The Apalachicola National Forest land that Wakulla County wants is full of cypress swamps and sinkholes — not the best place to build recreational fields and playgrounds. (Photo/Chloe Broker)
Sometimes I think the most “Florida” county of the 67, the one that best encapsulates the good and bad of the Sunshine State, is Wakulla County up in the Panhandle. It contains lots of wild natural beauty, and the politics can be equally wild.
Wakulla’s natural attributes include such beautiful places as St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge, the Apalachicola National Forest, and Wakulla Springs, which the state parks folks call “the world’s largest and deepest freshwater spring.” The water is so clear it was used for filming the underwater scenes of “Creature from the Black Lagoon.”
As for the politics, well, there are plenty of scary creatures lurking there too. The Tallahassee Democrat once described Wakulla County as a place “where political divisions run deep and conspiracy theories abound.”
The latest example of Wakulla politicians’ wobbly approach to the concept of “public service” involves the national forest. Wakulla County wants to swap some 200 acres with the Apalachicola National Forest and use the forest land to build a recreation area.
This is a deal that the county administrator says has been in the works since 2013. However, a lot of voters just found out about it last week and they’re howling mad. There’s now an online petition to stop it and a Facebook page called “Stop Bulldozing Apalachicola National Forest-Wakulla.”
Chloe Broker via subject)
One of the first posts on the Facebook page is from a local resident asking, “Why haven’t I heard about this? Nothing on the news?? Geez!!” The reply she received said, “That’s how they want it.”
“It’s been kept very quiet,” said community activist Chloe Broker, who’s been working to get the word out. “There’s no need to plow down this beautiful forest land and ruin people’s peace and quiet.”
Low-key notice
The 630,000-acre Apalachicola National Forest dates to 1936. It was created by President Franklin Roosevelt, probably the most radical left Democrat to ever serve as chief executive. FDR gave us Social Security and other government safety net programs, defeated the original Nazis, and helped start the United Nations. All it got him was elected to four terms.
These days, if you click on the Apalachicola National Forest website, you get a message from the U.S. Department of Agriculture that blames “Radical Left Democrats” for shutting down the federal government — although, last I checked, the government is under the control of the GOP.
Nevertheless, there’s a low-key public notice on the website that spells out what has so many folks outraged: “Wakulla County has proposed a land exchange with the Apalachicola National Forest. The county proposes to exchange lands near Sopchoppy, FL adjacent to Lawhon Mill Road for forest service land located near Crawfordville, FL east of Revadee Spears Rd.”
But that’s all the info offered by the feds. They don’t even mention that one of those cities is best known as the home of the most magical celebration in the state, the Sopchoppy Worm-Gruntin’ Festival.
The only other helpful item on the website is a timeline. It says there will be a comment period sometime next month. The final decision is tentatively scheduled for next March.
A county document outlining its future infrastructure needs delivered a couple more details: the location of the land in Crawfordville and the fact that the county wants to build “a multi-sport recreational center” with “athletic fields, playgrounds, seating, restrooms and concession stands.” The goal of the land swap is to “reduce the cost of land acquisition.”
But no one has surveyed the forest property to see if it’s suitable for use as a rec center, Broker told me. She sent me pictures showing it contains sinkholes and cypress swamps galore, neither of which are considered good terrain for any sport except mudbogging.
The people who live near that part of the forest like it just the way it is, she told me.
Perhaps that’s why the folks in charge haven’t asked their opinion. Florida is supposed to be the state with Government in the Sunshine, but these days a lot of politicians hide in the shade.
Why say whoa
I tried calling the forest service folks but, of course, I couldn’t reach them. They’re all twiddling their thumbs at home and waiting for our do-nothing Congress to reopen the government.
Chuck Hess via Wakulla County
Instead, I talked to a couple of former forest service employees. One, Chuck Hess, is a former red cockaded woodpecker biologist who spent eight years as a Wakulla County commissioner.
“It’s a bad idea,” he said of the land swap.
For the forest service, the land swap provides control of a piece of property that probably should have been a part of the forest already. Adding it to the federal holdings should make it easier to do controlled burns, which are essential to the health of the forest, he said.
There’s one problem: The county’s property has buildings on it that can’t be burned. They’re part of the Wakulla County Equestrian Center, which is under a covenant that says it cannot be torn down or moved, Hess pointed out.
“They have promised to keep that horse facility in place,” he explained. If the forest service can’t burn the property regularly the way it needs, he said, “I can’t see the benefit to the forest service.”
You could say the equestrian center is a good reason to tell the county, “Whoa!”
The Wakulla County Equestrian Center (Photo via the center’s FaceBook page)
Forest forever
I had an even longer conversation with another former national forest employee, Eugene Watkins, who says he’s lived in Wakulla County for more than 40 years. He offered a couple of sharp observations about the land swap.
“I think the land swap is mainly for Wakulla to get land without paying for land,” he said.
Looking strictly at what the land is worth, the county is getting a lot more than it’s giving away.
“The value of the land that [the county] is giving up is less than the value of the land that they’re getting,” Watkins told me.
But as Broker pointed out, it’s just not the kind of land where you can build ballfields and playgrounds without a lot of expensive major alterations, he said.
Watkins told me he lives about a mile away from where the county wants to build its new rec center. He understands why the people living even closer aren’t happy about trading in the peace and quiet of the forest for the hubbub of ballfields and playgrounds.
“When people moved in there, they were told it would be a national forest forever,” he told me. “But now they’ll have to cope with lots of traffic and bright ballfield lights shining into their backyards.”
Wakulla County Commission Oct. 20, 2025 meeting (Photo via screengrab)
Sprawl over all, y’all
Saying that Wakulla County’s commissioners like development is like saying Popeye wouldn’t mind a bite of spinach. They’re absolutely besotted with big-money developers, and the heck with any consequences to the residents
Two years ago, for instance, a citizens’ group proposed a springs protection ordinance because lots of people were worried about the future of Wakulla Springs, which is both a huge tourist attraction and the source of the community’s drinking water. The commissioners didn’t even want to discuss it for fear it would slow the county’s growth.
Such a devotion to sprawl-over-all has taken a toll on the county and its longtime residents. At a commission meeting Monday night, several people complained about how the place has changed so radically they barely recognize it.
Chad Smith at Oct. 20, 2025, Wakulla County Commission meeting (Photo via screengrab)
“The rate of growth in this county is ridiculous,” longtime Crawfordville resident Chad Smith told commissioners. “Our roads are falling apart, and our schools are jam-packed. This used to be my home, but this don’t feel like my home no more.”
The meeting room was absolutely packed, Broker told me. Lots of residents were ready to get up and raise sand about the proposed land swap.
Two things stopped them.
First, the commissioners got a report from a pair of consultants about the county’s poorly organized, badly maintained, and sorely understaffed recreation program. The consultants made it clear that the county’s current rec center has plenty of room for additional ballfields and other facilities, and that the local schools have land available too.
In other words, there’s no need to acquire any land from the national forest to build a new rec center.
Wakulla County Commissioner Fred Nichols via Wakulla County
Wakulla County Commission Vice Chairman Ralph Thomas (Photo/Wakulla County Commission)
Then came the second thing. After complaining about all the “hoopla” online about the proposed land swap, Commission Chairman Fred Nichols, a former cop, in effect said he’d like to put the whole idea under arrest.
“I wouldn’t feel comfortable putting a recreational park there,” he said of the national forest property. Then he went even further and said, “I’m not for messing with any U.S. Forest Service land.”
But then the commission’s vice chair, mortgage broker Ralph Thomas, piped up to say there was no formal land-swap proposal in front of the commission anyway. He insisted the opponents had “ginned up” the controversy and he had no clear idea what was being proposed.
That’s when a Florida Trident reporter named Michelle DeMarco who lives in Crawfordville stepped to the microphone. She reminded Thomas that she had emailed him about the land-swap when she first heard about it last year.
DeMarco compared the public’s anger over Wakulla’s proposed land-swap to the furor that erupted statewide last year when everyone found out Gov. Ron DeSantis was trying to sneak a trio of golf courses into a state park.
The Legislature wound up forbidding any governor to ever again try something so stupid. DeMarco pointed out how similarly unpopular the land swap had become.
“The people here don’t want this,” she told commissioners. They adjourned shortly afterward.
The way to win
Everyone I talked to attributed the push for this land swap to the longtime Wakulla County administrator, David Edwards.
Edwards, who was hired in 2011 despite having no experience in county management, has had a somewhat checkered history with the state Ethics Commission. That’s because of his tendency to accept gifts from county vendors and contractors.
He didn’t respond to my efforts to contact him for comment. But several people told me that Edwards has said in public that the land swap is an idea that’s been kicking around among county insiders since 2013. Hess confirmed that.
When I asked Hess why the swap was suddenly such a strong possibility now, he told me the reason was simple: “Because the current administration doesn’t really care about public lands.”
The minute he said it, I saw he was right.
Just last month, a Florida Phoenix affiliate reported that the president who’s even now ripping up the White House is “moving forward with a plan to open more than 58 million acres of previously protected national forests to development.”
Our frequently math-challenged chief executive is also proposing mass layoffs and firings of thousands of employees working in the federal agencies in charge of maintaining public lands.
This destruction of the public’s holdings is all part of the Project 2025 playbook that as a candidate he claimed was too extreme. Since he was sworn in, though, he’s been following it like it was written on stone tablets and handed to Moses on Mount Sinai.
The Heritage Foundation think tank’s blueprint calls for boosting timber sales in the national forests, not greater preservation or maintaining their peace and quiet.
Yet the people of Wakulla County clearly value the forest just the way it is. I think if they want to convince more than one commissioner to listen to them, they need to ramp up their opposition.
My suggestion would be for the opponents to challenge the five commissioners to a softball game at the county’s poorly maintained rec center. The winners get to decide what happens with the land swap, and the losers have to fix the existing rec center.
To ensure the right outcome, though, maybe the opponents should hide some of those Sopchoppy worms in the commissioners’ uniforms. Otherwise, they might try to wiggle out of it.