Mapping a Diverse Population for Everglades Restoration—
A Minority/Low-Income Analysis for Miami-Dade County

The Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan (CERP) will develop numerous water resource/restoration projects throughout south Florida. Because of the rich ethnic diversity in this area, project teams made up of representatives from federal and state agencies must know the demographics of areas potentially impacted by CERP projects. Determining the location of these populations assists the project team when planning outreach materials and activities to ensure maximum public involvement. These maps illustrate the diverse population in the project areas, the neighboring areas, and those areas downstream from restoration projects.

An analysis of the Census 2000 minority and household income data for Miami–Dade County is shown and the legend explains the color block quadrants, which show the relationship between the minority and household income percentages in each census block. The minority and household income thresholds for environmental justice potential areas chosen by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Region 4 were used to maintain consistency with the southeast region. In addition to the color coding, the pie charts in each tract represent the percent of Hispanic and Creole speaking populations within that area. This information is invaluable when the project team develops outreach strategies for individuals with limited English proficiency. An inset, not shown, provides a breakdown of minority statistics within the county for quick comparison with other counties.

The complete map set of 16 counties is available to view and download from the Equity Program from Evergladesplan.org.