Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
South Florida environmentalists turn out for the People’s Climate March.
South Florida’s environmentalists say President Donald Trump’s administration is in need of a climate change.
Hundreds of protesters turned out Saturday, Trump’s 100th day in office, for the People’s Climate March in Fort Lauderdale. The march, as well as similar protests in West Palm Beach and Miami, coincided with a national climate change march in Washington, D.C.
Trump’s proposals to withdraw from the Paris climate treaty and slash funds for the Environmental Protection Agency, as well as a decision Friday to remove climate change information from the EPA website, has alarmed many.
Local activists told supporters that Florida’s natural wonders, from the ocean to the Everglades, could be threatened.
Climate change has eroded seawalls, which could displace coastal residents and make them “refugees in their own communities,” said Emma Collum, a lawyer and activist
who organized a large Florida group for the Women’s March in Washington, D.C., in January.
She pushed for Florida to move toward a more “sustainable, clean, renewable energy,” particularly solar energy.
“We’re called the Sunshine State for a reason,” she said.
Paola Espitia, a local marine biologist, urged protesters not to take the natural resources of Florida for granted.
“I’m marching today because I’ve experienced the positive, powerful effects the ocean has brought to my life,” she said. “Whenever I spend time in, on, under or near the ocean, it gives me an amazing sense of well-being, and I don’t want to see that jeopardized.”
She asked the crowd to do their part by recycling and reusing, and avoiding disposable plastic straws and water bottles.
Protesters of all ages at the Fort Lauderdale event marched about a mile from George English Park, just east of the Intracoastal Waterway, to the beach and then back. They drank water from reusable bottles and carried large colorful signs with messages such as “Save the EPA. Science. Not Silence” and “Deny Trump Not Climate Change.”
Meredith Sanchez, of Boca Raton, brought her 7-year-old son, Michael, who held a sign with a globe that read, “There is No Planet B.”
“I came here so I could help the environment,” Michael said. “Without clear air and water, we couldn’t live and breathe.”
The climate change march was the latest in what have become almost weekly protests of Trump since he took office. Other marches have opposed his policies on women, health care, science and to demand he release his tax returns. Another series of protests are planned Monday to oppose his immigration policies.