Over the past 14 years, the University of Florida Extension Service and Sarasota County have held an annual Sustainable Communities Workshop. This year’s all-day conference was held Thursday at the LEED Certified Girl Scouts of the Gulf Coast Event Center, on Cattleman Road, and was packed with locals of all ages. I was thrilled to be invited to address the group because I wanted to convey Sarasota's heartfelt thanks for the work so many of them have undertaken over the years to protect our environment, which has influenced the City of Sarasota toward becoming a recognized environmental leader in the State. During a recent visit to Sarasota the Director of the Florida's Department of Environmental Protection, Noah Valenstein, told those gathered that he considered Sarasota as perhaps the most environmentally conscious and proactive city in the state. It was a nice compliment from someone in the know.

Although our region, country and the planet continue to have major environmental problems to solve, like rising sea levels and the acidification of our oceans and red tide, I reminded the attendees of their positive impacts as the environmental movement has seen tremendous success over the past 50 years, with significant air, water and fisheries improvements having been achieved in many parts of the more affluent regions of the world. That bodes well for the future. However, we learn as we go, and this generation’s urgent environmental priority must be focused on the need to dramatically decrease CO2, Carbon Dioxide, from the atmosphere, because CO2 is what is creating record high air and water temp’s year after year, causing sea level rise and a host of other major threats.

Decarbonization will be a challenging task because our carbon-burning economy has helped to dramatically improve our quality of life and well-being over the past 150 years, including doubling our life expectancy. But solving problems often creates new problems that must be tackled, and those attending Thursday’s conference are committed to finding solutions to the carbon problem while maintaining our way of life. In fact, most Americans want to help, we just have to make it easy for them to help, like being able to plug into affordable, clean, renewable energy sources. On the regulatory front, taxing what is burned, not just what is earned, is proving effective in some countries. The stakes are high. So high, our situation kind of reminds me of the Great Escape artist Harry Houdini. You may recall Houdini's big performance was being dropped into a tank of water confined by a strait jacket, and he had to escape before drowning. Somehow, he did it. We too are collectively engaged in a similar challenge, only ours is real, and we must escape from the straight jacket of our polluting ways by innovating and creating new, clean energy options, which will allow us to continue to flourish without fowling our planet any longer. Like Houdini, it's the great escape we somehow must make. Thanks to the people filling sustainability conferences here and around the world, we have a shot.

Please feel free to email me at Thomas.Barwin@sarasotafl.gov.

Thomas Barwin is Sarasota City Manager.