Florida Power and Light will be making nice with mainstream environmental groups in downtown Miami this week. The corporation is a sponsor of the annual Everglades Coalition meeting-- this year in downtown Miami. It is not likely many grass roots activists can afford the daily $100 price tag at the downtown Miami Hilton, plus parking. You could always take mass transit.
As the mainstream environmentalists meet at the Hilton downtown, in Martin County a group of Everglades Earth First! activists are camping out and seeking access to one of the oldest bald cypress swamps in Florida. The protesters are claiming that FPL's pumping to cool its nearby power plant is destroying the swamp. Most residents of Miami-Dade don't know that the local county commission allowed FPL's application for new nuclear reactors in South Dade to go forward despite the fact that FPL refused to include any data at all about where it was going to get its cooling water. The Martin County protesters are angered by a power plant this is only pumping a few million gallons per day for its cooling needs: FPL's nuclear facility will need more than 60 million gallons per day. Read the press statement and an article in the Palm Beach Post, below and our archive feature on Florida Power and Light for more commentary on its nuclear ambition in Homestead.
For Immediate Release
Media Alert: Activists Stand-Off with Law Enforcement at Barley Barber
Swamp
Media Contact: Panagioti Tsolkas 561- 308-9452 Taylor Sanderson
440-570-8631
January 6, 2009—Indiantown, Florida.
A group of local Everglades Earth First! activists are currently engaged in
a standoff with FPL, Martin County Sheriff, Homeland Security and the FBI
near Barley Barber Swamp, an old growth cypress swamp near the Florida Power
and Light Martin County Plant. The on-going vigil outside the Barley Barber
Swamp began the morning of January 5th after multiple requests by the group
to be permitted access to view the swamp. FPL is responsible to preserve
the area and has closed the swamp from public access since 2001.
After a thirty-person rally in front of the Martin County Power Plant, the
group attempted to hike into the swamp, but were stopped by law enforcement
who threatened arrests if activists entered the Barley Barber Swamp. The
standoff went through the night as activists maintain the public should be
able to see the impact FPL is having on some of the last remaining old
growth in the state. One of the trees, estimated at 1100 years old, is
likely the oldest tree in the southeast United States.
Earth First!er Taylor Sanderson stated that the group's demands include
"that FPL make a New Year's resolution to take accountability for damage
done to this beautiful swamp by the adjacent Martin County Power Plant,
currently the largest fossil-fuel plant in the United States. The
groundwater is literally being sucked from under the swamp, and the trees
are dying as a result." The group has worked with scientists monitoring
the hydrology of the affected area, and has concluded that the plant was
closed in 2001 not just for security reasons as FPL claims, but because the
power plant is obviously destroying an area that the company promised to
preserve. "We want this old growth forest that is home to the oldest bald
cypress tree in Florida to be preserved. FPL is killing the oldest cypress
trees in the state. Their actions must be monitored" Sanderson continued.
The group of activists anticipate several arrests in the coming days.
According to group member Russell McSpadden, "we are willing to accept
arrest if that is what it takes to preserve the Barley Barber swamp." Mr.
McSpadden added "we intend to fight FPL's destruction of South Florida's
wetlands through legal means and when necessary with our bodies, through
protest, civil disobedience, and the judicial system."
"We have a right to take matters into our own hands," McSpadden continued,
"We won't tolerate FPL's blatant destruction of Florida's natural resources,
including the desecration of Barley Barber swamp and the construction of the
West County Energy Center which will have an enormous environmental impact
on the Loxahatchee region of the Everglades. Elected officials and
environmental organizations throughout the state take contributions from FPL
and are turning a blind eye to the communities and wild lands they are
entrusted to protect. We won't tolerate apathy on the part of those who are
letting this go on."
Photos and video from the swamp are available upon request.
On-the-field interviews are available by phone or on site. Call for
directions and assistance to reach the vigil site.
We would like to extend an invitation for anyone to come out to the camp for
the most up-to-date reports, as the situation could change at any moment.
Unfortunately, the encampment is not accessible by car at this moment,
however, we can arrange bicycles for a crew to make the approx. four mile
trek. Please call 561.308.9452 and we can help make arrangements.
Protestors stage showdown with FPL over 450-acre swamp in Martin County
January 7th, 2009 by Post Staff
By JASON SCHULTZ
A showdown is brewing near Port Mayaca in Martin County as a group of environmental protesters are camping out for a second night tonight demanding access to a natural swamp on land owned by Florida Power and Light Co.
"If they don't open the swamp, we will cross the tracks and risk arrest," said Peter Shultz of Hobe Sound, a member of Everglades Earth First.
The Barley Barber Swamp is on property FPL uses for its power-generation plant west of Indiantown. Once open to the public for tours, the 450-acre swamp was closed after Sept. 11, 2001 for security concerns, FPL officials said.
The protesters are claiming the power plant is drying up the swamp.
"That swamp is conservation land and cannot be altered," Shultz said. "We want it opened up to the public."
Peter "Panagioti" Tsolkas, one of the key protesters, said several of them have camped out on an access road near FPL property close to the banks of Lake Okeechobee. They rotate people out every couple hours.
He said Martin County sheriff's deputies are preventing them from entering the swamp, which he said is public land, and threatening to arrest them for trespassing.
"We intend to go in because we have legal standing," said Tsolkas, who was arrested in 2004 for erecting a bamboo platform in the middle of Dixie Highway in downtown Lake Worth.
Other members of the group camping out tonight have also been arrested for a sit-in protest outside an FPL power plant under construction in western Palm Beach County last year.
Martin County sheriff's spokeswoman Rhonda Irons said deputies were monitoring the group and advised them they would be arrested for trespassing onto FPL's land, which totals 11,300 acres. She said so far there have been no arrests.
In an e-mailed statement, FPL spokeswoman Sarah Marmion said their property west of Indiantown is a unique ecosystem that "continues to thrive just as it has since FPL voluntarily preserved it more than 30 years ago."
The statement said the company anticipates reopening the swamp to the public in 2010, when a new solar energy plant being built on the property is expected to be completed.
Martin County also tries to work with FPL to open the swamp
Meanwhile a Martin County official who worked as a tour guide at the swamp as a youth said the county may be resurrecting its own efforts to get public access to the swamp.
Environmentally Sensitive Lands Administrator Chuck Barrowclough tried to talk FPL officials into re-opening the swamp for tours in 2006, but he said the talks did not go very far because the county did not have the money needed to pay for the swamp's upkeep and run tours. He said county commissioners last year made one of their key objectives the development of eco-tourism to diversify the county's economy.
Barrowclough said county officials are working on a new proposal to use county tourist money, derived from the county's hotel bed tax, to pay for a public access program that would allow activities like kayaking and bird watching tours on FP&L's property. Tax revenue and admissions fees would cover the costs, and the tourists would bring revenue to the community.
"It's one of our greatest natural resources," Barrowclough said of the swamp.
But Barrowclough said he did not agree with the protestors argument that the swamp was public property.
"I think there are much better ways to get access to a natural resource," he said.
Group member, Taylor Sanderson said she liked the idea of the swamp being open, but not if it meant the public would have to pay to tour it.
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