News of the Weird

East Winterberry Bridge
The city is waiting for the Coast Guard to approve the permit to fix the bridge – a new process despite other bridges having been fixed without it. The citizens of Marco Island have spoken: except for the four greedy people that straddle the bridge and the two Titanic-sized boat owners, no one wants the bridge raised. Place your bets: the bridge will be raised.

The Effects of Selling out to Corporate America
Some time ago the city gave away the ownership to the beach/access at the Marriott with the condition that the city will retain right of access/use. Efforts by a hearing-impaired young lady to petition the city for use at this locale have been stymied because … the city needs to get permission from Mass Mutual (the owners of the Marriott properties). And since Mass Mutual doesn’t respond …

At some time someone is going to look east, and unearth the recent history where the people of Miami Beach finally got fed up with the sellout of their beaches and sued to get them back. They won. Today no commercial entity owns any beach and access is ensured by law. We can only hold our breath here for such a novel approach to arrest the sellout and get back what belongs to all of us.

Sewers Are Better
Since nearly everyone on Marco relies exclusively on CNN and the daily rag for what is passed as news, quoting scientific studies and presenting the obvious is futile. But here is a source that the over-90 generation may appreciate. Yesterday, June 20, Paul Harvey reported that the most polluted area, causing the most serious diseases, in the United States is … the California coastline from Ventura County (approx. 1 hour north of Los Angeles) to the Mexican border. Why? Because the SEWAGE TREATMENT PLANTS ARE PUMPING SEWAGE INTO THE OCEAN.

Yes, a conspiracy by CARES no doubt. But for what its worth, a la John the Baptist screaming into the wilderness, this author lived in the death zone for years. Illness was a common way of life for nearly everyone. Worse, we were told by our elected officials that use of septic tanks was out of the question because they (the septic tanks that is) would harm the environment. And that only the government knows how to deal with the sewage and that there are laws and regulations and oversight and planning committees to ensure that the plants will not harm the environment.

Guess what. The plants are DESTROYING the environment and the people that live there.

Ok, now try this. If a governmental agency (the sewage treatment plant) fails, then it’s up to the government (the city, the county, the state and the feds) to act. Government vs. Government – yep, that is really effective. Which is the experience in California. The most environmentally regulated state in the country is the most polluted as the government organs digest the issue amongst them with no eye or concern to its citizens.

Same won’t happen here in Florida?

The government has no vested interest to act properly. Those that are forcing an unpopular decision are not going to be here when the effects of their decisions begin to impact our lives and the lives or our children (a la California). Don’t believe it?

Any of you believers in the government is the solution to everything ever heard of Florida Bay? That it’s dead? That it’s dead because of governmentally-regulated pumping of farming pollutants into Lake Okeechobee by the agribusiness industrial complex? And how long have there been studies upon studies studying the problem and attempting to derive a solution? Read: Florida Bay is dead – does that mean anything?

Be guarded, very guarded as to what our government can and is willing to do for us. At least on the sewer issue, California is a model of what we may face, and Lake Okeechobee/Florida Bay is what we already face.