A Washington, D.C., group says it wants to establish a fund to restore Florida seagrass meadows damaged by boaters and coastal construction projects.
The Ocean Foundation has proposed a mitigation fund that public agencies or private developers building bridges, marinas and other coastal projects would pay into for restoration of affected marine habitats, The Miami Herald reported Saturday.
Florida has 2 million acres of seagrass, down from 5 million in the 1950s, the newspaper said.
But opponents of the SeaGrassGrow program say such funds do more harm than good, and that the foundation has no track record of successfully restoring seagrass.
"I'm not against mitigation . . . but this type of restoration doesn't make ecological sense,'' said Roy Lewis, president of the non-profit Coastal Resources Group.
Lewis says the best way to fix seagrass damage is to let scars heal themselves naturally and keep boats out of affected areas.
"The money should be spent putting up more channel markers, especially in (areas) that are tough to navigate,'' Lewis said.
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