OPINION: Manatee County's natural wonders are worth protecting
How would you define the quality of the life you live – its worth?
For most of us, it’s the natural world that brought us here in the first place, the water, fish and wildlife. What I’ve come to appreciate over the years is how interconnected everything is. As the great 19th-century naturalist John Muir superbly stated, “When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the Universe.”
Nothing could be truer when it comes to the waters and wildlife that define our barrier islands and estuaries. The same is also true of the region’s economy, which is so intricately connected to the natural world. That’s why it’s so important that we fiercely guard our water quality, our seagrasses and our mangroves – the things that matter most.
Florida has a department that’s tasked to do this job. The mission of the Florida Department of Environmental Protection states: “The Florida Department of Environmental Protection is the state’s lead agency for environmental management and stewardship, protecting our air, water and land.”
The only problem is the department isn’t doing its job. In Manatee County, the Florida Department of Environmental Protection's biggest failure is Piney Point, where just last year an “emergency” more than two decades in the making sent 215 million gallons of phosphate process water – with 10 times the nitrogen of raw sewage – into Tampa Bay with devastating consequences.
More recently, the department has shown a lack of oversight and action in investigating a potentially major mangrove trimming violation. It took more than two months to initiate the investigation, which led to a questionable report that stated “the mangroves appear to be healthy.”
This is an obvious failure of leadership but one that leads beyond the department and staff; it harkens back to the administration of former Gov. Rick Scott, who eviscerated the Florida Department of Environmental Protection during his eight years in office.
Scott, now a U.S. senator, is no longer in charge in Tallahassee, and current Gov. Ron DeSantis' administration needs to step up and protect Florida’s most valuable resource: its environment. That responsibility also filters down to Manatee County’s lawmakers in the Florida Legislature – as well as to every citizen, including you and me.
It’s the state’s responsibility to protect Manatee County’s natural resources, including our mangroves. I wish I had the confidence that the state would step up and do that job, but history and Piney Point reveal a different reality.
Many residents first come to Manatee County to vacation and buy homes. It is our natural environment that drives our economy now – and hopefully into the future. But if we don’t protect our mangroves, our seagrasses and our water quality, we will slowly lose what brought us here in the first place.
If we are able to apply a little “enlightened self-interest,” we will realize that our area can become a magnet for people who seek our quickly-vanishing natural treasures. To accomplish this, it is critical that we elect politicians who understand the value of the natural world – and who will work to assure the people of Manatee County and the state that our most valuable resources are safeguarded.
Rusty Chinnis is the board chair of Suncoast Waterkeeper. This is an excerpted version of a column that was first published in the Anna Maria Island Sun.
This article originally appeared on Sarasota Herald-Tribune: We can't allow Manatee County's natural wonders to be destroyed
