Secretary of Environmental Regulation For Florida
As Secretary of Environmental Regulation, Browner headed the Florida Department of Environmental Regulation from 1991 to 1993, while living in Tallahassee. It was the nation's third-largest such state agency, with 1,500 employees and a budget of some $650 million. There she believed that economic development and environmental protection did not have to be in conflict with each other. She revitalized the demoralized department and turned it into one of the most active in the Florida state government. She shortened the amount of time it took the department to review development permits for wetlands-affected areas and for manufacturing plants; in doing so, she annoyed some environmentalists who thought that the streamlined procedures diminished public review.
Browner pushed for the halting of construction of new hazardous waste plants and municipal waste incinerators, on the grounds that health and environment consequences were insufficiently known. She brokered a deal with Walt Disney World that would allow it to build on wetlands it owned, in exchange for $40 million of work by Disney to restore endangered wetlands nearby. She pleased environmentalists by persuading Chiles, who had become governor, to negotiate a settlement to a federal lawsuit regarding damage to Everglades National Park and forcing the Florida sugar industry to bear much of the $1 billion cost. The head of Florida's largest business trade association described dealing with Browner: "She kicks the door open, throws in a hand grenade, and then walks in to shoot who's left. She really doesn't like to compromise. has done a pretty good job down here. People have more complaints with the way she does it than what she does."
Read more about this topic: Carol Browner
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