Federal waters off Florida’s coast remain in the Trump administration’s draft proposed offshore oil and gas leasing plan, the acting head of the agency that developed the plan said Friday. Florida waters “are still part of the analysis until [Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke] gives us an official decision otherwise,” Walter Cruickshank, the acting director of the US Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, told a House Natural Resources subcommittee. Following a meeting with Florida Governor Rick Scott, a Republican, on January 9, Zinke announced that he was “removing Florida from consideration for any new oil and gas platforms,” in regards to the draft proposed program his agency released the week before. That proposed plan called for 47 sales in federal waters, including 12 sales in the Eastern Gulf of Mexico, three in the South Atlantic and one in the Straits of Florida, over a five-year period. Zinke, who announced his […]