Thursday, September 30, 2021

"Missed message": Ignoring Cortada’s message as the current mayor once again misses the importance of going native – a Wildflower Meadow could have been planted, but we get – instead - another wasteful grass lawn

Pallets of sod on 136 Street
What a wasted opportunity! And this is what happens when you leave out creative minds and input from those concerned with the environment.

Truly a missed opportunity. Palmetto Bay could have — no, should have —planted for pollinators and established a Wildflower Meadow habitat for our local birds, bees and butterflies. But this takes thought, and concern for our environment. Once again, this project was never brought out for a public discussion. No public disclosure of the alleged landscaping plan.

Instead, sod was delivered to the SW 136th Street MEGA sidewalk Shared Path project on Wed. 9/29/2021. Please tell me that this is a joke, that SW 136 street is not actually receiving a planting of non-native grass as the replanting of greenspace lost to the MEGA sidewalk. 

This is not an environmentally friendly landscaping plan. Instead, it is a waste of lawn that will require fertilizer and watering - something that a village should avoid if it truly wants to be green. 

Instead, this mayor and council missed the message put out by the recent art piece installed by local artist Xavier Cortada - the message of Cortada's  "Flower Force" public art sculpture should have inspired this mayor and council to follow the LEED /sustainability statement and plant native Coreopsis wildflowers (the official State of Florida wildflower) rather than a high maintenance lawn. The native coreopsis wildflower is a Florida native. It is no maintenance and drought tolerant.

What a loss. A Wildflower Meadow might have improved this bland cement mega sidewalk. Seriously, what would have looked nicer, a Wildflower Meadow or grass? Another opportunity to improve our native environment is lost. We could have involved our local students in a planting project. Bringing volunteerism back to Palmetto Bay and continued to develop a sense of environmental steward ship, but instead, opportunity lost.

A wildflower meadow may have really tied SW 13th Street together.
It certainly would have been nicer than plain high maintenance St. Augustine lawn!

Oh, and just an aside, small landscaping trees are currently being planted. I have two observations here: First that these trees are small, not making up for the canopy of the mature trees lost to the cementing of SW 136 Street. Secondly, these trees are being planted on the Pinecrest side.

Yes, that's right, Pinecrest gets more trees and green while Palmetto Bay gets cemented over.

But then again, this mayor and council proceeded on this project on their own without public input or input from the Tree Board or Palmetto Bay Garden Club. The Palmetto Bay Garden Club would have been an excellent resource both for sustainability as well as creativity. 

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