Seminole County seeks grant to expand bear-proof trash cans

Bears are still making garbage a neighborhood problem in western Seminole County, and county leaders are seeking up to $50,000 to put more bear-proof trash cans where residents keep reporting encounters. Near Markham Woods, resident Simone Nelson said bears have come into her garage and even pulled open her fridge and freezer, a reminder that the county is treating the cans as a safety measure, not just a convenience.

The request is aimed first at the Wekiva watershed, where development presses against conservation land and bear habitat. Seminole County says that watershed covers about 56.2 square miles, or roughly 36,000 acres, in the westernmost part of the county. Congress designated the Wekiva River, Wekiwa Springs Run, Rock Springs Run and Black Water Creek as a National Wild and Scenic River in October 2000, and the county says its Black Bear Wilderness Area, a 1,650-acre conservation tract west of Interstate 4, functions as a corridor linking critical habitat.

County staff said the grant would fund another round of bear-resistant garbage cans, similar to ones Seminole has financed before. The proposal carries no match requirement, which lowers the cost to the county if the Wekiva Wild and Scenic River Advisory Committee approves it. County commissioners were expected to consider the request at a regular meeting the following Tuesday morning.

Seminole’s bear rules are not new. The county adopted its Urban Bear Management Ordinance on Dec. 8, 2015, and it applies to both incorporated and unincorporated areas. County guidance says garbage and recycling should be secured inside a garage, shed or other structure until at least 5 a.m. on collection days. The goal, according to county and wildlife materials, is to cut off easy food sources such as trash, grills, compost, beehives, livestock feed and other attractants that can pull bears into neighborhoods.

This is also not Seminole’s first attempt to use grant money to reduce bear conflicts. In 2017, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission awarded the county a $200,000 BearWise grant to help residents in the Urban Bear Management Area buy 64-gallon bear-resistant cans at discounted rates, and some eligible residents who could not afford them could receive one at no cost. FWC also said it was distributing $825,000 to 11 counties for bear-conflict reduction efforts.

The county’s bear-management strategy has centered on keeping food out of reach, and public reporting over the years has said bear-human encounter calls dropped sharply after the stricter trash rules took hold. Even so, bears have continued showing up in places such as Retreat at Wekiva, near Tuskawilla Road and along Gabriella Lane, keeping pressure on county leaders to decide whether another round of cans can make a visible difference.