Save or kill, or, what? by gimleteye

The news is piling up as though the Gods of Resolution are on strike. So we punched it up for you to help sort out.

Cut property taxes or increase sales taxes (more 'hope' for the poor and disadvantaged?)

County or federal HUD control of the Miami Dade Housing Agency (who appoints the ‘independent’ board?)

Community redevelopment funds or private funds to build Marlins baseball stadium in Miami (who can afford the costs of professional sports?)

Hialeah race track into housing development or community park

FPL coal fired power plant at edge of Everglades (who can afford mercury pollution?)

New water treatment facilities costing XX billions (Who will pay to clean up polluted drinking water supplies, taxpayers or rock miners?)

60 acres of parks in the City of Miami or lowest ratio of parkland to resident in US cities. (who wants a city on the bay where you can’t get to the bay?)

More subsidies for the $500 million Performing Arts Center. (who wants to wait for the neighborhood to become ‘safer’?)

$1.5 billion tunnel under Biscayne Bay to the Port of Miami or not. (who wants to subsidize bayside property values?)

Everglades Skyway or Tamiami Trail (who wants to pay $11 billion for a plan to restore the Everglades with a plug at the end?)


There is always a larger framework to the swirling news: today it is how the cost of living for South Floridians is colliding with a gathering recession in housing markets.

Then, there is the issue of plunging water levels in Lake Okeechobee that serves all of South Florida’s fresh water needs.

Only two years ago, water managers were so concerned about high water levels that they dumped massive amounts of polluted lake water into estuaries, causing algae blooms on both coasts. As New Times reports this week, we have our own algae bloom in south Biscayne Bay.

The problem with water is people: we tapped out the capacity of normal water cycles to provide for our fresh water needs. If climate change re-orders the extreme ends of water cycles—drought and/or oversupply—what then?

So far, the answer conceived by Jeb Bush water managers is massive development of industrial water management processes across the state. Great for campaign contributions, but, is it good for people?

What does South Florida look like, if we can’t manage our way out of overdevelopment? If a housing crash rips through county and municipal budgets? Or if climate change causes havoc to the one commodity we can’t live without: clean, fresh water?

And how do you want that mercury from FPL? With milk or sugar?