Resilient Coastlines Program News Today

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — The Nature Conservancy’s Joseph Schmidt envisions a future for the Lake Worth Lagoon. In it, American oystercatchers forage the shoreline, mangroves and oysters filter pollution, and kayaks glide from restored island to restored island. In turn, those islands help protect human development.

The construction of an island in the Lake Worth Lagoon is Palm Beach County's latest coastal resilience project. The island will feature a nesting site for American oystercatchers and other shorebirds, as well as oyster beds and mangroves to naturally filter the lagoon and create more intertidal habitat within the estuary. It's the latest attempt to prevent damage to coastlines due to storm surge.

UpdatedSat, Apr 10, 2021 at 12:11 am ET Reply This effort is funded through a $75,000 grant provided by the Florida Department of Environmental Protection. (Pinellas County ) PINELLAS COUNTY, FL — Pinellas County has identified potential policies to address the reduction of current and future flood risks in its coastal areas. Drafted as a part of the Resilience Planning Grant (RPG) project and with the help of different stakeholders, the identified draft policies address the Peril of Flood s...

His Resilient Florida initiative addresses the impacts of the climate crisis but not the causes Photo by Steve Cannon/AP When Ron DeSantis was running for governor in 2018, he found himself in a quandary. On the one hand, the effects of climate change in Florida—increased flooding in coastal communities, more-active hurricane seasons, and the loss of wildlife habitat—had become impossible to ignore. In the nation’s third-most-populous state, a 2018 poll found that 66 percent of voters con...

Blaise Gainey / WFSU Originally published on January 28, 2021 1:15 pm Governor Ron DeSantis is recommending a budget of $96.6 billion for the next fiscal year, an increase of $4 billion from last years budget. DeSantis’ plan comes as the state is expecting a deficit of more than $2.7 billion. The Governor says a large amount of his spending plan is earmarked for COVID-19 related costs and propped up by federal money. "$2.6 billion increase related to COVID expenditures. A lion share of...

/ Environmental advocates celebrated the creation of a chief resilience officer. Now they have doubts. For almost seven months, Florida had a dedicated leader on climate change. Then she left for another job. The state has now gone longer than that without a full-time replacement. Environmental advocates celebrated Gov. Ron DeSantis’s hiring of Julia Nesheiwat for the newly created position of chief resilience officer in summer 2019. They saw the move as a declaration his office would accept,...

Former State Resilience Officer Julia Nesheiwat speaks at an American Water Resources Association meeting in Ponte Vedra Beach in November 2019. BRENDAN RIVERS/ADAPT For almost seven months, Florida had a dedicated leader on climate change. Then she left for another job. The state has now gone longer than that without a full-time replacement. Environmental advocates celebrated Gov. Ron DeSantis’s hiring of Julia Nesheiwat for the newly created position of chief resilience officer in summer 20...

full-time position running the state’s response to sea level rise. Nesheiwat stepped down in February to take a homeland security job in the Trump administration. For most of 2020 at least some of her responsibilities were supposed to be shifted to Noah Valenstein, the secretary of the Department of Environmental Protection. From left: Florida Chief Science Officer Thomas Frazer, then-Chief Resilience Officer Julia Nesheiwat and Department of Environmental Protection Secretary Noah Valenst...