The Florida Roundup - Inflation remains high in Florida; record warm ocean threatens coral reefs

Episode Date: July 14, 2023

We look at why inflation remains high in Florida and what citizens are doing to grapple with rising costs of living. Plus, the threat that warming waters cause to coral reefs.

Welcome to the Florida Roundup. I'm Danny Rivero in Miami. And I'm Matthew Petty in Tampa. Well the state is leading the nation when it comes to increasing prices. While inflation appears to be cooling off across the United States, that isn't so much the case here in Florida. New data released this

week show that the Miami, Fort Lauderdale, West Palm Beach area had the highest inflation rate of all metro areas with a 9% inflation rate for the 12 months ended in April. In the Tampa, St. Pete, Clearwater area, the inflation rate hit 7.3% in the year that ended in May. Compare those rates for two major metropolitan areas here in Florida to the national average, according to the Consumer Price Index. And that national inflation rate now stands at 3%. Joining us now to talk about this is Sean Snaith, a PhD and director of the University of Central Florida's Institute for Economic Forecasting. Also joining us is Jim Saunders with the News Service of Florida

and Gabriela Paul, who covers the paycheck-to-paycheck beat for WUSF Public Media. Sean, Jim, Gabriella, thanks for joining us. My pleasure. We also want to hear from you. Are you paying more for food, housing, and insurance, and how has the cost of living affected your life? You can give us a call.

We're at 305-995-1800. That's 305-995-1800. Send us a tweet. We're at Florida Roundup. Sean, Snaith, let me bring you into this conversation for a start. Americans in general are seeing some relief from inflation. The U.S. government reporting a 3% inflation rate nationally this week. The lowest it's been since 2021, but Florida is kind of an outlier here and we heard some of those stats at the top of the show. Nine percent inflation for the Miami, Fort Lauderdale, West Palm Beach area for the year ended in April, pretty high in Tampa, St. Pete Clearwater as well. Why is this? Well I think there are multiple factors that are sort of keeping inflation high in Florida.

One certainly is population growth. As we know, Florida had the fastest growing population of any state in the country last year. And so, you know, all that influx of new Floridians, you know, creates demand across multiple sectors in the economy and, you know, can contribute to this increase in the cost of living. And so one of the big things, of course, is housing, which is a problem that, you know, the shortage of housing that really has its roots in the aftermath of the housing bubble collapse in 2008, 2009. And builders were a bit gun shy after going through that. the housing market to sort of overextend or to build at a pace that really was justified based on fundamentals of housing demand. And so pre-pandemic, the shortage was in place.

The pandemic and more importantly, pandemic policies really exacerbated this problem. It drove prices up at a 20% plus per annum clip for a couple of years and just led to a series of events that made housing costs rise significantly. And a lot of these factors are still in place. 305-995-1800 is the number. We want to hear about how you're feeling inflation, whether it's housing, whether it's the cost of food, cost of transportation, other factors.

Give us a call, 305-995-1800. Sean, I wonder if you could talk a little more about some of the other factors that would skew our inflation stats in Florida. I mean, what about the cost of gas, cost of transportation, getting around, things like that, and food as well? Right. Well, you know, gasoline prices have come down significantly from their peaks. And I mean, this is more of a national global kind of market when you're talking about oil, natural gas, gasoline. I think there was a mention in the lead up to the segment about the housing insurance market. So, you know, that factors into, you know, both housing prices and rent and so forth. And so that's something along with a shortage of housing that can't be cured overnight or with a magic wand.

In terms of the cost of other components of the Consumer Price Index, the labor market in Florida remains extremely tight. Recent unemployment rates are 2.6%, more than a percentage point lower than the national unemployment rate. So there has been and continues to be upward pressure on wages, which feeds into the cost of some of these services because businesses are forced to pay higher wages and some of those costs get passed along to Florida's consumer. Right. Higher wages and some of those costs get passed along to Florida's consumer Right, but those wages obviously aren't keeping up keeping pace with the cost of housing and other things right because even if those wages are Going up people are still struggling to make rent or you know put food on the table week to week

Absolutely, and that you know that's been a national issue for two years Well wages and salaries have gone up over that time period. The cost of living has increased more rapidly. And so I think one of the consequences of that we see in these new record levels of credit card debt that consumers are accumulating. I think people, you know, you're paying your rent, you're paying your utilities. You know, if you had to buy a car in the past couple of years, new or used, you'd probably have a much higher payment for that car than you would have just a few years ago. And so you get to the end of the month and you're paying all these necessities and, you know, ends aren't

meeting. And I think people are passing over the hole in the finances in many instances by using credit card debt. Gabrielle Paul with WSF, you've done some reporting on people using increasingly using credit cards here in Florida to cover basic expenses as inflation has stayed stubbornly high here in Florida. expenses as inflation has stayed stubbornly high here in Florida. What have you heard from Floridians in the Tampa Bay area about what they're doing? How are they keeping up with these rising costs? Yes, definitely. So I speak to a lot of community members every day about how they are being creative in their budgeting and as expenses like we've talked about, you know, grocery bills, maybe it's your monthly car payment, maybe it's, you know, it can be any number of climbing expenses. How are they getting creative and bolstering their budget to break even? And a lot of people are telling me that, you know, they may have already depleted

their savings accounts after some of these COVID era benefits ran out. And now they're having to turn to borrowing. And that's if a big if they've got the credit to formally borrow from their bank or if they have a credit card that has a limit that will kind of get them out of this tight spot. a limit that will kind of get them out of this tight spot. I talked to a Uber Eats driver, more of a biker, an Uber Eats biker in St. Petersburg who took out a credit card for emergencies about a year ago. And now he says it's the only reason he can get by month to month. He's putting everything but rent because he can't put rent on his credit card. He's putting that on credit and he's having to put every earned dollar he makes toward rent in St. Petersburg. And that's not a unique story from what I'm hearing on the ground.

The number is 305-995-1800. Want to go to the phones? We have Tiffany calling from Jacksonville. Tiffany, thanks for calling. You're on the Florida Roundup. Yes, thank you for taking my call. As a kind of solopreneur, I have a commercial and residential company here in Jacksonville, and we definitely, my husband and I, have felt the inflation come full circle for us to the tune that we've had to raise our rates just to be able to afford the cleaning supplies from our vendors. The other part of that, the reason why I say it comes full circle, is because we still have to manage our household. So groceries have gone up, which means I have to get really creative

when I'm doing dinner or when I'm doing bids, you know, keeping in mind that a lot of the supplies that I bought a year ago or two years ago are like $10, $20 more now. So it affects us on two ends. It affects our personal finances and our business finances because of the inflation. And Tiffany, is this impacting your life in other ways? Like, are you going out to eat as much as you used to? Are you making those determinations? We try not to go out to eat. Things like, for example, we enjoy salmon, my husband and I. But maybe a year ago, I wouldn't have mind sitting in a restaurant and he and I and paying, you know, $19.99 or $20, whatever it was. And now we go, that same meal has went up, you know, considerably.

And so now we just will go to our local grocery store and we don't. We typically, if we do eat out, about the only thing that my husband and I really will do is we'll do a dessert. We opt to do dessert. So we may opt for ice cream as opposed to doing an entire meal because it does affect my grocery bill and my grocery budget if we do that even once a week. So we typically, just for the sake of having a date night or something where we can connect and do something together, we just maybe will go and have ice cream because it's cheaper. Right. Thank you so much for the call, Tiffany. Jim Saunders with New Service of Florida, I want to bring you in.

When we look at the stubborn inflation rates here in Florida, a big part of it is the housing insurance market. And the state's passed a couple of bills and laws in the past few years trying to get the market down. But it's a persistent problem. We had just this week another insurance company, Farmers Insurance, announced that it's leaving the state, leaving thousands of policy holders in the lurch. Governor DeSantis has responded, sounding a hopeful note,

during a recent radio interview with Howard Carr, I want to listen to right now. note during a recent radio interview with Howard Carr I want to listen to right now. I think what's going to happen is because we did those reforms, it now is more economical for companies to come in. I think they're going to wait through this hurricane season, and then I think they're going to be willing to deploy more capital to Florida. Jim, can you help put this in context for us with the housing insurance market? What are homeowners caught up in this with their insurance company leaving the state? What are they going to do in the meantime looking for coverage there? Well, the farmer's decision is just kind of the latest. And I mean this has been building over the past

three years and anybody who has a mortgage knows probably that they're they've faced significant rate increases if they've been able to keep their their coverage so this is something that's been building and obviously farmers deciding to leave the state not only with property but also with auto insurance this week you know really got a lot of attention but it's really just part of a larger trend you know the legislature had special sessions two special sessions last year to pass bills to try to kind of shore up the insurance industry. But even the most optimistic legislators and, you know, and other industry people say it'll take a couple of years for that to filter

through the system. So, you know, it doesn't look like relief is going to be on the way real soon, if ever. And, you know, so we see citizens property insurance, the state, the state's insurer of last resort has just exploded in numbers of policies, it has more than 1.3 million policies right now and the president CEO said this week that's going to 1.7 million policies by the end of the year and that is an indication the private market is basically sort of crumbled and people are turning to citizens because a they can't get coverage elsewhere or b it's so expensive elsewhere that it's cheaper to go to Citizens. Right. A lot of issues there. And, of course, we've heard from DeSantis and other state leaders

that Citizens is kind of oversubscribed at this moment and undercapitalized. So concerns about the amount of weight in terms of insured folks that Citizens is carrying. Let's get a call in here from Ryan in Sunrise. Ryan, you're on the air. Thank you. Pleasure to be on. I can relate to the house insurance issue. I asked my insurance broker this year to look around and try to find me a better rate because it had gone up so much, and I was almost laughed off the call. sit where you are and don't switch insurers because they'll come out and inspect your home and just take what they're delivering to you and you can't do anything about it.

I don't want to sound despondent, but there are a few parts of this economy that aren't hurting the residents, and I don't understand why the policymakers aren't seeing it. Insurance is bad. The lack of cost of living increases for employees. You know, wages not keeping up with inflation. Even last year or the year before, just I don't want to leave the area. I moved here 23 years ago for a reason because I like the climate, but it's just really hard to live here. It's tough out there, Ryan.

Appreciate your call. Sean Snaith, if I could bring you back into this. I mean, folks like Ryan, they're painting a pretty bleak picture of the economy. Is there some good news, though? I mean, what are you seeing on the positive side? Or how should folks be trying to address, folks who can kind of pull some levers of power, address concerns of people like Ryan about homeowners insurance, cost of living wages, etc.? Right. Well, you know, I mean, I think in the broadest picture, you know, Florida's economy remains very strong.

You know, the labor market, as we mentioned earlier, incredibly low unemployment rates, you know, wage growth. Yes, it hasn't hasn't kept up with inflation, but, you know, we are seeing some downward trends in inflation overall. overall. But, you know, this legislation is going to take time, I think, as the others have said, to impact premiums. You know, both automotive and homeowners insurance in Florida are among the highest in the country. And a big part of driving that. I mean, obviously, we have hurricanes here that you don't have in Michigan, but the legal environment has really been behind what we're seeing happening. I saw a statistic that Florida accounts for about 9% of all homeowners insurance claims in the country, but 79% of legal action against homeowners insurance. So that's incredibly out of whack. And that in turn drives up premiums because these companies have to bear all this legal costs and it gets passed along to you and I.

Yeah. On the flip side of that, though, I don't think that was one of the factors that farmers mentioned in their note about why they're leaving. It's more about kind of managing risk exposure. Just in the last minute or so before we have to go to a break, Jim Saunders, what about sort of policies to try break, Jim Saunders, what about sort of policies to try and address some of these concerns, other things, whether it's homeowners insurance or other issues to try and kind of get a handle on inflation? What do we see during the session? What could we see coming down the pike? Well, in addition to the legislation that's passed on homeowners insurance, one of the big things that was a priority of this year's

legislative session was to pass a bill to try to deal with some affordable housing or workforce housing issues. It was a priority of the Senate president. I mean, they're putting more than $700 million into this program. It involves a lot of incentives and credits and so on for developers to essentially try to increase the stock of workforce housing. Again, though, I think it's one of those things that's going to take time to see how it plays out. Projects take time, even if what they are saying is that it does come to pass, that this helps improve the housing stock and make it more affordable, it's just going to take time to play out. So that was another big priority this year.

But, you know, sort of the double whammy of these housing issues is really, really hitting people, I think. Yeah, we're going to discuss more of this as we continue on with a discussion here on the Florida Roundup. We've been speaking with Jim Saunders with the News Service of Florida. Jim, thank you so much for your time. Thanks for joining us. Thank you. And also joining us this hour, Sean Snaith, Director of the University of Florida's Institute for Economic Forecasting. Sean, thank you too.

My pleasure. Gabriella Paul from WUSF. Stay with us as we continue the conversation about inflation and its impact on Floridians. You're listening to the Florida Roundup from Florida Public Radio. Stay tuned. Welcome back to the Florida Roundup. I'm Matthew Pitti in Tampa. And I'm Danny Rivero in Miami. And right now we're continuing our conversation about how Florida is struggling with the highest inflation in the country. But we'll turn our attention now to how folks are coping with these cost of living increases in their daily lives. Cassandra Tatum is a single mom of two and a longtime public school teacher living in Tampa. She's one of many Floridians who are finding it hard to afford groceries.

There's no extra expenses in any way. I've cut every single corner. I've even reached out to the financial advisor, seeing if there's anything else I could possibly cut. And there wasn't. financial advisor seeing if there's anything else I could possibly cut and there wasn't. Cassandra spoke with Gabriella Paul who covers the paycheck to paycheck beat for WUSF Public Media and Gabriella is staying with us now in the studio in Tampa. Also we want to welcome to the conversation AARP Florida State Director Jeff Johnson. Jeff thanks for coming on. Yeah thanks for having me on. This is a really critical topic. Thank you. And you can call us. We want to hear from you about how you're

weathering this inflation storm at 305-995-1800. And you can tweet us at Florida Roundup. Gabriella, just to follow up with you, one impact of the housing stress in particular is people getting evicted from their homes, people who can't afford to pay the rent in many cases. Can you give us a sense of what the current trends with evictions are in Florida, what you're hearing from people in this predicament? Yes, definitely. So eviction, particularly in the Tampa Bay region, which is what I can really speak to, is really the story of, you know, not the group of people that's living paycheck to paycheck anymore. It's what happens when you don't have a paycheck and the fallout of that or when you fall behind on one monthly payment. And what I'm hearing and what I'm learning in the Tampa Bay region in particular is that majority of people are that one crisis away from a financial emergency like eviction or that can lead to eviction.

And so what we know is that after a lot of this COVID era relief expired, so that's things like child tax credits, that's things like rental assistance. We're seeing a rebound in the rate of evictions and within that the rate of homelessness, because in the past, if you faced an eviction, you may have been able to get on your feet a little bit faster. But for those that, like we talked about a little bit earlier in the hour, have maybe racked up a few thousand dollars in credit card debt to stay afloat or have had to take out a loan that has a high interest rate, or you've taken up a few jobs now and you don't have a whole lot of expendable time, there's less of a safety net for a lot of people right now.

And you can call us at 305-995-1800. I want to go to the phones now. We have Jackie calling from Santa Rosa Beach. Jackie, you're on the line. Yeah. So I retired in 2021 and wasn't anticipating the increase in homeowners insurance. Actually, in early 2022, I received a letter because of the age of my home, regardless of all the improvements I made, impact, et cetera, that I was being canceled. And then subsequently, I made a decision to sell. It was going to be in my retirement home. The good news is that the real estate market was such that I was able to purchase another home,

but I had to move inland pretty far to be able to do that and to be able to afford the insurance. The broker told me it was going to go from $4,000 in 2021 to almost $20,000, which wasn't sustainable, especially in retirement. So one of the questions I have is, you know, I've read a little bit about what the legislature and the governor supposedly have done, but I'm not sure how that affects and will positively impact the citizens of the state of Florida. Any insight on that?

Thank you so much for the call, Jackie. Jeff Johnson with AARP. Do you have any response to what Jackie's talking about? I mean, obviously, this high inflation rates, high cost of home insurance is impacting many elderly members of your organization um yeah for sure and and i i have to say uh danny the uh the guest you had on before sean snaith has all the economics degrees my degree is in divinity and i think a lot of people are turned into prayer at this point, which is not necessarily the best solution for financial struggles. But the situation that your caller just outlined is one that people across Florida are dealing with on the property insurance side, as well as just on the housing

side. We hear a lot from retirees, people who retired here, who are in communities who have raised their homeowners association fees significantly, or who are in communities who have raised their homeowners association fees significantly, or who are in senior apartments where the rent has gone up significantly. We've heard from service providers who are telling us that they're seeing a new kind of class or new era of homelessness from elders who no longer have a place to go, a place to live, not necessarily because of the challenges that your reporter cited earlier, but just because the place where they live raised their rent so much, and they don't have a place to turn. So huge concerns. I agree with Jim Saunders from before

the break that the changes on the law around affordable housing are ones that we are optimistic will help in the long run, but they're not a lot of help right now. And I think a lot of people, when they think about Florida and retirees, think of people who are really comfortable, but it's worth remembering that for about a quarter of the people, 65 and over here in Florida, their social security payment is, or benefit is 90% of their income. And for about half of Floridians 65 and over, it's still the majority of their income is that social security benefit, which was never really meant to provide for a full retirement. It was really just focused on trying to keep people out of elder poverty. And with

inflation at the rates that it has been across the country, but especially here in Florida, it has really pushed people to the limit. So we've seen people go back to work if they can. We've seen people try to find ways to share housing. So not just like the vacation rental type market, but really trying to bring in roommates or people for co-housing. And we've seen communities trying to respond by making it easier for people to build accessory dwelling units. So like garage apartments, if you want to think of an example where they can generate a little bit of extra income by renting out space on their lot for somebody else to find housing. And Jeff, social security benefits, as you mentioned, a lot of retirees depend on that here in Florida.

The Social Security benefits were increased 8.7% this year for millions of residents here in Florida. Has that helped at all? And do we know if benefits will continue going up and at what rate in the coming year? Yeah, it's a good question. And the Social Security benefit cost of living adjustment happens each year based on inflation rates, national inflation rates and inflation rates that are geared towards the CPI for workers, which is sometimes not fully reflective of what retirees necessarily are paying money for. It does help a little bit, but the average benefit is about $1,500 a month

for a retired worker. So again, these are not huge, huge benefits. An 8% increase is welcome, but I know we heard from many people who said that their healthcare costs went up almost in lockstep. And so it was almost a wash or they made significantly less of a gain than you would expect from that number. Most retirees will say that in addition to housing and things like groceries, that health care costs end up being their most expensive, even with the Medicare program. And while we have seen changes at the federal level and efforts at the state level to try to lower health care costs, particularly around prescription drugs. The reality is for many people, those social security benefit cost of living adjustments do get eaten up by increased health care costs.

Right. Health care, a big part of the picture there. 305-995-1800 is the number if you're a retiree or just even if you're not, you're struggling with everyday costs, we want to hear from you, 305-995-1800. With us in the studio, Gabriella Paul, who covers the Paycheck to Paycheck beat. A lot of kind of questions coming in, folks worried about the cost of housing and those stresses. What else are you seeing, Gabriella? Yeah, just with fixed income top of mind coming off that conversation, you know, another part of that is the long-term care conversation. So that still falls within housing costs that are becoming more and more unattainable for a lot of Americans.

I was just looking at a statistic recently that said 8 in 10 Americans are unprepared to cover the cost of long-term care. And so what ends up happening is – That's a lot. That's a frightening stat. That is, yes, frightening statistic. And what's even more frightening is how that can have a generational kind of cyclical impact. A lot of times, you know, we talk about the sandwich generation. So those households with parents, with children that also are having to maybe pull out of their own savings or their own retirement funds to help caregiving support for aging adults. And that's a lot of times not because of a lack of planning on the side of aging adults, but because the cost of long-term care of places like, you know, nursing facilities, assisted living homes are also climbing at alarming rates as we're seeing residential apartments climbing.

So that's something on the horizon that there's not necessarily a solution for yet, but just spreading awareness and finding ways to creating better safety nets and growing those retirement funds is something that is top of mind for a lot of experts in that elder care space. Let's go to Stephen in Wellington. Stephen, I understand you're a retiree. What's on your mind? I am. I've been retired for 10 years. By the way, you just mentioned elder care. My wife and I have had the insurance for long-term care upon retirement. The cost has gone up so much, and the amount that is covered has gone down so significantly that it's almost not worth keeping it and paying the amount that the insurance company is asking, which is not, by the way, the reason I called. But something has to be done about long-term care in our society.

I did call to mention that our homeowners insurance in the last two years has gone up by $7,000, and our insurance agent told us we were lucky to get it, and so we're paying it. It is my impression and the impression of an awful lot of people in this state and people who I know from my work, that the governor is more interested in running for president and our state legislature is more interested in what we teach and what we say and how we live our lives than they are in our ability to continue to live in this state.

Eventually, we'll have to leave here. It's just not worth it with the hurricanes and everything else that everyone worries about and the cost of insuring our home. It's just absolutely insane, and our state government couldn't care less. Stephen, just before I let you go, are you making definite plans to exit Florida?

Well, we're thinking about right now possibly purchasing a pita tare up north and possibly moving into it nearer our children. This is no place for retirees, especially with a state government which offers so little for the inhabitants of the state. No place for retirees. Stephen, thank you so much. That's a bit of an indictment there.

Jeff Johnson with the AARP, your thoughts? I mean, there are still a lot of folks who want to move here, but some challenges, clearly. There are. We do continue to grow with new folks moving down. I will say, and I think the point that your caller raised is a really good one, and thinking back in time, the last time there was a spate of hurricanes in the early 2000s, we saw this. We saw a lot of people who retired to Florida end up moving. In many cases, they didn't go all the way back up north. If had come from the north, but they would go to Tennessee or North Carolina, those

kinds of places because of the cost of property insurance. I do want to hit on Gabriella's really, really good point about long-term care and how we pay for that. The reality is it is exorbitantly expensive to pay out of pocket for a nursing home or assisted living facilities. And so it is family members who provide the bulk of care. And family members, and I'm sure some of your recallers among them, will tell you that it's not only taking time away from the rest of their family and time away from work and earning money, it's also money out of pocket. I think the last survey we did showed that caregivers spend about $7,000 a year just out of pocket to provide help for

aging parents, in most cases, who they're caring for. And we've raised at the federal level that tax credits that we think about for caregiving, we often think about for child care, which is wonderful, but we ought not to forget those who are paying money to take care of aging parents and keep them independent and out of nursing homes where they end up being paid for by taxpayers through Medicaid. You're listening to the Florida Roundup from Florida Public Radio. Gabby, I want to come back to you. Governor DeSantis recently signed a law that overrode a lot of local protections for renters in places like Miami-Dade County and Pinellas County in the Tampa Bay area. Is the loss of those tenant protections in some parts of the state impacting people who are renting in this context of exploding rent

prices? Yes. So we're really, I don't know that renters are really feeling the impact yet besides just a general fear of the impending rescinding of these protections. So to kind of lay out the landscape, this was House Bill 1417, dubbed residential tenancies. And essentially, it repealed any local regulations that cities or counties may have put on the books that relate to tenant landlord relationships. So that's a lot of jargon. What that really looks like in real time is, for example, in Pinellas County, they had drafted something called the Tenant Bill of Rights. And that was certain protections for Pinellas County residents, things like a ban against source of income discrimination. So helping renters make sure they could use their Section 8 housing vouchers, for example, or their rental assistance without

pushback from landlords. So it's hyper's hyper local regulations that were designed to meet the needs of local renters based on what what lawmakers are not lawmakers sorry what officials saw happening in their own communities so essentially July 1st when this residential tenancies bill became law, everything that was on the books that related to tenants and landlords got repealed. So right now a lot of these local governments are going through the formal process of removing these ordinances from their books and with that this month we'll hear from citizens during some public hearings. But right now, it's just kind of a lack of movement. It's just

community organizers kind of voicing the fear of what might happen without these protections there. And it's a little bit of re-strategizing on the front of tenant advocates. And Jeff, we don't have too long to go. Any last thoughts on where this leaves Florida, where we're at, where we're headed right now? I think, I guess I'd say, I think that these are, this is part of a cycle, but it is something that the callers and the experts that you've had on hit. We have to figure out the property insurance piece because that has been significantly out of scope of what people can afford. As some of your earlier callers said, I guess the only thing I can offer in terms of hope is not so much hope, but controlling what

you could control. There are lots of ways to save money. They almost all involve time, but there are resources in the community, resources online. They won't necessarily manage those big ticket items like your rent and your homeowner's insurance. But to be able to manage some of the other things like groceries and gas and health care and saving the money you can will hopefully get us by until inflation becomes more realistic again. Got it. We've been speaking with Jeff Johnson, Florida State Director of the AARP, and Gabriela Paul, who covers the paycheck-to-paycheck beat

for WDUSF Public Media. Thank you both for joining us. We'll be back in a few minutes talking about the hot waters in our coral reefs. Welcome back to the Florida Roundup. I'm Danny Rivero in Miami. And I'm Matthew Petty in Tampa.

Florida's coral reefs are in hot water, literally. While we've been sweating through a blistering heat wave on land, ocean temperatures around Everglades National Park are also about 10 degrees above normal for this time of year. 10 degrees above normal for this time of year. The sea surface temperature in the shallow water of Garfield Bight hit 98.1 degrees for a couple hours this week. Scientists say the marine heat wave is totally extreme. And they're watching with alarm to see what impact these unprecedented ocean temperatures have on our coral reefs, a huge source of tourism and other vulnerable underwater ecosystems in Florida. Well, joining us with more is Jack Prater, who covers climate and Tampa Bay's beautiful beaches as well for the Tampa Bay Times.

Jack, thanks so much for being here. Nice to have you along. Hi, Matthew and Danny. Thanks so much for having me on. I'm happy to be here. Great. And you can call us as well 305-995-1800 if you've been out in the ocean lately what are you seeing maybe if you've got a

little more in-depth insights into it love to hear from you as well if you're taking a dip around the Florida Everglades or the Keys tell us what it's like 305-995-1800 you can also send us a tweet we're at Florida Roundup well Well, Jack, what happens to coral when the waters get too warm? And why are scientists so alarmed about what's happening with the water temperatures now in July? Sure. Yeah. So high water temperatures, like we're seeing now, and we often see in the summertime in Florida are ripe conditions for coral bleaching. So corals have a symbiotic relationship with algae that produce their food, and these high temperatures or high water temperatures that we see actually force corals to expel their algae,

and that's why you see them turn white and this blanched white uh and that's that's coral bleaching um but it's not a death sentence um as numerous scientists have reminded me uh but it it does carry a very increased risk of starvation uh and susceptibility to the diseases for these coral um so a bleached coral a bleached coral isn't a dead coral it's just a sick coral. Exactly yeah and these corals live for hundreds of years so recovery of recovering a bleached coral it can take years and decades for them to recover from this but you're right it doesn't mean that they're gonna die off immediately it just severely weakens them. So obviously the heat wave is having an impact on the ocean

temperatures but there are some other factors that you wrote about in your reporting for the Tampa Bay Times as well aside from the heat what else is causing the spike in the water temperatures in the ocean around South Florida and I guess what is it that's kind of not allowing those oceans to cool down like they normally would? Sure. So scientists are mostly concerned for how early in the season that we're seeing these high temperatures. Usually we see this kind of heat or maybe not this kind of heat because it is unprecedented from what scientists are saying. We usually see extreme heat in later August. So the question is, if it's this hot right now, how much worse could it get? And one of the biggest factors in that heat is that

ocean temperatures or ocean waters are really still right now around Florida. So when we see winds or weather events that kick up the water and sort of stir it, that actually cools off ocean temperatures. But we're seeing really flat waters in the Gulf and often Florida's waters. And that means that the sun is, sun rays and heat are being trapped on that flat still water by the oceans and being trapped. And that's why we're seeing these hotter temperatures. And another factor I'll just point out is the cool ocean breeze that we usually get is not cool. It's actually blowing hot air on us here in Florida. You know, I do want to mention, I mentioned at the top of this that coral reefs are a huge source of tourism,

people going to snorkel and scuba dive and whatnot. But corals are also very important to the overall health of the oceans. Jack, can you tell us a little bit about what else could happen if these corals get sick and very sick? And if we do see a die off, like what a lot of scientists really fear? Yeah, sure. So corals make up just 1% of the marine ecosystem, but they provide a habitat and support for about a quarter of marine life. And so these are sport fish habitats and fisheries that we, where we get our fish that we eat

coral reefs also protect coastlines from storms and erosion and things like that one researcher who I was talking to give her a really good analogy and compared coral reefs and corals to sort of trees in a forest and and coral die-off is is sort of like the deforestation of the ocean. But you're right. They do contribute to billions in tours of money. And over the last 40 years, the Florida Keys have lost about nearly 90% of their reef system. Which means less fish for the fisheries and local fishermen too, right?

Yeah, exactly. Exactly. The number to call us here is 305-995-1800. Again, that's 305-995-1800. Jack, I want to ask, I mean, there are current efforts underway to restore Florida's coral reefs. What is this historic heat wave that the ocean around us is facing right now? What does that mean for these restoration efforts? Do we know?

Sure. So researchers say that this heat wave really has potential to hamper restoration efforts. It's right around now in the summertime where restoration groups and scientists are coming out and planting baby corals and larvae out on the reef. But if they're planted in water that are this hot, scientists are saying that they could be killed within weeks of being deposited. And some of the more short-term and small-scale solutions that we've seen to this are shading reefs from the heat from the sun's heat or even dumping cooler water to help cool off the the surrounding waters in reef systems and when i heard about this that it really reminded me of manatee feeding that the fwc was doing a couple years ago with our seagrass die-offs and it's really another example of the human intervention that we often have to resort to when trying to conserve species.

You're listening to the Florida Roundup from Florida Public Radio. And Jack, I mean, one thing we haven't talked about a whole lot is hot waters fuel for hurricanes and tropical storms. We're not facing an immediate threat from any storm right now. tropical storms and we're not facing an immediate threat from any storm right now but what do we know about what it could mean if the temperatures stay around where they are now and we do see a storm coming at us right yeah we actually saw researchers sort of reverse course on their hurricane forecast this year uh earlier in the season it was forecasted that we would have a below average hurricane season and this hot water in the last few weeks have actually bumped that up to a likelihood that we'll see a more active hurricane season. And, you know, so much could change, especially with how this affects coral reefs as well.

You know, a hurricane could blow through an area and cool off off waters but that same hurricane could also you know damage a reef um so yeah that's that's what's going on with with hurricanes um we're in an el nino year which you know typically has a lower chance for hurricanes um but again that that this marine heat is is causing a lot of scientists to sort of backtrack on predictions for the season. 305-995-1800 is the number to call. I'd love to hear your thoughts on how you're experiencing the heat in the oceans. If you're used to fishing or getting out and recreating in the water, what are you seeing? What are you feeling?

305-995-1800. are you seeing? What are you feeling? 305-995-1800. We're with Jack Prater, who covers climate and the beaches for the Tampa Bay Times. Let's get a call in here. Let's go to John in Tampa. John, you're on the air. Yeah, I've lived in Florida all my life. I'm about fifth generation of Florida. And usually in July, it's hot. And everyone's complaining about hot. And I just heard this gentleman's complaining about the ocean being flat right now. When a hurricane starts, everyone complains about the hurricane being bad. And Florida Roundup is constantly bad news.

Can you ever give some good news for a change instead of complaining all the time? John, okay, thanks for your call. I wonder if we can kind of turn that back to the corals there. I mean, Jack, is there some good news in the terms of what we're seeing here? Obviously a lot of alarm, but are there some kind of signs of relief or maybe some positivity there in terms of people who are trying to protect these reefs? Yeah, of course. That was something that, you know, scientists pressed upon me numerous times in our interviews that, you know, this isn't all doom and gloom. Recent research has actually shown that some species of coral can

survive in hotter temperatures than we'd previously thought. And in conditions that are optimal and a little cooler, researchers have actually seen a bounce back locally in some reefs. So what was pressed upon me a lot was, you know, these coral reef systems are important and they're important to our way of life. They're important to our ecosystems. And they're just too important to give up on. We've only got about a minute here left, but I just want to get a tweet in here from somebody at Florida Butterfly 7. I feel we're witnessing an inflection point in the environmental societal collapse, climate change rather.

And it may be much closer than people would care to admit that many global indicators this summer are terrifying. Just in the last few seconds here, Jack, I mean, there is a bigger picture here, right? What are you thinking in terms of how climate factors into the warm ocean temperatures? Sure. So I touched on the El Nino, which is a natural weather event we see every two to seven years. That's normal. What isn't normal are extreme temperature fluctuations. So hotter hots like we're seeing now in the ocean, but also colder colds and colder nights in the winter. Yeah. Right. So a lot of kind of factors to think about there. How in the last few seconds

to Jack, I mean, are you going to be covering more of this as these temperatures continue? What's your kind of beat looking like for the next few weeks? Yeah, so this, again, we're super early in the season. The Keys have a coral bleaching alert level one, and that's expected to grow across the state's waters. So we're really going to be keeping an eye on that. Sorry, we got to go there. That's our program for today. The Florida Roundup is produced by WJCT Public Media in Jacksonville

and WLRN Public Media in Miami. Heather Schatz and Bridget O'Brien are the producers. WLRN's vice president of radio and our tech narrator is Peter Mance. Engineering help from Doug Peterson, Charles Markles, Jackson Harp, and Brady Corum. Theme music provided by Miami jazz guitarist Aaron Leibos at aaronleibos.com. I'm Matthew Petty. Thanks for calling in and listening.