Horseshoe Reef moved to Kennedy compound

Press Release
Contact:
The Sierra Club, Loxahatchee Group
Drew Martin, Conservation Chair
DMandCH@aol.com
561-533-6814

FLORIDA FISH & WILDLIFE CONSERVATION COMMISSION &
FISH & WILDLIFE SERVICE SHOULD STOP PALM BEACH PROJECT

Immediate discussion of reef cleaning and additional mitigation
with stakeholders is necessary.
Palm Beach, FL - April 12, 2006- While nearshore reefs were
outright buried
along Phipps Ocean Park, at least one Palm Beach County coral
reef,
Horseshoe Reef was damaged—perhaps irreparably— by the recent
massive beach
dredge-and-fill projects in Palm Beach. And, nearshore and
offshore reefs, as well as
the organisms associated with beach ecology, remain in
jeopardy, because of
the assiduous inattention by the Florida Department of
Environmental
Protection (FDEP) and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (Corps)
to the projects and
their impacts. Hundreds of millions in direct expenditures and
6,000 jobs
depend upon healthy reefs in Palm Beach County.
Both agencies issued the Town of Palm Beach a joint permit that
allowed
contractors to dredge within just 200 feet of the coral reefs.
Turbidity plumes
extended as far as 11 miles from the project site, and
independent turbidity
monitoring showed flagrant, massive and persistent violations of
the permit’s
turbidity limits. Furthermore, independent analyses of the
sediments for
beach/dune fill projects along Reaches 7 and 8 (Sloan’s Curve to
past Lake Worth
Pier) prove that the material is not even close to being
compatible with
native beach sand. The Sierra Club Loxahatchee Chapter, serving
Sierra Club
members in southeast Florida's Palm Beach, Martin, St. Lucie
and Okeechobee
counties, contends that both agencies issued a permit that
violates the sediment
compatibility rules outlined by Florida Statute 161.
Besides impacts to reefs, turtle nesting, beach infauna and
shorebirds, the
probably illegal permit and lack of enforcement places citizens
at an even
greater risk from storm surge, because of the false sense of
security the fine
sediment gives beachfront homeowners. The independent analyses
confirm that
the material will not provide beachfront properties with much in
the way of
protection from wind, waves and storm surge. Surely the Town’s
consultant
Coastal Planning & Engineering knows this—they do employ
registered
geologists--so we wonder why the Town has not been forthright
with beachfront interests
about their abiding vulnerability. Further, reefs stabilize
Florida’s
shorelines and these healthy reefs have existed for centuries.
Healthy beaches cannot
be maintained without healthy reefs.
Endangered Species at Risk
These reefs and beaches are vital to thousands of marine
species, including
endangered sea turtles. These sea turtles are granted federal
protection
during nesting season; however, the FDEP is allowing a
30-day-work-period
extension on Reach 8, so construction will occur deep into
turtle nesting season.
The dredging permit already authorized the killing of sea
turtles by “
incidental take.” Both the project design and the way the
dredge pipes were laid out
on Reach 7 created turtle death traps, and may lead to a loss
of one of Palm
Beach County’s most significant nesting areas. Now, FDEP is
clearly willing
to further jeopardize endangered species, for a project that
can’t possibly
provide much in the way of storm-surge protection.
In short, there is a cascading wave of disaster underway, one
that only
began with the destruction of reef and beach resources. Come
hurricane season,
the citizens of Palm Beach County may also become the victims
of the state’s
broken coastal management program. We contend that this disaster
is a result of
political pressure and the close relationships between state and
local
agencies and the coastal engineering, dredging and construction
industries.
If the Town of Palm Beach had done the project right with good
sand, then
the beachfront properties could have had some additional
protection without
losing public trust and resources, including our reefs.
We call for the protection of all existing Turtle Nest Sites.
It is our
understanding that a number of nests have already been located
in this project
area.
Everyone owns the beach and the reefs. The public lost precious
resources at
Phipps Park, and we are also paying to mislead property owners
and destroy
priceless resources with our tax dollars. We expect and demand
better. We
expect the reefs to be cleaned by the contractor and additional
mitigation
performed since the beach berm was overfilled in violation of
its scope of work. We’
re calling on FDEP and the Corps to convene a public meeting
between
stakeholders and agency officials immediately.