Thank you to our crest sponsor- Biscayne Bank!

Port of Miami was dredged starting in 2013 to create a deeper and wider port for updated shipping vessels. The sediment associated with this dredging impacted the health of nearly 250 acres of the Florida Reef Tract. Soon thereafter, the United States Army Corps of Engineers began plans to dredge at Port Everglades - located just 30 miles up the coast – with the hopes of continuing to make larger ports for these larger ships. The problem? The Florida Reef Tract also extends just offshore from Port Everglades, and without incorporating lessons learned from the dredging in PortMiami, the corals in this area stand to be impacted as well. One of these major lessons was that inadequate baseline data was taken BEFORE the dredging of PortMiami. In order to better account for benthic resources in Port Everglades, Miami Waterkeeper planned a “BioBlitz” event, to include the general public in our surveys of coral health near the new planned dredging site.

FPL’s Turkey Point nuclear plant is contaminating Biscayne National Park, the Biscayne Aquifer (our primary source of drinking water) and filling nearby wetlands with salt. Despite the myriad of environmental and safety problems with the plant, and while currently engaged in corrective action that may or may not work, Florida Power and Light (FPL) is now asking the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission to relicense these units. A license from the NRC would make Units 3 & 4 the oldest operating nuclear reactors in the United States and would allow them to operate until 2052 – giving them an unprecedented 80-year operating life! These reactors are already the hottest operating reactors in the U.S. and are the only reactors worldwide that use a cooling canal system rather than cooling towers.

Miami Waterkeeper Staff Attorney, Kelly Cox, delivers comments before the Nuclear Regulatory Commission

Join Miami Waterkeeper in welcoming Melva Rosa Gil Vera as she joins us for four months to teach us about her work and learn from ours through the Community Solutions Program!

The Community Solutions Program (CSP), sponsored by the Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs (ECA) and implemented by IREX, is a professional development program for the best and brightest global community leaders working in Environmental Issues, Tolerance and Conflict Resolution, Transparency and Accountability, and Women and Gender Issues. Melva is among 100 individuals from around the world selected to participate in the program this year, and we are so excited to have her expertise on our team.

Lawsuit over Dredging Achieves Restoration of 10,000 threatened corals 

Celebrate our legal victory with us!

The state of Florida made a recent grab for federal Clean Water Act authority through a pair of bills, one in the Senate and one in the House. These two bills seek to transfer authority over section 404 of the Clean Water Act from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers over to the State of Florida. This part of the law requires permits for any discharge of dredge and fill materials into “Waters of the United States” (wetlands, streams, rivers, canals, you get the idea).  The rationale? The state has more expertise and capacity to oversee the Section 404 permitting program which governs which dredge and fill materials may be discharged into “Waters of the United States.” Such waters include wetlands - essential ecosystems for coastal protection, water quality, and habitat. We, here at Miami Waterkeeper, think this would be a very bad idea.

Environmentally-Friendly Gardening Tips

Do you use fertilizer on your lawn or landscape? Do you know if you’ve been applying fertilizer correctly? When over-applied or applied incorrectly, fertilizer can be very harmful for the environment. Over-fertilizing plants in a lawn or landscape can lead to pest problems, excessive growth, and the pollution of waterways and groundwater.

Have you noticed abandoned or derelict vessels in Biscayne Bay? These vessels are both navigational hazards and eyesores for our community. Derelict vessels ranging from large commercial ships to smaller recreational boats can shift during storms, destroying crucial benthic habitat – the bottom of a body of water, such as seagrass or coral reefs. Furthermore, toxic chemicals that were onboard at the time of sinking, or oil spills from the vessel itself, pose a threat to surrounding ecosystems and to human health. Additional debris from the vessels such as fishing gear, nets, and other dispersed trash can harm marine life as well.

David Bouck presenting his Master's thesis entitled "Determining Trends in Water Quality Using High Resolution Land Use Data"

Biscayne Bay and its surrounding waterways are widely known as ecologically important areas. Coral reefs, seagrasses and mangroves protect nearly everything from juvenile fish to us as inhabitants of this large urban region. As part of their Habitat Blue Print program, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) made this loud and clear when they chose Biscayne Bay as one of 10 Habitat Focus Areas to focus their time and resources on conserving this important estuary. the Habitat Focus Areas have one thing in common- they are at an ecological tipping point and need help from scientists and other advocates to save them before it is too late. Miami Waterkeeper headed up a NOAA Habitat Focus Area grant, in partnership with many key players at the University of Miami and UF/IFAS Florida Sea Grant, to address "The Human Dimensions of Biscayne Bay: Socioeconomics, Spatial Modeling, and Community Engagement." Under this grant, Master's candidate David Bouck completed research related to nutrient loading in Biscayne Bay that was crucial to enhancing our understanding of the Bay's evolving water quality. Learn more about Bouck and his contribution to protecting this focus area!

Your Waterkeeper, Dr. Rachel Silverstein, sampling water quality in Biscayne Bay.

As Miami Waterkeeper continues to collaborate with other local groups in combating the ongoing threat of marine debris, we also continue our work on an equally serious but less visually perceivable marine issue: water quality. Water quality problems have persisted in the region but go largely unnoticed because it’s easier to turn a blind eye to something that you cannot see. However, the health issues for both marine life and humans is extensive, and so it is important that the issue gets the attention it deserves.

Marine Debris and Good Water Quality are Ranked the Highest in Importance by the Public