Ugly, Blighted Crayfish Habitat Being Created in the City

A news reporter recently biked past a swampy mess of land and commented about why a bulldozed, back-hoed piece of blight would be called a nature preserve. It brought a snippy response in a Letter to the Editor by a member of the "Bay County Conservancy". The letter writer insinuated that we should all hang our heads in shame for being here on earth, and our penance is to create these blighted swampy areas (at landowners' and taxpayers' expense) to grow the Panama City Crayfish. Here's the letter:

It’s worth the effort to protect wildlife, habitat

Tony Simmons’ Sunday column (“Suggestions to make the new year easier to face,” Jan. 14) pointed out the seeming incongruity of having a sign announcing a nature preserve on land that has been bulldozed and bush hogged. He invites readers to “laugh or cry … but appreciate the irony.” In my 33 years of living in Bay County, I’ve done a lot of laughing at the human arrogance that gives no thought to the landscape and its inhabitants, and I’ve done a lot of crying when I saw trees cut down, sand dunes bulldozed and wildlife lying dead beside the road. That is why I have been active in conservation groups since the year I moved here.
There actually is some logic behind the vegetation removal on the 10-acre Talkington Family Preserve, which is now owned by the Bay County Conservancy. When the land at 26th Street and Jenks Avenue in Lynn Haven was permitted for development, the Department of Environmental Protection required that offsets be made for the wetlands that would be destroyed. That agreement included setting aside the wettest 10 acres of the property and manipulating it to become suitable habitat for the protected Panama City crayfish, an animal that has almost disappeared because its living places have been destroyed by swamp-filling and ditch-clearing. Will this attempt to imitate Mother Nature work? We don’t know, but it is worth the effort to try. We have done so much to destroy the plants and wildlife that used to live here that we have an obligation to protect what is left.
The Bay County Conservancy is a local non-profit organization devoted to preserving pockets of native landscape, and it presently own 10 parcels comprising 170 acres. More information is available at 872-8260 or baycountyconservancy.org.
Candis Harbison, Panama City

News Herald Letters to the Editor January 16, 2007

This 'nature preserve' is simply land taken from a landowner who decided to use his private property to build apartments. Since there is constant hand-wringing in the City about the need for affordable housing, you would think the government would do everything they could to streamline the building of housing units. Instead, they demanded a portion of the land be given over. It was deeded to the conservancy who created the mosquito-breeding blight, in one of the fastest growing areas of Panama City, near churches and schools. By the way, since they have already decided that pesticides could be harmful to the crayfish, forget about mosquito control . What will they say if any cases of West Nile or other harmful mosquito-born diseases are traced to crayfish 'habitiat'? That the children deserved it because they don't understand how important the crayfish is to the world?

Now the State is trying to upgrade the crayfish to a 'threatened status', creating additional bureacracy and costs for any landowner that will want to do anything with their land in this city. Again, this is in direct opposition to the concept of making Panama City an affordable place to live.