Activists protest water district plan for major land buy for Everglades
Allen Eyestone/Palm Beach Post
Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Updated: 8:20 p.m. Wednesday, July 14, 2010
Posted: 6:05 p.m. Wednesday, July 14, 2010
Tea Party activists from across South Florida urged regional water managers Wednesday to kill the planned $500 million purchase of land owned by U.S. Sugar.
About 100 activists rallied outside the South Florida Water Management District’s headquarters on Gun Club Road to oppose the purchase, which Gov. Charlie Crist unveiled in 2009 as part of a plan to increase the flow of surface water through Florida’s Everglades. The deal’s opponents describe it as a corporate handout rather than a boon to Everglades restoration.
The Florida Supreme Court is weighing opponents’ arguments that the state’s plans to finance the purchase because the land deal would serve no public purpose and would delay restoration.
Many in Wednesday’s crowd held signs and wore T-shirts criticizing Crist and the land deal. Some traveled from the state’s west coast.
“The message is we want to end this bailout,” said Marianne Moran, who gave each of the board members a box of cookies made with U.S. Sugar’s product.
“If you end this bailout you can cut our taxes,” she said. “We are overpaying for this deal.”
Martin County resident Cindy Lucas, chair of her county’s 9/12 Tea Party Committee, said the district should be doing more to cut its budget.
“We are tired of taxes without representation,” Lucas said. “People are suffering here in Florida and we are going to go out and spend this money. No more bailouts.”
Several environmental groups, including the Audubon Society and the Sierra Club, spoke in favor of the purchase, saying it is critical to restoring the Everglades and supplying South Florida with clean drinking water.
“I think this is just an attempt to influence the election in favor of Marco Rubio,” Drew Martin of the Sierra Club said of Wednesday’s rally. Rubio, former Florida House Speaker, is facing Crist in U.S. Senate race and has received campaign contributions from Florida Crystals, a rival of U.S. Sugar.
“Really, they are well meaning people that are being manipulated by the industry,” Martin said. “This is a fight between sugar companies.”
Members of the governing board said they have no plans to raise taxes to pay for the purchase.
“We have no plan and there has been no discussion of raising taxes,” Chairman Eric Buermann said. “I know there are a lot of rumors out there regarding the acquisition of U.S. Sugar.
“There are some corporate opponents,” he said, in an apparent reference to Florida Crystals. “Whatever information you are hearing The information is wrong.”
Florida Crystals spokesman Gaston Cantens said the company is opposed to the purchase, but did not organize or pay for the Tea Party protest.
“Two years have gone by and they still have no clue what to do with the land they’re trying to force the taxpayers to buy,” Cantens said in an email.
Likewise, a campaign spokesman for Rubio said Wednesday: “For a long time, Marco has been a vocal opponent of Charlie Crist’s taxpayer-funded bailout of this major campaign contributor. This is another example of Charlie Crist’s willingness to say and do anything to win an election, even if it comes at the taxpayer’s expense.”
The budget proposal would keep the district wide tax rate flat next year at 25 cents for every $1,000 of taxable value, the same amount charged to homeowners this year. The plan would leave the district with about $61 million less in property taxes then it took in this year.
Governing board members are slated to vote on the rate proposal at a meeting today
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