Scott Atwell, Communications and Outreach Manager for the Florida Keys Marine Sanctuary, joined Good Morning Keys on KeysTalk 96.9/102.5FM this morning to talk about what’s been going on in the sanctuary.
The restoration blueprint has been a big topic recently and will be final in January.
Atwell said, “The number one question I receive in the three years I’ve been with the sanctuary is, when will the blueprint come out? And we finally have an answer. It’s going to be out in January. On Friday, the US Department of Environmental Protection issued what’s called the final environmental impact statement. So that sort of sets a clock that we know exactly when it’s going to happen. So it was a big day for us last week. I tell you, I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that this process has been the most collaborative effort in the history of the Florida Keys, 13 years and thousands of man hours of people coming together, coming to the table with a shared concern, really, that the ecosystem is threatened and we need to take some action to preserve it and improve it. I think everyone has been involved in it deserves a tip of the cap. I mean literally, what a process, the innumerable meetings and public comments and partner collaborations. It’s important to remember that the sanctuary and our parent organization, NOAA, report up through the US Department of Commerce, which is laser focused on creating the conditions for economic growth and opportunity for all communities. Certainly, the economic activity generated by the sanctuary was responsible for contributing over $4 billion and 43,000 jobs across the state of Florida, according to a study was commissioned by our Sanctuary Foundation and that valuable ecosystem has been under threat, bombarded by the things we’ve talked about over the month, coral disease, increased water temperatures and other issues. We don’t really have a minute to spare to get this thing moving. So it was a big day ensuring that this resource, the future of it that’s so vital to the economic and cultural foundation of the Florida Keys, can get some help and so the listeners can learn more about it on our website.”
What was the key to getting the restoration blueprint to this final point?
Atwell said, “I would say the key was balancing protections with access. We’ve never meant the sanctuary to be a museum piece that sits on a shelf and that you just look at, you never get to use it. So we wanted to balance the access with the protections. So we’re proposing to add 37 marine zones, mostly on the back side, to safeguard important bird species and turtles, but also on the ocean side, protecting deep water corals and sensitive habitats such as nursery grounds for valuable fishery species, also protecting sea grass, which is so vital to the ecosystem as well and sanctuary Preservation Areas, we’re going to do more to prevent anchor damage to coral reefs, while also providing a refuge for marine life and scuba divers. We’re going to be more proactive with vessels that are at risk of becoming derelict. We see those, you drive down the road and see all those vessels that have been grounded, we’re going to be able to be more proactive with that. Then we’re also going to limit cruise ship discharge to cooling water only. So that’s sort of like the protections, but the access, while we’re adding zones, we’re also reopening some areas, because conditions have changed, and 95% of the sanctuary is going to remain open to fishing. That’s 4,300 square miles of fishing area. We have so many constituents in in the sanctuary, and it was all about trying to balance it. So we think we found this sort of Goldilocks zone that’s just right. No one got everything, but everyone got something, and so it’s a day to celebrate.”
What’s next after the blueprint gets finalized?
Atwell said, “We’re in this required 30 day waiting period as part of the National Environmental Policy Act. So mid January, we will issue what we call the final rule, and then, following 45 days of Congressional session and review, Florida’s governor will have the chance to review it and perhaps veto some things that fall in the state areas, the state waters, or accept all of it, which we hope that he does. I think it’s important to recognize the hundreds of areas that we’ve successfully worked through with FWC. I mean, we took our cap to them for advocating for the fishing community, which is our constituency as well. But as I mentioned, we have other constituencies, so it’s natural and I think, quite frankly, expected that some things could be outstanding, but we’re just not at a point where we could wait any longer, because the ecosystem is crying out for help. So what we are proposing is, let’s pass restoration blueprint, then on Monday, whatever Monday that is, let’s roll up our sleeves and begin working on the things that we haven’t hashed out yet. We recommended last Friday to the sanctuary advisory council that it establish an adaptive management committee that would continue to refine the areas that need work and introduce them incrementally, so we don’t have to endure a long process like blueprint has been 13 years. So moving forward, we want to do this in smaller batches and get it done more quickly. But either way it’s good to say that the blueprint will be final in January.”
How did the Keys do specifically in the national photo contest held by the sanctuary recently?
Atwell said, “There are, I think, four categories, and the Florida Keys took first place in two of the four. A great photo by a Marathon resident, he was camping in the back country at night, and took a picture at 3am with the Milky Way shining down on the Florida Keys. Gorgeous photo. Then a Fort Lauderdale resident, who comes through the Keys quite a bit, took a photograph off the Upper Keys of an arrow crab, this is a very close up photo of an arrow crab right in front of a long spine sea urchin. So you’ve got all these vertical lines that really make an interesting composition. Listeners can see those photos on our our social media pages, so congratulations to both of them, and we’ll have more to say about that and display more of their photos in the coming days on social media.”
There was a celebration last week that had to do with mission iconic reefs.
Atwell explained, “On Monday, the ninth of December, we celebrated the five year anniversary of what is one of the largest coral restoration projects in the world, certainly one of the most comprehensive, and we celebrated that by launching a brand new website, which is missioniconicreefs.org. Right at the top of that very comprehensive website is a list of news stories that will also depict the release of a five year report that we just put out that illustrates how far we’ve come in five years and also a story about the reef future symposium, which took place last week in Mexico. Reef futures is actually where mission iconic reefs was born, envisioned in 2018 and a year later, it launched. This is a symposium that brings together choral restoration practitioners from around the world and our own mission iconic reef senior manager was the Program Chair, so she arranged all of the presentations that happened during the week. So it was a big success. Mission iconic reefs was well represented, and which means the Florida Keys were well represented in in this worldwide symposium.”
For more information, click here: https://floridakeys.noaa.gov/