After much wrangling over permit violations between St. Lucie County and the Florida Department of Environmental Protection over last year’s disastrous St. Lucie County beach replenishment, county officials have proposed to replace the rock-and-clay strewn land-based fill in question with a material more compatible with natural beach sand.

The county’s proposal—which entails removing what’s left of the original 30,000 cubic yards of rocky fill that originated from a landfill—is being reviewed by the state. However, the contactor Dickerson Florida (which laid out the original material) has told St. Lucie County that the work would be contingent on reassurances that the county will “compensate Dickerson for the anticipated $300,000 additional costs.”

That’s $300,000 that taxpayers (the great majority of whom do not own property foolishly located in harm’s way on a barrier island) will have to fork over. And over and over, in fact, every time storm waves batter the beach and beachside condominiums and homesites. Maybe it’s time that Florida wakes up and realizes that shoreline retreat is the only solution that will once and for all preserve Florida’s natural beaches, and keep folks out of harm’s way.

FS