Palm Beach Post - Frank Cerabino: Did you vote to protect Florida’s environment? Who cares?

Posted: 3:33 p.m. Wednesday, March 25, 2015

By Frank Cerabino - Palm Beach Post Staff Writer

If you were one of the 4,238,739 Floridians who voted for an environmental protection measure four months ago, I have news for you.

You don’t matter. Your vote was meaningless.

It’s not supposed be that way, but welcome to Florida.

The vote on Amendment 1, the Florida Water and Land Conservation Initiative, was the biggest vote-getter on Florida’s ballot in November, with a 74.9 percent approval rate.

It was 1.3 million voters more popular than Gov. Rick Scott, who was re-elected on the same ballot.

But Scott, the state’s big business interests and the state legislature had nothing to do with Amendment 1, and in many cases actively opposed it.

Amendment 1 was on the ballot because Florida’s leaders had all but abandoned Florida Forever, a $300 million-per-year state program to purchase environmentally sensitive land.

The program started by Gov. Jeb Bush was nearly wiped out under Scott and state legislators. So environmentalists brought the land preservation issue directly to voters through a ballot referendum.

Florida’s Water and Land Legacy, an environmental group drawing members from the 1000 Friends of Florida, Audubon Florida, Defenders of Wildlife, Everglades Foundation, Florida Conservation Coalition, Florida Land Trust Alliance, Sierra Club and other state environmental groups, collected over 1 million signatures to get the amendment on the ballot.

The ballot question asked voters whether they were in favor of funding the Land Acquisition Trust Fund to “acquire, restore, improve and manage conservation lands including wetlands and forests; fish and wildlife habitat; lands protecting water resources and drinking water sources, including the Everglades, and the water quality of rivers, lakes, and streams; beaches and shores; outdoor recreation lands; working farms and ranches; and historic or geologic sites.”

The funding source for this wouldn’t be a new tax, but a dedication of 33 percent of the net revenues from an existing excise tax on real estate deed and loan documents, commonly known as doc stamps. These doc stamps are a huge source of state revenue, bringing in about $2 billion a year.

So the voter-approved Amendment 1 made close to $700 million available each year for the acquisition and protection of environmentally sensitive land in the state.

Theoretically. That’s because the buying and protecting is still in the hands of the people who gutted Florida Forever to start with, and have little to no interest in protecting environmentally sensitive land from business development.

And there’s the rub, as Shakespeare would say.

Despite the windfall of money available to preserve this land, Scott put $100 million for Florida Forever in his budget this year — $200 million shy of the traditional level.

But his intent to shortchange the will of the voters is minor compared to the Florida Senate’s budget, which includes just $22 million in environmental land acquisition, with $20 million of that money going to Kissimmee River restoration land and $2 million going to Florida Forever.

So to recap, to restore the previous $300 million-a-year program to buy environmentally sensitive land in Florida, voters approved a measure freeing up an estimated $700 million a year for that purpose.

And despite this vote, the most popular vote-getter on the ballot, Florida lawmakers are doing other things with the money and proposing to spend a measly $2 million on Florida Forever this year.

“There’s no way that anyone could have read the amendment and consider this budget to be adequate,” said Aliki Moncrief, the executive director of Florida’s Water and Land Legacy.

But it gets worse. The Associated Industries of Florida has begun a radio and television campaign to give lawmakers cover by trying to persuade voters that Amendment 1 was not about buying environmentally sensitive land, but about protecting existing water supplies.

“Lawmakers are now deciding how to spend Amendment 1 money,” the ad said. “And special-interest groups want the lion’s share for their pet projects.”

So the 14-year-old Florida Forever program has become a “pet project” and you have become a special-interest group.

All 4,238,739 of you.

You’re a bothersome distraction from the sideline, one that must be ignored by the Floridians who really matter.

So stop getting in the way of the real business of lawmakers, which is finding a way to serve the Associated Industries of Florida and any other business group that might want to, as Joni Mitchell once sang, “pave paradise and put up a parking lot.”

Everglades CALL TO ACTION!

Save Our EVERGLADES Video

Amendment #1

It Just Aint’ So!

My reaction to Attorney General Bondi’s assertion when questioned during her campaign swing through Martin County that she had joined the litigants opposing the Environmental Protection Agency’s involvement with the six states that control the Chesapeake Bay watershed as a “Federal Takeover” of states’ rights doesn’t hold water!

The facts are: for far too many years unregulated manure and fertilizer from industrial-scale agricultural operations flowed from the six watershed states and the District of Columbia into Chesapeake Bay.

The once prolific aquatic plants that provided ample food for tens of thousands of migrating waterfowl died.  Acres of the world famous Chesapeake oysters are sadly diminished.  The most important breeding areas for the prized striped bass is so polluted that the young bass survival is threatened.

For 30 years the governors of Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, plus the District of Columbia were bombarded by their concerned citizens to form some kind of a pack to begin a joint effort to control the gross pollutants from entering the Bays’ watershed.  Their efforts were plagued by changes in governance and the failure of New York and Pennsylvania, both major contributors to the massive pollution loading of the Bay, to join in a joint effort.

The Clean Water Act passage in 1972 dramatically increased enforcement of industrial wastes disposal and offered the states’ millions of dollars of funding to upgrade and build modern sewage treatment plants.

The states formed a Chesapeake Bay Commission that finally successfully urged the states of New York and Pennsylvania to join the downstream states in a unified effort to restore the once prolific Bay.

Progress has been slow but increasingly effective.  The Bay is responding.

Factory hog farms generate 44 million tons of manure a year in the Chesapeake Bay watershed and cleaning up the run-off from those operations is a major problem.  That is similar to the manure pollution of Lake Okeechobee – the second biggest lake in the United States – and the fertilizer run-off problem that has plagued the Everglades, the St. Lucie Estuary, and hundreds of lakes and streams throughout Florida. 

The combined states and the District have agreed on a new timetable for action and enforcement. They requested assistance from the Environmental Protection Agency to set water quality standards that must be met.

Far from General Bondi’s assertion that EPA is attempting to ‘seize control’ over the combination of the states and District joint efforts, the vast majority of the citizens who live and make a living from the Bay welcomed EPA’s involvement and expertise.

Farming interests that will be required to reduce runoff of their manure into the tributaries filed suit claiming that EPA  was orchestrating a ‘take over’ of the pollution control measures required to produce clean water to restore the Bay’s productivity.

Frankly, General Bondi should have applauded the effort to cleanse Chesapeake Bay as a model of what Florida’s five Water Management District's and our states Department of Environmental Protection should be championing with her assistance instead of filing as a Friend of the Litigants who do not want to obey strict water quality standards that are being developed and enforced.

A close examination of the continuing water quality violations impacting thousands of miles of Florida’s river, estuaries and lakes should be her main concern rather than sticking her nose into Chesapeake Bay at the request of the ‘usual suspects’ whose campaign contributions prove that Florida’s agricultural polluters fear EPA’s ability to set rigorous water quality standards that are so desperately needed not only to save Chesapeake Bay but the vast majority of Florida’s precious waters.

Nathaniel Reed 

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Vote YES for Amendment #1 on November 4, 2014

On November 4th, voters statewide will be asked to approve Amendment #1 to the constitution, which will set aside funding for purchasing environmentally sensitive land to protect water resources and wildlife habitat.

As of January 2014, more than 683,000 signatures have been obtained from 14 districts.

The Florida Water and Land Legacy Amendment requires no new taxes. Instead, it calls for one third of the documentary tax paid on real estate transactions to be set aside for conservation spending programs, such as land purchases, management, and Everglades restoration.

The amendment would allocate 33% of existing excise tax on documents (the Documentary Stamp Tax) to fund these projects. Amendment backers, which include such groups as Audubon Florida, the Sierra Club and 1000 Friends of Florida, estimate the measure could raise as much as $10 billion over its 20-year life. If approved, the measure would go into effect July 1, 2015, and would expire in 2035.

While the amendment is a continuation of the collection of funds from the Florida Documentary Stamp Tax, this amendment would restrict the use of the funds for the very specific purposes of land and water preservation. It also would prevent the Florida Legislature from using these funds for other purposes. In addition, the amendment would not increase or decrease revenues or costs to the state or local governments, and would not use condemnation as a tool for acquisition. It also would not increase the rate of any tax, and continue the historical precedent of water and land preservation protection, which was the major recommendation of my chairmanship of Florida’s Environmental Future to then Governor Robert Martinez.

Florida once led the nation in environmental land purchases with programs named Preservation 2000 and Florida Forever, both of which were financed by using Documentary Stamp taxes. However, in recent years, the Legislature has sharply cut the money used for land buying, and fund balances are diminishing.

It may be that the Water and Land Legacy Amendment is warranted simply because it accomplishes a worthwhile goal, does not increase taxes or create new ones, and would benefit not only Martin County but the entire state. There also seems to be wide support for this proposal from a divergent source of individuals and groups who seem willing to make a long-term commitment and investment in the future of our state.