Comment from Mel King, The King Group

As a realtor in Lee County Florida, I strongly OPPOSE the National Marine Fisheries Service proposal to designate critical habitat for the U.S. DPS of the smalltooth sawfish. Our opposition to the designation is for the following reasons: • NOAA has not provided adequate advertising to the public about this rule change. • NOAA has not adequately explained their position to the public about this proposed changed. • NOAA did not provide any written information to the public on the process for determination or even where to find additional information to research their work. • This ruling has the potential of impacting private property rights in dock/seawall replacement permits, new dock/seawall permits, dredging of the Cape Coral’s 400 miles of canals and may possibly amount to a “taking” based upon severe restrictions on property use and access. • The City of Cape Coral was not made aware of the pubic meeting nor were they contacted to provide GIS or other data to aid in the analysis. • NOAA has failed to consider the effects on our waterways of decisions to release freshwater from Lake Okeechobee. Those lake releases impact water quality and salinity which are key issues with this proposal. We feel the data does not accurately reflect, nor has research been performed based on timings before and after freshwater releases. • At a minimum NOAA should extend the public comment period, provide a written report to the public and city entities and offer an open public comment session that allows for answers to questions from the public. • Throughout the NOAA information document it is suggested that; there is “little known”, “no direct research exists”, “very little information was known about the habitat usage patterns of the species”, etc. This suggests that there is incomplete information on which to base this designation. • The following paragraph, from page 3 of NOAA’s report has not been verified, nor has any supporting documentation been provided to justify this comment.: “Commenters on previous critical habitat designations have suggested that secondary costs to regional economies can also result from project modifications prescribed through Section 7 consultations. For example, some have been concerned that proposing critical habitat in areas of residential development would lead to reduced revenues and employment in construction-related firms, potential lost tax revenue associated with decreased residential development, and even impairment of regional growth (see Elliott D. Pollack and Company, 1999). In other designations, commenters have expressed concerns that critical habitat designation may require alteration in shipping channel dredging projects or commercial fishing activities to such an extent that it would result in regional economic impacts (see IEc, 2003). The project modifications for the categories of activities projected to require Section 7 consultations due to this proposed critical habitat designation are not expected to result in impacts at the scale of regional economies. The essential features are located along the shoreline and the proposed areas are not located in close proximity to major shipping channels. No commercial fishing activities that may require modification to avoid destroying or adversely modifying the essential features were identified. Even project modifications recommended for large U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) permitted projects, like cable or pipeline installation, are not expected to result in secondary costs to regional economies. The potential project modifications for predicted future consultations may require project relocation, horizontal directional drilling, restrictions on road/utility corridors, use of alternative shoreline stabilization methods, limitations on dock widths and size, limitations/restrictions on modifying freshwater flow, and/or sediment and turbidity control measures, and/or conditions monitoring. These requirements are not expected to have large- scale economic impacts. Thus, secondary costs to regional economies are not likely to result from the proposed designation, and these impacts are not discussed further in this report.” I am appalled that my government would once again try to forward these outlandish plans without proper study and review. Look at the Kissimme river and it will be plain to see why this needs much further study by someone other than bureaucrats in Washington.