Rivers Not Only Thing Polluted, Also People’s Conscious

Rivers Not Only Thing Polluted, Also People’s Conscious

Letter to the editor by concerned Treasure Coast citizen Eric Shabotynskyj

Rivers Not Only Thing Polluted, Also People’s Conscious — Palm City, FL.

Federal government sugar cane grower subsidies are a relic of the cold war. Originally they were designed to prevent Cuba from profiting off the sugar plantations formally owned by Americans. Apparently the labor conditions under the Batista government left something to be desired. Anyways now we pay the Fanjul brothers 100 million a year to grow worthless crops and pollute our rivers. Is this so they can try to starve their black skinned relatives back on the island?

When Florida was under Spanish rule it became a destination for native peoples and escaped slaves, from British colonies via Georgia and by sea from the West Indies. After converting to Catholicism they were granted freedom, in the only place in America where they could live freely. When Spain lost the 7 years war they ceded Florida in exchange for the British empire returning control of Havana. Once more those early Floridians boarded ships to the closest place where they could live without being enslaved again.

In this century the descendants of those early Floridians still live in the same countryside that US Navy base Guantanamo Bay is nestled. They are kept in poverty, robbed of opportunity by the same policies that use our own taxes to finance the pollution of our rivers, not to mention bringing so much prosperity to Belle Glade and Pahokee.

Next Story: Woman’s Body Found in Sugar Cane Field in Okeechobee

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  • Posted 6 years ago

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