Conservation dispute should be heard in trial, judge says Published: Tags: A gavel in a courtroom. (Pexels) A Leon County circuit judge has said a trial is needed in part of a long-running lawsuit about how the Legislature carried out a 2014 constitutional amendment aimed at land and water conservation. Environmental groups in October asked Circuit Judge Charles Dodson to grant summary judgment finding that some state budget items from 2015 and 2016 violated the constitutional amendment. Summary judgment would have short-circuited the need for a trial. But Dodson issued a nine-page ruling last week that said under a summary-judgment rule, “plaintiffs’ evidence is probably insufficient to conclusively establish the unconstitutionality of the appropriations challenged in their motions.