Port Everglades Expansion Dredging:
STAND UP FOR YOUR REEFS!
Florida’s reefs are invaluable to the economy, ecology, and livelihood of South Florida. Our reefs generate billions of dollars for the local economy and create habitat for valuable fish and other marine life. Unfortunately, we have lost over 80% of our corals since the 1970s. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is poised to start a major dredging project in Port Everglades, which crosses the Florida reef tract, putting corals in harm’s way. During a similar dredging project at Port Miami, just 30 miles south, the Corps illegally harmed 250 acres of coral reef and an untold number of corals. We’ve made it our mission to prevent this ecological tragedy from happening again in Port Everglades — the next port scheduled to be deepened and widened in South Florida.
Thanks to our recent litigation, the Corps has finally agreed to conduct new environmental analyses of the risk to the reefs (and also consider the impacts that occurred in Miami) before starting its planned dredging project to expand Port Everglades. We need all of our community members to stand up and demand better protections for our reefs this time around.
10,000+ comments to the Army Corps thanks to YOU!
The public comment period has now closed, but thanks to our members and our friends at the Center for Biological Diversity and EarthJustice — we flooded the Corps with over 10,000 comments! Thank you for your advocacy on this issue and for speaking up for our priceless coral reefs in Fort Lauderdale! Read our team’s full comments HERE.
We also got some great press coverage highlighting the Army Corps’ recent string of “alternative facts” related to the PortMiami and Port Everglades dredging projects. Read more in the Miami Herald and the Sun-Sentinel.
What’s next?
1) Stay up to date on the status of the Port Everglades project by subscribing to our newsletter HERE.
2) Learn about our ongoing legal actions to protect south Florida’s reefs HERE.
3) Sign our petition to ask for stronger protections for Florida’s reefs HERE.
4) Support our efforts with a donation HERE,
Originally published at https://www.miamiwaterkeeper.org/port_everglades_action_alert