Please watch an excellent video on the Lake Okeechobee crisis by the Weather Channel, which is really a crisis of Florida politics and water caused by Big Sugar's domination of water management infrastructure. Also, Maggie Hurchalla takes on the disinformation campaign being waged by Big Sugar.
In Miami-Dade County, what is at stake with Everglades restoration are not just birds and manatees: it's our water supply. Be informed. Watch, read, and speak out to your elected officials in the county commission and state legislature: Buy The Land Now and sign the Now Or Neverglades Declaration! Support groups like Bullsugar that are fighting Big Sugar's multi-million dollar disinformation campaign.
POINT OF VIEW
Negron on right track for Everglades restoration
Maggie Hurchalla, Palm Beach Post
Thursday, Dec. 8, 2016
Someone needs to point out that former Pahokee Mayor J.P. Sasser’s view of Everglades Restoration is a mythological beast.
As noted in his Nov. 29 Point of View piece, his plot goes like this:
Environmentalists don’t care about the Everglades. They hate the people that live south of Lake Okeechobee and want to destroy their livelihood. In the beginning, environmentalists opposed a storage reservoir south of the Lake even though we all know it was badly needed. Now environmentalists support a reservoir south of Lake O even though everyone knows it was never part of CERP (Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan) and is not needed. State Senate President Joe Negron, R-Stuart, is working to get the state to buy land south of the lake for a reservoir because U.S. Sugar is a client of his law firm.
Here are the facts:
CERP, or Everglades restoration, has always required buying a large amount of land south of Lake O. Without that land for storage, treatment and conveyance, Everglades’ restoration won’t work, Miami’s water supply will more rapidly go salt, and Florida Bay and the coastal estuaries will be irrevocably destroyed.
The unfinished reservoir where millions were wasted was a part of the state Accer8 program. It was designed to give most of the stored water to sugar growers, and less water to the Everglades than CERP called for. It did not include water quality treatment. It was an expensive mistake in the wrong place.
The land acquired earlier with state and federal funds has been used to meet the state responsibility for water quality ordered by the federal court.
The purchase of 60,000 acres of land in the 470,000-acre Everglades Agricultural Area will not destroy agriculture south of the lake. It is the amount of land required by CERP. Because of sugar’s huge requirements for irrigation in the dry season and for treatment of stormwater runoff, it is the only way we can have peaceful coexistence between the environment and the sugar industry.
Negron’s proposal to buy 60,000 acres does not favor U.S. Sugar. It has equal impact on the two big sugar companies.
CERP is not about alligators out in the swamp. It is about the future of South Florida. The continued insistence of sugar company supporters that water doesn’t have to go south and can’t go south will have unbearable consequences for all of us.
Negron has taken a leadership role in trying to negotiate what is right, fair and will work. We all need to get behind him.
In Miami-Dade County, what is at stake with Everglades restoration are not just birds and manatees: it's our water supply. Be informed. Watch, read, and speak out to your elected officials in the county commission and state legislature: Buy The Land Now and sign the Now Or Neverglades Declaration! Support groups like Bullsugar that are fighting Big Sugar's multi-million dollar disinformation campaign.
Toxic Lake: The Untold Story of Lake Okeechobee from Weather Films on Vimeo.
POINT OF VIEW
Negron on right track for Everglades restoration
Maggie Hurchalla, Palm Beach Post
Thursday, Dec. 8, 2016
Someone needs to point out that former Pahokee Mayor J.P. Sasser’s view of Everglades Restoration is a mythological beast.
As noted in his Nov. 29 Point of View piece, his plot goes like this:
Environmentalists don’t care about the Everglades. They hate the people that live south of Lake Okeechobee and want to destroy their livelihood. In the beginning, environmentalists opposed a storage reservoir south of the Lake even though we all know it was badly needed. Now environmentalists support a reservoir south of Lake O even though everyone knows it was never part of CERP (Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan) and is not needed. State Senate President Joe Negron, R-Stuart, is working to get the state to buy land south of the lake for a reservoir because U.S. Sugar is a client of his law firm.
Here are the facts:
CERP, or Everglades restoration, has always required buying a large amount of land south of Lake O. Without that land for storage, treatment and conveyance, Everglades’ restoration won’t work, Miami’s water supply will more rapidly go salt, and Florida Bay and the coastal estuaries will be irrevocably destroyed.
The unfinished reservoir where millions were wasted was a part of the state Accer8 program. It was designed to give most of the stored water to sugar growers, and less water to the Everglades than CERP called for. It did not include water quality treatment. It was an expensive mistake in the wrong place.
The land acquired earlier with state and federal funds has been used to meet the state responsibility for water quality ordered by the federal court.
The purchase of 60,000 acres of land in the 470,000-acre Everglades Agricultural Area will not destroy agriculture south of the lake. It is the amount of land required by CERP. Because of sugar’s huge requirements for irrigation in the dry season and for treatment of stormwater runoff, it is the only way we can have peaceful coexistence between the environment and the sugar industry.
Negron’s proposal to buy 60,000 acres does not favor U.S. Sugar. It has equal impact on the two big sugar companies.
CERP is not about alligators out in the swamp. It is about the future of South Florida. The continued insistence of sugar company supporters that water doesn’t have to go south and can’t go south will have unbearable consequences for all of us.
Negron has taken a leadership role in trying to negotiate what is right, fair and will work. We all need to get behind him.
1 comment:
The RiverWarriors of Martin and St Lucie County have been working on this with Mark Perry from Florida Oceanographic Society for years and our Gov Rick Scott does NOTHING to save the environment of FLorida - we need to protest until the Discharges from Lake "O" stop because it is against the Clean Water Act!!
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