'Cadillac Swampland' or 'Florida Follies': Cynthia Barnett's 'Mirage'

A few weeks ago I exhorted you all (you all?) to read Cynthia Barnett's book Mirage: Florida and the Vanishing Water of the Eastern U.S. My recommendation was based upon the opinions of others I respected, but now I can back that up: I just finished it while on a long plane trip from Portland to the Republic of Georgia. It sure made the time go fast. Wish it had been a longer book! 

Mirage is a well-researched, well-written book. It definitely ranks up there with the late Marc Reisner's Cadillac Desert, which mesmerized me just about 20 years ago. I could not put Mirage down. Barnett mentions the personalities: Walt Disney, Jeb Bush, Geroge Bush, Henry Flagler, Reubin Askew, Richard Nixon, T. Boone Pickens, Hamilton Disston, et al. She does not emphasize them as much as Reisner did in Cadillac Desert. That is an observation, not a criticism.

She starts the book with a sinkhole story. After that, it's all uphill.

Barnett does destroy one myth: Juan Ponce de Leon was not looking for the Fountain of Youth. He was there to settle the land and enslave the natives (Oh, say it ain't so, Cynthia!). Or, as the good sisters taught me in Catholic grammar school, to spread Catholicism to the Godless natives so that they would obtain eternal salvation (See, Cynthia!). Seems that Juan was the first in a long line of Florida charlatans.  Wonder if he sold real estate when he returned home?

Let me start by digressing, a favorite pastime of mine. Despite being a WWW - "Western Water Wonk" - I am an a northeasterner by birth and upbringing and Florida has held a fascination for me for a number of years. When I was growing up in the New York City metropolitan area, I was subjected to the ubiquitous Jim What's-his-name "Come on down!" National Airlines (remember them?) commericals during the gray days of winter. Florida was always portrayed as "retirement nirvana"; it seemed like most of my friends' parents were sentenced to spend their final years in some "Del Boca Vista" subdivision (from Seinfeld) brimming with blue-haired old women (BHOWs) playing  mahjong and fat old men (FOMs) waddling around the fairways. Turns out that is where most of them wound up. [More Jerry Seinfeld: "My parents didn't want to move to Florida, but they turned 60, and that's the law."] I never wanted to "wind up in Florida" because half of New York lived there. There were also the occasional stories of so-and-so's parents getting ripped off and buying Florida swampland, so the term "Florida real estate" became a pejorative term.  Barnett's book substantiates such occurrences. "What? Florida real estate scams?"

One would've figured that Florida would be "immune" to water woes - at least those involving quantity. It is one of our wettest states. But the growth and agriculture have taken their tolls, and now water/environmental quality problems have reared their ugly heads as well.  Real estate developers and big agriculture  spent a lot of effort and money in Florida's early days trying to get rid of water; now, they (especially the former) want it back to fuel continued growth. So the book provides a warning: just because you live in a "wet" place, don't think water woes, even those pertaining to quantity, will bypass you.

Florida real estate development is a juggernaut and I have seen it first-hand. For the past few years I've spent a few March days with my sister and brother-in-law as they escape the worst days of the DC winters by renting a house in Vero Beach. The growth is mind-boggling. It just goes and goes, although the current real estate downturn has had an effect (I have a friend with three unsold spec homes). Even after the devastating 2004 hurricane season, housing prices kept increasing and the real estate boom continued unabated. As one Realtor told me, the most inquiries she had after that season were from northerners who wanted to know if the hurricane damages and insurance claims would delay their new home closings! 

One thing that struck me: Florida is like California in many ways, but  especially in the distribution of water and people/growth: most of the former is in the north and most of the people and growth are in the south. Florida also reminds me of the Southwest USA: it wants it all - growth, environmental quality, a strong economy, and, of course, water for everything. Its politicians also are carbon-copies of some Western politicians in that they talk out of both sides of their mouths vis-a-vis water. They acknowledge serious water quality and quantity problems and the need for environmental protection, yet are addicted to growth. Again, they want it all.

But as I am wont to tell my students: "Want to see who's to blame for our water problems? Look in the mirror."

In fact, I found many similarities between "Western water" and Florida. Too many. Scary. Oh yeah, did I mention "greed"?

Barnett also notes the effects of unbridled development on the climate. The citrus industry has migrated south from the Jacksonville area to escape the increasing number of freezing days, a problem exacerbated by the destruction of wetlands.

Barnett's focus is Florida, but not exclusively so. She cites water issues involving the Northeaast, Great Lakes area, Texas, etc. She also makes an excellent point: Eastern water law, especially regarding water sharing and compacts, is developing. Unlike Western water law, mired in the prison of prior appropriation and fashioned long before water quality and environmental quality concerns, the East has a chance to "get it right". Dream on.

She also has a chapter on bottled water. What more can I say?

Hey, maybe we should allow the Bureau of Reclamation to operate in Florida.

I'm trying to get the NGWA to invite Barnett to be the keynoter at the Ground Water Summit next spring, and I want to have her speak at Oregon State University. We could learn a lot from her.

As I said before: "Read this book. Now!" It's an excellent cautionary tale.

I don't think Marc Reisner would mind my calling it "Cadillac Swampland".

"It has been said that 'water litigation is a weed that flowers in the arid West.' Well, the seeds have blown east." -- J.B. Ruhl, Florida State University, quoted in Mirage (p. 119).

Comments

[N4n8]

thank you sir

العاب بنات جديدة

[ronald]

thank you sir

[TJ]

When I read this book, I kept thinking *Could this happen in Oregon, another wet state?* The parallels are nearly exact - long term landuse laws challenged by property rights activists and developers with little thought of the connection to water, and when you think of the restoration of the Everglades, replace this with salmon - billions have been spent on both. MIRAGE may be the *tarot card* foretelling the future of land and water use in Oregon.