By John Cassani
August 29, 2016
Tallahassee Democrat
Public land ownership,
including the perceived need to secure more land south of Lake Okeechobee to reduce destructive flows of polluted water to the east and west coast estuaries, was discussed at a recent James Madison Institute (JMI) session on “environmentalism versus property rights.”
Many participants, including Florida House Speaker Steve Crisafulli, R-Merritt Island, and Senator Alan Hayes, R-Umatilla, supported the concept that Florida has enough land in public ownership, despite the popular voter backed Amendment 1 that restores much of the funding previously spent on conservation lands.
Some policy makers argue that publicly held land takes property off the tax rolls and there is additional cost to manage the land. These can be valid points in some contexts but may be dangerously short sighted considering the threats that challenge Florida now and in the coming years.
Non-partisan researchers using current USGS and NOAA data have determined that 36 percent of the land in Florida coastal counties – representing critical green infrastructure – is protected, providing key ecosystem services for nutrient cycling, detoxification, flood control and economic drivers such as tourism. However, 26 percent of this land or 1.9 million acres would be inundated by a three-foot rise in sea level, offsetting Florida’s past investment in protecting these lands.
As conservation science continues to advance, it is becoming more apparent that it may not be enough. The accelerating threat of climate change and sea level rise is magnified in Florida by a population growth rate of 350,000 people per year, while losing at least 75,000 acres of rural land to new intensive development per year.
These ongoing drivers of growth and land conversion are largely responsible for the widespread impairment of Florida’s waters, with vast implications for the state’s economy and human health. Insufficient regulatory compliance and oversight and the dismantling of Florida’s growth management program in recent years has furthered the decline.
Publicly owned conservation land cleans water more efficiently, offsetting the cost of acquisition, management and tax revenue lost by providing numerous additional services associated with biodiversity, carbon sequestration, water recharge and supply, flood control, fisheries and a tourism based economy worth billions of dollars annually.
The corresponding cost-benefit of buying land to store more water south of Lake Okeechobee, in addition to other storage and treatment options as recommended by scientists from the University of Florida Water Institute, would offset the economic and ecological damage when considering a broader outlook and the current rate and cost of ecosystem decline.
At the recent JMI session, Sal Nuzzo, the vice president of JMI, made the analogy of diverting from existing plans to restore the Everglades and coastal estuaries was like “chasing this squirrel because that’s what running across our path right now.”
In a rapidly changing state and planet, with a government and electorate mired in partisan politics, that squirrel is starting to look more like an elephant, as some suggest waiting decades to stem the ongoing damage with existing restoration projects planned years ago.
John Cassani is a resident of Alva and Chairman of the Southwest Florida Watershed Council.