Editor:

While the following is an excerpt from a presentation I made to the Baldwin County Commissioners at their Aug. 19 meeting in Bay Minette, the concerns I voice are reflective of the concerns of individuals from not only Baldwin County but Mobile County, as well as every county in the State of Alabama. Once again the issue is protecting one of our state’s most beautiful natural resources, Gulf State Park.

A powerful contingency of government officials, politicians, private business owners and developers have outlined a plan to build a highway through the protected wetlands of Gulf State Park. First of all, “Southern Evacuation Parkway” the name given to the proposed highway through Gulf State Park suggests that the main purpose of the route is for hurricane evacuation. Anyone interested in learning more about this issue can avail themselves of public records on file with the city of Orange Beach where they will find a document titled “Alternative Analysis Southern Evacuation Route Extension.” In this document it is stated that a new north-south roadway will number one, enhance the growth of the beach area and, in addition, provide an alternative hurricane evacuation route to Alabama 59. A few sentences later in this same document it further states that the project will NOT relieve the bottleneck that controls the overall evacuation of Baldwin County. With this proposed highway, the same traffic leaving the beach area would be funneled to the same bottleneck that already catches the traffic north of the island. The question is, why build the bottom end of an evacuation highway only to create a bottleneck at the top end?

To quote from a Letter to the Editor by Bill Bender which was printed in the Baldwin Register on Sunday Aug. 17, “It seems a little disingenuous to name this proposed route through Gulf State Park the ‘Southern Evacuation Highway’ when the impetus for the roadway is and always has been to enhance growth and development in Orange Beach and of course provide the convenience of transit to and from the beach and Canal Road.”

Mr. Bender is the owner of Bender Realty at Gulf Shores and a well respected property manager and developer. He speaks with the knowledge he has gathered from years of observing the efforts that have been made to take Gulf State Park away from the people of Alabama.

However, up until this point, it is my understanding that no governor’s administration prior to Governor Riley’s has ever supported a highway through Gulf State Park. With all due respect to Governor Riley, many believe this proposal to build a so-called “evacuation route” through Gulf State Park is being sold to the public much like the governor’s earlier attempt to take the Gulf State Park beachfront property from the people of Alabama.

In our state capitol on June 27 of this year, after several years of Governor Riley’s hard-fought fight to give our Gulf State Park beachfront to private investors to build a 4-star, $350-room-per-night hotel, resort and convention center (hardly affordable for most Alabama tax payers), Circuit Court Judge Eugene Reese charged the state with and I quote, “seeking to circumvent applicable Alabama constitutional and statutory law by means of an elaborate plan.” In a sternly worded opinion, Judge Reese ruled against the governor’s plan pronouncing it unlawful and unconstitutional.

When our grass roots organization Save Our Alabama Parks (SOAP) started its fight to stop the governor from giving away our Gulf State Park beachfront, many compared us to David going up against Goliath. We are gratified and proud to have played such a role in protecting our beachfront for the people of Alabama and urge the governor to forgo his appeal of Judge Reese’s ruling.

With the recent decisions made by the cities of Orange Beach and Gulf Shores to go forward with the construction of convention facilities in each of their cities, the need for another convention center on the Gulf Sate Park beachfront does not exist.

We commend and encourage the cities of Orange Beach and Gulf Shores on these decisions that put together private and public partnerships to build convention facilities on land other than that which has been set aside for all Alabamians and have been heretofore protected as our Gulf State Park.

Because government is trusted with the responsibility of protecting our environment, it is an unbelievable irony that government would even consider destroying the environment by proposing this so-called “Southern Evacuation Parkway,” which will disturb and possibly destroy some of the finest and most pristine wetlands in Alabama. In coastal areas such as we have in south Baldwin County, we are all aware that wetlands serve vitally important functions including storm-water storage and erosion control.

Wetlands are also intrinsically valuable, providing opportunity for recreation, aesthetics and education that include a potentially profitable draw to this area for ecotourism. Ecotourism has proven to be highly profitable for our neighboring state of Florida. Why not promote ecotourism for our Gulf State Park instead of allowing private developers (whose aim it is to profit rather than protect) to continue trying to wrestle away our public lands under the guise of a so-called Southern Evacuation Parkway? Why not look into other possible routes for an evacuation highway that would not disturb our vitally important public wetlands or compromise Gulf State Park in any way?

I encourage all those concerned with protecting our park from private encroachment and development to contact their representatives in Montgomery as well as Governor Riley and Conservation Commissioner Barnett Lawley. Remind them that Gulf State Park belongs to all of Alabama’s citizens not simply the powerful and the wealthy with political and financial influence. Tell our public officials that were elected to office by the vote of the majority of our citizens that giving away our Gulf State Park is not acceptable. This beautiful land creates by its very nature an attraction to our area, which is fast giving way to a sea of concrete high-rises that only the wealthiest of our citizens can even access. Let us Save Gulf State Park. Our future generations may not even have the opportunity to know what a wetland or unencumbered beachfront looks like much less the opportunity to enjoy it, unless we the people of the State of Alabama speak up NOW.

Fairhope resident