COLUMNS

Rick Scott: Election-year environmentalist

Staff Writer
Ocala Star-Banner

In case you’ve missed it over the past seven-plus years, Gov. Rick Scott wants to talk about jobs. Jobs, jobs, jobs. It’s been a winning mantra for him — twice.

What he doesn’t want to talk about — especially not this week — is his environmental record.

You see, Scott has the habit of becoming an environmentalist every time an election rolls around. The rest of the time? Not so much. OK, not at all. And for whatever reason, the majority of voters ignore what their eyes are telling them about the state of Florida’s environment — Lake Okeechobee being Exhibit A — and believe our governor, who critics have appropriately dubbed “an election-year environmentalist.”

Even while he has a list of faulty, often untrue “facts” at the ready should anyone bring up his environmental record on the campaign trail — like his “record environmental funding” (not true) or his opposition to offshore drilling (also not true) — this is a week when Scott doesn’t want to go near the subject. Reason? Just look at Lake Okeechobee. The 740-acre lake, the second-largest landlocked freshwater lake in the U.S. (Lake Michigan is the biggest), is 90 percent covered in green algae. Yes, it’s 2016 all over again — the last time a major algae bloom was spawned on Lake Okeechobee. That year, because the Army Corps of Engineers had to release rising waters in the lake so its famed Hoover Dike wouldn’t break, the algae smothered much of the southeast and southwest Florida coastlines, killing fish, wildlife, sea grasses and, uh oh, businesses.

Well, it’s deja vu all over again. The Army Corps suspended water releases for nine days recently, but with the rainy season here they have no choice but to resume them or risk a catastrophe of biblical proportions if the dike broke.

You just can’t hide from 700-plus acres of algae, can you governor?

Here’s the thing. The Okeechobee algae problem is a Rick Scott problem. The same Rick Scott who fiercely fought federal efforts to raise water quality standards in Florida. The same Rick Scott who junketed to the legendary King Ranch in Texas to party with Big Sugar executives and, ahem, donors who he rewarded with regulatory breaks. The same Rick Scott who signed legislation raising the amounts of chemicals and toxins industry can pour into Florida waterways.

Of course, Scott will deny any culpability. After all, he loves to tell us what a friend of the environment he is, right? Some friend.

Upon taking office, he promptly abolished the state’s growth management agency, the Department of Community Affairs, in a state where 1,000 new residents move in every day. He cut water management district budgets by $700 million his first year, ran off hundreds of experienced scientists and stacked their boards with developers, builders and industry executives who benefit from reduced water regulation. The number of cases brought against polluters by the Department of Environmental Regulation has plummeted 80 percent during the Scott reign. He gutted the popular Florida Forever land acquisition program embraced by his Republican and Democratic predecessors and has sat by idly while lawmakers raided the Amendment 1 money voters mandated in 2014 be put toward water recharge and environmentally sensitive land preservation, about $800 million a year. As for our springs, lots of talk, a little money and, well, they continue to decline.

Oh, an let’s not forget his infamous banning of the terms “global warming” and “climate change” in DEP memos and correspondence.

Scott comes from the world of corporate oligarchy. He understands the bottom line, regardless of what it takes to get there. I am reminded of his first month in office. He was proposing closing a bunch of state parks because they were a drain on the treasury in the midst of a recession. One day, he visited the Florida State Parks office and found out state parks are actually local economic drivers. He emerged touting their economic value — not their beauty or environmental necessity — and abandoned the idea. Alas, Scott, like too many of his less-government pals, knows the cost of everything and the value of nothing.

Yet, it’s campaign season and Scott has a nine-figure personal bankroll to fund his quest to be a U.S. senator. Expect our governor to become an election-year environmentalist whenever convenient, even while our eyes are telling us algae is killing Florida’s coastlines, and its lakes, rivers and springs aren’t doing so well either.