An example of Florida wetlands. Credit: Julie Hauserman I watched some of the opening Olympic ceremonies last week for one simple reason: I had read that Florida has more athletes in Tokyo right now than any state besides California. And they’re not just there to get away from the smell of the red tide fish kills, either.
Floridians are competing in every sport from weightlifting to water polo. To my surprise, though, not one of them is involved in such traditional Florida sports as the drive-thru gator throw, the downhill machete chop, or the naked-as-a-jaybird fleeing and eluding.
Longtime Floridians spend years learning to master such challenging sports as worm-grunting, interstate mullet tossing, and the 50-yard dash across hot beach sand. Why those are not Olympic sports is a mystery I cannot comprehend.
If there’s any sport at which Floridians would consistently win gold, though, it’s got to be the Tallahassee Switcheroo.
You’ve never heard of it? Oh, sure you have. It’s a sport that’s been played for decades in the halls of the 22-story Tower of Power in our state capital. It’s sort of like a pole vault where you wind up facing the opposite way you were supposed to go. Pulling it off requires steady nerves, a smooth delivery, and a bit of stealth.
The Tampa Bay Times unearthed a prime example of the Tallahassee Switcheroo this week by taking a closer look at the widely acclaimed Florida Wildlife Corridor Act. This 1944 photo by Robert L. Stone shows Florida ranch land that is managed in much the same way today. Credit: Archives of Florida, Florida Memory. The measure, you may remember, calls for buying up lots of farm and ranch land, or purchasing the right to develop that land, thus keeping it undeveloped and open for the use of wildlife. The goal is to create statewide pathways for such wide-ranging critters as bears and Florida panthers, which also benefits plants and animals that stick to just that area. The land-use purchases can help struggling farmers and ranchers avoid having to sell their property to developers.
The act won bipartisan support in both the House and Senate, something that is about as common as a Florida trailer park coming through a Cat 4 hurricane unscathed.
The catch wasn’t in the bill itself. Finding the Tallahassee Switcheroo required the Times to scour the part of the state budget that set aside millions of dollars for […]