Dear Friend,, If you’ve got even half an eye on Florida’s fight for clean water, you already know the big story that emerged from the state’s annual legislative session was undoubtedly the sneak attack that was Senate Bill 2508. Introduced quietly on a Friday afternoon in February, SB 2508 quickly made waves throughout the environmental community and across Florida. The bill housed a litany of bad policy changes impacting Florida’s fragile environment and allowed for just one opportunity for public comment. Cue the justified outrage. Across the state, citizens rose up in a surge of unified opposition. Environmental groups including Friends of the Everglades joined fed-up Floridians — many of whom sacrificed valuable time and money — to make the trek to Tallahassee. Thousands of emails and phone calls flooded lawmakers’ inboxes in an effort to block this bad legislation that would undermine Florida's environmental protections and protect powerful industries — most notably Big Sugar. Gov. DeSantis himself blasted the Legislature for attempting to “short-circuit public engagement and leaving affected agencies in the dark.” There's one thing we're absolutely certain of: Citizen opposition made a difference. SB 2508 was ultimately amended to remove some of the worst provisions. The problem is, it’s still a really bad bill. And the Legislature approved it. As it stands, SB 2508 still poses risks to Florida’s fragile environment and threatens to undermine years of work to develop the new Lake Okeechobee System Operating Manual (LOSOM) that could help relieve communities from toxic discharges and harmful algae blooms. Moreover, provisions that would allow the Rural and Family Lands Protection Program to buy land outright — possibly competing with the Florida Forever land preservation program — remain in place. So does wording allowing public utilities such as FPL to pay the Florida Department of Environmental Protection to expedite the wetlands "dredge and fill" permitting process. But there is good news: Though the original introduction of SB 2508 as a budget-conforming bill previously tied the legislation to the entire budget, making a veto unlikely, amendments to the language have freed it from that constraint. Gov. DeSantis CAN and SHOULD veto SB 2508. The will of the people has been absolutely clear. The threats that remain in SB 2508, and the underhanded nature with which it was set in motion, further justify our unified opposition. As a VoteWater supporter, we’re asking you to send a message to Gov. DeSantis today. Ask him to stand with Floridians by vetoing SB 2508. There’s no good reason to let this bill become law. — Your friends at Friends of the Everglades | 
