Florida Wildlife Federation’s Manley Fuller advocates placing a constitutional amendment before voters this fall that would prohibit oil drilling in Florida’s coastal waters. For this to occur, the Florida Legislature in special session needs to act before Aug. 3.

By Tom Zucco — Along with the tar globs, the toxic seawater, and the damage to the fishing and tourist industries, there’s another ill effect of the Deepwater Horizon oil disaster that, until recently, has been lurking in the background: A drop in the value of thousands of homes along Florida’s coast.

By Rebecca Eagan — Overdevelopment is ruining Florida’s quality of life and damaging her unique natural areas. It has occurred too quickly. Speculation fueled the housing bubble, raised our taxes, cost us precious public funds propping up ghost metropolises in the sticks, and then crashed to earth. This November we can put Florida on a brighter path with Hometown Democracy.

By Linda Young — Since 1993, Florida has been in a steady downward slide in search of the bottom rung on the ladder of environmental protection. We may have finally arrived with our pathetic response to the life-sucking disaster that encroaches deeper by the moment into our state waters.

Marine scientist and inventive deep-sea explorer Dr. Edith “Edie” Widder sums up destruction in the Gulf of Mexico from the BP oil spill in three words: “a hideous stain.” She says BP will never be able “to make things right.”

The political winners from BP’s Deepwater Horizon oil spill disaster are anything but clear. But the spill is the Three Mile Island of offshore drilling in Florida. After this, no politician who hopes to win an election will dare suggest that Florida again consider permitting offshore drilling – at least not for decades to come.

Recently, the St. Petersburg Times republished an editorial originally presented on May 6, 1945. The subject: drilling for oil of the beaches of Florida. The newspaper was against it then and remains so now. We were so engaged by the Times’ 1945 editorial that we decided to publish it here, too.

I was sitting in the color room of my salon the other day, trying to figure out whether the plastic from the earpieces of my reading glasses would react with hair dye and cause me to become an accidental LA Law redhead around the temples, when one of the stylists came around collecting old hair. She said she was going to send it to this place where they’re going to stuff human hair into pantyhose and line them up on the shoreline to absorb the oil when it washes up.

Editor’s Note: This op-ed piece arguing against offshore drilling near Florida’s coast first appeared on FloridaThinks on Feb. 1, when the issue was still very much alive in the Legislature. In light of recent events, we thought it was worth a second read.

Since Florida legislative leaders won’t have to wrestle with the offshore drilling question next year, thanks to the BP disaster, they might want use the time to think instead about what else Florida should be doing to address the state’s energy needs. The topic got little attention in the session just ended.

Global Warming? Climate Change? Pick any label that fits your politics. It doesn’t matter. What matters is that Floridians – like Alaskans – are already dealing with the impacts, particularly the rising sea level. Local governments in South Florida are forming regional compacts and teaming with federal and state agencies to identify vulnerabilities and regional strategies for adapting to a rising sea level.

By Bill Belleville — It’s a great irony that just as we are now learning about our corals, we are also in jeopardy of losing them: Reefs in the Florida Keys and offshore Southeast Florida have been declining in health over the last 20 to 30 years because of human effects, from nutrient loading to ship groundings to overfishing.

The Sunshine State Survey confirms what we might all have suspected – that the economy is, indeed, the chief worry of Floridians these days.

Florida’s Legislature has done little to protect gems such as Ichetucknee Springs. This year, however, there’s reason for hope. Check out the video link, too.

By Diane Roberts
Floridians have always taken for granted that we have an abundance of water – water to drink, flush, bathe in, swim in, fish in, and otherwise enjoy. We have always taken for granted that we, the citizens, have some say in decisions about our water.
Not any more.
Here’s what happened: Last year, SB 2080, [...]