FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact:    Pete Winton, Lee County Administration
                (941) 335-2777

FORT MYERS, Fla. (October 30, 2001) – The Board of Lee County Commissioner (BOCC) today approved two projects in east Lee County, including the second construction phase of Veterans Park in Lehigh Acres and the purchase of parcel along the Orange River for the Conservation 2020 Program.

The Board gave the go-ahead for the construction of phase II of Veterans Park, with Lodge Construction Inc. as the construction manager.

The second phase will include two lighted softball fields, a maintenance building, underground drainage and expansion of the mitigation area. The cost is $1.3 million and construction is expected to be completed within six months.

The park – at 55 Homestead Road in Lehigh Acres – is 45 acres. The first phase, completed in November 1993, includes a screened pavilion, basketball court, playground, play fields, skateboard track, volleyball court, a jogging and walking course, and parking.

The Board approved the purchase of a 60-acre tract located in the Buckingham Area, between Palm Beach Boulevard (S.R. 80) and the Orange River, and just west of Baptist Crossroads Church.

The cost was $1.75 million.

The property has 2,500 feet of frontage along the river, including an island, and it is contiguous to a conservation easement on the adjoining Crossroads Baptist Church property, Manatee Park, and Conservation 2020 parcel 132 (20 acres).

The property is 50 percent wetlands and 50 percent uplands. The river frontage is an area used by the endangered manatee as a winter haven due to the FP&L warm water discharge and sea grasses.

Lee County voters approved Conservation 2020 in November 1996 through a referendum that increased property taxes for seven years by 50 cents for every $1,000 of taxable property value. The increase raises about $12 million a year to buy environmentally sensitive lands. More than 7,500 acres has been purchased to date.