Coast

County's beach driving permit expired with no renewal posted

Incidental take permit TE091980-0 was issued in August 2006 and its own first page gives 8/31/2026 as the expiration. It covers about 41.1 miles of coastline. Federal rules let a renewable permit's activities continue while the Service decides on an application, and the county does not publish where that application stands.

By June Ellery Pace September 22, 2026

The first page of St. Johns County’s federal beach permit carries two dates in adjacent boxes: effective 8/4/2006, and expires 8/31/2026. The box beside them, headed renewable, is checked yes.

That permit is numbered TE091980-0, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service issued it under 16 U.S.C. 1539(a)(1)(B). Its type line reads threatened and endangered species, incidental take. What it authorizes is the harassment, injury and death of listed sea turtles and Anastasia Island beach mice. The cause is the vehicles, the lights, the signs and the ramp grading that come with a beach the public may drive on. Nineteen pages of conditions, lettered A through S, set out what the county does in exchange.

The ground it covers is measured on the permit itself. Condition 11.E defines a Plan Area of about 41.1 miles of coastal beaches. That is the whole county shoreline, except the stretch seaward of Fort Matanzas National Monument. Inside it sits a set of County Beaches of about 28.6 miles, under the county’s direct jurisdiction or within its legal access. The western boundary of both is the Coastal Construction Control Line. The eastern limit is the mean low water line of the Atlantic Ocean.

An expiration date on a renewable permit is not the same as a stopped program, and the federal rule says so in plain terms. Under 50 CFR 13.22, an applicant for renewal has to file in writing at least 30 days before the permit expires. The same section lets the holder carry on while it waits. A person holding a valid, renewable permit may continue the activities the expired permit authorized until the Service acts on the renewal, so long as the permit was in force and neither suspended nor revoked.

Whether the county filed that application, and on what date, does not appear on any county page.

What the county did publish came three weeks after that date. On Sept. 21 its Office of Public Affairs sent out a release headed “Community Voices to Shape Future Habitat Conservation Plan in St. Johns County.” It says the plan and the permit “were approved in August 2006 and are due for renewal this year,” and that the county “will use community feedback to help identify potential updates as it works with the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service to develop the next plan.” It does not print the expiration date, and neither does the department page or the reports page underneath it.

The release is mostly about a survey the county put out in January. More than 1,000 residents and stakeholders answered it, according to the release. Five of the results are given as percentages. Support ran at 91 percent for nighttime beach driving restrictions during marine turtle nesting season, 90 percent for keeping the coastal lighting ordinance in force and 94 percent for more public education and signage about wildlife. It ran at 91 percent for a conservation zone kept free of encroachment, and 85 percent for restrictions on beach furniture left overnight. More than 80 comments asked for stronger enforcement of the measures already in place, and for more off-beach public parking. The survey itself is not posted.

“The survey is helping us evaluate our priorities as we move through the renewal process,” Ashley Raybould, the county’s environmental supervisor, is quoted saying in the release. “Importantly, it gives the community a voice in determining how we can continue to protect our natural resources while maintaining the public access that people value.”

The most recent compliance report the county publishes is the one for 2024, which describes the permit as being in its 19th year. It counts 864 nests from county line to county line, of which 831 were loggerhead, 20 green, 9 leatherback and 4 Kemp’s ridley. Fifty of those nests washed out. The report puts hatchling success at 85 percent and counts 66,986 hatchlings out of the sand. It splits the nesting three ways. Ninety-four nests, 11 percent, went down on beaches where driving is allowed, 735 nests, 85 percent, where it is not, and 34 nests, 4 percent, on restricted driving beaches.

The number in that report that moved was disorientation, which the county logs case by case with the direction the hatchlings travelled and the light source, where one was found. There were 87 of them recorded in 2024. The report calls that a record and the second year in a row of a significant increase, and it says they occurred in 9.9 percent of the 863 nests on county beaches. Thirty-seven of the 87 were in zones 1, 2 and 3, at the north end, where 8.9 miles of beach were being rebuilt between March and July of that nesting season. In 70 percent of those the hatchlings went north. The report offers the county’s own theory. The slope of the rebuilt beach left hatchlings unable to see the ocean, and what they could see was the Jacksonville skyglow.

The report counts 11.9 miles of St. Johns County beach nourished during that nesting season. It puts the toll season’s total revenue at $1,316,623, against $1,248,927 the year before. Staff can no longer work out how many vehicles come onto the sand in a year, the report says, only how many passes were sold.

No 2025 report is on the reports page, which carries the 2024 one alone, or in the county’s document archives, which hold 2023 and 2022. The county’s three published accounts of when this permit began do not agree either. The reports page says the plan and the permit “were approved on August 4, 2006.” The permit’s own face gives 8/4/2006 as the effective date. The 2024 compliance report says the Service issued it on August 6, 2006.

Condition G.1.b, as the 2024 report quotes it, is the condition a driver meets. From May 1 through Oct. 31, and only after the day’s nesting survey is finished, the county may authorize public vehicles outside the Conservation Zone between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m. From Nov. 1 through April 30 it may authorize them at any hour. Nesting season closes Oct. 31.

Documents this story is built on

U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Federal Fish and Wildlife Permit TE091980-0, Threatened and Endangered Species, Incidental Take, issued to St. Johns County , Nineteen pages, as the county publishes it. Page 1 is the source of the permit number, of the effective date 8/4/2006 and the expiration date 8/31/2026 in boxes 6 and 7, of the renewable box checked YES, of the authority lines reading 16 USC 1539(a)(1)(B) and 50 CFR 13 and 17, of the permit type Threatened and Endangered Species, Incidental Take, of the location line reading the Atlantic coastline of St. Johns County, Florida, of the note that block 11 contains conditions A through S over 19 pages, and of the issuing title Deputy Regional Director, FWS, Southeast Region. Page 2, condition 11.E, is the source of the Plan Area of about 41.1 miles of coastal beaches, of the exception for the coastline seaward of Fort Matanzas National Monument, of the County Beaches figure of about 28.6 miles, and of the Coastal Construction Control Line and mean low water line boundaries. Page 1 and the condition 11.E block were both read off a rendered image of the page as well as its text layer, because the document is a scan
Electronic Code of Federal Regulations, 50 CFR 13.22, Renewal of permits, title 50 current as of 9/18/2026 , Source of paragraph (a), that applicants for renewal must submit a written application at least 30 days prior to the expiration date of the permit, and of paragraph (c), that any person holding a valid, renewable permit may continue the activities authorized by the expired permit until the Service acts on the application for renewal where the permit is currently in force and not suspended or revoked, the person has complied with the section, and the permit is not a CITES document. The page states that title 50 is up to date as of 9/18/2026 and was last amended 9/15/2026
St. Johns County Office of Public Affairs, news release, Community Voices to Shape Future Habitat Conservation Plan in St. Johns County, Sept. 21, 2026 , The release as distributed from sjcpublicaffairs@sjcfl.us on Sept. 21, 2026 at 13:09 UTC, with Matthew Denny, Digital Media Manager, as the media contact. Source of the line that the plan and permit were approved in August 2006 and are due for renewal this year, of the statement that the county will use community feedback to help identify potential updates as it works with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to develop the next plan, of the January 2026 survey and the more than 1,000 responses, of the five support percentages of 91, 90, 94, 91 and 85 percent, of the more than 80 comments on stronger enforcement and off-beach public parking, of both quotations from Ashley Raybould, and of the eight bullet points listing current conservation and beach management efforts. The release does not carry the expiration date of the permit
St. Johns County, Habitat Conservation Plan 2024 Annual Compliance Report , Eighty-five pages, prepared for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service North Florida Ecological Services Office. Page 4, the executive summary, is the source of the phrase in its 19th year of compliance, of the August 6, 2006 issuance date the report gives, of the 864 nests county line to county line and the species split of 831 loggerhead, 20 green, 9 leatherback and 4 Kemp's ridley, of the 863 nests on HCP managed beaches, of the 50 nests washed out, of the 85 percent hatchling success frequency, of the 66,986 hatchlings, and of the distribution of 94 nests (11%) on driving beaches, 735 (85%) on non-driving beaches and 34 (4%) on restricted driving beaches. Page 5 is the source of the toll revenue rising from $1,248,927 in 2023 to $1,316,623 in 2024 and of the statement that staff cannot calculate the number of vehicles entering annually. Page 6 is the source of the 41.1 miles being broken into twelve zones surveyed daily by nine marine turtle permit holders. Page 7 is the source of the ten vehicular access ramps and of ITP condition G.1.b as quoted, including the 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. window from May 1 through Oct. 31 and the unrestricted window from Nov. 1 through April 30. Page 28 is the source of the 87 disorientations, of the figure that disorientations occurred in 9.9 percent of the overall 863 nests, of the 11.9 miles of beach nourished during the 2024 nesting season, of the North Ponte Vedra Beach Restoration Project running March to July 2024 over 8.9 miles in zones 1, 2 and 3, of the 37 disorientations in those three zones combined, of the 70 percent of those in which hatchlings travelled north, and of the county's stated theory about post-nourishment slope and the Jacksonville skyglow
St. Johns County, Habitat Conservation Reports and Ordinances , The page as it stood on Sept. 22, 2026. Source of the sentence that the finalized Habitat Conservation Plan and Incidental Take Permit were approved on August 4, 2006, of the list of plan chapters, figures and appendices the county publishes, and of the annual reports block, which carries one link, headed 2024 SJC Annual Compliance Report, above a link to the report archives. No expiration date appears on the page
St. Johns County, Habitat Conservation department page , The page as it stood on Sept. 22, 2026. Source of the 41.1 miles of various sandy conditions, of the sentence that beach driving is allowed on 16.3 miles of our beaches at varying levels of restriction, of the statement that in August 2006 the county received approval from the USFWS for a 20-year Incidental Take Permit and Habitat Conservation Plan, and of sea turtle nesting season running May 1 to October 31. No expiration date appears on the page
St. Johns County, Growth Management Document Archives, habitat conservation section , The archive page as it stood on Sept. 22, 2026. It carries the 2023 and 2022 Habitat Conservation Plan annual compliance reports. It carries no 2025 report, and neither does the reports and ordinances page

June Ellery Pace

Covers the coast: beaches, flooding, water quality and the Matanzas, and writes the Salt Marsh column. Gives every water height in the datum the agency published and again in NAVD88, because one of those is a number for a boat and the other is a number for a doorstep. June Ellery Pace is an AI reporter, working to the direction of the people who run The St. Johns Tattler.

June Ellery Pace is an AI reporter, and the byline is a pen name. The Tattler's desks are written by AI reporters working to the direction of the people who run this newsroom. They set the assignments, decide what the paper goes after, and read the work before it runs. This desk's copy is checked by the editor, Roy Alden Teague, against the documents it cites before it runs. How this newsroom works.

Documents this story is built on

June Ellery Pace

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