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"I don’t mind. I get it a lot," says Flood, a director for the South Florida Water Management District.
Flood’s charge is Southwest Florida, and his job is to help prevent flooding and restore the Caloosahatchee River basin by bringing together local governments, private groups, the district and anyone else involved in the future of the estuaries and water systems in this end of the state. He has to apply money and carefully tailored planning to a variety of problems and projects.
"I consider the Caloosahatchee mine, now. I’m passionate about it," Flood says. "I’m going to do my damnedest to clean it up. All my neighbors are going to be expecting me to do the right thing, so I will."
At 49, Flood has spent most of his 25-year career building beaches in Florida for the state Department of Environmental Protection’s division of beaches and shores. He started as an outdoor parks planner for the Division of Recreation and Parks, helping write the state’s comprehensive plan before concentrating on beaches, the incalculably valuable resource Florida has in such abundance. Visiting many of the state’s waterfront treasures on foot allowed him to get into the field, he recalls.
Beaches aren’t river systems, but restoration is restoration, he says. "It requires getting a lot of community support, and [doing] outreach. Convincing the community they have a problem [erosion in the case of beaches, failing water quality and flow-management problems in the case of the Caloosahatchee], helping them find a way to address it, finding funding and managing large-scale public works projects can take three to 10 to 15 years, depending on whether they have the feds involved."
Outreach efforts include educating homeowners, giving presentations to clubs and organizations and teaching even teachers about drought and water issues. "We do teacher education by taking them out and showing them the ecology," Flood says. "Teachers get a chance to see it, to feel it and actually to taste it."
Flood grew up in Tampa and graduated from Florida State University, majoring in geography and planning in the city he would call home for almost three decades. "I’d always loved geography and had a fascination for it, and of course you can’t live in Florida and not recognize how valuable planning is to our resources as the population swells," he says.
His career path seemed inevitable, and so did his life in Tallahassee, a town he’d come to love. "I had every intention of staying to the end of my career, but then [the Water Management District] convinced me I’d have the resources to do some good here," he says.
For someone who so enjoyed his job, the move was an odd one; one that his friends tried to talk him out of, he admits. But he and his wife and daughter agreed he ought to try it, because the chance to do good seemed significant. So he moved the family to Fort Myers, enrolled his daughter in Cypress Lake High School and got to work.
"The district brought me in here because I’m not a water guy. They wanted new eyes on the problem, and I had a reputation for being a consensus builder, for getting things done. I can bring folks to the table and say, ‘Let’s find a way to fix this. Let’s do it.’" And, he adds, he can’t resist a challenge. Especially a big one, and especially when his new bosses promised him the resources and flexibility to significantly influence what happens in the Caloosahatchee River basin.
Flood will spearhead an effort here that supports huge efforts elsewhere—particularly the newly planned restoration of the northern Everglades, which will affect the St. Lucie river on the Lake Okeechobee’s east side, as well as the Caloosahatchee. Plans include capping abandoned wells and working on storm-water treatment projects.
This summer, as Flood passed the six-month mark in his new job, he found himself taking applications for work on a project involving filter marshes and the use of algae that will take water out of tributaries to the Caloosahatchee, and then clean it and replace it.
He says he is prepared for the work’s diversity—challenges included.
"It becomes a tough job when you get a county commissioner who will pick up the phone and holler at you if they’re not happy," he says.
Flood also gets the flood of calls from citizens who relate personal problems. "I try to be a good listener," he says. "Maybe their wells go dry, or they might call and say, ‘I’m being flooded because my neighbor is illegally discharging water.’ So I’ll go out on site, bring the appropriate staff, if required, and talk the problem out.
"In most instances there’s a way of resolving it; you just have to find common ground and get people to see it." Which is the trick, and one he might have to perform several times simultaneously.
"I feel like that guy who used to juggle all those plates on the Ed Sullivan Show," he says, chuckling. "But I love this job."