Update: Clean Water Gets Cleaner in the Florida Keys

David Martin: This is the good government show.

Roman Gastesi: So at any given time, we use a functional population of 170,000 people. There’s 170,000 people right now in the keys. Only 80,000 live here. So think about that. Another 90 or here? More. More here or here that are visiting that people actually live here.

Rhonda Haag: We have anywhere from a couple of inches to a couple of feet of saltwater on local roads.

Sandy Millhiser: We also have pictures of crocodile out in the road, so this makes the walk very risky to walk up and down this road.

Roman Gastesi: Good government is silent. It just gets things done.

John Millhiser: The little fishy swimming around in it, which, the rosy it’s been. Spoonbills are back now, and they’re going around eating the little fish and having fun. in it. But, it’s it’s not the right thing to be for a public road. I don’t think we need to be truly.

Roman Gastesi: And we just need to do our jobs.

David Martin: Welcome to a good government show. I’m Dave Martin. On this episode, we’re going to be. Well, we’re going to be all over the place. And that place is the fabulous Florida Keys. If you’re a regular listener, you know that The Keys is really one of my favorite places on the planet. If you’re not a regular listener, well, first of all, welcome.

All right. Now what you need to do is go back and listen to the first season. Make sure you listen to the episode about the keys and then come back. It’ll make a lot more sense. Oh, wait. Okay. All right. Oh, wait. Okay. You’re all back. Good. All right, so the Florida Keys, they’re like the Caribbean islands. They’re just a short drive from the mainland.

It’s got clear blue water, sandy beaches, some of the best fishing in the world. Great diving tiki bars. And it’s the home of my favorite frozen drink, rum runners. But there’s a lot more to the keys than just beaches and bars.

The Good Government Show is sponsored by our Co. That means our community. Our Co has found a way to make government more effective. Our Co provides the o u r platform. And this is an app that blends in-person and digital interactions to connect people with their government, their county, their town, their state. The Our Co app transforms meaningful conversations into reliable data.

They can turn results into projects and programs. The community has essentially already approved. It’s sort of like a flash poll by phone, but without the call. And in real time and wherever community members are, maybe they’re at their house or their office or, whether out just talking about local issues. maybe the choice is between putting in more local busses or expanding the bike lanes.

Arco can get you an answer immediately with oh, you are. You can engage your citizens or any group, learn what they want, and build programs and policies that advance your county, your job creators, your constituents. So visit our co.com. That’s o u r co.com and learn how they do it. And while you’re there okay. Demonstration.

Our friend Rhonda Hagg is the Monroe county chief resilience officer. And to her the keys are a massive environmental challenge, including one special problem.

Rhonda Haag: So the Florida Keys are a really beautiful place, and they will be for a long time to come. But things are changing, and they’re changing quite rapidly in what they don’t see is the level of flooding on the local roads in October and November, December, when we get the seasonal king tide flooding. We have anywhere from a couple of inches to a couple of feet of salt water on local roads or neighborhoods have difficulty getting to and from their homes.

David Martin: It’s the change that government leaders in the Florida Keys are dealing with every day. The flooding comes from the extreme weather changes, and that means streets being underwater. It means fish and alligators on the roads. It means impassable roads. And in some cases, emergency services can’t get through. So that’s one of the issues the county is dealing with.

It’s sea rise. In fact, some statistics show that parts of Big Pine Key and that’s in the lower keys. It’s going to be completely underwater in just a few decades. let’s hope the famous no Name pub is not affected, but other parts will be. On our first season of the Good Government Show, we met Rhonda Haag and she was getting their canal restoration project underway.

This is a project that’s already cleaned up 12 canals in all parts of the keys. When they were built, these canals were created. They just want to make one waterfront property and really think about water flow. And the result is that while there’s lots of waterfront property, many of these waterways in the keys, well, they kind of just are disgusting.

They smell marine life is gone. The water doesn’t flow. People don’t want to be there. They want to be outside this canal. Restoration $500 million project is fixing all that. And the good news is, as Rhonda will explain, the project is continuing and the canals are getting cleaned up.

Rhonda Haag: So what we’re doing is when we restore these canals, whether we backfill them, making two deep canals left deep or we take out the muck, we always put a weed gate in at the end if it needs it. If they’re one of these canals that are seeing this huge influx of, seaweed to keep out the seaweed.

And so really, the ultimate and goal of the whole canal restoration program is not just to increase the water quality in the canal. That’s that’s one of the main goals. It’s also that would then help increase the nearshore waters, which helps the coral reef and all things like that. So it’s everything ties together here in the keys with the canals and the nearshore waters.

And of course, when we improve the environment, it also improves the enjoyment that people get. They can swim in their canals again, their nearshore waters are now nurseries again for the fish and all types of marine life like it’s supposed to be. And then we get, you know, the visitors will see more marine life in the waters. And that’s what it’s really all about.

I’m very happy with what we’ve done. I wish we could do more per year. But, you know, resources are always limited and we have to make maximum use of what we have. It also takes a long time. We meet with each and every neighborhood and the canal residents on each and every canal in advance to notify them of the meetings.

We meet with them to let them know what’s going on.

David Martin: What would you like tourists to know about the place that they’re visiting and what’s going on there?

Rhonda Haag: We are a small island community with a very, very big resilience needs. So we, you know, we want our residents to be able to stay here. We want our visitors to continue to visit us, and we want to keep the beauty and the environmental beauty of the keys for as long as we can. But there are changes coming that we have no control over the levels of the sea rise.

We can’t change that. The only thing we can change is the way we adapt and mitigate.

David Martin: The hard challenge, Rhonda explained, is that with the funding they now get, they can only do about three canals a year. So that means would take like 30 years or more to clean up these canals. So they’re looking on faster methods to clean up canals that may not need as much work. But there is progress. And the people that live there have seen the changes.

Luckily, I got to see some of that for myself on a recent trip to the keys. My first stop was to meet Monroe County Administrator, our Roman guest, Desi. We talked about where we were with both the Canal project and the Sea Rise project, and he also sat for our Good Government Show questionnaire, and I got some tips from him on where to eat when you’re looking for fresh seafood in the keys.

So here’s Roman.

Roman Gastesi: My name is Roman Gastesi. I’m the Monroe County administrator, and we’re in Key Largo, Florida right now.

David Martin: We’re here to talk a little bit about sea rise. Tell me. Explain to me where in Monroe County the keys are. Are you at sea level or below sea level? And what does that mean?

Roman Gastesi: Well, as sea level rise, we’re at the highest point in the keys is something called Solaris Hill and Key West. And it’s about 20ft high. That’s very unusual. Very unusual. The rest of the keys average is about seven feet high. So and we’ve seen in the last 110 years, the level has gone up nine inches. And that’s empirical data.

We have a gauge that you can go online and look for it. No, a gauge down in Key West that’s been there since 1912. And it looks like the stock market goes up and down, up and down. But it’s got a trend analysis about nine inches in the last 110 years.

David Martin: What are you looking at. What’s the future for the keys.

Roman Gastesi: Right now we’re estimating another 9 to 24in in the next 50 years. And that’s a big range. We understand that. So basically continue what’s happened. But it’s still seems like it’s accelerating.

David Martin: So it took you 100 years to get here. It’s going to take you 50 years to double where you are correct.

Roman Gastesi: Correct. It’s definitely doubling. It’s gone up in the last four in the last 40 to 50 years. It’s gone up more than it did in the previous 40 to 50 years. There’s no doubt.

David Martin: So what does that mean to the people who live here?

Roman Gastesi: Well, it depends where you live. Are you already seeing the effects? some of the year lower areas down in Big Pine, up here in Key Largo, especially along the Bay, some of the areas that are low lying, they’re already starting to see the high tides. And they’re seeing what we call sunny, sunny day flooding. I guess just based on the, the the tides coming in when you got the high tides, especially in the fall when we have the, the moon tides.

David Martin: We talked with a couple of residents that talked about, you know, over a foot of water. They’ve talked about, you know, walking through fish. They’ve talking about walking past crocodiles and alligators. Is that what’s going on?

Roman Gastesi: Absolutely. It’s been very frustrating in the last five, six years because it’s really accelerated. And we’ve had very what we call the king tides, very high king tides. We’ve also had some, weather patterns because they’re in an area. If you look at the map and the topography, not only do they have the king tides, but they also have their like a bass in a big bowl that they’re in.

And all that water is coming up. so they’re affected two ways by the, by the winds and they’re just the abnormal, the tides that are being coming in. And they’re in very low lying areas. Frankly, those, those, some of those areas could not be built today. There are very low lying areas that would have been elevated, and some areas that were built at the same years in the 50s and 60s and just just down the street.

But they were elevated to seven, eight feet. They’re not having that kind of problem. So that’s the problem. These places that that were allowed to be built on very low level areas.

David Martin: So we call this the Good Government Show. Tell me what the government is doing to try to fix this. And what are your plans and what’s the project.

Roman Gastesi: Well, we did a vulnerability analysis. So we have about 311 miles in the county, County miles. And we went through each mile.

David Martin: That’s up and down the keys.

Roman Gastesi: That’s up and down keys. That’s entire keys. That’s what it’s what we call unincorporated key does include Key West, Marathon Island, rata. It’s just unincorporated Monroe County. They’re doing their own analysis now. The municipalities. So we’ve been doing that for the last few years. It took us three years, but $3 million, you can imagine doing all they did to surveying all the, you know, it’s a take a heck of a lot of work.

But we now have a plan, and we’re proud to say that we’re the first community in the state of Florida, and one of the only one in the nation that have a vulnerability analysis. We have a plan moving forward. Big price tag, $1.6 billion moving forward 20 years to implement. now we got to figure out how to pay for it.

David Martin: What did the what does the study tell you?

Roman Gastesi: The lower lying areas. We need to jump on those immediately. We need them.

David Martin: You know that we did.

Roman Gastesi: We did, but we have to we have to know what to do. Now this is actually has engineering now has that we’re ready to put these some of these projects out. The bid is my final one is up to bid right now. So we know it more or less what they cost. And then now the bids are coming in.

David Martin: So what’s the plan. What are they going to do.

Roman Gastesi: So obviously raise the roads right when you raise a rose. But now you have to capture the water. And you can’t just pump the water on surface because you’re capturing all the oil and all the good crime and everything. So we actually have to put it into that surface down at the pump it down and cleanse it at the same time.

That’s the expensive part. The handle and the management of that stormwater. The raising of the roses is easy. You just put still raise it, pave it, go. But then the water’s got to go somewhere. And that’s the expensive part. And that’s what a lot of the residents don’t understand. When you get when you give them the numbers, say, well, how can it cost $40 million when it’s just raising roads?

Yeah, but where is the water going to go? And if we don’t capture that water, guess what? It’s going to go in their yard. So in some of these areas and it’s going to be it’s going to flood the private sector. We can’t do that as a government.

David Martin: Doesn’t that water that you’re pumping and putting into the ground include fish garbage, aquatic life, other stuff.

Roman Gastesi: It can. Sure. Absolutely. Yeah. If it’s a tide coming in, especially during storms, they can so do it. Now you’re talking filtering and that kind of thing. It’s expensive. It’s very expensive to manage water.

David Martin: So there’s a lot to it. It’s not just pumping water. You got to pump it. You got to filter it. You got to you got to look through it. You got to inspect it. Right?

Roman Gastesi: Absolutely. And then and then there’s a question of is it does it make sense as a cost benefit analysis, for example, I see some of these neighborhoods and where these are going to be big policy questions. Some of these neighborhoods, especially in the lower keys where it’s 4 or 5, six miles to get out to 4 or 5 homes, does it make sense to raise and spend $30 million to get to 4 or 5 six homes?

Granted, they’re million dollar homes, but they’re not $30 million. So as a government.

David Martin: Or 30.

Roman Gastesi: Million combined, right, or $30 million combined. So why would we spend $30 million for four homes?

David Martin: Are you going to have to tell some people, we can’t help you?

Roman Gastesi: I see that day coming. Yes.

David Martin: That’s not going to work out. That’s not going to.

Roman Gastesi: Well, no it’s not. It’s just a reality that’s happening. And that’s called retreat. And we’re going to and that’s happening in other places, especially in the in the coast of, Carolinas and coastal Louisiana. Some areas of people have said you can’t live here anymore. We’re not we’re not going to spend, good money for a bad program.

David Martin: Have you broached the subject with the residents yet?

Roman Gastesi: We have. We’ve been we’ve been talking to them for years now.

David Martin: So how did this go over?

Roman Gastesi: Not well, not well. I mean, right now, the residents that are in the lower lying areas. And what are we in August right now? Probably in next month, about this time, maybe a little later in September, certainly October, November. They’re going to start sending us pictures of the sunny day flooding I talked about and how the streets are going to be full of water.

And it’s salt water too. So now you’re driving your car through the salt water and they’re mad. They’re mad at us because they want a quick fix.

David Martin: Well, that’s exactly what I was going to ask you next. I talked to some residents who were kind of furious that you spent all this money and you’ve been studying this. You know, I think some people said since 2012 and you’ve been talking about a, solution since 2012, and they go and still I have, you know, 14ft of water on my street.

Roman Gastesi: Right. Well, I know about 14ft, maybe 14in, but okay. That’s fine.

David Martin: Correction 40.

Roman Gastesi: Two. Yes. And they’re frustrated and they’re very frustrated. And they want us to jump in there. And that’s there’s two areas up here. I imagine you either went to Twin Lakes or to still right point. They’re both very, very low lying areas. Now, again, when you drove in there, you probably noticed right off of US1, you go down the hill in the keys, right?

So you know, if you’re at US1 is about ten, 12, 13ft in some areas. So you’re going down now you’re down in a 2 or 3ft range. And that’s why they’re getting the flooding that they’re getting. they think that we just have to raise roads and that’s going to solve their problem. It’s not it’s not we have to do something with the water.

And that’s why it’s taking so long. And then we have to pay for it. Now, if you don’t, if you live in the keys and you live in a higher area, if you live in the Solaris hill that I was talking about in Key West, or an island morada that was filled most of the Alvarado was filled appropriately and they don’t have the flooding.

Those people don’t want to pay. They don’t want their taxes to go up. They don’t want to contribute. If they’re neighbors, they’ll tell me, because you can go, you can go. I’ll tell you where they are. You can go talk to them and they will do what they’ll tell you is why are we paying for? They bought low lying areas.

Roman Gastesi: They should have done their their homework and they should have done their surveys. so do they.

David Martin: Have a case?

Roman Gastesi: you know, I don’t know if they have a case. I mean, it’s like it’s like this whole school board thing. Once your kids are out of school and they go to college, you stop paying the school board. So it’s the same argument. So we got to kind of have to spread the the pain a little bit. so we had to figure out a way to pay for it.

My, my plan is to have a dedicated penny sales tax. We, we have, a penny sales tax now that generates almost 55, $60 million a year. We can take that. We can add another one, generate another 50, $60 million bond that now we have $500 million that we can really make a dent on some of these. The problem is at the legislature in Tallahassee, which we’re part of being a non charter county, won’t allow us to do that, won’t even allow us to put in in front of our voters because the voters have to vote for it by referendum.

They won’t even allow us to get that far. So if we become a charter county, then we could do it on, on our own. and we’re even getting pushback from that. So and the good thing about the, the sales tax is that you’re here for a couple days, you’re going to pay the majority of it because you’re here, you’re paying, you’re buying stuff and you’re buying.

So 60 to 70% of the sales tax that we do, we collect is visitors like yourself. So as a as a local. So heck yeah it’s better than having a bad property taxes. All right. We can raise property taxes. But but if you aren’t going to pay for it by the way, you’re using our roads. Why you’re here.

So you might as well pay a majority of it.

David Martin: well, I’m happy to pay my share.

Roman Gastesi: Yeah, well, it’s a penny. I mean, it’s a set $0.01, so right now we’re at 7.5%. We would jump up to 8.5%, but we’re at less fine. Let’s face it, we’re a tourist economy. We have 80,000 residents. But now I just saw the new report. 5 million visitors every year. 5 million. So, you know, that’s a lot. So at any given time, we use a functional population of 170,000 people.

There’s 170,000 people right now in the keys. Only 80,000 live here. So think about that. Another 90 or here, more, more here or here that are visiting the people actually live here.

David Martin: So at any given time, that’s how many folks there are in the keys.

Roman Gastesi: We call a functional population. Correct. 170,000. That’s what we have to have enough police and fire enough resources for 170,000 people. And if the president visits, then he’s got to have his own, you know, he’s got to have a on.

David Martin: I don’t think he uses the white House anymore.

Roman Gastesi: No, actually, we use, Biden has a friend in Key Largo, and he comes quite often. More often you would think. Oh, yeah. And Obama used to build up social reef a lot. So I think Trump’s only been here and wanted that went down Key West, but it was only for 6 or 7 hours.

David Martin: So are you optimistic that you’re going to be able to tackle this in, you know, your administration?

Roman Gastesi: I am, and that’s why I’m here. I’m retired, but I’m going to come back only because of this issue, and I’m really excited about it. When I started, the big issue was sewer in the keys. We were the first county in the whole state of Florida, 67 counties to finish septic to sewer. We have no more septic tanks in the keys.

Might have be a few here or there, but we went. We got rid of all our septic tanks, 34,000 septic tanks, $900 million, 20 years and 25 years ago, when the state said when Rio County, you know, you have all this issue with the septic tanks and right there the price tag back then was 5 to $600 million, ended up costing $900 million to over 20 years.

And everybody say it can’t be done. It can’t be done. Well, we did it. And that was a big number back that one point.

David Martin: Number anywhere.

Roman Gastesi: Anytime. It’s still a big number, right? 900. If I tell you we’re gonna embark on a $900 million, 20 year project and I say, whoa, well, I’m telling you, not 900 and tell you 1.6 billion, and we’re going to do it in the next 20 years, and we’re going to figure out how to do it. Most likely we’re going to use the same formula that we did for sewers.

We got a third, a third and third. The residents pay a third. The local government will pay a third. And we call OPM. Other people’s money will pay a third, and that’s federal and state money. That’s the formula that I’m looking at to move forward. So we’ll see if we can pull it off again. That’s exciting stuff. We have to do it.

We have to do it.

David Martin: Do you have to do it? Is there I mean, can you there is a people will argue, well, you’re the one who lived here. You decided to move to this neighborhood knowing that this wasn’t the right place to be. do you still have two?

Roman Gastesi: Well, you know. Yeah. And I’ve heard that he was.

David Martin: Into a low lying area. Yeah.

Roman Gastesi: Shame on you. It’s a cost of living in Paradise, right? You know, you live in an island, right? And here you get hurricanes and you get sea level rise, and, you know, it’s happening. Well, I think I have I’m more optimistic. Not only that, we can fix it, but I think the sea level rise will slow down to.

I really think that we’re noticing it. I think the world is noticing it. You’re starting to see all kinds of the whole world is talking about it. the whole electric cars and the the climate change. I humans, we excuse my language, we screw up a lot of things, but we just fix it, too. And I think we’re going to fix it.

In the meantime, as we as we fix and plan for the next 50 years, I think we’re going to stop. I really think we’re going to stop it. I really hope we’re going to stop it. But I’m optimistic and we’re going to we’re going to slow it down. And maybe it won’t be that 24in that we talked about the high end.

It’ll be I’ll stay at the nine, maybe even seven when we catch it. Maybe we fix things. So that’s what I’m optimistic about. But in the meantime, I think we should do something or, or and I’m going to surprise you on this. Do nothing and tell the twin lakes of the world and the is still right. Tell the world you’re on your own.

And right now case law says we don’t have to do something. I think that’s going to change. But right now, all we have to do is maintain the roads. If there’s a pothole, if there’s, you know, something wrong with the road, we have to fix it. But sea level rise adaptation is not something that at this point local government is responsible for anyone responsible.

No, no. It’s nature. It’s happening. Whoever you want to blame it on. If you want to blame it on your aerosol spray, or if you want to blame it on, you know, fossil fuels, or you want to blame it on just natural selection or however you want to blame it, but it’s not something I think that’s going to change.

I think if we tell still right point right now and, Twin Lakes, you’re on your own, guys. Tough luck. You but in a low lying area, we can’t afford it. Other people just want to help you pay for it. Marathon all these other areas they think you guys find. It’s tough luck. I think it would be an interesting lawsuit.

and I’m not a lawyer, but that that could be coming. And as we see these price tags because of, for example, sand subdivision down in Big Pine, the sands of the sand subdivision in Twin Lakes, we’re going to be the first ones off the out of the gate. There are pilot programs like this. Can we really do this?

And they both have at least doubled in price from the original estimate back in 2015 2012. Number I don’t know where that came from. 2015 is when when my memories is that we really started digging into this stuff. And there might have been some complaints, 2012 that I remember, but 2015, so it’s been eight years. So yeah, those folks have big reason to think that, you know, governments that move faster.

David Martin: Tell me about something that has been successful. Let’s talk a little bit about the canal restoration project. When I was down here, I think there were three canals. I talked to a couple of folks who were very excited about the progress. How many canals have you got going? How many, where are you in the project now?

Roman Gastesi: I think we’ve done 6 or 7 canals by now. And again, that’s still in the pilot program because some of these canals are 35, 40ft deep, because that’s how far the dredge would go down back in the 50s and 60s to create that land where the homes are sitting. Right. So they dredged as much as they could. Well, the tide only comes in 6 or 7ft.

So you got this dead zone. That’s just nasty. And then you got all this settlement that been there. You got ten feet, sometimes eight feet of settlement, which is just nasty stuff that comes off the storm drains that goes in there. So what’s been successful? No. Successful I think has been the ones that we’ve got to take the settlement out back filled with clean fill up to about eight feet.

Sometimes I think we go ten sometimes. And then now we have this column of water that flushes with the tide, and it’s crystal clear water that the substrate that we put in, seagrass starts growing. You see manatees coming in, you see fish. And it’s been wonderful. Some of the canals are extremely clear, gorgeous. Some are not flowing as well as others because there is a terminal in that doesn’t allow it to flow.

So now we have to put culverts between. And that would put experimenting with that. And that’s that’s going to be like the next phase. So it depends on every canals different configurations different the flows different.

David Martin: What have you learned as you’ve done this.

Roman Gastesi: We’ve learned like for example, down in big carpet where one of the areas down south, the culvert was placed in the wrong place. It just, you know, engineers are human, right? They they can make mistakes, too. And it was just in the wrong spot. So we moved it, and now it’s in the right spot. Now it’s working great.

So. Well, we learned something there. I’m not going to tell you the engineering terms of what the flows are, but they the first one was not right. It’s harmless.

David Martin: Did you say oh it has to be directly next to this or it’s got to be this many feet or it was just an accident.

Roman Gastesi: A lot of engineering goes into this stuff. It’s not as simple as you know. You and I would think. Okay. Yeah. It’s just a lot of engineering, a lot of a lot of testing. So we’ve learned that we’ve learned at the back slows are very expensive, extremely expensive. We’ve learned that we have to have the equipment access in some areas, some neighborhoods.

You can imagine it all homes. So how do you get access? You know, what do you bring in the material. What do you bring in the barges. Where are you bringing the boats? Where are you bringing the employees? So sometimes we’ve had to put access out and and shuttle them in so you can imagine the expense of doing that in the time consumption.

so those are all the kind of things. We’re just the operation. But I think we can say that’s been a very successful program. The state helped us a lot because it’s mostly state money or some of our stewardship money.

David Martin: What are you the proudest of, of what you’ve done with it, with the Kyle restoration, what’s been the nicest surprise?

Roman Gastesi: Well, well, when we get an email like the email I showed you, you know that Rhonda shared with you that here we are. I think that was, about two years ago. Three years ago. And now they’re snorkeling in the canal. Like some of these canals you never even dip your toes in. And now people are actually snorkeling and they’re seeing coral and they’re seeing all kinds of, you know, seagrass and fish.

And that’s that’s those are proud moments.

David Martin: What else have the citizens told you?

Roman Gastesi: Well, that they again, the water is clear and they they feel good about it. It doesn’t smell. They can send their backyard. we have air curtains now where we have these air currents with seaweed blocks of seaweed. Not 100%, but a lot, you know, 50, 60, 70%. So the seaweed doesn’t come in and rotten. You get that sulfur smell.

so, yeah, you can sit in your backyard and you see activity fishing, especially in the afternoons and, and barracudas and all kinds of sea life. That’s why you live here, right? We want to see that. And so but we’ve we have lost that because some of these canals especially. So you said look at the timing. Now look at what’s happened here in the keys in the last 20 years to get the septic tanks.

Right. So you had all these septic tanks oozing into the canals. And I’ve done two studies when I went two years way myself, where we would not put dye in the septic in the toilets, flush toilet 300 times. And it it’s really easy to do when you’re a college kid, right. Put the toilet die and the flush toilet, flush toilet.

And then two guys at the dock and one guy, you know, putting the five gallon buckets of dye and isotope and then, oh, here it is. You see it oozing out of the out of the seawall. That’s how nasty this stuff was. And 34,000. I’m not saying all 34,000. We’re we’re going into the canals. But a majority were a lot of more.

So those are gone now. So that pollutant all those nutrients are gone because and then we come in and we clean up. What what’s that? Pollution, that kind of sediment down to the bottom. And then we’ve put in clean fill so stuff so so so so that’s those are proud moment. So tell us what government is all about when we can try to fix things that were designed in inappropriately years past.

David Martin: I as I recall, this was a very big project. a lot of, you know, millions and millions of dollars. And I, I want to say 93 canals you were targeting. Has it changed? Are you can you speed this up?

Roman Gastesi: we would love to speed it up. we need more money to do that. The state’s really stepped up in the last few years. our stewardship bill, we asked for $20 million every year. We do share that with the municipalities, but we get the majority of that. they were giving us six, 12, 13. the last two years, we ran the full 20, which is nice.

So we are speeding it up. We have more money. So we pick away at the canals and they’re all ranked. If you talk to Rhonda, you mean she’s got them all ranked? And we try to pick away at the worst first. And, well, I think we’re doing pretty well. We’re doing pretty well. If we get this penny sales tax, we might be able to use it for some of that.

we’ll free us some money so we’ll be able to over do what we call budget swap. Right. Some of the money we’re using now for matching and things, we can use it for the canals.

David Martin: After you get done with this episode, hear more good government stories with our friends at How to Really Run a City. Former mayors Kasim Reid of Atlanta and Michael Nutter of Philadelphia and their co-host, journalist and author Larry Platt talk with guests and other mayors about how to really get stuff done in cities around the nation. Check them out where you’re listening now or through their nonprofit news site, The Philadelphia Citizen Dot org slash podcasts.

All right, so on The Good Government Show, we have a questionnaire that we ask all government officials. All right. So that was all the fun part. Right now we’re going to get to your philosophy of government. All right. Are you ready?

Roman Gastesi: Sure.

David Martin: What is your definition of good government?

Roman Gastesi: Good government is silent. It just gets things done. We don’t go out and tell you what we’re doing when there’s no news, when there’s no emails and we’re just doing our thing. I started 34 years ago, and I’ve seen the change of just doing the right thing. I was with the Miami-Dade County and Water Management District, and then when things go wrong, you start out, you know, going out.

And I don’t think government needs to be doing that. I think we need to be able to respond and we need to be informing people, but not, you know, kind of cheerleading. I don’t think we need to be challenged. We just need to do our jobs.

David Martin: You’re the, county administrators from Monroe County, which is the fabulous Florida Keys. How do you know if you’re doing a good job? What do you use as your definition of your success?

Roman Gastesi: Oh, and when I run into, you know, it’s a small town, it’s, we went into this grocery store and people say thank you, and you respond to somebody’s complaint and you get things done, and then they email you back, text you back, say thank you. again, response I think we need to be able to respond. We need to be able to pick up a phone and and solve people’s problems when they have problems.

And then the keys are extraordinary because we were so regulated. People move here from other areas, and in some areas they don’t even have building departments. Let’s face it, they don’t have all the regulations that we have. So explaining to them and you get that first look of just so frustration, but then they understand why we have all these regulations and try to keep Paradise.

Paradise.

David Martin: How should these people hold you and other elected officials in Monroe County accountable?

Roman Gastesi: We need to be responsive. We need to be responsive. We need to do our jobs. And if we’re doing our jobs and there shouldn’t be complaints at all.

David Martin: And if you’re.

Roman Gastesi: Not, then there should be complaints, right. And we we encourage that and then we fix it. And we understand we have to most of the time. I gotta tell you, most of the times, folks, folks are moved in from other areas that are not so heavily regulated. And when we asked them for a flood certificate because they’re going to build a fence, what what does that have to do with it that well, those are FEMA regulations.

And we we’re under the FEMA regulations because of our flood insurance policies. Right. So we explain that, okay. All right. I’ll get you a damn survey so that those kind of things. So but be responsive and be respectful. and pick up the phone. I’m big on just picking up the phone and responding when people need when they have a question.

David Martin: What would you like people to know about how government works? in your 35 years, I think you said in government, you’ve seen a lot and done a lot. What would you like people to know about government from the inside?

Roman Gastesi: The the biggest thing right now, we’ve been going through it with Alan Mirada, which is where I live. And if you’ve been following that, they’ve been going through some tough times, this whole conspiracy theories and stuff. If they only knew that there are there is no conspiracy theory as far as I’ve never seen it. We’re just not that coordinated.

We’re just not that smart.

David Martin: You’re not smart enough to have a deep state.

Roman Gastesi: You know, we just not know. And people think, well, the county like right now we’re we’re helping island right out because they’ve they’ve had 11 managers in the last 20 years. I live there. And I said, listen, there’s this state law that says that there’s an executive on loan and I can I can get you one of my senior directors, the I, I say that apply the tourniquet because you guys are bleeding here.

Let them come in for 2 or 3 months and show you our processes and how we do things because something’s wrong, right away. You can see the emails, all the counties coming in to take over the Colorado. No, I’m no interest in taking over Colorado. So those are the kind of things that’s considered. And I think it’s gotten worse.

And you’re in you’re in the business with all this, you know, social media and stuff. It’s gotten worse. And I’ve seen the divisions get wider and really we’re all in it for the same reasons. We just want to live happy and be healthy and have, you know, a good quality of life. And there’s this whole conspiracy thing is crazy.

David Martin: Who’s your hero in government? Did someone inspire you to government service?

Roman Gastesi: You know, it’s funny, I know, I know, I, I always been involved, since a kid. I’ve always been involved and always my my friends always thought I was the geek. You know, I’d go to meetings and stuff and follow the news and, you know, and I don’t know why. I just got into it. I don’t know, I have a medical background.

My my parents have no medical background doctors. And, and, I started studying biology, went into biology chemistry and started as a hydrogeologist and pollution control inspector. And then I got my MBA, and here I am. I just, I like I like solving people’s problems.

David Martin: Is there a politician or anybody that, you know that you sort of look up to or I think, you know, admire, know?

Roman Gastesi: there was a gentleman in Miami merits to him, you know, in Little America, they call him the king. He was, he was a county manager when I first started, and he was just so professional and so correct. And it he’s taught us to do the right thing. And he taught me that, you know, whatever you do, be ready to be in the witness stand defending it.

So just don’t do anything wrong. Just you know, just just do the right thing.

David Martin: Good advice and advice.

Roman Gastesi: And it was like, you know, I was 22, 23 year old kid.

David Martin: All right. So this is the hardest question. I am only down here for a couple of days. I am down here in the keys. What am I have and where am I going? What are we eating?

Roman Gastesi: Seafood unimagined.

David Martin: Well, a little seafood is always good. What else you.

Roman Gastesi: Got? well, you got fish across the street here. You’re going to the fish. It’s a little north. It’s called the fish. How’s that?

David Martin: What do we service? What we.

Roman Gastesi: Ordered. That’s fish. And you’re going to have the, any fish I like. Mahi mahi. Mahi mahi, the mighty kami style. That’s awesome. I can’t go wrong. Whatever side you want. And then we go for steak because, you know, after a few days, you. You want a steak? A Ziggy’s mad dog, of course. And Adam Rata, you know about that, you know, but I remember Mad Dog Miami guy, remember, Jim bandage.

So unfortunately, he died. But, you know, so that’s a that’s a you’ll see the old dolphin memorabilia there and stuff. And at that steak. Steak. Good fish too, but mostly steak. And then overall restaurant. my favorite, our favorite. My girlfriend. Right. Is, square grouper. both here in on mirada or in Cudjoe if you’re, if you had a doubt.

But they have one in right now and that’s just overall great and and whatever you can get anything off the menu there. It’s just for dessert. You key lime pie person. I mean the keys. Yeah. All three of those have very good key lime pie. Very good key lime pie. All three of them. that’s I mean, I like you, I even I live here, and I never get sick of.

David Martin: It, I do. You talked a little bit about this. Did you aspire to a career in politics? Were you president of your senior class? Did it something you always wanted to? Did you want to be president when you were a kid?

Roman Gastesi: well, I can’t be because I was born in this country, so that was always a disappointment. And then I was a Henry Kissinger fan because he couldn’t be president. He probably would have been a great president. But he wasn’t born in this country either. So, but, yeah, I just I was always I was class president and quarterback of the football school football team, you know, just would always been out front to tell me getting out there, get involved and not being afraid to tell people what to what what I think.

David Martin: We are the good government show. Tell me about a good government project you’ve been able to pull off down here in Monroe County that you’re proud.

Roman Gastesi: Of, good government. Well, the the finishing the sewer system was, was really important because when I got down here, there was still people. That was only 15 years ago. We got mandated by the state in 99. So that’s I 25 years ago. So and people were still saying we didn’t need it, we didn’t need it, and we couldn’t afford it.

I was able to go to Tallahassee. Our relationship, the county’s relationship with Tallahassee was nonexistent. As a matter of fact, it was. It was very bad. And I had been to Tallahassee with the water management district, so I knew how to how to navigate that. That’s probably my finest moment. And I remember when I first started, well, we need to hire a dream team of lobbyist.

I mean, that was a dream team back then with basketball. And I got laughed out in the in the paper. And this guy is a lobbyist. And why do we need a lobbyist? Why do we need. Well, now, if you look at our lobbyists and the lobbyists that the municipalities have, we have top ten. We have them. All right.

And, you know, I say, if you can’t beat em, you have to hire them because you hire them for defense, too, so they don’t work against you. Well. But I don’t know what our number is, but I’m going to guess we’re about $350 million in right now from Tallahassee. And that’s probably my proudest moment that we’ve improved our relationship with Tallahassee.

I was the, the,

David Martin: And that allows good government on every other level, because now you’ve got a working relationship with people who respect each.

Roman Gastesi: Other. Well, absolutely. And but more importantly, the money. So we send now we’re sending about $250 million to Tallahassee every year on our tax receipts, right? 6% that we collect 250 million by, by diplomatic kick ups. Well, we throw they take it. I mean, they take it and they give us now if we don’t, if we don’t have any other programs or anything, we only get back because our population so low, about 20 million.

So you talking about being a donor community? 250 going north, 20 coming south? Well, this past year we got over 200 million just because of all these other programs. So those are proud moments that we’ve been able to tell. It’s still the state. We have all these programs. We’re like the little caboose where the little train that could.

And then now they even copied our program, this whole sea level rise program. Now it’s a statewide program where you first have to do a little I had to do a survey, and then you have to do data analysis. So they they implemented our program. So that’s a proud moment.

David Martin: Also how much of it factors into where we are. Who doesn’t love the keys. Who doesn’t come down here and think this is a beautiful spot. That’s to help.

Roman Gastesi: Absolutely. And I always joke with my colleagues, I always joke with the vendors. I joke with the Florida Fish and Wildlife. They were just here last weekend and they had six people down here. And you know, their budgets tight. And but we’re starting an artificial reef program, right. So we did a couple zoom calls and I said, guys, August, you know it kind of slows down.

Room rates are pretty cheap. I’ll talk to a couple of hoteliers. We’ll get you some rooms. Get down here. Didn’t take much did it. Didn’t take much, you know. But now we’re saying yeah, exactly. No goldfish and what hoteliers even even pay for the lunch. And you have until they added, you know, to do all the S9 things I have to declare.

So what. So you declare it. So what? You know so but yeah. So they came down here, someone brought their families, they were smart enough to get their room rate for in a couple extra days or a couple days before. So it’s not we have to use that to our advantage. You’re absolutely right. When I first started down in Key West, because I have an office and cuz my Fridays and my Mondays were always for for meetings, that’s like my secretary.

What what’s going on here? You know, I watch Fridays and Mondays and then I finally, you know, it was all vendors coming in, right? They’re coming in on, on the company tab, right. You know, me and I used to see the parking lot just like this. And I’d see them at the parking lot, take their jacket off and they change.

And underneath they got their, you know, their swimsuit and their family’s waiting for them, and they just drop off a car. I met with the administrator, checked off the expense account, and let’s go play. So absolutely, we want to take advantage of it. So I invite people down all the time.

David Martin: Thank you very much for your time. Pleasure to be in the case. Pleasure to meet.

Roman Gastesi: Spend a lot of money. We need it.

David Martin: To help tell this story. I toured the keys. My first stop was in Key Largo, where I met residents affected by sea rise, and they told me what was going on.

Sandy Millhiser: Sandy Millhiser. And I live in Key Largo, in a community called Twin Lakes, where a lot of flooding goes on.

David Martin: Tell me about the flooding. I’ve never been here for it. I want you to explain to me what it’s like. How bad is it?

Sandy Millhiser: Certain times of the year, we have something that is called a king tide, and the flooding here could be anywhere from 12in to 1in down and a mile long to a half mile long. And this flooding can remain from anywhere from a couple of months long. And then we also have a heavy when heavy rains come, we have continuous flooding out here in our road also.

And then sometimes these people go out very early in the morning. And we also have pictures of crocodile out in the road. So this makes the walk very risky to walk up and down this road.

David Martin: You’re walking with crocodiles.

Sandy Millhiser: Correct? I and other another living creek. Aquatic creatures that are in the road. Yes.

David Martin: John Millhiser is Sandy’s husband. And by the way, their home is beautiful. It sits on the end of a point in Key Largo and faces Florida Bay. That’s part of the Everglades National Park that reaches down into Key Largo Paradise. Especially if you love to fish. and John told me what it’s like to live in a flood zone.

And one of the special problems.

John Millhiser: So the residents have to drive their. Cars or their whatever. They’re driving trucks, whatever. Through this deep water. Completely saturating the undersides of their car with saltwater. With basically seawater, because that’s what the flood is that you’re looking at.

David Martin: That ruins cars? Sure does. I’ve been through.

John Millhiser: I just bought my fifth car.

David Martin: Have you walked through the water yourself?

John Millhiser: Yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah.

David Martin: What’s that like?

John Millhiser: Put put boots on and go for it. Like that’s it’s it’s it’s deep so it’s solid bottom but it’s deep. Go in and watch all the fish. the little fishy swimming around in it which, the rosy it’s been. But spoonbills are back now and they’re going around eating the little fish and having fun, in it.

But, it’s it’s not the right thing to be for public road.

David Martin: What keeps you staying here, though?

John Millhiser: Look around, look around. it’s it’s it’s beautiful here. I mean, it’s, that I like to fish. we like to, you know, go out and I’ve got backcountry fishing, I’ve got, out front fishing or snorkeling and all of that. And it’s all right here. This is this is the capital of the world for doing those things.

And, that’s why we decided to retire here.

David Martin: For Sandy and John and their neighbors to fix isn’t coming fast enough. But as both Ronda and Roman explained, they did fix it correctly. And that takes time and money. But I’m saving the best for last. The canals are cleaner. I went to Big Pine, can talk with some folks there who see some changes already. They’re canal restorations on the final steps and improvements are underway.

Joe Lamb: My name is Joe lamb. We’re in Big Pine Key on doctor’s arm.

David Martin: And you’ve been coming down here for a while. What have you noticed about the canals?

Joe Lamb: Look like they’re getting cleaner. I have what I can tell you that, like I said, I’ve been here a couple days. I love the Marina. Was a lot cleaner. This is a lot cleaner.

David Martin: I met another resident who also lives on a cleaner canal.

Patricia Ceballos: My name is Patricia Ceballos said. And we’re at Granada Avenue and Big Pine Key, Florida.

David Martin: And tell me what the plan is for the canal here for the restoration, as you understand it.

Patricia Ceballos: as far as I understand it is, we had that culvert put in between the two canals and. Right now it’s seems like it’s working pretty well. And we’re also going to have a grass gate put in at the end of our canal. Hopefully will make sure the grass doesn’t come all the way down to the very end of our canal, which would actually help and make the water a much clearer.

It’s been good since it finally started. Yes, and I think it can only improve.

David Martin: Let me go back to Rhonda, who got an update from one resident who lives on one of the restored canals. Yeah, a letter from someone there, because you read it to me. Because it was pretty impressive.

Rhonda Haag: Yes. This is from one of our, first restorations where we took a 40ft canal and backfilled it to a depth of about eight feet. So it’s. Hello, Miss Rhonda, we live on the Pigeon Bunting canal that was recently restored by Monroe County. We just wanted to let you know what a great job everyone involved did. The air curtains that were up during the work had been down for about two months now, and the canal is complete and already the water is clearing up and we can see the bottom of the canal.

We have noticed lots of fish, big and small in our canal. The manatees seem to like the shallow water more. A half a dozen of them show up just about every day. Now. We hope the seagrass from the bay will spread into our canal, and then we will have a beautiful aquarium right off our dock. We may even see some angel fish in here now that we have clean water.

Again, thank you and everyone involved so much. It’s really heartwarming to get letters like that.

David Martin: Where do you get your news from? Where do you get your state and local government news from? Because that’s getting harder and harder, and it’s essential to stay updated with your community, and it’s becoming increasingly important to know what’s going on in other cities and states, because they’re likely facing challenges that you’re grappling with, too, are you’re going to face eventually.

That’s why we’d like to welcome our new partner, route 50, to the show. Route 50 is a leading online publication covering state and local governments across the country. They’ve written about states protecting themselves against the rise in cyber attacks, counties using AI to better support citizens services, local responses to crumbling infrastructure and extreme weather, and much, much more.

There’s a lot there. It’s a one stop shop for issues affecting state and local governments and their residents. That’s you. That’s all of us. Do yourself a favor and go to route 50.com to see the topics and solutions they cover, and learn what other people in government are doing. They also deliver a daily newsletter called route 50 today.

I see it in my inbox every morning. I check it out and you should too. Thanks again. Route 50. We’re excited to have you on board and being a partner here at the Good Government Show.

What is it the county government does? That’s the question county commissioners get asked the most. And the simple answer is everything on the Good Government show. We’re so lucky to have talked with so many county commissioners and other county officials that have shown us how effective county government is. County government dates back to get this 1634, making it one of the oldest forms of government in the United States.

Think about it. Roads. Highways. Hospitals. Schools. Recycling. Law enforcement. Water. Sewers, and most of the county. Those services are maintained by the county that’s county government. The National Association of Counties represents all 3069 counties across the USA. Naco helps county government work better together through things like sharing best practices. When county government works well, well, that’s just good government.

There’s more work to do. More funding is needed, but the canals are being cleaned up one by one and the county is planning for the future. But for me, a visitor to the keys and someone who really cares about the keys, I say, well, everyone wants a fix now. Planning and doing it the right way is better government and that’s good government.

But listen, hey, I’m open to discussing this. Let’s talk. Here’s what you do. Head south down oversees highway around mile marker 84. Pull into the tiki bar, order a rum runner and get a floater on top and look for me unless it’s sunset, because by then I’ll be on the bayside. So go check out the chairs. on the beach by prayers.

Hey, until then, keep listening. Please share this story with your friends. We need everyone to know that special places like the Florida Keys are changing. Make sure to follow us and like us on all your social media. I’m Dave Martin, reporting from the Florida Keys, Monroe County, Florida. This is a good government show and we’ll be back here.

Until next time. Thanks for listening.

The Good Government Show is a Valley Park production. Jim Ludlow, Dave Martin, that’s me and David Snyder are the executive producers. Our show is edited and produced by Jason Stershic. Please subscribe then share us and like us and review us. That’s the best way to make sure we’re able to keep telling these stories of our government working for all of us.

Then listen to the next episode of The Good Government Show.

**This transcription was created using digital tools and has not been edited by a live person. We apologize for any discrepancies or errors.