Posted on Wed, Jul. 18, 2012

By CURTIS MORGAN
Cmorgan@MiamiHerald.com

Curtis Morgan / Miami Herald Staff - U.S. Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar is aboard an airboat in the Everglades on trip to tout the Obama administration's progress on Everglades clean up.

From a helicopter over Arthur R. Marshall Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge on Wednesday, U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar took in some of the daunting challenges of restoring the Everglades.

Down below, suburbs abut the refuge’s last cypress stands. Vast sugar farms loom to the north. Cattails, fueled by nutrient pollution, choke out native plants around its border. Massive man-made marshes filter dirty water flowing in, but not well enough. Giant pumps replicate a natural flow now blocked by canals and levees.

The visit to the western Palm Beach County refuge was intended to highlight Everglades restoration progress by the Obama administration, which has kick-started stalled projects with $1.5 billion in federal support over the last 3 1/2 years and struck an important pollution clean-up settlement last month with Florida.

But partisan election-year overtones buzzed almost as loudly as the cicadas. In what sounded an awful lot like Obama campaign talking points, Salazar ticked off a string of successes while also issuing a caution about the amount of work ahead and uncertain future state and federal support.

“Frankly, a great fear I have is there will be a U-turn,’’ Salazar told reporters after a chopper and airboat tour.

He questioned the long-term support of Republican Gov. Rick Scott for the deal, which will cost the state some $880 million to expand manmade marshes that reduce the flow of the damaging nutrient phosphorus.

“There has to be a continued commitment on the part of the state of Florida to get this thing done,’’ Salazar said. Scott, who had personally championed a settlement, released a statement saying his office has worked closely with federal agencies and environmentalists to secure the agreement.

“I would be shocked if Secretary Salazar said that, knowing how hard we’ve worked on our historic agreement to restore water quality and water flow to the Everglades,’’ he said. “I, along with all Floridians, care deeply about the Everglades and recognize it as an international treasure.’’

But notably absent from Salazar’s visit were representatives of the South Florida Water Management District, which is in charge of Everglades restoration for the state and headquartered a half-hour drive from the refuge. The district — which last week tentatively agreed to trim $100 million from its budget, money environmentalists argue should be put toward clean-up costs — referred questions to the governor’s office

Salazar, whose agency oversees federal parks and refuges, also warned that a budget drafted by Republicans in Congress would amount to a “death knell’’ for programs that fund conservation projects – not just Everglades restoration but nationwide.

“It’s not the kind of conservation agenda that Teddy Roosevelt or Barack Obama or I would support,’’ he said. “I will do everything I can to fight that, as will the president.’’

Salazar’s visit followed one last week to Orlando by four high-ranking administration aides to announce an $80 million purchase of “conservation easements’’ that will preserve 23,000 acres of rural wetlands in the Northern Everglades. Vice President Joe Biden and U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson, a fellow Democrat facing a tough election battle this year, made a similar Glades-as-a-backdrop stop in Miami-Dade County in April.

Matt Connelly, a spokesman for the Republican National Committee, accused the White House of using the Everglades to distract from more pressing national problems.

“It’s clearly a political move that highlights how desperate the president is to talk about anything besides his failed economic policies and political cronyism for campaign donors,” Connelly said.

Salazar insisted restoring the River of Grass had been his and the president’s top environmental priority from day one, Salazar said. He acknowledged there were decades of work ahead but argued “we have been able to move more the last 3 1/2 years than we have, I think, in the last 20 years."

The administration calculates that the $1.5 billion it has put into restoration in the president’s first term nearly matches the previous eight years under President George W. Bush — an uptick in federal funding that helped break ground on a number of long-stalled projects, including the bridging of Tamiami Trail. The White House banned the importation of the Burmese python that had invaded the Glades – an effort championed by Salazar – and after 18 months of intense negotiations cut a pollution clean-up deal with the state intended to resolve two long-running federal lawsuits.

How much Everglades support will resonate with typical Florida voters is uncertain but environmentalists heaped praise on the efforts by the administration. Historically, candidates from both parties have pledged to save the Everglades but so far Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney hasn’t taken a public position on continuing support for the $12.5 billion state and federal restoration project, said Eric Draper, executive director of Audubon of Florida.

“It looks like Romney has ceded the Everglades to the president,’’ Draper said. “The message that Romney sends out about smaller government and less taxes is antithetical to Everglades restoration.’’

Miami Herald Staff Writer Marc Caputo contributed to the story.

Environmentalists are applauding a pledge from the Obama administration and a Glades cleanup ruling by a federal judge.

By CURTIS MORGAN
cmorgan@MiamiHerald.com

Everglades restoration got a double boost this week — first from a Miami federal judge who approved a landmark $880 million pollution cleanup plan and then from the Obama administration, which announced an $80 million expansion of a program that already has preserved nearly 100,000 acres of rural wetlands in the Northern Everglades.

U.S. District Judge Alan Gold on Wednesday issued an order clearing the path for resolving long-running legal battles over reducing the flow of damaging nutrients from farm, ranches and yards into the struggling River of Grass.

The administration followed up Friday with an announcement that it will pay farmers and ranchers $80 million to place “conservation easements” on some 23,000 acres in the Northern Everglades, including a key parcel in Glades County that biologists consider critical to saving the endangered Florida panther. The 1,278-acre American Prime tract, named for a company that once wanted to develop it, provides a corridor for the big cats to cross the Caloosahatchee River and allow a population concentrated in Southwest Florida to expand northward.

The news conference in Kissimmee, featuring four top White House aides overseeing Glades issues, included the release of a report touting some $1.5 billion in Everglades funding over the past three years — a major increase over the previous four years under President George W. Bush.

“With the president’s leadership, we are making real and measurable progress in Everglades restoration,’’ said Nancy Sutley, the chair of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, in a news release.

Charles Lee, a longtime activist for Audubon of Florida, acknowledged the announcement was aimed at burnishing the president’s image in a swing state important to his reelection hopes but also called that typical election-year politics.

“From our point of view, $80 million and 23,000 acres is nothing to sneeze at,’’ said Lee, who attended the announcement at the Disney Wilderness Preserve. “That’s more than the entire state program has done in the last two or three years.’’

Among other projects, the report cited continuing work to restore 3,000 acres of historic floodplain along the Kissimmee River, construction of a new bridge along Tamiami Trail and plans to establish the 150,000-acre Everglades Headwaters National Wildlife Refuge and Conservation Area north of Lake Okeechobee.

The conservation easement program, funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, has emerged over the past three years as a promising new restoration strategy. Since 2009, the administration has spent $373 million, far more than any other state, to purchase similar easements on some 95,000 acres of wild lands mostly west and north of Lake Okeechobee.

The easements come much cheaper than outright land purchases. And they allow farmers and ranchers to continue using land while blocking development, preserving habitat and helping store and clean up damaging nutrients from water flowing south toward the greater Everglades. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said the administration’s Everglades efforts also have created nearly 7,000 jobs.

Cary Lightsey, a Lake Wales rancher whose family has participated in the program, told the Tampa Bay Times that future residents will appreciate the conservation program more than voters today.

“If we didn’t do anything, then most of this land would become houses,” he said.

The decision from Gold, who over the past few years has issued a series of rulings blasting state and federal agencies for “glacial delay” and repeatedly failing to enforce water-pollution standards tough enough to protect the Everglades, cleared the way for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to issue the state permits for a slate of new projects.

They’re part of a plan worked out between the EPA and the Florida Department of Environmental Protection with the goal of settling two lawsuits over Everglades pollution, one going back to 1988. Gold, who handled a lawsuit filed in 2004 by the Miccosukee Tribe and the environmental group Friends of the Everglades, had pressured both sides to draft a new plan.

It calls for the state to expand an existing network of 45,000 acres of artificial marshes that absorb damaging nutrients from farm and suburban storm runoff that damages native plants and the Everglades food chain.

Though most environmental groups have applauded the plan, the tribe and Friends of the Everglades have been lukewarm. They filed briefs calling it a step in the right direction but arguing it will push back cleanup deadlines to 2025 — almost two decades beyond an original 2006 target — and questioning whether the state has a firm plan to pay for the work.

 

A new Everglades restoration plan proposed by Gov. Rick Scott will delay restoration and will be unenforceable, according to the group Friends of the Everglades.

U.S. District Judge Alan S. Gold has scheduled a July 18 hearing in Miami on a framework agreement for restoration proposed by Scott in 2011. The $880 million, 12-year agreement was approved by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on June 13.

While Audubon Florida and the Everglades Foundation supported the proposal, Friends of the Everglades only had issued a short statement last month raising concerns.

Friends of the Everglades and the Miccosukee Tribe of Indians sued the federal agency in 2004 for failure to clean up sugar industry pollution flowing into the Everglades. Gold sided with the plaintiffs in 2008 and EPA issued an amended determination in 2010 ordering Florida and the South Florida Water Management District to construct additional stormwater treatment areas to treat phosphorus-rich water.

The new plan proposed by Florida calls for construction of 6,500 acres of additional stormwater treatment areas and water storage areas capable of holding 32 billion gallons, according to the Florida Department of Environmental Protection. Gold set the July 18 hearing date and required all of the parties in the case to file briefs in response this week.

In its filing, Friends of the Everglades said the proposed new timetable for restoration extends through 2025, five years longer than EPA had directed the state in 2010. The group also has concerns about technical shortcomings in the plan, its lack of interim standards and its enforceability.

In an opinion column submitted to news media, Friends of the Everglades President Alan Farago quoted President Ronald Reagan's approach to nuclear arms negotiations: "Trust, but verify."

"So far, what the state and EPA propose is a step in the right direction but lacks the iron-clad commitments that (Friends founder) Marjory Stoneman Douglas fought for and that our organization is determined to achieve for Florida and the nation’s interest in the Everglades," Farago wrote.

Spokespersons for the DEP and the EPA were invited to comment on Tuesday but had not provided responses by deadline.

DEP's federal court filing said the plan complies with a 2010 court order, EPA's amended determination and the federal Clean Water Act. DEP said no further discussions with EPA are necessary because the matters raised in previous court orders have been resolved.

The EPA said the timetable is based on estimates provided by the South Florida Water Management District for reliably financing and constructing the restoration projects. Assuming a consent order is approved in a timely fashion, all of the issues raised by the court will have been resolved, the federal agency said.

Related Research: Access pleadings and other documents filed in the Friends of the Everglades federal court case.

Reporter Bruce Ritchie can be reached at britchie@thefloridacurrent.com.

 

 

Rich Botta bags a python during a “Python Patrol” responder course on Thursday in Davie hosted by Florida Atlantic University’s Environmental Science Program in the Charles E. Schmidt College of Science. Taimy Alvarez / Sun Sentinel

DAVIE – They came to Florida Atlantic University to learn about wading birds, but on Thursday, they got a lesson in slithering snakes.

About 17 environmental science students, most of whom are studying avian ecology, were trained on how to capture Burmese pythons, non-native snakes which have virtually wiped out raccoons, marsh rabbits and other mammals in the southern region of Everglades National Park.

PhD student Jennifer Chastant, 31, who had never handled a snake before, volunteered to go first.

"The trainers said [the snakes] were a little calm in the morning, so I decided I needed to take care of this now," she said. "It's a little scary. It's a wild animal, and you don't know what it's going to do."

Because many of the students trek through the Everglades for research, it's not unusual for them to encounter the non-venomous pythons, said Dale Gawlik, who heads FAU's environmental science program in Davie.

"We want students to be comfortable. We don't want them to panic and make bad decisions," he said. "And it's a chance to do something good for the Everglades. It's a chance to get some potentially dangerous, invasive species out of the ecosystem."

Trapped pythons are used for research and training, including Thursday's event, which was sponsored by the non-profit Nature Conservancy and several other agencies.

Jeffrey Fobb, who works for the venom response unit of Miami Dade Fire Rescue, used a few basic tools in his demonstration: a golf club-sized snake hook, a fabric bag and black adhesive tape. He showed the students how to pin the snake so it was startled and could be easily and gently grabbed.

"You don't' want to give him the Kung Fu grip," he said. "You want to have your fingers right up next to his jaws. The more force you use, the more resistance you're going to get."

The students each were able to secure a snake into a bag without any bites, although doctorate student Jessica Klassen, 27, had a close call. As she removed her snake from a bag, the animal turned its head several times as if to strike her.

"It was exhilarating, but I just gave it some time to relax and calm down," she said. "It all worked out in the end."

Wildlife officials believe there are tens of thousands of Burmese pythons in South Florida, although exact numbers are unknown. More than 1,800 have been captured over the 12 years.

The python course is not open to the public. Anyone who wants to learn how to identify and report invasive reptiles are encouraged to take a free, online reptile detection and documentation class, available at ufwildlife.ifas.ufl.edu (select REDDy training).

If a python, Nile monitor, tegu lizard or other invasive exotic animal is seen, people are encouraged to stay at a safe distance, take a photo, and report it to 1-888-IVE-GOT-1, online at http://www.IveGot1.org, or on the IveGot1 mobile apps for the iPhone and Android.

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/palm-beach/fl-fau-python-20120628,0,5615454.story#

U.S. Supreme Court refuses to hear Florida's case in tri-state water dispute

Bruce Ritchie, 06/25/2012 - 05:28 PM

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The Apalachicola, Chattahoochee and Flint river system. Map credit: Atlanta Regional Commission

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday refused to take up an appeal filed by Florida in the case involving the Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint river system.

The decision not to hear Florida's request to review an 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruling could harm the Apalachicola River and bay, the Florida Department of Environmental Protection said Monday.

Alabama, Florida and Georgia have been fighting in federal court over water since 1990. Alabama and Georgia want water for industry and growing cities, while Florida wants water for fish and wildlife along the Apalachicola River and to support the seafood industry in Apalachicola Bay.

Lake Lanier, a federal reservoir on the Chattahoochee River in north Georgia, has been the focus of the dispute because it provides 60 percent of the storage capacity among the reservoirs on the river system.

U.S. District Judge Paul Magnuson in 2009 ruled that Congress must authorize Lake Lanier to provide water to Georgia cities. Without authorization, he ordered that water use be cut off in three years.

But the 11th Circuit overturned the decision and instead directed the Corps of Engineers to analyze its authority related to the Lake Lanier. 

Florida and Alabama in February asked the Supreme Court to review the case. The Supreme Court denied the petition on Monday without comment.

"The department is concerned that the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals decision could result in unbalanced management of the reservoir system, diverting more water from Lake Lanier for local municipal purposes, and depriving Florida of the water flows needed to support the ecology and economy of the River and Bay," Florida DEP said in a statement. "This could allow further disruption of the biological productivity and unique ecosystem of the river and bay and adversely affect endangered species and the bay's hallmark oyster production."

Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal said the Supreme Court had affirmed that drinking water always was an authorized use of Lake Lanier.

"We can now move forward with this issue behind us, have the governors work together and come to a long-term agreement that will provide for the water needs of all three states," Deal said in a news release.

The environmental group Apalachicola Riverkeeper said it was disappointed by the decision. Dan Tonsmeire, the group's executive director, said the states now can either focus on sharing water throughout the river basin, as the ACF Stakeholders group has suggested, or begin a new round of litigation.

"I think the most sane thing is to try to sit down and use the best available science and see what we can work out," he said. "I hold out some optimism we will achieve that overall look at how water can be managed in the whole ACF basin."

DEP issues guidelines to water districts for buying, getting rid of state lands

Bruce Ritchie, 06/26/2012 - 01:10 PM

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Water management districts must receive Florida Department of Environmental Protection approval for major land purchases under guidelines published by DEP this month.

The DEP memo, posted on a department website last week, has received a mixed reaction from environmentalists. Some of them last year accused DEP and Gov. Rick Scott of launching a takeover of the districts, which were established by the Legislature in 1972.

Florida has purchased 2.5 million acres since 1990 under Florida Forever and a predecessor land-buying program. State law provides for 30 percent funding to be divided among the five water management districts, although funding has been sharply cut by the Legislature since 2009.

Three months after taking office in 2011, Scott directed DEP to supervise activities of the districts including review and oversight of land acquisition and disposition. Scott said the districts must focus on their core missions of water supply, flood control and resource protection.

The June 8 guidance memo says districts should focus on acquiring conservation easements, which involve paying landowners to conserve land rather than having the state outright buy the property. DEP also says districts should buy land at 90 percent of the appraised value and should find partner agencies to split the cost.

Related Research: Access the directive from Governor Scott and DEP's land acquisition guidelines.

The guidance document requires any purchase of more than $500,000 to be approved by the department. Any purchase below that amount must be approved by the department unless it is for 90 percent or less of the appraised value.

The document calls on districts to sell land that is no longer needed for conservation purposes. However, DEP cautions the districts against eliminating significant landscape linkages, conservation corridors, natural or cultural resources or public recreational opportunities including hunting.

Clay Henderson, a lawyer and member of the Florida Conservation Coalition, said the memo clearly will have a "chilling effect" on new land purchases by districts. He said the districts also are being pressured to sell their lands.

"I'm just tired of being on the defensive," Henderson said. "We are so well-known for our successes with these programs. They have protected some outstanding examples of conservation land across the state and commanded wide support from the public." 

Charles Lee, director of advocacy for Audubon Florida, said he remains concerned about how the districts are identifying land to get rid of. But he said the guidelines have some good language, such as requiring a determination that lands are no longer needed for conservation and avoiding the elimination of conservation corridors and landscape linkages.

"The land acquisition provisions seem to give reasonable latitude for the districts to move forward with purchases, including the $500,000 purchases which don’t even have to be approved by DEP," Lee wrote in an email.

DEP spokesman Patrick Gillespie said department officials met with district representatives in February and they have been following informally following the guidance document since then.

"The purpose of the document is to provide guidance to the water management districts on purchasing land to support their core missions of water supply, water quality, flood control and natural resource protection while being judicious of Florida taxpayer dollars," Gillespie said in an email.

Under current projections, the Atlantic would swallow much of the Florida Keys and Miami-Dade in a century, according to experts at a sea-level rise summit

In this file photo, a picnic table in Everglades National Park sits in high water after a tropical storm dumped a ton of rain on South Florida. Extreme weather conditions and rising sea levels brought on by global warming could have a catastrophic effect on the state of Florida which will be ground-zero for global warming in the United States. David Walters / Herald Staff

By Curtis Morgan The Miami Herald

The subject of global warming has become so politically unpalatable over the last few years that neither party mentions it much anymore.

A conference on climate change sponsored by Florida Atlantic University made it clear that ignoring the threat has done nothing to slow it down — particularly in South Florida, which has more people and property at risk by rising sea levels than any place in the country.

The two-day summit in Boca Raton, which wrapped up Friday, painted a bleak and water-logged picture for much of coastal Florida.

Under current projections, the Atlantic Ocean would swallow much of the Florida Keys in 100 years. Miami-Dade, in turn, would eventually replace them as a chain of islands on the highest parts of the coastal limestone ridge, bordered by the ocean on one side and an Everglades turned into a salt water bay on the other.

Ben Strauss, chief operating officer of Climate Central, an independent research and journalism organization, warned that much of the southern peninsula south of Lake Okeechobee would be virtually uninhabitable within 250 years.

“There’s good reason to believe southern Florida will eventually have to be evacuated,” Strauss told some 275 scientists and climate and planning experts from government agencies, insurance companies, construction experts and other businesses likely to be impacted by rising seas.

While scientists can’t yet predict with certainty how fast and high seas will eventually rise, there is no disputing South Florida will be ground zero for the earliest major impacts, said Leonard Barry, director of FAU’s Florida Center for Environmental Studies.

“The sky is not falling, but the waters are rising,” he said. “We need to recognize that, prepare for that and begin to address it.’’

Four counties — Miami-Dade, Broward, Palm Beach and Monroe — have begun to do that under a 2009 agreement to work together studying how to mitigate and adapt to the myriad ripple effects of rising seas.

Though it might take a century or more to flood people out, scientists warned that potential impacts will come long before in the form of increasing damage from hurricane storm surge and flooding, rising insurance rates and shrinking freshwater supplies as sea water taints coastal wells.

If the rate of rise increases, as some new studies suggest, all those impacts could come sooner — in decades, not centuries.

University of South Florida oceanographer Gary Mitchum said data from worldwide tide gauges suggest the sea level rise might be speeding up, jumping from about two millimeters a year from 1950 to 1992 to three millimeters since.

That amount, a little bit more than a tenth of an inch, adds up quickly in low-lying South Florida, according to expert analysis.

Six more inches, for instance, would compromise half of the South Florida Water Management flood control gates at high tide, potentially worsening flooding losses. Seven inches would consume 30 percent of Big Pine Key. At a foot, 60 percent of Monroe County’s land would disappear. At three feet, 85 percent would be inundated — along with a large swath of coastal Miami-Dade and Broward.

Overall, according to a “Surging Seas” report produced earlier this year by Climate Central, Florida easily ranks as the most vulnerable state to sea-level rise, with some 2.4 million people, 1.3 million homes and 107 cities at risk from a four-foot rise, according to the report. Louisiana, by comparison, has 65 cities below the four-foot mark.

Miami-Dade and Broward alone have more people at risk than any state except Florida and Louisiana, Strauss said. Lee and Pinellas counties also are at high risk.

It’s not just coastal areas either. Low-lying inland cities like Hialeah and Pembroke Pines could be flooded out by a rising, saltier Everglades.

Daniel Williams, an architect and post-disaster planner, said he envisions a future where Miami-Dade would be confined to islands on the highest points of an ancient coastal ridge that runs along the coast. Inundated homes and building along the coast might be left behind to serve as reefs.

The Climate Central study projects that under current trends, the most vulnerable areas could see increased flooding as early as 2030. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, an international science panel, estimates the average sea level could rise from seven inches to about 24 inches by 2100 but notes it could be higher under some scenarios.

James Beever, a principal planner with the Southwest Florida Regional Planning Council, said the changes can already been seen in Florida’s landscape.

Some salt marshes, he said, had already moved inland by the length of a football field. In the Everglades, mangroves have also marched inland, as salt water transforms freshwater marshes.

“The things you read about in the literature that this is going to happen, it’s already happening,’’ he said.

 

Department of Environmental Protection Secretary Herschel Vinyard. Photo Credit: Ana Goni-Lessan

DEP Secretary Herschel T. Vinyard Jr. said Thursday he's concerned that establishing a committee to oversee springs issues could delay department efforts to protect water.

The comments were in response to statements Wednesday from former Sen. Bob Graham in a letter that he and other members of the Florida Conservation Coalition sent to Gov. Rick Scott. 

The letter cited dramatic declines in water flows to Silver and Rainbow springs in Marion County. Graham called on Scott to establish a resource planning and management committee as provided for under Florida law to oversee protection of springs in north Florida.

Vinyard said he shares Graham's sense of urgency in dealing with water issues. But Vinyard said establishing a committee could delay department efforts already under way, including two regional initiatives that are holding public meetings scheduled for next week. 

"To start from square one with a new committee or commission seems to be an opportunity for delay," Vinyard told The Florida Current. "And what I have is a sense of urgency. I want for both to move forward and move forward quickly."

The Central Florida Water Initiative includes only Seminole, Orange, Osceola Lake and Polk counties. Agencies involved in the initiative are hosting an open house Thursday in St. Cloud.

On Monday, the North Florida Regional Water Supply Partnership holds its initial stakeholder advisory committee meeting at the St. Johns River Water Management District in Palatka. DEP and the Suwannee River Water Management District also are involved.

A third working group was established three weeks ago to share data on Silver and Rainbow springs, said Jennifer Diaz, DEP's press secretary. The agencies involved are DEP's Florida Geological Survey, the St. Johns River Water Management District and Southwest Florida Water Management District.

Graham told the Current on Thursday that the lack of setting "minimum flows and levels" to protect Silver Springs shows the state water regulatory system is not working. Adena Springs Ranch has applied to pump more than 13 million gallons per day of groundwater.

Vinyard said he doesn't know why the minimum flows haven't been set for those springs. The St. Johns River Water Management District says it will set minimum flows for Silver Springs in 2013, after the ranch permit could be issued.

After being appointed last year, Vinyard said he established DEP's first Office of Water Policy to improve the sharing of science among the state's water districts.

"Obviously I can't control what was done or not done in the previous 30 years," Vinyard said. "But I share the public's concern."

"We have some of the best scientists, really, in the world on water issues housed in our water management districts and housed at DEP. They certainly have our support to do the right thing to protect these resources. I'm encouraging them to move as quickly as the science allows."

Related Research: Read Monday's letter from the Florida Conservation Coalition.

Reporter Bruce Ritchie can be reached at britchie@thefloridacurrent.com.