COLUMN: Oil and water will never mix in the Sunshine State

Dear Mr. Shaffer,

Thank you for your thoughtful comments regarding Hands Across The Sand and this proposed oil legislation.

Gosh, you would think being a tavern owner is a crime judging from your letter. Your efforts to paint me and my patrons as though they are alcohol-swilling lowlifes is laughable. Like we are a bunch of seedy, liquor peddling, imbibing sinners clomping around in wooden shoes.  

Ask anyone: Bud & Alley's, an award winning fine dining restaurant is about as much a tavern as you are a NIMBY liberal.

You got one thing right though, I am a bell ringer.

To set the record straight, I am a tax-paying, law-abiding business person who employs 140 staff in season and has provided thousands of job opportunities in the past 24 years.  

I won't even dignify or address some of the other things you called me.  

To the point: I am a business person who is a member of the Walton Area Chamber of Commerce. The Walton Chamber recently joined with all of the chambers of commerce — from Pensacola to Panama City — in signing resolutions against this oil legislation.

Let me clue you in. Attacking me is like trying to catch a feather in a windstorm. On Feb. 13, thousands of Floridians who agree with protecting our waters and shores will send a message to our legislators in Tallahassee that will ring loud and clear.

No oil on OUR beaches; No oil in OUR waters. Period.

Sorry, it is not the sole job of Florida to save America from terrorism or make us free of foreign oil.  

Florida can and should be the leader of our nation in solar energy. Our legislators should be taking the lead toward embracing this new technology and beginning the long yet eventual transition away from the prehistoric technology of oil.  

Tourism is the bedrock of Florida's economy. All it would take is one spill, one mistake and think of the loss of jobs and environmental damage to our beaches and waters.  

We ARE the Sunshine State. Texas is the OIL state.

Do we really want a bunch of anonymous Texas oilmen determining the future of our beaches and waters? I think not. That would be the real abomination.

Anyway, your efforts to paint this as some ill-conceived, liberal cause is the real bell ringer. Listen to this. Loud and clear.

There is a long line of conservative Republicans including Senator Durell Peaden, a Republican of Crestview, Republican Senator Dennis L. Jones, former Senator Jack Latvala, also a Republican, and others who have gone on record against oil drilling in Florida's waters.  Latvala is leading the Hands Across The Sand movement on Pinellas County beaches.

Sir, my concept of reality is clear as a bell.

Florida is a place of sunshine, fun and clean waters and beaches. That's why people come here.  

Our coastal legacy is all of the above and this NIMBY tavern owner, as you call me, will stand in a long line around the state to be sure it will stay that way.

So, how do you like the sound of that bell? I'll ring it loud and clear until the sun sets on this oil legislation.  
And please, attacking Sun reporter Debbie Wheeler in the way you did was very rude.  

Dave Rauschkolb is a restaurant owner and founder of Hands Across The Sand.