State’s green teamwork spurs hope
For many environmental advocates, this past week was a nightmare. President Trump signed an executive order on Tuesday clear-cutting a half-dozen orders from President Obama that were intended to fight climate change.
While a few Republicans criticized Trump’s order, the bulk of the complaints came from Democrats, highlighting a persistent partisan divide in Washington, D.C., on environmental policy. But in Florida, there have been hopeful signs lately that a bipartisan consensus is re-emerging in favor of aggressively protecting the state’s environment.
The Sunshine State’s senior U.S. senator, Democrat Bill Nelson, recently fired off a letter to U.S. Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke, urging him not to undo a federal moratorium on drilling for oil and natural gas in the eastern Gulf of Mexico. Nelson has led opposition to offshore drilling throughout his career in Congress. But his recent letter was co-signed by 16 members of Florida’s U.S. House delegation, including Republican Dan Webster of Clermont and four other GOP representatives.
Nelson worked closely with former U.S. Sen. Mel Martinez, an Orlando Republican, to muscle the current moratorium through Congress in 2006. But in more recent years, bipartisanship on environmental policy from Florida’s leaders has been the exception rather than the rule. Over objections from Democrats, Republicans have gutted development limits and cut funding for environmental initiatives.
The divisions haven’t all gone away. Republican Marco Rubio, Florida’s other U.S. senator, didn’t sign Nelson’s letter.
But fellow Republican Vern Buchanan of Longboat Key, who did sign it, said, “Florida’s coastal communities depend on a clean and healthy ocean and we shouldn’t jeopardize the state’s economy or environment by gambling on operations that lack adequate safeguards.”
Meanwhile, in Tallahassee this year, a push to pass a bill banning fracking in Florida has been led by Republicans: Sen. Dana Young of Tampa and Rep. Mike Miller of Winter Park. As Miller wrote for the Sentinel in a February guest column, “Protecting Florida’s clean water supply is intrinsically tied to our economy in so many ways from tourism to agriculture, and our state is already struggling to meet the growing demand for water.” Both the Senate and House versions of the bill have long lists of co-sponsors from both parties.
The bill’s bipartisan momentum led the American Petroleum Institute to fight back with TV ads declaring fracking safe and denouncing “big government rules” that would ban the practice and “trample on private property rights.” Of course, this is the same group that declared offshore drilling safe — before the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster spilled more than 200 million gallons of crude and fouled beaches in Florida and other Gulf states.
This past week the fracking bill was declared dead in a dispute between the two chambers, but Miller predicted the bill would be back next year. We hope it returns with an even longer list of Democratic and Republican co-sponsors.
The most ambitious environmental initiative of this year’s legislative session, a $2.4 billion reservoir to reduce discharges of polluted water from Lake Okeechobee, has been led by another Republican, Senate President Joe Negron. Like the proposed fracking ban, Negron’s reservoir plan has run into opposition from special interests, especially Big Sugar. But its bipartisan support is notable, and encouraging.
Our state’s beaches, waterways and underground water supply are priceless assets for the 20 million-plus residents and the 100 millionplus visitors a year who drive our economy. Bipartisanship on environmental protection might be still be elusive in Washington, but it’s imperative in Florida.
Florida Republicans and Democrats have been coming together on policies to protect the environment.
The state’s economic future depends on their bipartisan cooperation.