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Go to a Sarasota Herald-Tribune op-ed on Florida population growth
Go to a Sarasota Herald-Tribune editorial on Florida population growth
by Michael Browning
Palm Beach Post
October 20, 1999
Like the lower bulb of an hourglass, South Florida is filling up with people and running out of time, simultaneously. A new poll shows that Floridians are getting sicker of Florida, the longer they live here.
Florida's ballooning population is likely to become a significant issue in the 2000 election, according to a poll of 500 likely voters by a Washington-based group that advocates tightening immigration laws.
"This is the first time a poll like this has been taken, and it's some pretty startling stuff," said Christopher Conner, a spokesman for Negative Population Growth, an organization that claims 18,000 members nationwide.
"What we found was that the longer a person has been in Florida, the more unhappy they are with the way the state is going. Some 72 percent feel that growth, sprawl and overpopulation are Florida's major problem, and 39 percent feel that Florida is generally worse off than it was five years ago."
It is estimated that Florida adds 650 new residents every day, a million every four years. Even at 1992 growth rates, each day we needed two new miles of roads, two new classrooms, two new teachers, two new police officers, one more jail cell and two more prison beds, according to a state-sponsored study. At current growth rates, each day we need 111,000 more gallons of fresh water than we did the day before. Each day we flush 95,000 more gallons of waste water and generate 3,500 more pounds of solid waste.
Sixty percent of Florida's wetlands have been lost in this century. Each year about 150,000 acres of farmland in Florida are lost to development, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
The 'mezzanine solution'
Florida, which had a population of just 34,730 in 1830, hosts 15 million people today. It is the fourth most populated state in the country, after California, New York and Texas. Forecasts predict the population will top 20 million in 2020, and reach 30 million by 2050 -- double what it is today. Now 27 of the state's 67 counties have populations over 100,000.
Two counties, Broward and Sarasota, have passed resolutions calling this current week "Overpopulation Awareness Week." It's little more than a gesture, a bit like locking the barn door after the horse has run away. Broward had a population of 1,503,407 in 1998, and many people in the western reaches of the county live like the Dutch, behind levees, on land wrested from the Everglades -- land that ought to be submerged. Sarasota County boasts 321,404 souls, according to 1999 estimates.
Palm Beach County, with a population of 1,032,625 in 1998, is rapidly following in Broward's footsteps. Martin County numbered 211,707 in the last Census, in 1990. St. Lucie County hosted 150,171.
Miami-Dade County is planning to add another 1.2 million people by 2015. Broward expects to have 1,737,041. Palm Beach will have 1,373,800, according to comprehensive land use plan projections. Miami-Dade County planners jest darkly about "the mezzanine solution:" adding one floor to everything that has already been built -- going vertical, in effect.
Ah, the comprehensive plans
Don't look to the state or to the counties or to the cities to rein in development either. In 1985, compelled by law, city and county planners drew up comprehensive land use plans -- blueprints for future growth. Everyone who wanted to build in Florida would have to be "in compliance" with the "comp plan."
Plans would allow 101 million
Then, out of curiosity, a team of planners working for the Southwest Florida Regional Planning Council totaled up the theoretical state population allowed by all the comp plans.
The sum: 101 million people.
It was a figure eerily close to the projections aired during the lunatic days of the 1920s Florida Land Boom, when it was confidently predicted that Florida could easily host 100 million people because its land mass was a certain multiple of Massachusetts' area, and Massachusetts' population times Florida's size equaled 100 million.
Already the phenomenon of "half-backs" is manifesting itself. It began with Hurricane Andrew in 1992. South Floridians, who may have come here from out of state and who are fed up with South Florida, are moving to North and Central Florida: They are heading back northward, but only part way. They are "half-backs."
Seven Florida cities -- Orlando, Fort Lauderdale, West Palm Beach, Miami, Tampa, Daytona Beach and Pensacola suffer from urban sprawl -- the tendency of cities to expand into outlying areas, causing excessive traffic and smog, according to a 1998 report by the Sierra Club, a national environmentalist group. The cities were ranked by population.
The Orlando area is the most threatened by sprawl among regions with 500,000 and one million residents. West Palm Beach is fourth. Fort Lauderdale is ninth on the group's list, Tampa is 14th and Miami is 18th. Among cities with a population between 200,000 and 500,000, Pensacola is third and Daytona Beach is fourth.
Immigration policy under fire
Florida's extraordinary growth spurt has alarmed some people enough to act: Joyce Tarnow, a Pompano Beach anti-growth activist, heads a group called "Floridians For a Sustainable Population." It was Tarnow who persuaded the Broward commission to issue its growth awareness proclamation.
Tarnow disagrees with the notion that growth is strictly a local issue.
"The federal government could enforce the Clean Air Act," Tarnow said. "It could compel communities to adhere to strict water standards. Above all, it could reform immigration policy. We're letting in nearly a million people a year. That should be cut back to something like 250,000. We've got to put a stop to 'chain immigration,' where one family member can invite all the rest of his family, and all the rest of their families, to the United States."
The U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service's figures show that in budget year 1998, the most recent for which firm numbers exist, the U.S. admitted 660,477 immigrants legally, of whom 284,270 were relatives of prior immigrants. The six most desirable states for new arrivals in this country are California, New York, Florida, Texas, New Jersey and Illinois, in that order, immigration records show. Negative Population Growth's Conner realizes that anti-immigration attitudes don't sit well in South Florida, where the Cuban exile community has a powerful political voice.
"We're not xenophobic," he said. "We don't hate immigrants. We aren't singling out Asians, or Cubans, or Mexicans, or Latin Americans. We're just saying we need a rational immigration policy, one that allows us to absorb newcomers naturally."
© Copyright 1999 The Palm Beach Post
Florida Poll: Growth alters quality of life
by Stephen G. Reed
The Sarasota Herald-Tribune
October 14, 1999
More than 80 percent of Floridians in a recent poll said they consider the state's burgeoning population a problem, and 39 percent say Florida has become a less comfortable place to live in the last five years.
About two-thirds of the voters support impact fees and almost 60 percent want the U.S. government to lower immigration levels to head off population growth, the poll shows. But 61 percent oppose a state income tax to deter development.
The poll of 500 voters, commissioned by a Washington, D.C. non-profit organization called Negative Population Growth, shows that population is a significant concern of Florida residents, said Deputy Director Christopher Conner, who visited Sarasota Wednesday.
"Every environmental problem can be tied into a population problem," said Conner, explaining one of the voters' concerns. The poll also touched on issues such as the use of resources and costs for social services.
The poll's release coincides with heightened publicity about population in the United States and the world. Tuesday was designated the "Day of Six Billion" by the United Nations, to symbolically represent the day that the world's population crossed that threshold.
Florida's population is 15.3 million, and grows by about 750 people every day.
Floridians for a Sustainable Population is billing next week as Florida Over-Population Awareness Week, to increase dialogue about the issue, said local representative Wade Matthews.
Steve Liner, vice president for communications at the Florida Chamber of Commerce, said he has not seen the poll. He acknowledged that many people have misgivings about growth.
"Even we, here in the bastion of pro-business advocay, recognize that population growth is a two-edged sword," Liner said.
Although life may become less comfortable, the state's economy -- with little manufacturing and a heavy reliance on service industries -- is fueled by people, Liner said. Until Florida's economy becomes more diversified, population growth is needed to support the state's low tax rate and low cost of living, he said.
Among those polled, 47 percent agreed that the population must grow to sustain economic growth. But 76 percent agreed that growth endangers the state's resources, environmental health and quality of life.
Negative Population Growth hopes the poll will encourage lawmakers to better restrict population growth. The organization supports tighter immigration laws, for example.
"Immigration has always been an emotional issue", said Conner. "But what we're hoping to create is a dialogue about immigration policy."
Five percent of those polled in the survey were from Manatee, Sarasota or Charlotte counties. The poll's margin of error is 4.4 percent, and it was conducted in late September by the polling company of Washington, D.C.
Similar polls may be taken in other states, Conner said.
© Copyright 1999 Sarasota Herald-Tribune
State poll shows concerns about growth, population
The Ft. Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel
by Robin Benedick
October 13, 1999
More than four out of five Floridians surveyed think the state's growing population is a problem, and two-thirds want immigration scaled back, a poll indicates.
The poll, commissioned by Negative Population Growth, a Washington, D.C.-based group committed to reducing the U.S. population, is being touted as the first state survey to show strong discontent about growth and overpopulation.
"We have too many people being born and too many immigrants coming in," said Christopher Conner, Negative Population Growth's deputy director.
He hopes the telephone poll of 500 likely voters statewide sparks a national debate and prompts Congress to reduce legal immigration into the United States by hundreds of thousands of people a year.
Fewer immigrants and smaller households -- with families voluntarily having fewer than two children per household -- would help curb the nation's population.
Conner was in Fort Lauderdale on Tuesday, the day the United Nations expected the world population to reach 6 billion, to release the results of the poll taken in September.
Florida is seen as a microcosm of problems associated with rapid growth. Similar polls may be conducted in other states.
The poll results, with a margin of error of 4.4 percentage points, had few surprises: The longer people lived in Florida, the more concerned they were about growth, development, immigration, the environment and quality of life issues.
Joyce Tarnow, a Pompano Beach resident and president of Floridians for a Sustainable Population, wants the poll to get people talking about Florida's future.
Florida, the nation's fourth-largest state, doubled in population over the past quarter century to 15 million and is projected to double again in 39 years.
"We need to stop growth before it's too late and we've destroyed our natural resources," she said.
Florida can and should cure its overpopulation problem
by Wade Matthews
The Sarasota Herald-Tribune
October 17, 1999
The Sarasota County Commission has joined Broward, Lake and perhaps other counties in proclaiming October 17 to 23 as Florida Overpopulation Awareness Week. Statewide and local environmental and related groups have joined Floridians for a Sustainable Population in calling for public discussion of the consequences of over 15 million people now crowding into our state, more than the entire population of the United States as recently as 1830.
The number of Floridians has doubled in the past 25 years and is expected to double again to 30 million by 2038. The state now has over 5 times as many people as it had in 1950. If the county and municipal comprehensive growth plans already approved by the state Department of Community Affairs are built out at the projected number of inhabitants per dwelling, Florida will have over 100 million people, more than the present population of any European nation except Russia and over five times as many as the entire continent of Australia.
Can we support such population? Possibly, that is if we don't mind drastically reducing our consumption of natural resources, drinking our own wastewater, outlawing green lawns, accepting extinction of wild manatees and many other endangered wildlife, either paving over the state with massive traffic jams or accepting strict limits on who can have a private car and where they can drive, crowding our schools and jails, cutting down forests already reduced worldwide by half and filling up our few remaining wild places where a person can just be alone for a while without the constant noise and jostling of other people.
But why? What benefits do more people bring? The increased expenditures of more people just attract more competitors for local merchants, tradesmen and professionals. The new residents' taxe payments are consumed providing them with more services. With our minimal local unemployment rate, more jobs just bring more job-seekers. Aside from the development industry, whose provision of a constant stream of new houses keeps down the value of existing homeowners' equity, its pretty much a zero sum game, before even considering the great environmental cost.
How about what we occasionally read that the problem now is not overpopulation, but depopulation? The populations of a few European countries are actually dropping by a few tenths of a percentage point a year. This phenomenon is at least in part temporary, caused by couples' delay in having the still-desired two children until later in life. It last occurred in the 1930s when, like in Eastern Europe today, economic depression and political upheaval caused many to delay childbearing.
Those who raise cries of alarm over supposed depopulation almost always base their argument on the UN's low projection, rather than the middle projection, which is what the demographers believe is most likely. Worldwide, thanks to heroic efforts to educate and provide opportunities other than childbearing for women and to greater access to contraceptives, women are now averaging a little under three children each, still far above the replacement level.
The idea of a population implosion in Florida is even more ludicrous, since over half of the several thousand net new residents who arrive every week are migrants from other parts of the US, a little over a quarter are foreign immigrants, and the excess of births over deaths is the smallest component.
What will bring relief? In Florida, legislative change to require comprehensive plans for desired population, not projected population. Higher County impact fees, including schools, to be paid by developers but obviously passed through to purchasers of new construction. Few if any zoning changes that increase density on undeveloped land. National laws to restrict mass and chain immigration so that the annual legal immigration level to the US is returned to the two to three hundred thousand of a few years ago from the present level of over a million, including adjustments. Tighter border and airport controls to stop illegal immigrants, sanctions on employers who hire them, no more general amnesties that attract more to come illegally and wait for the next one, high tech photo social security cards for job seekers. Provision of education, counseling, job opportunities and contraception for those most at risk of having children without being able to support them. And internationally, much greater US support for family planning and for better employment and educational opportunities for women.
Public concern is growing. 26 % of the respondents to Sarasota County's annual poll of residents this past spring gave population growth as the most important problem for the Sarasota County government, almost double the percentage who chose either public schools or traffic and transportation, the next highest categories. A statewide poll just released of Florida voters shows that 31 % of Florida's voters listed over-population as posing the greatest threat to Florida's environment and quality of life, once again almost twice the number who chose either of the next highest threats.
If there is enough concern, Floridians can translate it into political will, and politicians will listen and act if they want to be elected. It's up to you.
--Matthews is a Sarasota resident and a member of the Board of Directors of Floridians for a Sustainable Population.--
© Copyright 1999 The Sarasota Herald
Outgrowing the earth: In Florida and worldwide, overpopulation haunts society
Editorial
The Sarasota Herald-Tribune
October 17, 1999
On Oct. 12, as Earth symbolically marked the arrival of its 6 billionth current inhabitant, a far smaller number went unnoted, despite its importance to Florida.
That number represents the approximate gain in the state's population from Jan. 1 through Oct. 12, 1999. About 750 people a day swell the ranks of Florida's 15 million residents.
Though 750 is a far cry from the planet's daily net gain of 214,000, it's enough to mean that Florida's annual population growth rate outpaces Earth's: 2 percent vs. 1.3 percent, respectively. If the rate seems minuscule, remember the cumulative effect: Florida's population has doubled in 25 years.
Whether on a state or global basis, the population boom haunts society with some difficult questions, chiefly: How can it protect individuals, the environment and economic growth all at the same time? What "livability" level do people expect, and is it sustainable? Will current political and economic systems be part of the solution, or part of the problem?
Florida's problem is migration
Industrialization, education and contraception have greatly reduced the global birth rate in recent decades, but they're largely irrelevant to Florida. Its problem isn't the birth rate -- it's migration, mostly from within the United States but also from Latin America and other parts of the world.
This vast incoming tide threatens the state's delicate environment, strains its limited resources and overwhelms its inadequate infrastructure. These effects are occurring despite a web of regulation aimed at "controlling" growth. Even if the rules were followed more rigorously, they could simply wind up allowing far too many passengers to board a very fragile lifeboat -- albeit in an orderly fashion.
Although Floridians recognize that growth has brought job gains, cultural advantages and other factors that enhance their quality of life, they are increasingly aware of its downside. And the sentiment against growth will accelerate as population pressures diminish what was once a paradise. More and more residents will wish for a magical growth repellent that does for Florida what birth control is doing for the developing world: saving its future.
Forget the magic potion. What's needed is the political fortitude to enact policies that no longer encourage growth and that more effectively contain what's already here.
Such policies would include higher impact fees and tax reform. They would include stricter limits on how and where housing is built, how water is used and how waste is disposed of. They would take into account the cumulative impact of people on the environment. They would insist on sufficient greenspace, reduce dependence on cars and roads, demand cleaner power plants and contain growth to already urbanized areas. They would make Florida's borders less porous to illegal aliens, and make sure that legal immigration does not exceed what the state can accommodate.
They would, in short, make life here more restrictive and more expensive, for newcomers and current residents. They could force painful conflicts between immigration pressures and the nation's humanitarian obligations. And they could unpredictably change Florida's economic picture.
Reforms gaining political support
In the past, the state has refused to swallow such tough medicines. But reforms become more palatable when tied to self-preservation.
Sarasota County commissioners seemed to reflect that notion last week when they signed a proclamation recognizing Oct. 17-23 as "Florida Overpopulation Awareness Week." The resolution notes that growth has overstretched resources, and it "acknowledges that there are limits to growth that must be recognized and addressed."
The board's willingness to sign such a proclamation, put forth by Floridians for a Sustainable Population, suggests that overpopulation concerns are achieving critical mass with voters.
This week is an appropriate time to intensify the dialogue on this crucial issue. Awareness is rising, but what about the political will? That remains to be seen.
© Copyright 1999 The Sarasota Herald-Tribune
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