The Everglades
In the Everglades, we use our legal and technical expertise on the cutting edge legal and policy issues of Everglades restoration implementation, representing environmental interests in state and federal court, and before local, regional, state and federal agencies. We have provided extensive legal advocacy to the environmental community in support of the Everglades Restoration projects that are designed to bring about
the most important ecological, and resulting economical, benefits. We have brought numerous legal challenges to development proposals that have threatened the protection or restoration of the Everglades and Lake Okeechobee. Our recent federal court victory
in the Scripps Biotech Institute case resulted in the relocation of that critical
project from the edge of the Everglades in western Palm Beach County, where it was
more likely to fail, to an eastern location, where its potential for economic success
is greatest. We also represent public interest clients in litigation over Palm Beach
County’s West-Central Region Sector Plan, which we believe fails to protect the
rural and environmental values in the region, and are regularly involved in numerous
development issues in western Palm Beach County, with a focus on protecting the
lands needed to restore the northern Everglades.
In Miami-Dade County, our legal advocacy on behalf of the Hold the Line
campaign is focusing on the combined fiscal, social and environmental reasons why
the County should maintain its Urban Development Boundary, which is facing its most
serious set of pressures in well over a decade. In previous years, we won an appeals court ruling overturning the State's approval of a plan to redevelop the former Homestead Air Force Base as a commercial airport complex. For more information,
read our white paper on Miami-Dade County’s Urban Development Boundary
and our comment letters to the County and the state on the recently proposed UDB changes.
The restoration of the Everglades is the largest and most ambitious environmental
restoration project ever attempted. In addition to its obvious engineering and scientific
challenges, it raises complex and cutting edge policy, legal and administrative
issues on a national scale. For more information, read:
Planning for Restoration - Restoring the Everglades Through Planning: The Responsibility of Local Governments
and the State to Avoid Urbanizing Lands Important to the Restoration of the Everglades
- September 28, 2004. To learn more about the impacts of Land Use Decisions and
Urban Sprawl on Restoration Efforts, read
Development Patterns in the Everglades.