1. Water, water, everywhere. Will Florida have drops to drink?
June 27, 2018
Water: Advocating for Protection
Chicago, Illinois
Water, water, everywhere. Will Florida have drops to drink?
Lightning Talk by LWV of Palm Beach County, Florida
I am Nikki Descoteaux, Environmental Issues Group Co-Vice-Chair for the LWV Palm Beach County, Florida. I am representing many of our Florida chapters, especially in South Florida.
Nikki Descoteaux
Co-Vice-Chair, Environmental Issues Group

2. Florida, A Water Wonderland
Florida has 8426 miles of shoreline, second only to Alaska. We are surrounded on two sides by the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic Ocean, linked by the Keys, our southernmost islands. The state has more than 30,000 lakes, including Lake Okeechobee, at 700 square miles, the nation’s fourth largest natural freshwater lake totally within the U.S. There are more than 11,000 miles of rivers, streams & waterways.

3. The Everglades, River of Grass
And it has the Everglades, the River of Grass, a flowing body of water & sawgrass prairie, 100 miles long and 60 miles wide, spanning the entire peninsula south of Orlando & Lake Okeechobee. If you drive ten minutes from my suburban home, you are in the Everglades’ Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge with its wildlife, myriad channels and thick aquatic vegetation. Florida could be called a Water Wonderland.
UB Fitness

4. Dangers to Florida’s Land and Water
Sea Level Rise
Ocean expansion inland
Saltwater intrusion
Oil and Gas Drilling, including Fracking
Aquifer pollution
Methane and carbon releases
Well leaks
Polluted Interior water
Septic system leaks
Untreated water releases
Proposed injection wells of partially-treated water
But all of this water and by extension, the whole state, are in danger. Look on the screen for the major culprits and their henchmen, causing flooding, shore shrinkage, Everglades’ damage, well & aquifer contamination, toxic algal blooms and more. Sea-level rise, oil and gas drilling along with fracking proposals, and polluted interior water keep environmentalists busy.

5. Sea Level Rise Projection Near Key West
Are you breathless from the enormity of Florida’s water issues? For today, let’s just take a look at sea-level rise, one of the Florida League’s priorities. The steady rise of the ocean is not tomorrow in Florida, it’s today! (Show this year with pointer.) By 2060, it may be almost 3 feet above the height of the year Already in coastal communities, the level has risen several inches.

6. King Tide Flooding October 2016
Photo by Palm Beach Post
Photo by Maxtstrz Flickr
Delray Beach
South Beach
That may not seem much but when you are Key West, Naples, or my city of Boynton Beach at only 3 feet above sea level, and Miami Beach at 2-4 feet, those inches mean flooding at every fall King tide, even with the sun shining. We don’t need a hurricane to flood! In fact, in 2016, an octopus was found in a Miami Beach parking garage!
Photo from newser.com
Key West

7. Dangers to Everglades’ Aquifers
Saintpetersblog
Under the Everglades are aquifers providing water to 1 in 3 Floridians. They are suffering from saltwater intrusion because of long existing drainage and flood control systems, agricultural irrigation using up precious water, farm and residential development right to the edge of the Glades and cross-state roads, all of which reduce freshwater flow in the Everglades to Florida Bay. The sea comes in where there is no freshwater to keep it back.
Sofia.usgs
Getty photos
Ft. Lauderdale Daily

8. State & Federal Solutions
CERP (Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan)
CEPP (Central Everglades Planning Project)
EAA (Everglades Agricultural Area) Storage
Reservoir)
The Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan was originally approved in 2000 as a part of the Water Resources Development Act. Here is the current federal and state approved strategy to restore freshwater flow and to slow down saltwater intrusion. It is supported by our state League and its chapters. Our League chapters went to legislative delegation hearings to back these approaches.
Sometimes we spoke with legislators locally, Sometimes in Tallahassee on our League’s Advocacy Day.

9. Everglades: Then, Now & After CERP.
Lake O
Last year, through our advocacy and that of environmental organizations, the legislature & our Climate change-denying governor approved SB10 mandating
and funding the EAA Storage reservoir and stormwater treatment area south of Lake Okeechobee. This water will move south, increasing the flow, retarding saltwater intrusion, and limiting toxic algal blooms in estuaries. Last month Congress put placeholders in the water bill for this $1.4 billion project. Completion could be in under ten years. .
nap.edu

10. LWV Education and Advocacy
LWV Lower Keys
lwv
Our League chapters are involved in educating about climate change, sea-level rise and resilience. We make presentations to municipalities, residents, schools, and the like, inviting panels of experts to share their knowledge as to what we can and should do. For example, the Lower Keys League ran a series of community forums on the issue and my own League held a Hot Topics luncheon on sea-level rise where renowned expert John Englander spoke.

11. Some Coalitions our LWVFL & Chapters Support
We can’t do this alone, so we are deeply involved with coalitions and advisory groups to address the problem. A Lower Keys League representative was instrumental on an advisory committee in getting a building height exemption code passed in Key West. Miami-Dade’s League is a founding member of the Miami Climate Alliance, both critical in passing a $500 million bond in 2017 to build Miami’s resilience to sea-level rise.

12. A .
Perhaps the powerhouse of these coalitions, also supported by the League, is the Southeast Florida Regional Climate Change Compact, created in 2010 to coordinate Climate Action Plans over four south Florida counties. The League has been influential in getting more municipalities to join the compact, often speaking before the city councils to encourage membership. After doing so in 2017, Boca Raton joined the Compact.
And 35 municipalities.

13. “Raise your voice, not sea level.”
BigPictureEducation
“Raise your voice, not sea level.”
Former U.N. Secretary General Ban
Obviously, we are fighting against the tide, figuratively and literally. Our accomplishments so far are limited, but growing. Sea-level rise cannot be stopped but the League will continue with its partners to educate, to advocate, and to develop means of adaptation and resilience, in order that Florida can be our home in the decades and centuries to come. Thank you.