The Everglades immigrant detention center known as “Alligator Alcatraz” is damaging enough in its own right, inflicting untold harms on the site and the greater Everglades ecosystem.

But more damaging over the long haul may be the legal precedent being set.

In a disturbing story earlier this month, Inside Climate News took a look at how the state has effectively taken over Everglades restoration from the federal government, assuming responsibility to construct key projects like the EAA Reservoir. The promise is that the state can do the job quicker, and maybe cheaper, than the federal government.

And, maybe. But how?

By skipping an environmental review, maybe?

One key contention in the lawsuit filed by conservation groups against the detention center is that Alligator Alcatraz is obviously a “major federal project,” and is therefore bound by federal law — meaning, among other things, that National Environmental Policy Act environmental review must be conducted.

The state claims the detention center isn’t a major federal project, and therefore no NEPA analysis needs to be done.

Jaclyn Lopez, director of the Jacobs Public Interest Law Clinic for Democracy and the Environment at Stetson University, told Inside Climate News that this may be a harbinger of things to come.

Specifically: Does NEPA apply where the state is running the show? It should; the “memorandum of understanding” signed by the feds and Gov. Ron DeSantis specifically states that “For any project carried out under authority described in this MOU, the state of Florida shall comply with the same legal and technical requirements that would apply if the projects or separable element were carried out by the Government, including all mitigation required to offset environmental impacts of the project or separable element” as determined by federal officials.

Inside Climate News notes that “The language raises questions about whether the state would be responsible for conducting environmental reviews on projects.”

And as former South Florida Water Management District Governing Board member Jacqui Thurlow-Lippisch said, “I don’t think they will, …The state of Florida has no desire to go through all of the responsibilities that the federal government did, and right now we have someone in office who would probably encourage them not to do it.”

After all, a thorough environmental review costs time and money — necessarily so.

During the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ development of the Lake Okeechobee System Operating Manual or “LOSOM,” the NEPA process committed the Corps to listen to all stakeholders, and that’s what happened. And we got a more equitable LOSOM because of it.

But the process took years. The state is trying to shave time off these CERP projects, and lengthy environmental reviews may slow the process. And where those in charge regard a thorough environmental review as mere “red tape,” there’s going to be pressure to curtail such a review — if not eliminate it entirely.

And hey, if it’s not a “major federal project,” no big deal, right?

But don’t be fooled — it’s a huge deal, for Alligator Alcatraz and, potentially, far beyond.