We don't mean to carp about the pioneering efforts of the Florida Keys Carrying Capacity Study in its early stages, but the study model unveiled two weeks ago doesn't appear to consider a number of pesky problems. 

All of us in the Keys hoped that the $6 million study, undertaken by Florida Department of Community Affairs and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, due June of 2002, would be an easily read road map for making decisions about the Keys' future. Something of broad scope and unambiguous.

The goal of the study, as iterated by a consultant at the rollout, is to "determine the ability of the Florida Keys ecosystem to withstand all the impacts of land development." Project leader Richard Calvo said, "We will not say the carrying capacity is 'x' number of people, but define the framework of that capacity in terms of natural resources and hurricane evacuation."

But wait, that's not what the DCA's and Corps' initial brochure said in describing the project. The goal then was to determine the impacts of land development on the environment "while addressing the economy, quality of life and community values and expectation... the study will consider the social environment with regard to such issues as sustainable tourism and human infrastructure..." 

Where in the model do we find a section on the economy or quality of life or community expectations? Have we narrowed the contract that dramatically? Is it half what it started out so boldly to be? 

We are reliably informed that there will be a fresh water component, but we haven't seen it yet. The availability of potable water is certainly a limiting factor in Keys' growth and we will continue to fight Miami/Dade for water rights from the Biscayne Aquifer, and Miami/Dade will win. No contest.

Where is the economic model and where is the visual and scenic component? At present, the study's purpose seems to lean heavily toward answering the question, "What is absolute rock bottom? At what precise point, as modeled by computer, will one more carport or one more person cause the county to sink?"

We would much rather see the study lean the other way. That is, how will particular developments impact the recovery of those resources identified in the Year 2010 Comp Plan as already over their carrying capacity, including near shore waters, sea grasses and hurricane evacuation. We would add a quickly dying and overstressed reef. Let the study tell us how to recover not how much more damage we can do. 

It may well be that the economic impacts should not be part of the study, or that time, deadline and pragmatism show that quality of life can't be quantified and modeled. If that's it, someone from DCA or the Corps should say so. Make our expectations coincide with reality. 

Beyond lowered expectations, we have a few quibbles. According to Diane Barile, a member of the water study group who teaches Coastal Zone Management at the Florida Institute of Technology in Melbourne, no scientist in the group is wholly happy with the data they were using. They found important gaps in the information they had to work with, or felt they were accepting data that was unquestioned. For instance, in wastewater parlance a deep injection well means 3,000 feet or so deep, pumping the water into the boulder zone. In Keys wastewater studies, deep injection means 60 to 90 feet, a standard adopted by the consultants. The argument is that somewhere between 60 and 90 feet there is a mud layer that acts as an aquaclude, a barrier to stop the effluent from rising back to the surface. The hitch is that some geologists believe the mud layer exists only near two Keys. So what's the reality? We can't get helpful results predicated on bad information and bad assumptions.

The health of Florida Bay is one of the defining issues for us; we are islanders and water is our treasure. We live and play on it and it drives our economy. That is reflected in the carrying capacity study, in which water quality is integral. 

The problem we see, as pointed out by several members of the water study committee, is that the northern boundary of the study area in Florida Bay runs east and west about halfway between Key West and the mainland. How can we model a recovery of half of Florida Bay without knowing what's flowing into it? Nothing in the capacity study ties the Keys waters into the millions and millions of acre-feet of wastewater draining into them from the mainland's urban and agricultural areas. 

Yes, we understand that any northern boundary line would be arbitrary, since the Florida watershed starts near Orlando, but to disconnect the bottom half of the bay from its drainage basin appears to miss the point. 

The good news about the carrying capacity study is that it has good and dedicated people involved who are seriously concerned about the health of the Keys and sincerely want what they produce to be of true benefit. Plus, the process is not rigid, it is adaptive. New information can change it. This is new science, going where no one has gone before, the first study of its kind. We are thankful for the help, and we understand that not everything lends itself to being quantified. 

As Diane Barile says, carrying capacity is like pornography; you may not be able to define it, but you know it when you see it. 

Read All About It 

Apropos of the above, and fresh water restrictions, we have a modest proposal. Why not a brochure fully and truthfully explaining the ecology of the Keys with particular emphasis on our water, both salt and fresh, where it comes from and where it goes, and why it is like gold to us? We could also brag a bit about our determination to live in peace with the environment and about the various initiatives we have undertaken in that quest, some of which are quite pioneering and even interesting. The brochure could be distributed to everyone checking into a local lodging and at waters ports outlets. 

It would lend credence and substance to our pitch for eco-tourism. Surely the capacity study has room in its $6 million budget for such a teaching aide.

D.E.