By James Call
http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/wfsu/local-wfsu-898181.mp3
Tallahassee, FL – No oil appeared to be leaking after a drilling rig exploded and sank in the Gulf of Mexico, the Coast Guard said Friday. Officials are trying to contain what spilled from the blast and prevent any threat to the coast's wildlife and plants. The Coast Guard says there is a rainbow sheen of crude oil mix on the water, fifty miles off the Louisiana Coast. Environmentalists say if it moves landward it will be a disaster. James Call reports anti-drilling forces in Tallahassee are making plans to use the spill in an effort to keep in place a ban prohibiting oil and gas drilling off of Florida's coast.
Standing behind the security guards at the state Capitol's front doors and to the left of the Great Seal of the State of Florida in the rotunda stands a folk singer with guitar in hand. He sang, "So come together, Florida. We've got to take a stand, forever and always protect our sand, protect our water."
This is how Thomas Lynch spent Earth Day Thursday. Last year when he was teaching in North Carolina, he heard the Florida House had voted to lift the ban on drilling off of Florida's waters. Now, he's back home in Tallahassee and part of an effort by folk musicians to promote sustainable sources of energy.
The tourists filing past guards pay him little attention, although design of the Capitol's rotunda carries his song to three floors. Lynch is a mathematician. He served a stint with Teach for America, a non-profit foundation that recruits what it says are the nation's most promising teachers and assigns them in an effort to eliminate educational inequities in public schools. He taught Algebra-2 in what he called the lowest performing school in North Carolina and now is looking for a teaching job in Florida. Until he finds one, he and other folk musicians are laying plans to bring protest music to Florida's Capitol.
"But we're going to actually have a sidewalk protest. All of my friends are coming out, and we're going to play in front of the old Capitol. We're going to build from there for next year for the opening day of session, the real one, and we're going to set up outside and it's going to be a rally in support of the ban that is in effect and the historical conservative movement of that of conservation and protecting what is ours."
Lynch and his friends may have time on their side. The flaming collapse of a rig off Louisiana's coast appears to be creating second thoughts around the Capitol. Although the lawmakers in line to be Senate President and Speaker next year are favorably inclined to oil and gas exploration in the Gulf, panhandle lawmakers are expressing concerns and the head of Florida's largest business lobby tells the Tallahassee Democrat the Louisiana explosion is "not going to make it any easier for us."
Lynch says he and his friends may stop back at the Capitol during the session's final week to entertain lawmakers.