Columbia County Board of County Commissioners votes tonight, Feb. 16, 2017 on Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations in our county. This is to prevent industrial agriculture, animal factories and the like from being allowed on aquifer high recharge areas, such as the JTC Farms fiasco near Fort White.
Hats off to Charlie Trowbridge who spent four hours of his time yesterday alerting people about the small window of time they have to make their voice heard, tonight in Lake City. This picture above appeared in today’s issue of the Lake City Reporter.
Merrillee Malwitz-Jipson, who was then OSFR policy director and now is with Sierra Club, began the movement to change the Land Development Regulations to restrict industrial intensive farming on high recharge areas of the aquifer. Such is the JTC operation located between Fort White and the Santa Fe River. OSFR has continued this struggle for a year, meeting with the county attorney last August to help initiate the amendment to the regulations.
Today, Thursday, February 16, at 5:30 p.m. come to School Board Administrative Complex Building, at 372 West Duval Street in Lake City. This is the second and final reading of the amendment to the regulations. This is an extremely important meeting to show support to amend our Land Development Regulations to protect the aquifer.
Comments by OSFR historian Jim Tatum.
-A river is like a life: once taken, it cannot be brought back-
Special thank you Mr. Trowbridge. I wish I could have made the meeting or helped with signage my job had the upper hand.
Thank you Charlie Trowbridge for your dedication and diligence.