Florida's Battle of the Swamp

In the East Everglades, homesteaders and officials square off

After he retired from his road-paving business in Miami, Russell Carter, 63, acted on a lifelong dream. On five acres of sparsely settled land 20 miles west of the city, he set up a rural retreat, built a ranch house, landscaped the plot around it and stocked four new fresh-water ponds with fish. Ever since, Carter has been in deep trouble.

So have many of his neighbors. Jo Ann Kirkland, 42, was arrested and taken away in handcuffs. When a pesky bureaucrat called on Tom Cartier, 41, a retired nuclear reactor construction worker, he tossed the official into a pond where his pet alligator Pocketbook holes up (the man was unharmed). Vows Cartier: "I won't be threatened on my property."

The eye of this Southern squall is a 242-sq.-mi. area at the tip of the Florida peninsula known as the East Everglades. Like Everglades National Park, just to the west, it is still unspoiled, filled with palmettos and sawgrass, marshes and wildlife. And that is the problem. Eager to escape Florida's crowded, condo-filled coast, the homesteaders have picked one of the state's most ecologically fragile regions, essential to the environmental well-being of all of South Florida.

Much of the peninsula was once a great natural sponge of swamps, marshes and flood land that trapped and filtered fresh water. But to clear the way for development, as well as to control floods, these wetlands have been largely drained away. This has not only threatened the quality of surface water but also cut off its flow into underlying aquifers, the porous rock formations that serve as subterranean reservoirs.

Today very little untouched wetland remains, especially in Dade and Broward counties. They get much of their water from a formation called the Biscayne Aquifer, extending from Miami on the east to the Everglades on the west. But heavily populated Miami and its environs draw so much water that the water table is rapidly falling, permitting sea water to seep into the aquifer. Only in the Everglades, where the land over the aquifer is still unpaved, can this reservoir be effectively resupplied. To make matters worse, Florida has been suffering through a decade of sparse rainfall, which has dried up many swamps, at least temporarily. This year the drought is so severe that Governor Bob Graham declared South Florida a disaster area and approved plans for $450,000 worth of cloud seeding.

In spite of the East Everglades' ecological importance, government agencies took little notice of the new settlers until a real estate boom was well under way. Now at least 600 people live in the area. Most bought their property before 1978, when the Environmental Protection Agency began a $1.2 million East Everglades study that became part of a national wetlands preservation program. Many put up dwellings without building permits. Those who dug water holes rarely bothered to tell the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which supervises wetland areas. When officials finally served summonses and cease-and-desist orders, some were run off at gunpoint.

Under current zoning laws, one house is permitted on five acres. But government scientists have urged raising the zoning requirement to one house on 40 acres. They argue that if the population is allowed to rise, the residents will clamor for flood-control drainage canals, thus further reducing the area's ability to clean and store water. Beyond this, environmentalists point out, development will imperil the East Everglades as a feeding and breeding ground for wildlife in the neighboring national park, home of such endangered species as the Cape Sable sparrow and the Florida panther.

Dade County's board of commissioners is about to consider the zoning change. But the residents, who are already suing the county to save their homesteads, contend that the land is no longer a true wetland. They are determined to fight for every square inch. As one told County Planner Sam Poole, "If we don't get justice through the courts we'll get it with our guns."

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