At Water Management District, Gov. Rick Scott achieves "astounding brain drain" ... by gimleteye

There is something worth knowing about the South Florida Water Management District and the scientists quantifying baselines, plans, metrics and measurement of Everglades restoration: they labored beneath the radar, mostly, of political meddling. That meddling was the result of federal litigation in the 1980's that continues to this day because the state of Florida primarily represents the interest of polluters.

Yesterday's Draconian staff cut of the science arm of the District may have achieved what politics never could in the modern era. Gone are career scientists with encyclopedic knowledge of what the Everglades had been. All "to save thirty dollars on your tax bill", said Chris McVoy, one of them. Once the scientists left the building, it is anyone's guess what comprises the best restoration money can buy, at what price and with what results. Those results, you can be sure, will not be to the benefit of the Everglades. Who speaks for the Everglades, now?

McVoy is a PhD soil scientist whose investigations led to the clearest understanding of how water flowed and where, before any of the drainage systems imposed by Florida's early settlers. In today's Palm Beach Post, he attributes the massive layoffs to "pure politics". I believe McVoy, a scientist with impeccable credentials and integrity.

Let's cut to the chase. Having elected political leaders like Gov. Rick Scott out of the confusion of a generational economic crisis, the 40 Year War Against The Environment acquired new momentum. Scott came from nowhere, fueled by the anger of Tea Party activists. But the GOP quickly adapted to the loss of its own standard bearers. It turns out that the Tea Party is funded by the same radical right that pushed George W. Bush and Dick Cheney to the White House. Cheney's first act was to shut out environmental organizations from secret deliberations on environmental science policy. Scott didn't even know the meaning not to mention, history, of environmental policy when he came to Tallahassee.

The budgets that built District science capacity were the result of federal litigation against the state of Florida for allowing the unabated pollution of the Everglades-- mostly by Big Sugar. Beneath the hoopla in Congress about debt ceilings and deficits, the GOP organized for its primary mission: to attack the federal US EPA. All the Tea Party sees is "overreaching regulations". All their funders see is money. While the Tea Party jostles to raise the beleaguered taxpayer onto their shoulders, the goal of their funders is to shift the costs of pollution as far away from themselves as they can, right onto the backs of taxpayers.

The GOP is using the economic crisis like Governor Scott: to cripple whole areas of public policy with which it disagrees. But political theory doesn't underline the 40 Year War on the Environment: money does. They claim it is your money they are saving-- with their thirty dollar savings. But it is theirs: billions of dollars of assets and equity that depend on how the law defines pollution and the penalties to polluters.

Only a few days ago, in Iowa, Michele Bachmann attacked Tim Pawlenty for supporting "cap and trade"; an effort to deal with global warming. You see, the very notion that the planet is warming because of our economic activities mobilizes the radical right under the banner of ideological purity.

At his 2003 Tallahassee inauguration, then Governor Jeb Bush faced a rapturous audience and said, in words that echo today; “There will be no greater tribute to our maturity as a society than if we can make these buildings around us empty of workers; as silent monuments to the time when government played a larger role than it deserved or could adequately fill." It takes a village to raise a child, and it takes a flame to burn the village down. (click 'read more' for the Palm Beach Post story on the layoffs)



"Brain drain astounding" as dozens depart water district under state cutbacks
Bruce Bennett/Palm Beach Post

Chris McVoy lost his job at South Florida Water Management District Friday, August 12, 2011. He was a Senior Environmental Scientist. "They told me around 11am," he said. "I have worked here since 1995. I've devoted the better part of my career to working on Everglades restoration. I'm pretty disappointed that the governor and legislature have lost their commitment to Everglades restoration. This is just straight politics."
By Christine Stapleton
Palm Beach Post Staff Writer

Updated: 8:15 p.m. Friday, Aug. 12, 2011

Posted: 7:35 a.m. Friday, Aug. 12, 2011

Officials at the South Florida Water Management District did not release the number of workers laid off by the agency on Friday but there were many, with departures throughout the day. Workers were asked to leave quickly.

An estimated 100 people are expected to be gone when the layoffs are completed Aug. 17.

A plain-clothes sheriff's deputy wearing a bullet-proof vest sat at the security desk near the agency's front door all day Friday. No incidents were reported.

"The brain drain out of this place has been astounding," said Christopher W. McVoy, a senior environmental scientist in the Everglades division, who was laid off on Friday afternoon. McVoy, who has a Ph.D. in soil physics from Cornell, worked at the district for 15 years. "Obviously people losing their jobs is a bad thing but it goes way beyond that. What they are undoing here is big."

Already 123 workers have left the agency after accepting buyouts in June. Of those, 19 were scientists. Several other scientists left earlier this year, finding jobs at other agencies or institutions, after learning layoffs were imminent. The scattering of such highly specialized scientists who devoted years of their careers to the unique problems of South Florida, such as the Everglades restoration, will take its toll, McVoy said.

"Building up that institutional knowledge is invaluable," McVoy said. "It will be much harder to recreate it."

Workers remaining will see reductions in benefits, including medical insurance, tuition reimbursements and a health care subsidy for retirees, along with elimination of the vacation and sick leave buyback program and the matching contributions the district makes to an employee's deferred compensation plan.

The staff and benefit cuts are being made to comply with a new law, strongly backed by Gov. Rick Scott, requiring the district to slash by 30 percent -- about $128 million -- the money it can raise through property taxes

To accomplish that, the board approved a proposal to set a tax rate just under 44 cents for every $1,000 of taxable value, down from this year's rate of 62 cents. Based on that rate, a home with an assessed value of $200,000 with a $50,000 homestead exemption would save about $27.

"A lot of people talk about it like it's a natural disaster, a fatalistic sense that bad things just happen," McVoy said, standing in the parking lot after losing his job. "This was a very deliberate, very organized effort that didn't have to be -- just to save about $30 a year on your tax bill."