonathan Dickinson State Park are owed a public comment meeting in good faith with members of the Florida Department of Environmental Protection’s Acquisition and Restoration Council (ARC),” the letter states. “It is the ARC that will actually vote on whether golf courses and hotels will be built in our park, and the public deserves the ability to make their voice heard.”
The letter criticized a previously scheduled one-hour public-comment meeting that had been scheduled this week, especially since no ARC members were planning to attend.
The Florida chapter of the Sierra Club has criticized the state’s Great Outdoors Initiative, raising concerns that the plan would lead to bulldozing “swathes of nine of our precious state parks” to create facilities such as hotels, sports fields and golf courses.
“The public outcry from across the political spectrum was deafening,” the Sierra Club said in a website post.
Gov. Ron DeSantis on Wednesday distanced himself from the golf course proposal at Jonathan Dickinson State Park, vowing that such a project would not go forward at the site and the public would not lose any green space.
“This was something not approved by me,” DeSantis said in press-conference comments provided to the Florida Record. “I never saw that. .. They're not going to do anything this year. They're going to go back and basically listen to folks. … A lot of that stuff was half-baked and not ready for prime time."
DeSantis described the proposed golf course development area as one occupied by abandoned military buildings rather than green space.
The Aug. 23 letter to the governor and state environmental officials also criticized the scheduling of public-comment meetings in August when many community members are out of the region.
The group that initially proposed the golf course development, the Tuskegee Dunes Foundation, said in a statement that it is no longer pursuing the plan.
“We have received clear feedback that Jonathan Dickinson State Park is not the right location,” the statement said. “We did not understand the local community landscape and appreciate the clarity.”
The idea was to bring “world-class golf to southeast Florida” and donate proceeds from the golf courses to support families of the military and first-responders, according to the statement.