Duck Key canals, Key Largo project go to hearing

A proposal to perform maintenance dredging in Duck Key’s manmade canals could hit rough water Wednesday.

Monroe County Planning Commission members, meeting at 10 a.m. at the Marathon Government Center, will hear issues including a pending ordinance change that could permit maintenance dredging on Duck Key’s manmade canals.

A current plan submitted by the Duck Key Community Benefit, a group formed to spearhead efforts to perform maintenance dredging, goes beyond what Monroe County commissioners previously agreed to allow, a staff report from county planners says.

County commissioners at a January 2016 meeting with Duck Key residents agreed to consider changing laws that could have blocked dredging of manmade canals that have filled in and where seagrass has taken root.

County commissioners were “not in favor of allowing maintenance dredging in areas with benthic [marine bottom life] resources in channels, even if at the mouth of a canal — areas where both edges are under water,” a staff summary describes.

In the revised dredging proposal, “the applicant also has included basins and the immediately adjacent waters located no more than 200 feet from land in Duck Key, which is inconsistent with [County Commission] direction,” the report says.

Duck Key’s proposal describes the open-water entrance as part of the “canal system.” But dredging in open waters appears to be “directly in conflict” with commissioners’ stated intent at the 2016 meeting, county planners say.

The Duck Key plan also lists dredging in an enclosed basin, which proponents previously said was not part of the dredging work.

County commissioners had previously denied a dredge request near Duck Key from landowners who sought to restore a channel dug decades ago but now has silted in and become a grass flat.

Key Largo project

Planning Commission members also will be asked to consider a major conditional-use permit for Southcliff Estates, a 28-unit residential housing complex near mile marker 95 on Key Largo.

Residents in the Snapper Lane and Lobster Lane area have strongly objected to the project, citing concern over increased traffic on narrow side streets and loss of native vegetation on the two-acre site.

If building permits are issued, wrote resident Jim Russell, “the character of our neighborhood will be changed forever for the worse.”

Developer Richard Riehl contends the project has proper zoning and will provide reasonably priced rental apartments “for people who want to live and work in the Keys.” County planners have recommended approval of the conditional-use permit, with some relatively minor alterations to the site layout.

A major conditional use permit would outline conditions that must be met to assure a proposed project is suitable for the site. Building permits still must be obtained.

This story was originally published June 24, 2017 at 8:43 AM with the headline "Duck Key canals, Key Largo project go to hearing."