Everglades Legislative Caucus--public comments

Your may have read about the formation of an Everglades Legislative Caucus last week.  The group met for some fact finding at the Refuge, followed by a press conference nearby...

They were kind enough to allow the Marshall Foundation to say a few words.  Along with our public comments, I also delivered the following written statement...
 

Public Comment to Everglades Legislative Caucus, November 28, 2011

Bedner’s near the Entrance to the Arthur R. Marshall Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge

On behalf of the Arthur R. Marshall Foundation, thanks for the time to say a few words in support of Everglades Restoration at the upstart of the Everglades Legislative Caucus.   We very much appreciate Representative Steve Perman for spearheading the genesis of the Caucus.

We see a significant increase in potential of achieving my Late Uncle’s Everglades repair objectives, as outlined in the Marshall Plan, issued as a Friends of the Everglades Newsletter, published by Marjory Stoneman Douglas, in 1981. To repair the Everglades, Uncle Art saw as Job 1, the Restoration of the Kissimmee Basin, i.e., the Everglades Headwaters.

Our organization is very glad to add our support to the proposed Everglades Headwaters National Wildlife Refuge.  As this project goes forward, it will make a huge difference by preserving vast acres of wetlands to provide water storage and treatment with positive economic impacts.

In executing another key part of the Marshall Plan, the full restoration of sheet flow, we are glad to share that our organization is also highly pleased that a Central Everglades Project and a streamlined federal-state implementation is being added to the  Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan or CERP(+) to do what Uncle Art Outlined in 1981;  kudo’s for an equally robust approach to involve all stakeholders, including small grass-roots organizations like ours.

These two projects are essential elements of the greater Everglades Ecosystem restoration.  There is some back-channel conversation that there may not be enough money to do both of them, suggesting we should pick one or the other.  This would be an incredible mistake.  We cannot do without either of them to fully restore the greater Everglades ecosystem.  We ask the Everglades Legislative Caucus to support both to ensure a fully successful Everglades restoration outcome.

In previous comment, the ArtMarshall.org has provided Ecosystem Services Valuation (ESV) analysis based on peer-reviewed literature, to show that a restored River of Grass, the apparent objective of the Central Everglades Project, would provide a 10 to 1 return on investment (ROI). 

We view our ESV demonstration as a challenge to the Federal agencies to act on recommendations in the White House Report:  Sustaining Natural Capital – Protecting Society and the Economy, for use in ROI Decision-Support in projects like the proposed EH NWR.

Of these two initiatives discussed, nothing could have pleased Uncle Art more.  As Senator Bob Graham noted on these grounds in 2006, Art Marshall was the quintessential example that one man could make a difference. 

We look forward to working with the Everglades Legislative Caucus, CERP implementers, the National Wildlife Refuge Association, and other NGO’s, to see to fruition, the legacy of an extraordinary plan and the man who wrote it. Also that a small grass roots organization can make a big difference.   Thanks for the opportunity to make these comments.

For the Art Marshall approach, Semper Fi,

John Arthur Marshall, Chairman of the board.