cuRRentsWater farm gives

hope for estuarypg 10

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Don't turn BOCC meetings into courtroom Pg 7

Volume 5 Issue 3 June 2015

Martin County

LNG now on FEC rails? p7Anne Scott faces Hobe Sound p16

Stuart-Martin Chamber President & CEO Joe Catrambone , right, is joined by chamber members Will Carson, left, and John Hennessee on a recent tour of the Caulkins Water Farm. pg 10

Martin County CurrentsJune 20152

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Features

All the articles and opinion pieces are authored and/or edited by Publisher Barbara Clowdus,except as otherwise noted. All the typos, mistakes, grammatical errors, omissions, andmisspelled words are hers alone, too. The good photos are taken by someone else. Allcontents are copyrighted 2015 Martin County Currents LLC.

EDITOR BARBARA CLOWDUSeditor@MartinCountyCurrents.com

ADVERTISINGadvertising@MartinCountyCurrents.com

ANNOUNCEMENTScalendar@MartinCountyCurrents.com

SUBSCRIPTIONSsubscriptions@MartinCountyCurrents.com

ColumnistsEditorial ................................ 8Unfiltered ............................. 9Barbara Clowdus

One Florida Foundation ............... 12 - 13Capt. Don Voss & Nyla Pipes

Art Kaleidoscope .............. 20Maya Ellenson

Pompano Reporter ........... 21Rich Vidulich

Calendar ...................... 22-23

cuRRentsMartin County

PUBLISHER -- Barbara Clowdus PRINTER -- Southeast Offset, Inc.WEBSITE -- Sonic Fish, LLC GRAPHIC DESIGN -- Simone FongA monthly newspaper, Martin County Currents LLC is distributed free throughout the county. Allopinions are those of its authors, and letters to the editor are encouraged. Contact information: MartinCounty Currents LLC, 5837 SE Avalon Drive, Stuart, FL 34997. www.MartinCountyCurrents.com.772.245.6564.

7FEC railroad adds

to AAF worries

10-11Caulkins:

new solution to discharges

5Comp Plan

amendments not approved

Martin County CurrentsJune 2015 3

PICK UP A COPY -- All Martin County Publix; all Chambers of Commerce; all Public Libraries;Marriott Courtyard Hotels; Denny's in Stuart & south Port St. Lucie; The Original PancakeHouse in Jensen Beach; Fresh Catch in south Stuart; Fish House Art Center & Valero's inPort Salerno; CVS & Kwik Stop in Hobe Sound; YMCA on Monterey; Rines IGA in Indiantown;Alice's in Cedar Pointe Plaza & Portofinos's in downtown Stuart; Zynga's & Ripper's in PalmCity; The Mail Stand in Tequesta; plus numerous bank, medical and professional lobbies inhigh-traffic areas throughout the county.

16Will CRAs get axed?

Drivers on their way to Indiantownsoon will see a three-story structurebegin to take shape at the constructionsite of the C-44 reservoir and stormwa-ter treatment area on Citrus Blvd. It is apump station that will house four re-motely operated electric pumps withinthe 21,000 square-foot, three-storybuilding that, when complete, will de-liver 1,100 cubic feet (about 8,228 gal-lons) per second from the C-44 canalinto the new reservoir.

Capable of storing about 16 billiongallons of water, the 3,400-acre reservoirwill feed the Stormwater TreatmentArea (STA), which will include 32 milesof berms, 30 miles of canals and 56 con-crete water control structures, and a va-riety of plants to remove and storenutrients from the water before it flowsinto the river and estuary.

The South Florida Water Manage-ment District approved the contract inMarch for the $40 million pump station,which should be completed in Septem-ber 2018.

"One after another, the District hasapproved construction contracts in re-cent months for the major components

of the C-44 Reservoir and StormwaterTreatment Area," said SFWMD Govern-ing Board Member Kevin Powers,whose area includes Martin County."This is the kind of progress needed tocomplete the project and begin opera-tions to improve water quality for theSt. Lucie River and Estuary."

In July 2014, the SFWMD GoverningBoard approved a major agreement withthe U.S. Army Corps of Engineers which was originally constructing allcomponents of the project to allowthe SFWMD to expedite construction ofthe stormwater treatment area, a pumpstation and a portion of the project dis-charge canal.

In August 2014, the SFWMDawarded approximately $5.4 million forconstruction of the spillway that willserve as the single point of water move-ment out of the entire project, allowingthe SFWMD to retain local runoff on ap-proximately 7,000 acres of the 12,000-acre project site.

These investments were in additionto the $101 million allocated last fall bySFWMD to build the stormwater treat-ment area.

Martin County CurrentsJune 20154 News Stream

C-44 gets 3-story pump station

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Although the Florida Department ofTransportation grants that would havebeen used to build a U.S. Customs fa-cility at Witham Field are now dead,residents still wonder if and whenthe project will return to the countycommission.

Those of us in the marine industryespecially want to see a customs facilitybuilt in Martin County, said John Hen-nessee, who owns a marina in PortSalerno. This was fully funded, hadbeen approved once, was widely sup-ported throughout the county, andshould be under construction right now.

First approved by a business-friendlycommission majority in 2009, the fee-based facility proposed for WithamField underwent multiple hearings be-fore the current commission. In additionto the FDOT grants, the project wouldhave also been funded through airportenterprise funds, which come from fuelpurchased at the airport.

The facility was approved, reconsid-ered, approved again and finally voteddown when construction bids exceededestimated costs, even though FDOT of-fered grants to cover the overage andprivate marine and aviation businessescontracted with the county to pay forany operating shortfalls.

Support for the facility came fromthe City of Stuart, Stuart Main Street, theDowntown Business Association, theMarine Aviation Industries of the Treas-ure Coast, Preserve Martin County, theRealtor Association of Martin County,

all five chambers of commerce, the Mar-tin Health System, among others, in-cluding individuals who urged thecommission to consider the conveniencefactor for boaters traveling to and fromthe Bahamas, many of whom have fam-ily members in the islands, as well as

residents and visi-tors traveling to thearea by air.

Many promi-nent residents alsoemailed countycommissionersseeking support fora customs facility,including John

Payson, of Jupiter Island, who wrotethat he did not believe the rumor thatcustoms would make Witham Field acommercial airport.

Highly regarded environmentalistNathaniel Reed stated that a customsfacility would create much needed,high-paying jobs in this county, andLou Gerstner called the plan a verylow cost (perhaps a NO COST) opportu-nity to do something for the local busi-nesses that represent the backbone of acommunity.

Commissioner John Haddox wrote aletter to customs supporters, urgingthem to stay engaged with the issue.Despite the most recent defeat of Cus-toms, he said, I continue to hold outhope that this facility will again comeforward and get another chance to gaincommission approval.

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Administrative Law Judge Chris-tine Van Wyk entered a recom-mended order June 2 thatAmendment 13-5, first adopted August13, 2013, then amended in April 2014 toresolve challenges by four large MartinCounty landowners, is not in compli-ance with state statutes.

One of the environmental groupsthat had intervened, Martin CountyConservation Alliance, posted online thegood news that the four-story heightlimit had been successfully defendedalthough it was never at issueandCommissioner Ed Fielding remarkedduring the June 9 commission meetingthat only two relatively minor pointsremained to be resolved, which he ex-pected to be settled out of court soonwith Midbrook 1st Realty, the last re-maining challenger.

Both sides have 15 days in which torespond to the judge's recommendedorder to note exceptions to the judge'sruling, after which each side then has anopportunity to comment on the other'scomments. Attorney Linda Loomis Shel-ley of Tallahassee is representing thecounty. Comments will be reviewed byVan Wyk prior to her final order, but herdecision then can be appealed.

Amendment 13-5 revised Chapters 1,2, and 4 of the Martin County GrowthManagement Plan, and was originallychallenged by multiple landowners, in-cluding Becker Holdings, ConsolidatedCitrus, Lake Point, and Midbrook 1st Re-alty, which owns the Hobe Grove prop-erty west of the Florida Turnpike andsouth of Bridge Road. The case washeard Sept. 30 and Oct. 1, 2014, in Stuart.

Intervenors in addition to the conser-vation alliance included the IndianRiverkeeper, 1000 Friends of Florida,City of Stuart, Town of Sewall's Point,and the Town of Jupiter Island.

The landowners challenged theamendment on the basis that relevantand appropriate data and analysis hadnot been used in crafting the rewrites,thus leaving landowners unable to de-termine the county's predictable stan-dards for use of their land.

The current Comp Plan, which hadundergone a state-mandated review ofrelevant conditions and changes in staterequirements, was approved in 2011,and had been in effect only one yearprior to Hurchalla's rewrites.

Also currently under considerationby Van Wyk is a separate challenge to

the county's revision of Chapter 10 of theComp Plan, also written by Hurchalla,that eliminates the commercial zoningdistrict at the county's interchanges withI-95, bans the extension of sewer linesinto the secondary urban services dis-trict, bans on-site sewage disposal sys-tems (septic tanks and package plants)larger than 2,000 gallons, and prohibitsmore than one septic tank per parcel re-gardless of size of the parcel.

The arguments were heard April 28-29 in a challenge by 10 Martin Countyfarmers, some of whom also are chal-lenging the first rewrites, but Van Wyk'srecommended order in that case is notexpected for several more months dueto the state's backlog of hearings.

Preponderance of Evidence RequiredIn an administrative law hearing, the bur-den of proof that a Comp Plan amend-ment is not in compliance with statestatue falls to the petitioners to prove be-yond fair debate. This means that 'if rea-sonable persons could differ as to itspropriety,' a plan amendment must be up-held, Van Wyk wrote in her order. Thestandard of proof to establish a finding offact is preponderance of the evidence.

The majority of the judge's rulingsfound the challenger's arguments fairlydebatable, however, two points werefound conclusively in favor of the chal-lengers that verified their charge thatthe Comp Plan amendments lacked sub-stantive data and analysis, as requiredby state law.

That ruling blocks the amendmentfrom becoming a county ordinance tochange the Comprehensive GrowthManagement Plan.

Midbrook challenged the county'smethods for determining the need forfuture residential development, which isbased on population projections, resi-dential demand analysis, and residentialcapacity analysis.

The judge upheld the county'smethodologies in calculating residentialdemand and population projections, butrejected the county's methods for deter-mining capacity, including the county'smethod of determining the capacity ofvacant acreage in already approved,multi-family residential projects not yetbuilt. The judge declared that it was nota professionally-acceptable method forgathering the data.

The judge also rejected the county's

assertion that there is only one urbanservices district, classifying the easternand Indiantown areas as simply subsec-tions of one Urban Services District, thususing their combined acreages and popu-lations to determine residential capacity.

By combining the two areas into oneurban services district, the analysis forthe eastern portion of the county, whichis more populated and more in demand,went from accommodating 94 percent ofthe residential need for housing in theEastern Urban Services District and 1,569percent in the Indiantown Urban Serv-ices District to accommodating 466 per-cent of the need for residential housing inthe entire county over the next 10 years.

The amendment does not take intoaccount the separate and distinct hous-ing markets in the Eastern and In-diantown USDs (urban servicesdistricts), according to the order, thusupholding the petitioner's contentionthat by combining the urban servicesareas, the county was limiting choices,limiting supply, and increasing prices,which violates state statutes.

County's Positions UpheldOther points contested by Midbrook,but upheld by the judge, included thestricter use clause in determiningwhich policy to follow in the case ofconflicts, and the super-majority vote(four of the five commissioners) beingrequired to determine any changes thatcould affect the St. Lucie River, thewater table or the county's water supply.The fact that the County Commissionmay have to adopt those changes by

four votes rather than three, she said,does not relieve the County Commis-sion from supporting its legislativechanges with appropriate data.

Although Van Wyk conceded thatthe county had acknowledged a short-age of commercial property, she dis-agreed with Midbrook that the countywas basing its determination of com-mercial and industrial uses of propertysolely on population. Further analysisis planned (by the county) to continuerefining the inventory, she added, andto consider whether population de-mands for retail/commercial servicesshould be applied to the vacant land.

She also pointed to the county's ap-proval of the Ag-TEC Future Land UseMap amendment which added sub-stantial amounts of industrial and com-mercial property to the county'sinventory, thus whether or not ade-quate lands for commercial use to servefuture needs is at least fairly debatable.

Van Wyk also said that the statedmission of the Comp Plan to provide abalance of uses, including the balance offuture economic development with en-vironmental concerns, as written in theamendment, did not differ substantiallyfrom the wording of the current CompPlan mission, contrary to the petitioner'sassertion that the plan did not balanceeconomic concerns.

Van Wyk also found that Hurchallahad provided adequate public inputduring the crafting of the changes, andMidbrook had not proven beyond fairdebate that Hurchalla had prejudicedMidbrook by the countys adoption ofamendments she had written.

The complete 64-page administrativeorder can be read in full or downloadedat: www.doah.state.fl.us/ROS/2013/13003397.pdf.

--Barbara Clowdus

5Martin County CurrentsJune 2015 News Feature

Comp Plan changesjudge's scrutiny

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Martin County CurrentsJune 20156 News Stream

City and county boards agree to seek better relationship

AGovernment 101 mediationsession conducted by FloridaGulf Coast University ProfessorBob Lee, an expert in governmental af-fairs and training, took place in Stuarton June 2 to smooth future relations be-tween the county's two major govern-ing bodies. It appears to have at leastpaved the way for more one-on-oneface time between them.

Differences in philosophy regardingeconomic development and river restora-tion often is blamed for the strained rela-tions between the City of Stuart andMartin County. The City of Stuart's com-missioners encourage both, but is ham-pered in raising revenue by the numberof older homes that qualify for propertytax exemption within city limits, thus themajority of its tax revenue comes from itsbusiness district.

Annexation often has entered citycommissioners' comments during meet-ings, but a plan for annexing propertieshas not been developed, according to CityManager Paul Nicoletti. The only annex-ation petition we have before us now isBaker Road (hotel), Nicoletti said, andour annexation policy is voluntary; thereare no plans to change that.

The Board of County Commissioner'sopposing philosophy seeks to restore theriver primarily by quashing further de-velopment, and is wary of the city's in-terest in annexing unincorporated areasthat lie along its borders.

The city-county relationship was

strained further when the city resorted tofiling a lawsuit to obtain nearly$1,000,000 in tax increment financingfunds for its Community RedevelopmentArea that had been calculated incorrectlyin the property appraiser's office, goinginstead to the county's general fund.

Snug Harbor widens the riftShortly, after the TIF issue was settled,and the city obtained its misappropriatedCRA payment, several Snug Harbor resi-dents complained to the county commis-sion that the city had offered them sewerhookups, but only if agreeing to volun-tary annexation by the city. The city hadcut the cost of hook-ups to approximately$5,000 per resident, around $20,000 lessthan to hook up to the county's system.

A Snug Harbor resident, Walter M.Goldberg, spoke out at several commis-sion meetings, presenting a petition rep-resenting 72 of the 100 properties inSnug Harbor, to contest what he consid-ered to be coercion, since most resi-dents wanted to hook up withoutannexation.

He also appealed to the state Depart-ment of Environmental Protection in anunsuccessful attempt to block grantfunding for the sewer expansion.

In response to the Snug Harbor com-munity's concerns, County Commis-sioner Doug Smith insisted that thecounty protect its residents and calledfor a city-county meeting to discuss notonly potential Snug Harbor annexation,

but the city's annexation policies as awhole. That was in 2013.

Several attempts followed by CountyAdministrator Taryn Kryzda to set ajoint meeting date to discuss the city'sannexation policies; however, the cityhad responded by requesting a medi-ated, joint meeting with Dr. Lee. Thecounty agreed, if the ethics portion of theprofessor's course was dropped.

The session June 2 at Flagler Place in-cluded a professorial lecture by Lee onthe types, roles and responsibilities ofgovernment, one-on-one sessions rotatedamong commissioners, and groups oftwo to determine the topics of highest in-terest to each commission, which in-cluded improved communication, thefire services merger, and annexation. In-stead of quarterly joint meetings, MayorKelli Glass-Leighton called for the twocommissions to meet monthly in a jointsession to discuss issues of mutual inter-est, including Palm Beach Road, theWilloughby road extension, and the ap-portionment of sales tax revenue and im-pact fees, etc.

Commissioner Eula Clarke also sug-gested that perhaps the commissionersshould attend each other's commissionmeetings to become better informed.

Merging fire services top issueThe most pressing issue, both governingbodies agreed, is the merger of fire serv-ices, which currently is being studied byan outside consultant, Fitch & Associ-

ates LLC, at a cost of $98,000, beingshared by the city and the county. Aftercompletion of the study, expected by theend of the year, Fitch will recommend astructure and finance model, or if con-solidation is not an option, an alterna-tive strategy to reduce the cost of fireservices without impacting homeown-ers' insurance rates.

The merger has been attempted pre-viously several times, according to CityCommissioner Jeff Krauskopf, but thelast proposals by the county in 2009 re-sulted in higher costs to city residents.The city and county disagree also onfunding source, the city preferring an in-dependent fire district, and CountyCommissioner Sarah Heard saying, ab-solutely not.

The idea of a merger re-emerged inFebruary 2014, when the Martin CountyTaxpayers Association and County Com-missioner Ed Fielding suggested revisit-ing the idea. Taxpayers AssociationPresident Richard Geisinger, after a cur-sory analysis, suggested that $1 millioncould be saved annually with a merger.

When the city commission voted totake part in the study, Stuart residentHelen McBride urged commissionersnot to proceed. Our city cares abouttheir residents, she said, but everytime the county gets involved in some-thing with the city, it's us, the city's resi-dents, who are the ones who get hurt.Please, do not let the county take overthe city's fire department.

Liquid natural gas is poised to be ei-ther a best friend to Martin Countyresidents, or its worst enemy. An LNG plant in Indiantown, after

spending years jumping through all therequired federal and state regulatoryhoops, will soon be under constructionand operational by 2016, adding signifi-cantly to Martin County's tax and em-ployment base.

At the same time, the ever-increasingnumber of FEC rail cars, which soonwill be carrying thousands of tons ofLNG to Florida ports from less tightlyregulated plants than Indiantown's, willalso most likely be burning LNG forfuel. The 24 new GE locomotives pur-chased in 2014 by FEC Railroad can beconverted from diesel fuel to LNG, witha conversion kit and an LNG tanker car,according to a GE press release.

All Aboard Florida locomotives likelyalso will be running on LNG. Two com-panies related to All Aboard Florida's par-ent company, Fortress Investment Group,are building two LNG facilities, one in Ti-tusville and one near Miami InternationalAirport in Medley at the Hialeah RailYard owned by FEC Railway.

Despite the billions of tons of liqui-fied natural gas projected to be travelingthe rails through Martin County, LNG isnot one of the hazardous materials iden-tified by Martin County Fire Rescue Di-vision Chief Daniel Wouters in hisrecent report to the Martin County Com-mission on the county's vulnerability inchemical spills.

The concern we have is the increaseof the high-speed passenger trainsalong with the cargo, which travels at alower speed, he said, referring to All

Aboard Florida's projected 32 trainsdaily crossing more than 26 intersec-tions in Martin County. That has thepotential to increase our risk for thesetypes of accidents.

The chemicals Wouters listed, includ-ing liquefied anhydrous ammonia andliquefied chlorine gas, are toxic, how-ever LNG is not. It is the preferred fuelfor trains and trucks because of its farlower cost. It also burns cleaner thandiesel fuel. Since natural gas is cooled toaround minus 260 degrees Fahrenheit,LNG also is non-flammable and floatson top of water. It vaporizes quickly, soa spill does not threaten the water sup-ply; however, LNG still poses hazardsduring production and transporting.

In the event that a LNG tank is rup-tured in a transport accident, spillingLNG, a high probability of a fire exists. Aflammable natural gas vapor/air mixture

will be formed im-mediately in thevicinity of the LNGpool, according to

the Federal Transit Administration, butthere is no odor associated with its vaporsto warn first-responders. If ignited by aspark or other external ignition, the heatreleased from an LNG pool fire is approx-imately 60 percent greater than that of agasoline pool fire of equivalent size.

To obtain authorization to exportLNG from any Florida port, anotherFortress company, American LNG Mar-keting LLC in New York, obtained twoDepartment of Energy authorizations,one on March 19 and the other May 29,to export a combined 33 billion cubicfeet (600,000 metric tons) of LNG inter-nationally from the Medley and Ti-tusville plants. The authorizations eachtook less than three weeks to obtain.

Although American LNG pledged inits Department of Energy application thatall the applicable permits would be ob-tained for the Titusville facility, no such

promises weremade for the Med-ley plant. In fact,American LNGsaid that the com-pany was cate-goricallyexcluded fromrequiring state orfederal permits,including from theFederal EnergyRegulatory Com-mission, whichnormally overseesLNG facilities.

The Medley plant, under the nameLNG Holdings LLC, incorporated inFlorida a year ago, purchased from ChartIndustries an LNG liquefaction plant thesame month, which is already nearingcompletion within months of arrival. Theplant is expected to produce 100,000 gal-lons of LNG daily, according to Chart.

Indiantown residents have waitednearly eight years for the proposed LNGplant there, confident in the state andfederal oversight of its operations andthe 30 high-paying jobs it brings to thecounty. For Martin County residents,however, the prospect of trainloads ofLNG from a plant with no energy com-mission oversight, traveling on thesoon-to-be crowded FEC tracks, proba-bly not so much.

--Barbara Clowdus

Although the legal efforts tothwart the issuance of private ac-tivity bonds to All AboardFlorida got shut down by the U.S. Dis-trict Court, efforts to get the CoastGuard to pay attention to boaters mayhave paid off.

A full-time bridge tender may soon bestationed at Jupiters Loxahatchee Riverand St. Lucie River drawbridges as theU.S. Coast Guard conducts tests on theNew River whether a bridge tender de-creases boater backups caused by passingFlorida East Coast Railway trains.

The Loxahatchee River railroaddrawbridge in Tequesta is 90 years oldand takes approximately 30 minutes togo down for trains, according toTequesta officials; the St. Lucie Riverdrawbridge takes less time, but bridgeclosure times are a major issue thatdrew the Village of Tequesta, the City ofStuart, the Town of Jupiter, and MartinCounty to oppose All Aboard Florida'saddition of 32 trains daily to FEC's antic-ipated 20 trains. FEC currently runs 14trains daily.

Barry Dragon, director of the districtbridge program for the 7th Coast Guard

District, issued the proposal followingpublic meetings and 3,000 written com-ments regarding wait times at the threerailroad drawbridges.

The experiment began in May at theNew River Bridge in Ft. Lauderdalewhere boaters can now call the bridgetender to find out if a train is on its way.The test is scheduled to run throughOct. 16, but Dragon said the changescould be applied more quickly to theother bridges, depending on test results.

The Florida East Coast Railway mustcover the cost for the bridge tender, andother upgrades such as lights and acountdown clock ordered by the CoastGuard to address the inability of thebridge owner, FEC, to operate the bridgeunder current regulations.

Awaiting decision from FRAAll Aboard Florida announced that itwould begin selling bonds on June 22 toraise $1.75 billion, but it also is awaitingapproval of a Federal Railroad Adminis-tration loan pending release of the finalEnvironmental Impact Study.

Terry Rauth, assistant director of en-gineering for Martin County, reported

at a recent meeting in Hobe Sound thatthe county had received copies of thedraft 90-percent-complete design plansfrom AAF, but many questions re-mained unanswered, she added, suchas the grade percentages at crossingsthat will change with the addition of asecond rail.

We have asked repeatedly for thosefinal grade percentages, Rauth said,since they will determine how steep thegrade will be for drivers attempting tocross the railroad tracks, but wehaven't gotten a response.

She cautioned that the public maynot have a second opportunity to com-ment on the Environmental ImpactStatement, since the Federal RailroadAdministration is not required to releasea second draft.

The first phase of All AboardFloridas 235-mile project from Miami toWest Palm Beach is under constructionwill begin service in early 2017. The sec-ond phase of the $3 billion project, fromWest Palm Beach and nonstop throughthe Treasure Coast to Orlando Interna-tional Airport, is set to begin running inlate 2017, according to AAF officials.

Coast Guard listening to AAF protests

Millions of gallons of LNG will be riding the rails

Martin County CurrentsJune 2015 News Feature 7

The storage tanks for the liquified natural gasare in place at the Medley plant, ready to holdthe 100,000 gallons of LNG produced daily tofuel FEC trains and to export internationally.

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The Fortress Investment Group-related liquified natural gas plant inMedley is nearing completion without any apparent federal regulatoryoversight. The LNG will be used to fuel FEC trains. The U.S. Depart-ment of Energy also authorized sale of the LNG it produces to bothFederal Trade Agreement and non-FTA countries.

Martin County CurrentsJune 20158 Voices

Editorial: Our commission meetings are just fine

We agreed this week with Stu-art attorney Virginia Sher-lock, who objected to thecounty commission's sudden proclivitytoward conducting workshops on im-portant topics outside of commissionchambers. Not only did we agree withSherlock, so did Commissioners JohnHaddox and Doug Smith.

When those two commissioners op-posed leaving commission chambers foryet another workshop session, SarahHeard suggested having just one of theirtwo scheduled workshops in the upstairsconference room. Smith's impassionedresponse was that commissioners had tochoose: Either they were going to con-duct the people's business in the open,transparently, as they all profess is theirmuch-heralded goal, or they were justpretending to want open government.

As a result, both of this week's work-shopsone examining new rules formeeting procedures and the other aboutthe county's secondary urban servicesdistrictswere in commission chambersinstead of in a conference room. Bothwere televised. Both elicited much publiccomment. That's the way government issupposed to work. Kudos to Doug Smith.

Five other workshops have been heldwithin the past 12 weeks, but withoutclose public scrutiny: on the budget, oncapital improvement projects, on codeenforcement, on the analysis of countyfacilities and buildings, and on strategic

planning, which was around the sametime as the City of Stuart's strategicplanning workshop. Theirs, however,was at Flagler Place, a venue that wouldaccommodate hundreds of residents.Not upstairs in a conference roomsmaller than commission chambers.

And Stuart's session was at 9 a.m. ona Saturday morning. Saturday! Whichgovernment body do you supposeserves its constituents more openly andresponsively?

Had all the workshops this year beenin commission chambers, the publicwould have had fewer surprises. Theywould have heard Fielding and Hearddirect Kevin Freeman, of the communitydevelopment department, to investigatepooling of all seven of the Commu-nity Redevelopment Areas' $6 millionannually in Tax Incremental Financingfunds to help pay for the projected $250million in sewer projects, or maybe forresurfacing some county roads, ormaybe to dredge the inletnever mindthat TIF funds collected are from tax-payers who live in those districts andcannot by law be spent outside of thedistrict from which they were collected.

Never mind that those CRA projectswere selected by the residents who live orwork within those boundaries to be nec-essary to the health, safety and well beingof their residents, and that they'd been in-vesting their time and tax money for 15years or longer to see them accomplished.

Never mind that that a TIF fund in-vestment into a CRA more likely wouldpay far more in the long term by attract-ing tourists and visitors to these historiccommunities, which would help fillrestaurants and boost retail sales, stimu-lating the local economy, stabilizingsmall businesses, which would investtheir own private dollars in buildingrenovations and upgrades that increasesimpact fees, and attract more businessesinto revitalized areas that, in turn, helpcreate a desirable neighborhood, thusincreasing property values, which, ulti-mately, increases county tax revenue.

I think we'd be far better off to leavethe CRAs alone, said Haddox, duringthe workshop, and to allow those (TIF)funds to do what they were intended todoto stimulate the local economy.

We also would have heard commis-sioners direct Kevin Abbate, parks andrecreation director, to bring a revenue-enhancing plan to the commission thatincluded charging for beach parkingand for use of boat rampsand specifi-cally to start with Hobe Sound beach,which lies adjacent to the home of Com-missioner Anne Scott, who also wantsalcohol banned and the beach closed atnight to improve security. Oh, yes,and also to protect those nesting turtles.

Scott wants also to conduct commis-sion meetings more efficiently, andcomplains that this just isn't working.Quite to the contrary, we believe Ed

Fielding has done a superb job of con-ducting commission meetings, extend-ing respect to citizens at all times and tomost of the commissioners most of thetime. We applaud also the way he han-dles proclamations: with genuine grati-tude for citizens' community service andwithout short-changing their message orrecognition. He keeps the meeting flow-ing, and if he can fill a gap by movingitems around in the agenda, he'll do it.There's nothing about commission meet-ings that needs to be fixed.

Scott wants the commission run like acourtroom. She wants no public commentother than what's on that day's agenda,otherwise, it's politicking. She wants acertain amount of time allotted to eachagenda item, to be followed closely, inorder for people to know in advancewhen to show up, so they don't have sithere for hours. She wants a certain deco-rum followed to prohibit applause or out-bursts from the audience. Shoot, sheprobably wants men to take off their capswhen they enter, and to prohibit womenwearing bermuda shorts!

But this is democracy. Yes, it's some-times messy and burdensome, and sincewe live in the sub-tropics, we're a littlemore casual and informal than inChicago, where Scott lives. Haddox saidit best: Just like (a public speaker) said,we asked for these jobs...If there's two orthree hours of public comment, so be it.Amen.

If I am on an operating table, I will bemore than happy for all the comput-ers and gadgets that are in that oper-ating room. And, in my line of work as aCPA, I would be lost without a cellphone and a computer. E-mail and tex-ting are tremendous blessings to those ofus who use them in business and per-sonal communication, and for peoplewho travel, they are blessings that enablethem to contact their world back home.

For all the blessings, though, aremany curses: In days gone by, it wascommon for the average family to sitaround the supper table and have mean-ingful conversation. Their whole lifenow seems centered around the latesttechnology, and all the apps that go withit. Their attention deteriorates into aconstant stream of texting, Facebook,Twitter, video games, and on and on.

Now smart phones can even act asalarm clocks. One parent actually sendstexts to his children to wake them up, astheir iPhone sits beside their bed inplace of the alarm clock.

Those phones have become the rul-ing force in many peoples lives. Theycant even sit in church for an hourwithout checking out the latest what-ever on their iPhone. Children and par-ents seldom read anymore or even talkto each other.

I refuse to be part of the herd. Justbecause others are doing it, must I do it,too? Does anyone think for themselvesanymore, or question the validity ofwhat is happening in society?

My wife has a Facebook account, butspends very little time on it. The fewtimes I have ventured onto it, I see whyit wastes so much time: There is a com-ment from someone, so you go to theirsite. Oh, there is so and so, I will checkout their site, and on and on it goes,until you have wasted countless min-utesmaybe even hours.

Facebook shares with the wholeworld information about yourself andother people that may or may not haveany value, or should not even be shared.A study by a US market research firm

reports that 40% of the messages onTwitter are "pointless babble" along thelines of "I am eating a sandwich now."When we must tell the world, I just gotup, showered and ate breakfast, (andhopefully they brushed their teeth), wehave lost something somewhere. I thinkit might be our sanity.

Texting destroys not only spokencommunication, but is an extremelydangerous weapon. We need to pass alaw forbidding use of hand-held phoneswhile driving. I have been guilty of dial-ing a number on my cellphone whiledriving, catching myself about to crossover, not only the center line in the road,but to cross over into the great beyond!

Video games control preteens. Tex-ting controls teenagers. Facebook con-trols young adults, and maybe seniorsare safe only because many of themdont have computers. They still readbooks and talk to each other how bor-ing! If they only had Facebook or Twit-ter, they could know who just got up,showered and ate breakfast!

Internet companies used to watchusage levels increase when peoplebooted up at work. Now they see theuptick earlier in the day. It is a rocketship that takes off at 7 am, says CraigLabovitz, as quoted in the New YorkTimes. He owns Arbor Networks, acompany that analyzes Internet use.Akamai, which helps sites like Face-book, says traffic takes off even earlier at 6 am on the East Coast.

If you are guilty of excessive depend-ence on technology, ask yourself: Am Iaddicted? What impact does this haveon my family and/or me? Has our fam-ily drawn closer, or drifted apart, aseach does his or her own thing? Could Iuse that Facebook time in a more prof-itable way? Am I caught up in peer pres-sure to do it, because they're doing it?

Try something new: Read a good book.Talk to someoneface to face. If you do, Ithink you'll have a very good day.

Jim OlsenHobe Sound

Guest Editorial: Blessings and curses of technology

Allow our CRAs to live up to potential

The people who live in MartinCounty, particularly those whohave lived here their entire lives,are what give form and substance tothe fabric of this place. The rest of usabsorb their heritage and become partof their legacy without the sweat, bloodand tears they shedfrom the commer-cial fishermen, citrus growers, cattleranchers, artists, charter boat captains,boat builders, farmers and teachers tothe Seminoles and the Bahamians whowere among our earliest pioneers. Theircharacter set this place apart, and itflows through the DNA of those whocame after.

The rest of us are just lucky we stum-bled upon this spot.

Making this our home, though, re-quires of us that we continue the legacyof those foundersa much greater re-sponsibility than just preserving an era'shistoric buildings. It means ensuringthat their history does not slip awayfrom us, even as we modernize and em-brace new technology and lifestyles.Perhaps more than anything else, that'swhat the community redevelopmentareas mean to most of ustaking re-sponsibility to protect and enhance oursomewhat undeserved legacy.

Think for a moment about how dif-ferent each of these historic areas arefrom the rest of the county: Port Salerno,Old Palm City, Rio, Golden Gate, In-diantown, Jensen Beach, and HobeSound. Each has its own flavor, itsunique history, and its own perplexingissues. All of them qualify under thestate statue as a blighted areanothow we typically define that wordbutbecause each has sections with their oldbuildings, or outdated infrastructure, orpoor roadway layouts, or lack of street-lights, few if any contiguous sidewalksand generally a lack of neighborhoodconnectivity.

Those conditions impede each CRAfrom reaching its full potential to createhealthy, safe and desirable places forpeople to live, to work and to ensure thestory of that place will endurethesafety nets to stop their slide into a non-descript oblivion. The Hobe Sound andOld Palm City CRAs were on the cuspof making genuine strides toward reach-ing that potential when their projectswere killed.

Considering that our population isaging (50 is now the median age in Mar-tin County, and the number of familieswith children under the age of 18 hasdeclined over the past 15 years) weshould recognize that these are theneighborhoods that can increase thequality of life of our older generation bymaking them walkable and bikeable,with streets that are safe to cross, andwith friendly gathering places withshops, parks and playgrounds for chil-dren and grandchildrenexactly the

same qualities that young people arestarting to appreciate and desire forthemselves.

All of our county's CRAs have a planin place to improve connectivity, to ad-dress stormwater and flooding issues,and to improve safety, which in turnlends itself to improved health, happi-ness and quality of life. These plans havebeen thoughtfully, sometimes painfully,constructed by those who live there, be-cause no one else quite knows the needs,the history or the flavor of a place, orwhat streets flood, and where shortcutsreveal the patterns of foot-traffic.

Residents who take an active part indeveloping their plans, the members ofthe Neighborhood Advisory Commit-tees, realize and accept the responsibil-ity required to spend hours of theirpersonal time. They recognize also thatit's a privilege to have an opportunity tohelp shape the vision and outcomes fortheir neighborhood.

Ideally, as a community translates itsvision into reality with improved infra-structure, affordable housing whereneeded and revitalized commercial areaswith a combination of grants and TIFfundinga portion of the tax that comesfrom only the increase in property valueswithin the boundaries of the CRAren-ovation by business owners follows. Arevitalized commercial area attractsother businesses, more residents, creat-ing the kind of desirable neighborhoodsthat increases property values over thelong term, spreading from the commer-cial areas to the residential.

Look at the City of Stuart, an exam-

ple of successful revitalization, the resultof city commissioners working along-side residents to make it happenandthey still plan more to come.

Martin County's seven CRAs fit thecounty's vision of itself, keeping devel-opment within urban districts, creatinga strong infrastructure in the county'score areas, and strengthening smallbusinesses, all while enhancing thequality of life of residents. Now theirvery existence is being threatened bypowerful voices who object to mixeduses that allow livings spaces amongcommercial areas, and to a populationdensity that's allowed in downtowns,but unavailable elsewhere.

Those voices have the audacity toblame the Hobe Sound CRA for themanufactured-home debacle that costthe county $200,000, which happenedbecause there was no NeighborhoodAdvisory Committee at the time. It hadbeen dismantled by the county com-mission, thus could not review whatwas coming.

Any failings of the county's Commu-nity Redevelopment Agency can beborne only by the County Commissionitself, which is directly responsible forevery decision and every direction givento the county's Community Develop-ment Department and the CRAs for 13of the past 15 years.

We have commissioners who say theright words about celebrating the cul-ture and history of this place, nurturingsmall business, and ensuring a goodquality of life for all residents, but theirlofty words now sound hollow.

The CRAs were an experiment. Byidentifying the seven areas of theold 1920's train stations that re-main as small town "mainstreets" wouldCRA land use incentives and CRA TIFfunding help address the lack of basicurban infrastructure?

The car wasn't king back then. Thereare no parking lots. There were nodrainage and stormwater retention re-quirements or wetland or upland nativepreserves. There was no sewer and waterutilities and septic systems were the onlyalternative. The TIF funding was a strat-egy that depended on investment in thesecore areas providing a return in terms ofincreased taxable value. TIF funds aregeneral fund taxes that normally wouldgo to the general fund. We all pay thosetaxes. They are NOT like special taxingdistricts where residents are taxed extraand provided with extra service.

In a sense, the TIF funds are "bor-rowed' from the general fund with theexpectation that increased taxable valueswill return those funds to the generalfund. For the payback to happen, theCRAs have to sunset at some point whenthe goals are met and the areas are nolonger determined to be "blighted". CRAsand TIF funding are supposed to be

about blighted areas where infrastructureimprovements will make the blight goaway and improve property values. Theoriginal design of CRAs included largesections of mostly residential propertyaround the core Mixed Use Overlay(MUO) area and designated them as"blighted Most of them are not blightedby any stretch of the imagination.

As a result, the TIF funding doesn'tact as designed. The whole CRA areapays the same taxes as everyone else.The CRA gets to keep 65-95% of theirtax increment to build projects that willovercome the blight. The tax incrementis the amount of taxable value in anyyear that is more than the base year. Thebase year for different CRAs varied from1999 to 2002. Analysis shows that mostof the $25 million plus that has beenspent on CRAs has been spent on proj-ects that benefit the core area. Most ofthe tax increment has come from the un-blighted area of the CRA outside thecore MUO. A second unforeseen prob-lem has been the change in the cap ontaxable value for non-homestead prop-erty. Prior to 2011 a constitutionalamendment put in place a 10% cap onincreases in taxable value.

This means that if a one million dol-

lar investment in a CRA causes a onemillion dollar increase in market value,it will be ten years before the taxablevalue catches up to the market value.

As long as there is not a dependablelarge revenue stream to take on majorprojects like sewer and water, the CRAswill continue to do smaller projects thatbenefit only a few parcels. The TIFfunds are General Fund revenues. Theyshould not be spent for special perkswith limited benefits when there are se-rious unmet maintenance and capitalproject needs countywide.

If the thesis is that neighborhood ad-visory boards should determine howgeneral fund revenues are spent in theirneighborhoods, then all neighborhoodsshould have a NAC and be allowed toto determine how money is spent intheir neighborhood. That would requirea substantial increase in property taxesif the County continued to provide basicservices. Analysis of the ten year historyof CRAs shows that the MUO core areascannot support any major projects. Theinvestment of $25 million from the gen-eral fund over ten years has not in-creased taxable value significantly inthose areas. Including areas outside theMUO that are not blighted does not

meet the criteria for a CRA. More impor-tant, using taxes from the residentialareas around the MUOs without provid-ing benefits there is simply not fair.

Finally, there is the question of theland use incentives offered by the CRAs.They are designed to give bonus densi-ties to Mixed Use projects that teardown existing structures or build on va-cant land in the CRA. They simply havenot worked. The CRAs were put inplace prior to 2002. It's 2015. One MixedUse project has been partially builtRennar River Place. It has not been astriking success. It has not delivered thepromised benefits.

CRA incentives have caused prob-lems in some areas. The modular homethat appeared in a stable residential areain Hobe Sound was located there be-cause of CRA incentives. Where designstandards have been mandated outsidethe MUO, residents have been unpleas-antly surprised to find out that they hadto build porches and garages in a certainway. It's time to lay out all the factual in-formation about CRAs.

--Attributed in Email Posts to Former County Commissioner

Maggy Hurchalla(Clipped due to space constraints)

Comments on CRAs circulating on the Internet

9Martin County CurrentsJune 2015 Voices

BarbaraClowdus

Unfiltered

Situated along CitrusBoulevard adjacent tothe C-44 canal, theCaulkins pilot projectstunned South Florida WaterManagement District engineersalmost immediately by storingmore than double the amountof water expected. Despite itsunexpectedly superior per-formance, however, the projectstill must overcome two majorhurdles: Funding ends within sevenmonths, so the project must appeal tostate legislators now embroiled in budgetbattles for funds to expand the project, atthe same time that water farming itselfhas come under fire by some environ-mental activists.

I wish there was some other term forit than 'water farming,' just because itsounds crazy, says George Caulkins III,whose father planted the orange groveon Citrus Boulevard in the early '60s thatnow stands fallow in four feet of water,as he addressed a group of Stuart-MartinCounty Chamber members on a tour ofthe South Florida Water Management

District pilot project in May. I'm a citrus farmer, and when the

water management district first ap-proached me about turning my orangegroves into a water farm, I said no, notinterested, said Caulkins, educated atYale and a former Marine helicopterpilot and veteran of Desert Storm.

The Caulkins groves next to the C-44canal were considered an ideal locationto test the concept of water farmingearly in the Dispersed Water Manage-ment Program, which began in 2006,when the SFWMD began paying ranch-ers to hold stormwater on their lands,rather than drain them. The first early

successes resulted in an expansion of theprogram in 2011, after citrus greeninghad decimated thousands of acres ofFlorida orange groves, including thoseof the Caulkins Indiantown Citrus Com-pany, then fallow orange groves werelooked at to store water as Evergladesprojects came online.

We'd survived everything thatcould be thrown at citrus farmers,Caulkins said. Drought, freezes, hurri-canes, canker...but greening killed us,just took us to our knees...We stoppedpicking oranges four years ago, but nowwe've got a new use for old technology(the irrigation infrastructure for farm-ing), dreamed up by the South FloridaWater Management District.

The infrastructure already in placethe water pumps and canals throughoutthe propertydramatically reduces theupfront construction cost of a water farm,although until the Caulkins project, noother true water farms were part of thedistricts Dispersed Water Managementprogram anywhere in the state.

State's first water farmSFWMD, with a matching $1.5 milliongrant from DEP, published a request forproposals for water farm pilot projectsin 2012 and three farms were selected in2013, just as raging rains were causingunrelenting discharges from both LakeOkeechobee and the local drainagebasin. Of the two pilot projects in Martin

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Caulkins water farm new hope to estuaries

Floridas first, true water farm exceeds all expectations, according to state officials, and its right here in Martin County. An expanded Caulkins Water Farm on 3,200 acresnear Indiantown holds the promise of relief to the St. Lucie River and Indian River Lagoonestuaries from annual deluges of polluted waterup to half of the water storage needed to reduce annual discharges by 90 percent, according to recent studies.

Brown water enters theCaulkins Water Farmfrom the C-44 canal.

George Caulkins, IIIProject manager of the Caulkins Water Farm, Tom Kenny, points to the treeline on the horizon, the boundary of the Caulkins 3,200-acre farm.

gives

County and one in St. Lucie County,Caulkins is the largest and the first inthe state to be operational.

Other Dispersed Water ManagementProjects plug ditches to retain stormwa-ter runoff. The Caulkins project insteadpumps billions of gallons of water fromthe C-44 canal onto the Caulkins site,now a shallow-water reservoir thatlooks like a slice of the Everglades withalligators swimming among hyacinthstoward a flock of baby gallinules, withan eagle overhead and stilted heronspicking at the shoreline.

It's as different as a farm is to a fac-tory, said Tom Kenny, the Caulkinsproject manager, who struggles to findthe right words to outline clearly theenormous benefits of a water farm overother types of Dispersed Water Manage-ment sites. Essentially, in addition tostorage, the water farm also cleanses bil-lions of gallons of water while recharg-ing the surficial aquifer, capturing about75 percent of the phosphorous and 50percent of the nitrogen that otherwisewould foul Martin County's estuaries.

The project, enclosed entirely by aseven-foot levee built with the spoilfrom a newly dug canal, provides a totalof 413 acres of permeable land to treatpolluted water from the C-44 and tocapture the 55 inches of annual rainfall.Operational since mid-February 2014,the Caulkins pilot projectincludingthe existing 22 miles of irrigation canals,within and around the perimeterhasstored 8.6 billion gallons of water, morethan 25,000 acre-feet of water, nearly2.25 times what had been expected, ac-cording to project engineer Melissa Cor-bett of the MilCor Group.

Designed to hold 6,780 acre-feet ofwater, the SFWMD statistical reportwhich excludes the water stored in theexisting canals on the propertyshowsmore than 12,000 acre-feet of water havebeen stored within the reservoir's 413-acre reservoir proper.

Right off the bat, it was so success-ful, Kenny added, that they (SFWMDengineers) made us stop pumping sothey could come in here to dig a moni-toring well right smack in the center tosee where all that water was going, sothose numbers do not include the monthit took to do that.

An independent technical analysisby the University of North Florida's en-gineering department confirmed whatSFWMD had discoveredthat the waterwas not going right back into the C-44,Kenny said.

With the addition of 14 additional

11Martin County CurrentsJune 2015 News Feature

monitoring wells on the perimeter of theproject, the results are continuing to bestudied by multiple agencies. Dr. Christo-pher Brown, an UNF engineering profes-sor, has confirmed that around 82 percentof the water percolates downward into thesandy soil to recharge the aquifer, 11 per-cent is lost to evaporation, and around sixpercent remains static within the reservoir.

The first question people are goingto ask is, does this water drain back intothe C-44, and, yes, some of it will, even-tually, said Dr. Brown, but it will takefrom one to 10 years, and it will be aslow seep from the aquifer, not the del-uge that's so damaging now.

Estuaries hang in the balanceAlthough area scientists, including Dr.Edie Widder, founder of the Ocean Re-search Conservation Association in Ft.Pierce, often caution that the IndianRiver Lagoon/St. Lucie River estuariesare now at a critical tipping point of noreturn, most of the public's focus hasbeen on long-term solutions, leaving theestuaries at the mercy of incessant, pol-luted stormwater drainage from theOkeechobee/St. Lucie River drainagebasin and the unpredictable, periodicdeluge of Lake Okeechobee discharges.

We all know that the St. Lucie Riverand the IRL (Indian River Lagoon)needed projects completed yesterday,said Martin County resident Kevin Pow-ers, vice chair of the South Florida WaterManagement District Governing Board,who addressed a tour group on June 1.

Powers, under fire since he led theSFWMD vote not to exercise the state'soption to purchase 48,000 acres south ofLake Okeechobee, pointed west towardthe C-44 reservoir and stormwater treat-ment construction site, explaining tovisitors that it will not be operationaluntil 2020; however, the privately con-structed Caulkins project took only 16weeks to complete.

The most abused resource we have is

time, Powers added, and for whateverreasons, federal projects take a longtime....but these (water farms) are deliver-ables that we can count on now, and sincewe don't need to purchase the land to dothis, the upfront cost is much lower.

Even an expanded Caulkins WaterFarm, plus the two additional waterfarms on the C-43 and C-44 canals cur-rently under construction will not han-dle hurricanes or major rains, such asthe 136-billion gallons of water going totide in 2013, Powers conceded, but theycould meet and exceed the additionalstorage required to end the regular, an-nual discharges to the St. Lucie Riverwhile the full range of 68 Evergladesrestoration projects are completed.

This really is a win-win-win,Caulkins said. This resolves an imme-diate, pressing issue for the St. LucieRiver as we wait for other restorationprojects to come on line. It will alsoallow time for researchers to find a pos-sible cure or solution to citrus greening,which means I can hope one day to re-turn to citrus farming.

As long as Caulkins keeps alive thathope and still can earn an income fromhis land, he's far less likely to sell it todevelopers. In the meantime, the landremains on Martin County's tax rolls,can help restore the estuaries, and giveshope that the county's citrus industrycan one day rebound.

When he first bought land in Mar-tin County, my father was told the soilwas too sandy here to grow oranges,Caulkins said, but after a hurricanewiped out all their groves up on theridge, he said that sandy soil hadsaved him. After I took over, he re-minded me again: 'Son, this sandy soilwill save you.'

What he could not have foreseen wasthat sandy soil would help save not onlyan orange grove and a family business,but an estuary, too.

--Barbara Clowdus

A bargain in the making

The University of North Florida analysis, using Department of Environ-mental Protection on-site monitoring gauges, shows that the CaulkinsWater Farm pilot project removed 2.66 metric tons of phosphorus and13.10 metric tons of total nitrogen from February 2014 to March 31, 2015, simi-lar on a per-unit-basis as to what is predicted for the C-44 reservoir andstormwater treatment area under construction by the U.S. Army Corps of En-gineers and the South Florida Water Management District as part of the Ever-glades restoration plan.

The C-44 reservoir/storm water treatment area's total capacity is expectedto be 56,000 acre-feet of water storage that includes a 3,400-acre reservoir underconstruction by the Corps of Engineers and a 6,300-acre stormwater treatmentarea under construction by the SFWMD.

The Caulkins Water Farm pilot project cost, based on the SFWMD originalestimates of 6,780 acre-feet of water stored, is $76 per acre-foot, as compared tothe C-44 project, which is an estimated $268 per acre-foot of water retentionbased on a 50-year life span. The total construction costs of the C-44 projectwill top $500 million, which includes land acquisition, according to a recentaudit, plus about $12 million annually to maintain and operate.

The controversial Alico water disbursement project, according to a 2014state inspector general report, costs $136 per acre-foot to hold back 91,000 acre-feet of water west of Lake Okeechobee on about 35,000 acres.

Local environmental activists insist that the water farm projects should berestricted to only government-owned lands because of cost and because theyare not a permanent installation.

Dr. Brown's calculations of the cost of the Caulkins project, however, usingconservative storage numbers, shows that the pilot's cost has been about $37per acre-foot. The initial investment by the SFWMD was $1.36 million for thethree-year project.

Adjusting for what had been unanticipated costs for the pilot project, the ex-panded Caulkins Water Farm is estimated to cost $125 per acre-foot of water.

Caulkins keys: Location and sandy soil

The success of the Caulkins Water Farm pilot project, 450 acres of a3,200-acre fallow orange grove within a quarter mile of the C-44 canal,is its sand.When we drilled down, there wasn't a bit of marl in 40 feet of soil, said

Tom Kenny, project manager. It's all sand.As a result, the water recedes at about one-tenth of a foot per day through

percolation and evaporation; thus that amount is available to be refilled by ad-ditional water each day.

If we were to expand to 3,000 acres, says landowner George Caulkins,we could continue to take 300 acre-feet per day, even after the reservoir is al-ready 'full.'

With 325,853 gallons of water in an acre-foot, this translates to 97,755,900 gal-lons of water taken out of the C-44 canal everyday that would not flow into theSt. Lucie River.

At the peak of the 2013 discharges, about 4.8 billion gallons were being re-leased daily.

We could not make much of dent in that, Caulkins concedes, but there isno project contemplated that could do much with that volume.

Even a reservoir contemplated for the 28,000 square mile parcel of U.S.Sugar land south of Lake Okeechobee would hold only 100,000 acre-feet ofwater, according to SFWMD engineers, so eliminating discharges at that high avolume will require multitude projects and an overall, statewide water strategythat includes the Kissimmee River Basin.

However, if you look at the 2015 discharges, it is a different story,Caulkins adds. The Army Corps was releasing about 400 million gallons aday into the C-44 from the Lake (when releases started Jan. 16). We could havebeen taking 25 percent of that daily release.

Every day.

Some of the canals are covered completely with water lettuce and hyacinths, which will needto be removed mechanically to keep the water farm functioning at peak levels.

One of the biggest challenges tostopping the Lake Okeechobeedischarges has been our (nat-ural) tendency to be parochial. In otherwords, we want to solve our own imme-diate problems without looking at theentire Everglades system, which in-cludes the whole Kissimmee River andOkeechobee basins, south to Florida Bay.The solutions we seek do not begin atLake Okeechobee's rim; rather, theybegin at the headwaters of the Ever-gladesthe Kissimmee Chain of Lakes.

Before the Kissimmee River wasstraightened to provide more land fordevelopment, much of the Kissimmeebasin was flooded, especially during thewet years, which contributed to the nat-ural recharge of the Floridan aquifer.The water sitting on land for longer pe-riods of time also evaporated faster andfed the rain cycle. The water system wasin balance.

Now, water flowing from Orlandoreaches Lake Okeechobee in six days,when it used to take six months. By al-tering the Kissimmee River's naturalflow, we pay the price with estuary-damaging Lake Okeechobee discharges,and central Florida now faces a seriouswater shortage in the not-too-distant fu-ture. The Central Florida Water Initia-tive finally will address those issues.

The group is a collaborative, water-supply planning effort comprisingthree state water management districts,the Florida Department of Environ-mental Protection, the Florida Depart-ment of Agriculture and ConsumerServices, county water utilities, envi-ronmental groups, business organiza-tions, agricultural communities andother stakeholders.

The CFWI planning area includesOrange, Osceola, Polk, and Seminolecounties and southern Lake County. It

includes the headwaters for seven riversystems: the Alafia, Peace, Hillsborough,and Withlacoochee rivers in the South-west Florida Water Management Dis-trict; the Kissimmee River/Chain ofLakes in the South Florida Water Man-agement District; and the Ocklawahaand St. Johns rivers within the SaintJohns River Water Management District.

We have been attending these meet-ings as representatives of One FloridaFoundation, and, frankly, much needs tobe improved. The plans currently beingconsidered do not give enough priorityto water conservation, a frequent criti-cism by others too, and alarmingly callfor drilling deeper into the Floridanaquifer to tap resources we haventtapped yet, which could negatively im-pact surrounding lakes. They reaffirmthe old patterns of unsustainable wateruse. We should all know better by now.

We believe more can be done andshould be done to conserve water in

urban areas by adopting and encourag-ing use of bio-swales, green roofs, per-meable pavements, and xeriscaping. Atthe very least, planting less water-inten-sive lawns should be a requirement fornew development.

Water doesnt stay put in our owncities and counties. This is especiallytrue with our karst landscape of lime-stone and our sandy soils, which allowwater to flow freely from one place toanother on top of the ground and below,bringing with it our neighbors pollu-tants. But it also gives us a supply ofwater. The flip side of that, the watercan also be manipulated with reservoirs,dams, canals, etc., which cause positiveor negative changes downstream. Letspush for something positive!

It would be wise for all of us to edu-cate ourselves and pay attention to theCentral Florida Water Initiative, for theirdecisions could be part of a solutionorpotentially create more problems.

To study their draft plans for the cen-tral Florida region, go to www.cfwiwa-ter.com. The comment period ends July31 and may be our best opportunity everto give input on the future of our water.

Nyla Pipes is a founder of One FloridaFoundation, which addresses water issuesthroughout the state.

Opportunity knocks with central Florida initiativeNyla

Pipes

One Florida Foundation

12 Martin County CurrentsJune 2015One Florida Foundation

I wish I'd called you FIRST!

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The Central Florida Water Initiative holds great potential inhelping resolve some of our most perplexing water issues.Their task is to create more storage in the headwaters of theEverglades to stave off water shortages in central Florida,but it also will slow the amount of runoff that reaches theKissimmee River and Lake Okeechobee, only to be flushedto tide through the St. Lucie and the Caloosahatchee rivers.

In addition to hosting river clean-ups, raising funds for scholarships,and launching educational initia-tives, an essential part of the OneFlorida Foundation mission is instillinga sense of stewardship among theyouth who live along our waterways.

One Florida members organized anouting in May for the youngsters ofthe Sword Outreach Ministries, whohad worked hard over the past fewmonths to help clean up MooresCreek in Fort Pierce.

We decided it was time to enjoysome recreation and introduce them toour Indian River Lagoon and spoil is-lands, said Nyla Pipes, a One FloridaFoundation founder. We can't thankLisa of Lisa's Kayaks enough for loaningus a paddleboard and several kayaks.Her continued support is invaluable.

The group, some of whom hadnever been on a boat, spent the day ona spoil island, learned to paddle, im-proved their swimming skills, andended the day with a hike and bar-beque picnic.

We were also treated to the sight ofthree manatees hanging out in the ma-

rina as we wrapped up ourday, Pipes added.

In addition, OneFlorida Foundation's fund-raising efforts will sendsome deserving highschool students from Mar-tin and St. Lucie countiesto Florida Atlantic Univer-sity's Pine Jog Center's residential re-search institute, H2O to Go, inconjunction with FAU John D.MacArthur Campus, FAU Harbor

Tents offering seFt. Pierce City M

Judges for the LiLinda Hudson, SGayle Harrell, an

One Florida'smonthly projects definetheir mission

FAU's Dr. Jim Mastersontakes measurements and scientific samples to provide the Florida Wildlife Commission with informationto assist with invasivespecies control.

13Martin County CurrentsJune 2015 One Florida Foundation

Amajor stumbling block to stop-ping Lake Okeechobee dis-charges is the sheer amount ofwater that needs to be displaced1.6million acre-feet of watera hugeamount without a home. It constitutesthree feet of depth in Lake Okeechobee.

During the height of the rainy sea-son, with discharges raging, all itsgates and spillways fully opened, thelevel of Lake Okeechobee can be re-duced by merely one inch a day; there-fore, when it rains in north-centralFlorida and the Lake already is dump-ing, no progress can be made to reduceLake levels.

Since that is the case, if the gates tothe St. Lucie and the Caloosahatcheerivers are closed to stop the discharges,how can we expect to move all that watersouth using only one gate, when havingall of them wide open could not do it?

Something else to consider: SouthFlorida Water Management District esti-mates the amount of water that can flowsouth to supply the Everglades rangesfrom 1,250 to 2,500 acre-feet per day, atotal of 430,000 acre-feet per yeara farcry from the 1.6 million acre-feet thatwas dumped to tide in 2013.

Why can't more water go south? It ispolluted to upwards of 400 parts per bil-lion phosphorus. Court mandates requirethat water must be no more than 10 parts

per billion phosphorus when it reachesthe Everglades and Tamiami Trail.

The STOZE and WATER INSTITUTE reportsOne Florida Foundation's STOZE reportaddresses these issues in a similar fash-ion as does the University of FloridaWater Institute/Negron Report. The fol-lowing are some of their similar points:

1. Address the faucet. As Nyla Pipes reports, the Central

Florida Water Initiative is beginning toaddress the issue of water drainage fromthe entire Kissimmee River Basin northof Lake Okeechobee. More than 50 per-cent of the water discharged in 2013came from this area. One Florida Foun-dation (and others) consider this to bethe faucet. If we can control thefaucet, we can control the discharges.

The current Kissimmee Basin RanchReserves Project is addressing the future

need for that area's surface water use inthe coming years as drinking water lev-els drop to a critical level. Their initialeffort will hold an additional 100,000acre-feet of water in the middle basin.

Although that's just 28 percent ofthe amount sent to Lake Okeechobeefrom the Kissimmee Basin, it is a start;however, considering that 860,000 acre-feet of water was sent to the Lake in2013, the upper and middle Kissimmee

Basin should plan to hold, use and/orstore closer to 500,000 acre-feet in fu-ture rain events.

2. Dredge Lake Okeechobee. When Lake Okeechobee reaches

more than 16 feet of depth, the threat ofa dike breach comes into play: over 16feet, the chances move to one percent;over 17.6 feet, the chances move to 25

Capt.Don Voss

One Florida Foundation

The solution is possible, if we do the math . . .

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Nyla Pipes and Capt. Don Voss present a One Florida Foundation check to fund student scholarships to FAU Pine Jog Summer Institute representatives Anne Henderson, Chris Hill,and Ray Coleman.

continued on PAGE 15

Branch Oceanographic Institute and theCES Riverwoods Field Laboratory.

Students will work with research sci-entists to develop an understanding forthe interconnectedness and complexity

of South Florida water systemsand the environmental issuesfacing them, conducting re-search on the Kissimmee River,Lake Okeechobee, and the In-dian River Lagoon.

We donated $2,600 duringthe Great Give, Pipes said,which allowed FAU Pine Jogto leverage our donation for alittle bit more money for schol-arships.

One Florida also was amajor sponsor and helped or-ganize the Treasure Coast Li-onfish Safari on May 16-17 torid near-shore reefs, inlets,and bridges of the invasive li-onfish. In spite of poor visibil-ity and windy conditions,dive teams removed 224 lion-fish from the waterways of In-dian River, St. Lucie, andMartin counties.

Scientists from HarborBranch Oceanographic, SeaGrant, The Smithsonian, andthe Fish and Wildlife Commis-sion took samples, measure-ments and shared theirknowledge with the public.The first-ever Lionfish ChefsChallenge also now is an im-portant part of the safari, de-signed to create a market

demand for this tasty fish.We are already planning for next

year, Pipes said, as this event hasproven both productive and popular. Staytuned for details as they develop!

eafood and vendors' wares lined the waterfront of the Martina in May or the Lionfish Safari.

ionfish Safari Chef's Challenge included Ft. Pierce MayorSt. Lucie County Commissioner Jim Oppenborn, State Rep.nd Ft. Pierce City Marina Manager Dean Kubitschek.

Pho

tos

by N

yla

Pip

es.

14 Martin County CurrentsJune 2015Water News

15Martin County CurrentsJune 2015 Water News

percent; and over 18 feet the chancesmove to 40 percent.

Understanding that 1.6 million acre-feet of water causes a three-foot rise inLake level, we could technically hold allthe excess stormwater drainage insidethe lake, as long as the starting level wasbelow 13 feet at the beginning of the sea-son, and, of course, as long as all thatwater was not dumped on us at onetime, such as from a major storm eventor hurricane.

Taking the lake depth lower than 13feet, however, interferes with the man-dates of navigation that require a channeldepth of seven feet, and with agriculturalmandates that sufficient water be main-tained in the Lake to meet irrigation needs.

As a result of those mandates, theLake generally is held at a 13-footlevel; however, if just the Lakes navi-gational channels were dredged bythree feet, the Lake's level could belowered to 12 to 12.6 feet at the begin-ning of the season, thus allowing sig-nificant, additional water storage andimproving the likelihood that Lakelevels would not exceed 16 feet duringthe rainy season. The gates to the St.Lucie and Caloosahatchee could stayclosed (except of course when theCaloosahatchee River needed the freshwater to combat its seasonal high-salinity levels).

3. Let's do the math. 1,600,000 acre feet of water was dis-

charged in 2013, so that's our targetnumber.

430,000 acre-feet can be sent southand cleaned, trickling out of the Lake at1,250 acre-feet per day

100,000 acre-feet of water can beretained by the Ranches Reserve Project.

400,000 acre-feet of water couldbe/should be stored or retained in theupper Kissimmee drainage basin.

Therefore, the amount remaining ofthe 1.6 million acre-feet of water thatwould need to be contained to preventdischarging to the estuaries is 630,000acre-feetall of which could be storedin Lake Okeechobee, except in the caseof major rain events. Instead of expect-ing no more water than we received in2013, we must plan for more.

4. Look at creative ways of storingwater.

Water retention and water farming

allow for large land areas to cleanwaterupwards of 250,000 acre-feet ofwater annuallyholding it back whenneeded for agriculture and for munici-pal water supplies. As other projectscome online, and if we can work to in-crease water storage at its origins, thestopping all the Lake Okeechobee dis-charges is closer than it appears.

Fix the faucet and stop the dis-charges.

Capt. Don Voss, nationally recognized forhis environmental initiatives to improve thewater quality of the Indian River Lagoon,will be a regular contributor to MartinCounty Currents. All advertising on thesepages will benefit One Florida Foundation,dedicated to addressing water issuesthroughout the state.

Capt. Don Vosscontinued from PAGE 13

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And that $22 million purchase, thatinvestment, was right here in Mar-tin County, said Kevin Powers,vice chair of the South Florida WaterManagement District's Governing Boardand a Martin County resident, referringto the purchase of the Harmony Ranchdevelopment. That's something that'snot gotten much media coverage, but itshould. It's significant.

The water management district firstpursued the purchase of HarmonyRanch land in 2008, but funds dried updue to the recession. Negotiations beganagain in 2011, and in December 2014, thegoverning board announced that it hadapproved the purchase of 1,780 acres ofland, jointly funded by Florida Foreverfunds and the remainder of MartinCounty's half-cent sales tax initiative topurchase conservation land.

The final purchase, however,amounted to nearly 2,000 acres as nego-tiations proceeded, according to officials.

That land will help improve waterstorage and water quality for the C-44canal and the South Fork of the St. LucieRiver, Powers added.

The property is in two parcels, plus a100-foot strip of land north and east ofthe FPL easement that gives a directconnection to the drainage outfall. The2,000 acres lies within the Palmar Com-plex of the C-44 drainage basin, part ofthe Comprehensive Everglades Restora-tion Plan (CERP) Indian River Lagoon-South Project.

The property represents the first ac-quisition for the Palmar project compo-nent of IRLSouth, with futurepurchases to total around 90,000 acres,much of which lies in Martin County.

Land purchase setsnew record by districtThe first day of June officially marked the largest single purchase of land by the South Florida WaterManagement District in the state, according toSouth Florida Water Management District officials.

After final negotiations, nearly 2,000 acres of Harmony Ranch were purchased for $22 millionby the South Florida Water Management District and Martin County. The land lies south ofBridge Road, with parcels on each side of Pratt-Whitney, as indicated by the dotted line. Courtesy of MilCor Group Engineering.

16 Martin County CurrentsJune 2015News Feature

Divergent opinions aired at Hobe Sound town hall

Perhaps Hobe Sound and PalmCity residents should not havebeen quite so surprised in Maywhen the Martin County commissionersnixed their Community RedevelopmentArea projects. After all, CommissionersFielding and Heard have had a long his-tory of objecting to them particularly,and to the concept of neighborhood re-vitalization in general.

It was Commissioner Anne Scott'svote in 2014 that saved Old Palm City'sCommunity Redevelopment Area proj-ect, after Heard said it sounded to her asif it would benefit only businesses,which is her long-standing criticism ofall the Community RedevelopmentAreas. There are seven in the unincorpo-rated areas, all older, historic neighbor-hoods including Hobe Sound, Old PalmCity, Indiantown, Rio, Golden Gate,Jensen Beach and Port Salerno.

Neither Hobe Sound's nor Old PalmCity's project survived this year's Capi-tal Improvement Plan workshop, whereall the capital projects must be ap-proved by commissioners prior to beingfunded. Sufficient funds are already in

trust from Tax Increment Financingfunds collected from within the CRAboundaries to build both CRA projects,but critics are beginning to complainloudly that the tax funds should go tothe general fund instead.

Tax Increment Financing, called TIFfunds, are a percentage of the increasein taxes as the result of an increase inproperty values within the CRAboundaries. By state law, those fundsare to be spent only within the CRAwhere they were collected. If unspentafter three years, they are transferredinto the general fund.

I'm very interested as to why any-one thinks the CRA is doing them anygood, said Scott within minutes of in-troducing herself to a Hobe Soundcrowd of more than 100 residents at atown hall meeting May 14, which setthe tone for her comments the rest ofthe evening.

We're going to be looking at thiswhole business of CRAs, she said. Is itdoing what we want it to do, and is it anappropriate way to address county in-frastructure needs.

Scott made it clear, she thinks theCRA projects are not relevant in light ofthe current county infrastructure back-log, particularly because All AboardFlorida may change the configuration ofthe intersection at Bridge Road andDixie Highway in Hobe Sound, and be-cause plans for the 17-acre Winn DixiePlaza are unclear.

Either of those could make any ofthe CRA improvements obsolete, sheadded, although resident HarryMacArthur reminded her that twotracks ran through Hobe Sound, plus aspur, until the late '70s. That intersec-tion is not going to be any different nowthan it was then, he said.

Expending taxpayer funds that be-long to the entire county, Scott said, washer primary concern, which should bedone in a productive and frugal and fis-cally responsible way.

Community members, including for-mer and current Neighborhood Advi-sory Committee members, remainedpolite, but also shot back.

I have two questions, said AngelaHoffman, current chair of Hobe Sound'svolunteer advisory committee. Whynow? We are all volunteers. We take timeaway from our families to work on this,to make our community a better place,and this is essentially the same projectthat we've been working on for years.

Scott reiterated the comments byFielding and Heard at the CIP work-shop: The funding for CRA projects ac-tually belongs in the general fund to beused in the highest and best way forall county residents, not just for projectsthat benefit only select areas.

Over the past 15 years, Scott said,the Hobe Sound CRA has received $6million, and where did it go?

Laying sewer lines in Hobe Soundand in Banner Lake, which was one ofthe most expensive projects, as well as ahost of smaller projects, such as gate-

way signs and bike racks, she was in-formed by NAC members. The projectthat has caused the most recent flak,however, is burying power lines under-ground along Bridge Road to create amore attractive streetscape and to beless vulnerable to weeks-long poweroutages after hurricanes.

Residents also want to reconfigure adangerous intersection for pedestriansat Bridge Road and Dixie Highway,where a service road to A1A shops is ac-cessed from the same intersection. Thecost is $1.2 million, $800,000 of whichwill go to FPL to bury the lines.

NAC member Gretchen Reich, whohas served nearly all the 15 years theHobe Sound CRA has existed, under-scored Hoffman's remarks that the proj-ect had remained the same, and that theonly changes have come as a result ofchanging county commissioners.

It amazes me that we've had thisexact plan for at least eight years now,she said, and we're just finding outnow that there's something wrong withit? Why have we been working so hardon this all these years?

Mike Ennis, former chair of the NACand a long-time Hobe Sound resident,walked to the front of the room to ad-dress the crowd.

We wanted to do basic infrastruc-ture first, said Ennis. These are the ba-sics, the very basics. Let's get thesedone, then we can do other stuff.

Ennis said that the NAC membersdecided to work on the premise that ifthe commercial areas are addressed first,that the economic benefits would spreadover time to the residential areas.

I watched that CIP meeting, hesaid, and I want you to know, we havetwo commissioners who support andwho understand the CRAs, and that'sDoug Smith and John Haddox. AnneScott did not disagree.

--Barbara Clowdus

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Martin County Commissioner Anne Scott faces Hobe Sound residents at a recent town hallmeeting, assuring them she "hopes" to spend TIF funds in Hobe Sound that were collectedfrom taxpayers within the Hobe Sound CRA boundary, although she opposes their CRA project.

The intersection at Bridge Road and Dixie Highway that Hobe Sound residents want reconfig-ured so residents are able to cross safely. It also will reduce the number of "fender-benders"that result of having a service road entrance at the same intersection.

Everyone believes he or shealready knows about theMapp Road project in OldPalm City