Guest AuthorWith the million-dollar sugar babies still running the show in the Legislature, it might seem impossible to stop the polluting discharges bombarding the coasts and sucking dry the Everglades.
And yet there seems to be a sense of momentum for change in the air.
More and more angry citizens are realizing that purchasing 46,000 acres in the Everglades Agricultural Area south of Lake Okeechobee is the only possible way to curtail the extreme damages inflicted on the St. Lucie and Caloosahatchee estuaries and the Everglades River of Grass.
Nothing else – nothing – will significantly diminish the astounding discharge agonies facing the two big estuaries east and west of Lake Okeechobee.
For nearly five years, U.S. Sugar Corp. has touted their agreement to sell this land as an example of responsible environmental stewardship and good corporate citizenship. In promotional materials, newspaper columns and on their website, they were for this deal.
Now, U.S. Sugar Corp. wants to walk away from its binding contract to sell this land. Its lobbyists are telling the legislature to delay the purchase and encouraging them to use the money for local pork-barrel projects instead of protecting the Everglades. They’re putting greed ahead of critical drinking water supplies and the health of Florida’s world famous recreational fishing industry.
Why are some legislative leaders going along with sugar’s hypocrisy and double-dealing? Because of the tens of millions they’ve raked in from the sugar industry: campaign money, luxury vacation junkets, free meals and entertainment, post-legislative employment and the fawning attention of dozens of registered lobbyists.
Although our powers-that-be have continued to coddle the polluters, pressure is building to restore the waters that once teemed with marine and plant life.
That’s where you come in. Stand tall. Add to that pressure.
Send an email or make a phone call to the governor and your state legislators who are about to spend hundreds of millions of newly dedicated tax money that voters intended for conservation purposes.
This is money from the documentary tax on real estate transactions, approved in November as a constitutional amendment, favored by 75 percent of voters. Clearly, the voters want waters cleaned and protected, even if the despoilers and their political chums don’t.
Tell the governor, legislators and all other leaders that part of the Amendment 1 funds must be used for storing water south of Lake Okeechobee, including the optioned purchase of necessary U.S. Sugar property. We insist.
The choice is simple: follow the will of the voters and scientists who support this land purchase to protect the Everglades and our drinking water or side with the sugar industry.
Fire away.
Let them all know how much the waters and outdoors mean to you. Your personal expressions can have a tremendous cumulative effect.
Even though Gov. Rick Scott and a host of powerful officials might have resided in Big Sugar’s left pocket, that could change in a hurry if the errant leaders feel grassroots pressure from you and other dedicated citizens.
Let the emails and phone messages soar. Please, cry the ecosystems.
Karl Wickstrom is the founder and editor-in-chief of Florida Sportsman magazine and a member of the International Game Fish Association’s Hall of Fame. Column courtesy of Context Florida.
