1.Florida scientists claim they were fired for being outspoken
2.Florida aims to regain momentum on Scripps, biotech

COMMENT

A couple of very timely items with the Biotech Industry Organisation (BIO) having its annual bash in Philadelphia.

This years event is bound to be packed with mayors and governors from across the US desperate to lure biotech companies to their area with promises of tax breaks, government grants, and even help with parking.

One of those who will be pumping the flesh is Florida governor Jeb Bush, brother of president George W. Bush. As our second press report below notes, "Bush plans to shake hands in Florida's booth at the upcoming Bio2005 biotechnology industry conference in Philadelphia. He said he'll do whatever he can to 'close the deal' when life-science companies express interest in relocating to Florida."

Bush has already spearheaded an initiative to hand over USD510 million of Florida and Palm Beach County taxpayers money to build a new biotech centre for the Scripps Research Institute, based in San Diego. Land, buildings, labs, offices, equipment, even employees' salaries for seven years: Scripps got it all for free, putting in no money of its own. The company will eventually repay Florida up to USD155 million, half of the state's investment. But the payback provision will not kick in until 2011. Bush and other Florida officials hope that Scripps will make Florida a biotech hub – like San Diego.

The wisdom of using San Diego as a model is open to question, given the industry's record of failure there. But Bush seems blind to the risks. "It's always good to have sceptics, but I like to be on the dreaming side," he told the press. "It's a lot more fun on the dreaming side of the road."

Yet biotech, as the Associated Press has reported, "remains a money-losing, niche industry firmly rooted in three small regions of the country: 'This notion that you lure biotech to your community to save its economy is laughable,' said Joseph Cortright, a Portland, Ore. economist who co-wrote a report on the subject. 'This is a bad-idea virus that has swept through governors, mayors and economic development officials.'"
(Biotech investment busy going nowhere)
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=4134

Another damaging effect of the bad-idea virus taking hold can be seen in item 1. Florida Department of Environmental Protection scientists have been warned that they would face "the harshest possible discipline" for hampering efforts to build Scripps.

And firings and relocations of scientists who have spoken out is just what has been happening of late as science has been subverted by development pressures.

Lisa Interlandi, an attorney for the Environmental & Land Use Law Center which represents groups opposed to the designated site for Scripps, is clear about where the pressure is principally coming from: "There was an atmosphere created, from the state, from the governor's office, that this project had to be approved at all costs."
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1.Some South Florida scientists claim they were fired for being outspoken
By Neil Santaniello
Staff writer
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
June 19, 2005
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-pscience19jun19,0,4853614,print.story?coll=sfla-news-sfla

Andy Eller said he was just doing his U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service job -- protecting the endangered Florida panther from development -- when he was fired in 2004 for finding fault with the science his employer used to approve home and road construction through panther territory in southwest Florida.

Marine biologist David Boyd said the Florida Park Service reassigned him to an office 170 miles away after he pointed out environmental flaws in a plan to widen an 18-mile stretch of U.S. 1 into the Florida Keys.

Florida Department of Environmental Protection scientist Herb Zebuth said supervisors tried to make him see the Scripps Florida biotechnology park project their way after he voiced concern about its potential impact on water storage at a public meeting.

The day after his February 2004 remarks appeared in the press, Zebuth said he was pulled into a phone call with then-DEP Secretary David Struhs for "a pep talk ... on how great Scripps was."

Previously, Zebuth said, DEP workers were warned they would face "the harshest possible discipline" for hampering efforts to build Scripps, "which, of course, is being fired."

Ideally, science goes about the business of finding answers to questions unpolluted by politics or ideology. Conclusions get handed off to the policy makers, who factor the findings into their decisions or perhaps reject them. But in South Florida, the cases of Eller, Boyd, Zebuth and other federal and state environmental agency scientists demonstrate that political science can get in the way of real science, environmental activists and other critics charge. During the past six years, a series of instances of scientists openly criticizing or exposing the flaws in environmental protection and restoration has brought a range of retaliatory actions -- from reprimands to firings.

"I can say that I've seen a trend," said Frank Jackalone, the Sierra Club's senior regional representative for Florida. "I have heard anecdotally from my fellow policy advocates that the word in the scientific community is: Don't rock the boat."

Officials with the state agencies and the water management district have said that they don't try to control what scientists can do or say, or retaliate with pink slips for open differences of opinion with management. They have attributed the dismissals and demotions to work performance problems.

A wildlife service official said the agency strives to upgrade its scientific output and address deficiencies. The Department of Environmental Protection said it has an open-door policy allowing staff freedom to question agency directives.

"The amount of great science being brought forward is overwhelming," said Ernie Barnett, DEP director of ecosystem projects.

The water district's former executive director, Henry Dean, said earlier this year: "I would never try to suppress scientific debate."

But South Florida Water Management District scientists Lou Toth and Nick Aumen said they l