Recently ended sea turtle lighting program was very successful

A four year program to help beachfront homeowners retrofit their homes with sea turtle friendly lighting recently ended and administrators say the program did a lot for our nesting turtles and their hatchlings.

The federal grant provided about about 65 thousand dollars a year to hire a part-time code enforcement officer to visit homes and businesses near nesting beaches and offer assistance in bringing their outdoor lighting into compliance with county sea turtle lighting rules

The grant ended last month and administrator Erik Lovestrand said it was very effective.

Overall, 136 homeowners on St. George Island pledged to switch to sea turtle safe lights and 117 properties actually went through with it.

That was an 86 percent success rate which was higher than the grant required.

The program also provided nearly 1,500 amber LED bulbs and 950 shielded lights to

replace the older lighting on many of the homes.

The bulbs are not only sea turtle friendly, they will also outlast traditional halogen or incandescent bulbs by 28 times and burn much less electricity.

Franklin County is still taking part in a a multi-county program to help retrofit lighting on beachfront property within 1,000 feet of existing conservation lands to expand the dark-sky area along important sea turtle nesting beaches.

That program will end in December.

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