On the heels of that damning Sports Illustrated indictment 33-years ago, Graham went on to beget Save our Beaches. And Save Our Everglades. And Save Our Rivers. And other environmental initiatives. Eventually, Grahams green legacy would make possible the purchase of tens of thousands of acres of mangrove swamps, upland forests and open beaches. The Apalachicola River, the Suwannee and the St. Johns are better off today because Floridians — under the leadership of Graham and some of his successors — made the decision to invest in floodplains, wetlands and water recharge areas to protect them against runaway development. Thats the good news. The bad news is that over the past several years, Florida legislators — cemented in their jobs by gerrymandering and eager to pander to growth-at-any-cost lobbyists — have systematically unraveled many of the environmental protections set into place during the Graham era and all but stopped investing in land preservation and water quality. I thought about the infamous Sports Illustrated Swimsuit-Paradise Lost issue on Thursday evening as I watched former-Gov., former-U.S. Sen. Graham — his hair turned silver, his face lined by the passing the decades — sit on a podium at the University of Florida and do the same thing he did back in the 80s: Ask Floridians to invest in natural Florida. Grahams latest green crusade is Amendment 1: Floridas Water and Land Legacy. If voters approve that proposed state constitutional amendment in November, it will earmark 33 percent of the states documentary stamp tax on real estate transactions — an existing tax, not a new tax — to be spent on land and water conservation acquisitions.
Posted on: Thu, 11 Sep 2014 10:20:45 +0000
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