Jekyll Island board may ask legislators to set firm acreage limit on development | jacksonville.com

JEKYLL ISLAND | The island’s governing board said Monday it may ask for legislation setting a firm acreage for development on the state-owned island, which could end disputes over the so-called 65-35 rule.

In a late morning workshop on the island’s master plan, the Jekyll Island Authority board member Buddy DeLoach said making the acreage part of state law would end the need for basing development on the legally mandated limit of 35 percent of the island’s land.

That acreage would fall within that 35 percent limit, he said.

“If that complies with the law, why would we have to do anything else?’’ DeLoach asked.

The board has come under fire from conservation groups based on a more-than 40-year-old state law saying that the authority must not develop more than 35 percent of the land above the mean high tide. A task force drawing up a new master plan wanted the island’s size determine by surveying land above the highest tides, but Attorney General Sam Olens said that authority must use the mean high tide standard because it is a state law.

Member Bob Kruger said the board does not plan to develop any land outside its existing footprint, but that it may “need 100 acres in our packet in case something happens.”

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