Give an environmentalist enough money and the incentive to make more, and watch how fast he dumps those pure principles he professes.
I've written about the hypocrisy of wealthy environmentalists before. Read "Paul Tudor Jones: Pot Calling the Kettle Polluter". Unfortunately, here we go again. Another Everglades Foundation board member who wants us to do as he says, not as he does.
It gives me no pleasure to repeat the "outing" of "the Golden Bear," a Florida legend and in my opinion the greatest golfer of all time.
But the last time I heard him talk, some years ago at a dinner in Martin County, Nicklaus wasn't talking golf, he was slamming "the greedy corporations" that would destroy our natural Florida. He was proud, he said, to call himself an environmentalist. (This is a theme that plays particularly well in well-heeled Treasure Coast neighborhoods.)
Indeed, the Golden Bear, with singer Jimmy Buffett, has been the major celebrity face of The Everglades Foundation since wealthy Orlando developer George Barley and billionaire Paul Tudor Jones founded it in 1993. In fact, in 2015 Nicklaus and his wife Barbara were among the "chairmen" of the Everglades Foundation's 10th Annual ForEverglades Benefit.
Turns out he wasn't as committed to environmentalism as we all thought.
Nicklaus -- these days a golf course community developer of some substance -- landed himself in a legal pickle with the U.S. Department of Justice. The federal agency is suing four of his companies for unauthorized construction work on wetlands at The Bear’s Club, a 369-acre private golf course community in Jupiter that he co-developed.
Plainly put, in 2010 the golf legend filled in almost an acre of wetlands so he could relocate a tee box, fix the "soggy feel" around the 15th hole and make room for the development of five residential lots.
In case you missed it, in a story published Feb. 8, FloridaBulldog.org claims Nicklaus needed permission from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, didn't get it, in fact pooh-poohed the Corps’ denial to modify the original building permit, "which included an easement agreement to set aside several acres as protected wetlands."
Federal prosecutors contend the wetlands fill-in had a profit motive. (You think?) The initiation fee for a golf membership at The Bear’s Club is $90,000 and the annual fee is $25,000. Can't have VIP players standing around in the mud -- screw the Clean Water Act, screw the conditions of his permit.
Oddly, "environmentalist" Nicklaus isn't going public with an apology. Beloved icon that he is, a mea culpa and paying the fine probably would have gotten him off the hook with most folks. But no. Instead, Eugene Stearns, the Miami lawyer for Nicklaus and his partners claims it's all, well, no big deal.
“The tee box required building a pad on a relatively small piece of wetlands,” Stearns told FloridaBulldog.org in an interview. “The change near the 15th hole was a result of people hitting balls into the area that would get really muddy when it rained. If you go out there, you’ll see the wetland area is still very beautiful.”
I can't help but wonder what the Martin County commissioners, who define glorified mud puddles as protected wetlands, would do if Nicklaus & Friends filled in an acre of wetlands so people on a golf course wouldn't get their wet feet.
To repeat: When I said environmental hypocrisy is nothing new, believe me, it isn't. Read the Paul Tudor Jones story cited above and you'll see what I mean.
To make a long story short, the Everglades Foundation chairman and benefactor was once slapped with a $2 million fine for destroying wetlands.
It happened in the 1990s while Jones was building his $30 million "wildlife preserve" on Maryland's Eastern Shore. (Actually, it was a private hunting club, but when you're worth $3.3 billion, you can call it a botanical garden with a cranberry bog and a beanstalk if you want, who's going to argue?)
Paul Tudor Jones isn't the only rich environmentalist who can't see The Cause when his personal interest is at stake. In the same story I wrote about 1000 Friends of Florida founder Nathaniel Reed -- keeper of the family land development business. Despite environmentalist creds up the wazoo, Reed thought it was OK to prune the mangroves at his Jupiter Island Golf Course in violation of two state rules. For each offense, or for illegally trimming the mangroves, Reed could have been fined up to $10,000 a day. But he wasn't.
Reed never paid a dime. Broke the law, got the law changed to have his own way, came out smelling like a rose.
The Reed decision led to the 1995 Mangrove Trimming and Preservation Act. It substantially changed Florida's mangrove protection statutes, reducing the paperwork and permitting required to trim these coast-protecting trees.
So what if it weakened mangrove protection in Florida, Reed is an "environmentalist," isn't he? And he said it was all right.
The point is, Jack Nicklaus is only the latest in a long line of moneyed enviros to speak out of both sides of their mouths. On the other hand, like Jones and Reed, he has money and celebrity, and I'll betcha his environmentalist pals at the Everglades Foundation have already forgiven him.
Reach Nancy Smith at nsmith@sunshinestatenews.com or at 228-282-2423. Twitter: @NancyLBSmith
