News - October   2002 

 

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31-October-02

Alerts: Mining, Lack of Independent Review Threaten Everglades Restoration

"The Everglades is a test," said the late author and activist Marjory Stoneman Douglas, known for her tireless efforts to protect Florida's unique wetlands. "If we pass, we get to keep the planet." [Note: Joe Podgor, former president of Friends of the Everglades, is the correct source of this quote.]  If the Everglades is a test, it appeared we might get a passing grade when, in 2000, a $7.8 billion plan to restore the south Florida ecosystem was signed into law by President Bill Clinton. The goals of the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan included purchasing and protecting additional wetlands acre-age and restoring a more natural water flow to the Everglades. It was heralded as the largest environmental project in American history and a national model for future restorations.  Read more . . . 
Copyright  © 2002  Sierra Club Planet Newsletter All rights reserved.

                Related Link,

                Sierra Club
                Florida Chapter

Bronson Spends; Nelson Contends
Charles Bronson is finding out that money can't buy you love -  or an election. Bronson, appointed last year as commissioner of the Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, is beloved by Florida farmers and ranchers. But he remains virtually unknown to most state voters despite spending $1.5 million on television advertising. Recent polls show Bronson tied with Democrat David Nelson, a Miami middle school librarian. Nelson, who runs his campaign out of his living room, can barely afford copying fees for fliers he hands out on the rubber chicken circuit. A poll published Sunday by the Miami Herald and St. Petersburg Times showed Bronson and Nelson each with 38 percent, and 24 percent of the respondents remain undecided. That mirrored the findings of a Tampa Tribune/WFLA, News Channel 8, poll conducted a week earlier. Though the race has attracted little interest outside agricultural circles, it holds huge implications for both political parties.   
Copyright  © 2002  Tampa Tribune  All rights reserved.

Editorial: Practical Steps To Husband Water
If Hillsborough County commissioners are serious about solving water problems, they'll give serious attention to some conservation measures endorsed by the city-county planning commission and previously recommended without success by the county staff. The proposals could significantly reduce water consumption and provide relief to a community plagued by chronic water shortages. Water regulators, threatening hefty fines, forced the commission to impose an outdoor watering ban in south Hillsborough this past summer to prevent pumping at the area's wellfield from violating its permit.  That Talk Of A Moratorium: The necessary move outraged residents, and commissioners quickly sought to blame others, including the Southwest Florida Water Management District, which regulates water use in the region, and Tampa Bay Water, the regional water supplier.  
Copyright  © 2002  Tampa Tribune  All rights reserved.

Proposals to settle rural growth plan challenges rebuffed
Landowners pleaded during a mediation session Wednesday that they deserved a break from a new plan for rural growth in Collier County, but they didn't get very far. Collier County representatives, backed by the state Department of Community Affairs and environmental groups, rebuffed proposals to settle challenges the landowners filed in September to the new plan. The plan, adopted by county commissioners this summer after three years of study, is the county's answer to a 1999 slow-growth order from Gov. Jeb Bush and the Cabinet. It affects some 93,000 acres on the edges of Golden Gate Estates and includes a Transfer of Development Rights program intended to compensate landowners in preservation areas. The primary focus of Wednesday's session was whether to allow rock mining to take place in areas the plan sets aside for preservation in the North Belle Meade, a huge, largely undeveloped tract north of Interstate 75 and east of Collier Boulevard. 
Copyright  © 2002  Naples News  All rights reserved.

New reports may ease dock permit gridlock
The federal agency responsible for a moratorium on boat dock permits in parts of Lee County is expected to release two long-awaited manatee protection reports in the next week. Under a federal judge’s threat of contempt of court, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service will issue a manatee refuge and sanctuary plan Friday and a manatee protection plan on Tuesday. Both reports are positive steps in a process that may help relieve Lee County’ s boat dock permit problems. “We hope they will provide for permits to go forward,” said Sam Hamilton, southeast regional director of Fish and Wildlife. “However, I think Southwest Florida will still see some challenges. It will be a center of interest for us.” The reports, however, are just plans. They could not be implemented until May, after a six-month period for public comment. Fish and Wildlife recently has become the target from both sides of the manatee issue. 
Copyright  © 2002  News-Press. All rights reserved.

Editorial: Land buy opportunity too good to pass up
Gov. Jeb Bush and the Cabinet can make a small but valuable addition to preserve lands around Estero Bay on Nov. 13 if they agree to buy the property known as Estero 60. A land trust represented by Andy DeSalvo has agreed to sell the 60 acres, which abut the state’s Estero Scrub Preserve. The price was not available Wednesday, but DeSalvo said he understood it was less than state appraisals. That’s nice, especially since the taxpayers paid a whopping $32 million for the 1,300-acre Estero Scrub after county commissioners doubled the allowed density of a proposed development there. This time, commissioners had declined to double density on DeSalvo’s property. In the meantime, the state finally began to show interest in acquiring it. The state has dithered way too often over the years on land that could have buffered Estero Bay from development, losing the land or running up its price. 
Copyright  © 2002  News-Press. All rights reserved.

Environmental worries on proposed I-4 beltway explored
A new task force began meeting Wednesday to look for a compromise on a plan to build a beltway that would loop north from Interstate 4 around Orlando between Sanford and the Disney resorts. The beltway would make it easier for motorists to avoid the often congested downtown Orlando area but would cross the sensitive Wekiva River basin between Sanford and Apopka. The Wekiva, a tributary of the St. Johns River, is one of only two rivers in Florida to be designated a national "Wild and Scenic River" and also is an Outstanding Florida Water. Plans for the proposed beltway have been stymied for years because of environmental concerns. Earlier this month, Gov. Jeb Bush created a task force with representatives of key government agencies and the environmental community to try to resolve the issues. The 16-member task force met for the first time Wednesday.    
Copyright  © 2002  Daytona News-Journalonline All rights reserved.

                Related Links,

                The Friends of the Wekiva River

                Lower Wekiva River Preserve State Park

                American Rivers - Wekiva RIver

                Subsurface Characterization of Selected Water Bodies in the St. Johns River basin . . .

There's still hope to restore the lake
Even though it seems bleak, there is still optimism that the restoration project at Lake Trafford will begin within the next six months. According to spokespersons with the fisheries department, the original bids came in way above the $17.5 million that Immokalee residents and nature advocates have raised together over the past six years. The South Florida Water Management District advised Collier County commissioners that bids for dredging muck from Lake Trafford are 50 percent higher than projected and that new criteria would have to be implemented before new bids could be sought. Officials said that, because of the wording, project bidders were assessing potential problems and adding cost into their bids for worst case scenarios. 
Copyright  © 2002 Newszap All rights reserved.

St. Johns River Summit to Held in January
An environmental summit which Jacksonville Mayor John Delaney described as the first step in a vast effort to restore the health of the St. Johns River will be convened in January.  "This obviously is going to be a multibillion-dollar effort. But just because it's big, doesn't mean it isn't doable," Delaney said Tuesday.  The St. Johns River Summit will be held Jan. 13-14 at the Prime Osborn Convention Center in Jacksonville. The meeting is designed as a follow-up to a smaller 1997 event that helped focus public support for programs to repair the effects of pollution and development on the waterway that splits northeast Florida.  The first summit addressed issues only within the lower St. Johns, but organizers of the new event said it would deal with the entire 310-mile-long river. 
Copyright  © 2002  Tampa Tribune  All rights reserved.

Wekiva task force pressed for time
A newly formed task force agreed Wednesday to gather three more times to solve the complex challenge of connecting an expressway around Orlando while not destroying the treasured and endangered Wekiva River wilderness.  The compressed schedule left some in the 16-member group wondering if they could give more than brief consideration to intricate matters of road design, environmental protections and suburban sprawl.  "Frankly, I'm troubled by the lack of time," said Florida of Audubon Senior Vice President Charles Lee, speaking to the group shortly after it convened for the first time.  The group's goal is to recommend by Jan. 15 -- in time for the next legislative session -- how and where to build an expressway that connects Interstate 4 near Sanford to State Road 429 in Apopka.  Issues they will tackle include where to elevate the road, where to place interchanges and what to do with State Road 46.   
Copyright  © 2002  Orlando Sentinel  All Rights Reserved.  

30-October-02

News Release: District and USGS Team up on Hydrologic Studies
The Southwest Florida Water Management District and the U.S. Geologic Survey (USGS) have agreed to jointly fund hydrologic data studies throughout the District. The data collected from these studies will support a wide range of activities including water supply development, flood management, natural systems protection and water quality.  The proposed funding agreement requires the USGS to collect continuous and periodic data from: 130 sites along the District's lakes and streams, 164 groundwater wells, and 40 stations measuring surface water quality.  In addition to shared data, the District and the USGS have conducted joint hydrologic studies for several decades. Under the agreement, 10 ongoing and two new multi-year projects will be funded.  Read more . . .
Copyright  © 2002  Southwest Florida Water Management District  All rights reserved.

Relentless growth alarms Floridians
Rows of barrel-tiled roofs march across the landscape. Earth-moving equipment lumbers through old farm fields, building houses for the thousands of newcomers arriving each year for sunshine and golf. Once considered a quiet alternative to bustling southeast Florida, the state's southwest side has seen an explosion of growth. Traffic backs up on Interstate 75 and Tamiami Trail, as the morning rush hour brings thousands of workers from Lee County to the resorts and hotels of wealthier Collier County. Each year, the tourists seem to arrive a bit earlier and leave a bit later. "Every single aspect of our lives has been changed," said Elaine Christman, a retired teacher who moved to Naples from Pennsylvania 11 years ago with her husband, Ed. "The wealth is here. If they build one more brick I'm going to scream. It's not a rural town any more. When the holidays come, you can't get around. We stayed put in the last hurricane. There's no way to evacuate. We're growing so rapidly." 
Copyright  © 2002  Sun-Sentinel  All rights reserved.

Estero 60 parcel may be added to Estero Bay Aquatic Preserve buffer area
First the state wouldn't buy the 60-acre Estero tract Andy DeSalvo's land trust owned, then Lee County wouldn't increase its density. Now, years later, the state may buy the land after all. The property known as Estero 60 is located at the western end of Pine Avenue, nestled against the Estero Scrub Preserve. That land itself was once destined for development before the state stepped in and paid $32 million for the 1,300-acre parcel. In that case, the state could have had the land for half the cost but refused to buy it. Lee County commissioners approved a land use change that doubled the allowable building density, and then the state bought it at double the original price. If Gov. Jeb Bush and the Cabinet agree on Nov. 13, the state will add the Estero 60 piece, expanding the Estero Bay Buffer area that protects the state's first aquatic preserve and provides habitat for the birds, tortoises and occasional deer that call the area home.   
Copyright  © 2002  Naples News  All rights reserved.

Concerns about Lake Hicpochee
When South Florida Water Management representatives unveiled their proposed site map for creation of the C-43 Basin Storage Reservoir, part of the Lake Hicpochee restoration project, at the Glades County Board of County Commissioners regular meeting Monday, county officials were alarmed to lean that much of the land targeted for acquisition falls in the county's Enterprise Zone west of the lake. SFWMD Governing Board Vice Chairman Leonard Lyndale assured the commissioners that it was still early in the process and the district will work with the county to avoid adverse impacts as a result of the project. "We're aware you're concerned, we don't want to go into areas where you have economic development activities planned. We hear your concerns about displacement of business and residential areas and we want to minimalize the impacts," Mr. Lyndale said, adding that the district hopes to acquire much of the land through easements, to avoid removing property from the county's tax rolls. 
Copyright  © 2002 Newszap All rights reserved.

Everglades Restoration
NPR's Phillip Davis reports on the $8-billion project to restore Everglades National Park. The effort in Florida will be the largest environmental restoration project in the nation's history, but there are serious questions about whether it can work. (6 minutes)  Read more . . . 
Copyright  © 2002 NPR All rights reserved.

                Related Links,

               http://www.npr.org/ramfiles/atc/20021030.atc.04.ram

                National Public Radio

                All Things Considered

Residents: ’Glades work is just talk
More studies needed to determine bay’s natural state
All the talk about restoring the Everglades and Florida Bay has generated little more than talk, Florida Keys residents told project managers Monday.  "I see a lot of studies but I don’t see any bricks and mortar," said Tavernier resident Jerry Wilkinson at a presentation in Key Largo.  "Take the C-111 canal and shut it down," said Key Largo crab fisherman James McDowell, worried about "a chemical soup" from the waterway that he believes is destroying marine life in Blackwater Sound and Barnes Sound.  "If we all threw a cement block in the canal, we could do better," McDowell said.  Fred Tooker, a Tavernier conservationist, said he fears that increasing water flows into Florida Bay without removing agricultural pollutants, such as phosphorous, will threaten the marine ecosystem.   
Copyright  © 2002  Florida Keys Keynoter  All rights reserved.

Tommie Barfield students in Panther Posse track the big cats 


Ricky Pires leads Tommy Barfield Elementary 
School students in the "panther growl" during 
a Panther Posse rally at the school last week. 
Dan Wagner/Staff

For a growling good time, panthers beat birds, believes 10-year-old Tommie Barfield Elementary School student Kelsey Parsons. "Birds aren't as cool," Kelsey said. They don't stalk other animals. They don't weigh over 100 pounds when grown. They don't change the color of their markings as they age. And, added 9-year-old Alex Rafferty, "Panthers can eat birds."  Until the end of the school year, Alex, Kelsey and their fellow intermediate multi-age classmates will track and trace the movements of their own particular panther, through the Friends of Florida Panther refuge and Florida Gulf Coast University's community outreach program Wings of Hope. Much better than birds. And, Kelsey said, much better than reading about a panther in a book. "We're actually tracking a real panther," she explained. "It's not like it's on a computer."    
Copyright  © 2002  Naples News  All rights reserved.

29-October-02

Pesticide kills mosquitoes, birds, lawsuit claims: EPA accused in suit by wildlife advocates
A chemical used to kill disease-spreading mosquitoes in Lee and Collier counties also kills endangered birds, charges a lawsuit filed against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in federal district court Monday. The Florida Wildlife Federation, American Bird Conservancy and Defenders of Wildlife said by allowing the registration of the pesticide fenthion the agency is violating the Endangered Species Act and Migratory Bird Treaty Act. "Fenthion is basically a known bird-killer. It was formulated specifically to kill birds," said Gavin Shire, a spokesman for American Bird Conservancy. "It’ s still used in Florida in a few counties against mosquitoes. But it’s still extremely lethal to a few birds." Shire cites a die-off of piping plovers on Marco Island. "Lee and Collier counties are the counties that use the most," Shire said. Lee County Mosquito Control Director Bill Opp said the accusations are not called for.  
Copyright  © 2002  News-Press. All rights reserved.

Commentary: Halloween begins the sugar season
Hampton Roads, Virginia- The origins of Halloween are often debated around this time of year, with some arguing the night of wearing costumes and begging for sweets began as part of a harvest ritual, others claiming that it all started as a way of paying respects to ancestral spirits. But those explanations were merely part of a hugely successful cover-up operation, as Halloween actually was invented by a cabal of greedy conspirators bent on one goal: the sale of sugar. Decades ago, the sugar cane conglomerates, otherwise known as Big Sugar, became aware that the Everglades were not being drained quite so quickly during the fall months. They deduced that a slump in sugar consumption tended to occur after the beginning of the school year, as children were no longer at home to steal spoonfuls of the substance from the sugar bowl while Mom was hanging out the wash or looking through the medicine cabinet for tranquilizers.   
Copyright  © 2002 Daily Press All rights reserved.

Environmentalists suing to suspend use of mosquito-fighting pesticide


An immature Reddish Egret forages in the 
shallow waters off Tigertail Beach on Marco 
Island on Monday. The area has become a 
battleground over fenthion, a pesticide used
 to keep mosquito populations in check that 
may also be killing birds. Environmental groups 
are suing to order the U.S. Environmental 
Protection Agency to consult with the U.S. 
Fish and Wildlife Service  about devising new 
rules for spraying fenthion. 
Michel Fortier/Staff

Environmental groups filed suit Monday asking a judge to suspend the use of a mosquito-fighting pesticide used in Collier and Lee counties and to order the EPA to work with federal wildlife officials to devise new rules for spraying it. Fenthion, sold as Baytex, is suspected in the deaths of hundreds of shorebirds on Marco Island beaches in 1998 and 1999, including birds protected under the Endangered Species Act and the Migratory Bird Treaty Act. A federal investigation is ongoing. The lawsuit was filed by the American Bird Conservancy, Defenders of Wildlife and the Florida Wildlife Federation against Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Christine Todd Whitman. The suit charges that the EPA is ignoring warnings about fenthion and is breaking the law by not consulting with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. 
Copyright  © 2002  Naples News  All rights reserved.

Martin seeking funds for Blueways purchase
Martin pushes to buy Blueways Officials are working to  find new funding sources to purchase the environmentally  sensitive waterfront property. Martin County officials have a new strategy to acquire prime real estate along the Indian River Lagoon that has been on the county's conservation wish list for years. Instead of waiting for South Florida Water Management District officials who are bogged down in Everglades restoration efforts county planners say they're willing to take the lead to find new partners for the project. Named in the county's 1998 Healthy Rivers 1 percent sales tax referendum, the 474 acres of waterfront property known as the Indian River Blueways have fallen far behind efforts to acquire the other named properties in the law. Now, county officials, with the help of activists with the Nature Conservancy, have begun efforts to lobby the state and begin a search for new funding partners.   
Copyright  © 2002  Stuart News -TC Palm  All rights reserved.

Real Florida: Pink power

The wild flamingo keeps eating as observers 
pass.  Flamingos eat  little things, but they 
are fond of blue-green algae.  It's what gives 
them their pink color. [Times photo: Ken Helle]

Florida loves flamingos. Even though they may not be from here. And plastic ones outnumber wild ones. And they are a bit strange. If flamingos were not real birds, we would have to invent them. Ugly and beautiful, clumsy and graceful, they represent everything nerdy and cool about our state. So speaketh a man who knows that flamingos may not even be native Floridians. As a Chicago-born guy who has been known to decorate his lawn with plastic flamingos, I can live with the contradiction. Whether the flamingos I see so rarely in the Florida wild are actually escaped zoo birds hardly matters to me. As a lifelong member of what I call the cult of the flamingo, I'll take my flamingos however I can get them. I saw my first live one in the early 1950s at a Miccosukee Indian village near Miami. The tame flamingos pranced, stretched their wings and honked. Mainly, they looked like weird, pink, upside down croquet mallets from Alice in Wonderland.   
Copyright  © 2002  St. Petersburg Times  All rights reserved.

28-October-02

Press Release:  Groups Sue EPA to Protect Florida Wildlife from Bird-Killing Pesticide
Three environmental groups today filed suit against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) today over the use of a highly toxic pesticide that is killing federally protected species in Florida. The lawsuit, which was filed in federal district court by Defenders of Wildlife, American Bird Conservancy, and Florida Wildlife Federation, charges EPA with violations of the Endangered Species Act (ESA) and Migratory Bird Treaty Act (MBTA) by its registration of the pesticide fenthion. Fenthion has been documented to cause severe ecological impacts and is exceptionally toxic to birds.  "Fenthion is one of the most dangerous bird-killing pesticides in use in this country," said Dr. Patti Bright, Director of American Bird Conservancy’s Pesticides and Birds Campaign. "It is not necessary to bear the extreme ecological costs of fenthion when there are equally effective pesticides available for mosquito control that won’t kill birds, don’t wreak environmental havoc, and are in use to combat mosquitos in 49 other states and even most of Florida," Dr. Bright added.  Read More...
Copyright  © 2003  Defenders  All rights reserved.

Related Links,

Defenders of Wildlife is a leading nonprofit conservation organization  recognized as one of the nation's most progressive advocates for wildlife and its habitat. 

American Bird Conservancy (ABC) is a 501(c)3 not-for-profit dedicated to the conservation of wild birds and their habitats in the Americas. 

Florida Wildlife Federation is a dynamic, statewide organization made up of Floridians from all walks of life who share a common goal of conserving Florida's wildlife and wildlife habitats.

Local magnet school to build tortoise preserve  
Two ailing gopher tortoises that can't be released into the wild might move to Sawgrass Springs Middle School if state officials approve a plan to create a special preserve. "It's a great community outreach," said science teacher Judie Woods, who runs a popular after-school "Critter Club" with 150 members. "It enhances the students' understanding, and it makes them more enthusiastic about science." The tortoises need a special home because they suffer from upper respiratory tract disease, a pneumonia-like ailment that is contagious and requires isolation. However, "Butch" and "Scar" are asymptomatic, could live for decades and need somewhere to stay. Plans are to move Butch and Scar to a grassy stretch next to the school's 130-seat outdoor environmental classroom sometime in the next two months, said Joan Kohl, founder of the Sawgrass Nature Center, a nonprofit organization that will soon construct a wildlife hospital next to the environmental magnet school.    
Copyright  © 2002  Sun-Sentinel  All rights reserved.

Watchdog: Growth Plans Need Updating
A "smart growth'' group wants the state to crack down on cities and counties that have failed to update their comprehensive growth plans as required by Florida's 1985 growth-management law. The group, 1000 Friends of Florida, said letting local governments slide on the required plan modifications is a sure recipe for sprawl, the unplanned development that eats up rural areas and costs taxpayers money. "If you've got land plans that don't have current natural resources protection or current policies on how your infrastructure - schools, roads, water - is to be paid for, and you're looking at new development approval, how are you going to make informed decisions on what's best for the public?'' asked Charles Pattison, executive director of 1000 Friends. Every seven years, local governments are supposed to update their plans, looking at changes in population, growth patterns and encroachment on natural resources.      
Copyright  © 2002  Tampa Tribune  All rights reserved.

                Related Link,

                1000 Friends of Florida .... 1000 Friends of Florida's mission is to protect and improve Florida's quality
                of life by advocating responsible planning for the state's population growth ....

Marjory told you so 
"There are no other Everglades in the world. "They are, they have always been, one of the unique regions of the earth, remote, never wholly known. Nothing anywhere else is like them: their vast glittering openness, wider than the enormous visible round of the horizon, the racing free saltness and sweetness of their massive winds, under the dazzling blue heights of space... " So began Marjory Stoneman Douglas' book, The Everglades: River of Grass, published 55 years ago and now reissued in a special facsimile edition by Val Martin of Port Salerno in his Florida Classics Library. The republication could hardly be timelier. Half the Everglades are gone, drained and replumbed to suit the needs of an exploding population, and a vast federal and state project to restore them might or might not work. The whole region has gone from unique to endangered to probably lost. Much  of what Douglas predicted 55 years ago has come devastatingly true.     
Copyright  © 2002  Palm Beach Post  All rights reserved.

USDA Announces $153 Mil. CREP Program for Florida
USDA today announced a voluntary program being launched with the state of Florida restore up to 30,000 acres of environmentally sensitive Florida land, including the Everglades. Through the Florida Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program (CREP), USDA, farmers and Florida will work together to protect Florida's diverse ecosystem by providing financial incentives to farmers to retire cropland and marginal pastureland via this $153 million program.. The Florida CREP aims to reduce phosphorus runoff through constructing wetland treatment systems and riparian buffer strips. CREP will increase water storage capacity in the Lake Okeechobee watershed through wetland restoration. Also, the program will reduce agricultural pollutants in the lower St. Johns River and the Ocklawaha and Indian River Basin. Overall, the program will help improve lands from the northeast corner to the southern tip of the state.    
Copyright  © 2002 Agweb All rights reserved.

                Related Link,

               Questions and Answers on the Florida CREP announcement.

Federal program to pump $153 million to Florida sensitive lands
Hundreds of farmers in Florida can volunteer to plant native grasses and vegetation in place of crops through a new program designed to restore environmentally sensitive lands. Federal and state agriculture officials announced the $153 million project Monday on the banks of the ailing Lake Tohopekaliga near Kissimmee. The program will pay farmers who volunteer to plant native vegetation that will stop pollutants from running into Florida waters and create more wildlife habitat. Lands and waters across the state, from the Ocklawaha River in northeast Florida to the Everglades, are expected to be improved with the project, said Leslie Palmer, an administrator for the state Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services. The initiative will include rehydrating wetlands, improving water quality and storage, creating and restoring habitat for birds and other wildlife and planting native trees, grasses and vegetation.   
Copyright  © 2002  Sun-Sentinel  All rights reserved.

                Related Link,

                Farm Service Agency

Environmentalists Intervene in Clean Water Challenge
Environmentalists hope to help defend aspects of the Clean Water Act before the Supreme Court this term in a case in which developers are challenging the law's application to wetlands and streams. The environmental law organization Earthjustice submitted a brief on Friday asking the Supreme Court to uphold the Clean Water Act against industry attempts to weaken it. Addressing one of the most crucial environmental cases on the Supreme Court's docket this term, the Earthjustice brief opposes attempts by agricultural, mining, and roadbuilding interests to accelerate unpermitted destruction of wetlands and streams around the nation. "Three decades after the passage of the landmark Clean Water Act, our nation continues to lose tens of thousands of acres of wetlands each year, and hundreds of miles of streams as well," said Howard Fox of Earthjustice, attorney for the conservationists. 
Copyright  © 2002  Environment News Service (ENS) 2002. All Rights Reserved.   

Editorial: Bronson Is The Clear Choice For Agriculture Commissioner
The commissioner of agriculture and consumer services is one of the most important elected offices in Florida. The commissioner wields considerable influence over the agriculture industry and environmental initiatives and in January will be one of three votes besides the governor on the reconstituted Florida Cabinet. Yet many people are unaware of the responsibilities of the office and are surprised to learn it is a Cabinet-level position. Besides promoting and protecting agriculture, the department's employees bust unscrupulous mechanics, conduct controlled burns to minimize the danger of forest fires, inspect food markets and, when necessary, halt the sale of dangerous products. They certify weights and measures and validate gasoline pumps. There is only one candidate this year who has the qualifications, background and work experience for this job - incumbent Commissioner Charles Bronson, a Tallahassee Republican.    
Copyright  © 2002  Tampa Tribune  All rights reserved.

27-October-02

Estuary recovering from Lake O releases
What a difference a couple of weeks make. Thanks to the tapering off of the rainy season and the cessation of a summer long series of freshwater discharges from Lake Okeechobee, the St. Lucie River estuary is showing signs of recovery, experts say. Water-quality tests are coming back with encouraging results, oysters are feeding and sea-grass beds are looking good -- all of which are positive indicators for the delicate inlet where freshwater current meets salty tide. "Last week we had a great surprise," said Mark Perry, executive director of the Florida Oceanographic Society. "The water quality is improving and it seems like everything is starting to stabilize." The estuary had been on the decline since June, when heavy rains fell, pushing Lake Okeechobee over 15.5 feet above sea level. That's when the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers started flood-control measures, spilling lake water into the St. Lucie River in intermittent bursts called "pulse" releases.   
Copyright  © 2002  Palm Beach Post  All rights reserved.

Rampant growth is good? 
No way during an otherwise solid performance in last Tuesday's gubernatorial debate, Jeb Bush blurted something so wacky that I could hardly believe eyes.
In trying to paint a rosy portrait of Florida's economy, the governor cited as evidence the fact that the state's population is still soaring at a net gain of nearly 900 new residents every day. Bush actually was smiling as he said this -- a sign of either grossly misplaced pride or a warped sense of humor. Either way, his media advisors must have been diving for the Maalox. The last thing a front-running candidate ought to do is remind voters that their beloved home state is rapidly transforming into an urban pit. No place in the country has swollen more recklessly than Florida during the last 50 years, and no place has seen such stark social and environmental consequences.    
Copyright  © 2002  Miami Herald  All rights reserved.

Scientists keep eyes on refuge survival
The beam of light swung left and right across the dusk-covered water. In the 200,000-candle-power throw of her spotlight, Laura Brandt was looking for something. Here and there she found it: small sets of eyes that flashed back in quick semaphore, glinting like tiny red bicycle reflectors from the sides of the L-40 canal. Alligator eye-shine. Brandt, a senior wildlife biologist, was counting alligators on Wednesday evening inside the eastern rim canal of the Arthur R. Marshall Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge. From her elevated airboat seat, she cruised a 6.2-mile run of the canal west of Boynton Beach. During the 10-kilometer search she found gators drifting slowly across the sky-glow-lit open water; gators floating motionless amid green mats of water lettuce and water hyacinth and gators peering out from gaps in the cattail and willow that grow as solidly as subdivision walls along the canal banks.      
Copyright  © 2002  Sun-Sentinel  All rights reserved.

Election 2002: Greenspace tax proponents include some developers
A rematch of sorts is under way between greenspace tax foes and tax backers as the Nov. 5 election draws nearer. A measure on the ballot would authorize Collier County to issue up to $75 million in bonds to buy land for preservation. The bonds plus interest would be paid back with a property tax that would cost up to $25 per $100,000 of taxable property value. Voters defeated a drastically different land acquisition program in 1996, but this time around, a few things have changed. Opponents, who formed an anti-tax political action committee in 1996, are less organized this year. Tax supporters, bedeviled by dissension in their ranks in 1996, have come together behind the new greenspace proposal and are well-funded. The leader of the 1996 anti-tax PAC said last week that the new playing field could put greenspace advocates on top on election night.        
Copyright  © 2002  Naples News  All rights reserved.

State plan fails lagoon by ignoring top pollutant
St. Lucie River advocates say a state plan to ensure healthy waterways won't do much for the Treasure Coast where quantity  of fresh water is a bigger concern than quality. Last week, members of the Rivers Coalition met with representatives of the state Department of Environmental Protection to learn about a program to identify the rivers, lakes and streams that do not meet certain water-quality standards. Although the St. Lucie River, the Indian River Lagoon and their tributaries and canals have not been placed on a list of unhealthy waters, some coalition members said it doesn't even matter. "This is working as a smoke screen to the issue of quantity," said Karl Wickstrom, publisher of Florida Sportsman magazine and a member of the Coastal Conservation Alliance, a boaters' rights group. "An estuary has a degree of brackishness. Unless you address the quantity issue there's a problem."    
Copyright  © 2002  Stuart News -TC Palm  All rights reserved.

26-October-02

Migrating Whooping Cranes Have Made Little Progress
Sixteen whooping cranes and their ultralight chaperons haven't had good luck weather- wise. Wind and rain in Wisconsin have grounded the endangered birds all but three days since their migration began two weeks ago. The cranes have flown 91.8 of the more than 1,200 miles in their journey from Necedah National Wildlife Refuge to Chassahowitzka National Wildlife Refuge in western Citrus and Hernando counties. This is the second year pilots have led the birds in an effort to build a second migrating population in the United States. The birds last flew Sunday.     
Copyright  © 2002  Tampa Tribune  All rights reserved.

                Related Link,

                You can follow their progress on the Internet at www.bringbackthecranes.org

Governor Talks to Audubon Members: 
He tells them the class-size amendment could force program cuts.
Passage of the class-size constitutional amendment on the Nov. 5 ballot could force cuts in environmental programs, Gov. Jeb Bush told Audubon members Friday. "There's a real debate about priorities," he said, warning that across-the- board cuts to pay the estimated $2.5 billion annual price tag to implement the amendment would come from a pool of about $4 billion in the state's general fund that's not already devoted to education. "That's not going to happen; I won't let it happen," Bush said. He made his comments at a luncheon talk on the second day of the annual Audubon Assembly, which drew conservationists from all over the state. Bill McBride, Bush's Democratic opponent, is scheduled to address the group today.       
Copyright  © 2002  The Ledger All rights reserved.

Dredging firm faces state fines for oil, grease, foam spills
Department of Environmental Protection officials plan to fine the dredging company that worked on the St. Lucie Inlet more than $28,000 for spilling oil, grease and plastic foam pieces into the water. Phil Wieczynski, chief of the DEP's Bureau of Emergency Response, said Friday that the official letter will be sent to the Illinois-based Great Lakes Dredging next week, giving corporate officials the opportunity to pay the fine or request an appeal hearing. Great Lakes officials would not comment Friday. The company was contracted by the Army Corps of Engineers for $12.6 million to dig a 20-foot-deep impoundment basin in the rock just south of the northern jetty and dredge the navigational channel, which was filling with sand. Work ended in September, just three months after dredging began with the introduction of the Texas, a 365-foot, maroon dredge machine anchored at the tip of Sailfish Point.       
Copyright  © 2002  Stuart News -TC Palm  All rights reserved.

Canker decision key, agriculture chief says
Florida's commercial citrus industry isn't all that's at stake in the upcoming court hearings over the citrus canker controversy, Florida Agriculture Commissioner Charles Bronson said Friday. Speaking at the Indian River Citrus League's annual meeting in Vero Beach, Bronson said what's decided at the 4th District Court of Appeal in West Palm Beach could impact agricultural producers across the nation. A decision that bars the state from removing trees that are infected with canker or that have been exposed to the bacterium could set a precedent that keeps government from being able to control crop diseases, livestock illnesses and pests, he said. "What happens in the 4th DCA case is going to have the power to either save or destroy the industry in this state," Bronson said. "No one will be safe in any agricultural industry where pest and disease is a potential problem."     
Copyright  © 2002  Palm Beach Post  All rights reserved.

Did cement deal pour money into GOP? 
Paving firm gave $190,000 to Republican Party accounts after N. Florida deal was sealed
A year after Gov. Jeb Bush canoed down Florida's beloved Ichetucknee River and vowed to protect it, he shocked environmentalists by allowing construction of a cement plant nearby that they claim could pollute surrounding air. Now, a Herald analysis reveals new information about the controversial episode: Executives and lawyers representing Anderson Columbia Inc., the big paving firm that sought approval for the plant, poured nearly $190,000 into state and national Republican Party accounts over the two days after a key part of the deal was concluded. At the same time, a Herald review of public records shows that one critical component of the deal -- the $23 million price the state paid to buy a lime rock mine from Anderson Columbia -- was based on an unusual appraisal process.  
Copyright  © 2002  Miami Herald  All rights reserved.

New facility will test controls for invasive plants
University of Florida Vice President of Agriculture and Natural Resources Michael Martin hosted groundbreaking ceremonies on Oct. 23, for a new $3.8 million Exotic/Aquatic Quarantine Facility at UF's Indian River Research and Education Center in Fort Pierce. Other officials participating in the ceremonies, which began at 10 a.m., include Walter Tabachnick, professor of entomology and nematology, center director of the UF/IFAS Florida Medical Entomology Laboratory and interim center director at IRREC; Connie Riherd, representing Commissioner of Agriculture Charles Bronson and the Florida Department of Agriculture Consumer Services; and Ronald D. Cave, IRREC assistant professor of entomology and nematology, whose appointment will be with the new facility. State Sen. Ken Pruitt, R-Port St. Lucie, was be in attendance and was recognized for his leadership in supporting funding for the facility.    
Copyright  © 2002 Newszap All rights reserved.

                Related Link,

                Indian River Research and Education Center

Letters to the editor: 
Election 2002 Part of the solution
The Conservancy of Southwest Florida encourages eligible voters to say "yes" to Conservation Collier, the last item on the ballot. Your vote will preserve water, wildlife and our quality of life. We've all heard the old adage, "If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem." With our diverse support, we need to look at it from another viewpoint: "If we're not part of the solution, then we've got a problem." Thanks again to everyone who has contributed.
— Kathy Prosser
President and CEO, The Conservancy of Southwest Florida
Copyright  © 2002  News-Press   All rights reserved.


The Orchid Rescue: The Native Orchid Restoration Project seeks to rediscover and restore lost orchids of the region.


Lee Hoffman attaches a rescued orchid in 
its native habitat.  
Photo courtesy Lee Hoffman

Where do those beautiful orchids that decorate homes and stores throughout the area come from? Originally, they came from species found growing in the wild all over the world. Since the first wild orchid was discovered more than a century ago, these wild orchids have been collected, cultivated, hybridized and sold to the public. Florida is home to more than two thirds of all native orchids in the United States. Naples alone supports, or once supported, more than 40 species, the highest concentration in the United States. For example, outside of Cuba, the exotic ghost orchid (Polyradicion lindenii), grows only in South Florida. The rarity of these orchids causes some people to go to any lengths to possess them, including poaching them from their native swamps, despite the fact that they will not survive outside their native habitat.    
Copyright  © 2002  Naples News  All rights reserved.

Glades activists eye candidates with suspicion
Whoever wins the race for South Florida's U.S. House District 25 won't be representing just people. The new representative also will be the voice for alligators and ibises, sea trout and snakes, sawgrass and swamps.  District 25, newly carved out of several other congressional districts, includes almost the entire Everglades and a large part of Big Cypress National Preserve.   It's considered one of the most environmentally sensitive areas in the nation and is the focal point of a multibillion-dollar federal restoration effort expected to take decades to complete.  But environmentalist activists worry that neither candidate, Republican Mario Diaz-Balart or Democrat Annie Betancourt, is truly committed to the environment. They point to both candidates' low rankings among legislators by the Florida League of Conservation Voters.    
Copyright  © 2002  Miami Herald  All rights reserved.

Seminoles get a royal visit
A small group of women shuffled into an impromptu receiving line, traditional Seminole patchwork skirts brushing against each other in the lobby of the tribe's Ah-Tah-Thi-Ki Museum. One showed what she had to give the prince, a pillow she'd stitched with Seminole-style design. Another showed what she had, a small sweet grass basket. "I've got me!" said tour guide Mornin Osceola with a laugh, before a friend passed her a book of Seminole legends.  Just then, Crown Prince Albert of Monaco, emerged from his museum tour and Osceola, 34, composed herself with the help of a few  forced exhales.  Prince Albert, sporting a satin Seminole jacket in Monaco red and white, had requested the visit with the tribe while in South Florida to promote the World Olympians Association.   
Copyright  © 2002  Sun-Sentinel  All rights reserved.

25-October-02

UM School of Law Celebrates the Life of Prof. Robert Waters (1926-2002)

Law School Institute He Founded to be Renamed in His Honor

The University of Miami School of Law will celebrate the life of beloved Professor Robert H. Waters, who died September 2 after a long battle with cancer, with a service at 3 p.m. October 25 in the Student Lounge at the School of Law, 1311 Miller Drive, in Coral Gables.  Serving on the School of Law faculty for 30 years, Professor Waters was an integral part of the School of Law, and was an outstanding teacher and mentor to countless students. At UM, he helped found the Woodson-Williams-Marshall Association for black faculty and administrators and began an enrichment program for black students entering law school.  He also founded the James Weldon Johnson Summer Institute at UM Law School.  Read More...
Copyright  © 2002  University of Miami. All rights reserved.

Commentary: Everglades Restoration: A Long Haul
Over the past few months the Everglades restoration program has come under criticism from The Washington Post and other newspapers. As former chief environmental adviser to Govs. Bob Graham, Bob Martinez, Lawton Chiles and Jeb Bush, let me give my perspective on this issue.  Everglades restoration was initiated in 1983 by Gov. Graham. The "Save Our Everglades" program had many notable accomplishments, including Kissimmee River restoration, Everglades National Park and Big Cypress National Preserve expansion, Florida panther recovery, and restoration of natural water flow. However, we realized that the state alone could not restore the entire Everglades system; successful restoration would require major modifications to a massive federal water project, with 1,700 miles of canals and levees, stretching from Orlando to the Florida Keys.   
Copyright  © 2002  Orlando Sentinel  All Rights Reserved.   

Sugar Industry Expert: Set Phosphorus Limit at 15.6 ppb ; Blame Airboats
The Sugar Industry staked out its stand today on what number should end up in the phosphorus criterion rule required by the Everglades Forever Act. Duke University Professor Curtis Richardson, hired by the sugar industry to make a 5 hour presentation to the state's Environmental Regulation Commission, recommended that the standard be set at 15.6 parts per billion - contrasting with the 10 part per billion standard recommended by the Department of Environmental Protection. Richardson also threw in another twist, suggesting that "disturbances" such as airboats in the Everglades Conservation Areas are a greater cause of the conversion of natural Everglades wetlands from sawgrass to cattails than phosphorus pollution from agricultural fields, raising the specter that the sugar industry may call for limitations on recreational use of Everglades lands as an alternative to a strict water quality standard.  Read more . . . 

Letter to the Editor: 
Judge state's Everglades stance by interests supporting it
In his response to The Post's Oct. 13 editorial "Make rules, not promises," Florida Department of Environmental Protection Secretary David Struhs mischaracterizes the issues ("State must keep the flexibility to give Everglades the water it needs," Tuesday). The adoption of clear restoration planning goals would make it harder for the state to cheat the Everglades out of the water it needs in favor of water for future economic interests. Florida officials oppose putting such goals into new federal regulations that will guide restoration. Because the state can provide no compelling reason why these goals shouldn't be in the law, the secretary resorts to mischaracterizing them. He calls them "inflexible" and "destructive." That's hogwash.     
Copyright  © 2002  Palm Beach Post  All rights reserved.

Swiftmud deal to help restore part of wetlands:
The project will affect 550 acres of wetlands in the eastern section of Potts Preserve. Work will take one to two months. State environmental officials Thursday announced an agreement that clears the way for a $61,000 project to restore 550 acres of wetlands in the eastern section of Potts Preserve. The deal, which does not cover a more controversial area in the western part of the 9,300-acre preserve, gives the Southwest Florida Water Management District the right to work in state land overseen by the Department of Environmental Protection. DEP and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers awarded Swiftmud dredge and fill permits last year, but the larger agreement was worked out only recently. The work involves removing sections of dike roads and filling in ditches created decades ago to drain wetlands for agricultural or cattle use.      
Copyright  © 2002  St. Petersburg Times  All rights reserved.

                Related Links,

                Map WC-1 Potts Preserve Trail
                Potts Preserve is located northeast of Inverness. From US 41 ...

                Florida's Trail Guide-Central West Region-Potts Preserve/Flying ... 

                Ken's Page - Potts Preserve

                Potts Preserve... The Tsala Apopka Chain of Lakes, which encompasses much of the 
                Potts Preserve is an important part of the Floridian aquifer's hydrologic system....

                Trails.com :
                Potts Preserve Trail The Potts Preserve was originally known as the Dee River Ranch and contains 
                over 8,000 acres. 

                Potts Preserve

                * pdf file (must have Acrobat Reader to open)

Lake plan has yet to reach nutrient goals
The proposed 2002 Lake Okeechobee Surface Water Improvement and Management (SWIM) Plan is in its final stages of the most recent update. Originally adopted in 1987, its goal was to reduce the amount of nutrients  -- primarily phosphorus -- that was entering Lake Okeechobee. While some reductions were realized through the years, the South Florida Water Management District (SFWMD) has yet to realize the legislative- mandated goal for the amount of tonnage of phosphorus that enters the lake. Now, the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Florida Department of Environmental Protection (FDEP) have implemented new regulations for the amount of phosphorus that can be contained in inflows to the lake. The state has passed the Lake Okeechobee Protection Act to help reduce the nutrients.      
Copyright  © 2002  Newszap All rights reserved.

Commissioners delay vote on Ag Reserve
County commissioners Thursday delayed a decision expanding an Agricultural Reserve development of million-dollar homes by using a former sand mine as required open space. Developer Kenco Communities already has approval to build 405 homes in a project called The Oaks of Boca Raton on land northeast of Clint Moore Road and State Road 7. The developer was asking to add 88 homes. Developers can build only one unit per acre in the Ag Reserve, 21,000 acres west of Boca Raton, Delray Beach and Boynton Beach. Also, they must condense projects to 40 percent of the land while leaving the rest as open space. Part of the open space used to justify additional units in The Oaks comes from property originally used to excavate sand and is now mostly a lake. The move is allowed, but some environmental advocates say it twists open- space intentions.     
Copyright  © 2002  Palm Beach Post  All rights reserved.

In-lake restoration measures necessary to achieve recovery from phosphorus
A large component of the proposed 2002 Surface Water Improvement and Management (SWIM) Plan from the South Florida Water Management District (SFWMD) is the Lake Okeechobee Sediment Management Feasibility Study. It is estimated at the present time, more than 51,600 metric tons of phosphorus are in the mud sediments of Lake Okeechobee. The material is often re-suspended into the water column by wind and waves on the shallow lake. This transports phosphorus into the water column at a magnitude equal to external loading from the watershed, scientists have determined. Because of the high internal loading, the lake may not respond to external phosphorus reductions and some studies have concluded in shallow lakes, in- lake restoration measures are necessary to achieve recovery.   
Copyright  © 2002  Newszap All rights reserved.

Everglades pits Lennar against state
A pivotal legal battle signaling whether state bureaucrats bear sufficient political will to buy land necessary to support the $8.4 billion Everglades restoration was scheduled to enter a new phase Oct. 24. Four national environmental groups, Lennar Corp. (NYSE: LEN) and the South Florida Water Management District filed proposed orders Thursday with Florida administrative law judge Robert E. Meale, who is expected to rule by late December whether the district erred in April when it granted Lennar a permit to build 3,300 homes on sensitive wetlands near Biscayne Bay. Stakes run high, since the turf tussle's outcome will likely set precedent, lawyers for Lennar and environmental groups agree. Meale will decide whether the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan (CERP) required the district on April 11 to instead reject Lennar's bid to build Lakes by the Bay South on 516 acres.   
Copyright  © 2002 SouthFloridaBizjournal All rights reserved.

Water Management District hopes to handle more local permitting
There are a few new faces in the South Florida Water Management District office in Fort Myers and more employees are expected to migrate to the west coast office soon. The year started off with the addition of Service Center Director Carol Wehle, who replaced current Deputy Executive Director Chip Merriam. Carla Palmer joined the staff recently as regulatory section leader. Both moved to Fort Myers from the St. Johns River Water Management District.  Review personnel for permits are expected to start flowing through the door next month. Trudi Williams, district board chairwoman, said the district hopes to eventually perform all permitting out of the Fort Myers office.  "We're moving all the consumptive use permits and the environmental permits here so all Southwest Florida permitting will be done in Southwest Florida," Williams said.     
Copyright  © 2002  Naples News  All rights reserved.

Put Everglades first, scientist says
Get involved in the restoration of the Everglades today because it will affect your quality of life in the future, a wildlife and wetlands ecologist told a Fort Myers crowd Thursday. Write a letter to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers or show up at a South Florida Water Management District meeting, urged Frank Mazzotti, a well-known Fort Lauderdale-based scientist who spoke at Community Breakfast 2002. The fifth annual breakfast at the Hall of Fifty States gathered 100 of Southwest Florida’s environmentalists, conservationists, developers, politicians, biologists and others who came to network and share ideas.  People each year bring their own coffee mugs. Nobody lays out linen tablecloths, and environmentally friendly beans are used in the morning brew.  Event sponsors are the Southwest Florida Council for Environmental Education and Audubon of Southwest Florida.    
Copyright  © 2002  News Press  All rights reserved.

Proposed greenspace tax opponent says ballot question is misleading
A leading opponent of the proposed greenspace tax on the Nov. 5 ballot sent a letter Thursday to the Florida Division of Elections, saying the ballot question is misleading. Taxpayers Action Group President Tom Macchia complains in the letter that voters could interpret the ballot question to mean that the proposed greenspace acquisition program would be funded with existing tax revenues — when in fact program supporters have made no secret of the fact that they envision an increase in the property tax rate.  Macchia's letter appears to amount to little more than an empty exercise, though. Division of Elections Director Ed Kast said Thursday that Macchia is looking in the wrong place to address issues of confusing ballot language.  "We have no statutory authority over that," Kast said.  "They'd have to challenge that in the courts."   
Copyright  © 2002  Naples News  All rights reserved.

24-October-02

Further delay sought for hearing over rural fringe growth plan
The two sides in a challenge of a plan to control rural growth in Collier County have something else to disagree about: when they should have their day in court. The 15,000 Coalition and Century Development of Collier County filed a petition in September for an administrative hearing on a sweeping new plan for growth on 93,000 acres on the edges of Golden Gate Estates. The petition charges that the plan is based on bad science and won't protect property rights. Collier County attorneys thought they had a deal with coalition director and Century President Don Lester to put off the hearing until Dec. 3, 4 and 5 to give Lester more time to prepare after his attorney withdrew from the case because of a dispute over fees. The hearing had been set for Oct. 31 and Nov.1.But on Tuesday, the same day Administrative Law Judge J. Lawrence Johnston signed the order setting the new hearing dates, Lester called Johnston's office in Tallahassee to inquire about a further delay until the end of January.  
Copyright  © 2002  Naples News  All rights reserved.

New Program Offers Adventurous Classes
No student wants to spend his winter break in class, right? What if the class were entitled “Downhill Skiing” or “Intro to Whitewater Canoeing?” If rock climbing, canoeing and kayaking, snow skiing, hot air ballooning and scuba diving sound like a great way to spend winter break, then George Mason University’s Department of Health, Fitness and Recreation Resources has the perfect winter programs for Mason students. The department will sponsor an intersession Everglades canoe expedition entitled “Florida Everglades: Studying the Ecosystem by Canoe” Jan. 3-17, 2003. This 12-day trip, which is worth three credits, will combine a multi-day canoe expedition with the environmental study of what is hailed as the largest and most unique sub-tropical ecosystem in the U.S. Students interested in these programs may find specific dates and times of course offerings by checking the course listing on the Registrar’s Web site: http://registrar.gmu.edu/schedule/.  Read more . . . 
Copyright  © 2002 George Mason University All rights reserved.

ENVIRONMENTAL ACTION COMMITTEE (EAC) MEETING NOTICE
Wednesday, November 6, 10:00 a.m.-1:30 p.m. Conference Room 2A, second floor, Bldg. B-1 District Headquarters, 3301 Gun Club Road West Palm Beach, Florida
AGENDA
I. Florida Earth Foundation (FEF)……………...Stan Bronson     
(See www.FloridaEarth.org)                                                   
II. Palm Beach County Issues……………...…   Rosa Durando
III. Martin/St. Lucie County Issues ……………  Members/TBD
IV. Public Comment/Non-agenda Issues..……………All
V. Approval of Previous Meeting's Minutes…..….....Members
VI. Next Meeting: …………………...December 6 at SFWMD  Read more . . .

California Panel Bans Fishing Around a Marine Sanctuary
After four years of study and debate, the California Fish and Game Commission today approved a network of marine reserves around the Channel Islands, creating what amounts to a network of underwater parks where fishing is off limits. The commission, which was faced with several alternatives ranging from doing nothing to closing as much as 34 percent of the state waters in the Channel Islands National Marine Sanctuary, chose a plan that bans fishing in 19 percent of the state waters that surround Anacapa, Santa Cruz, Santa Rosa, San Miguel and Santa Barbara Islands, covering some 175 miles. The commission passed the measure on a 2-to-1 vote, with two members absent. Mike Chrisman, vice president of the commission, voted against the measure, saying he supported creation of the marine reserves, but believed that a better means of assessing their success in preserving the marine environment was needed before action was taken.  Read more... 
Copyright  © 2002  NY Times, AP online  All rights reserved.

County turns up nose at manure plan
With the polo set returning soon for the "season" in Wellington, officials are again saying they don't want Martin County to become the Palm Beach County town's equine latrine. County commissioners say a renewed proposal to import horse manure and other stable products to a western Palm City ranch isn't any rosier now than when it was offered five months ago by the Martin County Soil and Water Conservation District. "If that's a pilot project to solve Palm Beach County problems, then it should be a pilot project in Palm Beach County," Commissioner Lee Weberman said. "You can't tell me you can't find a farmer there that would like to try the pilot project in Palm Beach County if it's that great a deal with no environmental impact."  Commissioner Michael DiTerlizzi said the district should use manure piling up at equestrian communities throughout Martin County rather than spreading Palm Beach County's problem across local ranches.          
Copyright  © 2002  Stuart News -TC Palm  All rights reserved.

23-October-02

Renaissance Village on hold
Hoping to allow more time for an alternate site to be found for the Rev. Leo Armbrust's proposed facility for at-risk children, the Palm Beach County Commission voted Tuesday to postpone discussion on the Renaissance Village project until Nov. 12. "I don't think that there's anyone here that's opposed to Renaissance Village," said Lisa B. Interlandi, senior attorney with the Environmental & Land Use Law Center in West Palm Beach. "Likewise, I don't think that there's anyone here that's opposed to the Loxahatchee River." Armbrust, a Catholic priest and chaplain for the Miami Dolphins, has proposed building Renaissance Village, featuring a 300-bed boarding school for troubled teens and a golf course, on a 576-acre portion of the Cypress Creek property, an environmentally-sensitive site north of Indiantown Road and east of Mack Dairy Road.  Read More...
Copyright  © 2002  Stuart News -TC Palm  All rights reserved.

Everglades legislation reaches halt in House, Senate
The legislation St. Lucie River advocates had hoped would be the first step toward funding $1 billion in Treasure Coast Everglades projects apparently is dead for this year. The Water Resources and Development Act stalled in the House of Representatives and the Senate before legislators returned home to campaign for November's elections. When they return on Nov. 12, only six weeks will remain in the session, and Everglades specialists say there are too many hurdles to overcome for the legislation to be approved before Congress adjourns. "There is no action pending at this point," said Dave Hewitt, a Washington-based spokesman for the Army Corps of Engineers, which had requested project approval and funding from Congress. The bill would have been the first step toward providing $1 billion in reservoirs, stormwater treatment facilities and conservation land on the Treasure Coast.     
Copyright  © 2002  Stuart News -TC Palm  All rights reserved.

Commissioners approve Immokalee-area rural growth plan 
The new plan sets the stage for growth and environmental preservation in the county's most remote stretches of natural areas and farmland. 
A groundbreaking plan for rural growth around Immokalee won unanimous support Tuesday from Collier County commissioners, putting an upbeat ending on a three-year process that began amid distrust and low expectations. In 1999, Gov. Jeb Bush and the Cabinet ordered Collier County to do a better job of protecting the environment and, taking a cue from the county's largest landowners, gave the county until 2002 to do it through a "community-based and collaborative" study. Over environmental advocates' objections, county commissioners gave landowners control over a study of almost 200,000 acres around Immokalee and appointed a citizens oversight committee. Landowners hired powerhouse engineering and planning firm WilsonMiller Inc. to do the job.     
Copyright  © 2002  Naples News  All rights reserved.

Keys jetboat transportation service launched   
Visitors to Islamorada and the Upper Keys have a new transportation option with the start of four-day-a-week shuttle jetboat service between Coconut Grove and Islamorada. Dubbed First Lady of the Keys Express, the 50-foot catamaran with jetliner- type seating for 49 passengers will depart Dinner Key Marina on Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday morning and make the three-hour run down the Inland Waterway, docking at Holiday Isle. The jetboat will make the return trip over the same route each day. Mark Rosandich, a 15-year veteran of the excursion boat business who runs a 159-passenger shuttle boat operation in Cancun Mexico and a catamaran sailing excursion boat in Puerto Rico, has teamed up with Miami's Michael Dudek and the Floribean Hospitality Group to market and operate the Florida Keys trips.     
Copyright  © 2002 Community Newspapers All rights reserved.

Toxic Fertilizers Challenged by Lawsuit
Farm, consumer and environmental health groups have filed a lawsuit to overturn a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) rule allowing hazardous wastes to be used in fertilizers. Under the rule, toxic heavy metals, including lead, arsenic, mercury, and cadmium may be recycled into zinc based fertilizers. The hazardous waste derived fertilizers would not be labeled as such, and may be applied to farm lands and home gardens without further restrictions. While industries have long been disposing of their hazardous wastes through fertilizers, the practice was not officially authorized until this rule. Many of the heavy metals that will be recycled into fertilizers are toxic substances. Lead has been known to cause behavioral problems, learning disabilities, seizures and even death. Mercury may cause neurological abnormalities, including cerebral palsy in children and severe deformations in animals. 
Copyright  © 2002  Environment News Service (ENS) 2002. All Rights Reserved.

                Related Links,

                U.S. Environmental Protection Agancy
                Wastes: Waste-derived Fertilizer

                Safe Food and Fertilizer

Sediment removal of lake's tributaries considered
The Lake Okeechobee Protection Program was adopted by the Legislature in 2000 and committed the state of Florida to restore and protect the lake. The law establishes a long-term program and requires significant involvement and cooperation between a myriad of state and federal agencies to implement major public treatment projects that will protect and restore Lake Okeechobee. According to the law, all structures discharging into Lake Okeechobee from the South Florida Water Management District (SFWMD) are to achieve the 140-ton Total Maximum Daily Load Limit (TMDL) by Jan. 1, 2015. That translates into a 40 parts per billion target unless the TMDL for the water body is different.  The integrated watershed and lake-management strategies will have activities at many levels.  There will be implementation of Best Management Practices (BMP) and technologies at the parcel level.  There will be development of in-lake remediation projects.      
Copyright  © 2002 Newszap All rights reserved.

22-October-02

Editorial: The Clean Water Act at 30
The Clean Water Act of 1972, one of the most successful and popular of all the environmental laws enacted under Richard Nixon, turned 30 last Friday. What should have been a celebratory moment, however, was instead an occasion for grumbling, mostly directed at President Bush. His administration has done little to broaden the reach of the law, and there are those in the environmental community who fear that he is now plotting to weaken it in fundamental ways, chiefly by narrowing its scope.  Thirty years ago the nation's waters were in terrible shape — Lake Erie on its deathbed, Ohio's Cuyahoga River bursting into flames, lakes, streams and beaches closed to fishing and swimming. There has been great progress since then, almost entirely the result of the 1972 law.   
Copyright  © 2002  NY Times online  All rights reserved.

New Map Shows Human "Footprint" Covers Most of Earth

A team of scientists from the New York-based Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) and Columbia University's Center for International Earth Science Information Network (CIESIN) has produced a new, comprehensive map of the world, showing how human beings directly influence more than three quarters of the earth's landmass.  Published in the latest issue of the scientific journal BioScience, the map should serve as a wake-up call that humans are stewards of the natural world, whether we like it or not - something that should be viewed as an opportunity, the authors say.  The map adds together influences from population density, access from roads and waterways, electrical power infrastructure, and land transformation such as urbanization and agricultural use.  It reveals that 83 percent of the land's surface is under human influence, while a staggering 98 percent of the area where it is possible to grow rice, wheat or maize is directly influenced by human beings.  Read more . . . 
Copyright  © 2003  Wildlife Conservation Society  All rights reserved.

                Related Article,

                October 22, 2003
                The Last of the Wild

                Related Links,

                World map*

               Atlas of the Human Footprint

            About the Data

                * pdf file (must have Acrobat Reader to open)

News Release: Conservationists Applaud Forest Service Action to Control ORV Damage
The partial closure today by the U.S. Forest Service of approximately 7,000 acres to Off Road Vehicles (ORVs) in Florida’s Ocala National Forest is a positive if overdue step, according to Defenders of Wildlife.  "Until today the U.S. Forest Service in Florida has been unable and unwilling to bring the ecological damage caused by ORVs under control and we applaud them for doing something about it.  The closures in the Ocala National Forest are a step in the right direction" says Christine Small, Habitat Conservation Associate with Defenders of Wildlife.  Illegal trails in the areas of the Ocala National Forest known as Paisley Woods and Lake Delancy have increased by 20% over a period of 11 months. Beginning November 4, 2002, motorized vehicles will be restricted to designated roads in approximately 7,000 acres.  Read more . . . 
Copyright  © 2002  Defenders  All rights reserved

                Related Article,

                November 2, 2002
                Report: Out of Control

Grow organic, grow business?
M&M Groves in Fort Pierce isn't growing just run-of-the-mill Florida oranges. The 3,000-tree grove is certified organic by Florida Organic Growers of Gainesville. "It's a tough thing to do," says M&M's co-owner Vicki Miller, who began organic citrus growing with her husband, Walter, about seven years ago. "We don't use any pesticides or herbicides. We mow our weeds. The fruit can't be put in a truck that has had fruit with pesticides on it." The Millers and other 120 or so certified organic growers of fruit, vegetables, sugar cane and rice in the state are hopeful that U.S. Department of Agriculture national organic standards that took effect Monday will boost their business.  "That is the hope of everyone. The good thing about this is the standardization," said Marlon Sequeira, organic program manager for West Palm Beach-based Florida Crystals Corp. "Now we have one playing field and it gives us a competitive edge.      
Copyright  © 2002  Palm Beach Post  All rights reserved.

Plan to treat waste a half-baked idea?
From the toilet to the farm field, Palm Beach County wants to market its waste-water sludge as a bumper crop. The county plans to start construction next year on a $25 million aste-water treatment plant at 45th Street and Jog Road that would bake sludge into pellets the size of buckshot. The crumbly nuggets could be sold as plant food to fertilizer companies, retail stores and golf courses. County waste-treatment plants now produce a wetter and more disease-laden sludge that is trucked out of town and slopped on farms. Last year, the county produced 18,730 tons of sludge that cost about $244,000 to haul away.  The sludge farms, however, are rapidly diminishing. Environmental rules are getting stricter. Dumping and trucking costs are rising. Some places, such as Martin County, have decided they don't want to be Palm Beach County's dumping ground.    
Copyright  © 2002  Palm Beach Post  All rights reserved.

Governor held stock in oil firm
At a time when his brother was deciding whether to allow oil rigs off Florida's coast, Gov. Jeb Bush's personal portfolio included stock in a politically connected Texas company seeking to drill in the Gulf. At some point in 2001 -- as the White House was mulling over drilling rights in the eastern Gulf with the governor playing a role in negotiations -- the trustees who oversee Gov. Bush's finances purchased shares in Longleaf Partners Fund, a mutual fund with major investments in the Pioneer Natural Resources Co.  Pioneer, whose largest single shareholder is former George W. Bush business partner Richard Rainwater, was bidding for a lease in waters off Florida.  Had Pioneer been granted a lease by the president's administration, its investors, including the Florida governor, would have been in line to reap the benefits.           
Copyright  © 2002  Miami Herald  All rights reserved.

State must keep flexibility to give Everglades the water it needs
In the Oct. 13 editorial "Make rules, not promises," The Post advocates an inflexible water allocation formula for the Everglades natural system that would lock in unnatural water releases into the Everglades. The state of Florida holds the position that there will be enough water for both nature and people, but we must take care of nature first. And nature, which is dynamic, not static, would be destroyed with invariable, steady-state flows. An enforceable agreement was signed in January, which requires the natural system to receive the water it needs for restoration, nothing less. The president and Gov. Bush represented the equal interests of federal and state taxpayers with their signatures. This is the best approach because it sticks with the original intent of the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan that calls for delivering the right amount of water of the right quality at the right place at the right time.   
Copyright  © 2002  Palm Beach Post  All rights reserved.

Helicopter rescues uncle, 6-year-old from disabled airboat
It was to be an afternoon airboat ride in the Everglades, to fish and just spend some time together. Thirteen hours later, Steven Messier and his 6-year-old nephew, Josh, tired and sore from dozens of mosquito bites, were pulled from the dark swamp by a Coast Guard helicopter. They had run aground on a dry grass bed off Loxahatchee Road and had blown the engine trying to get unstuck. Mechanical and fuel problems with the rescue helicopters had delayed their return, but they finally walked in the door of their home about 3:30 a.m. Monday. "He headed right for the shower," said Messier's wife, Sharon Messier. On Monday, a day after their ordeal, Steven Messier finally found his boat after searching all day with friends. At noon Sunday, Steven Messier had pulled away from the Lox Road ramp with his nephew in the airboat he has owned for two years.    
Copyright  © 2002  Sun-Sentinel  All rights reserved.

On Environment, Bush, McBride Come Up Dry
Floridians who worry about disappearing rural areas, rampant development and fouled waterways may be wishing they had more choices in this year's race for governor. Though Gov. Jeb Bush insists his record on protecting the land and water is ``a great one,'' environmentalists disagree. Under Bush's stewardship, they say, the Department of Environmental Protection has become a rubber stamp for developers and polluting industries. Bush has signed laws that make it harder for citizens to challenge harmful permits, and easier for the state to build toll roads into rural countryside. Democrat Bill McBride, on the other hand, has no environmental record, unless one counts his leadership of a law firm that has consistently represented some of Florida's worst polluters. McBride waited until just three weeks before the election to reveal an environmental platform, and it was sketchy at best, critics say.   
Copyright  © 2002  Tampa Tribune  All rights reserved.

21-October-02

Professor Mary Doyle
Director of the Center for Ecosystem Science and Policy Professor, has had extensive government experience in environmental work, serving as Deputy General Counsel of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and more recently as Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Water and Science. She was instrumental in drafting and securing Congressional passage of the legislation authorizing Everglades restoration. Professor Doyle also chaired the South Florida Ecosystem Restoration Task Force made up of federal, state, local and tribal officials with responsibility for the Everglades. Professor Doyle was Dean of the U.M. Law School for nine years.  The University of Miami Alumni Association invites you to Learn More: University of Miami Alumni Lecture Tour with Mary Doyle, Director of the Center for Ecosystem Science and Policy Professor and Former Dean of the School of Law  Read more . . . 
Copyright  © 2002  University of Miami. All rights reserved.  

                Related Articles,

Professor Doyle's eBoard                 

Mary Doyle

Former UM Law Dean Mary Doyle Accepts Interior Dept. Post

Mary Doyle Named To 2 Major Posts

Letter to Editor: Residents have a right to remain in Everglades
Re U.S. Rep. Peter Deutsch's Oct. 15 column, Congress must restart Everglades restoration: 
The Miccosukee Tribe of Indians lives in the Everglades. We remember well Deutsch's support for National Park Service efforts to stop the housing of tribal members in our traditional homeland. Fortunately, Congress passed a law that clarified our right to live on the border of Everglades National Park in perpetuity. The same interests now want to force our neighbors from their homes in the 8 ½-Square-Mile Area located outside the park. Deutsch says that removing one-third of this predominantly Hispanic community is necessary to restart Everglades restoration. The opposite is true. The obsession with removing people from this area has prevented Everglades restoration from ever getting started. Congress authorized the Modified Water Deliveries Project in 1989. Its purpose was to restore more-natural flows to the Everglades and the park.     
Copyright  © 2002  Miami Herald  All rights reserved.

Unedited Version of Previous Letter: 
8.5 SMA OBSESSION STOPPING EVERGLADES RESTORATION
Misplaced priorities destroy Tribal Everglades
It was no surprise that Congressman Peter Deutsch ignored the fact that the Miccosukee Tribe of Indians live in the Everglades in his recent opinion editorial. We well remember  his support for  Park Service efforts to stop the housing of Tribal members in our traditional homeland where we have lived for centuries. Fortunately for our small Tribe, Congress passed a law that clarified our right to live on the border of Everglades National Park in perpetuity. The same interests are now trying to force our non-Indian neighbors from their homes in the rural 8.5 Square Mile Area located outside the Park. Congressman Deutsch claims the forced removal of one third of this predominantly Hispanic minority community is necessary to "restart" Everglades restoration. The opposite is true.    
Copyright  © 2002  Miami Herald  All rights reserved.

SWIM plan not meeting goals
In order for the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan (CERP) to be successful, upstream waters need to be sent into the Everglades at the right times of the year, in the correct quantity and very pristine where nutrients are concerned. Translated to everyday English, the Kissimmee River, Lake Okeechobee and all other inflows to the lake must be cleaned up if there is any chance of CERP being successful. The Lake Okeechobee SWIM plan was adopted in 1987, and has been updated every five years since. The SWIM plan was adopted to reduce the nutrient flows into Lake Okeechobee. They focused primarily on phosphorus and nitrogen. The South Florida Water Management District (SFWMD) would initiate or continue programs and projects to protect the lake. However, that has not been the case. In spite of having 15 years to reach the original target for the loading of phosphorus into the lake, they have been unable to achieve that goal.      
Copyright  © 2002  News Zap - Okeechobee News  All rights reserved.

King challenger takes green stance 
Differences are plentiful in the state Senate race between a powerful political fixture in Northeast Florida and the energetic newcomer taking him on. State Sen. Jim King, the Jacksonville Republican in line to become Senate president next year, holds a huge name recognition and fund-raising advantage over challenger Andy Wojcicki, a 26-year-old who's never before run for office. King, 62, has been in Tallahassee since 1986, serving 13 years in the House and the past three in the Senate. Wojcicki, 26, hadn't been active in politics until five months ago, when he decided to give King a run for his job. Barring a huge swing toward Democrats in the Senate this November and an unlikely revolt, if King defeats Wojcicki next month, he would lead the state Senate for the next two years. A debate Friday at the Florida Coastal School of Law set the contrasting views on the table.   
Copyright  © 2002 Jacksonville Times-Union All rights reserved.

Convoys Bring Relief
"This is the first October, since 1992, that we have not been flooded," said Madeline Fortin, "…and it's because the Convoys came here. They don't want to run the risk that the press might get wind of what they are doing to us." That sentiment was echoed across the nation along the convoy routes, and at every rally, from the largest to the smallest. "We are just so grateful to know we aren't in this alone. We can't thank you enough for taking the time and effort to come here. You are our heroes," said business owner Linda Whitely of Miami, as she donated $200.00. Members of the Klamath and Ohio Convoys indicate that the outstanding success of the relief effort has bolstered spirits among the crew, as well. "We hear that kind of thing a lot," said crew member Rocky Dippel, "that's why we know we are doing the right thing."  Read more...
Copyright  © 2003  Sierra Times All rights reserved.

States work on plan to make lakes great
Everglades envy is gripping leaders across the Great Lakes region. It's the green of the Everglade that afflicts them with jealousy. Not the green of lush plant life, but the green of cash - as in $8 billion. That's how much money the federal government will spend in an ambitious 30-year plan to restore the thousands of square miles of ecologically crucial but degraded Florida swamp. Leaders in this region want that kind of money to restore the Great Lakes. "Everyone took notice of what Florida got," said Chris Jones, who heads the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency. "Even in Washington, that's a lot of money." But before the region can get Everglades kind of money, it needs a plan. So for more than a year, the governors of the eight Great Lakes states have been putting one together, and representatives met here last week to discuss ways to build partnerships to restore the lakes. Next month, they will release a report.   
Copyright  © 2003  Cleveland.com  All rights reserved.

Rally backs creek over development
Many of the hundreds of people at Sunday's rally to "Save Cypress Creek and the Loxahatchee River" have hiked or canoed through the watershed, but could they describe it? Not well enough to do it justice. You have to see it yourself, they advised. "It's just... absolutely amazing," said Barb White, chairwoman of a committee to protect Cypress Creek. "Beautiful," echoed County Commissioner Karen Marcus. And, endangered. Though Palm Beach County and Martin County have committed to protecting much of the land around the Loxahatchee River, which is a federally protected wild and scenic river, the rally on Indiantown Road centered around 576 acres west of Jupiter owned by the Rev. Leo Armbrust. The Catholic priest has hoped to build Renaissance Village, a project featuring a golf course and a boarding school for troubled teens, on that site. 
Copyright  © 2002  Palm Beach Post  All rights reserved.

Environmentalists study cabinet races carefully
Remember Orimulsion, that tar-based fuel Florida Power & Light Co. wanted to burn at a Tampa Bay power plant? The Florida Cabinet killed that idea. And when lawmakers wanted to let private property owners fence off part of the state's shorelines, Cabinet members persuaded them to back off. While each Cabinet member is elected to handle duties specific to the office, together they are the stewards of state lands and decide which parcels should be conserved and which can be developed. Already, conservationists are carefully combing through the voting records of the four candidates vying to fill the two open seats on the state Cabinet. Developers and agrarians are watching, too. Each post becomes even more important next year, when the Cabinet shrinks from six members to three and the Cabinet hands its public school duties to the Board of Education. 
Copyright  © 2002  St. Petersburg Times  All rights reserved.

Restoring the urban forest
By now, the story has almost attained the status of legend. One day back in 1995, 15-year-old Jared Milarch got so frustrated at watching the sick and dying trees on his family's farm that he told his brother and father he wanted to get out of the tree business altogether. "I remember asking my dad: 'Why can't we have trees like those big ones you and grandpa are always taking us to see?'¡" said Jared, who's now 23. That got his father thinking. Dave Milarch, 53, is a second-generation tree farmer, and he knew all about the ancient art of cloning, or grafting trees. But grafting is done primarily to produce bigger fruit or more colorful blossoms; Milarch had never heard of anyone cloning the big strapping specimens known as "champion trees" simply to produce healthier trees. So he and Jared decided they'd be the first. In 1996 they gathered buds from seven Michigan champions and sent them to an Oregon nursery with years of cloning experience. 
Copyright  © 2003  Record - Eagle (Traverse City) All rights reserved.

20-October-02

HSBC's New Loan: 2,000 Environmentalists
Lynne Marshall says she has never fully understood why HSBC Holdings one of the world's largest banks, would send 2,000 employees on far-flung environmental expeditions. But Ms. Marshall, who was among the first to be chosen, is not second-guessing her employer. "This was a dream of a lifetime," said Ms. Marshall, 42, an HSBC vice president and trust account officer — and an archaeology buff. She spent two weeks in July excavating animal bones and sifting sediment to help researchers study early man in Venta Micena, Spain, all at HSBC's expense. "I just can't believe I had this opportunity." Ms. Marshall, from the HSBC office in Buffalo, is part of an uncommon experiment. HSBC, which is based in London, announced early this year that it was donating nearly $50 million to the Earthwatch Institute, WWF (formerly known as the World Wildlife Fund) and Botanic Gardens Conservation International for conservation projects worldwide over the next five years.    
Copyright  © 2002  NY Times online  All rights reserved.

Flood control part of SWIM plan
The goal of the 2002 Surface Water Improvement and Management (SWIM) plan is to meet the mandated TMDL target and in-lake phosphorus concentration of 40 parts per billion. It is also to achieve a phosphorus load of 140 tons per year. In the draft version of the SWIM plan that will go before the Governing Board in November will be the various projects and programs to reach those goals. The areas we reviewed from the plan in the last installment included phosphorus load reduction in the tributaries; reduction of nonnutrient pollutant loads; reduction of in-lake nutrients; and, environmental resources. In this third installment we take a look at Flood Control and Water Supply, Recreation and Navigation. Flood Control and Water Supply the flood control and water supply goals in the SWIM planning area are: 1) To ensure adequate flood protection to local communities and agriculture around the lake. 
Copyright  © 2002  Newszap All rights reserved.

2nd big development proposed in Jupiter
Regional planners learned last week of another large development in Jupiter that could affect water flows to the Loxahatchee River. As with the proposed 800-acre WCI Communities proposal next to it, some elected officials and river advocates expressed concern. Jupiter Falls, a proposed mixed-use development near Interstate 95 and Indiantown Road, is next to the planned massive WCI Communities mixed-use development. It is also within the Loxahatchee River basin. "Even though some of the projects aren't on the river and don't abut Jonathan Dickinson State Park, they are in the Loxahatchee River basin," said Marge Ketter, a river advocate from southern Martin County. "Anything that happens there not only affects the traffic situation, but it affects the Loxahatchee basin as well." 
Copyright  © 2002  Stuart News -TC Palm  All rights reserved.

Centerpiece: Searching For Sawfish

Sawfish are related most closely 
to stingrays, even though they 
bear some resemblance to sharks.  
There are two species of sawfish
 — smalltooth and largetooth — 
and they may grow to be as long 
as 18 feet.

Two Southwest Florida researchers gather information about the elusive prehistoric-looking creature Sawfish? Sure, we saw fish, you might be inclined to answer upon your return from a day out on the water. No, sawfish. Seen any? Signs posted at tackle shops, marinas, dive shops and boat ramps are asking people to relate their sightings of sawfish, a prehistoric-looking creature known for its long flat bill, on each side of which 17 to 34 teeth protrude.  Sawfish are related most closely to stingrays, even though they bear some resemblance to sharks. There are two species of sawfish — smalltooth and largetooth — and they may grow to be as long as 18 feet. Large populations of sawfish ranged as far north as New Jersey as late as the early 20th century, but their numbers seemed to have dwindled. They are known best for their distinctive saw — or rostrum — which can often be spotted hanging on the wall of a seafood restaurant or in a private home as a curiosity. 
Copyright  © 2002  Naples News  All rights reserved.

Smalltooth Sawfish
Smalltooth sawfish is one of two species of sawfish that inhabit U.S. waters.  Smalltooth sawfish commonly reach 18 ft (5.5 m) in length, and may grow to 25 ft (7 m). Little is know about the life history of these animals, but they may live up to 25-30 years and mature after about 10 years. Like many elasmobranchs, smalltooth sawfish are ovoviviparous, meaning the mother holds the eggs inside of her until the young are ready to be born, usually in litters of 15 to 20 pups. Sawfish species inhabit shallow coastal waters of tropical seas and estuaries throughout the world. They are usually found in shallow waters very close to shore over muddy and sandy bottoms. They are often found in sheltered bays, on shallow banks, and in estuaries or river mouths. Certain species of sawfish are known to ascend inland in large river systems, and they are among the few elasmobranchs that are known from freshwater systems in many parts of the world.
Copyright  © 2002  Naples News  All rights reserved.

Volunteer groups clear out exotics
Marking the end of National Wildlife Refuge Week, public officials joined Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts and Navy ROTC students Saturday in removing invasive Brazilian pepper plants from the Arthur R. Marshall Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge west of Boynton Beach. The gathering also was a call for volunteers to join refuge officials in fighting exotic plants, which consume more than 25 acres per day. Brazilian peppers, melaleuca and Old World climbing fern make the lands they cover
unsuitable for wildlife. The National Wildlife Refuge Association is urging Congress to provide the nation's 540 refuges with $150 million in the next five years. Refuge officials could then train 5,000 volunteers and deploy 50 rapid-response strike teams across the country. The U.S. House of Representatives recently approved $2 million for the refuges, but the money has not been divided and might not be distributed until November or December.
Copyright  © 2002  Sun-Sentinel  All rights reserved.

Editorial: Rebellion’s concerns misplaced
It’s easy to sympathize with many of the angry people assembled in Naples on Friday to support the “Sawgrass Rebellion.” Locals joined with protesters from as far away as the Pacific Northwest to complain about government environmental programs that — at least in these people’s eyes — roll right over the property rights and other concerns of the little guy. That definitely happens sometimes. But the desire of a few people to live in or near environmentally important areas should not stand in the way of the great cause of Everglades restoration. Vast swathes of southern Florida have been claimed for human settlement, with massive impact on natural resources. It is in our own best interests to preserve as much as possible of what is left for the welfare of future generations in an increasingly crowded state.
Copyright  © 2002  News Press  All rights reserved.

Grant delay likely to push back Naples Preserve project
Although Naples Preserve supporters are rushing to complete the preserve project by the winter season, Naples City Council is slowing them down. The city's staff planned to submit a grant application to the Collier County Tourist Development Council, which was scheduled to discuss the application during its Monday, Oct. 28, meeting. Preserve supporters need $125,000 to complete the project at the southeast corner of Fleischmann Boulevard and U.S. 41. When council members heard of the application on Wednesday, they instructed City Manager Kevin Rambosk to remove it from TDC's agenda because they didn't authorize anyone to submit the application. "I think this has slipped through the process," Mayor Bonnie MacKenzie said during the council meeting. "We have in the past done things in a hurry. We have made mistakes. We want every T crossed and every I dotted." 
Copyright  © 2002  Naples News  All rights reserved.

Sawgrass Rebellion' rally gets little local response
Property rights activists calling themselves the Sawgrass Rebellion wrapped up a cross-country convoy Saturday with a rally at a small Everglades community. But the final stop fell flat for convoy members when few local residents showed up to protest an Army Corps of Engineers plan to flood much of their Homestead community. The leaders who invited them never showed. Convoy leader Bill Ransom hooked up a 10-foot bucket on his trailer and left Oregon on his cross-country tour after receiving a letter from the Dade County Farm Bureau asking for help in saving farmland from the Everglades restoration project. "We were five stops into the tour, in Nevada, when they called us up and said the whole thing was off," said Ransom as the convoy organized in a dusty gas station parking lot south of Miami. "But we had no intention of heading home, we don't care if there is only two people we are coming to see."
Copyright  © 2002  Sun-Sentinel  All rights reserved.

Property group stages Everglades rally
Oregon property rights activists calling themselves the Sawgrass Rebellion wrapped up a cross-country convoy Saturday with a rally at a small Everglades community. But the final stop fell flat for convoy members when few local residents showed up to protest an Army Corps of Engineers plan to flood their community. The leaders who invited them never showed. Convoy leader Bill Ransom left Oregon on his cross-country tour after receiving a letter from the Dade County Farm Bureau asking for help in saving farm land from the Everglades restoration project. “We were five stops into the tour, in Nevada, when they called us up and said the whole thing was off,” said Ransom as the convoy organized in a dusty gas station parking lot outside Miami. “But we had no intention of heading home, we don’t care if there is only two people we are coming to see."    Copyright  © 2003  Statesman Journal  All rights reserved.

Recreation ravages protected wetlands
Miami-Dade County's Model Lands, a 47,000-acre tract of endangered wetlands in South Dade, were supposed to be an environmental sanctuary for rare and endangered plants and animal life. But after years of rampant target shooting, all-terrain and off-road vehicle use and illegal hunting and dumping, the environment is not only endangered but a public safety hazard as well. The area, an 18-mile stretch on U.S. 1 south of Florida City, crosses a prairie-like terrain en route to the Keys. It has become a recreation area that is nearly impossible to patrol, law enforcement officers responsible for the jurisdiction say. "It's a free-for-all," said Rick Conover, who oversees law enforcement for portions of the Model Lands owned by the South Florida Water Management District. "We've got a lot of people going through that area. They are carrying guns -- big guns." 
Copyright  © 2002  Sun-Sentinel  All rights reserved.

Election 2002: Soil and Water races could become referendum on ROMA plan

Local property rights advocates are making a bid this Election Day to take over the Collier Soil and Water Conservation District and stop plans for a wetlands mitigation bank in Golden Gate Estates. Property Rights Action Committee President Bill Lhota and Treasurer Lynda Hittinger and taxpayer watchdog Ty Agoston form a bloc of candidates running for three seats on the five-member district board. The election is Nov. 5. Agoston, a retired grocery merchandiser, is running against Soil and Water District Chairman Michael Ramsey. Lhota, a construction consultant, is running against semi-retired attorney John Cochrane for an open seat. Hittinger, a former laboratory manager, faces research scientist Michael Urbanik for a second open seat. Opponents say the plan threatens property rights of landowners within the mitigation bank area. Supporters say it poses no such risk to landowners and instead would make it easier to get wetland permits to build a home in Golden Gate Estates and preserve open space. 
Copyright  © 2002  Naples News  All rights reserved.

Editorial: The Need To Think Through What We Want Florida To Be
Florida's inability to contend with its rapid development is illustrated by a shocking number. If each city and county developed to the capacity allowed by its land-use plans, Florida would swarm with 86 million people. As the Tribune's Kathy Steele found, most of them would be located along the coasts and across the center of the state, flanking the I-4 corridor. It's not hard to imagine the scope of the chaos should the state - which is already straining to provide roads, water, schools and other necessities for its almost 16 million residents - ever reach that number. That, of course, won't happen. The land-use population figures are fantasy - far exceeding what communities could accommodate. Besides, gridlock, pollution, crime, high taxes, crowded schools and other ills would slam the brakes on Florida's growth long before it got anywhere close to 86 million.
Copyright  © 2002  Tampa Tribune  All rights reserved.

19-October-02

Editorial: Bring Back Hetch Hetchy? 
In 1913, in defiance of established law and the wishes of millions  of  Americans, Congress foolishly approved the construction of a dam and an eight-mile-long reservoir in a lush valley known by its Indian name, Hetch Hetchy, in the northwest corner of Yosemite National Park. The dream of righting this wrong has never really died. Now it's back, in the form of a proposal by Environmental Defense and other conservation groups for a feasibility study to see whether it would be economically and hydrologically plausible to knock down the dam, drain the reservoir, uncover 1,900 acres of valley floor and restore what the naturalist John Muir once described as a "grand landscape garden, one of nature's rarest and most precious mountain temples." Hetch Hetchy, once the largest reservoir in California, catches water from the High Sierra and sends it along to San Francisco.
Copyright  © 2002  NY Times, AP online  All rights reserved.

Phosphorus levels must be reduced
The goal of the effort to meet the mandated TMDL target and in-lake phosphorus concentration of 40 parts per billion and achieve a phosphorus load of 140 tons per year, over-target phosphorus loading must continue to be reduced, the executive summary of the 2002 Surface Water Improvement and Management (SWIM) plan states.  The areas we will be reviewing from the plan include: phosphorus load reduction in the tributaries; reduction of nonnutrient pollutant loads; reduction of in-lake nutrients; environmental resources; Flood control and Water supply; Recreation; and, Navigation. There is an expanded Works of the District program, the new Lake Okeechobee Protection Plan, and other new programs and projects to achieve the inflow target are being implemented. They are Phosphorus Load Reduction in the Tributaries. 
Copyright  © 2002  Newszap All rights reserved.

Sept. 11 commission; Everglades ecosystem

Jennifer Sergent is the 
Washington correspondent 
for the Daily News.

Congress left town this week without having approved an independent Sept. 11 commission to expand on the work already being done by a House-Senate intelligence panel. Stephen Push, whose wife died in the plane that crashed into the Pentagon, blamed the White House for stonewalling congressional action. He also blamed Rep. Porter Goss, R-Sanibel. "Even though he agrees with us, he's still going to do the White House's bidding," Push said. At issue is who serves on the commission and how many votes are necessary to approve the issuance of subpoenas. Congressional proponents, both Republican and Democrat, support a commission that would have two chairs, one appointed by the president and the other by Democratic leaders. The rest of the 10-member panel would be evenly divided between Democrats and Republicans. And on votes to approve a subpoena, lawmakers support a commission that would need only a 5-5 tie.     
Copyright  © 2002  Naples News  All rights reserved.

Sawgrass Rebellion: Property rights the focus of rally


Property rights advocate Bill Lhota, center, 
and neighbor Donna Scarpa, right, both of 
Golden Gate Estates, discuss issues pertaining 
to their homes at the Sawgrass Rebellion 
rally on Friday at Lhota's home. Lhota 
welcomed friends, neighbors and members 
of the Klamath Bucket Brigade, a group from 
Klamath Falls, Ore., who drove across the 
country to support property rights. The event 
featured food, music and speeches. 
Gary Coronado/Staff

After three weeks on the road, farmers and ranchers from as far away as Oregon and Ohio pulled into Collier County on Friday for a peaceful rally for private property rights. Local property rights advocates met the cross-country caravan about 10 a.m. in the Publix parking lot at Immokalee Road and Collier Boulevard. From there, a 40-vehicle convoy headed to the rally — dubbed the Sawgrass Rebellion — in the front yard of a remote Golden Gate Estates home on 18th Avenue Southeast. People came and went throughout most of the afternoon with the crowd topping out at about 200 people at any one time, authorities said. They sat in lawn chairs or stood in the shade as a parade of speechmakers and musicians stepped up to a microphone on a makeshift stage erected across the home's front porch. The rally was set to end at 10 p.m. with a candlelight vigil. An American flag hung from the home's two-story columns above a banner that stated "Sawgrass Rebellion and Don't Flood My Land."
Copyright  © 2002  Naples News  All rights reserved.

Buyout prospect depresses prices of E. Bonita land
Land prices drop quickly east of Bonita Grande Drive and north of Bonita Beach Road. At least, that's typically the case. While land across the street south of Bonita Beach Road continues to develop into high-priced gated communities, neighboring property owners have found themselves within the confines of a buyout area that the South Florida Water Management District plans to restore into a more natural state. Ironically, the additional scarcity of land caused by the buyout has made the available pieces more valuable. One piece, a 2-acre parcel on the corner of Bonita Beach Road and Bonita Grande Drive, is under contract for approximately $2 million to a developer planning to build a Walgreens on the site. The land is technically within the confines of the buyout area. However, with past impacts on the property, including clearing, and its location on a burgeoning commercial intersection, the cost of acquiring the property at market price would take a disproportionate share from the Water Management District's budget for the entire project.    
Copyright  © 2002  Naples News  All rights reserved.

Developing a 'sustainable' environment


For its work to promote biodiesel at its 
Gulf Harbor Yacht and Country Club, 
WCI was one of two local organizations 
to receive awards for efforts to manage 
and protect Florida's coastal areas. The 
Bonita Bay Group was also recognized 
by the Council for Sustainable Florida for 
creating a turtle friendly environment at 
its Brooks beach club. Contributed

After a year during which residents of The Brooks applauded a loggerhead turtle named Fisher as it was returned to the gulf waters from which it was rescued, and WCI Communities built the first Florida marina offering an environmentally friendly diesel fuel alternative for boat engines, the two companies were recognized for promoting sustainability within their developments. The Lee County-based developers were two of 17 recipients of awards from the Council for Sustainable Florida. The organization, made up of representatives from business, environmental groups, government, education and citizen organizations, recognized organizations and companies for initiatives aimed at coastal conservation and revitalization.  This spring, WCI converted a marina on its Gulf Harbor Yacht and Country Club along the Caloosahatchee River to offer biodiesel for the first time in the country at such a facility. 
Copyright  © 2002  Naples News  All rights reserved.

Editorial: Bronson for Agriculture
Whatever Charles H. Bronson's shortcomings might be as the state's Agriculture commissioner, the relevant point for voters in the upcoming election is that his opponent, David Nelson, has done almost nothing to prove his competence for the job. Nelson, a 39-year-old teacher, has run a minimal campaign, and his victory in the Democratic primary appears to have been a fluke. Bronson, 53, a rancher and former state senator, was appointed to the agriculture job last year and shows a command of the office's duties. This is an important job. The full title of the office is the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services. The commissioner directs some of the state's most important consumer protection programs. When it comes to agriculture, the second largest industry in the state, the commissioner has the contradictory duties of promoting and regulating it. Copyright  © 2002  St. Petersburg Times  All rights reserved.

18-October-02

Water board wonders what to do
After months of talking about solving the region's water crisis, elected officials and utility authorities from Central Florida agreed Thursday on their next step -- more talking. "We all need affordable, dependable water supplies to meet the growth of the region," said Orange County Chairman Richard Crotty, speaking to the group. "We all are concerned about protecting our unique natural environment -- our lakes, wetlands and springs -- from over-pumping the aquifer," he said. "Working together now should help us avoid costly conflicts in the future." When the group, working to formulate the East Central Florida Water Supply Planning Initiative, began its meetings in January, there was some sense that solutions to those concerns would emerge by the end of the year. While remedies were discussed -- including the use of treated sewage for irrigation, conservation and finding other water sources -- how to get them under way was left unaddressed.
Copyright  © 2002  Orlando Sentinel  All Rights Reserved.         

30th Anniversary Finds Clean Water Act in Jeopardy

On the 30th anniversary of the Clean Water Act, environmental organizations warn that lax enforcement is still permitting dangerous discharges of water pollutants. The groups blame the Bush administration for weakening key regulations designed to protect and clean up the nation's waters, calling the administration's record the worst for clean water in the past three decades. Almost half of U.S. waterways are too polluted for swimming or fishing. (Photo courtesy U.S. Forest Service) Around the nation today, Bush administration officials and water experts will be talking about the accomplishments of the Clean Water Act, as well as the challenges that still lie ahead. "Most Americans would agree that the quality of our water has improved dramatically over the past quarter century, although there is still much to be done," said U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Christie Whitman. "We are not only celebrating but re-committing to the Clean Water Act's goals of fishable and swimmable waters." Read more...

Letter to the editor
Spare 'Glades homes
Congressman Peter Deutsch eloquently described the beauty and importance of the Everglades (Congress must restart Everglades restoration, Oct. 8 Other views column). [See below.] Unfortunately, his letter wrongly suggests that restoration cannot proceed unless part of a community known as the 8 ½ Square Mile Area is condemned by the federal government. While certain interest groups may prefer to convert a low-income neighborhood into partially submerged land, doing so is in no way required for restoration. Congress in 1989 directed the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to safeguard this unique community during restoration. By the Corps recently decided to implement the self-styled "compromise alternative 6 D" that would condemn homes and flood land there. 
Copyright  © 2002  Miami Herald  All rights reserved.

Commission to vote on Immokalee area growth plan Tuesday
A landmark plan to control growth across some of Collier County's most remote stretches gained new support Thursday. The Conservancy of Southwest Florida signed on to the plan after a morning of negotiations with growth management attorneys for Collier County — hours before the county's Planning Commission voted unanimously to recommend approval of the plan to county commissioners. A County Commission vote is set for Tuesday. "I believe we have all the interest groups singing from the same hymnal," attorney Nancy Linnan, one of the county's growth management consultants, told Planning Commission members. "This is a very carefully crafted and delicate agreement with everyone." The county is working toward a Nov. 1 deadline. The plan also requires approval from the state Department of Community Affairs, or DCA, the state's growth management oversight agency.      
Copyright  © 2002  Naples News  All rights reserved.

Editorial: To protect state citrus, keep Bronson in office
Not many Floridians recognize the scope of responsibility assigned to the state's agriculture commissioner. Besides the obvious demands of overseeing what the job title implies, the commissioner's office regulates moving companies and travel agencies, certifies weights and measures, validates gas pumps, licenses pawnshops, fights wildfires, and investigates charity and telemarketing scams. Most recently and most notably, the commissioner has had to deal with the citrus canker outbreak and the mosquito-borne spread of the West Nile virus. This is not a position for entry-level candidates. The job requires broad experience and understanding of issues that often come fraught with complications. Incumbent Republican Charles Bronson has an overwhelming advantage in both requirements over an inexperienced and unproven challenger, Democrat David Nelson, and The Post recommends returning him to the office.
Copyright  © 2002  Palm Beach Post  All rights reserved.

Sugar growers begin harvest
After being delayed since Monday by rain, Florida's sugar cane harvest, the nation's largest, began Thursday in Palm Beach and Hendry counties. That rain, plus balmy temperatures and the summer rains before it, are expected to help growers produce more sugar than last season -- a whopping 2 million tons of the sweet stuff. Last year, a prolonged drought held the crop back to 1.98 million tons. The sugar, as well as molasses and other byproducts, were valued at $800 million, the U.S. Department of Agriculture said. As soon as the morning dew evaporated Thursday, the first fields were burned to remove debris, creating a spectacular controlled fire with billowing clouds of smoke. Each year the cane is burned to rid the stalks of leafy undergrowth and speed up processing. As the fires began, mechanical harvesters were moved into the fields in western Palm Beach County near South Bay, where the cane was cut and loaded into wagons to begin its journey to the sugar mills. 
Copyright  © 2002  Palm Beach Post  All rights reserved.

A Plea For Help
"Some 200,000 acres are now targeted for removing the people to restore the Everglades." Henry Lamb, executive vice president of the Environmental Conservation Organization  "Our residents and farmers are being flooded and forced from    their properties by federal agencies. So far there have been    fourteen flood-related deaths and more than $1 billion in  flood-related losses."  - Madeleine Fortin, president, East Everglades Legal Defense Foundation The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is accelerating these problems by attempting to circumvent a direct congressional directive and expand its project authorization by language placed in the House version of the current Department of the Interior appropriations bill. This bill could be voted on as early as the week of July 8th. Thousands of citizens in south Florida will be devastated if this language is not removed from the appropriations bill.  Read more...
Copyright  © 2002  Paragon Power House  All rights reserved.

                Related Links,

                Trouble Brewing In Florida's Swamps

                Transforming America

Palm Beach tops neighbors for sprawl
Broward and Miami-Dade counties have been surpassed by Palm Beach County in urban sprawl, according to a three-year study on sprawl released Thursday by a national environmental and affordable housing advocacy group. While Palm Beach County's slow-growth advocates have warned for years of "Browardization," the study says Palm Beach County is one of the nation's most sprawling areas, more spread out than any other area in Florida. While Broward County was 55th on the list and Miami-Dade County was 75th, Palm Beach County ranked sixth on the list of 83 large metro communities, according to professors Reid Ewing of Rutgers University and Rolf Pendall of Cornell University, who wrote The Smart Growth America report. 
Copyright  © 2002  Sun-Sentinel  All rights reserved.

Measuring Sprawl and Its Impact
Much as Justice Potter Stewart said of pornography, most people would be hard pressed to define urban sprawl, but they know it when they see it. Increasingly, however, that is not good enough. As more and more metropolitan areas debate the costs and consequences of poorly managed expansion there is an increasing need to be clear about the terms of the discussion. Politicians and planners aiming to contain sprawl also must have an agreed-upon way to define and measure it in order to track their progress. Beyond that, it is important for policy makers to be able to demonstrate how, and to what degree, sprawl has real implications for real people. The study underlying this report, the product of three years of research by Reid Ewing of Rutgers University and Rolf Pendall of Cornell University, represents the most comprehensive effort yet undertaken to define, measure and evaluate metropolitan sprawl and its impacts.  Read more...
Copyright  © 2002  Smart Growth America  All rights reserved.

17-October-02

East Bonita property owners to attend Sawgrass Rebellion rally
When property rights advocates converge in Golden Gate Estates on Friday for the Sawgrass Rebellion rally, some angry East Bonita Springs property owners will be there to help lead the charge. The Rebellion is largely the result of property rights issues in Collier County, but some Lee County residents in East Bonita say they feel compelled to attend. They want to speak out against what they see as a trend that gives government too much say in how people are allowed use their land. The East Bonita buyout is a project of the South Florida Water Management District and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Landowners are being forced to sell so that 4,600 acres can be restored to its natural state. Affected property owners call it a mitigation program in disguise. "They say it's to prevent flooding and it's not. They say it's to protect the panther and it isn't," said Byron Liles, who owns 12½ acres in the buyout area.    
Copyright  © 2002  Naples News  All rights reserved.

Hardee May Be Stuck With Mine Clay
Hillsborough County commissioners voted unanimously Wednesday to oppose efforts to pipe the clay slurry byproduct of phosphate mining from Hardee County to Hillsborough. Staff members recommended consulting with the Florida Department of Environmental Protection. But commissioners said they wanted to telegraph a clear position to Hardee commissioners who are to discuss the issue at a meeting today in Wauchula. ``In our hearts we know if DEP says yes, we're going to be mad,'' said Commissioner Ronda Storms, who worried that mined-out land in her eastern Hillsborough district would be the target dumping ground. ``The answer is no.'' Lex Albritton, Hardee County manager, said Wednesday he still will invite Hillsborough representatives to a workshop on the issue planned for Oct. 25 in Wauchula. Land-use regulations generally require the clay muck left over from phosphate mining to be stored in the county it came from.   
Copyright  © 2002  Tampa Tribune  All rights reserved.

Editorial: New threat to manatees
At first, a preliminary report from state biologists recommending that the manatee's status be upgraded from "endangered" to "threatened" sounds like good news, and in some ways it is. Manatee populations have increased over the past 30 years. While the sea cows face some loss of habitat, such as the decline of Florida's natural springs and disappearing sea grasses, warm- water releases from power plants allow them to thrive where they couldn't survive before. But other issues remain, notably the rules by which the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission is deciding the status of the manatee, the red-cockaded woodpecker and other species that have been considered endangered. In 1999, the commission adopted a new, stricter definition that makes it much more difficult for the state to list species as endangered and thus deserving of the toughest protection rules the state can set. 
Copyright  © 2002  Palm Beach Post  All rights reserved.

Rural Collier growth rules coming together ahead of Nov. 1 deadline
Writers of new rules for growth in rural Collier County are running through draft after draft as they work to gain support for the new plan this week. The county's Environmental Advisory Council got into the act Wednesday with a unanimous vote of lukewarm support for the plan — contingent on a list of recommended revisions. "We think this is not a perfect document, but we think there have been improvements," said EAC member Alexandra Santoro. The plan is the county's answer to a 1999 order from Gov. Jeb Bush and the Cabinet to do a better job of protecting the environment. The order came after Collier County lost a legal challenge to part of its growth plan. The county's Planning Commission meets today starting at 8:30 a.m. at the Collier County government center to wade through the plan, which would apply to almost 200,000 acres around Immokalee.    
Copyright  © 2002  Naples News  All rights reserved.

Sawgrass Rebellion protesters arrive in state capital
Property rights advocates brought their "Bucket Brigade" to the state capitol Wednesday, the latest stop in a cross-country protest that travels to Naples today or Friday. Two weeks after leaving their homes in Klamath Falls, Ore, road-weary members of the Sawgrass Rebellion brought their message and symbols to Tallahassee to protest state and federal efforts to restore portions of the Florida Everglades by flooding lands now containing homes or used for agriculture. They were joined by an Ohio farmer who likewise traveled a great distance to make the point: that state and federal environmental programs, including the restoration of the Everglades, are tearing hardworking people from their land with little if any environmental benefit. The convoy is coming to South Florida at the behest of local property rights groups angered by restrictions placed on their lands by a host of environmental programs ranging from the Endangered Species Act to Everglades Restoration.  Read More...
Copyright  © 2002  Naples News  All rights reserved.

Group also opposes East Bonita project
The Sawgrass Rebellion has a problem with government projects that force people to give up their land. When the rebellion caravan pulls into town Friday, it is expected to bring hundreds, maybe thousands, of supporters with it to protest not only the Southern Golden Gate Estates project in Collier County, but others in the area as well. A project in East Bonita is folded into the mix along with a land use plan in Collier County’s rural fringe and another Everglades restoration project west of Miami. The East Bonita project, called the Southern CREW (Corkscrew Regional Ecosystem Watershed) Project, is a 4,670-acre area east of Bonita Grande Drive and north of Bonita Beach Road that water managers want to return to nature to act as a water recharge area and to help alleviate flooding along the Imperial River. The district received state permission to condemn property in June 2000. 
Copyright  © 2002  News Press  All rights reserved.

Restoration protest comes to Collier County
Everglades restoration is coming at a cost beyond the usual $7.8 billion tally — private homes, land and businesses — including property in Southwest Florida. One plan, called the Southern Golden Gate Estates Hydrologic Restoration, aims to restore historic water flows over a 94-square-mile subdivision in Collier County. The project is essential to the health of the surrounding environment and water supplies in southern Florida, government officials say. Many people have sold their land willingly. Some felt they had been bamboozled when they bought the properties with the “swamp land in Florida” ripoff. Others love their homes on the edge of the Everglades and refuse to budge. To many of them, Everglades restoration is the ripoff. Still others living north of the project say their land will be affected, too. 
Copyright  © 2002  News Press  All rights reserved.

Chesapeake Bay's Health Not Improving

Promises by state governments and federal agencies to clean up the Chesapeake Bay have made virtually no impact in the past five years, according to an annual report from the Chesapeake Bay Foundation. The nation's largest estuary rates a 27 out of 100 on the environmental group's health index for 2002, unchanged from last year and a long way from the organization's goal of reaching 40 by 2010. The benchmark of 100 reflects the Chesapeake as described in the early 1600s, when clean water revealed meadows of underwater grasses, vast oyster reefs and abundant fish. The Chesapeake Bay has lost most of its sea grass beds (Photo courtesy U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service) "The improvements in the Bay have stalled," said Chesapeake Bay Foundation (CBF) senior scientist and assistant director Kim Coble. "There is a good effort but we need to see some changes in practices and in commitment from leadership in order to get it moving." 
Copyright  © 2002  Environment News Service (ENS) 2002. All Rights Reserved. 

SFWMD must approve lake plan
The latest update on the Lake Okeechobee Surface Water Improvement and Management (SWIM) Plan will go to the governing board of the South Florida Water Management District for final approval in the next couple of months. Final public meetings to solicit comments are being held. On Oct. 16 the meeting was held in the district's Service Center auditorium. The original SWIM Act was adopted by the Florida Legislature in 1987 and required the state's five water management districts to prepare individual SWIM plans for priority bodies of water, including Lake Okeechobee. The district is required to describe strategies and potential programs for restoring or protecting the water body to Class III standards or better for recreation, propagation and maintenance of healthy, well-balanced populations of fish and wildlife. 
Copyright  © 2002  Newszap All rights reserved.

16-October-02

California Farmers to Give Up Some Water
Southern California water agencies reached a tentative agreement Wednesday to shift millions of gallons of Colorado River water used by desert farmers to fast-growing urban San Diego. The plan is a key step in an overall effort to reduce California's over-reliance on the Colorado River. The state has been under an end-of-the-year federal deadline to create a plan showing how it will cut its use of river water. The government has threatened to cut California's water allotment severely if the state fails to meet the deadline.  Under the agreement, reached after four days of marathon negotiations, farmers in California's Imperial Valley will use about 2 percent less water from the river each year and instead allow the 3 million people living in San Diego to use it. The shift should also help the Metropolitan Water District, which serves 17 million other Southern California water users. The utility will not have to send as much water to San Diego and can draw less from the Colorado River. 
Copyright  © 2002  NY Times, AP online  All rights reserved.

                Related Links,

                U.S. Interior Department

                Imperial Irrigation District

Lebanon Taps River at the Center of Israel Row
Lebanon started pumping water Wednesday from a southern river that also supplies Israel -- a project that has drawn Israeli ire and U.S. mediation to avoid a regional flare-up. Israel has said it takes a "grave view'' of the project to pipe water from the Wazzani river to parched southern villages. But Lebanese guerrilla group Hizbollah has warned it would retaliate "within seconds'' to any Israeli attack on the new pumping station. Amid tight security, Lebanese President Emile Lahoud officially opened the project on the Wazzani, a tributary of the Hasbani river that feeds the Jordan river and the Sea of Galilee -- Israel's biggest freshwater reservoir.  Lebanese security forces stood guard as Lahoud sent water gushing through the pipe at the center of the row, which has prompted Washington to dispatch envoys to cool tensions and drawn U.S. calls for Lebanon not to begin pumping.  
Copyright  © 2002  NY Times, AP online  All rights reserved.

The Nature of Things
Needs of Wildlife Are Routinely Neglected in State Road Projects
As Florida officials continue looking at wild lands to protect from the daily onslaught of bulldozers, new research gives more support to the idea that there's a good argument to expand wild tracts so they can be connected. It is a concept called wildlife corridors. In its simplest form, it means a path between natural areas, often following logical routes such as rivers. Corridors allow wildlife to move through the landscape to hunt, to find mates and to maintain genetic diversity. The idea has been around for decades. I attended a conference at the University of Florida in the 1980s, but the science was still emerging. That is, although the value of wildlife corridors seemed self-evident, some scientists acknowledged they would have been hardpressed to prove the benefits of corridors if it came to a showdown. 
Copyright  © 2002  The Ledger All rights reserved.

Water quality proposals ranked
The St. Lucie River Issue Team sent the list, with a Port St. Lucie project at No. 1, to state legislators.
In an effort to bring up to $23 million in water quality improvement efforts to the Treasure Coast, members of the St. Lucie River Issue Team sent a final ranking of projects to state legislators Tuesday. The team, made up of 20 scientists, engineers and water quality experts, received $5 million from the state in June and hopes to receive at least $10 million this year during the state budgeting process.In total, the 17 government agencies submitted $11.5 million in projects, which must be matched by at least 50 percent by local sponsors. "If we can get enough funding to fund everyone who applied for an Issue Team grant this year, that'd be great," said John Mitnik, director of the state Department of Environmental Protection's Port St. Lucie office and co- chairman of the team.  
Copyright  © 2002  TCPalm All rights reserved.

River group lauds halt of Okeechobee discharges
Officials declined to say whether there will be any more water released from the lake this season.
River advocates rejoiced Tuesday as water managers announced an end to the discharges from Lake Okeechobee into the St. Lucie Estuary at least temporarily. Thanks to the near-misses by Kyle, Lili and Tropical Depression 14 all of which were once coming straight at Florida the wet forecasts on the Treasure Coast and in other areas of the state ended up dry enough to allow the lake's level to actually recede. With Lake Okeechobee at a stable level and a lack of water flowing south from the Kissimmee Valley, water managers agreed in a conference call Tuesday to stop all discharges just one day after the latest pulse release ended. "We made our decision for a ... pulse release on the information we had 10 days ago, and it dried out over the last 10 days," said Chris Smith, the chief of the Army Corps of Engineers' water management division in Jacksonville.    
Copyright  © 2002  TCPalm All rights reserved.

The Buffer Zone
Town considers guidelines for communities bordering preserve lands.
It's been said that good fences make good neighbors. More than a dozen concerned residents and members of area environmental groups Monday hoped to convince consultants for the Town of Jupiter that good buffers can also make good neighbors. With the Nov. 5 Town Council decision on the Jupiter Isles development quickly approaching, the town has hired Sarasota-based environmental consultants RMPK Group to gather data on the possible effects of residential developments located next to natural areas. The consultants will also help establish guidelines for buffer zones between communities and preserve lands. John Sickler, Jupiter's director of Planning and Zoning, said consultants met Monday and Tuesday with interested residents, environmental groups and stakeholders with the proposed Jupiter Isles and WCI Parcel 19 projects.   
Copyright  © 2002  TCPalm All rights reserved.

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                The RMPK Group, Inc.

Shore Subject
Treasure Island residents are battling city officials to keep their quirky beach community from turning into a canyon of high-rise hotels.
The future of Treasure Island was up against the clock and the ladies of Jazzercise on Sept. 19.Four months earlier, the Pinellas County city's commission had asked its municipal zoning board to review proposed regulations that will likely replace the funky bars and sandy roadhouses along Gulf Boulevard with glitzy high-rise hotels.  At the rear of a city hall auditorium where the zoning board was meeting, beneath a clock ticking precariously close to 6 p.m., Jazzercisers had gathered.  Nearby was perched a Jurassic boom box so massive that a turn of the volume past five might threaten the city noise ordinance. The platoon of women, resplendent in flowered tops and stretch pants, aimed disapproving glances toward zoning board Chairwoman Roseanne Petit. 
Copyright  © 2002  The Weekly Planet  All rights reserved.

                Related Article,

                November 13, 2002
                Orbitals: Fighting Over Treasure

Police: Arcadia Fish Hatchery Owner Killed 4,000 Endangered Birds
The owner of a DeSoto County fish hatchery has been charged with killing 4,000 endangered or protected birds and an alligator, police said. Fish and wildlife officials arrested Vicky Davidson, 40, of Arcadia, on Tuesday after a six-month, state and federal wildlife investigation into multiple killings at Davidson's fish hatchery. Davidson faces at least six violations of Florida law and the federal migratory bird act, said Gary Morse, a Florida Fish and Wildlife spokesman. The charges range from a third-degree felony to a second-degree misdemeanor. Wildlife officials said Davidson purchased 25,000 shotgun shells and told her employees to shoot at anything that posed a threat to her fish. Wood storks, black-neck stilts, cattle egrets, eastern meadowlarks, herons and at least one alligator were killed over 11 months, Morse said. DeSoto County Jail released Davidson Tuesday night after she posted $4,500 bail. 
Copyright  © 2002  Tampa Tribune / Associated Press  All rights reserved.

15-October-02

Invasive Species Overrun U.S. Wildlife Refuges


Purple loosestrife, is crowding 
out native plants from about 
400,000 acres of federal 
wetlands, marshes and meadows. 
(Photo courtesy King County 
Department of Natural Resources 
and Parks)

Invasive species are wreaking havoc on wildlife refuges across the country, warns a new report released in conjunction with National Wildlife Refuge week. Members of Congress joined the report's sponsors at the National Wildlife Refuge Association in calling for new efforts to stem the flow of nonnative species into U.S. ecosystems. Invasive species - foreign insects, plants and animals that wreak havoc on native ecosystems - cause more than $100 billion damage each year.  Invasive plants alone have invaded more than 100 million acres of land nationwide, and almost eight million of those acres are in wildlife refuges, areas created to protect the most important examples of biological diversity across the country.  "America's wildlife is under siege by a relentless force that respects neither geographic nor political boundaries," said Evan Hirsche, president of the National Wildlife Refuge Association (NWRA). 
Copyright  © 2002  Environment News Service (ENS)  All Rights Reserved.

Laser plane to map out ocean floor
The ocean floor from Tequesta to Boca Raton is about to be zapped by a laser beam emitted from a low-flying aircraft. Starting Saturday, the turboprop-powered plane will make flights from 11 p.m. to 6 a.m., when skies are free of other airplanes -- and most residents are sleeping. "It's going to look mighty suspicious with this plane going back and forth, back and forth, in the middle of the night," said Rick Spadoni, senior vice president with Coastal Planning & Engineering, a Boca Raton company working on the project. It's not a scene from science fiction or a secret test of a new military weapon. The plane, which will fly 1,600 feet above the water, is quiet compared with corporate jets, Spadoni said. The purpose of the month long operation is to create a map of the sea bottom's contours, positions of fragile reefs and shifting movements of underwater sand.    
Copyright  © 2002  Palm Beach Post  All rights reserved.

Florida Land-Use Map A `Blueprint For Sprawl'
The map lays out the most extreme scenario. What would happen if each city and county in Florida followed its own land- use plan, developing them to their maximum capacity? Wall-to-wall, 86 million people would crowd onto the peninsula. A swath of Central Florida from coast to coast and up and down both sides would meld into an H-shaped megalopolis rivaling the Washington, D.C./Boston/Philadelphia corridor. Wildlife would be trapped inside shrinking habitats ringed by subdivisions, malls and highways. Migration would follow a zig-zag path through the urban maze. Shorelines would shrink. Finally paradise would be paved. Can't happen? Well certainly not by 2010, the map's projection date. And though the map is 8 years old, it is unique. It was the first attempt to visualize Florida's future after lawmakers mandated the creation of land- use plans. Nothing like it has been attempted since.   
Copyright  © 2002  Tampa Tribune  All rights reserved.

Estero Bay environmental group still debating if marine lab needed
An environmental group that watches over developments within the Estero Bay watershed is still not quite sure what to think of a local university's plans to build a marine lab along the Bonita Beach Causeway.The Estero Bay Agency on Bay Management voted Monday to send Florida Gulf Coast University's marine lab proposal back to a review committee. Members will take another look at the marine lab in November. At stake is whether the group supports the marine lab and the siting selection process used to narrow down potential locations. FGCU has trimmed the list of possible sites down to a barrier island just north of the Lover's Key/Carl E. Johnson State Recreation Area boat ramp and a location within the Estero Bay Buffer Preserve west of Estero Bay. University officials are leaning toward the barrier island site. Some members said the man-made causeway could provide an ideal location for studying local marine systems.     
Copyright  © 2002  Bonita Daily News All rights reserved.

FGCU fielding offers for lab’s site: Black Island proposal for marine studies brought criticism
Florida Gulf Coast University may have more location options for its marine lab.
In the wake of criticism surrounding the current Black Island proposal, offers have been streaming in, said Win Everham, FGCU chairman of ecological studies, when presenting the school’s plans to an Estero Bay watchdog group Monday. But, Everham said at this point he could not disclose which properties were offered. The Estero Bay Agency on Bay Management, often called the ABM, asked a subcommittee to get more information before issuing an endorsement of a site. “We’re talking in circles because we don’t know what the university wants,” said ABM member and Bonita Springs resident Meg Hutchins. Some members wanted to see a site plan first. “To develop a site plan takes time, energy and money,” Everham said. “We’re not going to develop a site plan for something that might not happen."    
Copyright  © 2002  News-Press  All rights reserved.

Earth Science Week Marks a Watershed Event
There are more than a few drops of truth in the ancient mariner's lament: "Water, water everywhere, nor any drop to drink." Water covers three-quarters of Earth's surface but almost all is in the oceans. Most fresh water is locked within glaciers and ice caps, leaving the humans of this planet with just 1 percent for their own use. You'd think we would eagerly protect that precious 1 percent, but in the United States, at least, the record of environmental stewardship was pretty dismal for a while, particularly in the 1950s and '60s when stories of rivers catching fire and populations of dead fish washing ashore were often front-page news. In 1972, after years of pressure from conservation groups like the Izaak Walton League, Congress passed the Clean Water Act.  To honor the 30-year anniversary of that legislation, Congress declared 2002 the Year of Clean Water.    
Copyright  © 2002  Washington Post  All rights reserved.

EDITORIAL:  Even the public interest is for sale
Florida Gulf Coast University has an opportunity to expand. They are poised to receive 100 acres of contiguous land to the east of the University along with a healthy donation of nearly ten million dollars. Only to accept this "donation" would be acknowledging that they are being used as nothing more than a pawn for development profits. When FGCU started out, they were touted as the "environmental" friendly University. This was partly due to the difficulty encountered during the planning of the new University and the manner in which they overcame the many environmental hurdles. Lee County was one of the last places on the list of sites proposed for this campus, but even with environmental concerns, a low ranked site became the new University.  Ever wonder how that happened?  It may have helped that an old time, well-connected Florida family owned the site and the surrounding land for miles.    
Copyright  © 2002  Golden Gate Gazette All rights reserved.

Judge wants specifics in lawsuit over permit challenges
Environmental groups will seek specific examples of how a new law makes it harder for them to fight development permits as part of a challenge to the law's constitutionality. Several environmental and community groups sued in August to block a law signed in May that allows the state to buy land for Everglades restoration, saying that a tacked-on provision on who can challenge permits will keep them from fighting development. Their lawsuit claims the two subjects - Everglades restoration and permits for developments outside the Everglades - are entirely different, violating a state constitutional ban on addressing completely separate subjects in the same law. In a hearing on the suit Tuesday, Judge Ralph L. Smith made it clear that the groups need to point to a specific problem rather than challenging the law based on a hypothetical situation.    
Copyright  © 2002  Miami Herald  All rights reserved.

Editorial: Our Wetlands Need Protection
Wetlands are vital to Floridians who are almost entirely dependent on groundwater for drinking water. Wetlands are deemed so important that Kenneth Terrien, 64, in Marion County, was recently fined $5,000 and sentenced to six months in jail for refusing to comply with a judge's order to restore his property to its original state. State Department of Environmental Protection officials say they gave Terrien several chances to remove fill material and restore the three acres of wetlands he filled in over a period of months. The last straw, apparently, was when he reportedly told officials that they could take him to jail, claimed he could do whatever he wanted with his property and said officials couldn't inspect the affected area. Once property owners understand the problem, they usually comply with DEP requests, said Angela Booker, who manages the DEP's Beach and Wetland Resources Department in Orlando. 
Copyright  © 2002  The Ledger All rights reserved.

Florida Panther's Great Leap Hits a Wall

More panthers live in South Florida 
now than at any time in decades, 
an estimated 70 to 100 adults and kitten. 
Copyright  © 2002 Tom and Pat Leeson/
Photo Researchers.  All rights reserved.    

The Big Cypress Swamp region of Southwest Florida is a vast, wet, mysterious land of biological exuberance and subtle beauty. It is, as well, the last redoubt of the Florida panther, the stealthy and powerful cat that roamed the southeastern United States until hunting and development isolated it here by the mid-20th century. When they were first listed as endangered in 1967, barely 30 panthers were left. Biologists undertook a crash program to prevent them from vanishing completely, and today there are more panthers in South Florida — 70 to 100 adults and kittens — than at any time in decades.  Now the Florida panther faces a different peril, a product of the recovery program's success. Wildlife scientists caution that the current number of panthers may be as many as South Florida can hold. Because at least 250 animals are needed for a self-sustaining population, the biologists say, new habitat must be found to support them. 
Copyright  © 2002  NY Times online  All rights reserved.

An Effort to Undo an Old Reservoir in Yosemite   
An old black and white photograph hangs behind the bar at the Evergreen Lodge, a rustic roadside establishment just outside this park. It shows wildflowers dancing in the thick grass. A river glides between a pair of imposing granite walls. To visitors here, the scene from 1914 looks instantly familiar. "People think it is Yosemite Valley," said Dan Braun, the lodge's proprietor. "But it is not. They have no idea that Hetch Hetchy looked like that, too." For most of the past century, the Hetch Hetchy Valley, 15 miles north of its more famous and bigger sibling within the park, has served as a 300-foot-deep bathtub holding melted snow from the High Sierra for people and businesses in San Francisco and its suburbs. Now a group of environmentalists wants to drain the eight-mile-long reservoir and restore the valley to what John Muir once described as a "grand landscape garden, one of nature's rarest and most precious mountain temples." 
Copyright  © 2002  NY Times, AP online  All rights reserved.

Ten-Mile Creek mounds remind us that indiginous people lived locally
Every now and then, the ghosts of our past rise up to remind us they were here first, and that we should not forget them. In the latest such incident, the past is delaying plans made by the South Florida Water Management District to build a pump station for the $20 million Ten-Mile Creek Water Preserve in St. Lucie County. Contractors preparing the ground, recently purchased from the Minton family, found four mounds, or middens, erected by the indigenous people of Florida. The middens indicate that the native people spent some time around the creek, long enough to amass a lot of garbage and debris at a minimum, or to bury their dead if they lived there for some time. There is uncertainty about what these mounds are, or if they are of any historical and archeological value. 
Copyright  © 2002  Stuart News -TC Palm  All rights reserved.

14-October-02

Trust in SFWMD, Corps is waning
(Third in a series on the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Project)
Less than two years after the $7.8 billion effort to restore the Everglades was signed into law, troubles and stumbling blocks are causing a large fracture in the seemingly solid wall of support for the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan (CERP). Even Congress did not include funding in the recent Water Bill they passed  It is something they include in the even numbered years. However, members of the U.S. Senate said last week the funding would be adopted in the new year. In the 20 months since the plan was signed, groups of scientists and some government officials have expressed doubts about the viability of the plan.   
Copyright  © 2002  Newszap All rights reserved.

                Related Articles,

                October 12, 2002
                Doubts raised that ‘Glades can be saved

                October 13, 2002
                Brain surgery not as complicated as CERP

Small Organic Farmers Pull Up Stakes  
A curious thing happened on the way to a national organic standard: the small farmer, once at the heart of the organic movement, got left behind. Talk to those who have farmed organically for years and you will find a surprising number who have decided not to call their produce organic any longer. The costs — administrative, monetary and philosophical — of using the government-defined label are too great. Only farms certified under the United States Department of Agriculture's regime can legally call their produce organic after Oct. 21. (Farms with annual revenues under $5,000 can forgo formal certification, though they are expected to follow the rules.) At local farmers' markets around the country, you'll find many farmers who say their vegetables are "grown without chemicals" or that their meat is "free of antibiotics," but many won't use the "O" word. Others are wondering if they will continue to. Why are these organic farmers opting out?    
Copyright  © 2002  NY Times, AP online  All rights reserved.

Retreat on Clean Air 
The Bush administration has taken another step backward in the fight against air pollution. Last week, it joined the automobile industry in a lawsuit charging that a California program encouraging manufacturers to sell cleaner, more fuel-efficient "hybrid" vehicles — cars powered by a combination of gasoline and electricity — usurped federal authority. The suit is a direct challenge to California's longstanding authority to set emission standards tougher than the federal government's. More broadly, it is further evidence of President Bush's unwillingness to offend his political allies by pushing the industry to develop cleaner cars and thus lessen urban smog and the dangers of global warming. At immediate issue is California's right to set its own emission standards. The Clean Air Act gave California this power partly because its pollution problems were uniquely severe.   
Copyright  © 2002  NY Times, AP online  All rights reserved.

Weston frontier comes to an end
Seventeen years after building its first house on the western edge of South Florida civilization, Arvida is poised to sell its last home and leave Weston, the sprawling city it created. With more than 15,000 Weston homes sold, Arvida is finishing one of the great success stories in the history of South Florida real estate, transforming 16 square miles of swamp and farmland into one of the country's largest planned developments and one of the most desirable suburban ZIP codes in South Florida. The average Weston home now sells for $271,000, 40 percent better than the Broward County average and 21 percent more than South Florida as a whole. The city has an international reputation as one of the most high-end locales beyond the South Florida waterfront, and it is famous -- and notorious -- for its tailored, tidy appearance.    
Copyright  © 2002  Miami Herald  All rights reserved.

An unnatural silence

[Times photo: Lara Cerri]
The new cement plant would release hundreds 
of tons of pollutants -- mercury, carbon 
monoxide and fine particulates, among others 
-- that local residents fear will settle into the 
springs.

As Gov. Jeb Bush and challenger Bill McBride sparover protecting Florida's environment, on the campaign trail they steer clear of one touchy subject. Neither candidate mentions the cement plant under construction on State Road 27 in Suwannee County, a gray behemoth rising above the trees 3 miles from the popular Ichetucknee Springs State Park. The cement plant represents perhaps Bush's most controversial environmental decision during his first term. But McBride hasn't made it an issue in the governor's race. The law firm he led for a decade, Holland & Knight, represented the cement plant's owners. Despite being fined for a series of environmental violations during construction, the cement plant's owners plan to fire it up about a month after the Nov. 5 election. 
Copyright  © 2002  St. Petersburg Times  All rights reserved.

Debris and pollution threaten pristine springs
For 20 years, Carla Roberts has come to the spring at the headwaters of the Wacissa River in Jefferson County to relax, swim and just watch the crystal blue waters bubble mysteriously from the river bottom. These days, the spring is still clear and bubbling, but Roberts has noticed some changes. Roberts says algae and weeds have clogged much of the river around the spring, and the water level at its shore has fallen at least 10 feet in the past two decades. "This is just devastating to me," Roberts, 52, said as she waded in the Wacissa spring recently. "The spring is getting clogged up with trash, and the weeds are terrible." In part, Roberts is right. Litter is increasingly marring the pristine beauty of Florida's springs and can clog the mouths of the springs. That can lead to a restricted water flow and a less healthy condition for the springs, which are not only natural wonders but tourist attractions that generate millions of dollars of income each year.    
Copyright  © 2002  Sun-Sentinel  All rights reserved.

Climate Research Looks To Land Use
Coal-burning energy plants and gas-guzzling automobiles aren't the only culprits in causing global climate changes. Land-use changes - urban sprawl, cutting down or replanting forests, and farm irrigation practices - might be just as responsible, according to a study paid for by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. ``It's a shared responsibility,'' said Roger Pielke Sr., atmospheric scientist at Colorado State University, who co-authored the study. It was published by The Royal Society, the United Kingdom's National Academy of Science. The study offers a formula to measure heat redistribution to determine the effect of greenhouse gases and land-use changes on climate. It's a tool local governments or states can adopt when planning for growth, Pielke said. Knowledge about human-related causes for climate changes has been around awhile, Pielke said. "We're just building progressively stronger evidence,'' he said.   
Copyright  © 2002  Tampa Tribune  All rights reserved.

                Related Links,

                Governor's Office
                Task Forces and Commissions
                2020 Energy Study Commission

            Assessment of the Consequences of Climate Change on the South Florida Environment

Rivals' environmental records spotty
It could make a perfect attack ad against Gov. Jeb Bush: In 1999, the governor's administration flip-flopped and allowed a soot-spewing cement plant near one of Florida's most pristine rivers. One problem, though: Bush's Democratic challenger, Bill McBride, ran the law firm that lobbied for the plant. Environmentalists also denounce Bush for signing a law that protects developers from legal challenges. But McBride's old firm supported the law, too. And Democrats assail Bush's support for a stymied proposal to pump untreated runoff into Florida's aquifers. McBride calls it a "dumb idea." But McBride's running mate, state Sen. Tom Rossin, voted for it. Toss in a lack of detailed environmental proposals from McBride's school-centric campaign, and you have a race with a lot of gray amid the green. Corporate lawyer McBride and ex-developer Bush both say they love the Everglades and Lake Okeechobee. 
Copyright  © 2002  Palm Beach Post  All rights reserved.

13-October-02 

Brain surgery not as complicated as CERP
(Second in a series on the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Project)
Less than two years after the $7.8 billion effort to restore the Everglades was signed into law, troubles and stumbling blocks are causing a large fracture in the seemingly solid wall of support for the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan. In the 20 months since the plan was signed, groups of scientists and some government officials have expressed doubts about the viability of the plan. The plan is riddled with inconsistencies and the ecological benefits seem to be taking a back seat to other features such as water supply for the over-developed Gold Coast, and flood control for the 16 counties that comprise the South Florida Water Management District (SFWMD). Destruction might be too strong a word for what has occurred with the Everglades in the last 80 years, but it surely is crippled. 
Copyright  © 2002  Newszap All rights reserved.

                Related Articles,

                October 12, 2002
                Doubts raised that ‘Glades can be saved

                October 14, 2002
                Trust in SFWMD, Corps is waning

Editorial: Make rules, not promises
Florida's environmental groups sometimes disagree, but they are united in believing that the rules for Everglades restoration must be tightened to assure that the priority remains the Everglades, rather than development or agriculture. The Everglades Coalition, which includes more than 40 groups, joined last week with U.S. Sen. Bob Graham, D-Fla., to make that point. Sen. Graham, along with Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., and three other senators have asked the Army Corps of Engineers to close the loopholes in the rules. But Florida Department of Environmental Protection Secretary David Struhs continues to insist, on behalf of Gov. Bush, that the rules are adequate. He's wrong, and they're right. The corps, which will build the reservoirs, underground water storage wells and other projects that are part of the $8.4 billion federal-state plan, has made the rules too vague.   
Copyright  © 2002  Palm Beach Post  All rights reserved.

Editorial: Election 2002 — green tax
It always happens. Development pops up when and where the public and government officials least expect it — a restaurant in the middle of Barefoot Beach Preserve? — and there is a mad scramble for the money to save the property from being a casualty of growth. Seldom is there money locally, or at least without a special referendum, and we scrounge for state and federal grants. Usually unsuccessful, we vow to plan ahead so this never happens again. Yet, it does. Yet, it doesn't have to. Now, at last, someone has planned ahead. Environmental and business organizations have come up with a plan to raise a modest pool of money — not large enough so there's money to burn, but large enough to make a difference — to buy green space, then open it and manage it for public access and enjoyment. There is plenty to like: There would be no duplication. 
Copyright  © 2002  Naples News  All rights reserved.

Editorial: Developer deal wrong for FGCU
News flash: There is no pristine land in Lee County. It’s all been dredged, filled, ditched, drained, diked, farmed, mined, developed or invaded by exotic plant species. Therefore, we might as well develop every inch of it. We’d actually be improving the land. That’s the conclusion if you follow the thinking of Florida Gulf Coast University President William Merwin, the university’s board of trustees and the Ginn Co., which wants to develop 1,400 homes and 72 holes of golf on 5,400 acres adjacent to the university at triple the level of recommended development density for the land. The land is designated in the Lee County Comprehensive Plan for density reduction and groundwater resources. In return, the university would get 100 acres of land for future institutional development, million of dollars for an engineering school and be able to swap 215 acres with the company for land that would be adjacent to the existing university. 
Copyright  © 2002  News Press  All rights reserved.

12-October-02 

Doubts raised that ‘Glades can be saved
(First in a series on the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Project)
It was an uneasy alliance to say the least. Less than two years after the $7.8 billion effort to restore the Everglades was signed into law, troubles and stumbling blocks are causing a large fracture in the seemingly solid wall of support the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan. It was revealed after the plan was signed on Dec. 11, 2000, that many of the projects contained in the plan were merely ideas that had no basis in reality. That caused the first group of scientists and some government officials to express doubts about the viability of the plan. The plan is riddled with inconsistencies and the ecological benefits seem to be taking a back seat to other features such as water supply for the over-developed Gold Coast and flood control for the 16 counties that comprise the South Florida Water Management District (SFWMD).   
Copyright  © 2002  Newszap All rights reserved.

                Related Articles,

                October 13, 2002
                Brain surgery not as complicated as CERP

                October 14, 2002
                Trust in SFWMD, Corps is waning

Letter: 8 ½-Square-Mile Area protected by 1989 law
I am dismayed at the misconstrued facts in Rep. Peter Deutsch's Oct. 8 Other views column, Congress must restart Everglades restoration. Deutsch relates a tale of concern for Everglades restoration and the need to authorize the Army Corps of Engineers to condemn some 100 homes and more than 750 properties in the 8 ½-Square-Mile Area as the cornerstone of restoration. The late congressman Dante Fascell initiated Everglades restoration through passage of Public Law 101-229 in 1989. It stated that 107,000 acres of land was to be given to the Everglades for expansion and gave protection to the 8 ½-Square-Mile Area by providing flood protection to mitigate adverse conditions due to increased water flows that restoration would bring. A U.S. magistrate and federal judge recently ruled that the law afforded protection through flood-control systems to the area, not condemnation. 
Copyright  © 2002  Miami Herald  All rights reserved.

Pottery find delays Everglades project
The discovery of ancient pottery on land designated for water storage and treatment has put a kink in one of the first projects of the Everglades restoration plan, water managers said this week. Construction of a 550-acre reservoir and 110-acre storm-water treatment area at Ten Mile Creek was set to begin this month. But in a report dated Sept. 30, archaeologists hired by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' Jacksonville district said they had found four sites containing ancient ceramic scatterings. Only one site, however, is within the boundaries of the $30 million Ten Mile Creek project, which is in central St. Lucie County, about 7 miles southwest of Fort Pierce. Archaeologists from New South Associates Inc., a Georgia firm, will keep digging for a month or two to collect more information, said Denise Arrieta, project manager for the South Florida Water Management District, which is working with the corps on the project.
Copyright  © 2002  Palm Beach Post  All rights reserved.

Growth woes strangling county
Randy Dugan's commute takes him on a daily tour along Palm Beach County's most congested stretch of road. Dugan, who works at Oaks Florist across from Florida Atlantic University, says traffic along the section of Glades Road from Interstate 95 and Florida Atlantic University often stalls him for 20 minutes. And with Palm Beach County's population projected to increase by 60 percent during the next three decades, there's little reason to be optimistic. "I think it's going to get a lot worse," Dugan said. County traffic planners say they'll have to find new ways to manage that growth as the county's open space fills up. Palm Beach County -- excluding the Everglades -- has space for only 1.55 million people, according to county planners. But by 2030, the county's population is expected to grow by 60 percent to 1.86 million, according to the University of Florida's Bureau of Economic and Business Research. 
Copyright  © 2002  Sun-Sentinel  All rights reserved.

Federal funding for Southern GG Estates flood control project faces delay
A piece of Everglades restoration in Collier County's back yard likely will have to wait until next year to get federal funding, project backers said this week. That's because the Water Resources Development Act of 2002 has stalled in Congress after getting caught up in a larger debate over environmental reform of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the federal partner for the restoration. Now, a push to get restoration money authorized through some other bill also has faltered because of continuing uncertainty about how best to keep the local restoration project from making flooding worse beyond its borders. The project would return natural water flows to an abandoned subdivision called Southern Golden Gate Estates, south of Interstate 75 and east of Collier Boulevard. While some environmental advocates say it is more important to get the restoration right, others say delays mean risking a loss of public support for Everglades restoration. 
Copyright  © 2002  Naples News  All rights reserved.

11-October-02 

Saving sea grass: Getting ready for the regatta
It takes only a slow drift on a sunny day across the shallows called The Featherbeds to see why they're so vital to Biscayne Bay -- and so vulnerable. Snapper dart above sea grass and sponges. Small sharks and stingrays stir mud clouds as they scour for food in water so skinny their fins sometimes flutter above the surface. Below them are the white and barren trenches, crisscrossing underwater like roads on a map. They're scars cut by boats going where they shouldn't, into water that may be less than a foot deep at low tide. With hundreds of boaters hitting the bay for a weekend of partying built around the Columbus Day Regatta, Biscayne National Park is posting the marine equivalent of ''Keep Off The Grass'' signs. In addition to beefing up patrols, park crews for the first time are surrounding The Featherbeds with several dozen orange and white buoys, all marked "Hazard." 
Copyright  © 2002  Miami Herald  All rights reserved.

The Wadden Sea designated as Particularly Sensitive Sea Area (PSSA)
The Marine Environment Protection Committee (MEPC) of the International Maritime Organization (IMO), which is the UN organization responsible for the world-wide regulation of shipping, has, at its meeting in London, 7-11 October 2002, agreed to designate major parts of the Dutch, German and Danish Wadden Sea as a Particularly Sensitive Sea Area (PSSA).

Last year, the three countries agreed at the Wadden Sea ministers conference in Esbjerg in Denmark to apply for a designation of the Wadden Sea as a PSSA to the IMO. This application has now been honoured by the IMO. The area designated as a PSSA is basically the marine area of the Wadden Sea Conservation Area, being the Wadden Sea national parks in Germany and the Wadden Sea nature protection areas in Denmark and the Netherlands (see map). The PSSA covers an area of approximately 15,000 km².  Read more . . . 
Copyright  © 2002  Common Wadden Sea Secretariat All rights reserved.

                Related Links,

                "The Wadden Sea designated as a PSSA" (pdf 270 kb) *
                (Wadden Sea Newsletter, November 2002)

                * pdf file (must have Acrobat Reader to open)

Environmental groups assail Bush on Glades
A coalition of environmental groups criticized Gov. Jeb Bush Thursday for the environmental achievement it once praised, the one he touts the most in his re-election campaign: restoration of the Everglades. Just two years ago, the Everglades Coalition gave Bush and his environmental chief, David Struhs, a Steward of the Everglades award. Now, the coalition says Bush is jeopardizing the $7.8-billion restoration plan. They say the state has refused to write tight rules to ensure that water goes to natural systems before it is used for agriculture and growth. The coalition includes 43 environmental groups, including the National Wildlife Federation, the Sierra Club, the National Audubon Society and the World Wildlife Fund. "We'd like to give Gov. Bush a better grade for this," said Mary Munson, director of the Suncoast region of the National Parks Conservation Association.  Copyright  © 2002  St. Petersburg Times  All rights reserved.

Ecology groups hit Bush on Glades priorities
Less than a month before Gov. Jeb Bush faces voters at the ballot box, Florida's environmental lobby charged on Thursday that the governor who championed the Everglades Act appears more interested in securing a water supply for South Florida businesses and developers than in restoring the River of Grass. The criticism is spawned by a complex rule-making process taking place in Washington, in which environmentalists and the U.S. Senate are at odds with the Army Corps of Engineers and Florida's Department of Environmental Protection over the regulatory language that will govern the massive, $7.8 billion Everglades restoration project. Bush's image among environmentalists already took a beating this week when three major environmental groups -- the Sierra Club, the Florida League of Conservation Voters and the Florida Consumer Action Network -- endorsed his challenger, Democrat Bill McBride, even though the Tampa attorney won't release his environmental plan until Saturday.
Copyright  © 2002  Miami Herald  All rights reserved.

Bush Weakened Glades Project, Coalition Charges
Everglades restoration is one of Gov. Jeb Bush's proudest accomplishments, an achievement he trumpets as evidence of his fidelity to the environment and to differentiate himself from Democratic challenger Bill McBride. But Bush's image as environmental protector was undercut Thursday by the Everglades Coalition, the alliance of environmental groups that won congressional approval for Everglades restoration almost two years ago. Coalition members charged that Bush and his environmental secretary, David Struhs, have weakened rules that will govern how the $8 billion project will be carried out during the next 30 years. Rules Have `Wiggle Room' They said the rules are written with "wiggle room,'' so water restoration projects in the Everglades will be used primarily to benefit developers and agricultural interests. 
Copyright  © 2002  Tampa Tribune  All rights reserved.

Groups accuse Gov. Bush of delaying' Glades effort
Turning up the pressure in their Everglades campaign, environmentalists accused Gov. Jeb Bush on Thursday of "stonewalling" efforts to strengthen federal regulations so they would better restore natural water flows through the ecosystem. "The devil and the promise of Everglades restoration is in the details," said Shannon Estenoz, co-chairwoman of the Everglades Coalition. "Headlines are great. But you have to be able to read the fine print and see the same commitment. These regulations are the fine print." Representatives of the Sierra Club, Audubon Society, Everglades Trust and the National Parks Conservation Association appeared with Estenoz at a Tallahassee news conference and criticized the Bush administration for discouraging changes to the current draft federal regulations. They called on him to support the inclusion of stronger guarantees for ecological progress. 
Copyright  © 2002  Sun-Sentinel  All rights reserved.

$26 million deal near on Cypress Creek
A swath of undeveloped marsh and woods west of Jupiter and Tequesta would join the battle to save the Loxahatchee River under a $26 million land deal that water managers blessed Thursday. Palm Beach County, Martin County and the state would split the cost to buy 2,586 acres along Cypress Creek from a partnership controlled by Maryland horse breeder James Moran. The parties still have to sign a contract sealing the deal, which also needs approval from Gov. Jeb Bush and the state Cabinet. The purchase also depends on Martin County and the district's buying an additional 1,410 acres to the north from a consortium that includes Elizabeth Pataki, wife of New York Gov. George Pataki. Still, Thursday's unanimous vote by the board of the South Florida Water Management District was a big step toward preventing development along the creek, a crucial tributary for the scenic Loxahatchee.
Copyright  © 2002  Palm Beach Post  All rights reserved.

10-October-02 

The Big Cypress Deal
The cover story is conservation, but the Bush boys have their hands in the taxpayers' pockets again

 
Illustration By Brian Stauffer

Standing in a dark suit during an Oval Office ceremony on May 29 with his brother Jeb at his side, President George Bush announced that the federal government would rescue Big Cypress National Preserve from ruin by buying private mineral rights for $120 million from the majority owner of those assets, Collier Resources Co. The firm had for years proposed adding two dozen oil fields on the 716,000-acre preserve, as well as conducting seismic testing requiring underground detonations. Later that day, Jeb and U.S. Interior Secretary Gale Norton stood before reporters outside the White House and explained the terms of the federal buyout (still awaiting congressional approval). C.R. Co., owned by the wealthy and storied Collier family from Naples, would receive either cash or oil leases somewhere off the Gulf Coast -- far from Florida's shores.    
Copyright  © 2002  Miami New Times All rights reserved.

Euthanized Animals Can Kill Wildlife

A dead bald eagle found this summer at a Florida landfill highlights a continuing threat to the nation's birds of prey and other native species - accidental poisoning after feeding on the carcasses of pets or livestock. Animals euthanized at veterinary clinics or animal shelters can contain enough residual poison to kill wild animals. The dead eagle at the West Palm Beach land fill was discovered by a work crew, lying next to the carcass of a dead cat. An investigation by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's (USFWS) division of law enforcement confirmed the presence of sodium pentobarbital in the crop contents and the liver of the eagle.  The bald eagle that died at a Florida landfill this summer was found next to the carcass of a euthanized cat. (Photo courtesy USFWS) Sodium pentobarbitol, a barbiturate drug, is widely used by veterinarians to anesthetize animals for surgery.  
Copyright  © 2002  Environment News Service (ENS) 2002. All Rights Reserved. 

Groups urge tighter Everglades restoration rules
Environmental groups urged Gov. Jeb Bush Thursday to push the federal government to tighten proposed rules for Everglades restoration to avoid having it sidetracked into providing water for developments and farms. The Everglades Coalition, which includes Audubon of Florida, the Everglades Trust, the Sierra Club and several other groups, criticized Bush's administration for discouraging changes to the current draft of federal rules. The group says the proposed regulations as they stand now could allow the three-decade-long project to get shifted into purposes other than restoring water in the Everglades to its original flow. "The problem with the regulations is that they are fuzzy, there's a whole lot of wiggle room in them," said Shannon Estenoz, co-chair of the coalition.   
Copyright  © 2002  Miami Herald  All rights reserved.

9-October-02 

Florida's Flood of Tyranny
Normally any catastrophic flooding in Florida is brought on by hurricanes and tropical storms bringing water ashore.  These are not normal times, however.  Florida is now battling literal and figurative flood waters of government-sponsored tyranny. Floridians' private property and the constitutional rights associated with them are being washed away under the direction and acquiescence of our Federal Government.  The National Park Service and the Corps of Engineers are leading the assault on the average Americans in this case.  Bringing up the rear assault are state resource agencies within Florida, which are also populated with radical environmentalists. Anyone familiar with natural resource issues in this country will not be surprised by this piece of information.  Others, whose focus is generally on other types of issues, would be well-advised to not blow off this article and what its contents forecast for all Americans. You are not safe within your subdivisions! Read more...
Copyright  © 2002 America's Voices All rights reserved.

6-October-02 

Environmental matriarch
"Where's the clock?" For Rosa "Cissie" Durando, it's become second nature to yield to the clock after a good two or three minutes of holding her finger in the air and exhaling a litany of warnings, questions and critiques upon the officials she's trying to persuade. Crowned the matriarch of environmental issues, Durando, 76, joked about being tied to a timer in her 25 years of activism in Palm Beach County. The Audubon Society of the Everglades, of which Durando is a life member, sponsored a surprise roast at a West Palm Beach hotel Saturday in Durando's honor. The event also raised money for the society's scholarship fund. But the fun of the afternoon came with the quips about Durando's distinctive style of prodding -- well, nagging -- officials to manage growth responsibly and protect the environment. The nagging, Durando's roasters said, has not been without results.  Copyright  © 2002  Sun-Sentinel / Associated Press  All rights reserved.

Editorial: The Vanishing-Farmland Dilemma
Last week, a new study by the American Farmland Trust showed that the nation loses two acres of farmland every two minutes to sprawl development. Moreover, the gobbling up of American farmland has no correlation with actual population growth; from 1982 to 1997, the U.S. population increased by 17 percent, while the amount of farmland and green space consumed into urban areas increased by 47 percent. So, what's going on? Increasingly, farms are giving way to country homes on large lots -- as large as 10 acres -- that are linked to urban areas by new roads and highways. "We are consuming more land per person than at any time, in the most wasteful way," Ralph Grossi, president of the nonprofit trust, said last week. Of course, knowing that farmland is being eaten up by sprawl is one thing. Finding ways to halt the sprawl may be the central dilemma of our times.  Copyright  © 2002  The Ledger All rights reserved.

5-October-02 

Plan is $45 million toe in water
In a package featuring $8 billion worth of steps to restore the Everglades, it is the biggest technological maybe: Will a proposal to warehouse rainwater in 333 wells deep underground really work? While no one can say for sure, the National Research Council said Friday a draft plan to investigate the viability of the water-banking method "goes a long way" toward finding the answer. Crafted by federal and state water managers, the $45 million research plan is comprehensive and puts proper emphasis on findings that will come from nine test wells to be drilled to evaluate the water-storage idea, said a council report prepared by a committee of distinguished scholars. Three of those pilot wells would be west of Boca Raton, five next to Lake Okeechobee and one near the Caloosahatchee River in Hendry County.    
Copyright  © 2002  Sun-Sentinel / Associated Press  All rights reserved.

U.S. plan would protect seagrass
A rare seagrass that grows only in southeast Florida was recommended for additional federal protection on Friday, a move that generated deep concern in the boating industry. The National Marine Fisheries Service released a recovery plan for Johnson's seagrass that calls for boating restrictions, government acquisition of important habitat, additional scrutiny of dock construction and other measures. Possibly the scarcest seagrass in the world, Johnson's seagrass can be found only in shallow water from northern Biscayne Bay to southern Brevard County. Slow to reproduce, it faces threats from coastal development, motorized boats and storms. It serves as food for manatees and green sea turtles, and it provides shelter for juvenile fish. The recovery plan now goes to an implementation team that will take steps to implement the protection measures over the next few years.    
Copyright  © 2002  Sun-Sentinel / Associated Press  All rights reserved.

Glades project gets scientists' approval
Managers of the most expensive and controversial project in the Everglades restoration effort -- a network of wells and underground reservoirs -- are on the right track to answer health and environmental questions about the plan, according to a report released Friday by the National Research Council.  That's a significant change from last February, when an initial council study found numerous holes in the plan from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and South Florida Water Management District. ''Our overall impression was that they had done a conscientious job of addressing the issues,'' said Jean Bahr, a hydroecologist from the University of Wisconsin who chaired a team of scientists that wrote the report. Expected to cost nearly a third of the $8 billion restoration, the project would drill 330 wells and pump as much as 1.7 billion gallons a day underground; it could be sucked back out for use during droughts.    
Copyright  © 2002  Miami Herald  All rights reserved.

Everglades plan to aid Loxahatchee River
The $8.4 billion Everglades restoration has a new mission: saving the cypress-lined Loxahatchee River from dying of thirst. At the behest of river activists, South Florida water managers have added efforts to replenish the river to their state-federal Everglades plan. That means money from Washington can help provide reservoirs, filter marshes and finance other improvements. Water managers haven't decided what they will do for the river or how many millions of dollars it will cost, said Patti Sime, a division director at the South Florida Water Management District. Still, the change was praised by one river activist, who has accused the district of starving the river of both fresh water and the attention it deserves. "This is absolutely critical," said Patrick Hayes, an ecotourism guide in Jupiter.    
Copyright  © 2002  Palm Beach Post  All rights reserved.

More Everglades monitoring needed, scientists say  
More monitoring wells and a deeper look into how water quality will affect ecosystems are some of the suggestions lobbed at the Everglades restoration project Friday by a group from the National Academy of Sciences.
The Committee on the Restoration of the Greater Everglades Ecosystem is an independent advisory panel to the South Florida Ecosystem Restoration Task Force. The task force is comprised of state and federal agencies overseeing the multibillion-dollar restoration. Aquifer storage and recovery, as the process is known, has been successfully employed on a much smaller scale in Florida since 1983. But the size of the new proposal — 330 wells along the northern shore of Lake Okeechobee, the Caloosahatchee River and dotting Palm Beach County — is unprecedented and has raised concerns.
Copyright  © 2002  Naples News  All rights reserved.

No room for cemeteries in S. Fla. suburbs
Even if you wanted to, you could not spend eternity in Weston. When master planners divided plots of land to be used for commercial, residential and religious uses, they left out one thing: cemeteries. ''We simply forgot,'' said George Casey, president of Arvida's South Florida operations as he scanned a map of Weston, an otherwise exquisitely planned city of 57,000 souls. In South Florida's fast-growing suburbs, the afterlife is an afterthought, at least as it pertains to the disposition of remains. Space has been allocated for schools, fire stations, churches, parks and shopping plazas, but not for cemeteries and mausoleums. This is surprising when you consider that a substantial chunk of South Floridians -- 13 percent in Miami-Dade County, 16 percent in Broward County -- are over age 65.
Copyright  © 2002  Miami Herald  All rights reserved.

4-October-02 

Bush tweaking key environmental act: Critics: Exceptions will weaken law
Bit by bit, the Bush administration is carving out exceptions to a law that is widely regarded as the legal cornerstone of environmental protection. The law is the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969. It requires the government to study systematically all environmental impacts that a federal project would have, weigh alternatives and take public comments into account before going forward. NEPA's requirement for ''environmental-impact statements'' has resulted in the delay, cancellation or alteration of many federal projects over the years -- such as roads, dams and airports -- in the name of protecting nature from unnecessary despoilment.  The policy is ''the Magna Carta of all the environmental laws,'' said University of Vermont law Professor Patrick Parenteau. It is now the model for more than 100 other nations. But in the name of improving efficiency, the Bush administration wants to change the way the policy works. 
Copyright  © 2002  Miami Herald  All rights reserved.

First Hispanic on state supreme court is sworn in
In a Florida Supreme Court packed with his family, friends and associates, Justice Raoul Cantero donned his black robe Friday and took his seat on the bench of the state's high court.  One of the first things he did was pass out a guayabera, a lightweight loose-fitting shirt acceptable as business attire in Caribbean countries, to each of his six colleagues.  ''Now I will always have a little bit of Miami here at the court,'' Cantero said.  Gov. Jeb Bush, who appointed Cantero this summer to succeed retired Justice Major Harding, praised the legal and writing skills of the newest justice.  Bush also said it was important to have Florida's high court reflect the diversity of the state. The justices include a black man, a white woman, a black woman -- and now, with Cantero's appointment, a Cuban-American.    
Copyright  © 2002  Miami Herald  All rights reserved.

Thanks for the chance to serve 
Dear Friends: When I was first elected, I pledged to stand on principle. My friend and mentor, former New Hampshire governor Meldrim Thomson, told me: "You stand for something or you stand for nothing." That is the creed upon which I have tried to model my 18 years of public service for the people of New Hampshire. Agree or disagree, you always knew where I stood. The people of New Hampshire gave me the high honor of electing me five times to represent them in the U.S. House and Senate. It is a privilege for which I will always be grateful. As the senior senator from New Hampshire for the past 10 years, I have had the honor of sitting on the Senate floor at the original desk of Daniel Webster. It is a daily reminder that we are all but temporary stewards of this great nation. I learned about the value of hard work, patriotism and responsibility at a young age, having been raised on my grandparents' farm after my dad, a naval aviator, died during World War II.    
Copyright  © 2002 Concord Monitor All rights reserved.

                Related Link,

                Please use the following form to contact Senator Bob Smith with your comments and concerns. 
                If you are a New Hampshire resident, please include your full name and address if you wish to 
                receive a written response. http://smith.senate.gov/webfor.html

Property Rights Group Hits the Road
Western ranchers and farmers who have clashed with the government over fish protection are leading a new call to arms, heading to Florida with a giant shovel and bucket in tow. The cross-country convoy by the Klamath Bucket Brigade of Klamath Falls, Ore., and the Jarbidge Shovel Brigade of Elko, Nev., is meant to rally support for the cause the groups share with Florida farmers: property rights. All three groups say the government is trampling their rights in order to protect endangered species. "We want to spread the message about how property rights are being assaulted all across the U.S. -- how the Endangered Species Act is being used by environmentalists and government groups to run people off their land," Bill Ransom, a third-generation rancher and logger from Klamath Falls, said during a stop Tuesday in Reno.    
Copyright  © 2002 Newsday All rights reserved.

                Related Links,

               Klamath Bucket Brigade

                Jarbidge Shovel Brigade

                National Audubon Society

                Sawgrass Rebellion

Everglades restoration projects jeopardized
Congressional panel drops authorization
A congressional committee dropped a bill that would have authorized major Everglades restoration projects - including one in Southwest Florida. Audubon of Florida leaders said they fear the move puts Everglades restoration at risk of being delayed. "It's not going to affect whether it lives or dies, but it's going to make it a longer time period," said Mike Bauer, Southwest Florida policy director for Audubon. "As time slips away, the money may slip away with it. "Failure of the Water Resources Development Act of 2002 to pass in committee in late September had nothing to do with the Everglades, said Erik Smulson, spokesman for the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works. "We could not reach a bipartisan agreement on Corps (U.S. Army Corps of Engineers) reform, so we are working to move individual projects," Smulson said.    
Copyright  © 2002  News-Press All rights reserved.

Storm water guru at helm of academy
Martin Wanielista — Florida's widely acknowledged guru of storm water management — is putting his nickname to good use with the creation of the Storm Water Academy. The dean of the University of Central Florida's College of Engineering and Computer Sciences, Wanielista believes the academy will become a hub for scientific research on storm water management — ultimately leading to major advances in curing Florida's water woes. "Water has always been considered an inexhaustible resource, but the quantity and quality of our water is decreasing," says Wanielista. "Now, we have to look at ways to manage our storm water, meaning how to treat it, where to put it and how to use it." Water woes Approximately 90 percent of Florida's public water supply comes from ground water.   
Copyright  © 2002  Orlando Bizjournals All rights reserved.

3-October-02 

If Florida can be protected, why not Montana?
If Florida Gov. Jeb Bush were governor of Montana, would the Rocky Mountain Front get highest-level protection from future oil and gas development? You bet it would. This May, President Bush announced he intended to buy back more than $200 million worth of oil and gas leases off the Florida coast and in the Everglades. It's an election year, and the president's move to "save the glades" no doubt helped his brother's campaign for re-election. Protecting these unique areas was something people in Florida had backed enthusiastically. In describing why the leases would be bought up, Interior Secretary Gale Norton reasoned the area in the Everglades has negligible energy reserves, provides critical wildlife habitat and has powerful local advocates for its preservation. These qualities perfectly describe Montana's Rocky Mountain Front. But instead of suggesting a similar offer for the Front, the administration seems willing to undo hard-won conservation measures.    
Copyright  © 2002  Summit Daily News All rights reserved.

The not-so great debate

If you missed the first gubernatorial debate in Jacksonville Friday night and somehow managed to avoid the endless regurgitation given same by the media, here's a brief recap: McBride was nervous as a new bride, stuttering over his words and mouthing vagueries that, if continued through the campaign, will get his ass handed to him as a hat come election day. Bush was poised, calm and armed with statistics. He won because McBride failed to get in the dirt and exploit the many shortcomings of the Bush era. It was a predictable exercise in high-stakes politics, with nonspecific questions -- "What will you do to improve education?"; "What will you do for the environment?" -- prompting nonspecific answers. And we the voters of Florida learned practically nothing about the two guys vying to run the state, except: Bush hates taxes and swears last month's election debacle wasn't his fault (though he pledged to fix the problems); Read  More...
Copyright  © 2002  Orlando Weekly © 2002 All rights reserved.

Loxahatchee added to restoration plan
Water managers have decided to add the Loxahatchee River to statewide Everglades restoration efforts, ensuring more money and commitment to the threatened waterway. Until last week, the river, in northern Palm Beach and southern Martin counties, was considered outside the local projects of the $8 billion Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan. But after strong lobbying efforts by local Loxahatchee advocates, the river's restoration will be added into the water management district's Northern Palm Beach plan, which will now border the $1 billion in projects designed to restore the St. Lucie River and Indian River Lagoon. The Northwest fork of the Loxahatchee, the first federally designated "wild and scenic" river in the country, is popular with canoeists, who catch glimpses of long-ago Florida along its cypress-shaded banks.    
Copyright  © 2002  Stuart News - TC Palm  All rights reserved.

2-October-02 

LAND USE RIVALS GREENHOUSE GASES IN CHANGING CLIMATE

Replacing sunlight reflecting snow and ice 
with surfaces that absorb more sunlight, 
like buildings, causes localized warming of 
the atmosphere.
(Photo courtesy University of Connecticut)

Changes in land use may rival greenhouse gases in their contributions to global warming, suggests a new international study. The report details the effects of urban sprawl, deforestation and agricultural practices on regional surface temperatures, rainfall patterns and atmospheric circulation, arguing that these land surface changes may have more impact on climate than greenhouse gas emissions. Most climate change studies have focused on how heat trapping gases like carbon dioxide (CO2), released by human activities such as the burning of fossil fuels, are warming the global climate. However, other human activities which cause changes in land surfaces and vegetation may be even more important, say the authors of a recent study. 
Copyright  © 2003  Environmental News Service - ENS All rights reserved.

Editorial: More allies for Riviera
Riviera Beach deserves much more than the few drops of help the Environmental Protection Agency has produced to remove cancer-causing chemicals from the city's water supply. If area congressmen have any clout in Washington, the city may get a pleasant October surprise. In the meantime, the issue is gaining national attention. The Sierra Club, in a 49-page report titled "Risk," cites Riviera as one of 25 endangered by the Bush administration's "weakening" of toxic waste cleanup policies. The report specifically criticized the EPA for "stalling, backpedaling and neglecting" the aquifer contamination in Riviera Beach and Lake Park. The EPA has yet to demand accountability from Honeywell for the 22 toxic chemicals that leaked into city water wells during the 1960s, when the company had a manufacturing operation in the city.    
Copyright  © 2002  Palm Beach Post  All rights reserved.

                Related Article,

                Communities at Risk -- Florida: Lake Park and Riviera Beach

Citrus land values souring
The value of the region's commercial citrus groves has declined more than 11 percent in the past year, according to a recent annual survey of agricultural land values. Low prices paid to growers, coupled with diseases such as citrus canker and the tree-killing virus tristeza, are to blame for the lowest grove land values in 18 years, said John Reynolds, a University of Florida agricultural economist who has been conducting the yearly survey since 1985. "Citrus land values tend to track closely to what happens in terms of prices growers receive," Reynolds said. "Tristeza and canker have both affected people's outlook. " While soaring land values have come to be expected in South Florida, the survey shows the commercial citrus groves are the exception.  The value of the region's orange groves declined by 11.2 percent, and its grapefruit groves' value declined 15.6 percent in the past year, Reynolds said.   
Copyright  © 2002  Palm Beach Post  All rights reserved.

Guest Opinion: FGCU should say no to Ginn's tainted land
University has to be creative with lands it has
As a member of the FGCU "family," I am profoundly disturbed by FGCU's proposal to build an engineering school on environmentally sensitive land necessary for recharging our aquifer system. Dangle a $13 million jewel before the university (with the taxpayers kicking in another 7.5 million for the love-fest), and we will sleep with any developer, blissfully ignoring the inconvenience of our environmental conscience. The university gladly escorts developers on their forays so they look legitimate, just as long as we get some pretty token, some tiny parcel of land. In this case, the administration of FGCU is supporting the Ginn Co.'s 5,400-acre proposal to develop lands east of the university, seeking exceptions and amendments to current plans and codes that limit development of Density Reduction Groundwater Resource areas.  
Copyright  © 2002  News-Press All rights reserved.

1-October-02 

Enforcement of Environmental Laws Has Slipped, Democrats Say   
Congressional Democrats, trying to revive the issue of the environment in a political atmosphere increasingly devoted to war, said today that the Bush administration had fallen down on enforcing the nation's environmental laws.  In a report to be released on Tuesday, the Democrats found a "dramatic decline" in enforcement of environmental statutes during the Bush administration compared with the Clinton administration based on analyses of data from the Environmental Protection Agency.  The Bush administration initiated about half the number of administrative actions against polluting companies in two time periods compared with the agency under President Bill Clinton, the report said.  The agency disputed the report, saying the number for the Clinton administration was inflated because of a new rule on drinking water coming into effect. 
Copyright  © 2002  NY Times online  All rights reserved.

Revised:  06/13/03