After months of negotiations, this week Florida Gov. Rick Scott signed into law a bill that could help reverse the 40-year ecosystem decline occurring in the Florida Everglades. SB10, sponsored by Sen. Rob Bradley, will fund the creation of a 78-billion gallon deep-water reservoir (enough water-holding capacity to fill 120,000 Olympic-size swimming pools) south of Lake Okeechobee.
Everglades Foundation CEO Eric Eikenberg says the plan will, “significantly reduce the amount of harmful discharges from Lake Okeechobee that have long caused destruction along the east and west coasts of Florida. It will also allow for a significant amount of water to be stored, cleaned and moved south into the Everglades and Florida Bay where it is needed.”
The bill, passed on May 2 by state lawmakers, allows Florida to borrow $800 million to cover its half of the estimated $1.6 billion state-federal project.
Via Orvis: “We are proud to have spent the last year working with key partners–such as The Everglades Foundation, Sandy Moret/Florida Keys Outfitters, Captains for Clean Water, Bullsugar.org, and Bonefish and Tarpon Trust–to build grassroots support and to convince Florida legislators that now is the time to act. Thankfully, the folks in Tallahassee came through, and we thank them for their willingness to listen and to make a tough choice to bet on the future.”
Tom Bie is the founder, editor, and publisher of The Drake. He started the magazine in 1998 as an annual newsprint publication based in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. He then moved it to Steamboat, Colorado (1999), Boulder, Colorado (2001), and San Clemente, California (2004), as he took jobs as managing editor at Paddler, Senior Editor at Skiing, and Editor-in-Chief at Powder, respectively. Tom and The Drake are now both based in Denver, Colorado, where The Drake is finally all grows up(Swingers, 1996) to a quarterly magazine.