Take Action: Protect Florida's Emerald Coast

Protect Florida's Emerald Coast

Urge the Bush administration to perform a complete environmental study of the impacts of a proposed new airport in the Emerald Coast's sensitive wetlands habitat.

Chief Lawrence Evans, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers

Dear Mr. Evans,

(Edit Letter Below)

I strongly urge you to perform a complete environmental review of the proposal to build a new airport at the West Bay site in Bay County. This process must include a public hearing for citizens to comment on the Army Corps of Engineers' proposal to issue a Clean Water Act permit to the Panama City-Bay County Airport Authority that would allow wetlands and streams to be destroyed.

There are less environmentally damaging alternatives to building a new airport at the West Bay site, yet the Corps has not met its obligation to analyze the full range of options. Instead, the Corps defined the purpose of the project narrowly to eliminate all alternatives to the airport authority's proposal, without evaluating their environmental impacts.

At the same time, I am concerned that the Corps' analysis examined only a fraction of the harmful environmental impacts of the first phase of the airport's construction, but considered a 50-year mitigation plan that is intended to compensate for the environmental harm of the entire building process. The Corps' analysis must evaluate the full impacts of losing 2,000 acres of wetlands for the airport footprint and sacrificing more than 7,000 acres of wetlands surrounding the airport site to secondary development. The proposal would eliminate more than 300 acres of flood surge protection and bury more than four miles of natural streams.

Again, I request that you examine the full impacts of the proposal for the new airport and hold a public hearing so that citizens can comment.

Sincerely,
[Your name]
[Your address]

Sincerely,

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