News: Tarrance Group: Voters aren’t keen on Scott’s Everglades, growth management plans

Orlando Sentinel
3/1/11

TALLAHASSEE - A majority of Floridians don't want the state to abandon the Everglades and state-regulation of growth, according to a new poll commissioned by an environmental group opposed to budget cuts proposed by Gov. Rick Scott.

Two-thirds of voters (65 percent) said that restoring the Everglades was an important issue to them personally, and 55 percent were opposed to Scott's budget proposal to cut Everglades restoration funding from $50 million to $17 million next year.

Opposition to the cuts was strongest in Miami, West Palm Beach, Orlando and Tampa, where majorities of voters had a negative reaction to the idea, the survey found.

Majorities of both men and women disagreed with the governor's Everglades cut.

"There's no question if you abandon the main [Everglades restoration] project .... the project's going to come to a halt, folks will be laid off, and our water supply will be compromised," said Kirk Fordham, CEO of the Everglades Foundation ,a non-profit group created in the 1990s that supports the massive environmental endeavor.

Since Everglades state funding hit a peak of $200 million under Gov. Jeb Bush in 2005, it has gradually been choked down to the present $50 million level, which advocates say is barely enough to keep the massive, re-plumbing of Florida's famed River of Grass moving forward.

"We believe everybody needs to share the pain, but Everglades restoration has already taken a disproportionate hit," Fordham said.

Scott also proposed zero funding for Florida Forever, a conservation program that buys land to turn into parks and wildlife refuges. The program already has been battered by the housing bust, which reduced its funding source from real-estate taxes and bonds.

Scott has also directed water management districts to reduce their budgets by 25 percent to help fulfill his campaign promise to rein in property taxes. That will squeeze the South Florida Water Management District, which oversees most of the state's Everglades restoration work. More on that here.

The survey also found that a majority of voters weren't keen on Scott's plan to dismantle Florida's 25-year-old growth-management system and return most of those decisions on when and where to allow big development projects back to local governments.

The survey asked voters if they agreed with a statement that Florida needed to manage growth to avoid placing more burden on taxpayers for roads, schools and other infrastructure, and 61 percent supported the statement. When asked if the state needed to manage growth to reduce traffic congestion, 65 percent agreed. And when asked if the state should manage growth to protect rivers, lakes and other waters, 81 percent agreed with the poll.

The governor has proposed folding the state Department of Community Affairs, which polices large-scale development statewide, into another agency and slashing spending from $779 million this year to $110 million.

Asked of government should stop regulating growth because it was costing the state jobs, only 42 percent of the survey respondents agreed and 48 percent disagreed. The rest were unsure.

"These numbers indicate that the public understands there is a need for a check on growth," Fordham said.

"They understand that quite often county commissioners who are too often beholden to campaign contributors don't always make decisions that are in the best interests of the water supply or their own development interests in their back yard."

The poll was conducted by the Tarrance Group, a Virginia polling firm that has worked for Florida Republicans for years. It surveyed 607 likely voters Feb. 13-14, and the poll has a margin for error of +/- 4.1 percent.