South Miami Mayor Phillip Stoddard has an idea on how to deal with elected officials who deny climate change's existence: build a “tower of shame” with each of their names on it.
"And starting at the bottom, at sea level, we inscribe the name and elected offices of every federal and state-level elected official in Florida who failed to commit significant resources to address climate change and sea level rise when they had the chance to do so,” he said Wednesday.
Stoddard, who was of course being facetious, spoke during a conference call in which environmental advocates called out the two dozen top officials throughout the U.S. — including three attorneys general and, of course, our own governor, Rick Scott — who openly deny that climate change is real.
Hell, ours even banned state officials from using the term.
Kristen Ellingboe, a senior researcher with the Center for American Progress, mentioned Kentucky Governor Matt Bevin by name for calling the phenomenon “a lot of fluff and theory,” and noted that, while many state attorneys general don't explicitly deny climate change, more than half are suing the federal government over its unprecedented Clean Power Plan, which would require the reduction of carbon dioxide emissions to pre-2005 levels.
As you might guess, Florida is one of those states.
Nearly all of the 21 climate change-denying governors are Republican, except for one, West Virginia's Early Ray Tomblin, a Democrat.
She said she and her colleagues also found another interesting correlation among those who don't buy what an overwhelming majority of scientists agree on.
“We found that governors and attorneys general who are actively working to block action on climate change, so that includes the ones that are working against the Clean Power Plan, have received more than $23.8 million in dirty energy contributions," she said.
Interesting? Yes.
Unexpected? No.
But Stoddard argued that the shortsightedness over climate change is costing precious time and resources, and if money is their concern, politicians in places like Florida need to think beyond their term limits.
“The two biggest elements of our economy down here are tourism and trade," he said. "They are both threatened by sea level rise. People come to South Florida for our beaches, but our beaches are washing away. We do huge business with South America, but our Warehouse District is going to be flooded in 30 years, and I can't get anybody to do a thing to protect it.”
Areas of South Florida have been seeing more regular incidences of extreme flooding, and climate scientists estimate much of the area will be permanently underwater by 2100. Stoddard acknowledged that it's nearly impossible to quantify the costs of protecting vulnerable areas against the impacts of sea-level rise and other associated symptoms of climate change, especially when such a gradual yet dramatic change is hard for many to grasp.
“It's hard to wrap your head around the idea that land isn't permanent," he said. "And it's taking people time to adjust.”
But build a tower, we can.
This article appears in May 5-11, 2016.