The evening advisory committee meeting is usually not attractive, but the Li County Conservation 20/20 Land Acquisition and Management Advisory Committee meeting held on Wednesday is an exception to the proof rule.

Sharp questions, intense exchanges-even comedy relief involving alcohol and guns also marked the gathering, which focused on the employees' decision to let Lehigh Acres extract more than 8 tons of saw palmetto berries from Pine Island preserves and sell them , And then split the profit with the county.

The approved harvest is a change in the county’s policy that previously strictly prohibited berry picking and urged citizens to surrender any pickers they found in the county’s protected area.

The fruits of plants are an important food source for many animals, and they also rely on dense leaves as shelter.

So far, the profit potential has exceeded the county's policing efforts. The market fluctuates, but in recent years, pickers have earned $3 per pound and sold them to brokers who sold them to extract supplements for enlarged prostate and other health problems.

In case you missed it: As palm berry poaching continues on public land, Li County tested a limited harvest

And: the saw palmetto berry season begins and arrests for illegal picking

The harvester working on the 20/20 field removed 17,280 pounds from Pine Island Flatwoods Preserve, earning approximately $1.80 per pound. The harvest brought in $15,696.71, and Jesse Lavender, the director of parks and entertainment, said it would be returned to his department.

Lavender pointed out that the four-day harvest in August was an "exploratory activity" and was frustrated by the inability to prevent poachers from emptying the fruit preserves.

"As we spoke, these poachers basically picked us up," Lavender said. "Illegal logging is everywhere on our land... This has been a problem for many years (but) we cannot control and contain this poaching," he said, most of which occurred before dawn. "So we are studying different management strategies. A good government will consider every option available to us in the future, evaluate and study it, and bring it back for more discussion."

Committee member and retired environmental scientist Rae Ann Wessel said the move was wrong in many ways, including the fact that the board was not consulted.

"This is not discussed or submitted to the committee at all (and) this is what we are here for... Representing the community and providing help, opinions, issues, support and critical analysis to the county."

In fact, Wessel said that the August meeting was cancelled due to lack of business. "Well, I would say that this is clearly the responsibility of the committee," she said. "This is exactly what the committee needs to consider... We were established because the public supports the plan and we have expertise in all areas that can be provided to the county. It is also to prevent accidents in the county."

Then, she said, there is a lack of role models.

"As a county, we will not set an example for events you don't want the public to participate in," Wessel told Lavender. "When you say something is bad, you don't do it everywhere. This is the contradiction I see here... You have to set a standard, and you have to abide by it."

Board member and attorney Sawyer Smith was obviously annoyed on behalf of Lavender. He asked, "Jesse, is it acceptable to voluntarily protect palm trees with whiskey and a rifle?" There was a snicker in the room.

"I think you understand how enthusiastic people are on this topic, Jesse." Smith said to his colleague, "He accepted...I think he heard your opinion, and I think we will come back appropriately at the next meeting. solve this problem."

Bill Hammond, a long-term environmental educator in Fort Myers, sees this problem in every way. "I myself eat (medicinal) palm berries," he said, "but on the other hand, we know that bears depend on them, as do other wild animals," he said.

Many animals, including gopher tortoises and protected species such as black bears and panthers in Florida also use them.

"More than 100 species of birds, 27 species of mammals, 25 species of amphibians, 61 species of reptiles, and countless insects use them for food and/or cover," scientists David Maehr and James Layne in a paper on Florida native plants Wrote in. "If saw palmetto is not the plant species with the highest usage rate of wildlife in Florida, then it will definitely compete for this honor."

Songdo resident Noel Anders told Lavender and the committee that this is why it is wrong to remove the fruit from the land dedicated to sheltering these species. "Resource mining is not suitable for protected areas.

"These are protected areas, not parks," Anders said. "We have such an amazing growth in the county. There are very few homes for wild animals and plant species... This is an impulsive decision made by the staff. , It is wrong to not submit it to this committee."

"Therefore, policies that run counter to the protection of resources are inconsistent with 20/20."

solution? Hammond recommends harvesting from "other non-protected areas."

He also sympathizes with those "poor people who work hard to make a living, desperate people. So this is the moral conflict between me and this."

Lavender said the harvester was properly licensed and left 20% of the berries on the plant.

Anders was skeptical, citing reports of berries dumping in piles on the ground, although county spokesperson Betsy Clayton confirmed in a later email that the berries were still on the plants.

Holly Schwartz, a member of the non-profit organization eYes, suggested on the 20/20 that the county try to use all-terrain vehicle patrols or tracking cameras to attract the attention of poachers and other illegal users. "I live near a protected area," she said, where it was "affected by shootings, all-terrain vehicles, fires, and all these crazy things."

After listening to everyone’s opinions, Lavender assured the board members: “We will use the information collected from this supplier and later bring more formal information back to the committee, our board of directors and the county government.”

Tell Lavender that he does not want to micromanage, and the chairman of the board of directors Carl Barraco encourages him to "spend as much time as possible... so that we can really look at the information you collect and make real, good, and wise decisions together. "