South Florida prepares for rising seas

Posted on January 9, 2012 by Webmaster

By David Fleshler, Sun Sentinel
7:19 p.m. EST, January 8, 2012

A battle plan for an anticipated assault by seawater has been drafted by four South Florida counties, attempting to protect one of the nation’s most vulnerable regions from the impact of climate change.

The proposal by Broward, Palm Beach, Miami-Dade and Monroe counties calls for 108 actions to deal with rising sea levels and other consequences of global warming.

Among the steps: Redesigning low-lying roads to keep them above water, restricting development in vulnerable areas and relocating drinking-water wells inland to protect them from contamination by salt water. The plan contains no cost estimates.

Sea levels in South Florida could rise by one foot by 2040-2070 and two feet from 2060 to 2115, according to an analysis prepared by the scientific staff of the four counties, using federal, state and academic studies.

Palm Beach County Commission Chairwoman Shelley Vana said the draft Regional Climate Action Plan is an attempt to adapt early, allowing the region to armor itself against a more watery world as smartly and cheaply as possible.

“The bottom line is we need to have responsible planning in place to deal with whatever the future will be,” she said. “We don’t want to go out on a limb and panic, but we have to be responsible. It will have a much smaller impact on the way people live and what they have to pay to live that way than if we did nothing.”

The plan calls for the designation of areas of particularly high vulnerability, called Adaptation Action Areas, which would have stricter building codes that would discourage development in the most vulnerable places, more spending on drainage systems and other infrastructure to protect property, and the acquisition of land for use as buffers.

It would attempt to reduce the region’s emissions of carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping gases by encouraging more walkable development, improving public transportation and promoting the use of renewable energy. It calls for assessing underground sources of drinking water for vulnerability to contamination from encroaching salt water, protecting them where possible and replacing those that can’t be protected.

There would be new design standards for roads and bridges in low-lying areas, and vulnerable areas would be assessed to see whether roads should be rerouted. Existing roads could be modified to make sure they’re high enough and have adequate drainage. This could be done in the course of road improvements that take place anyway in areas with poor drainage, except that under the plan roads would be modified for anticipated sea levels rather than just for current drainage difficulties.

“We need to make sure our transportation corridors are functional in future conditions,” said Jennifer Jurado, Broward County‘s water resources director. “We would modify it to provide not only for today’s circumstances, but tomorrow’s as well.”

The public has until Feb. 10 to comment on the plan, which can be seen in full at southeastfloridaclimatecompact.org. Comments may be submitted to comments@SoutheastFloridaClimateCompact.org.

After that, the plan staff will incorporate public input, prepare a document setting out how recommendations will be implemented and bring the final plan to the four county commissions for approval.

Jon Van Arnam, assistant county administrator of Palm Beach County, who is on the plan’s steering committee, said an analysis of the costs will take place over the next few months. He said there was “no question” that elements of the plan would require “significant public investment” and cooperation by all levels of government.

In Broward County, a one-foot rise would affect property with a current taxable value of $403 million to $828 million. In Palm Beach County, which is generally at higher elevation, properties valued at $396 million to $557 million would be vulnerable.

The climate-driven rise in sea levels has taken place primarily because water expands at it warms, although melting glaciers are expected to contribute more to the increase in coming decades. In the past century, sea levels have risen 4.9 to 8.8 inches, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

The vast majority of climate researchers have concluded that global warming is taking place and is caused by human activities. Among the organizations endorsing this view are the American Meteorological Society, American Geophysical Union, National Academy of Sciences, American Association for the Advancement of Science and World Meteorological Organization.

But among the general public there remains considerable skepticism, and this has generated opposition to efforts elsewhere in the United States to develop local plans for rising sea levels. In Virginia, for example, The Washington Post reports that a plan to rezone land for a coastal dike against sea-level rise generated harsh opposition from local residents who said climate change was a hoax being used by the United Nations to seize land and redistribute wealth.

Tony Coulter, a member of South Florida Tea Party, said there’s a lot of skepticism about climate change among the group’s members but said the issue is not high on their agenda, which focuses on shrinking government, protecting Constitutional rights and lowering taxes.

“A lot of us think it’s bogus science,” he said. “I personally do. Global warming is a natural cycle of the earth. But I’m all about being prepared. Let’s monitor this. Let’s gauge what’s happening.”

dfleshler@tribune.com, 954-356-4535

Article source: http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/palm-beach/fl-climate-action-20120106,0,6428300.story

Casey Anthony wants $1.5 million for first interview, reports say

Posted on August 8, 2011 by Webmaster

from Sun Sentinel

An article in the Daily Mail, tweets from Nancy Grace and other reports are claiming that representatives for Casey Anthony are currently shopping her first post-acquittal interview for $1.5 million.

While many media outlets say they do not exchange money for interviews, some offer to pay high amounts for photographs and other images. After taking a public-relations hit in several high-profile cases, ABC News representatives said the media giant will no longer be buying photos or video as a way of getting a news subject to cooperate, reports The Daily Beast .

“We can book just about anyone based on the strength of our journalism, the excellence of our anchors, correspondents, and producers, and the size of our audience,” said ABC spokesman Jeffrey Schneider in an article from The Daily Beast . “These licensing deals had become a crutch, and an unnecessary one.”

According to TMZ, NBC representatives have said they are not among media outlets in the battle for Anthony’s first interview.

An NBC representative told TMZ, “NBC News has not and will not be in a bidding war for a Casey Anthony interview. No money has or will be offered, no licensing or other arrangements. If we were to conduct an interview it would be under our standards.”

TMZ also reported that Anthony’s parents, George and Cindy, have been offered $250,000 to appear on a syndicated talk show.

Port St. Lucie accepts steel from the World Trade Center for public monument

Posted on August 7, 2011 by Webmaster

From Sun Sentinel

Plans to create a public monument proposed for the Civic Center in memory of victims of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in New York are back on track.

In a unanimous vote, the City Council Monday night agreed to accept a piece of steel from the World Trade Center from the 9/11 First Responders of the Treasure Coast.

“We welcome it, and we’ll be proud to have it in Port St. Lucie,” Mayor JoAnn Faiella said.

The non-profit group is organizing transporting the steel to the Treasure Coast for memorials in Martin County and Port St. Lucie.

Councilman Jack Kelly initially attempted to arrange bringing a 30-foot beam of steel from the World Trade Center to Port St. Lucie at the council’s July 11 meeting. However, the council nixed the plan after councilwoman Michelle Berger, Shannon Martin and Vice Mayor Linda Bartz said Kelly failed to put a formal discussion about it on the July 11 meeting agenda.

Berger, Martin and Bartz said they needed more details, such as the cost, where the steel would be stored and how it would be erected. They said they knew nothing about the project.

Kelly said the steel would be trucked in from New York at no cost, but the deadline to truck it in was July 27 and time was of the essence. However, that deadline has since been extended, said Dennis McKenna, president of the 9/11 First Responders.

McKenna gave an emotional presentation Monday night and asked the City Council to reconsider accepting the steel. The non-profit group was founded by McKenna in 2009 and its mission is to never let anyone forget the tragedy of Sept. 11.

At several points of the discussion, McKenna, who was an agent for the U.S. Department of Justice during the 9/11 attacks, got choked up talking about the importance of creating the memorial.

“We never, ever will let one day go by that people don’t remember or hear 9/11,” McKenna said. “This steel is going to give more inspiration and more electric feeling to people you can’t even imagine.”

McKenna said it was his hope the steel would be placed at the Civic Center to coincide with the 9/11 remembrance ceremony the city has there each year. He said the plan is to place an American flag next to the steel and a spotlight so it’s visible at night.

He also said more people would have access to it at the Civic Center, and it would be an attraction.

McKenna said he initially requested a 30-foot beam, but now it’s likely Port St. Lucie will be getting a 20-foot steel column instead.

McKenna said no more pieces of steel are being distributed throughout the United States, and this was a rare opportunity for the city to have it.

“It’s not a scrap piece of steel,” McKenna said. “No, no, no. It’s a special piece of steel. It’s sacred.”

He said he’d like to see the steel stored by the Police Department to keep it safe and secure. He also said the memorial would be of no cost to the city to create. McKenna said he already has volunteers, including an national award-winning architect, ready to design it and erect it.

Bartz said veterans have expressed interest in having the steel placed at Veteran’s Memorial Park. However, McKenna said he felt the Civic Center was a more appropriate place for it.

Berger said the council would decide where to put it.

“In the end, it will be the city that selects where it goes,” she said. “I need to hear from you that you would be OK if this council decides it should be put somewhere else.”

McKenna responded: “I would be OK with it, but we would want to see it somewhere where history can live and prevail.”

Two other pieces of steel from the World Trade Center were placed at Digital Domain Park and at a St. Lucie County fire station.

Davie couple used simple techniques to save $80,000 to travel the world

Posted on August 3, 2011 by Webmaster

from Sun Sentinel

Think you can’t achieve your dreams in a tough economy? Think again.

Daniel and Jillian Tobias of Davie did. They were able to travel to 50 countries in 21 months, thanks to old-fashioned scrimping and budgeting. And here’s the surprise: The Tobiases are still in their 20s.

To help others benefit from their experiences as extreme savers, the Tobiases recently launched a free personal-finance website — DoughHound.com — when they found they couldn’t create a personalized household budget on other websites without divulging personal information, such as credit card or bank account numbers.

“It took some effort but we did it,” said Daniel Tobias, 29, of the couple’s extreme savings plan.

So how did they do it, and what savings lessons can be learned from their experiences? Here’s a look at five key strategies they made work.

Live within your means

In many ways, the Tobiases were able to live their dream by living within their means. It may sound simple, but it’s not easy. The average South Floridian’s credit card debt is $4,555, one of the nation’s largest. A quarter of aging baby boomers haven’t saved a penny toward retirement.

By contrast, the twenty somethings lived on just one of their two incomes — and banked the other. They had no credit card debt, drove a 1996 Geo Prizm and rented a tiny 575-square-foot apartment for four years to boost their savings. They managed to pay $60,000 toward their college loans and squirrel away $80,000 for their global journey.

What kept them going was their dream: Both have a passion for travel. It’s important, they said, to both dream and budget: Watching their spending allowed them to have the means to climb Mount Kilimanjaro, tour the Taj Mahal, watch the Tour de France, visit Machu Picchu and enjoy 46 other countries.

Now they’re working on a new goal: Save enough to establish roots here. They’ve already bought a house and car. They’re also paying down their remaining $40,000 in college loans, which Daniel Tobias said is manageable since they carry only about 2 percent interest.

Set a goal, create a plan to meet it

The secret to budgeting — which no one likes to do — is deciding what you want and then coming up with a plan to afford it, Daniel Tobias said. “Figure out what is important to you and, by all means, spend your money on it,” added Jillian Tobias, 28.

To save for their trip, Daniel Tobias created color-coded spreadsheets on Excel to help them track how much they were spending. They did that every day for four years, tracking every expenditure and looking for savings. Even a soda out of a vending machine warranted a notation, he said.

It was “very elaborate,” he added.

“I hated it,” Jillian Tobias admitted, but added: “It made me think about what I was spending on. I would think: If I don’t spend this, that could buy me a meal in Bolivia.”

Choose free hobbies over costly pursuits

For four years, they passed on expensive pastimes and cultivated interests in less-costly pursuits. “We really avoided the big night out — that might cost $50 apiece for dinner,” Daniel Tobias said.

They clipped coupons and shopped sales. They concentrated on passions that were free: Mountain biking and kayaking. They had free cable through their apartment complex and read free books through an exchange where members traded books.

“We had fun but we weren’t extravagant,” Jillian Tobias said. “We really made it work.”

Amid drought, 10 billion gallons of water drain out to sea in first two weeks of July

Posted on August 1, 2011 by Webmaster

by abreid@tribune.com – Sun Sentinel

Dumping billions of gallons of water out to sea in the midst of a lingering drought is South Florida’s water-supply irony.

Drought concerns quickly can become flooding scares in the course of a summer afternoon downpour because there’s not enough water storage in crowded South Florida

About 10 billion gallons of storm water was drained into the ocean from local flood-control canals during the first two weeks of July, according to the South Florida Water Management District.

That’s more than 600 million gallons a day washing away, right on the heels of the driest October-to-June on record.

With emergency landscape watering restrictions still in place, enough stormwater was drained into the ocean during the first half of July to fill more than 15,000 Olympic-sized swimming pools.

South Florida’s 2,000 miles of drainage canals and levees were created to protect neighborhoods and farms sitting on what used to be the Everglades from flooding. They are not so good at saving water long-term.

Adding to the problem, proposed reservoirs remain delayed, unfinished or plagued by problems, hampering South Florida’s ability to hold onto more water. And there’s not enough money — or in some cases, political commitment — to finish them.

“We are trying to retain as much [water] as we can,” said Susan Sylvester, district director of operations controls. “In South Florida, we go from one extreme to the other. … Water has been discharged to tide. There’s no place to store it.”

The farther north and west rain falls, the more water storage options are available for the South Florida Water Management District.

Lake Okeechobee as well as the Everglades water conservation areas — which stretch across western Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties — are key water storage areas that can be tapped to supplement water supplies.

But the Army Corps of Engineers during 2010, in the name of flood control, drained more than 300 billion gallons of Lake Okeechobee water out to sea, despite warnings that it could worsen South Florida’s water supply strain during a drought.

The closer rain falls to highly-populated areas around Interstate 95, the more likely that stormwater will get drained out to sea, according to Sylvester.

With limited water storage options, environmentalists advocate tougher watering rules for homeowners and farmers alike to conserve more water. They also call for buying more western farmland to store water through Everglades restoration.

“South Florida escaped a catastrophic drought by a very thin whisker this year,” said Charles Lee, Audubon of Florida’s advocacy director. He said the “political clout” sugar cane growers wield at the district too often give them preference over environmental and urban water needs.

Instead of blaming agriculture, the solution to South Florida’s water supply woes is speeding up the decades-long project to strengthen Lake Okeechobee’s dike so more water can be stored in the lake, said Barbara Miedema, vice president of the Sugar Cane Growers Cooperative of Florida.

“We don’t have enough water to go around when everybody needs it,” Miedema. “The best place to store water is the lake.”

Everglades restoration plans — which call for building reservoirs and water treatment areas — are billed as the way to boost the water supply for the environment as well as agriculture and urban populations.

But Everglades restoration remains years behind schedule. Also, the water management district has a questionable track record with the reservoirs — racking up costs with limited results saving water.

That includes $280 million for a reservoir left unfinished in southwestern Palm Beach County .

While long-term water storage fixes remain far from completion, the near daily dumping of water from summertime rains continues.

abreid@tribune.com or 561-228-5504

This mosquito season is one of the worst in South Florida history

Posted on August 1, 2011 by Webmaster

by dfleshler@tribune.com

A late-starting mosquito season has quickly developed into one of the worst in modern memory, forcing residents of many neighborhoods to run from their homes to their cars through swarms of blood-sucking insects.

Broward County Mosquito Control reports 500 to more than 700 complaints a day, as tiny, aggressive salt marsh mosquitoes blow in from the Everglades. Palm Beach County , farther from the salt marsh bugs’ breeding grounds, is reporting about 100 calls a day, the worst in the past few years.

“They’re very small, they’re very fierce biters,” and unlike most other types, bite around the clock, said Joe Marhefka, Broward County‘s mosquito-control director. “It’s creating a really big problem.”

The long drought delayed the breeding season, but since the rains began in June, they have been reproducing in stupendous numbers.

“People are calling like crazy,” said Marhefka. “They can’t get to their cars, their kids are getting bitten up.”

When Tony Moonen arrived at West Broward High School in Pembroke Pines to pick up his daughter from band camp, he found the mosquitoes had attacked in force.

“She was covered with bug bites all over her legs,” he said. “They had been out in the field practicing, and a lot of kids in the band got bit. I was out there, and I got bit pretty bad. I’ve got sores all over my legs from scratching.”

Maria Hernandez, of Miramar, feels trapped in her house.

“We’re getting eaten alive,” she said. “I have to run from my car to my house as if I’m running away from something. I can’t go skating with my dog. I can’t go outside at all.”

Shelly Redovan, executive director of the Florida Mosquito Control Association, said heavy concentrations of mosquitoes are being reported statewide.

“It’s been a rough season for pretty much everybody,” she said. “Across the state people are reporting more numbers than they usually do.”

A possible cause is the drought, she said. Many mosquito species lay eggs on dry land that would eventually become wet, and with the lack of rainfall over the past few months, there’s been a lot more dry land than in typical years. When the rains came, raising the water levels of lakes, ponds, marshes and canals, vast numbers of mosquitoes started to hatch.

“There was more dry land for laying eggs, and when the rain came you’d have these massive explosions of mosquitoes,” she said. “Most places are having a difficult mosquito season so far.”

In Palm Beach County, the western neighborhoods near the insects’ marshy breeding grounds are particularly infested, said Ed Bradford, the county’s mosquito control director.

Initially, northern Palm Beach County from the ocean to Lake Okeechobee had the worst of it, although more complaints are now coming in from southern Palm Beach County, he said.

He said it was vital for people to eliminate the standing water in which they breed.

“Every day you have rainfall, you get more larvae hatching out,” he said. “Unfortunately we have been getting multiple hatches. Each mosquito can lay 200 to 300 eggs. And it just takes a few mosquitoes and you could have 1000 mosquitoes hatching out and biting you.”

Both counties dispatch trucks for anti-mosquito spraying in hard-hit neighborhoods. Palm Beach County contracts for a helicopter out of Lantana to spray more spread-out western communities. Broward County uses a twin-engine plane.

Although mosquitoes transmit diseases such as dengue fever and West Nile virus, the species that carry these diseases have not yet begun breeding in great numbers. They are expected to peak from September through November.

The salt marsh mosquitoes making life miserable in South Florida breed in areas beyond the reach of these vehicles, although there are separate populations along the coast.

But Broward County has responded aggressively to complaints — which peaked at 738 on Tuesday, compared to the typical season’s 200 or 300 a day — and the phones seemed quieter Wednesday, Marhefka said.

In addition to eliminating standing water around their homes, authorities advise people to wear clothing that protects arms and legs, avoid the outdoors at dawn and dusk and use repellent that contains DEET.

dfleshler@tribune.com or 954-356-4535

Charter schools get $55M for upkeep, public schools get $0

Posted on July 31, 2011 by Webmaster

from Sun Sentinel

Traditional public schools in Florida will get no money from the state this year for additions or needed repairs to thousands of aging buildings, but charter schools will score big.

All of the state cash budgeted for school construction and maintenance is going to the independent, tax-financed charters favored by the Republican-dominated Legislature and Gov.Rick Scott.

The charter school operated for children of employees of The Villages, the Republican stronghold in north Lake County frequented by Scott and former President George W. Bush, is expected to receive about $1 million.

School district officials across Florida are bemoaning the Legislature’s decision to cut traditional public schools out of PECO — the Public Education Capital Outlay program. The state’s 350 charter schools will share $55 million, while the approximately 3,000 traditional schools will go without.

“Every cent allocated for school construction went to charter schools,” complained Lee Swift, a Charlotte County school board member who heads the Florida School Boards Association.

Swift said lawmakers should focus on “properly funded traditional schools” instead of pressing for more charters that drain resources from the traditional schools.

But Sen. David Simmons, a Maitland Republican who chairs the Senate’s subcommittee on school appropriations, said the reason the traditional schools aren’t getting any PECO cash this year is simple: They don’t need it.

“We did a whole lot of building a few years ago,” Simmons said. “Growth has stagnated, and there has been some overbuilding of schools in some areas.”

He pointed to Seminole, which has more than 9,000 vacant seats after a decade of school construction. The School Board recently closed Longwood Elementary in an economy move and is considering closing other schools next year.

But Seminole Superintendent Bill Vogel counters that Seminole and other districts still need cash for roofing and air conditioner repairs, painting, plumbing work, carpeting and other maintenance projects.

“We desperately need the PECO money,” Vogel said. “It is essential for maintenance of our buildings.”

And not all districts have stopped growing and needing more classrooms, either. While overall enrollment in Florida public schools fell by 19,305 students over the past five years, districts such as Lake and Osceola have continued to grow.

The state has never been overly generous with money for school repairs, forcing school districts for the past 30 years to raise local property taxes to cover maintenance expenses.

But each year every school district in the state got a modest sum from the Legislature for school repairs, and many years there was an extra allocation toward school construction.

This past year, for example, Orange County schools got about $6.7 million for maintenance and repairs, and Seminole schools received $2.4 million.

“This year we get nothing,” said John Pavelchak, finance director for Seminole schools for the past 20 years. “This is the first time I remember getting nothing.”

Lack of PECO money will pinch school districts whose other main sources of revenue for repairs — property taxes — have dwindled because of the poor economy.

Lake schools had hoped to get about $1 million in state maintenance funds toward an estimated $6 million in needed repairs such as school air conditioning units that maintenance director Mike Corr has characterized as “just a heartbeat away from catastrophic failure.” Officials are considering borrowing money or bumping other projects to cover costs of the air conditioner repairs.

PECO funding for traditional schools varied from year to year, peaking in the 2007-08 school year at just over $500 million, with more than half for new construction.

PB Zoo tiger cubs to meet public on Friday

Posted on July 30, 2011 by Webmaster

by abreid@tribune.com

Prowling between palm trees with little black-striped tails swishing behind, the new stars of the Palm Beach Zoo seem too cute to grow up and eat you alive.

The zoo’s three newborn Malayan tiger cubs make their public debut on Friday evening to crowds that have waited since May for a first-hand look.

The three cubs on Thursday got a chance to venture outside the indoor enclosure they have called home since birth. They explored the shaded terrain of the outdoor tiger exhibit with their mother, Berapi, keeping watch as zoo staffers, donors and media quietly took a sneak peak.

Other visitors can get their chance to see the cubs at 5:30 p.m. on Friday during the zoo’s Safari Nights program, intended to draw crowds during cooler evening visits. After that, the tiger cubs will be back on the prowl on and off during regular zoo hours.

“They are still exploring, they are getting farther away from mom,” Assistant Zoo Director Keith Lovett said Thursday as he watched the tiger cubs scratch tree trunks, wade into the water and venture close to the edge of the screened enclosure. “The cubs are thriving … It will be interesting to see how they react to the crowds.”

Natives of Malaysia and Thailand, there are only about 500 Malayantigers left in the wild, where poaching and loss of habitat thins the population.

The cubs were the firsttigers born at the Palm Beach Zoo and only the second litter born this year in North American zoos.

The Palm Beach Zoo hopes to breed more tigers. Keeping the current cubs when they reach maturity and adding more requires expansion, according to zoo officials. The new cubs are the centerpiece of an effort to raise $3 million for an expanded tiger exhibit.

Oh, and by the way, it’s a boy — times three.

Zoo officials got a closer look at the growing cubs on Thursday and learned they had three boys, not two boys and a girl as once thought.

No names yet for the new cubs. The zoo is offering the chance to name the cubs as part of its fundraising campaign. The zoo plans to hold a naming ceremony by early 2012.

abreid@tribune.com or 561-228-5504

Lobster miniseason gets off to rough start; one diver dies in the Keys

Posted on July 27, 2011 by Webmaster

by Sun Sentinel – swaters@tribune.com

Strong winds and choppy seas made for less than ideal conditions on the opening day of the annual lobster mini season Wednesday.

Many divers either canceled their plans or cut their dives short because of waves that built to 3 feet to 5 feet and southeast winds of 17 knots to 22 knots Wednesday morning.

“If it wasn’t miniseason, I wouldn’t be out here,” said Jim Mathie, of Deerfield Beach, the author of “Catching the BUG,” a book about lobster hunting. “It’s too bumpy.”

Still, Mathie and his crew of Roger Soles, Braden Whitworth, Andy Rubin and Chuck Van Buskirk caught 51 lobsters diving in 70 feet off Pompano Beach on Mathie’s 29-foot boat Chiefy, nine shy of their limit.

Miniseason is the first chance for divers to catch lobsters since the regular season closed April 1. In addition, lobster hunters are allowed to keep 12 lobsters per person except in the Florida Keys and Biscayne National Park, where the daily bag limit is six per person. The bag limit for the regular season, which is Aug. 6-March 31, is six per person statewide.

One lobster diver died Wednesday in the Keys. The Monroe County Sheriff’s Office reported that Mark Fountain, 54, of Montgomery, Mass., was diving in the ocean off Tavernier on a private boat when he became separated from his son and his son’s girlfriend.

When the son went to get Fountain with the boat, Fountain was floating on the surface and was not responsive. He was brought aboard and escorted to Tavernier Creek Marina by the U.S. Coast Guard, where he was pronounced dead by paramedics shortly after arriving at 9:40 a.m. An autopsy will be performed to determine the cause of death.

In Broward County , there were reports of a few stranded divers, all of whom were rescued. Two boats overturned off Miami, but their occupants were rescued.

The reduced number of divers resulted in just a few citations issued by Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission law enforcement officers. Lt. Dave Bingham said one diver in Broward was cited for scraping the eggs off a female lobster — no egg-bearing females can be taken — and there were several citations for under-sized lobsters and a few for dive flag violations.

Bingham was diving in 18 feet of water Wednesday morning with his daughter and two others in his 17-foot Boston Whaler. He said the divers and the boat got bounced around by the choppy seas.

“It definitely made me a believer in having a bigger bilge pump,” Bingham said. “It was rough.”

Arilton Pavan of Dixie Divers in Deerfield Beach said the 28 divers who went out Wednesday morning on the store’s boat Lady Go Diver averaged two or three lobsters apiece diving north of Boca Inlet. Although he didn’t have any cancellations for the trip, Pavan said a lot of divers who had planned to go out on their own boats stayed home.

“It was a little bumpy for the average diver,” Pavan said.

Roray Kam and Jim Higgins went free-diving on Higgins’ boat in 15 feet off Fort Lauderdaleand got their two-man limit of 24 lobsters within an hour.

“We left the dock at 5:30 and were back by 8:30,” Kam said. “It was rough, but we knew what to expect, so it wasn’t too bad.”

swaters@tribune.com or 954-356-4648

Aggressive mosquitoes bring misery to South Florida

Posted on July 22, 2011 by Webmaster