Monroe County Will Work with AOSIS to Protect FL Keys

In what is believed to be a first, a municipal government in the United States is joining with an international alliance of island nations to combat global warming. The Monroe Board of County Commissioners in the Florida Keys passed a resolution in mid-March acknowledging the likelihood of significant impacts from global warming and agreeing to work with the

Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS), which is comprised of 42 countries at high risk from sea-level rise with global warming. Monroe County includes communities in the 90-mile (150 km) string of islands off the southern tip of Florida known as the Florida Keys. According to Kara Saul Rinaldi, of the World Wildlife Fund–U.S., (quoted in

BBC News Online, March 16) the resolution “is sending an important message to policymakers in Washington, who appear not to see that there could be dramatic impacts if climate change is not stemmed.”