New Generation Challenges
Osprey Hunting: Photo by Adobe Stock
Although the Founders’ instincts were correct, even they could not have imagined the explosive population growth and rate of development in the county since 1970. In that year SLC’s population was 50,836. In what has become the largest city in SLC, Port St. Lucie, its population was 330 in 1970. In 2023, SLC’s population was 350,000, with Port St. Lucie’s numbers registering in over ½ million people (with projections of one million people by 2060): an exponential growth rate.
The CASLC celebrated its 50th Anniversary in 2022. The Founders’ torch has been passed to a new generation with challenges all its own. Primary among them is that new residents, numbering in the hundreds of thousands, have little or no knowledge of the incredible natural resources available here.
For example, we expect few people today know of the fish who emerges at night from the North Fork of the St. Lucie River and walks up the bank. Or, even that such a River exists. Or, that the Indian River Lagoon historically was considered the most biodiverse estuary in the United States, vital for its spawning and nursery habitats, and that fish circulate between the Lagoon and the Atlantic Ocean. Or, that a one-of-a-kind-in-the-world deep water Oculina Coral Reef ecosystem in the Atlantic Ocean off of Fort Pierce is linked to fish in the Indian River Lagoon. Or, that local advocates have been fighting to preserve and protect these unique natural resources for many decades.
Consequences of Rapid Population Growth and Development
Along with rapid population growth, of course, is rapid development: one is always associated with the other. New residents barely comprehend, if at all, the consequences of the loss of wetlands and other absorbing and filtering soils to the new buildings, homes, and pavements. Instead of water recharging our aquifers much of it must now be channeled to storm water systems bringing with it all manner of pollutants from our yards, streets, and agriculture. And, of course, stormwater is often sent to our River and Lagoon. Our native flora and fauna have been severely impacted through loss of and/or pollution of their habitats.
Threats to our state parks and other local natural preserves have also increased in that they can appear to be easy pickings for politicians wishing to give precious, and increasingly scarce, land and water resources to developers, agriculture, and other moneyed interests.
Climate Crisis
The newest, biggest, and overriding threat we now face is the climate crisis. It’s already affecting us: we’re experiencing change in weather patterns and precipitation causing floods and droughts, more intense hurricanes, rising temperature and acidification of our ocean, rising sea levels, and the effects of unrelenting heat, on our ecosystems and their flora and fauna, but also on us.
The historical context of our times is that never before has everyone on the planet been impacted at the same time by the same anthropogenic (human society) created ecological crisis: climate change. Each of our locales will be affected somewhat differently, (for example, Florida will experience stronger hurricanes and rising sea levels), but we’re in this global crisis together.
Our means of making a difference is to address the climate crisis locally. Indeed, in in 2019, CASLC initiated the first Treasure Coast workshop on Climate Resiliency Planning. Partnering with us was the SLC Environmental Resources Department. Specifically tailored to county and municipal elected officials and staff, we sought to motivate them to create action plans. CASLC has and will continue offering a broad range of educational events to heighten climate awareness and push for a sustainable future.
Our Common Mission
Wei Ji
(Wei meaning crisis, and Ji meaning opportunity.)
For those of us, whether native born Floridian or scientist studying Florida’s environment and species or just plain aficionado of natural Florida, there is no doubt our Florida ecosystems and species are in crisis. Many of us are in a state of solastalgia,** mourning the loss of the paradisical natural beauty and healthy functioning of our Florida ecosystems and their interconnected native flora and fauna. The easy subtropical lifestyle, with its simple joy and serenity amidst natural land-and-waterscapes, is also fast disappearing.
The Chinese pictogram of Wei Ji depicts a time of crisis which also contains heretofore unimagined opportunities for change. CASLC wishes to seize that opportunity, and to do so with the courage, conviction, and commitment of our Founders.
Our mission is even more relevant today, and much more urgent than it was in 1972. Not only are we called to protect ecosystems and their flora and fauna, but to restore altered and damaged ecosystems and their species habitats. We will search out and recommend innovations that are working elsewhere so as to speed up better adaptations, as evidence of successes we can promote here. We will look for examples of how to improve quality of life while bringing in nature’s benefits to our community.
We will promote eco-literacy, a sine qua non for the practice of true sustainability. We will invite eco-inspiration from sponsoring field trips in our parks and preserves, in which we gain a Sense of Place, to exploring the works of eco-art and literature. At any moment, even the smallest and humblest of creatures gift us with a sense of wonder and awe that Rachel Carson so eloquently describes. It is that moment that feeds our resolve to continue our advocacy, and to our continued pursuit in meeting the “Great Work” of our times.
The Alliance in our name is also more relevant today than in the 1970s. Our successes were often due to a consortium of organizations and individuals joining together for common cause. Thankfully, the number of environmental organizations has mushroomed since that time, thus the potency of these new consortiums can serve as force multipliers for urgent and productive change.
We’ve got work to do! Join us and let’s make a difference!
Imagine how our Founders would respond to the overwhelming eco-challenges we face, my bet is that each of them would echo Marjorie Stoneman Douglas’s Instruction to “Never ever give up.” Indeed, Founder Lace Vitunac left us with that specific instruction before her passing on Earth Day in 2018.
** Solastalgia: Coined in 2003 by G. Albrecht to describe the loss to human identity and wellbeing due to the “distress specifically caused by environmental change in one’s home environment.”