COMMENTARY

MILT THOMAS

Please raise your hand if you will benefit from the now approved Oslo Boat Ramp remake?

Okay, now raise your hand if the think it’s a bad idea?

I thought so.

You would think a boat ramp project in one of the fragile areas of the already fragile Indian River Lagoon would be the worst idea since thalidomide, but that does not seem to matter to a few local businessmen, some officials in Tallahassee and the entire county commission. It reminds me of the early days when we were told cigarettes might cause cancer. It took a monumental anti-smoking campaign before the connection reached critical mass and people stopped smoking in significant numbers. Also the increasing number of provable deaths from cigarette smoking helped convince Americans smoking was not all it was lit up to be.

So here we are, worried about the future of the Indian River Lagoon, a centerpiece of our quality of life, and all the scientific evidence is in that we are slowly strangling it, yet the people we elect feel there’s room for one more boat ramp in the increasingly still waters.

It will be interesting to see how fast the Oslo ramp project is actually completed, now that a judge has ruled against science and a majority of Indian River County residents. Once completed, who will benefit the most from the project? It will become apparent as time goes on and it may reach a point where this action was the lagoon’s death knell. Of course, there’s always the chance life will go on above and below the lagoon’s surface and all the controversy will be forgotten. Wasn’t that what the cigarette companies hoped would happen once the connection between smoking and cancer was established?