THE CONSERVATION ALLIANCE OF ST. LUCIE COUNTY, INC.
MARINE RESOURCES COUNCIL OF EAST FLORIDA, INC.
THE AUDUBON SOCIETY OF ST. LUCIE COUNTY
THE ST. LUCIE WATERFRONT COUNCIL, INC.
THE FORT PIERCE SPORTFISHING CLUB
__________________

P.O. Box 12515, Fort Pierce, Florida 34979

OPEN LETTER TO GOVERNOR JEB BUSH

The Honorable Jeb Bush, Governor                                                             February 15, 1999
State of Florida
Executive Office of the Governor
The Capital
Tallahassee, FL 32399-0001                                             RE: FORT PIERCE HARBOR

Congratulations on your election and inauguration as our Governor. We wish you well in your leadership of Florida into the next century as a state of which all of us can be proud.

NATIONAL AND LOCAL TREASURE

In your recent helicopter visit to Port St. Lucie, you had a dramatic view of our area's most prominent feature in which we take great pride, the Indian River Lagoon, which:

• ". . .contains a richer assortment of aquatic plants and animals than any other estuary in the continental United States. . .a national treasure at your doorstep." (Address to St. Lucie County Board of County Commissioners by Dr. Grant Gilmore, October 16, 1996
  
  

• Millions of taxpayer dollars, a different kind of treasure, have gone toward the restoration of this unique body of water through the National Estuary Program, the Florida SWIM fund, the Everglades Restudy and other environmental programs. Many more dollars are scheduled to be spent.  In Ft. Pierce alone, this environmental investment will help protect and increase the more than $510 Million recreation- and tourism-based annual taxable sales (Visit Florida, Florida Tourism 1996) which depend entirely on a healthy lagoon and high quality of marine life that cannot be replaced.

MOST SENSITIVE INLET

• "Within the lagoon, the greatest biological diversity is in the vicinity of the Fort Pierce inlet. . .The lagoon area that is influenced by tides from Ft. Pierce inlet extends roughly north to Vero Beach and south to Jensen Beach." (Florida Game and Fresh Water Fish Commission, 1994)
  
  

• "While we acknowledge the need for widening the channel for safety purposes, we are concerned about any encouragement this project might give to the port expansion proposal. . .We have serious concerns with that proposal and its anticipated impacts on the Indian River lagoon system and do not want our approval of the widening in any way to indicate support for the expansion." (Virginia B. Wetherell, Secretary, Florida Department of Environmental Protection, 1994)
  
  

• It is estimated that the port expansion plan will result in the loss of adjacent seagrass beds, the loss of which in turn will cause the disappearance of approximately 400,000 marine animals such as snook, grouper, snapper, spiny lobster and others that depend on the grass beds for critical habitat. (Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institution 1991 and St. Johns River Water Management District 1996)
  
  

• ". . .it would be difficult to find a more sensitive location for expansion of port facilities. Ports have a history of fouling the environment with occurrences such as fuel and cargo spills, bilge discharges, turbidity increases, groundings and other shipping accidents, wake damages to seagrass and other productive shallow water communities."". . .We strongly believe that the Indian River Lagoon is not an appropriate place for a major port and we continue to recommend against the implementation of Fort Pierce harbor expansion." (Florida Game and Fresh Water Fish Commission, 1991 and 1994)

VOODOO ECONOMICS

• This expressive phrase, coined by your father, accurately describes the absence of a responsible economic rationale or business plan for an expanded cargo port. No disinterested, thoroughgoing financial and business analysis, such as would be required to propose and finance a similar project in the private sector, has ever been publicly disclosed.
  
  

• Costs and benefits must be measured by comparing the full transaction costs, including all "external" ones such as pollution damage to the Indian River Lagoon and decline in property values.
  
  

• "The many polluting activities frequently associated with ports are very hard to control. . .Due to the potentially severe consequences. ..We do not believe the economic analysis in the Master Plan is adequate.  . .We do not recommend state endorsement. . .The economic benefits . . .are very doubtful and do not outweigh the direct, indirect, and cumulative environmental costs." (Victoria J. Tschinkel, Secretary, Florida Department of Environmental Regulation, 1986)
  
  

• A lead article in the Wall Street Journal of February 19, 1997("Seaports' Expansion Plans Could Create Overcapacity," F1) highlighted over-optimistic projections for an expanded port in Ft. Pierce, observed that the cargo volume in our tiny port amounted to less than 5% of those of its closest neighbors, Canaveral and Palm Beach, and also identified FSTED's $222 Million tax-favored bond issue as the principal driving force behind such inflated plans.
  
  

TAXPAYER FLIM FLAM

• In the July, 1997 edition of the Fort Pierce monthly, Prime Times, the late Larry Stephenson, its Editor and Publisher, exposed the "voodoo" aspect of the FSTED port funding in stark contrast to what taxpayers were being told: 
  
  "$8 million port money not a state grant, but a loan - Under Loan Agreement, county has legal and binding obligation"
  
  

• Not only are these funds not "free", as publicly advertised in a misleading way prior to public hearings (TEFRA hearings, October 1996), the funds cannot lawfully, under federal tax restrictions, be used in connection with "mixed" industrial and recreational land uses. In the March 1996 referendum, 96% of the participants voted for recreation- and tourism-based port development.
  
  

• In short, St. Lucie County taxpayers are being asked not only to degrade the health of their most valuable community asset, the Indian River Lagoon, but also to write a blank check in support of that folly.

We are unalterably opposed to any cargo port expansion at the Ft. Pierce Harbor and will continue our campaign to have the port property developed in a responsible and environmentally sustainable manner consistent with the millions already invested in the revitalization of our downtown and waterfront areas. The cost we are unwilling to consider for any benefit was best stated by Dr. Grant Gilmore to the County Commissioners in 1996:

"How much does it cost to tell my grandson that there are no more fish to catch, but we can go watch a freighter unload at the Fort Pierce dock with shimmering oil streaking from its bilge floating across a black dead lagoon?"

        Grace Stock, President                                                      Judy Gersony, President
Conservation Alliance of St. Lucie County                                   Audubon Society of St. Lucie County

    Delores Johnson, President                                                            Jim Egan, Executive Director
    St. Lucie Waterfront Council                                                             Marine Resources Council

David T. Tillman, Conservation Director
The Fort Pierce Sportfishing Club