If you have ever had a desire to see the Florida Keys the way Ernest Hemingway did, you might want to take that trip before they become little more than polluted islands in the oil stream that’s pouring out of the Gulf of Mexico.
BP said on Monday its plan to siphon oil through a mile-long pipe in the Gulf of Mexico is working, pumping more than 1,000 barrels–42,000 gallons–of crude oil a day into a tanker ship. But it may be too little, too late; one edge of the oil slick is inching closer to a powerful ocean current that could paint our coastline black.
While we are happy to hear one of BP’s plans is not failing miserably, we are more interested in the company’s plan for cleaning the Florida coastlines on its dime, or if BP even has a plan. BP is only responsible for the first $75 million in indirect damages, with the rest coming out of a $1.6 billion trust fund that oil companies pay into through a small per-barrel tax.
Florida has one of the strongest tourist economies in the world, with millions of visitors bringing the state more than $60 billion in revenue a year. If our beaches get covered in oil, it could mean billions in damages and thousands of layoffs among the nearly one million people who work in Florida’s tourism industry. That trust fund is simply not enough.
The spill would also devalue expensive coastline property, leaving the state with less property tax revenue during already tough times. We could end up losing even more programs than we have in the past few years if Florida has another budget shortfall.
If it were up to us, BP would take the $6 billion in profits it has already made in 2010 and save our coasts.
