South Florida Water Management District

Rick Scott Touring Palm Beach County Today

Tropical Storm Isaac might be gone and Palm Beach might be a little drier... but it's about to get creepier! But in a good way. Maybe. Hopefully. Gov. Rick Scott is in town, armed with FEMA, a helicopter, and a smile. Isaac left a big heaping mess in Palm Beach County over the weekend, and now i ... More >>

Hungry Hungry Pythons Decimate Mammal Populations in Everglades

​It's no secret that Burmese pythons have been wreaking havoc in the Everglades, but the extent of their destruction has been hard to grasp. A new study provides some of the first hard statistics on how these invasive reptiles are altering the food chain, and the numbers are downright scary.Betwee ... More >>

Gov. Scott Presents Plan for Everglades Restoration -- Meaning More Engineering

​The Everglades is too far gone for anyone to let it take its natural course. South Florida's entire inland economy depends on a water system that stays around the same level all year long, avoids flooding communities (cough, Weston, cough) that are stupidly built in the natural flow of water from ... More >>

South Florida Environmentalists Say Sale of Any Water District Lands Is a Dumb Idea

U.S. Fish & Wildlife ServiceDear humans, Get off my land. Love, this panther​The South Florida agency charged with securing water -- the stuff that makes your shampoo foamy -- for future generations has been having a tough time lately.Rick Scott and the GOP-led Legislature capped property taxe ... More >>

William Stewart: Second Person This Week to Be Caught Mid-Download on Alleged Child Porn

Palm Beach County Sheriff's OfficeWilliam Kenneth Stewart, wearing what appears to be a South Florida Water Management District shirt.​For the second time this week, cops served a warrant on a child-pornography suspect and allegedly found pictures and videos of naked kids mid-download on their com ... More >>

Huizenga CFO on Water Management Board; Does This Have Anything to Do With Yachts?

Flickr user: totalAldoHuizenga is building a megayacht center in Riviera Beach.​Rick Scott's decision to appoint a pro-business corporate executive to the South Florida Water Management District's governing board is not exactly stunning. This is the governor, after all, who declared Florida "open ... More >>

A Tour of Gov. Rick Scott's Dirtiest Deeds

Rick Scott's Dirty Deeds That Didn't Make Top 12 List

​This week's New Times cover story, "Enemy of the State," details the dozen worst accomplishments from Gov. Rick Scott's first six months in office. Unsurprisingly, there were plenty of dirty deeds that didn't make the list. Here are a few of the highlights:1. Following a property-tax-cutting prop ... More >>

Rick Scott's Quiet Campaign Against the Environment

Parks and trees? Who needs 'em!​Remember the environmental apocalypse Rick Scott was supposed to create?While campaigning for governor, Scott called the Department of Community Affairs, the state agency charged with overseeing local development projects, a "jobs killer." He said he'd heard complai ... More >>

Florida Wildlife Commission: Be on the Lookout for Freak Seven-Foot Lizards

U.S. Geological SurveyThis is a Nile Monitor lizard, which you should not wrestle​If you see a seven-foot lizard in your Broward or Palm Beach residence, that's a problem, according to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.Nile Monitor lizards, native to Africa, have been popping u ... More >>

Rick Scott Appoints Businessman With History of Everglades Pollution to Board That's Supposed to Keep it Safe

Smokestacks similar to this one spewed some nasty stuff under Portuondo's reign at Montenay.​If there was any question whether Florida Gov. Rick Scott favored business over the environment, this week he ended the debate. Scott appointed a businessman with a history of environmental problems to ove ... More >>

Burmese Pythons Not Going Anywhere

Courtesy, AP/Everglades Nat'l Park​At left, you'll find the single most interesting picture taken in Florida in the last five years. (Other than this one, I mean.) Pictured is a 13-foot Burmese Python which has bitten off more than it can chew -- except the python has dispensed with the biting, an ... More >>

Warren Newell and Tony Masilotti, Out of Prison and Crying Innocent

Warren Newell wants his conviction tossed.​There's nothing quite so heartwarming as a convicted political felon crying foul and asking for his hard-earned bribes back. Two former Palm Beach County commissioners are fighting that fight, and their chutzpah is admirable.Warren Newell and Tony Masilot ... More >>

Rick Scott Property Tax Calculator Ignores Small Fact: Florida Law

​GOP candidate for governor Rick Scott released this pretty snazzy new website on Friday: It's a property tax calculator that figures out a Floridian's tax if Scott gets elected versus Democratic opponent Alex Sink. There's just one problem with his site: It ignores the Florida Constitution.Scott' ... More >>

Controversial Herbicide Atrazine Will be Used Through At Least September

Flickr: Loz FlowersSugar Cane Atrazine = BFF?​Farmers equate saying goodbye to atrazine to depleting Floridian agriculture. But a growing number of scientists believe atrazine, an herbicide widely used to remove weeds and promote the growth of cash-crop sugar cane, may cause cancer and birth def ... More >>

Did Friendship Cost a Young Scott Rothstein Lawyer Her Life?

Pompano City Manager Making Changes Following Corruption Charge Against City Official

Photo: City of Pompano BeachDennis Beach​Dennis Beach, city manager of Pompano Beach, wants to put prospective volunteers through a more rigorous training course before allowing them to volunteer on city committees. He hopes that it will help to prevent arrests like the one that occurred Monday, w ... More >>

Harvey Oyer, the Lawyer Who Inked Deals That Put a Politician in Prison, Still Walks Free

The Rise and Fall of South Florida's Daily Newspapers

On the Hunt for Exotic Lizards in the Florida Everglades

The Dirty Dozen of 2008

If only we could fit all the bums in...

Morning Juice: Kids Forced to Buy Beer at Gas Stations, Rare Woman with Two Homes Found, Box Home Better Than Condo

Banned from Clubs, Kids Buy Beer Again in front of HessPalm Beach County has made it illegal for anybody under 21 to get into alcohol-serving night clubs. Now I know what you're probably saying, "Get your hands off my Bud Lite Lime, old man." But this new ordinance passed yesterday is actually good ... More >>

Residents of a Davie trailer park think their contaminated water made them sick

Crist's Secrecy Prompts Suit

River of Greed, Part 2

When it comes to the Broward School Board, bad plans never really die

River of Greed

The plan includes playing footsie with a controversial land baron and paving over a piece of the Everglades

Did John Gotti Do Anything Right?

Attack of the Killer Weed

Can a hardy little moth stop the fern that wants to eat the Everglades?

Best Power Couple

Mary and Kevin McCarty

Scripps...Shut Up!

Why don't Jeb Bush's men want us to know about Scripps?

Bitter Sugar

Forget the awful past, Palm Beach's sugar barons say. It's time to make nicey-nicey and go into real estate.

Don't Drink the Water

A deceptive city manager. A Machiavellian administrator. An incompetent lab director. Are the Pompano taps to be trusted?

For the Birds

Should 2700 little sparrows be allowed to hold up the reclaiming of the Everglades?

Best Place to Canoe

Loxahatchee River Canoe Outfitters

West of Eden

On a ranch that's almost the Everglades, the Weekley family has built an unlikely empire

A Defanged Doppelgänger

SoFla's sci-fi fans once had a place to call home. Now they're nomadic, dwindling in numbers, and graying.

The Glades Trade

The state has a big job in trying to save the Everglades. Question is, Does it know what it's doing?

Party on the Playa

Eighth Annual Hollywood Beach Latin Festival

Deep Roots

The wide and welcoming branches of the baobab beckon our humble scribe

Take It to the Ribbit

Old-school frogger Norman Padgett may be the last of a dying breed: He makes a living off our slimy, fly-eating friends

The Joy of Sect

For members of Soka Gakkai, the path to enlightenment (and maybe a new car) is through chanting

Postcards From the Edge

Peace and quiet, great fishing, tax-free land. Welcome to the Everglades, where "hunt camps" are enjoying a new lease on life.

Postcards From the Edge

Peace and quiet, great fishing, tax-free land. Welcome to the Everglades, where "hunt camps" are enjoying a new lease on life.

A Natural Alliance

Buck Island Ranch is home to the threatened caracara, and it's a laboratory where ranchers and conservationists are learning to work together

A Tree Hugger Turned Tree Hater

Determined to save his beloved Everglades, Chris Murch has become a melaleuca hit man

Best Scenic Drive

Fort Lauderdale to Lake Okeechobee by levee

Best Freshwater Fishing

Everglades Holiday Park

Undercurrents

Demon Seed

Patient Zero in the melaleuca plague is hiding out in plain sight in Davie

The Hunted

Tracking animals in the Everglades is a tiring, maddening business. Which is just how a decreasing number of hunters like it.