31-March-04
Legislature
may take up water reservation issue during session
By CHARLIE WHITEHEAD
© Naples
News
The issue of how water
reservations for the environment balance with water for future growth may
yet be addressed through legislation this session in Tallahassee. Environmentalists,
developers and now Lee County will be watching carefully to see if a bill
that the Association of Florida Community Developers may propose finds
state cooperation and a legislative sponsor. The
bill is borne of a controversy over the Department of Environmental
Protection's effort to change a rule that would expand the list of
environmental uses for which it could reserve fresh water. Currently
water use rules allow the state to reserve water for wildlife protection
and for Everglades restoration. The new rule would allow reservations for
aquatic preserves, Outstanding Florida Waters and state parks and public
lands. It would also allow prospective reservations, meaning it could
reserve water from future resource restoration projects. Read
more
Sugar stymies Glades plan
A plantation purchased by the state is needed for Everglades restoration,
but the growers are ignoring a request to leave.
By CRAIG PITTMAN
© St.
Petersburg Times
Florida taxpayers spent
$130-million five years ago to buy a 50,000-acre sugar plantation south of
Lake Okeechobee as part of the ambitious plan to replumb the Everglades.
Gov. Jeb Bush called the Talisman Sugar Plantation
"the linchpin of Everglades restoration." The
state didn't need the Palm Beach County land immediately, so it let sugar
companies continue farming there. Now the state is preparing to take it
over and recently notified the sugar companies to move out by April 2005.
But the companies won't budge. They
say the notices sent out by the South Florida Water Management District
don't meet the strict contractual requirements for terminating the lease.
"Accordingly, we do not recognize the notices as
valid, and we will continue to plan our operations consistent with this
position," Florida
Crystals vice president Armando Tabernilla wrote in a terse, Feb. 11
letter. The other two companies that lease the land, U.S. Sugar and the
Florida Sugar Cane Growers Cooperative, agree. Read
more
Sugar grower refuses to leave leased
land slated for Everglades restoration
By Neil Santaniello
© Sun-Sentinel
Sugar grower Florida Crystals
says it intends to ignore government notices telling the company to
prepare to vacate thousands of acres of taxpayer-bought farmland that
plays a central role in Everglades restoration. The
company argues that the South Florida Water Management District failed to
follow the legally prescribed procedure to warn growers about the start of
work to flood 50,000 acres of district-owned farmland south of South Bay.
The construction will create reservoirs that will benefit wetlands and
wildlife. Environmental groups say the move
suggests sugar growers intend to delay or seriously thwart the
construction of water-storage areas integral to the success of the $8.4
billion Everglades restoration plan. The western
Palm Beach County land at issue, best known as the Talisman Sugar
property, "represents the heart and soul of Everglades
restoration," said Charles Lee, senior vice president of Audubon of
Florida. Lee called the sugar industry position "the initial
declaration of war" from farmers over the property's fate.
Developers accused of making water grab
Environmentalists fear developers are trying to divert water from the
Everglades as part of an assault on a rule proposed to set aside water for
the environment.
BY MARC CAPUTO
© Miami Herald
TALLAHASSEE - Florida
developers have launched a quiet campaign in court and in the Legislature
to scrap a proposed rule that would help save water for Everglades
restoration and wetlands across the state. The
Association of Florida Community Developers has asked an administrative
judge to block the proposed rule, saying its ''vague'' wording doesn't
spell
out how much water should be reserved for the environment. It also
questions whether there's even an Everglades left to restore. At
the same time, two association lobbyists are meeting with receptive state
lawmakers, who said they will consider developer-drafted legislation to
stop the state Department of Environmental Protection from implementing
the rule because it intrudes on the Legislature's authority to make laws.
Noting the association's close ties to Gov. Jeb Bush
and a former Enron subsidiary that wanted to sell Everglades water,
environmentalists say the association's one-two punch is part of a broader
scheme to control all the water in Florida, as evidenced by a failed
proposal earlier this year to divert water from the state's rural north to
urban areas in the south. Read
more
30-March-04
Area official stresses role of estuary
life
By PAMELA SMITH HAYFORD, phayford@news-press.com
© Ft. Myers
News-Press
KEY LARGO — Lee County
Smart Growth Director Wayne Daltry on Monday urged managers involved in
Everglades restoration to remember Southwest Florida estuary life, not
just better-known species impacted by the project. When
people typically think of Everglades creatures, they often have crocodiles
and panthers in mind. But those are just a few of the many forms of plant
and animal life affected by Everglades restoration, and Daltry doesn’t
want plants and animals living in the Caloosahatchee River left out.
“We want to make sure (the Multi-species Recovery
Plan) includes estuary species,” Daltry told the South Florida Ecosystem
Restoration Working Group, which represents 29 agencies. The group met in
Key Largo to talk about what issues are most important when it comes to
the plants and
animals living in the restoration region. The
working group reports directly to a federal and state task force that was
established in 1993 to coordinate environmental restoration in South
Florida.
29-March-04
Carl Hiaasen: 'No shortage of reasons to
be outraged'
Novelist and Miami Herald columnist Carl Hiaasen will receive the Denver
Press Club’s 10th annual Damon Runyon Award on Friday night.
By J. Sebastian Sinisi
© Denver
Post
The
last thing novelist and Miami Herald columnist Carl Hiaasen wants to be
called is an "environmental" writer. With
notable exceptions like Edward Abbey, environmental writers don't make
readers laugh, and Hiaasen does not have that problem. Crooked
developers, corrupt elected officials and dumb-as-dirt white trash who
assist the other spoilers of South Florida are recurring characters in
Carl Hiaasen's 10 best-selling novels. In his novels and twice-weekly
Herald column, few scoundrels go unstoned. Their
themes are best summed up in a 2001 collection of his columns:
"Paradise Screwed." Hiaasen will receive the Denver Press Club's
10th annual Damon Runyon Award on Friday night. After
16 years of cranking out a column and more than 20 of writing novels,
Hiaasen still succeeds at the rare feat of enabling readers to laugh at
the follies surrounding serious issues. "If
we couldn't laugh, we would all go insane," sang former Florida Keys
resident Jimmy Buffett. Hiaasen still lives in the keys and can still
cause readers to laugh at the unbelievable stupidity and greed that have
despoiled the South Florida he knew as a boy. But
Hiaasen's laughter and satire that mask the anger have made a difference.
And that difference made Hiaasen this year's pick for the Press Club's
Runyon Award, to put him in the company of Jimmy Breslin, Pete
Hamill, Herb Caen, Molly Ivins, Maureen Dowd and other journalistic
notables.
Water rule
challenge may end through agreement
By CHARLIE WHITEHEAD
© Naples Daily News
There may be an agreement in
the works that would settle a developer group's challenge of a state rule
to expand reservations of fresh water for environmental purposes. Local
developers still aren't saying how they feel about the Association of
Florida Community Developers' challenge of the proposed Department of
Environmental Protection rule. Some Lee County commissioners raised a
stink about the challenge this week, demanding to know where local members
of the association — Bonita Bay Group, Collier Enterprises, Barron
Collier, Ginn Development and WCI — stand. As of Friday, none had
returned calls or made statements. Cathy Vogel,
lobbyist for the association, says there might be a settlement in the
works. Vogel says the challenge was filed simply to allow continued work
on the new rule. The state currently can reserve
fresh water for the environment to implement Everglades restoration,
potentially withholding it from proposed development. The change would
expand allowable reservations to include Outstanding Florida Waters,
parks, preserves and public lands. Read
more
A changing of the guard at Fisheating
Creek
State gives contract to another, ending Estero environmentalist's tenure
at campground
By ALAN SCHER ZAGIER
© Naples
News
PALMDALE — Fisheating Creek
is more than just a workplace for Ellen Peterson. Ask
anyone who knows the 80-year-old retired schoolteacher, avid canoer and
former Edison Community College administrator: the place practically
courses through her veins. It infuses her very soul. Her
reward for unswerving devotion to one of the state's few remaining natural
treasures? A pink slip. After a lifetime's
journey from rural North Carolina to Estero -— with
stops in Maine, South America and elsewhere along the way -— Peterson
came to this remote corner of Glades County two years ago to breathe life
into a moribund campground. She signed a
contract with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission to run
the state-owned campground, about 40 miles northeast of Fort Myers.
Her mission: help nature lovers rediscover Fisheating
Creek after a 10-year legal battle between the state and Tampa-based
agricultural giant Lykes Bros. Inc., which in 1989 decided to restrict
public access to a 53-mile navigable waterway long cherished by outdoors
enthusiasts. The dispute was settled in 1999
when the state agreed to buy and preserve nearly 20,000 acres in the newly
designated Fisheating Creek Wildlife Management Area. At
an age when many of her peers in Southwest Florida consider switching the
remote control a form of physical exercise, Peterson dove into her new job
with vigor. Read
more
28-March-04
South Miami development threatens
evacuations
© Key
West Citizen
The Florida Keys is the most
tightly regulated area in the state of Florida, when it comes to growth
management. That's true if you are pleased with
the deal recently worked out between
Monroe County and the state of Florida. Or if you think it failed to
protect our besieged natural resources. Or if you think it is far too
restrictive. The truth is, the Keys are limited
to a few hundred new homes per year, and in return will receive more than
$100 million in state money for buying natural lands and improving water
quality. Meanwhile, the county alone
has promised to come up with another $200 million for water quality in the
next three years. All this did not happen
spontaneously. It happened because the state of Florida, for 30 years now,
through Republican and Democratic administrations in Tallahassee, has
expressed its strong belief that the Keys is one of Florida's most special
and fragile places. As an Area of Critical State Concern, the county is
under state scrutiny like few other places. Read
more
Fortifying a falling fort
The National Park Service is looking for a few good masons to repair
historic Fort Jefferson, deteriorating slowly on an isolated bit of land
68 miles from Key West
By Maya Bell
© Orlando
Sentinel
DRY TORTUGAS NATIONAL PARK --
The working conditions are daunting, but the perks are great: stunning
views, all the fish you can catch and bragging rights to saving Fort
Jefferson. Brick by historic brick, the nation's
most isolated, ambitious and star-crossed coastal fort is falling into the
sea. That is prompting the National Park Service to look for 15 or so
hearty souls willing to brave isolation and deprivation to undo the damage
wrought by 158 years of
tropical salt air. It's not a mission for the
meek or pampered. The masonry crew hired for the
first phase of the $16 million repair on Garden Key, a 23-acre sand island
68 miles due west of Key West, must be self-sufficient. Completely
self-sufficient. After all, this job will be a yearlong,
bring-your-own-everything test of endurance. That includes the basics:
food, water, housing, sanitation and electricity. Read
more
Panther strategy tangled
Habitat slips away as plan awaits release
By PAMELA SMITH HAYFORD, phayford@news-press.com
© Ft.
Myers News-Press
Land vital to the survival of
the Florida panther is disappearing while a year-old conservation strategy
sits mired in red tape. The strategy, drawn up
by 11 panther experts, recommends no new roads and no widening of roads in
any of three panther zones; no turning farms into
golf course communities; no converting citrus groves to reservoirs. A
panther kitten at its home at White Oak. Only 80 to 100 Florida panthers
remain in the wild. Habitat is crucial because panthers need a lot of room
to roam. File photo special to news-press.com Some
permitting agencies know about it. Some don’t. Meanwhile,
construction moves forward in what the panther experts called primary and
secondary panther habitat, a 4,400-square-mile area east of Interstate 75.
Work on the strategy began four years ago, in February
2000, when the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service asked 10 outside experts
and one of its own to develop a landscape-level conservation strategy and
draw a map of land needed for the endangered cat’s survival. The
so-called Florida Panther Subteam finished the report in December 2002.
However, the subteam’s report isn’t widely known
because Fish & Wildlife hasn’t released it yet. The agency is
waiting until it has finished what it calls a “panther tool” — a
document based on the report that will be used by permitting agencies to
determine whether a project will hurt panther habitat.
Officials aim to hasten Scripps
By Prashant Gopal and Shana Gruskin
© Sun-Sentinel
The fast-track project to
build a biotech hub in northwestern Palm Beach County is, for the first
time, wrestling with environmental and quality-of-life issues that could
be out of county and state government officials' control, threatening
hopes of meeting a tight schedule to open by September 2006. The
chosen site for The Scripps Research Institute's Florida expansion
has drawn the attention of environmentalists, who are concerned about the
project's location next to a major wildlife corridor, and of local
residents, who worry about impending traffic, noise and biohazards.
Also, federal environmental regulators, who aren't
obliged to meet the
state's accelerated three-month approval process, could take more than a
year to review the Scripps development plan. Monday,
nearly a dozen government agencies -- local, state and federal -- will
begin an intense three-day meeting to help the county take the project
through a tangle of complicated permit applications and sort through key
issues of concern to residents and regulators. Read
more
Environmental
groups upset over wetlands rules changes
By CATHY ZOLLO
© Naples Daily News
Recent changes in the way the
federal government regulates wetlands and other waterways and a push in
the Florida Legislature to test the dumping of treated sewage water in
canals has state and national environmental groups alarmed. The
League of Conservation Voters, Florida Public Interest Research Group,
Earthjustice, Natural Resource Defense Council, Citizens for the Bay,
Clean Water Network and the Sierra Club Florida Chapter have banded
together to call attention to their concerns. "We
are, collectively, calling on the Bush administration to reverse its
current policy and uphold the Clean Water Act by applying its
protections to all waters of the United States," said Sandra Diaz of
the League of Conservation Voters Education Fund. The
groups say the administration and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers are
backing off from protecting certain wetlands and waterways, such as
canals. Meanwhile, they say, a bill under consideration in Tallahassee
will require a pilot project to test the dumping of treated sewage water
in those canals. Read
more
27-March-04
Lake O drops toward target for ecology
By Libby Wells
© Palm Beach Post
For the first time in 10
months, Lake Okeechobee this week dropped to less than 15 feet above sea
level, and water managers say it could lose another foot or more before
June 1 if the weather remains dry. The lake was
at 14.8 feet on Friday, which is the lowest it has been
since May. High water levels have killed almost 40 percent of the
730-square-mile lake's submerged vegetative habitat and damaged the
brackish St. Lucie estuary because of nutrient-laden freshwater
discharges. Lake and estuary advocates would
like to see the level at 13.5 feet before the summer rains begin, and
water managers said that depth might be
attainable. "We've had below-normal
rainfall in March. If that continues through April, I think there's still
a probability we can make it to 13.5 by June 1," said Susan
Sylvester, head of water control operations for the U.S. Army Corps of
Engineers in Jacksonville. "So it really depends on what
happens."
A ruling for
pollution
Editorial
© Palm
Beach Post
Private industries and
utilities don't have the right to dump dirty water into clean water. A
government agency shouldn't have that right, either. That's the issue in a
long-running court battle between the South Florida Water Management
District, which needs to dump dirty water from urban drainage canals, and
the Miccosukee Tribe and Friends of the Everglades,
which sued to stop the district from dumping that polluted runoff into
clean Everglades water. This week, the U.S.
Supreme Court also muddied the case. The court rejected the district's
argument that it merely moves polluted water from one place to another and
so doesn't need an expensive federal permit. The permit would set a
timetable and force the district to clean water before dumping it into
Everglades marshes.
Groups
Target Water Limits
By MIKE SALINERO
© Tampa
Tribune
TALLAHASSEE - Several
powerful developer groups are trying to change provisions of Florida law
that allow the state to reserve water for the environment. The target of
the developers' lobbying efforts is a seldom-used statute that allows
state agencies to reserve water for ``protection of fish and wildlife or
the public health and safety.'' That law has been used only
once, when the St. Johns Water Management District reserved water for the
Paynes Prairie State Preserve just south of Gainesville. But
the law is slated to play a crucial role in the $8.4 billion Everglades
restoration project, which depends on massive water storage projects.
Developers are worried that the effort to capture water
and reroute it across the Everglades won't leave enough for development in
South Florida. ``We're not opposed to the idea
of water reservations, but there has to be a certain equity in the
legislation that takes into account the needs of agriculture, community
development, as well as environmental uses,'' said Ken Plonski, spokesman
for WCI Communities Inc., developers of Sun City Center.
26-March-04
Family of panthers being taught to avoid
humans
By BRENDAN FARRINGTON
© Miami
Herald
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - Wildlife
officials are using dogs and slingshots to teach a family of Florida
panthers not to get too comfortable around humans. The
three cats have been spotted several times around homes in the Big Cypress
National Preserve in southwest Florida since last fall. While its not
unheard of to encounter the endangered panthers in the region, these
animals seem to have lost their fear of humans. "There
were instances of cats hanging out in people's yards and not taking
off," said Bob DeGross of the National Park Service. "There was
one instance where a gentleman was walking up his driveway and the cat was
following him for a short distance ... This is the first time we've ever
had to deal with this. Why these cats have displayed behavior like this is
hard to say." Read
more
Florida’s panthers may be released in
out-of-state forests
By David Fleshler
© Sun-Sentinel
A federal study has ranked
two national forests in Arkansas as the most promising sites for returning
the Florida panther to parts of its historic range, but any proposal to do
that would face intense opposition from farmers and other state residents.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service commissioned the
study as part of its efforts to save the panther, now confined to a
shrinking habitat southwest of Lake Okeechobee. While the number of
panthers has climbed to 80 or 90 adults over the past few years,
biologists say the only way to ensure the species' long-term survival
would be to create additional populations in parts of its former range.
Until then, the species remains vulnerable to extinction from an epidemic,
hurricane or bad birth years.
Istokpoga residents focus on
Okeechobee's water quality
By RIC LILJENBERG
© News-sun
LORIDA -- Through the next
several years hundreds of millions of dollars will be spent in the battle
to save Lake Okeechobee and reverse a trend that left unabated will
eventually destroy Okeechobee's water quality, its fishery, and its
wildlife habitat. Much of this massive problem
begins in the upper reaches of its watershed that extends all the way to
the Orlando area where lakes there empty into what becomes the Kissimmee
River. To the east of the Kissimmee River
watershed lies the Taylor Creek system, and to the west, Fisheating Creek
carries water to Okeechobee. Until now, a fourth
major watershed region -- the 3.5 million acre Lake Istokpoga watershed --
was not included in the multi-million dollar Lake Okeechobee Restoration
Project. Thursday's more than three-hour meeting
at the Lorida Community Center brought together Lake Istokpoga residents
and representatives from
several agencies. The historic meeting marked the first time the Istokpoga
watershed was recognized by engineers of the Lake Okeechobee Watershed
Project. Read
more
Experts fear drift algae a sign of a
sick ecosystem
By CHAD GILLIS
© Naples Daily News
It clogs boat motors and
plugs commercial fishing nets. And some groups worry that a cluster of
drift algae blanketing Lee County's shoreline this week could lead to a
red tide event or further damage to the region's already depleted sea
grass beds. Red, green and brown drift algae
have been reported from the Charlotte Harbor area south to Fort Myers
Beach this week. While the blooms are not toxic to humans like a red tide
event, many water
quality experts fear the algae is a sign that Southwest Florida's
ecosystem is unsteady. "The existence of
the blooms themselves are harmful because it's an indicator of an
unbalanced system," said Wayne Daltry, Lee County's Smart Growth
director. "We have been noticing more of these algae blooms covering
more areas." The bloom was first reported
by John Cassani of the Southwest Florida Watershed Council. Cassani
noticed the bloom while flying
home from vacation earlier this week. Read
more
25-March-04
Heavier, more frequent Lake O discharges
being considered
Instead of an increase in "pulse"-style releases, activists are
recommending slow "bleeding" of the lake throughout the year.
By Suzanne Wentley
© Stuart
News
Federal water managers are
considering a new proposal that could allow for heavier, more frequent
discharges from Lake Okeechobee into the St. Lucie River while scientists
work on an overhaul of lake management rules. "I
think it gets at ... people's frustration," said Susan Sylvester, a
civil engineer with the Army Corps of Engineers in Jacksonville. "They're
seeing the lake go up and they're not thinking the releases were adequate.
We were making the releases that (the rules) were calling for."
Even though the proposal would increase the volume of
water discharged from the lake, the goal of the increased flexibility is
to ensure the
constant, heavy releases wouldn't happen again this year, corps scientists
said. Read
more
Some claim proposed airport commerce
park could harm environment
By RIDDHI TRIVEDI-ST. CLAIR
© Naples Daily News
A commercial/industrial
development planned for the northeast corner of Alico and Airport Haul
Roads either will be a boon for the nearby airport or cause harm to the
environment, depending on whom you believe. The
Lee County Hearing Examiner on Wednesday heard the application to convert
241 acres to a mixed commercial and industrial development. County staff
is recommending approval for the application for Airport Interstate
Commerce Park. Hearing Examiner Diana Parker
said she did not have any immediate or major concerns with the application
but would make her decision after a site visit. The
developer wants to create an industrial/commercial subdivision that would
have access on Airport Haul Road and Alico Road, said Tom Lehnert of Banks
Engineering, representing the applicant. Read
more
Water District: Everglades restoration
to stay on track
By JOEL ESKOVITZ
© Naples Daily News
WASHINGTON — As the legal
battle involving water quality in the Everglades shifts from the U.S.
Supreme Court to a federal court in Miami, the South Florida Water
Management District said Wednesday the lack of a verdict means that
Everglades restoration will remain
on track. The Supreme Court, in an 8-1 ruling
Tuesday, asked the lower court to obtain more information before
determining whether water on either side of a Broward County pumping
station should be considered one body. The Miccosukee Tribe, which
initially filed suit against the district, contends the district needs a
federal permit because it is pumping polluted water into a pristine
section of the Everglades. Nicolas Gutierrez,
chairman of the district's governing board, has contended that an outcome
in favor of the tribe would force the
district to apply for permits at its 300 major water structures and 2,000
minor structures throughout its 16-county area. Read
more
Landmark church slated for Ave Maria
development
By DIANNA SMITH
© Naples Daily News
With no height limitation in
view, Ave Maria officials have the freedom to build high to the heavens.
And that's exactly what they plan to do. A
landmark church 150 feet tall and a 60-foot red-tinted glass cross with a
40-foot body of Christ were among the designs that Ave Maria officials
revealed Wednesday during a press conference at LaPlaya Beach & Golf
Resort in North Naples. After a brief
introduction from a table of men in dark suits, cream
drapes were removed from 12 boards to reveal the plans for the first phase
of the Catholic university and town. Collier County commissioners didn't
see those renderings when approving the development's first phase during
Tuesday's commission meeting. Camera shutters
clicked in unison and television cameras focused on the force behind Ave
Maria, the founder of Domino's Pizza, Tom Monaghan, who sat quietly and
peered away as people admired the display like pieces of art. Read
more
24-March-04
Lee wants to know local developers' stance on water use challenge
By CHARLIE WHITEHEAD
© Naples Daily News
Lee County commissioners want to know where the local members of the Association of Florida Community Developers stands on the group's challenge of a state water use policy that prioritizes environment over new development, but the locals aren't exactly clamoring to say.
State policy allows agencies to reserve portions of Florida's limited fresh water for environmental purposes. Lee officials have been working to get such a reservation for the Caloosahatchee River, which, along with nearby estuaries, has been damaged by radical fluctuations in freshwater flow from Lake Okeechobee.
The association, a 52-member coalition of development interests, filed a challenge to a Department of Environmental Protection rule expected to help implement reservations for water bodies.
The new rule would not permit future development if it would interfere with flow to a natural system with a reservation.
Read more
Reform of U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
Questioned
© Environment News Service
WASHINGTON, DC, March 24, 2004 (ENS) - The U.S.
Army Corps of Engineers is moving ahead with more than $12 billion in
projects that harm the environment and waste taxpayer dollars, according
to a two year investigation by the National Wildlife Federation (NWF) and
Taxpayers for Common Sense. The joint report
finds that members of Congress often turn a blind eye to legislative fixes
that could stop many of these projects in their tracks. "Despite
exploding deficits, Congress continues to spend like drunken sailors on
gold plated pork barrel water projects," said Steve Ellis, vice
president of programs at Taxpayers for Common Sense. "The problem is
that the Corps of Engineers is aiding and abetting this spending spree
because they have never met a boondoggle they did not like." The
two organizations read through tens of thousands of pages of Corps
documents and conducted dozens of interviews to rank the most
environmentally and fiscally wasteful water projects in the nation. Read
more
Area home building on rise
© Palm
Beach Post
Residential construction
contracts signed in February in Palm Beach County rose 3 percent from
February 2003, to $182.6 million from $177.9 million, according to the
Dodge Reports. Dodge tracks the construction industry nationwide. For
the year to date, total residential construction contracts in Palm Beach
County have risen 12 percent over the same period in 2003, to $388.1
million from $345.2 million. Palm Beach County
commercial construction contracts signed in February dropped 37 percent
from the same month a year ago, to $41.9 million from $66.1 million in
February 2003. For the year to date, commercial construction contracts in
Palm Beach County are up 6 percent over last year, to $124.3 million from
$117.1 million. In the Treasure Coast -- Martin
and St. Lucie counties -- residential construction contracts for February
rose 15 percent over February 2003, to $88.2 million from $76.8 million,
Dodge said. For the year to date, residential construction contracts are
up 38 percent over last year, to $213.8 million from $154.8 million.
Wanted: Manatees. Huh?
Editorial
© Palm
Beach Post
Beware, Floridians. The
"killer manatees" are back. In fact,
manatees may be the most gentle creatures on the planet. Three years ago,
however, marine industries tried to undercut protection for them by
portraying the sea cow as an imminent threat. This year, the "killer
manatee" theory has found its champion in state Sen. Mike Bennett, R-
Bradenton. The 2003 recipient of an award from
the Marine Industries Association of Greater Tampa Bay has sponsored
Senate Bills 342, 540, 542 and 1676 to solve problems that only he and
dock builders see. They portray the docile, tubby manatee as some sort of
herbivorous predator, cruising sea grass beds and munching endlessly,
consuming every blade of grass in Florida's 29,400 miles of tidal waters,
streams, rivers and canals. Consider the ravaged
grass beds, the homeless fish. And what if manatees spread communicable
diseases -- if there are any -- when they warm themselves near discharge
areas at power plants?
Proposal would force developers to meet
stronger wildlife protection rules
By ERIC STAATS
© Naples
Daily News
Collier County would be able
to require developers to meet stricter wildlife protection rules under a
proposal county commissioners moved forward Tuesday. The
3-2 vote starts the proposal next month through a long process to amend
the county's growth plan. The process, including review by county advisory
boards and the state Department of Community
Affairs, might not be wrapped up until October. Commissioners
Jim Coletta and Tom Henning voted against the proposal, leaving it one
vote short of the four-vote supermajority needed to approve it. Even
if the proposal wins approval, it could be short-lived. Commissioners
set a November deadline to hear back from a stakeholders group charged
with recommending a more comprehensive wildlife protection plan for
Collier County. Read
more
Glades
pumping-station case sent back to court in Miami
The U.S. Supreme Court sends a closely watched Everglades pumping station
case back to federal court in Miami.
BY KARL ROSS
© Miami
Herald
The U.S. Supreme Court in a
ruling Tuesday declined to settle a long-standing dispute between the
Miccosukee Tribe of Indians and local water managers over a Broward County
pumping station the tribe says is polluting the Everglades. The
case, believed to have far-reaching repercussions, is being closely
monitored by environmental groups and public officials from across the
country. At issue is whether the South Florida
Water Management District needs to obtain a federal pollution discharge
permit to operate pumps that keep
suburban enclaves dry but spill contaminants across a levee to the west.
The Supreme Court ordered the case be returned to U.S.
District Court in Miami to determine whether state water managers need to
treat pollutants discharged by its S-9 pumping station. In doing so, they
overturned favorable rulings for the Miccosukees obtained over the course
of the six-year legal battle. Read
more
Commissioners approve first phase of Ave
Maria project
By DIANNA SMITH
© Naples
Daily News
Despite the absence of
detailed plans, the Collier County Commission unanimously approved the
first phase of the Ave Maria project Tuesday, making Barron Collier Cos.
the first landowner to participate in the county's rural growth plan.
The approval means nearly 5,286 acres of rural land
south of Immokalee are now protected from future development and Barron
Collier Cos., along with Tom Monaghan, the founder of Domino's Pizza and
the force behind the university, have enough credits to convert 960 acres
of agricultural land into the first Catholic university to be built in the
United States in 40 years, as well as a town to go
with it. The nearly 5,286 acres of protected
land, which is divided into four areas, includes 850 acres in Camp Keais
Strand, which is part of a regional flow way, and 4,435 acres in and
adjacent to the Okaloacoochee Slough along Immokalee Road, east of
Immokalee, where
panthers have been known to roam. Read
more
Coral threatened by disease
A mysterious flesh-eating disease is killing staghorn coral off the
Florida Keys.
BY CARA BUCKLEY
© Miami
Herald
KEY WEST - Staghorn coral,
once abundant but now rare in the Keys, is being lethally stalked by an
unidentified flesh-eating disease that scientists are at a loss to
explain. ''A lot of very freshly exposed
skeletons alerted me,'' said Dana Williams, a postdoctoral associate at
the University of Miami. ``But we have no idea what it is.'' Staghorn
coral, so named because of its antler-like branches, is already in steep
demise in the Keys. Since the 1970s, 80 to 90 percent of the island
chain's reef tract has died, according to Cheva Heck, spokeswoman for the
Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary. Pollution, algal blooms,
sediment and a host of diseases have been blamed, among them coral
bleaching, black-band and white-band disease and white plague. But
this coral-tissue-eating disease appears to be a newcomer, the scientists
involved said. Read
more
U.S.
Supreme Court sidesteps issue on dirty water being pumped into Everglades
By Neil Santaniello
© Sun-Sentinel
The U.S. Supreme Court on
Tuesday evaded settling a dispute over dirty water pumped into the
Everglades, bouncing the issue back to a lower court. The
ruling on an dispute keenly watched by several states contained enough
ambiguity to fuel claims of victory from both sides of the legal fight
centered on a trio of diesel-powered stormwater pumps near Weston. Environmentalists
said they were victorious because the court rejected a South Florida Water
Management District argument that pumps were immune from federal
clean-water permits because the machines didn't generate the dirty water
they push into the central Everglades. "We
didn't get everything we wanted, but we got 90 cents on the dollar,"
said Earthjustice attorney David Guest. But the
court, in a 14-page decision delivered by Justice Sandra Day
O'Connor, left open a chance for the district to ultimately prevail in the
long-running suit brought by the Miccosukee Indian Tribe and Friends of
the Everglades.
High court
ruling in Everglades case pleases both sides
By Robert P. King
© Palm
Beach Post
Water managers eventually
might have to get costly federal permits for their pumps that pollute the
Everglades -- but not just yet, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled Tuesday.
In an 8-1 decision that left both sides claiming
victory, the justices said a federal judge in Fort Lauderdale acted too
hastily when he ordered the South Florida Water Management District to
seek permits for pumps in western Broward County. But
the Supreme Court also rejected one of the district's prime legal
arguments -- that its pumps cannot be blamed for moving water that's
already polluted. That caused environmentalists and the Miccosukee Indian
tribe to predict they'll win when the case returns to a South Florida
courtroom for further argument. "I don't
see how we could lose," said Miccosukee attorney Dexter Lehtinen,
who joined Friends of the Everglades in suing the district in 1998. The
justices, he said, "just slam-dunked the district on its legal
arguments."
Foley joins 'Glades restoration push
The senator [congressman] sent a letter to the Army Corps of Engineers
chief in Washington asking that the plan be fast-tracked.
By Suzanne Wentley, staff writer
© Stuart
News
The local Everglades
restoration plan hasn't reached the desks of members of Congress, but a
lobbying push is already under way in Washington. Rep.
Mark Foley [http://www.house.gov/foley/
] has joined forces with a local river activist, two Martin County
commissioners and the region's top Army Corps of Engineers official to
bring attention to the $1.2 billion plan to clean and store water in
Martin and St. Lucie counties. On Tuesday,
Foley, a Republican who represents much of the Treasure Coast, sent a
letter to the corps chief in Washington asking that the plan be
fast-tracked through the bureaucratic process for quick congressional
review. "It is not only of utmost
importance to me but to the citizens of Martin County and the people of
Florida to see this project finally executed," Foley wrote to Lt.
Gen. Robert Flowers. Read
more
23-March-04
Supreme
Court dodges major ruling in Everglades pollution case
By GINA HOLLAND
© Miami
Herald
WASHINGTON - The Supreme
Court, sidestepping a major decision on the government's power to regulate
clean water, told a Florida court Tuesday to reconsider a pollution
dispute involving the Everglades. The ruling
extends a six-year fight between the 500-member Miccosukee Indian tribe
and a water district the Indians accuse of illegally dumping pollutants
into Florida's Everglades. The South Florida
Water Management District's pump west of Fort Lauderdale dumps as much as
423,000 gallons a minute of polluted runoff from
suburban lawns, farms and industrial yards into the Everglades, including
189,000 acres the state leased to the tribe and promised to keep in its
natural state. The district was sued in 1998 by
the Miccosukees and Friends of the Everglades under the federal Clean
Water Act. Read
more
U.S.
SUPREME COURT REJECTS SFWMD POLLUTION ARGUMENT
Press/For Immediate
Release
MIAMI- On March 23, 2004 the U.S.
Supreme Court rejected the South Florida Water Management District's
argument that they are only moving polluted water and are not the source
or responsible party for purposes of the CWA, but remanded the case back
to the District court for a factual determination of the
"distinctiveness" between Water Conservation Area 3A and
suburban Broward County. The case, the South
Florida Water Management District v. the Miccosukee Tribe of Indians, et
al., involves the South Florida Water Management District's practice of
pumping polluted water from urban and agricultural areas into Florida's
famed River of Grass. It was brought by Friends of the Everglades, a
small grassroots group founded by Marjory Stoneman Douglas, and the
Miccosukee Tribe of Indians, who live in the Everglades. The suit
alleges that the South Florida Water Management District, an agency of the
State of Florida, is violating the federal Clean Water Act by collecting
and dumping untreated run-off into the Everglades rather that treating it
or enforcing pollution laws against landowners. A U.S. District
Court and federal Appeals Court ruled in favor of Friends and the Tribe
and the Water Management District appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court last
year. John Childe, attorney for Friends of the
Everglades, said "We are grateful that the Supreme Court has
determined that the Clean Water Act applies to the kinds of pumps being
used by the SFWMD and welcome the opportunity to demonstrate to the Court
the difference between the pristine Everglades and a man-made suburban
drainage district." Read
more
SUPREME COURT
RULES:S-9 SAGA TO CONTINUE
Miccosukee Tribe Wins On Only Question Presented By the District Supreme
Court Calls District Argument "Untenable" Remands for Factual
Record On Issue Presented by Solicitor General
PRESS/For Immediate Release
Dexter Letinen (305) 279-3353
Joette Lorion (305) 281-0429
Today the U.S. Supreme Court
issued a 14 page opinion delivered by Justice Sandra Day O'Connor (along
with a separate two page opinion by Justice Scalia in which he partly
agrees and partly dissents) in the case South Florida Water Management
District v the Miccosukee Tribe of Indians and Friends of the Everglades.
The sole question the District presented to the Supreme Court was:
"Whether the pumping of water by a state water management
agency that adds nothing to the water being pumped constitutes an
"addition' of a pollutant ‘from' a point source triggering the need
for a National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System under the Clean
Water Act." The Miccsoukee Tribe prevailed on this issue with
the Supreme Court clearly rejecting the only issue the District's
presented. The Opinion states: "This initial argument is
untenable, and even the District appears to have abandoned it in its reply
brief." Opinion at p. 7. According to
Dexter Lehtinen, who argued this case before the Supreme Court, The
District wasted tons of taxpayer dollars bringing the question of whether
they are responsible for dirty water that their pump discharges into clean
water if their pump doesn't add anything to that water to the U.S. Supreme
Court, which heartily rejected it, calling their claim untenable. Read
more
Endangered wildlife could delay
construction of Scripps labs for months
By Prashant Gopal and Neil
Santaniello
© Sun-Sentinel
Mecca Farms' landscape of
oranges, rock-mining pits and stormwater ponds hardly seems a place to
stumble across rare wildlife. But at least one
endangered bird -- the Everglades wood stork -- has been seen visiting the
1,900-acre citrus grove, biologists and birders say. Another
endangered wetland creature, the snail kite, hunts for food next door to
the future Scripps Florida location and probably raids its existing
retention pond for its main chow, the apple snail, they say. And
the threatened but rebounding bald eagle also might be making Mecca one of
its haunts, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission says.
The endangered wildlife could pose a problem for county
planners trying to get The Scripps Research Institute's laboratories
running by 2006 by increasing the risk for complications and delays to the
project's tight schedule.
20
-March-04
Developers challenge DEP rule over water resources
By CHAD GILLIS
© Naples Daily News
Some Southwest Florida developers and landowners are saying rivers and estuaries shouldn't be given precedence over future growth and agriculture when it comes to the state's water supply.
A coalition of developers recently filed a challenge to a Florida Department of Environmental Protection rule that's expected to solidify the concept of reservations for rivers and other water bodies.
Called the Association of Florida Community Developers, the group is made up of 52 companies and landowners such as the Bonita Bay Group, the Ginn Co., Barron Collier Cos. and Collier Enterprises.
The challenge period for the DEP rule ended Friday and the issue could soon go to mediation or to court.
Reservations are basically a way of legally guaranteeing a certain amount of flow to a natural system.
Read more
19-March-04
Conservationists ask EPA to take over water protection
By CATHY ZOLLO
© Naples Daily News
Two national conservation groups said Thursday that Florida's environmental enforcers aren't up to the job of controlling polluters, so they are asking the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to step in.
The request from the National Resource Defense Council, the Sierra Club and Florida resident Linda Young came in a letter of intent to sue EPA if the agency doesn't take over enforcement of the Clean Water Act from the Florida Department of Environmental Protection.
Young is Southeast regional director for the Clean Water Network, a coalition of organizations seeking strong clean water safeguards.
Young, the NRDC and the Sierra Club offered dozens of examples where the state has failed to require permitting for polluters and failed to enforce Clean Water Act requirements.
Read more
18-March-04
What's At Stake! Stop Big Developers
from Pumping Florida Dry and Paving It Over!
Two Proposals by Developers Threaten Florida's Water and Critical Wildlife
Habitat
© Audubon
of Florida
The Association of Florida
Community Developers, claiming to represent 52 major development companies
owning over 1.4 million acres of land in Florida, has launched a major
attack on Florida's laws protecting water, remaining wildlife habitat, and
open space. This strategic attack on Florida's
environmental laws seeks to repeal key protections for Florida's wetlands,
springs, rivers and important wildlife habitat. A two-pronged attack is
aimed at weakening an important Florida program, that has guided major
development projects in Florida since 1972, and invalidating recent
decisions by the Florida Department of
Environmental Protection, which attempt to reserve at least some water for
the natural environment. This effort to reverse the limited progress we
have made on growth management and protecting water resources in Florida
comes at a time when over 800 people are moving to Florida every day and
approximately 200,000 acres of land is taken over by sprawling development
every year! Read
more
17-March-04
Developer plans Everglades museum, wildlife
foundation
By C. Ron Allen, Staff Writer
© Sun-Sentinel
Developer Ron Bergeron wants
to add one more facet to his empire: a museum and foundation. Bergeron
-- who has a park, an industrial park and a land development company
bearing his name -- said he wants to document the history, the wildlife
and the people of the River of Grass. He also wants to save animals that
live in the Everglades and preserve their habitat. Bergeron,
whose grandfather was a game warden in the wilderness, anticipated that 80
percent of the display at the Bergeron Everglades Museum and Wildlife
Foundation will be animals and birds that have been displaced and cannot
return to the wild. He intends for the nonprofit
educational corporation to be financed through grants and private dollars.
Depending on where the museum is built, he said he plans to support it
through either the sale of his real estate or cash.
Internal Memos Reveal Public To Be
Misled On Planned National Park Cuts, Even As Push For More Visitors
Launched
Source: Coalition of Concerned National Park Retirees
Contact: Christine Kraly, (703) 276-3258 or ckraly@hastingsgroup.com
WASHINGTON, D.C.///March 17, 2004///Even as the Department of Interior's
National Park Service (NPS) kicked off a major national campaign last
month with the U.S. travel industry to increase visitors to national
parks, the federal agency was quietly passing along instructions to park
superintendents to further reduce park maintenance and services, such as
lifeguards on summer beaches and visitor center operations on Sundays and
holidays, according to internal NPS memos made public for the first time
today by the nonpartisan Coalition of Concerned National Park Service
Retirees. The memos also reveal how NPS coached park superintendents on
how to mislead the news media and public about the service cuts in order
to avoid both "political controversy" and making the same kind
of budget-related statements that led to the controversial ouster in
December 2003 of
U.S. Park Police Chief Teresa Chambers.
Preservation program may adjust
acquisition boundary
By ERIC STAATS
© Naples Daily News
The Florida Forever land
preservation program, running up against growth pressures along Collier
County's urban boundary, is considering a retreat from a decade-old land
acquisition project. The project, part of the
Picayune Strand State Forest known as Belle Meade, has been on the state's
acquisition list since 1993. Land buyers now are
considering redrawing the acquisition boundary to exclude land still in
private ownership along Belle Meade's
western edge, which abuts the county's urban area, and to exclude active
farm fields in another part of Belle Meade. The
idea is part of a statewide review of land acquisition projects
and could come before the state's Acquisition and Restoration Council as
early as this June, said Kathalyn Gaither, a spokeswoman for the state
Department of Environmental Protection. Read
more
Roll the tape: It's Everglades 101
By Sally Swartz
© Palm
Beach Post
Wading birds, a kayaker
paddling on a jungle river, little boys fishing and a baby playing on the
beach tell part of the story. So do woodstorks searching for food in
greasy ooze, dirty brown water fouling the St. Lucie River, fish covered
with sores and angry residents waving protest signs. But
the real surprise in this documentary about the Indian River Lagoon and
St. Lucie estuary is the unity among the people interviewed by Hunter
Reno, a TV reporter who is the niece of former U.S. Attorney General Janet
Reno and former Martin County Commissioner Maggy Hurchalla. If all the
folks Ms. Reno talked with knew they had been invited to the same party,
they might send regrets. But one on one, Republicans and Democrats,
businessmen and environmentalists, bureaucrats and fishermen are united in
one cause: getting money from Congress to "get the water right"
for the Everglades, starting with the Indian River Lagoon.
16-March-04
National Park Rangers 'Endangered'
Leading Parks Advocate Releases Report Outlining Critical Staffing
Shortages in National Parks
CONTACT: Andrea Keller,
National Parks Conservation Association, 202-454-3332
Washington, D.C. - The nonpartisan park watchdog, the National
Parks Conservation Association (NPCA) today issued a groundbreaking report
on the critical shortage of staff in America's national parks, a shortage
that directly affects the experiences of millions of visitors this summer
and cripples the ability of the National Park Service to protect the
nation's heritage. "America's national park
rangers have become an endangered species," said NPCA President
Thomas Kiernan. "President Bush--and some of his predecessors--made
strong commitments to the American people about protecting our national
parks. But when push comes to shove, the parks are under funded year after
year by Washington." Read
more
Community fears big cats
By Kaydee Tuff
© Golden Gate
Gazette
Two months after reports of
Florida panthers frequenting the Pinecrest community near Loop Road in the
Big Cypress Preserve, several wildlife agencies admit the animals may pose
a safety concern to residents. "There are
no known cases of panthers attacking humans in Florida," says Florida
Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) officer Henry
Cabbage, "However, the presence of panthers that seem to have grown
accustomed to being around humans is unusual enough to deserve
attention." State and federal conservation
officials met with Pinecrest area residents and other concerned
individuals, Mar. 6, to discuss the presence of panthers around residences
and a conservation education center. Jan Michael
Jacobson, of the Everglades Institute, says the problem is more than a
just concern. He says he fears for his life and the lives of nearby
residents. Read
more
Argo Ranch bought by Sarasota developer
Equestrian friendly’ country estates planned
By DICK HOGAN
© Ft.Myers News-Press
A 1,728-acre Alva ranch is
being sold to a Sarasota developer for a community of country estates.
More than 1,100 acres of the Argo Ranch along Telegraph
Creek north of State Road 78 was sold last week for $10.2 million by
members of the Baker family to partnerships controlled by Sarasota-based
Benderson Development — the largest privately held developer in the
United States. The balance will be sold in a
separate transaction, according to
Thomas R. Baker, whose family has owned the land since the 1960s and still
operates it as a working ranch. Last summer,
Baker was in negotiations to sell the land to Lee County for preservation,
said Karen Forsyth, director of county lands. As
recently as December, Benderson had the property under contract and
approached the county to sell part or all of the property but the county
decided to pass until the sale actually went through, she said.
Groups suggest increased enforcement
Some environmental groups think more monitoring and better enforcement of
existing regulations may deter some illegal clearing
By RIDDHI TRIVEDI-ST. CLAIR
© Naples Daily News
The fine for illegally
cutting down a mangrove can be as high as $40,000 in Lee County. For a
homeowner that's a significant amount of money. "But
for a developer, that's pocket change," said Nancy Payton, field
representative with the Florida Wildlife Federation. "It's just the
cost of doing business. And in most cases of environmental violations like
that, the ability to do what they (developers) want to do, when they want
to do, outweighs the fines or penalties they might face." Environmental
groups such as the Florida Wildlife Federation and the
CREW Land Trust are expressing their frustration at the inability of
environmental regulations to deter illegal clearing and other activities
by large landowners and developers that harm endangered species and
sensitive wetlands in Southwest Florida. Read
more
15-March-04
Scientists to pore over new plans for
Lake O
The plans include holding the lake at a lower level, installing pumps and
limiting discharges to the estuary.
By Suzanne Wentley
© Stuart
News
State scientists today plan
to discuss new Lake Okeechobee regulation methods that could limit heavy
discharges into the fragile St. Lucie Estuary. South
Florida Water Management District scientists will present to an advisory
committee preliminary plans to change lake management rules to improve the
ecological health of the lake and the estuaries into which
it drains. By reviewing the rules, scientists
hope to hold Lake Okeechobee at a lower level, install pumps that would
ease water supply concerns and allow for very low-volume discharges to the
estuaries when needed. "The lake is high
and it's frustrating for all of us who work directly on the lake, but the
prognosis of how we manage is improving," said Susan
Gray, the district's director of the Lake Okeechobee division. During
the past few months, state scientists have worked with the Army Corps of
Engineers' Jacksonville office to create computer models to determine the
effect of new rules that would allow the lake to drop a foot
lower — to 12.5 feet above sea level — by the start of the rainy
season. Read
more
Five Florida Small Businesses Thrive by
Focusing on the Everglades
By Tom Stieghorst
© Miami Herald
It's Monday morning and Cindy
Gregg is making her regular pitch at BeachPlace Towers with her friend
"Nasty." Only a year old, Nasty
already has 80 teeth. The baby American alligator
helps hold the attention of about 200 timeshare owners, who have packed a
19th-floor suite of the Fort Lauderdale high rise for their orientation
seminar. As Nasty wriggles for freedom, Gregg
tells the crowd about the birds, bears and other wildlife highlighted on
her tram tour of the Florida Everglades. Afterward,
Marc Fisher, a podiatrist from Springfield, Mass., agrees to spend about
$360 on the tour for himself and three sons. "It's the educational
part that appeals to me," Fisher said. "The kids have studied
this in school." Read
more
Cures for Complexity
Long a technology laggard, the $3 trillion worldwide construction industry
is beginning to use IT to manage increasingly complicated projects—and
learning useful lessons about the character and challenges of complexity
itself.
BY FRED HAPGOOD
© CIO
"Guys in this business
are guys who like to build things," says Steve Setzer, spokesman for
Constructware, an application service provider that supplies management
support services to the construction sector. "They don't like
paperwork." Or, until recently, computers.
Setzer is struggling to untangle a paradox: IT is about
managing complexity, and the average construction project is a sink of
complexity. Gargantuan construction projects are veritable swamps. Yet the
construction industry has tended to be a lagging adopter of IT.
"Until recently, construction IT usually reported to the CFO because
the only information technology in the business was that supporting
accounting," says Mark Napier, a vice president and systems manager
at Bovis Lend Lease, the London-based construction giant currently
building the AOL Time Warner tower in New York City (among other
projects). Read
more
Officials work to protect Florida
panthers from disease
By ERIC STAATS
© Naples
News
The first sign of trouble for the
Florida panther population came in November 2002. Researchers,
conducting routine checkups on the endangered cats, captured a female
panther north of the Collier-Hendry line in the Okaloacoochee Slough
Wildlife Management Area. The checkup found a
surprise: a case of feline leukemia in the wild panther population.
The panther showed no outward signs of the disease when
it was captured, but it died five months later from an overwhelming
bacterial infection. That case was followed by a
second one in January 2003, then two more during the 2004 capture season.
One of those three panthers has died from the disease, a second was killed
in a fight with another panther. The third still is roaming the
Okaloacoochee Slough. The four cases mark the
first reports from anywhere in the world of multiple feline leukemia cases
in populations of wildcats. Read
more
Popularity tough on dolphins
Editorial
© Key West Citizen
Is there a more magical moment in
the waters off the Keys than having a bottlenose dolphin surface nearby,
maybe even decide to play in the wake of your boat? Those
of us lucky enough to live here still marvel at these moments. And for our
visitors, they become once-in-a-lifetime experiences. Unfortunately,
they have also become an increasingly sought-after commodity, luring
dozens of charterboats into business in the Key West area to sell trips to
see local wild dolphins. The key word there is
"wild." Unlike the dolphins at captive facilities up the road,
these creatures are free and under no one's supervision or care.
They are covered by the Marine Mammal Protection Act, which prohibits
harassing them or approaching them too closely — but enforcement of
these measures is sorely lacking. Read
more
14-March-04
Chief fought the law, and tribe won
Brawler: He challenged authorities over tribal gambling and endangered
species law - and wrestled reptiles just for fun.
By Robert Little and Mike Adams
© Baltimore
Sun
HOLLYWOOD, Fla. - An orphan
by age 13 who says he is half-Irish and never knew his father, James E.
Billie grew up on tribal lands where living conditions had scarcely
improved since the Army stopped trying to exterminate the Seminoles in
1858, after the third of what the tribe calls the Seminole Wars. When
the first Seminole bingo hall in Hollywood opened shortly after Billie's
election as chairman in 1979, members of the tribe subsisted largely on
tourism-related businesses and tribal payments of $100 a year or less.
Today, the Seminoles' rise to wealth through gambling is owed largely to
the brash, nose-thumbing style of the man who served as the tribe's
chairman for two decades. From the start,
controversy dogged Seminole gambling operations. The Pennsylvania Crime
Commission said investors in the tribe's first casino had ties to mobster
Meyer Lansky, and the ensuing history is punctuated by legal battles,
fixed bingo games and allegations of profit skimming. Read
more
Development plan ignites furor
A proposed development for 18,000 people on wetlands near Florida City
would cripple efforts to restore Biscayne Bay and the Everglades,
environmentalists say.
BY ANDRES VIGLUCCI AND CURTIS MORGAN
© Miami
Herald
A developer wants to build
what amounts to a small city on protected wetlands outside Florida City, a
project that if approved could open the door to development of broad
swaths of now-untouchable farm and open lands elsewhere in South
Miami-Dade County. The developer, Atlantic
Civil, has presented the rough outline of a project of startling scope to
regional planners -- 6,000 dwelling units, nearly 400,000 square feet of
shops, two schools, 240 hotel rooms and a cinema multiplex. The
estimated population -- about 18,000 -- is more than double the current
population of Florida City, which is seeking to annex the site. The
1,500-acre site sits in a flood-prone zone outside the county's boundary
for urban development and in the middle of a broader wetlands zone
considered integral to multibillion-dollar efforts to replumb the
Everglades and restore natural water flows to Biscayne Bay. Read
more
13-March-04
Scripps Howard Foundation announces
National Journalism Award winners
By Naples Daily News Staff and wire reports
© Naples
News
CINCINNATI — A Naples Daily
News 15-day series about widespread pollution of the Gulf of Mexico won
the national Edward J. Meeman Award for environmental reporting when the
Scripps Howard Foundation on Friday announced the winners of its annual
National Journalism Awards. The Daily News
series, "Deep Trouble: The Gulf in Peril," won the award in the
under 100,000 circulation category for the series, which published from
Sept. 28 through Oct. 12. The Edward J. Meeman
Award in the over 100,000 circulation category was won by The Washington
Post for a series, "Big Green," which brought attention to
questionable business practices at The Nature Conservancy, the world's
largest, nonprofit environmental group. Of the
Daily News series, the judges said it is "a remarkable project that
delivered incredible insight. It is massive in its scope, but matches its
volume with the excellence of its writing, reporting and
photography." Kelley Benham of the St.
Petersburg Times won the Ernie Pyle Award for human interest writing. Read
more
Return of the everglades
Away from Florida's theme parks and beaches, LASZLO BUHASZ visits the
saw-grass prairies and mangrove swamps of Everglades National Park. Here,
a multibillion-dollar project aims to curb the damage done by poachers,
agricultural runoff and water-cycle manipulation, while drawing attention
to the beauty of North America's largest subtropical wetlands
By LASZLO BUHASZ
© The
Globe and Mail
EVERGLADES NATIONAL PARK,
FLA. -- At Shark Valley, the northern entrance to Florida's Everglades
National Park, a cluster of people on a walkway have set up cameras on
tripods to photograph a comical turf war between a rare wood stork and an
anhinga. Perched on a branch above a black-water slough, the two birds
sporadically clash beaks like avian swordsmen. Nearby,
a snowy egret preens its white feathers and a great white heron wades in
the black water stalking fish and frogs. On either side of the walkway,
alligators of all sizes soak up the sun. The shallow waters teem with fish
and turtles. "It's fantastic to see so much
wildlife clustered together like this," says Bruce Smith, a retired
bureaucrat from Washington. He and his wife, Mary, who are both
birdwatchers and amateur photographers, are on their first trip to the
park and are relishing the beauty of the creatures around them. Read
more
12-March-04
Water managers angry with U.S. officials
over exotic growth in Everglades
By Neil Santaniello
© Sun-Sentinel
Tired of seeing the north
Everglades draped in the wrong kind of green-- exotic plant green -- South
Florida water managers lashed out this week at federal wildlife officials.
They complained that, at least from the air, there's
little visible evidence of progress in the U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service's battle against exotic plants overtaking the Arthur R. Marshall
Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge in Palm Beach County. South
Florida Water Management District board members said the U.S. Interior
Departments is spending money on monitoring and research that could be put
to better use eradicating the federal wildlife refuge's two prime pest
plants: melaleuca and lygodium, fast-spreading tree and vine overtaking
native wetland plants. "I can't see any
sign of anything going on over there" to get ahead of the problem,
said Michael Collins, a district board member, during a board meeting
Wednesday in Miami.
09-March-04
Tallahassee's disgrace
Lobbyists in Florida's capital are buying votes, writing bills and making
their fortunes - at the cost of political integrity.
A Times Editorial
© St. Petersburg Times
Florida lawmakers like to
blame the ascendancy of high-powered and high-priced lobbyists on term
limits, as if legislative naivete were somehow to blame. But, as St.
Petersburg Times capital bureau chief Lucy Morgan reported on Sunday,
those who are well-connected in Tallahassee are getting fabulously wealthy
by delivering a single product: votes. The
"MoneyWorld" that Morgan described is about political
immorality, not uninformed
innocence. "These folks who support the
political process don't make contributions,
they make investments," says Tom Lee, a Republican senator from
Brandon who is line to become the next Senate president. "... It
scares me that we are moving down this path. Whoever has the most money,
wins." In the past decade, as Republicans
have taken charge of both legislative chambers and the governor's office,
the ante to sit at the big Capitol
table has reached six and seven figures. The lobbying firms have become
one-stop shopping for lawmakers, delivering pre-written laws, fine food
and drink, entertainment and campaign contributions. Thirteen lobbyists
now top the charts at more than $10-million each - $10-million in campaign
contributions over the past seven years from companies they represent to
the legislators whose votes they are buying. Last year, lobbyists spent
nearly
$8-million, or roughly $50,000 per lawmaker, simply wining and dining the
Legislature. Read
more
05-March-04
For-profit method of rebuilding coast
explored
Group meets in N.O. to discuss 'mitigation banks'
By Mark Schleifstein
© Times
Picayune, LA
Making a profit from
rebuilding wetlands would seem to be a tall order, especially for people
familiar with Louisiana's costly struggle to restore its coastline.
But a group of business executives, scientists and
federal and state officials from across the nation are meeting this week
in New Orleans to discuss successes and failures in the new world of
"mitigation banking." A wetlands bank
is a firm that buys or leases former wetlands that can be
restored and enters into an agreement with the federal or state government
to let the company issue mitigation credits for each acre restored.
The bank sells the credits to developers who are
required by the federal Clean Water Act to create or restore wetlands when
they fill or destroy natural wetlands. Otherwise, the developers would
have to restore
wetlands themselves. Read
more
The
Politics of Sugar
© Center
for Responsive Politics
As this study nears
completion, debate in Washington is joined on what many believe is the
ultimate test of the political power of the sugar industry: the
reauthorization of the long-standing sugar price-support program. Will the
sugar industry lose its lucrative "sweet deal" of the last 60
years? Will the forces of fiscal restraint and government reform prevail?
These questions move to the forefront of the congressional agenda with the
1995 farm bill, and they invite us to explore a classic example of
money-dominated policy making. Our
story begins with the trail of political money in Washington -- the
millions of dollars given in myriad ways to finance political campaigns
and influence national policy-making. The trail continues to Florida,
where the federal government support program has enriched a few families
at the expense of all consumers while inflicting unprecedented
environmental damage. This study goes well beyond the simple examination
of the cost of sugar price supports, demonstrating that at the end of the
road, the public is holding the bag -- paying for everything from higher
sugar prices to the multimillion-dollar cleanup of the Everglades. Read
more
04-March-04
Supreme
Court Hears Everglades Case
Decision Will Impact Clean Water Act
© National
Wildlife Federation
Restoration of Florida's famed
"river of grass" could be
impacted by a Supreme Court ruling
that will determine the
scope of the Clean Water Act's ability to regulate
the transfer
of polluted runoff into protected waters.
Photo: JASON STONE
The Supreme Court recently heard arguments
in a case that could significantly impact both the Florida Everglades and
water management practices across the nation. The case involves the South
Florida Water Management District's practice of pumping
phosphorus-contaminate runoff from South Florida commercial areas into the
protected waters of the Everglades. The Miccosukee Tribe of Indians filed
a lawsuit alleging that the water management district is required under
the Clean Water Act to seek a permit to pump. However, the defense argues
that pumping this runoff is not in violation of the Clean Water Act
because it is simply moving
polluted water around, not actually causing new pollution.
NWF, in conjunction with several other groups, has filed a "friend of
the court" brief, urging the Supreme Court to uphold a lower court's
decision in favor of the tribe. "Regulation would ensure the pumping of
mass quantities of polluted water into the Everglades is properly
managed--a move that makes sense in light of all the time and money
committed to Everglades restoration," says NWF Water Resources Counsel Jim
Murphy. "On a national level, it will also determine the overall scope of
the Clean Water Act's ability to regulate the transfer of polluted water."
A final ruling on the case is expected in June.
Read
more
Motocross motors into Big Cypress
Introducing a top-caliber motocross park in South Florida, the Seminole
Tribe Motocross will feature several tracks, a drag strip for
four-wheelers and a three-mile trail in the heart of the Everglades.
BY JAMES HESKETH
© Miami
Herald
World-class motocross is now
here in South Florida. The 85-acre Seminole
Tribe Motocross, featuring multiple tracks, a drag strip for
four-wheelers, and a three-mile trail is being carved out of the heart of
the Everglades on the Big Cypress Indian Reservation -- just an hour or so
from Miami and Fort Lauderdale. On the ride to
the park with Todd Sandoval and Bill Anderson from Palmetto Motorsports,
who were taking me on my first off-road riding experience, I learned some
history of motocross in South Florida. ''Up to
the seventies,'' Sandoval said, ''there were a lot of places for motocross
tracks. Pompano, Deerfield Beach, Hollywood, Homestead all had tracks.
There was even a track in Hialeah at what is now Amelia Earhart Park.
''But by the '80s,'' he said, ''rising [real estate]
values made it impractical for people to use the land for motocross.''
Now the only local track is Pepsi Air Dania, in Dania
Beach, which has been operating on a month-to-month lease and is set to
close down soon. The next closest track is at Okeechobee City, west of
Fort Pierce. Read
more
New trees dot land in project on ranch
By Libby Wells
© Palm Beach Post
A sprawling ranch in
northwest Martin County that will be used to store and clean water flowing
into the St. Lucie and Indian rivers is being replanted this week with
thousands of native trees in an effort to restore the cattle farm to its
natural condition. The 22,656-acre Allapattah
Ranch, which was all pine flatwoods and wetlands before it was cleared and
drained for cows and crops, is being sown with 125,000 5- to 6-inch slash
pine seedlings grown at a nursery in Chiefland and brought south in a
refrigerated truck. The $40,000 project is being
done by the South Florida Water Management District, which owns all but
2,400 acres of Allapattah, and the state Division of Forestry. The
replanting was not supposed to start until next year, but the trees were
available and the weather was right, the water district said.
03-March-04
Judge
closes case after setting up review procedure
By CATHERINE WILSON
© Sarasota
Herald-Tribune
MIAMI -- A federal judge has
taken Everglades pollution cleanup off the public stage, at least
temporarily, by setting up a procedure for expert review of federal and
state restoration work. U.S. District Judge
Federico Moreno concluded that "it may be impossible" to meet
phosphorous standards, the most critical aspect of the project, by 2006.
But he gave a special master broad authority to monitor compliance and
formally closed the court case with a one-page order last week. The
decision brings to an end a two-year series of court hearings at which
attorneys bickered about compliance, although anyone who claims public
agencies are violating a 1992 settlement agreement can ask the court to
get involved again. Special master John Barkett,
an environmental lawyer who has handled nine Superfund cleanup cases,
could mediate any dispute and would be asked to make recommendations to
the judge on any motions claiming noncompliance. Read
more
78 Miami-Dade homes being razed for
Everglades restoration
By Neil Santaniello
©
