Southwest Florida Watershed Council to Meet Feb. 20th at FGCU

The next meeting of the Southwest Florida Watershed Council will be Thursday February 20 in Room 213 of Florida Gulf Coast University's Cohen Center, with presentations beginning at 12:30 pm. Plan to stop at the entry Kiosk for a parking permit and proceed to Parking Garage PG1. Campus map to PG1 and Cohen Center.

The meeting will feature two speakers.

The first speaker will be Mr. Tom Reese starting at 12:30.

Mr. Reese is an environmental attorney from St. Petersburg who has litigated some very prominent cases in Florida. He has practiced law since November 20, 1980, with primary experience in listed species protection, Clean Water Act, groundwater, and comprehensive land use planning. Mr. Reese is currently litigating with EPA regarding the assimilative capacity baselines that have never been developed which is the CWA Section 303(d) impaired waters issue and will present on this topic as it relates to Florida.

The second speaker will be Mr. Sean McCabe who is an attorney with the Southwest Florida Regional Planning Council. Mr. McCabe will start his presentation at 1:00. His presentation title is: "The Biggert-Waters Flood Insurance Act of 2012–Good Intentions and the Law of Unintended Consequences." Mr. McCabe's prior experience includes private, nonprofit, and public sector entities in Florida and Arizona, primarily in administrative, land use and environmental law. The discussion will focus on the realities of legislative policy work.

Q&A will follow at 1:30.