How to adapt to sea-level rise? Dade releases its vision
Miami-Dade County’s new sea-level rise strategy has a vision for higher homes and roads, and property buyouts, but it doesn’t attach figures to those concepts.
Miami-Dade’s new strategy for adapting to sea-level rise comes down to two main ideas: build up higher and back away from the water.
That could look like building elevated homes straight out of the Florida Keys, or buying out whole streets of homes on the riverfront, or shorelines lined with mangroves instead of condos.
On Friday, Miami-Dade released its vision for how it will survive the 2 feet of sea-level rise it expects by 2060, enough to cause an estimated $25 billion in damages.
“This is our existential challenge. This is the one that trumps them all,” said Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava at the Friday morning press conference announcing the
report.
Levine Cava touted the sea-level rise strategy as the first in the state and promised it will guide the “billions” the county will invest in its infrastructure.
Billions might not cover it. This report didn’t hazard a guess at how much it would cost to do everything it would take to protect Miami-Dade from sea-level rise, but fixing septic tanks alone would cost well north of $4 billion.
The report lists the $1.7 billion Miami-Dade has already spent or plans to spend elevating buildings and critical equipment (like storm pumps) and restoring mangroves. It also shows the $542 million worth of adaptation projects Miami-Dade has identified so far that it doesn’t have cash for, a clear undercount of the work to be done.
The press conference took place in front of a giant South Florida Water Management-run gate near the mouth of the Little River. The gate helps prevent flooding on inland parts of the river, or, it used to.
Now with sea-level rise, the system’s old reliance on gravity pushing water toward the coast doesn’t work as often. The water management district and Miami-Dade have applied for a FEMA grant to upgrade the gate and install new pumps, a multi-million dollar project that will likely have to be repeated at each and every flood gate in the county to prepare for rising seas.
“[Sea-level rise] threatens not only our homes and our roads, but our industry and our economy and overall our lives,” said Miami-Dade Commissioner Rebecca Sosa, who has commission-wide dibs on all legislation relating to climate change.
Harvey Ruvin, the longstanding clerk of the courts and one of MiamiDade’s earliest advocates for climate action, praised the county for finally addressing “the inevitable, relentless reality” of climate change. He led the county’s sea-level Rise Task Force in 2015.
“The one thing we didn’t really have going for us is a mayor with a passion for the subject,” he said, a dig at former Mayor Carlos Gimenez, a Republican who is now a U.S. representative for Miami. “Now we can sit back and know that the work on that task force will be turned into tangible action.”
This strategy will be updated every five years, and annual progress will be tracked with implementation
reports.
LIVING WITH MORE WATER
The 106-page report sums up all the different strategies used by cities and counties throughout the state — like elevating homes, raising roads, buying out properties and restoring mangroves and coral reefs — and imagines how and where they could be used in Miami-Dade.
The five main approaches laid out in the report aren’t meant to be used one at a time, said MiamiDade’s Chief Resilience Officer.
“We had to be sure we weren’t prescribing solutions for any part of the county,” he said.
For most of the county, the report suggests building like the Keys. That means homes on legs, and getting comfortable with a lot more water in your daily life.
This path forward would require a stronger building code to ensure homes and offices could withstand the more powerful storms of the future, as well as more living shorelines — coastal barriers made up of absorbent landscaping like mangroves, rather than steel and concrete sea walls.
For “the ridge,” the naturally high ground around the railroad tracks stretching throughout the county, this report suggests building more and higher. The report acknowledged that people will “gradually” decide they don’t want to live and work in places that flood all the time, and they’ll come looking for higher ground.
That movement could push out the longtime residents of the handful of high-elevation spots, especially those with a high population of renters, like
Little Haiti. Those spots are often historically Black and Hispanic communities that were forced to the formerly undesirable inland locations through racist redlining policies. Advocates call the elevation-related pressure to displace these communities climate gentrification.
To combat that, the report suggests MiamiDade explore “anti-displacement policies.”
Another approach explored in the report is “expanding blueways and greenways,” which basically means expanding parks and canals to absorb more water. That expansion requires moving homes and buildings out of the way, a tough sell for any government. The report only talks about voluntary buyouts, which are popular in the Florida Keys but have proven less so in Miami-Dade.
The companion to that concept is creating “blue and green neighborhoods.” That involves swapping a lot of the landscaping in residential areas for more absorbent trees and plants, as well as
All interested parties are invited to attend. For copies of the PTP Five-Year Implementation Plan and/or for further information, please contact the Office of the Citizens’ Independent Transportation Trust by calling 305-375-1357 or by sending an email to: citt@miamidade.gov. Information is also found on the CITT website at: It is the policy of Miami-Dade County to comply with all requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act.
making parks that do double duty as water storage spots during heavy rains.
For the western and southern suburbs, the report suggests continuing a longstanding Florida tradition: building on fill.
The process of scooping out dirt and sand from one spot to build higher in another spot is how those suburbs came to be after the water management district’s canal system drained the Everglades. This strategy would involve demolishing old properties and roads and rebuilding them on even higher piles on fill.
BRINGING IN DOLLARS
The most immediate threat to Miami-Dade from sea rise is likely financial.
Miami-Dade is counting on continued outside investment, and rising property values, to raise some of the money it needs to adapt. But neither are givens.
The increased risk of flooding and strong hurricanes is spiking the cost of flood and windstorm insurance,
and experts say it could eventually spook banks from offering mortgages in flood-prone areas. Some research shows it might already be affecting property values, which could crumble in the future if nothing is done.
Ajani Stewart, senior management consultant for urban and coastal resilience with Arcadis, the lead consultant on the report, said the new sealevel rise strategy is another signal to the financial market that Miami-Dade is taking steps to protect itself from sea rise.
“The investor community, the risk assessment community is looking at Miami-Dade County for what is it doing to secure its future and continue to be the type of place that attracts investment,” he said.
Several studies have shown that investing in resilience projects makes financial sense. A recent report found that every dollar invested in MiamiDade adaptation projects yields $5 to $9 in benefits.
But finding those dollars to invest initially can be tough. That could change this year if Gov. Ron DeSantis’ proposal to help governments adapt to rising seas with a $1 billion loan fund is approved.
But the biggest opportunity for the county right now is at the federal level — a $6.1 billion plan developed by the Army
Corps of Engineers to protect the county from future storm surge. If the county agrees on the plan’s details and if the feds eventually fund it, Miami could be in line for $4 billion in government cash to do plenty of the things on its action item list: floodproof buildings, elevate homes, protect hospitals and water treatment plants and restore mangroves.
The next deadline for the county is in April, when the mayor will have to decide whether to commit in writing to continue the project or ask for a waiver to pause the process.
“We left the meeting with a commitment for everybody to accelerate and them to try to meet the concerns within the month,” Levine Cava told the Miami Herald. “It was clear they’re listening.”
Looking beyond the $1.9 trillion COVID relief bill, President Joe Biden and lawmakers are laying the groundwork for another top legislative priority – a longsought boost to the nation’s roads, bridges and other infrastructure that could run into Republican resistance to a hefty price tag.
Biden and his team have begun discussions on the possible outlines of an infrastructure package with members of Congress, particularly mindful that Texas’ recent struggles with power outages and water shortages after a brutal winter storm present an opportunity for agreement on sustained spending on infrastructure.
Gina McCarthy, Biden’s national climate adviser, told The Associated Press that the deadly winter storm in Texas should be a “wake-up call” for the need for energy systems and other infrastructure that are more reliable and resilient.
“The infrastructure is not built to withstand these extreme weather conditions,” said Liz SherwoodRandall, a homeland security aide to the president. “We know that we can’t just react to extreme weather events. We need to plan for them and prepare for them.”
A White House proposal could come out in March.
“Now is the time to be aggressive,” said Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, a former South Bend, Indiana, mayor who knows potholes.
At a conference with state and local highway officials Thursday, he referred to the often-promised, never-achieved megainitiative on roads, bridges and the like from the
Trump administration.
“I know you are among those who are working and waiting most patiently, or maybe impatiently, for the moment when Infrastructure Week will no longer be a kind of Groundhog’s Day promise – but actually be something that delivers generational investments,” he said.
Much of America’s infrastructure — roads, bridges, public drinking and water systems, dams, airports, mass transit systems and more — is in need of major restoration after years of underfunding, according to the American Society of Civil Engineers.
In its 2017 Infrastructure Report Card, it gave the national infrastructure an overall grade of D+.
Both chambers of Congress will use as starting points their unsuccessful efforts to get infrastructure bills through the last session.
Democrats passed a $1.5 trillion package in the House last year, but it went nowhere with the Trump administration and the Republican-led Senate. A Senate panel approved narrower bipartisan legislation in 2019 focused on reauthorizing federal transportation programs. It, too, flamed out as the U.S. turned its focus to elections and COVID-19.
Biden has talked bigger numbers, and some Democrats are now urging him to bypass Republicans in the closely divided Congress to address a broader range of priorities urged by interest groups.
During the presidential campaign, Biden pledged to deploy $2 trillion on infrastructure and clean energy, but the White House has not ruled out an even higher price tag.
McCarthy said Biden’s upcoming plan will specifically aim at job creation, such as with investments to boost “workers that have been left behind” by closed coal mines or power plants, as well as communities located near polluting refineries and other hazards.
“He’s been a long fan of investing in infrastructure — long outdated — long overdue, I should say,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Thursday. “But he also wants to do more on caregiving, help our manufacturing sector, do more to strengthen access to affordable health care. So the size — the package — the components of it, the order, that has not yet been determined.”
Sen. Bernie Sanders,
I-Vt., chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, recently told the White House that he’s ready to use the budget maneuver known as reconciliation to pass a broad economic recovery package with only Democratic votes. That drew stern warnings from Republicans who have already closed ranks against Democrats’ COVID-19 relief bill.
West Virginia Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, the top Republican on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, said there’s bipartisan support for ambitious steps on infrastructure. But that “should not extend to a multitrillion-dollar package that is stocked full with other ideologically driven, one-size-fits-all policies that tie the hands of our states and our communities,” she said.
Capito will be helping to craft bipartisan legislation on the Senate side.
Rep. Peter DeFazio, chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, told the AP that he foresees a comprehensive House package that will go beyond roads, bridges and public transit.
He also expects it to have money for water systems, broadband and the power grid — addressing a weak infrastructure laid bare after the crippling blackouts in Texas.
Democratic Sen. Tom Carper of Delaware, the new chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, said his goal is for his committee to pass an infrastructure bill by Memorial Day.
In the House, Rep. Sam Graves, the top Republican on the transportation panel, said Republicans would be open to a larger package as long as it didn’t greatly add to the national debt.
But many lawmakers oppose an increase in the federal gas tax, one way to help pay for the spending, while groups such as the Chamber of Commerce argue against increasing taxes on companies during a pandemic.