Developers want to kill 250 trees (half have trunks over 1 foot in diameter!) and bulldoze wildlife habitat, spoiling a breathtakingly beautiful part of the Cockroach Bay Aquatic Preserve, just to build eight houses where they don’t belong: on a fragile, skinny mangrove-lined sand-spit, sticking out into the middle of the Little Manatee River at Mill Bayou. (See map at right, and photos after the jump.) Of course they would dump truckloads of fill and pave a road over the riverine habitat in the process.

It’s hard to imagine a worse place to build houses than in the middle of the Little Manatee River — an undammed, dynamic, tidal river that floods frequently. This little spit (only 300 feet wide!) is sometimes completely underwater, and yanking out the trees and vegetation would only make it more vulnerable to storm damage and erosion. Building in tidal flood plains like this, in the Coastal High Hazard Area, puts families in danger and raises insurance costs for all of us.

The Little Manatee River’s mangrove islands and sand-spits are part of her natural ecosystem. They provide important riverine habitat and natural protection from storm impacts. This pristine river, designated by the state as an Outstanding Florida Water, is a regional asset, teeming with life, precisely because it has not been urbanized by development such as this. Yet.

Although our county planners recommended approval of the project (business as usual) as did a zoning hearing master (it’s what they do), the developers’ proposal was denied by the county commission a year ago (Hooray!), in response to opposition by Tampa Bay Sierra Club & local residents along with a timely editorial by the Tampa Tribune urging denial.

(See Channel 10’s television coverage and hear WMNF’s radio coverage of that hearing.)

But the developers appealed the commission’s denial in court, where they won a do-over (remand). So citizens need to fight once more, to protect the Little Manatee River and her wildlife. If we don’t show up with a big crowd, commissioners could easily side with the developer this time.

What makes me worry that the commission might flip-flop on this? History: In their editorial urging commissioners to deny this current proposal, the Tampa Tribune reminded them of their reprehensible decision, in 2006, to let this same developer rezone the landward neck of this spit for 22 houses, noting, “The developer should be satisfied with the questionable approval it already has gotten.”

This article appears in May 20-26, 2010.