Manatee awarded $5M federal grant for conservation land purchase

Manatee County has been awarded a $5 million grant to offset the purchase late last year of the 68-acre Crooked River Ranch in order to preserve it.

The grant from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is for the $11.2 million purchase of the property in Parrish. Since the county has already closed on the sale, a county spokesman says the “grant frees up more county dollars to work on protecting even more environmentally sensitive properties here in Manatee.”

Manatee commissioners voted unanimously in December to buy Crooked River Ranch, saying at the time that it “will provide for coastal resiliency, water quality protection/improvement and native habitat protection/improvement.”

The purchase was made through the county’s Environmental Lands Program which allows the use of tax money to buy, improve and manage land to protect natural resources and for parks.

The piece of land is between Interstate 75 and Fort Hamer Road and gave the county rights to one of the last remaining sizable, privately owned parcels along the river.

The grant, the county says in a statement Tuesday, is part of a $75 million NOAA program to support coastal habitat restoration and estuarine research reserves. The funding came from the Inflation Reduction Act and Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.

A total of 22 projects in 16 states received grant money from the agency, with Manatee’s the only one in Florida, according to the county.

In a statement at the time of the purchase, the county said conserving the property will benefit manatees that graze on vegetation along the shoreline as well providing a habitat for birds, including roseate spoonbills and wood storks.

On Tuesday, Manatee said “the Crooked River Ranch property is one of the few large undeveloped parcels along the Manatee River and will contribute significantly to creating a connected-wildlife corridor and enhancing climate resilience and water quality in an area under intense pressure from development.”

Manatee staff worked on the deal with the family and the Conservation Foundation of the Gulf Coast for several months.