Floridians Turn Law Into License to Raze Mangroves : Environment: Measure meant to ease restrictions on trimming of the vegetation unleashes a virtual massacre. And thereby hangs a cautionary tale.

It seemed so simple, and the time so politically ripe for a no-nonsense Republican solution to the most vexing environmental problem in a state overwhelmed with vexing environmental problems.

Forget the imperiled Everglades. Forget dying reefs, evaporating wetlands, endangered manatees and roseate spoonbills. This is about mangrove trees--one of the most biologically important but loathed plants in Florida, where they grow like towering, wonderful weeds at the water’s edge. Great for crabs, fish and birds. Bad for waterfront views and property values.

And so, Republican state Rep. Jack Latvala from the Tampa area pledged he was going to take a stand.

What followed was the Great Mangrove Massacre.

The story of the mangrove debacle stands as a cautionary tale for a nation and a Republican-led Congress that is pushing to roll back a raft of environmental protections--bills that would limit the roles of the Environmental Protection Agency and Interior Department to police unique habitats, endangered species and water quality.

For if nature can be ruthless and efficient, so can humans.

A few months ago, the Republican-led state Legislature passed, and Democratic Gov. Lawton Chiles signed, Latvala’s controversial Mangrove Trimming and Preservation Act of 1995.

For the last decade, trimming mangrove trees along canals and bays was often a cumbersome and expensive affair, involving brain-teasing paperwork, complex rules and a $500 permit. The state’s environmental regulators often insisted on visiting the site and battling with property owners over each cut. A “window” through the bushes could be trimmed here--but not there. Critics like Latvala said it was a royal pain in the neck.

Latvala hoped his new law would simplify the process. It essentially ended the permit requirements and allowed much more liberal manicuring. In fact, if a professional “mangrove trimmer” is employed, a property owner can whack 30-foot trees thigh high, as long as they are still--technically--alive. After the Latvala law was passed, state environmental regulators threw up their hands, concluding that technically alive meant just that. As long as a few leaves remained, no problem.

Freed from state environmental regulators, and given the choice between the mangrove and a nice view of Sarasota or Tampa Bay, many homeowners and developers fired up their chain saws.

Where once tangled fringes existed along shorelines, there are now neat hedges. In some spots, trees were cut to the ground. The full damage, still contested, is not yet known.

Latvala himself confessed to being somewhat shocked by the aggressive cutting. “Obviously, the law needs to be amended,” he said. Some people, unfortunately, went overboard, he said.

And yet, the conservationists and the Florida Department of Environmental Protection also are being blamed for the massacre--for promulgating rules and regulations in the past that critics say were so complicated, so mind-numbingly detailed and unrealistic, that the current backlash was almost inevitable.

“I’ve lived here 30 years, and I could not see the water from my house,” said Salu Devnani, a homeowner on old Tampa Bay, who vigorously cut his trees and set off a firestorm when local nature lovers and fishermen saw his handiwork. Devnani said he considers himself a nature lover--but he wanted his view back.

Why all the fuss? Mangroves--the red, white and black species--grow at the water’s edge in tropical Florida, where their roots, leaves and branches nurture osprey, eagles and endangered wading birds. They also support a vast commercial and recreational fishery, providing shelter and food for snook, trout, snappers and tarpon. The trees also control erosion, filter pollution and protect against hurricane damage.

“They are the most productive food web that anyone has ever measured,” said James Beever, perhaps the state’s most eminent mangrove biologist at the Florida Game and Fresh Water Fish Commission.

State environmental regulators report getting hundreds of calls about the new legislation. And many times, they hear from fishermen or others ratting on their neighbors for hacking down the trees.

“It is, perhaps, the single most contentious environmental issue in the state,” said Nevin Smith, the Department of Environmental Protection’s director of executive services.

To make matters worse, the state environmental agency basically threw up its hands, saying the new legislation took away most--if not all--of the agency’s enforcement powers.

Latvala and the bill’s other outspoken supporters pledge to amend the new law. The problem, they say, is that not all mangroves are alike. Some grow in clumps along an otherwise lifeless canal and do not support much biological growth, and these can be whacked. Other mangrove stands, they admit, might be more precious.

Latvala, who said the controversy over his bill took him “by surprise,” promised to rewrite the legislation and try to make everyone happy. But it does not look like it will be easy.