Speak up!

Quote…

“Give me liberty to know, to utter and to argue freely according to my conscience, above all other liberties.” Milton

This coming  Monday, December 8th, 2014, at the City of Stuart commission chamber, located at 121 SW Flagler Avenue, from 9-12,  it is our turn to speak up to our Legislative Delegation about the importance of  the St Lucie RiverIndian River Lagoon.

This is our designated time before the state legislative session formally begins to call attention to our legislators  the importance of the SLR/IRL to our local economy and quality of life in Martin County. It is our time to tell them we appreciate what was done last year but we want more. We want to purchase lands in the EAA, Everglades Agricultural Area through the help of Amendment 1 order for more water to flow south and to restore what we can of the northern and…

Looking at the clouds over the St Lucie River, Roosevelt Bridge, Stuart, Florida. (Photo Jacqui Thurlow-Lipppisch 11-14)

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that…” Martin Luther King, Jr.

The  situation for the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon remains a bleak one, but I am telling you, “I can see the light!”

At last week’s Water Resource Advisory Commission, (WRAC), of the South Florida Water Management District, (SFWMD), Dr Gary Goforth, (http://garygoforth.net) the great scientist watchdog of the District and former employee who designed and “built” the Storm Water Treatment Areas, (STAs) for the SFWMD, stood before the commission and gave thanks to the District and to the Army Corps of Engineers for “sending more water south” through the STAs to the Everglades  in 2014, than since 1995.

273,188 acre feet in fact! 

Although 273,188 acre feet of Lake Okeechobee water will not save the St Lucie, sending this…

Railroad Bridge, Stuart Florida. (Photo JTL, 2014.)

Classic photo of original wooden trestle bridge over the St Lucie River and train, courtesy of the Historical Society and Sandra H. Thurlow.)

Train going over new steel railroad bridge in 1905 before it was double tracked. (Archives of Sandra Henderson Thurlow, Stuart on the St Lucie.)

Did you know that Henry Flagler’s East Coast Railroad was originally named “Jacksonville, St Augustine and Indian River Railroad? ” I didn’t until I reread my mother’s “Stuart on the St Lucie” book. The name was changed on September 9, 1895 to the infamous and famous East Coast Railroad. The train did and does, massively affect our Indian River Lagoon Region.

Yesterday, All Aboard Florida had a poster presentation at the Kane Center where the public was allowed to view and then put hand written comments in boxes. The Stuart News said 800 people showed up…

Plume from canal runoff C-44, C-23 and C-24, October 17, 2014. (All photos Jacqui Thurlow-Lippisch and Ed Lippisch.)

Today, I will take you on an air tour, hopefully one of the last of this year’s rainy season. In Florida, rainy season corresponds with hurricane season that lasts June through November. Nonetheless, typically the rains start to wind down towards the end of October.

The Army Corp of Engineers has not released from Lake Okeechobee this years so it has given us an opportunity to see what the runoff  in our area is “in and of itself.” I refuse to use the words “local runoff” because the St Lucie River and Indian River Lagoon’s runoff is over 50%  of what is was before the Water/Flood Control Districts and the ACOE created since the 1920s in order to drain the land for development and mostly agriculture.

It is the runoff of these…

This is a photo of a sewer pipe going straight into the Indian River Lagoon. (Royal Poinciana Cottages, Jensen, ca. 1950 photo courtesy of Sandra Henderson Thurlow.)

Changing oil over the IRL, Pitchford Filling Station, Jensen 1920/30s. (Photo courtesy of Thurlow archives.)

As bad as things are today for the St Lucie/Indian River Lagoon, in the past we did things that today would be inconceivable, like having sewer lines drain directly into the river, or draining oil into the lagoon from a car…. For centuries people have put waste into the water so it could just “flush away.” Things  like this were done when very few people lived along the river and the waterways  could actually handle this misuse. Today with over a million people living along the 156 mile lagoon such ignorance  is not an option; we know better now. It is interesting to wonder what photos from today…

Charlie Crist visits the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon October 3, 2014. (Photo by Jacqui Thurlow-Lippisch.)

As you probably saw in the paper, Charlie Crist, Democratic gubernatorial candidate for Florida, visited Stuart on Wednesday, October 3, 2014. Very exciting! I have been waiting for the governor’s race to crank up and for the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon to be in the spotlight as it should be.

In my dream of dreams Governor Scott and Charlie Crist would come to Stuart debate. For now, I will be satisfied that this year both have visited and spoken and are aware of health issues facing the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon.

I had seen Charlie Crist speak before at the Florida League of Cites, in Hollywood, but it was fun to see “the man, the myth,” our former governor, up close, face to face, along with his beautiful wife Carol.

I shall…

Flying west towards Clewiston and the proposed Sugar Hill development, along the southern rim of Lake Okeechobee, looking north, one sees wet lands inside of the lake, the rim canal, a water structure, a southerly canal, agriculture lands, and highways…(All photos, Jacqui Thurlow-Lippisch.)

An open field exposes the land’s black gold. Pahokee area heading to Clewiston.

On Sunday, a beautiful day, Dr Shaun Engebretsen flew my husband and I, in his Piper Lance, to get a “higher view” of the  proposed Sugar Hill Sector Plan around the area of Clewiston in Hendry County and to get a shot of its heart, Airglades Airport.

I decided to continue this planned trip even though on Friday, October 3rd, the South Florida Water Management District (SFWMD) sent a letter to the state land planning agency “recommending against approving the proposed Sugar Hill Sector Plan, DEO #14-3SP, as it does not provide sufficient…

“Farmer Fred,” Mr Fred Burkey, stands in front of the outlet of the new rain garden just installed by Martin County at the Hoke Library in Jensen. (All photos by Jacqui Thurlow-Lippisch 9-27-14.)

Recently, I kept hearing about “rain gardens,” and how they could be used in the Town of Sewall’s Point to help the Indian River Lagoon. I kept nodding my head, but I really had no idea what they were.  A “garden for rain” obviously, but nonetheless, no image would  crystallize in my mind.

After a field trip with UF IFAS extension office representative, (http://martin.ifas.ufl.edu), Mr Fred Burkey, I now know, so today, I am going to share with you about a very cool, beautiful, and useful thing Martin County and others are promoting to help our ailing St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon and waterways across our nation.

The idea of a rain garden to hold water and…

The movement to derail All Aboard Florida is gaining momentum. (Photo of Peter Schmidt, owner, United Yacht Sales. Peter and his wife Anne attended the Florida NOT all Aboard Flotilla. (Photo, Jacqui Thurlow-Lippisch.)

Yesterday morning, over 100 boats gathered at the Roosevelt Bridge in Stuart, forming a flotilla in opposition to “All Aboard Florida’s” high speed train which would close the bridges over the St Lucie River for unacceptable periods of time. A large red sign on Angie and Jeff Swenson’s boat read NO TRAINS.

(Above photo by Ed Lippisch and Scott Kuhns)

Just in case you are not familiar with the project,  I thought today I would describe the basics of how All Aboard Florida’s father company, Fortress Investment Group, is structured, as the best ways to garner change, is to understand “how it works.”

We here in Martin County have certainly learned this with our St Lucie River/Indian River…