Everglades Wins Big

The state of Florida has pledged to buy up sugarcane farms to help restore the flow of the Everglades. For a bargain $1.75 billion, US Sugar will relinquish 300 square miles of its holdings south of Lake Okeechobee over the next six years.

Great news for the people of Florida, as well as for birds, alligators, crocodiles, and manatees. The agreement comes between Republican Governor Charlie Crist and US Sugar, reports the Miami Herald. It's at least partially the result of the South Florida Water Management District board voting seven months ago against the practice of backpumping (pdf) dirty farm runoff into Lake Okeechobee, which then flows south into the Everglades.

That vote was the result of a 2007 court victory by Earthjustice, when a federal judge ruled that backpumping violated the Clean Water Act.

The buy-out of US Sugar will not end the Everglades' troubles. Another 500 square miles of sugarcane farms owned by other companies remain in production. Yet the deal marks a revival of the Everglades restoration effort, the largest of its kind in the world, aimed at undoing flood-control projects that have been killing the Everglades for decades.

I spent a lot of years, years ago, in the Everglades making a documentary for Nature. Once this lush ecosystem flowed like a river, the aptly-named River of Grass. If the Crist-US Sugar deal is actually signed in September, the clock will roll backwards 100 years, giving many endangered species the first hope of survival in as many years. US Sugar's 1,700 employees, meanwhile, have been promised retraining by the state of Florida.

It should be noted, however, that the impact of increased flows is less clear for ecosystems further downstream, in Florida Bay and the Florida Keys. The Everglades flow is being monitored mostly for phosphorus levels. The seawater end of the system needs equal monitoring for nitrogen levels. If not, expect a bigger dead zone to develop. The lesson: we need to clean all waters of more crap.

Julia Whitty is Mother Jones' environmental correspondent, lecturer, and 2008 winner of the Kiriyama Prize and the John Burroughs Medal Award.

Comments

This is a monumental event for the Everglades. This is a long time coming. The downside, however, is that US Sugar has had use of this land for generations. In those generations they have had benefit of both state and Federal tax benefits and price supports. It is not like US Sugar couldn't just walk away from this property and feel the first pinch in the bottom line. They will walk away with nearly two billion dollars and the State of Florida will have the obligation of cleaning up after them.

Thanks Charlie. You are a brilliant Republican Governor.

Posted by: Lantern Bearer on 06/24/08 at 6:30 PM Respond

Who researches these stories? US Sugar has been looking for ways to cut its losses and get out of sugar farming in So. Florida for several years. The executives get to split two billion dollars while 1,700 people are added to Florida's welfare rolls. A great triumph for environmentalism? Please!

Posted by: Jim on 06/24/08 at 9:38 PM Respond

They paid US Sugar too much. The firm should have been forced to cleanup any mess, then the State should have used 'eminent domain' to remove them. They remove ordinary homeowners for much less, for freakin' freeways.

Again, working class tax payers get to bail out corporation.

Posted by: Elydog on 06/25/08 at 1:28 PM Respond

What about all the people of Clewiston who don't work for US Sugar? Their land and businesses will be rendered worthless by this buyout. I sure hope the state has plans to compensate the entire town.

Posted by: James Redish on 06/26/08 at 3:13 PM Respond

There's no pretty finish in the story of Florida's environmental degradation. So much has been lost that this is only a small step in the overall reparations which need to be made.

Posted by: Jaleeza on 06/28/08 at 7:06 AM Respond

Interesting. My understanding is that sugar crops typically deplete soil and are heavily sprayed. (Hawaii)

Posted by: Diane Landowski on 06/30/08 at 1:19 PM Respond

FOR YEARS THE WELL SUBSUDIZED SUGAR INDUSTRY IN FLORIDA RAN BUS TOURS CLAIMING THAT THEY WERE NOT POLUTING THE EVERGLADES. NOW THEY WILL REAP ANOTHER HARVEST OF MONEY, YOUR TAX MONEY, AFTER YEARS AND YEARS OF BIG CASH PAYMENTS TO THE WEALTHY GROWERS. THIS IS B/S. I HOPE THE PEOPLE OF FLORIDA APPRECIATE WHAT IS BEING DONE FOR THM.
CONSIDER THAT THEY HAVE HUNDREDS OF ACRES THAT THEY CAN CONTINUE TO POLLUTE

Posted by: ADDIE FORREST on 06/30/08 at 2:05 PM Respond

Typical Republican-in-moderate-clothing (Crist) buys out and bails out big business (US Sugar) while declaring an environmental victory. State (FL) to foot all cleanup and will attempt to undo 1% of damage caused. Film at 11.
I'm a Floridian, and I think this is disgusting.

Posted by: Allen Wright on 06/30/08 at 6:44 PM Respond

Sadly, I think Jim and Elydog are accurate - too much money given to people who will now use it to create another environmental mess.

Posted by: weee recycling on 07/01/08 at 7:20 AM Respond

Lantern Bearer is so right. And, although I know it's tongue in cheek, "Brilliant Republican Governor" is an oxymoron.

Posted by: breezi on 07/02/08 at 7:23 AM Respond