Everglades Day participants said they didn’t come just to hear “Cheeseburger in Paradise,” but certainly Jimmy Buffet was a lure to the lunchtime event in the Capitol courtyard Tuesday.
Buffett played to a crowd numbering in the hundreds, including mostly state lawmakers, environmentalists and tropical-print shirt-clad Parrotheads as part of a rally to advocate for the state to complete the purchase of some 47,000 acres of U.S. Sugar Corp. land — price tag: $500 million. Florida has until October to make the buy before the price rises dramatically. But neither the South Florida Water Management District nor the Legislature has shown much interest, preferring to concentrate on Everglades restoration projects already under way.
“Buy that land!” shouted Buffett from the Old Capitol steps. Tuesday’s concert venue might have been a little unorthodox, but attendees were singing and swaying to the island beat as Buffett advocated for restoring and cleaning Lake Okeechobee.
“I’m happy to be in Tallahassee on Everglades Day,” Buffett told the crowd. The singer has long been an Everglades patron. “We have come here today to hopefully change the attitudes of the Legislature and the governor … [to] remind them to do the will of the people.” Buffet was referencing Amendment 1.
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