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Gov. DeSantis Appoints Sanibel Native to South Florida Water Management District

Rachel Iacovone
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WGCU
Sanibel City Councilman Chauncey Goss addresses the crowd at the Rookery Bay Environmental Learning Center on Tuesday, Jan. 29.

Gov. Ron DeSantis gave a sneak peek at one of the most highly anticipated line items on the upcoming state budget recommendation on Tuesday during his visit to Southwest Florida. 

DeSantis’ press team only told media that the governor was going to make a “major announcement." But, his choice of venue — the Rookery Bay Environmental Learning Center in Naples — kind of gave it away.

“I have a couple of announcements. One will be about appointment,” DeSantis said. “One will be about budget.”

But, both were related to water.

Credit Rachel Iacovone / WGCU
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WGCU
Casey and Ron DeSantis at the Rookery Bay Educational Learning Center in Naples

As you may recall, DeSantis asked the entire South Florida Water Management board to step down in his first week in office. And, now, a few weeks later, DeSantis has appointed Sanibel native Chauncey Goss to fill one of the nine open seats.

“He served in senior roles in politics, in the U.S. House and White House, and he’s got an impressive professional resume,” DeSantis said. “But, he also has a clear record of supporting and serving Florida’s natural resources.”

Goss has served on the Lee County Coastal Advisory Council and worked with the Charlotte Harbor National Estuary Program. Right now, Goss is active with Captains for Clean Water, and he’s a city council member in Sanibel.

Credit Rachel Iacovone / WGCU
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WGCU
Goss tells the crowd what he's most looking forward to in his new position.

“We spoke about this about a year ago,” Goss said. “It was well before the election. It was well before the red tide. It was well before we lost a summer because of the blue green algae.”

What Goss and DeSantis had talked about was Florida’s water quality, which they both felt — and continue to feel — is in dire need of help.

Which brings us to the second part of the governor’s announcement.

“Okay, now, we’re going to talk about the budget,” DeSantis said. “We are having a historic $625 million for water resources projects, including Everglades restoration.”

Here are the highlights of that breakdown: the C43, C44 and EAA reservoirs are getting a collective $467 million; $150 million is going toward targeted water quality improvements, like septic conversions and nutrient pollution reduction; blue-green algae related line items are getting nearly $21 million; $1 million is going to the Department of Health to research the health impacts of algae exposure, and finally, $40 million is going toward raising Tamiami Trail to restore the southward flow of Lake Okeechobee at a rate of 900 million gallons a day.

DeSantis says this initial amount is only step one of four in his plan to reach the $2.5 billion he promised in his very first executive order.

Credit Rachel Iacovone / WGCU
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WGCU
DeSantis waves at the crowd, as he and his wife, Casey, walk up to the Rookery Bay Educational Learning Center.

Rachel Iacovone is a reporter and associate producer of Gulf Coast Live for WGCU News. Rachel came to WGCU as an intern in 2016, during the presidential race. She went on to cover Florida Gulf Coast University students at President Donald Trump's inauguration on Capitol Hill and Southwest Floridians in attendance at the following day's Women's March on Washington.Rachel was first contacted by WGCU when she was managing editor of FGCU's student-run media group, Eagle News. She helped take Eagle News from a weekly newspaper to a daily online publication with TV and radio branches within two years, winning the 2016 Society of Professional Journalists Mark of Excellence Award for Best Use of Multimedia in a cross-platform series she led for National Coming Out Day. She also won the Mark of Excellence Award for Feature Writing for her five-month coverage of an FGCU student's transition from male to female.As a WGCU reporter, she produced the first radio story in WGCU's Curious Gulf Coast project, which answered the question: Does SWFL Have More Cases of Pediatric Cancer?Rachel graduated from Florida Gulf Coast University with a bachelor's degree in journalism.