Meeting Notes
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Amy Eason, Martin County Environmental Resource Engineer, told the July 24 Rivers Coalition meeting how the county was addressing sea-level rise. They look at three factors that create flooding: sea level rise, rain runoff and storm surge from hurricanes, and assess how every project (such as the recent raising of MacArthur Boulevard) can mitigate those factors as far as 75 years in the future. It’s a big job…
Drew Bartlett, the Executive Director of the South Florida Water Management District, then gave an update on their projects. One of the biggest: Raising 6.7 miles of the Tamiami Trail to allow a whole lot more water to flow from Lake Okeechobee and the Northern Everglades past the man-made barrier and into Florida Bay. It hasn’t been completed yet, but the “River of Grass” is already getting bigger and bigger – which is what Mother Nature originally intended.
He also mentioned the current problems in the St. Lucie River are coming from discharges from the north and not, as usual, from the west. They have been forced to discharge water from the C-23 and C-24 canals into Ten-Mile Creek and the North Fork this summer, so it’s the North Fork that is currently suffering from too-much sediment. Unfortunately, the two new reservoirs that will alleviate this problem won’t be operative for at least another two years. Bartlett then gave us status updates on five other ongoing/just completed projects, and also mentioned the District hasn’t observed any adverse Alligator Alcatraz-related impacts on their operations.
Another speaker noted, almost as an aside, that the highest sugar subsidy increase in history was tucked somewhere deep inside the now-signed 980-page “Big Beautiful Bill”.
The next Rivers Coalition meeting will be in September. Back in two months…
-- Walter Deemer, League of Women Voters Martin County Chapter Representative
