Florida’s beach problem is making its way to Massachusetts. Backers of influential beachfront property owners plug it as “beach nourishment,” but most fishermen, surfers and environmentalists recognize it for what it is—dredge-and-fill projects. Whatever you call it, it’s becoming more prevalent in the news.

Down in South Florida, the Surfrider and Snook foundations filed suit against a Town of Palm Beach proposal to bury at least 7 acres of hard-bottom and coral habitat in the name of so-called “beach nourishment.”

Terry Gibson, a member of the Surfrider Foundation and plaintiff in the Palm Beach suit, is immersed in the continual beach-fill projects off Florida’s coast.

“First off, erosion isn’t a problem for beaches, just for buildings. And in most cases, the sediment they’re dredging up is clustered mud, not sand,” he said in an interview with Surfer magazine. “Several of Florida’s top geologists are bothered that the Corps and the dredge lobby call this stuff ‘sand,’ much less these massive dredge-and-fill projects ‘nourishments.’”

In New Jersey, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers released a cost-analysis report to determine the best course of action to remove discarded military munitions pumped onto the public beaches of Surf City and Ship Bottom as part of a beach-fill project.

Now, a special interest group, the Siasconset Beach Preservation Fund, is spearheading a private campaign to fill up to three miles of Sconset Beach on Nantucket's east shore with offshore bottom. The area may spread from the Sankaty Lighthouse to Sesachacha Pond. According to the group, the Sconset project will require at least 1.5 million cubic yards of fill and need to be re-filled at least every 5 to 7 years.

Outcry against the project was immediate. The Web site, www.BagtheBluff.com, was started to voice the concerns of those who couldn’t be heard over moneyed stakeholders involved in the project.

Some immediate concerns include the detrimental effects of fill dumped onto the beach, the degradation of offshore shoals if certain “borrow sites” are picked for dredging, damage to the environment, and the possibility of a dynamic striper fishery disappearing.

Geologists have made it clear, beach-fill projects do not stop naturally occurring erosion, it only slows the process. And “re-nourished” beaches and area waters often become “dead zones” without life such as invertebrates, fish and birds.

One advocate went as far as to videotape the bottom structure off Sankaty Lighthouse to show exactly what environment might be covered over. It included lush mussel and clam beds, as well as schools of spawner-size stripers.