Mysickriver.com: how the health of taxpayers and visitors are Florida's lesser concern compared to the rights of big polluters who fund political campaigns ... by gimleteye

Lost in the tsunami of news coverage about Big Sugar's role in fouling Florida's iconic waterways is the real public health threat from toxic algae.

Here is an interview with a Martin County resident whose website is called: mysickriver.com
One might ask, why is a private individual (who asked for anonymity) -- unconnected to public health services in any way -- undertaking what the State of Florida ought to be doing: creating a database of illnesses caused by contact with Florida's diseased waterways? There is an answer to this question, but first, mysickriver.com The front page includes a statement of purpose:

"... to gather relevant data that will fuel further research into the health of our dying river systems. The information collected will be used to create a comprehensive report in regards to the human health concerns which are facing the areas surrounding Lake Okeechobee and the Saint Lucie River, Indian River Lagoon, and Caloosahatchee River systems. As the main objectives of this study are rooted in the purpose of scientific research and human wellness, we ask that participants be honest and forthcoming with their experiences."

When did you start mysickriver.com?

I started the website during what we call "The Lost Summer of 2013". It was late July.

What lead you to start mysickriver.com?

I grew up in Martin County. I have three kids and they are growing up in Martin County … that is part of what makes this so personal to me. I have such a deep love for Martin County. I went to elementary, middle school and high school here and I think this area is so, so very special. It bothers me so much what is happening to our water. My son LOVES to fish. He hates TV, hates computers and tablets, and he hates to be inside. His whole life is about the water. If he could have a fishing rod in his hand all day, he would be in heaven. Isn't this what we want? To have children who aren't stuck indoors, passively staring at television sets? It bothers me he is growing up in a community that loves the water but can't anymore. It bothers me that the very first question he asks in the morning -- because he knows -- "... where is it safe to go in the water? ... where is the water dirty? ... and even if the water is good, he knows we can't eat fish he catches." This is Florida, and it should be safe all the time. Even little things, … It just breaks my heart. When I was a child, over the summer we used to go to camp at the local environmental center. I couldn't wait to go there. We would learn about the manatees, about dolphin and fish in our rivers. Everyone looked forward to being in the third grade because that was when you could go seining in the river. We would put out a net and draw it in and catch sea horses, little turtles, all kinds of fish -- 20 species of fish -- it was just so glorious. But if you go out now, even when the water is safe, the children see one or two species of pinfish. Our waters have been killed off to the point where it is not the same as it was decadees ago and that is just really sad.

That is a very compelling story. Why won't you let me use your name?

I'm a very private person. I did this website because no one else had. We are just neighborhood people here, and we all know about Big Sugar.

You're afraid?

Yes.

Is today's algae bloom worse than 2013?

Yes. It is 100 times worse. 400 times worse, but what is happening now is making me more confident. I'm getting positive encouragement from friends and they are getting involved, too.

What kind of response did you have in 2013?

It was difficult to get the word out. The website only had about 35 reports of illnesses, but I heard about a lot more.

Was there a trigger?


Over July 4th weekend, a lot of friends came down with terrible stomach flu, vomiting and diarreah … once I started asking questions about what they had done, I discovered that most had gone to our local sand bar for the Fourth … I found out there were around 50 cases of people who had become violently ill who had gone to that sand bar. I called the Martin County Health Department. They said they were not required to post signs or alert people becuase they didn’t have public facilities, bathrooms or public access … after a lot of phone calls, they were able to test in other areas … so now the sand bar is posted. At the time, there were a few locations where the county had posted high bacteria warnings, but there was nothing posted for the sand bar or a lot of other parks even though the algae had shown up there.

Why didn't you call the state of Florida Department of Health?

It didn't occur to me. I called my local county. They are the people I know.

Did you feel the Martin County Health Department was responsive?

Yes and no. In 2013 they weren’t encouraging reports about illnesses. They would only take reports at that time if people had gone to doctor, and if the doctor had given a definitive diagnosis. Of course, that is hard for doctors to do. Sometimes the symptoms of bad water are the same as food poisoning or the flu. Anyhow I wanted to see, with the website, if down the road we could see clusters of similar symptoms and possibly dates and times. If we would get 10 reports in one specific area where we know algae is present, that is a smoking gun. I talked with an epidemiologist who said the information could be useful.

After 2013, "The Lost Summer", what happened to your website?

Once the discharges stopped, people tend to forget. My webmaster let the domain subscription lapse, and so I actually had to relaunch it last month.

So this summer is worse than 2013?

This year’s event is without a doubt, 100 percent worse. It is just absolutely devastating. I have close to 90 reports right now of people who have gotten severe respiratory illnesses, flu-like symptoms. Some people are getting skin lesions from contact from the water and infections that are very hard to treat. A few weeks ago someone I know, a good friend who lives just half a mile down the street from Central Marina dropped his fishing rod into the water … he didn’t even jump into the river for 30 seconds … then he came straight to my swimming pool and jumped in to wash off ... he didn't even have contact with the actual algae but that night he became violently ill and for the next three days he had awful diarrhea, fever chills and he missed work for the first time in 20 years. In twenty years he had never taken a day off from work for sickness. Not one day. Thirty seconds of exposure to the river.

What are your hopes for mysickriver.com ?

My hope is that more people discover the website. I know that people who are using the Caloosahatchee River and over in Lee County they are getting the same algae bloom from Lake Okeechobee. I also know that people around Lake Okeechobee are using lake water to drink. There are a lot of diseases associated with toxic algae, including neurological ones. The people who are drinking Lake Okeechobee water are at risk, and they should know. I'm hoping eventually to make the data from the website public so that it can be shared and that people know it is a trust worthy source. I am just trying to get information that can help Florida in general. I almost don’t trust anyone else when it comes to these issues, so it’s something I started myself … I know where this information is coming from. It is a very close and tight-knit community.

So what is the biggest lesson you have learned from this experience?

Well, I'm finding out that if you look at how the state regulates agricultural fertilizer -- nitrogen is the biggest pollutant and cause of the algae blooms -- that the basin regulations are all screwed up and Lake Okeechobee is basically just a sewer for polluters. The state is supposed to control impaired waters, but if you look closely it just seems that the state wants to create them. The state should be protecting people, right? My son should be able to put a fishing line in the water without asking me if it's safe or not. That isn't a way to live.

How can people contact you?

People can contact me anonymously through Facebook.

Thank you very much.

NOTE TO READERS: The reason the state does not maintain data bases and track water borne illnesses is no mystery.

Gov. Rick Scott, Agriculture Secretary Adam Putnam, and Big Sugar shills like Lee County state representative Matt Caldwell have a thousand excuses. "It's the federal government's fault," they say who otherwise bang the table about "state's rights". The fact is that the State of Florida has sole responsibility for water quality rules and regulations.

Every attempt, over many, many years by environmental groups to proactively tighten pollution regulations has been opposed by the Florida Chamber of Commerce, by Associated Industries of Florida, and by Big Ag -- especially Big Sugar. Florida's tourism-related industry groups have been no help at all, either, and Florida's mainstream media -- with a few exceptions -- as been mostly absent even though it takes no imagination whatsoever to predict these results.

Accumulating data of people who become ill from contact with Florida's waters would put pressure on the state to do something about polluters. That is exactly opposite of what big polluters who fund political campaigns want.

Like the bumper sticker says, if you're not outraged, you're not paying attention.

Dirty politics and dirty water go hand in hand, in Florida … by gimleteye

"Florida can better regulate its water than bureaucrats in D.C.," said GOP Congressman Steve Southerland at a news conference last month in Tallahassee, with Putnam at his side. Baloney. The two were urging Congress to pass a change to water rules that further hampers the EPA to protect people, the economy and environment.

It is a trend that Democrats have failed to resist. The assertion of states rights -- in particular against federal regulation of the environment -- animates corporate polluters and their mouthpieces in Florida like no other issue.

For instance, last year the Florida Chamber of Commerce and Associated Industries both lobbied very heavily against EPA involvement in regulation for pollution of Florida waters by excess fertilizer runoff. Instead of hard, fast numerical standards for pollution, Florida has new standards that are unlikely to ever be effectively enforced because they are written so loosely.

While coastal residents on the St. Lucie River and Caloosahatchee are spitting mad about the consequences, even they -- mostly Republican voters -- don't put two and two together. For example, how this marketing of states rights matches the aims of the biggest polluters in Florida, Big Sugar, with the biggest private industrial conglomerate in America, Koch Industries and its affiliates. Both support the erosion of environmental accountability straight through Florida law down into the local counties where rules and regulations are also set up so that polluters can evade accountability, shifting the costs of pollution to taxpayers.

It's too bad that more Floridians won't cast their vote against Republicans who violate the basic tenet of conservatism: full cost accounting for toxics in our air and water.

The problem is not "bureaucrats in D.C.", the convenient bugaboo and scapegoat.

The problem isn't the EPA.

The problem is government-designed-to-fail. And the proponents of government-designed-to-fail are those same congressmen and secretaries of agriculture like Adam Putnam who slammed a door in a Tampa Bay Times reporter's face when confronted with questions about being wined and dined on a hunting trip by U.S. Sugar, to the King Ranch in Texas.

Dirty water politics organizes in the clubs and back rooms and hunting lodges where ordinary voters are excluded. In November, it is time to throw the cronies out -- back into the private sector where they can do whatever they want, free from the intrusion of government.

Congressman Southerland's assault on behalf of corporate polluters in Florida has national ramifications and shows what is at stake in the November elections. If control of the US Senate shifts to the GOP, there will be very little to hold the polluters back from getting what they want.

You can't claim to be conservative and at the same time stand for shifting the costs of pollution to taxpayers.


IN OUR OPINION
Editorial: Dirty water politics
Ocala Star Banner
Published: Thursday, September 4, 2014 at 6:30 a.m.

A proposed rule that would clarify what bodies of water fall under federal regulation has created a political firestorm here in Florida, pitting dozens of environmental groups against a powerful coalition of big business, big agriculture and conservative politicians.

The idea originally was to bring clarity to what waters and wetlands fall under Environmental Protection Agency purview, as ordered by the U.S. Supreme Court and Congress. But so far, the only thing that is clear is that the opposition, led by Congressman Steve Southerland, R-Panama City, and Florida Agriculture Commissioner Adam Putnam, are more concerned about protecting big business and agriculture interests than protecting our state's steadily deteriorating rivers, lakes and springs. Southerland has introduced a bill in Congress, disingenuously named …

Kabuki Theater: Former Senator Bob Graham, on Everglades Restoration ... by gimleteye

"Everglades Restoration: Can this marriage be saved?" is the question asked by former US senator Bob Graham (Democrat), the living political icon most closely associated with government efforts to save the River of Grass.

In a Miami Herald editorial, Graham blames the Florida legislature for extremism in the 2011 session that eviscerated environmental protections and budgets. He might have added that the main funders of political campaigns: Associated Industries, the Florida Chamber of Commerce, the builders, realtors, and speculators were rubbing their hands with glee at the time. ("If we knew it would be this easy to decapitate environmental regulations, we would have crashed the economy a long time ago.") Graham cites draconian cuts to science and administrative protections endorsed by Gov. Rick Scott (Republican). He sidesteps the fact that Scott funded his way to the governor's mansion without a jot of knowledge about Florida's environment or the deformed politics targeting protections put in place through broad bipartisan support in earlier generations of the legislature.

Indeed Graham's editorial is better viewed as Kabuki drama, although one has to be well versed in the form that has unfolded over decades to recognize the points. That is the key point about Kabuki, a thousand year old tradition of Japanese drama where every plot point and character is well known to the audiences. (continued...)

Two Weeks Ago for Me and Yesterday for Barney Bishop. By Geniusofdespair

I went to my broker 2 weeks ago with the goal of unloading all my stocks. Yep, he talked me out of it. I did dump 10% of my holdings in stocks.

Am I enjoying my vacation? Why don't you ask my broker.

On a happy note, Barney Bishop (Rick Scott BFF) has resigned/forced out from Associated Industries of Florida. He is staying on until December and will consult for AIF thereafter. Can you believe he was once the head of the Democratic Party? He should move to Maggie Valley. He and Steve Shiver would get on famously. The $400,000 salaried Bishop may have been targeted for his friggin' big mouth -- for saying the number one goal of the group was the removal of Senator Bill Nelson. Apparently Bill Nelson must have some fans left over at AIF.

Florida: abandoned to the land speculators by Governor Scott... by gimleteye

One of the key features of the 40 Year War on the Environment has been-- at least in Florida-- to dismantle federal regulatory authority in favor of the state. That is why, at the present moment, the Republican, radical right has taken such ferocious aim at the US EPA for attempting to impose nutrient standards in Florida waters. The right appears completely blinded to the fact that the EPA is not over-reaching but merely responding to a federal court decision. Lost in the smoke and mirrors is a disturbing fact about the next Republican achievement, if it can be called that: dismantle state authority in favor of local city and county government.

There is nothing new about this. Jeb Bush favored emptying government buildings in Tallahassee. It has just taken nearly a decade, and a massive crash in the economy -- that could have been averted if the speculators had been kicked out of the halls of power-- to achieve. Gov. Rick Scott has picked up the cudgel and beaten growth management in Florida to a pulp. Protections that citizens and environmentalists had relied on, tepid and weak as they were, have vanished. What is left? Our county commission.

A newspaper editorial in the Florida Keys last weekend, from the Florida Keynoter, picked up this thread by calling attention to the rare defeat of a rock mining proposal in West Palm Beach in district court, on the basis that the county had violated, by approving the mine, its own comprehensive land use plan. "Richard Grosso, the attorney who represented the 1000 Friends of Florida in the Palm Beach County case, told the Florida News Service the appellate court's ruling will reinforce local growth controls at a time when state lawmakers have weakened state oversight of growth management. "Once they are written, comprehensive plans mean what they say," Grosso said, "not what a majority of county commissioners think should happen."

Who wants to bet that the Miami-Dade County Commissioners can be trusted with growth management? What the radical right selectively forgets is: history. Growth management became a state responsibility for the simple fact that enough legislators, Republicans and Democrats, became disgusted with the ramshackle, disorganized and chaotic growth that was over-running the state by the 1970's. If the Miami-Dade County Commission had its choice, Miami International Airport would have been moved into the middle of the Everglades. And only last year, County Commissioner Pepe Diaz saw nothing wrong with moving ATV's into the old Jetport site in Big Cypress National Preserve, over designated state and federal protections. These are all facts conveniently ignored by the radical right and their lobbyists in the Chamber of Commerce and Associated Industries. (click 'read more', for the Keynoter editorial)

Failing to Protect Florida: the Unfolding Rick Scott Governorship ... by gimleteye

The Orlando Sentinel published a spot-on editorial the other day on a subject we are sickeningly familiar with:  the determination by the state Republican leaders and the hang-dog legislature that treads in their footpath: we can't afford to clean up the mess we have made of Florida's waters. It is a pathetic disgrace. Knowing the actors as we do, it is apparent to us that so much of what is going on in Washington today -- the frenzy over the budget and debt ceiling -- is about billionaire polluters using smokescreens to attack the true source of their anger: the EPA.

That's right, the EPA whose expenditures are .3 percent of the monthly federal budget. The Sentinel names, names. We are glad for example that the Sentinel calls out Barney Bishop, of Associated Industries, for his reckless leadership. We call Bishop, the lobbying organization's "Jack-Ass-In-Chief". And he is. But the biggest omission in the Sentinel editorial is Gov. Rick Scott. Scott is a sycophant of Barney Bishop -- not the other way, around -- because when no other Republicans would come to Scott's side during the Governor's Race, Bishop (who laughingly calls himself a Democrat) did. Today, Governor Rick Scott has directed the state's legal muscle against the EPA's effort to clean up Florida's waters, because Florida won't. It is Scott who is helping blow the doors off protections due ordinary Floridians. He is the intransigent one, and he has to go.

Protect Florida's water
New federal regulations aren't the enemy; the state's intransigence is.
Orlando Sentinel - July 26, 2011

Last year's hysterical reaction from opponents of tougher federal clean-water rules was, unfortunately, only the beginning.

Since the Associated Industries of Florida's Barney Bishop hammered "radical left-wingers" for daring to impose new regulations that would strap businesses, we've seen a lawsuit from Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi and Agriculture Commissioner Adam Putnam.

The pair sued those awful left-wingers running the Environmental Protection Agency for imposing what will be new limits on how much phosphorus and nitrogen can get into waterways from sewage plants, industry and other sources.

Central Florida's John Mica got into the act, too, introducing legislation in Congress that would blunt the EPA's ability to toughen Florida's ineffective water-pollution limits. The EPA's "almost unprecedented power grab" would create a "regulatory nightmare," Mica gasped on the floor of the U.S. House.

Central Florida's Sandy Adams injected her trademark hyperbole. The congresswoman tied the EPA's coming rules to clean Florida's waterways to an imagined plot by President Obama to undermine anti-pollution efforts. And her office said the new EPA rules "would effectively kill job creation throughout Florida."

Fortunately, Mica's bill won't make it to a vote in the Senate, which appreciates that the EPA should have the ability to draft and enforce rules making states comply with the federal Clean Water Act.

Drought! Straight Talk from the Real Book of Revelations ... by gimleteye

Drought, wildfires, floods. The first three minutes of network news is like a TV primer from the Book of Revelations. But when destroyed drinking water wells in South Florida are on Nightly News, the story won't be the simple-twist-of-fate. In South Florida, political decisions on water management put property owners at risk of a modern Exodus, or, fresh water at the price of gold. It is not a topic in TV political debates or campaigns, but it is the dirtiest little secret in Florida. Understanding it, is to also know why the Everglades are at such peril.

For decades, politicians allowed more growth and development and agriculture than our aquifers could reasonably sustain. This wasn't conjecture or smarmy, feel-good ethos. Within government agencies, scientists, policy makers and attorneys treaded on the subject like walking on egg shells. Early on, it was established to be political suicide to stand up to the destroyers on water supply or water quality issues. Sugar billionaires, their lobbyists, builders and developers and trade associations like the Latin Builders Association had the inside track in the inside hallways. It is still going on. Last week, Florida's Jack-Ass-In-Chief Barney Bishop-- the Associated Industries leader ("a life-long Democrat" who led the successful effort to dismantle Florida's growth management agency), appeared on Fox calling out the U.S. EPA for "killing jobs faster than President Obama can create them". Bishop, a carpetbagger if there ever was one, has prevailed on Florida Governor Rick Scott to push back against federal authority to regulate nutrient pollution where the state won't: overwhelming Florida's valuable rivers, estuaries and coastal real estate values. To round up the disaster, after so many decades, in a pithy "killing the goose that lays the golden egg" puts an unforgivable smiley face on abject corruption.

Water managers stuck wells and routed water to serve an unsustainable volume of growth. This secret is at the heart of government in Florida and has been known within government offices in South Florida for at least 40 years.

Once drinking water wells are pumping salt, the facts will emerge. Reporters will scan the blogs, for where to start. One story worth recounting is Gary Pesnell's. Pesnell, a retired District wildlife biologist, worked for the South Florida Water Management District in the early 1970's. He was given a remarkable assignment; to take as much time as necessary to inventory and catalog the natural resources of Lake Okeechobee. In the course of his work, he began to expose how the Everglades would be sacrificed-- willfully-- for the political imperatives for growth. Scientists were fearful for their jobs then, as they are today. Now that he is retired-- watching from a distance the drought disaster unfold in South Florida-- Pesnell spoke out, last week, on a Sierra Club listserve. Perhaps more will speak out, a kind of chorus in a kind of Greek tragedy that is Florida.

Lake Okeechobee, locally referred to as The Lake or The Big O, is the largest freshwater lake in the state of Florida. It is the seventh largest freshwater lake in the United States and the second largest freshwater lake contained entirely within the lower 48 states. Okeechobee covers 730 square miles (1,890 km²), approximately half the size of the state of Rhode Island, and is exceptionally shallow for a lake of its size, with an average depth of only 9 feet. The lake is divided between Glades, Okeechobee, Martin, Palm Beach, and Hendry counties. Maps of Florida show that all five of these counties meet at one point near the center of the lake.

Historically, the entire southern Florida peninsula was influenced by Lake Okeechobee and seasonal flooding. It is the sputtering, sick heart of the dying Everglades. To one extent or another, water management uses Lake Okeechobee as a key determinant in canal levels for all the counties south of the lake, comprising millions of water users. Here is what Pesnell has to say:

Who lobbied for Genting Berhad, owner of Miami Herald property? It's no mystery ... by gimleteye

The sale of The Miami Herald property to a Malaysian gambling magnate, for three times the next comparable sale on Biscayne Bay, points to Florida's future: full scale casinos. Tempting as it is to draw a wan observation about the games of fortune taking over mainstream media, the $239 million deal speaks for itself. The convent for casinos both tears the Christian conservative base of Florida's GOP and is a hymn to the party's impenetrable majority in the state legislature. The path to casinos is also highlighted by a wealthy governor who bought his way to the executive office in a campaign that denied access to newspaper editorial boards. In other words, if no one is listening and everyone is looking the other way, what you say to appease the God-fearing Christians and Tea Party acolytes in your base is just words. Do what you want and get what you can, now. That is the ethos the Malaysian Chinese are betting will prevail in Miami. Based on recent history, it is a very good bet.

In an interview with FloridaEnvironments.com, Associated Industries of Florida CEO Barney Bishop admitted to this mindset. Florida's GOP, goaded by the Chamber of Commerce and Bishop, aimed and succeeded in eliminating the state land use planning agency based on statements that regulations inhibiting development in Florida were wrecking the economy. They glided over facts that from 2007 to 2010 -- in the midst of the worst economic recession since the Great Depression-- "the state agency had approved 1.5 billion square feet of commercial development in addition to nearly 600,000 new housing units and nearly 1 million acres of land use changes." Bishop affirmed the party line and gospel to the GOP faithful. According to the St. Pete Times, "DCA was that bogeyman for us... so we essentially got rid of that." And so it will be with barriers to full-scale gaming in Florida.

The Republican base that deployed right-wing, "Christian" values to marginalize opposition and secure a lock on the state legislature is now prepared to vault a long history of legislative bars to full casino operations in the state, even if cracking the code means elevating the mysterious economic benefits of gambling over the mysterious benefits of faith.

The pro-casino forces tested the waters for change in this session of the Florida legislature. Genting Berhad, the Malaysian corporation that bought the Miami Herald property, is one the entities registered to lobby at the legislature. So who are the lobbyists and what are their connections? If you wanted to build an effective team to launch tall ladders against the church walls, you would need a senior strategist first who had the full confidence of the dominant players in the GOP.

Assault on environment led by the ill-informed, shortsighted ... by gimleteye

In the Orlando Sentinel, Scott Maxwell has it exactly right: legislators in Tallahassee are caught in a tidal wave of ignorance. While he suggests "taking names", he won't name, names. Carpet baggers like Barney Bishop of Associated Industries and the hoi polloi of Florida's business community who won't stand up for reason, even though their predecessors and, yes, even Republican leaders in the past had the good sense not to throw Florida's environmental protections under the bus. But on this important point, we can definitely agree: Miami-Dade state legislators are simply not held to account by voters for taking positions that are so antithetical to the public interest: Exhibit A, the destruction of the state planning agency, the Florida Department of Community Affairs. Who can argue that the Urban Development Boundary is a bad thing? Land speculators. Period. Who can argue that the Miami-Dade County Commission isn't fully committed to weaseling out of requirements to protect the UDB according to state law? No one. Unfortunately, none of our local mass market media pays attention to what our state legislators do, during session. They can't afford to. And are we ever paying the price.

Scott Maxwell TAKING NAMES

In a moment, I'm going to tell you about plans to gut one of Florida's key environmental programs — one meant to safeguard everything from manatees to the seafood you eat.

The program is cheap. Its effectiveness has been touted by politicians on both sides of the aisle. Yet, Florida politicians are trying to degrade it as we speak.

But first, I want to offer you a window into the mind of your typical state legislator.

It's a scary place. But if we're going to deal with those who are trying to take Florida back to the Dark Ages, we must understand how they think.

Our subject is state Rep. Chris Dorworth.

Six months ago, the Lake Mary Republican met with the Orlando Sentinel's editorial board to try to score a campaign endorsement.

During the meeting, the ed board was trying to understand why Dorworth wanted to dismantle the Department of Community Affairs, the agency charged with ensuring sensible land planning.

The agency had thrived under governors ranging from Bob Graham to Jeb Bush, with all of them touting DCA as a guard for both residents and the land.

But Dorworth thought DCA was a problem. He claimed the agency constantly blocked wonderful and sensible projects.

Really? The ed board asked for an example.

"There have been numerous examples," he replied.

OK. So how about you name one of them?

"I think every single time they work on anything," Dorworth continued. "They kick back plans all the time."

Then it should be easy for you to cite one.

"Listen, I'm not going to tell you whether a project has merit or not," Dorworth responded (right after saying DCA was constantly blocking projects with merit). "I'm going to tell you that DCA has shut down several projects."

So DCA was busy killing projects "all the time." There were "numerous examples." Yet the man wanting to undermine DCA couldn't cite a single one.

This, my friends, is what passes for leadership in your state.

Facts, logic and our natural resources are becoming casualties of an ideological war.

Watch Out For Barney Bishop - AGAIN! By Geniusofdespair

The Miami Herald insists on publishing any drivel that Associated Industries of Florida's leader Barney Bishop writes. I guess the Herald is afraid of him. I say: Know your enemies. Both of us have warned you about Barney - Rick Scott's pal - before, in 19 posts (23 about AIF). Barney always refers to studies - he has an EXPERT study on everything. In his letter to the Miami Herald yesterday, he mentions the Reason Foundation. According to Wikipedia:

"Reason is self-described as nonpartisan and publishes a statement of values that can best be described as libertarian. Like most think tanks, they are a non-profit, tax-exempt organization that provides papers and studies to support a particular set of values."

He also brings up TaxWatch. Here is the speaker line-up at their upcoming Board of Trustees Meeting (Do they sound Republican Partisan enough?):
The Honorable Rick Scott, Governor, State of Florida
The Honorable Pam Bondi, Attorney General, State of Florida (Confirmed)
The Honorable Jeff Atwater, Chief Financial Officer, State of Florida (Confirmed)
The Honorable Adam Putnam, Commissioner of Agriculture, State of Florida
The Honorable Marco Rubio, Senator, United States Senate
Florida Department of Juvenile Justice Secretary Wansley Walters (Confirmed)
The Honorable Mike Haridopolos, President, The Florida Senate (Confirmed)
The Honorable Dean Cannon, Speaker, Florida House of Representatives
The Honorable Will Weatherford, Speaker Designate, Florida House of Representatives

TaxWatch got the Prudential - Davis Productivity Award. Guess who is one of the Judges for this award? Barney Bishop. I wouldn't trust any study TaxWatch put out. Barney Bishop you can't fool me. Here is TaxWatch's Executive Committee:

Rock Mining in Florida, poised for the big kill ... by gimleteye

The theme, "Florida for sale!", is prominently on display in Tallahassee by the rock mining industry. What the industry is poised to do, is to exempt permitting from local regulations.

Rock mining regulations are a sore point in Miami-Dade where the industry's footprint is most visible from above, at the far edge of Miami International Airport. Although the industry itself is secretive and extraordinarily wealthy, it is no secret that zoning changes from agricultural land to rock mining is a precursor to changes in order to build more platted subdivisions. This tried and true formula works especially well when it is time for industry to beat back wetlands protections: first you drain the wetlands, then you dig out the lime rock, then you build houses around your lifeless water features otherwise known as "lakes".

The Miami-Dade County Commission, under former commissioner Natacha Seijas' direction, virtually shut out the public from the local regulatory process long ago. People complained too much. People like homeowners in West Dade whose foundations cracked and interiors parted ways from joists and drywall due to blasting by rock miners.

So between zoning issues and comprehensive land use planning -- also being eviscerated by the state legislature and barely legal governor Rick Scott-- and homeowners who happen to live near rock mines (like the ones who live near the proposed Cemex expansion in West Dade), it is fascinating that the industry finds its top priority is to pre-empt local regulations. Of course, the builders and developers and wrecking crew generally favor local control, unless they can get an easier path to permitting at the state level. Blame the Florida Chamber of Commerce, Associated Industries, the Florida Engineering Society, and the Wetlands Mitigation Banking Alliance.

One of my top five stories about rock mining (largely consolidated today under ownership by foreign corporations) occurred during the time I was leading opposition to a Lennar plan to build a community of 15,000 on Card Sound Road called Florida City Commons. Environmentalists had been struggling to protect this area crucial for protection of the nearby waters of Biscayne National Park for decades. Congress had long acknowledged its importance for Everglades restoration. Environmentalists were imploring federal agencies to prohibit the expansion of rock mining through wetlands destruction, when on February 4, 2006 I literally stumbled on the carcass of a dead panther on the side of the road, a stone's throw from the proposed site. The photo above is one I took that night.

The county commission, again led by Seijas, Barbara Jordan and the unreformable majority, had rolled over. State agencies from the water management district to the Florida Department of Community Affairs had been ineffectual at best and complicit at worst. The US Fish and Wildlife Service not only refused to write a jeopardy opinion for the panther in the area, managers sensitive to political interference re-assigned scientists who advocated the measure be brought to bear against development of wetlands there.

The end of the story: agencies that wouldn't block wealthy rock miners from expanding in panther habitat in the early 2000's recently erected a twelve foot fence topped with barbed wire on the widened 18 Mile Stretch to the Florida Keys to certify their missions, including Florida's, to "protect" the Florida panther. What you see is through that fence is Administrative Fraud at a grand level. It stretches all the way to Tallahassee. These thoughts were on my mind on a recent trip into the 10,000 Islands and Everglades National Park. So few birds. So many catfish. You don't need a GPS or chart to tell you the direction the state is headed. That sound of blasting from Tallahassee? It is the patrimony of Florida that GOP extremists are blowing up just like the Taliban did in Afghanistan.

(March 1, 2001 (AP): Using everything from tanks to rocket launchers, Taliban troops fanned out across the country Thursday to destroy all statues, including two 5th-century statues of Buddha carved into a mountainside. Despite international outrage, troops and other officials began demolishing images, which they say are contrary to Islam, in the capital of Kabul as well as in Jalalabad, Herat, Kandahar, Ghazni and Bamiyan, said Qadradullah Jamal, the Taliban's information minister. "The destruction work will be done by any means available to them," he said. "All the statues all over the country will be destroyed.")

Destroy Florida, an explosive new C-4 ... by gimleteye

C4 is a type of plastic explosive. It is also the IRS designation of certain political action committees that are now springing to life since the Bush Supreme Court gave "personhood" to corporations, unleashing an avalanche of special interest, corporate money against the public. "Destroy Florida" goes by another name, "Free Market Florida". It is the new political action committee launched by the same idiots who brought down Florida Hometown Democracy.

The Florida Independent reports, "Free Market Florida prepares to do battle with environmentalists". Their nominal target is the US EPA and the federal agencies intent to protect Florida's water from pollution unleashed by Big Sugar and unscrupulous county commissioners like Natacha Seijas, who allowed growth to run rampant as kudzu.

The real target is Florida Senator Bill Nelson. "The new group’s address is listed as 610 South Blvd., Tampa, the home of dozens of political committees that operate in Florida and nationwide. A letter on Free Market Florida’s home page from Florida Chamber of Commerce CEO Mark Wilson says the group will help the business community take on “aggressive anti-free market groups”.

Wilson and his buddies, like Florida jackass-in-chief Barney Bishop of Associated Industries, are trying to pressure Senator Nelson to stand up with them, in their effort to kill off the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Emboldened by last November's results, they are intent on destroying what is left of government's capacity to help people. Everything to them that does not have a dollar sign attached is a "job killer". But look at the job they did on Florida during the housing boom: flooding the state with rampant overdevelopment. They called it, then, "what the market wants" and it was a bad dream built on the foundations of fraud.

Well these fraudsters are back, at it. With the Supreme Court in their pockets, independent political committees outspent progressives 10-1 in November 2010. In 2012, you are not going to believe how much money they will throw at the destruction of the public interest. The cynics like those behind Free Market Florida might as well be using the real C4 explosives: they are blowing up this nation's future, wrapped in an American flag and ugly, unrecognizable versions of Christianity. Does Senator Bill Nelson have the guts to stand up to the destroyers, neatly coiffed, suited, and wing-tipped? We'll see, soon enough. (click, 'read more', for the Florida Independent article)

Free Market Florida prepares to do battle with environmentalists

By Travis Pillow | 03.01.11 | 2:08 pm
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A new group claiming that California-style regulation and litigation are crippling Florida’s economy has launched to “take the fight to” environmental groups and other “special interests.”
Officially announced today, Free Market Florida describes itself as “a project of Citizens for Lower Taxes and a Stronger Economy, Inc., a 501(c)(4) organization.”
A political committee, also called Citizens for Lower Taxes and a Stronger Economy, last year ran the campaign against Amendment 4 — aka “Hometown Democracy” — and disbanded in January. A 501(c)(4) is a nonprofit organization that is allowed to lobby and run campaign ads without disclosing its donors. The new group’s address is listed as 610 South Blvd., Tampa, the home of dozens of political committees that operate in Florida and nationwide.
A letter on Free Market Florida’s home page from Florida Chamber of Commerce CEO Mark Wilson says the group will help the business community take on “aggressive anti-free market groups”:

Those who oppose economic development and job creation will say or do anything and, until now, Florida’s business community has had to “gear up” for the multiple battles special interests wage. Now, with FreeMarketFlorida.org, the business community has a permanent effort, complimentary to that of the Florida Chamber and others, which will meet the opposition whenever and wherever they choose to engage. #
Now is the time to take the fight to them.

Apparently that involves fighting EPA water quality regulations — known as numeric nutrient criteria, which the agency created for Florida after a lawsuit brought by environmental groups — and challenging the Department of Community Affairs, which the group describes as “Soviet-style” central planners whose activities should be left to local governments. #
Gov. Rick Scott and committees in both houses of the state legislature are already working on plans to scale back the department’s functions.

Beware of Associated Industries of Florida. By Geniusofdespair

If you will only read one of my posts this week: MAKE IT THIS ONE.

Gimleteye, sometimes irks me when he brings up Associated Industries of Florida (AIF) in passing -- I believe we need to highlight it. We are ALWAYS talking about them in articles but it seems we are not doing a good job of letting you know just how powerful they are to affect our lives. View their legislative priorities (hit read more) and you will know Rick Scott's legislative priorities and that of the conservatives in the legislature.

Be assured that Rick Scott is listening to AIF chief Barney Bishop. Read the article about Hospitals written by John Dorschner today in the Miami Herald and within the first few paragraphs he writes: "A powerful business lobbying group, Associated Industries of Florida" is agreeing with Scott on the issue. Bummer. In lockstep with Barney Bishop's group. Ick.

Etch the name of the group and their leader in your memory because you can bet 'your' Governor Rick Scott takes his marching orders from them. Busting unions is certainly something AIF will be more than happy to fund. Also AIF orchestrated the effort to kill Amendment 4. See Barney below talking about Rick Scott when he was running (they were friends then -- no surprise there):

link to video

AIF legislative priorities at a glance (you won't like this so don't hit read more if you don't want to get depressed - this is our future):

2011 Legislative Issues At-A-Glance
(remember all these are worded to TRY to sound good)....

Legislative Issues The following is a listing of additional issues that AIF will be involved in (as of February 1, 2011) for the upcoming 2011 Session. These issues and our positions can change based on amendments. When our position does change, it will be noted in both the Daily Brief and Weekly Update reports that AIF provides to members and legislators throughout the session.

Contracting

* Support legislation to ensure consistent, streamlined and fair contract elements for entities providing health and human services to the state of Florida by incorporating national accreditation standards into the existing health and human services framework; allowing the use of a centralized document vault and allowing agencies to designate a lead agency to ensure that monitoring is coordinated.

Economic Development

* Support efforts to reduce regulatory burdens that inhibit businesses’
ability to establish and expend in Florida.
* Support efforts to further expedite permitting processes within state agencies.
* Support reestablishing funding levels of Enterprise Florida’s economic development “Tool Kit.”
* Support legislation aimed at providing tax credits for venture capitalists that invest in Florida’s emerging businesses.
* Support efforts to broaden the reach of Florida’s Growth Fund to reach more emerging businesses.
* Support measures to help existing or emerging businesses access badly needed capital markets.
* Support efforts to streamline the state’s economic development organizations.

Education

* Support increasing access to rigorous coursework and increased high school graduation standards, particularly in STEM subject areas: Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math; so that students can compete globally in the 21st century.
* Support efforts to increase education in the arts, multilingualism, multiculturalism, and technology literacy to assure the workforce is prepared for the creative economy.
* Advocate flexibility in plans to fulfill the mandates of the class-size constitutional amendment.
* Support the continuation of the Banner Centers for Workforce Development and Ready-to-Work programs.
* Support reforms that will keep our best teachers in the classrooms.

Elections

* Support efforts to re-establish Florida’s signature revocation process.
* Support reforms to the process for amending the state constitution by citizen initiative.
* Support efforts to change the life span of petition signatures for citizen initiatives from the current 4 years to 2 years.
* Support legislation designed to protect the secret ballot process in Florida.

Energy

* Encourage the exploration, production and storage of petroleum and natural gas in an environmentally safe manner while ensuring a continuous supply and reasonable cost of fuel for all of Florida’s needs.
* Support incentives for the use of hydrogen fuel and the future expansion of alternative fuels and clean coal technologies.
* Support environmental and economic regulatory policies that create a stable investment climate so that electric utilities can build more fuel diverse generation systems to meet Florida’s growing energy needs, and continue to maintain and enhance the transmission and distribution system.
* Oppose government mandates that will unnecessarily drive up the cost of essential energy services for businesses in order to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
* Support the expansion and building of future nuclear facilities in Florida.

Environmental

* Support “Incentive Based Permitting” for those companies who are good stewards of Florida’s natural resources.
* Support the environmental self-audit privilege.
* Support state funding for alternative water supply programs.

General Business

* Support legislation providing for personal identity-theft protection and for protection of personal and business data held by state and local governments while at the same time balancing the needs of commercial entities to have access to such information to service their customers and promote commerce.
* Oppose legislation that requires businesses to rely on flawed federal verification systems for immigration status of employees.
* Support efforts to create statewide regulation of fertilizer sales.
* Support constitutional amendment protecting Floridians’ rights to a secret ballot.
* Support efforts to require important corporate information to be published in our newspapers and not just on the internet.

Growth Management

* Support efforts to re-enact the Community Renewal Act.
* Provide for the “fast track” of any project deemed to be economic development.
* Support efforts to revise the role of the DCA so that its function is less of an impediment to job creation.

Health Care

* Support proposals that encourage employers to provide health insurance benefits to their employees.
* Continue to support proposals to inject market-based solutions into the Medicaid Program to ensure appropriate high quality and cost-effective care is provided to our state’s elderly, poor and disabled.
* Oppose the expansion of ad valorem taxing authority of state taxing districts for the funding of health care facilities.
* Oppose proposals that would introduce the government into the private contracting process between insurers and providers.
* Support efforts to ensure that Low Income Pool (LIP) Council dollars follow the patient and are distributed in an equitable manner.

Insurance

* Continue efforts to bring about affordability and availability of commercial and residential property insurance utilizing sound business principles.
* Support legislation requiring a 15% rate increase for all Citizens policyholders each year until its rates are actuarially sound.
* Oppose burdensome restrictions on health insurers, such as “any willing provider” and provider contract restraints that drive up the cost of health care.
* Oppose legislation that would place additional mandates on health insurance policies.
* Support the Insurance Commissioner’s efforts to pass legislation to eliminate abuses associated with stranger originated life insurance (STOLI) arrangements.

Legal & Judicial

* Oppose the weakening or repeal of any of the 2005-06 legal reform law.
* Support adequate funding of the judicial branch.
* Preserve the rights of parties to settle cases independently without interference from their attorneys.
* Continue support for existing caps on non-economic damages arising from medical malpractice lawsuits.
* Support legislation that offers basic protection from unnecessary litigation to business owners who offer their services to first responders during natural disasters.

Taxation

* Support legislation to adopt the 2011 version of the IRS code so that Florida businesses do not have to keep two sets of records.
* Support legislative ideas that would help to lower the rising cost of property tax for both homeowners and businesses across the state.
* Support legislation to reduce the communications services tax currently on all communications devices (except residential lines).
* Support efforts to enforce the fair collection of state sales tax.
* Fight the efforts to divert money from trust-fund revenue streams to general revenue.
* Support sales tax holidays, such as exemptions from sales tax on items to be used for hurricanes supplies, school readiness, and energy efficient products.
* Support passage of the Amendment 6 implementing bill.
* Oppose the enactment of combined reporting, or a “Unitary Tax” in Florida as well as increases in excise taxes.

Technology

* Encourage the enhanced government spending on IT in order to provide better services to citizens and businesses and to ensure that Florida’s state government remains at the cutting edge of IT.
* Support funding for redesign of legacy or outdated agency IT systems.
* Support increasing compensation and competency requirements for state CIOs.
* Monitor and influence any bill filed on the Agency for Enterprise Information Technology (AEIT), or data consolidation efforts.

Transportation

* Support the transfer of new revenues from tag and title fee increases to the Transportation Trust Fund.
* Strongly support legislation that allows for aggregate rock materials to be mined without obstruction from irresponsible interest groups or ill intended county/municipal moratorium.
* Support raising the weight limit on commercial trucks using state and local roadways to weight limits that equal those of our surrounding states.
* Support legislation exempting Auxiliary Power Units (APUs) from commercial truck weight restrictions.
* Oppose any efforts to raid the state’s Transportation Trust Fund.

Unemployment Compensation

* Require all unemployment compensation appeals referees to follow consistent and established criteria statewide for determining if an employee was appropriately discharged for cause and deny benefits in those cases.
* Require interpretation of the unemployment compensation benefits award statute to carry a neutral construction rather than be construed in favor of the claimant in all instances.
* Study alternative tax calculation methodologies that may produce more fair and equitable tax rates for Florida employers and identify all impacts prior to adoption.
* Permanently allow a quarterly payment plan that lets employers spread out their unemployment compensation payments over the whole year without penalties or interest.

Workers’ Compensation

* Oppose any efforts to erode the savings experienced by all Florida employers as a result of the AIF-supported 2003 Workers’ Compensation Reform Act which resulted in savings now of over 50%.
* Oppose the creation of a state fund or other state risk bearing entity.
* Continue support for increased funding for state fraud investigations.
* Oppose any efforts to statutorily establish procedures, guidelines or other provisions that are currently available through administrative action for which statutory authority already exists.
* Oppose any raid on the Workers’ Compensation Trust Fund without first giving money back to employers.

Workforce Development

* Support the establishment of career academies in Florida’s schools that will prepare Florida’s students with industry certifications to compete with students from around the world, not just other states.
* Continue support for Florida’s Banner Centers for Workforce Development.
* Support the “Ready to Work” program.

Workforce Housing

* Support full funding of Florida’s housing trust monies solely on housing.
* Repeal the cap on the Sadowski Housing Trust Fund.

OUR FILE ON ASSOCIATED INDUSTRIES OF FLORIDA

The Florida Jackass: its head is the Chamber, its hind quarters, Union Bosses ... by gimeleteye

Ryan Houck, the baby-faced spokesman for polluters aiming to decapitate environmental protection in Florida, is spokesman for a slick campaign reminding like-minded jackasses that unions sided with business to defeat last November's ballot referendum, Florida Hometown Democracy. Never mind that a wee-wee percentage of Floridians believe that environmental and land use rules are too strict. Unions abandoned environmentalists once, Houck crows, and now it is time to abandon them again by throttling EPA's efforts to hold billionaire polluters accountable to nutrient standards in Florida waters. I say, give Houck and the Chamber jackasses feedbags filled with oats and methyl mercury.

As for Florida's union members, this would be a time of soul-searching about leadership and how poorly working class Floridians have been served. In Wisconsin, environmentalists are battling with unions to stave off the money influence of the billionaire polluters. But here in Florida, it is a long stretch to find union leaders who ever reached out to environmentalists. Houck and his billionaire buddies crow about the victory of business and labor in defeating environmentalists over Amendment 4; the state-wide ballot initiative that was hacked to death by the Chamber and its big money funders.

Never mind that last fall Houck campaigned against Florida Hometown Democracy, claiming not even environmental groups supported it. The point: anyone can re-write history when others are too timid, weak, or indifferent to speak out. The same way that union bosses played members for fools, by refusing to support Florida Hometown Democracy, they are doing again; Exhibit A, the recall election against Hialeah county commissioner Natacha Seijas.

Seijas has been a nightmare for Florida environmentalists for 18 years. During that entire time she cultivated the support of union bosses. Union members, on the other hand, never questioned who and what Seijas stands for: the painted darling of land speculators and the Growth Machine that drove the Florida economy into the ground. It's not just Miami-Dade environmentalists who suffered, through the continuing meddling of Seijas and her staff in regulatory issues and infrastructure in Miami Dade. Today, Seijas is already arguing for a lock and hold on years of planning -- mandated by the state-- to fix all the billions of stuff she allowed to be left behind during her overly long career. That's because under Governor Rick Scott and the interests who hire Houck, Florida is in a race to the bottom to eviscerate environmental protections. Seijas is confidant of unions' votes in the recall election slated for March 15. SEIU contributed at least $20,000 to defend her, already. (If I were a union member and voter in Hialeah, I'd steer as clear of Seijas as Libyan soldiers are, of Khaddafi.)

Union members should do the math: who is stuck in cars in endless traffic, wasting family time and spending nearly $4.00 a gallon to commute to jobs from distant suburbs? Union members live in those distant suburbs. Who is paying the price for land speculators who support Seijas, Houck et al in order to shift the costs of growth to ordinary taxpayers? Who voted for growth and rock mining to wreck the wellfield protection zone, imposing hundreds of millions of costs on ratepayers? Who was taken to the woodshed by a Republican governor-- Jeb!-- for refusing to protect Florida's drinking water aquifers? You think union members might care to know what Seijas and Houck represents? They might, if their leaders brought it to their attention.

Now the unions support Seijas and they are being thanked in advance for supporting the Chamber of Commerce and Associated Industries jackasses who think it is great they won the race to the bottom and now are twisting arms of the Florida Congressional delegation to oppose the EPA and prevent accountability for Florida's polluted waterways. It is fascinating to listen to Houck talk about union members joining with business to destroy the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Really, what it is, is nauseating.

Climate chaos and adaptation ... by gimleteye

The end points of climate chaos are famine, disease, and war. Not necessarily in that order. On the way, civilization has chances to avoid the worst of it: first, stop climate change by altering patterns of consumption-- especially those that produce carbon dioxide. On this chance, we missed. The die is cast. Signs of climate chaos are here, now. This doesn't mean, necessarily, that all is lost. But on second chance, adaptation, we are losing ground at an accelerating pace. Here is an assessment of the brutal facts, and a hope that it foments more than surrender.

The experience in the United States is instructive. The science of climate change has solidified at the same pace as the calcification against meaningful adaptation. The ascendent politics in the US is strongly organized around campaign contributions from polluters who are determined to wring out the last the profits before the climate bell tolls. The Koch brothers stand out as examples; billionaires funding GOP conservative think tanks and the Tea Party to foment for "regulatory reform", crystalized in the effort to knee cap the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. In Florida, a particular form of thievery has merged against the EPA: to obstruct the imposition of rules against water pollution. The Chamber of Commerce and groups like Associated Industries are determined to block the EPA and lobbying Congressional delegations. But the battle to undermine EPA is mainly to serve the purpose of inhibiting or even destroying the ability of the federal government to address climate change adaptation.

It is an unstated, undeclared Civil War on the Climate, framed as a struggle by Republicans and conservative Democrats against the overbearing hand of the federal government. Never mind that the EPA is only beginning to emerge from the dismal politicization of science during the Bush terms when ideologues appointed to key staff positions throttled honest debate about climate change, wielding red pens like swords to excise any paragraphs offending oil and gas and coal producers.

In the meantime, fiscal crises at the state levels now provide a powerful reason for Republican legislatures to eviscerate agency budgets and staff charged with environmental protection. "Create jobs" by wrecking environmental protections. It happening in Florida, where the state legislature is primed to embrace draconian reductions in agencies and regulatory missions that have been chronically hobbled, but also in other GOP-controlled legislatures as well. The Tea Party, blinded to the motives of its funders, is mainly serving to kill off any moderate discussion of environmental protection within the GOP and scaring the daylights out of the remnant Democrats.

Part of the GOP demagoguery on the war against federalism is that the best government is the government closest to the people. It is worthwhile, then, to take a close look at how local government is faring on the matter of adaptation to climate change.

In Florida's most populous county, Miami-Dade, Harvey Ruvin, the county clerk, has been engaged for decades in the pressing matter of organizing municipal governments response to climate change. Ruvin is a long-time member of ICLEI, the international local government sustainability initiative, and successfully advocated for the county's establishment of an Office of Sustainability. Recently, EOM highlighted a tense exchange between Ruvin and the county commissioner who has micromanaged public discussion of environmental affairs, Natacha Seijas. Although the county has made some movement forward on the matter of adapting and changing energy consumption in county government, on the heavy lifting not only has no progress been made, but Seijas has waged a determined effort on behalf of her key supporters-- builders and developers-- to negate any firm policies that would adapt land use to the reality of rising sea levels. In addition, Seijas has stacked the Office with highly paid staffers who are, primarily, loyal to her. For example, in 2010 Seijas intervened in the local initiative and halted the incorporation of sophisticated topographic mapping, showing exactly where sea level rise will affect property and property values, that could have the consequence of harming land speculators' investment.

The one level of government that Republicans in Florida embrace-- local government-- is frozen in place to serve the narrow and short-term interests of a status quo that will not yield its prerogatives. Massive investment, in lobbyists, law-making, and interventions in national politics-- like the effort to neuter the EPA-- advance in direct proportion to climate chaos. Although adaption could fortify national security, it is being undermined by local thievery. That government is mainly organized to reward speculators has been laid bare by the Great Recession. As climate conditions worsen, speculators will tilt the playing field harder in their favor. For the rest of us, getting clear of climate chaos will be like throwing bales of tea into a hundred mile an hour headwind. No one knows how long it will take for us to get there, but thanks to our stable of political leadership, dark days are coming faster than we will be able to adapt.

Gov. Twitter and His Twi'tes: re-arranging the deck chairs ... by gimleteye

Yesterday Florida Gov. Rick Scott summarily fired the head of Enterprise Florida. Today, he called for a new state Department of Commerce. His group of Twi'tes (a contraction of Twitter and acolytes), including the Florida Chamber of Commerce and Associated Industries, praised the Governor. "The fact that Gov. Scott will be so engaged in this new agency, to the point where it will be elevated to 'Plaza Level' status, is more than encouraging,'' AIF jackass-in-chief President Barney Bishop said in a statement. The Titanic also had a plaza level.

Here is the nonsense about this idea. Former Gov. Jeb! was the state's top economic officer, just as Gov. Scott is advertising to be, now. Jeb! invested considerable energy in recruiting major new employers during his two terms. To the extent Jeb! was successful, it depended on pushing poorly qualified taxpayers into homes they couldn't afford. The main effort that Jeb! staked his claim to economic development? Scripps in wetlands west of Palm Beach.

The Scripps project would have killed several birds with one stone, and that's why Jeb! liked it so much: hi-tech jobs in green fields, making nearby property owners (ie. Big Sugar and rock miners richer), while putting the whip to environmentalists. In the case of Scripps, the environmentalists won. Yes, Scripps came to Florida but it was not in the wetlands where the land speculators had made their bets.

Now I believe this is exactly what Gov. Twitter has in mind when he is quoted, "People want to do business in Florida. We need to make that easier.'' That is going to happen by decapitating environmental rules and regulations, like state land use planning. The long knives are out. It's what keeps jackass-in-chief Barney Bishop motivated. Jeb! never thought he could get away with it, even though he fired the state's top wetlands regulator, Herb Zebuth, at the time. State and federal environmental laws prevented Scripps from being the economic engine where he wanted it. But now we have an economic crisis of unparalleled proportions, and the villains in Florida will certainly not let it go to waste, pushing the rest of the Tea Party Twi'ites away from the lifeboats meant to save the first class passengers on the plaza level. (click, 'read more')

STATE OF FLORIDA
Scott proposes rebirth of commerce department


Gov. Rick Scott wants to create a state Department of Commerce -- which was abolished in 1996 -- to help bring business to Florida.
BY MICHAEL PELTIER

THE NEWS SERVICE OF FLORIDA

TALLAHASSEE -- Saying the state must streamline or perish, Gov. Rick Scott on Thursday told business leaders he wants to resurrect a Department of Commerce under his control that would coordinate economic development efforts from an office ``two doors down'' from his own.
Speaking to board members at Enterprise Florida's annual meeting, Scott told the group that businesses now face a labyrinth of agencies when they consider relocating to the state, duplicity of effort that Scott says is costing jobs and has to stop.
``When you don't have one person looking over everything, it makes it more difficult to get things done,'' Scott told reporters after his appearance before the board. ``I'll have a hard time holding somebody accountable for this if I don't have a person responsible for it.''
The department was abolished in 1996 at the behest of then-Gov. Lawton Chiles.
Scott envisions a department run by a secretary appointed by the governor who would be responsible for taking the lead and coordinating efforts from Enterprise Florida, the Agency for Workforce Development and the Office of Tourism Trade and Economic Development (OTTED).
Scott's proposal brought immediate kudos by the Florida Chamber of Commerce and Associated Industries of Florida, which said they were encouraged by Scott's aggressive assertions that his office would be responsible for coordinating efforts to get companies to do business in Florida.
``What I heard from the governor is that he is going to say is `I -- Rick Scott -- I'm responsible for job creation and I'm going to bring this into my office. . .so that everyone knows who to call for job creation,' '' said Mark Wilson, president and CEO of the Florida Chamber of Commerce.
Business leaders have long complained Florida is losing business to other states because of the state's cumbersome permitting process and a redundancy of effort between competing agencies.
``The fact that Gov. Scott will be so engaged in this new agency, to the point where it will be elevated to `Plaza Level' status, is more than encouraging,'' AIF President Barney Bishop said in a statement. ``It's the promise of a new day when Floridians aren't looking for work, but actually getting to work. ``
Lawmakers in 1996 abolished the Department of Commerce, which critics argued had become a political chit that had become ineffective in enticing business into the state. The department's functions were divided up among a group of other agencies including OTTED, Enterprise Florida and more recently other groups including Space Florida.
Jeb Bush, before he was governor, was secretary of the agency under former Gov. Bob Martinez.
Scott said he envisions a commerce department that would have control over economic development funding, including tax incentives and rebates now appropriated by the Legislature. He said details of his proposal would accompany the release of his budget request on Feb. 7.
``I've been calling companies since the second of November,'' Scott said. ``People want to do business in Florida. We need to make that easier.''


Read more: http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/01/28/2038469/scott-proposes-rebirth-of-commerce.html#ixzz1CKga84FH

The Florida Legislature: A Cuckoos Nest ... by gimleteye

Here is what the new Florida legislature wants to do, with the apparent approval of Gov. Twitter Scott:

"HB 239 2011
55 (1) The department, water management districts, and all other state, regional, and local governmental entities may not implement or give any effect to the United States Environmental Protection Agency's nutrient water quality criteria rules for the state's lakes and flowing waters, finalized on December 6, 2010, and published in Volume 75, No. 233 of the Federal Register, in any program administered by the department, water management district, or governmental entity."

Is the Florida Legislature an insane asylum run by high functioning mentally ill, or, is it a barely legal, criminal syndicate protected by corporate-run political action committees? Whatever, legislators and lobbyists are baying at the moon-- these are the business interests-- the Florida Chamber of Commerce, Associated Industries (and jack-ass-in-chief Barney Bishop), Big Ag (ie. Big Sugar)-- promoting legislation that says, in fact, Florida has to live in the stinking mess it created; this sea of pollution that rings the state. The fact is: the state's polluters will not be held accountable to clean up the cost they impose on us, for the toxic soup they have created.

Forget health care reform: what is really driving these wing-tipped and neatly coiffed to fund The Tea Party and the politically illiterate is the conviction that environmental rules are what caused the Great Recession. This is the idiocy driving the proposed Florida House legislation.

In my view, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is doing more in the Obama administration to redress its lackluster performance than since its earliest days in the 1970's. Yes!, to the EPA for holding the Legislature's feet to the fire. Or, at least trying to. Floridians deserve to know what the idiotic legislature is trying to do (in more than a tweet by our governor.)

Bankrupt:ProPublica on Florida's unemployment fund ... by gimleteye

The website ProPublica, journalism in the public interest, published a fascinating investigation of the crisis in the nation's unemployment finance systems. There are some interesting statistics that I did not know: Florida ranks 46 of 51 states in average weekly benefits. I'd like to hear Associated Industries take, on that. Or the Chamber of Commerce. I know their response: Florida's regulatory environment inhibits jobs. Baloney. We have one growth model in Florida and it has performed miserably: chew up wetlands and open space for suburban sprawl. Fueled by the supply chain, the growth engine remains active in Tallahassee but no where else. The Tea Partiers who are against federal funding for the states: check out where Florida is borrowing money from, to keep the unemployment trust fund afloat. Yes to states rights, no to federal intervention? Voters need to wake up, but so far Floridians are sleep walkng.

GOP: time to deliver the knock-out blows ... by gimleteye

Couldn't help but notice how, even before the Scott administration has taken office, the long knives are out on the GOP side. Ryan Houck, coordinator of the Chamber of Commerce and Associated Industries and Big Sugar campaign to defeat Amendment 4, appears in the Orlando Sentinel letters page noting the "crushing defeat" of supporters of growth management and bleats, quoting Friedrich Von Hayek, "the more the state 'plans', the more difficult planning becomes for the individual'. Houck takes aim-- as the GOP legislature is ready to do-- at the Florida Department of Community Affairs; the agency that, among other tasks, holds local government zoning decisions to consistency with planning initiatives like Miami-Dade's Urban Development Boundary (under attack, again, by Homestead land speculators).

Houck is only a bit player, delivering the message. It is being incorporated, too, in the plan to quickly and radically expand the school voucher program throughout the state of Florida. And not just Florida. The fire exploding on the education front is overwhelming. In the past 48 hours, legislation similar to that proposed for Florida has also been introduced in Montana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Wisconsin. The demise of public education and of teacher unions is the goal of this massive GOP push. When parity and equity in education are diced and divided into a thousand pieces, with children funneled into for-profit schools answerable to shareholders or remaining public schools that shelter the rest, it will be so much easier for corporations to roll up the remainders and to make sure that creating a passive consumer is the highest order of democracy. 1984 wasn't far off the mark. In the United States, the road to serfdom is going to have a lot of exit ramps, for the wealthiest. Click, 'read more'.

My Word: Cut, don't create, red tape
By Ryan Houck
12:00 AM EST, December 14, 2010
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Only weeks after Florida voters tossed Amendment 4 into the dustbin of bad ideas, Jane Healy has managed to misread the most obvious of signals. In her column "Will Scott and Cannon play games with growth?" (Orlando Sentinel, Nov. 28), she calls for new growth controls in the midst of a devastating recession while neighboring states aggressively compete for Florida jobs. Only Healy could imagine that the 67-percent-to-33-percent defeat of Amendment 4 means that Floridians have an appetite for new regulation.
From an armchair seemingly stuck in the outdated attitudes of the 1980s, Healy calls on Gov.-elect Rick Scott to form yet another growth commission and urges the Legislature to extend the life of Florida's renegade Department of Community Affairs — a bloated and predatory agency that aspires to centrally plan major sectors of our economy.
The overwhelming defeat of Amendment 4 suggests that a majority of Florida voters do not share Healy's opinion that more regulation is the answer. Voters made that clear on Election Day by soundly dispatching Amendment 4 at the polls and handing antigrowth activists the most crushing defeat in recent memory.
In "The Road to Serfdom," free-market philosopher Friedrich von Hayek wrote that "the more the state 'plans,' the more difficult planning becomes for the individual." Hayek's point is that government efforts to manipulate the free market through central planning — telling individuals what to produce and where to produce it — create uncertainty and higher costs. These economic hazards invite more central planning, creating an ever-growing, never-sufficient morass of regulation that worsens the problems it is intended to fix.
A legacy of that misguided approach, the DCA has long since strayed beyond its original planning purview and now meddles in issues outside its jurisdiction. Less of a growth guide and more of a growth nanny, DCA presides over a hopelessly byzantine planning process decipherable only to the agency's technocrats and incomprehensible to most of the small businesses and local governments forced to navigate it.
Healy's views and the DCA in its present form are relics of a "Tallahassee-knows-best" mindset — a Soviet-style regulation scheme that has no place in the highly competitive global economy of today. As local leaders work to diversify our economy, attract innovative industry and add high-paying jobs, it is past time to drop the 1980s mindset with its emphasis on planning Florida's economy.
It's time to cut red tape, not create more. Policymakers should abandon the DCA — at least in its current form — and let locals lead. Taxpayers will pocket the savings, and job-hunters will reap the rewards.
Ryan Houck of Orlando is the executive director of Citizens for Lower Taxes and a Stronger Economy.

Rick Scott, pack your bags: DCA isn't killing jobs, the Growth Machine is ... by gimleteye

Florida has three industries: tourism, agriculture, and construction/development. These industries are bound together by land speculation, avoidance of environmental regulations, and gaming buyers. The hucksterism has expanded radically in the past decade, to include the idea that the environment is protected by existing regulations and a (bloated, inefficient) bureaucracy. What is undeniably true is that environmental agencies are so brow-beaten by the Growth Machine ideologues, that a significant percentage of agency time and energy is spent either fending off attacks or strategizing how to avoid them. Florida is the manifest example of government designed to fail, by pressuring from outside and when then doesn't work, from within: using ideologues in high positions to undercut mission and legislators to cut budgets and staffing where agencies interfere with campaign contributors' business lines.

Florida is floating in a sea of man-made pollution; our waters are toxic precisely because we can't get the toxics out of our politics. Poisoning regulations meant to protect our air and water and weakening environmental laws has been an essential part of promoting Florida's economy for so long that most people are simply incapable of separating out the charlatans and cynics who say either "it's all good" or "jobs come first".

One example: most Floridians believe the Everglades have been "saved". A chief culprit-- but not the only one-- is excess phosphorous that is mainly the result of runoff from sugar fields and cities built in low-lying flood plains. In 2005, the US E.P.A. published data indicating that 49 percent of 2063 square miles of Everglades were contaminated by phosphorous, measured at 1270 locations. This compares to 34 percent measured in 1995-1996. Today, efforts by the EPA to impose enforceable limits on phosphorous pollution in the Everglades are opposed by the state, which has taxing authority through the legislature but is afraid to use it to clean the environment. And that is just the Everglades. Movement by the EPA to impose enforceable limits on phosphorous pollution in all Florida waters has triggered a political backlash wrapping up Democrats and Republicans, despite the evidence of human health threats, threats to tourism, and the economy from poisoned waters.

No politician wants to run on a platform, how bad things are. But this election cycle, what the public has been treated to is a non-stop, in-your-face, how bad the unemployment is with no-- and I mean, NO-- further development of the theme that state policies and the Florida legislature substantially contributed to the economic calamity. This idea that our economic woes are a form of immaculate conception fits neatly with creationism and its boosters. Some days I wonder if there is so much mercury in Florida's environment that it has made its voters plain stupider than the rest of the nation.

Now here comes Rick Scott claiming that the Florida Department of Community Affairs, nicknamed DCA, is "killing jobs". In doing so Scott is picking up the code and secret handshake between Florida builders, the Florida Chamber of Commerce, and Associated Industries: all development is good. All development in farmland is better than good because at the end of the day, it is more profitable building tract housing and condos than raising vegetables or sugarcane.

There is a further bit of idiocy that goes along with Rick Scott's uninformed view of DCA: that is, that local government can do a better job of managing growth than the state. What a crock of horse manure. The entire reason for Amendment 4, Florida Hometown Democracy, is on account of the deformation of government by big contributors to political campaigns from construction and development sectors of the economy, to local elected officials. Just how bad it is, exhibit A: Miami-Dade's own unreformable majority including Joe Martinez, Pepe Diaz, Dorrin Rolle, Bruno Barreiro, Barbara Jordan, Audrey Edmonson, and last but scarcely least, the Queen of Mean, Natacha Seijas (VNS). This is the level of government Rick Scott wants to further empower? If you like our county commission, by all means vote for Rick Scott. He's your man.

Rick Scott is either lying or he knows so little how Florida really works that he should pack his bags and emigrate to the Cayman Islands or Bahamas or some other tax haven to clip coupons of junk debt issued by corporations he knows better than Florida's environmental and growth management laws. The GOP Legislature had the Florida Department of Community Affairs in its cross-hatch long before the building boom. They have sought to bust up the do-good'ers and get government off the backs of their developer cronies so they can build in more wetlands, on more estuaries, and in more sugar fields-- driving up the price of speculatively purchased property.

The victims don't just include the environment. The victims of this nonsense are ordinary people and clueless voters. I fault Democrats running for high office who simply lacked the courage, the initiative or the conviction to say that the party made mistakes and that those mistakes in Florida have been tied, substantially, to the growth at any cost programs of government that turned Florida into a pinata for influential campaign donors who depended on zoning for the next mega-mall, for the next insta-grow suburb, and for the next square mile turned into a taxpayer funded anonymous place to fill the needs of Wall Street mortgage pools. Of course, if the Democrats in Florida did that; they would have no campaign contributor base either. But as usual here, Democrats are mostly GOP-lite.

Still, what the Florida GOP is serving up this election cycle is the worst hash of candidates and "programs" that I have seen in Florida in more than two decades of observations. Rick Scott made hundreds of millions of dollars exploiting government health care programs. His business model and lobbying first advocated for the very government reimbursement limits that he, then, found ways to undercut and thereby profit. The corporation he founded paid the largest civil fine for Medicare fraud in US history. Does that tell you, anything? Hello? Rick Scott wants to "save the Everglades", too. Anyone, home?

There is approximately one week for the clucking chickens among the electorate to get their heads screwed on straight. Whether that can happen or not, is very much undecided at this unhappy point in time.