I read with great interest the story on the U.S. Sugar project in Hendry County in Thursday's edition of the Palm Beach Post.
While I mostly agree with the editorial ("Dont rush decision on U.S. Sugar-Hendry County sector plan"), I want to share with my fellow Floridians a few facts that never seem to be discussed in public but are well-known to us here in the Glades region.
In 2008 when Gov. Charlie Crist spent a large chunk of the public's change to purchase some of U. S. Sugar Corp. (USSC) land , he only had to wait a short time and he would have spent pennies on the dollar. U.S. Sugar was going bankrupt. Charlie could have bought those parcels on the courthouse steps.
We here in the Glades region knew this and we knew there were other parties interested in purchasing all or part of U.S. Sugar that had the potential of creating new jobs. Instead, Gov. Crist bailed them out under the ruse of saving the Everglades.
It was a win-win situation for USSC. They got the money and still got to farm their land. Hey, hats off to them for pulling that one off! Business is business, right ? The environmental groups would have made a deal with the devil to "save" the Everglades. Poor Charlie just wanted to be a senator.
Now imagine our shock when a political ad pops up on TV blaming Gov. Rick Scott for bailing out sugar. Right now, that is a bold-faced lie.
However, if Gov. Scott does approve USSC's land-use proposal, he is in the same boat with Charlie Crist. Both -- not just Charlie -- would become high-priced prostitutes for not only U.S. Sugar Corp. but for any other business with a large pocketbook. The citizens of the state of Florida deserve better from our leaders. It's our fault, we need to demand better.
The cities of Pahokee, Belle Glade, South Bay, Clewiston and Moore Haven are located at the southern end of Lake Okeechobee. We are spread across Palm Beach, Hendry and Glades counties. The reason we were originally settled was for agriculture.
However, we are not synonymous with sugar. To judge us that way is not only narrow-minded, but shows a lack of knowledge of an area that puts a lot of food on the table. Also, U.S Sugar Corp. is not the whole sugar industry, either in what it's doing now or in the decisions it has made in the past. To fail to make that distinction is not fair to the rest of the industry.
We here in the Glades are under attack by those who see us as the sole cause of the environmental issues facing the St. Lucie River, Indian River Lagoon and the Everglades.
Nothing would make the affluent residents of the Treasure Coast happier in their million-dollar homes on the Intracoastal Waterway than to see us flooded out while they sit on their toilets connected to 250,000 septic tanks that feed the toxic blue-green algae they blame us for. I say again, when they deal with their septic tanks, they can talk to us about water flowing south.
J.P. Sasser is a four-term former mayor and lifelong resident of Pahokee, Fla.
