It’s not every day that Jason Garcia, the former Orlando Sentinel advocate for left wing causes and a perpetual critic of Florida’s business landscape, stumbles onto something worthy of our attention. But every now and then, well, you know, even a broken clock, blind squirrel, etc., a legitimate issue surfaces amid his predictable partisan tripe.

Garcia recently highlighted the 2024 report from Florida State University’s Center for Rare Earths, Critical Minerals, and Industrial Byproducts. The study underscores a glaring regulatory problem: Florida is sitting on an estimated $31 billion worth of valuable minerals – trapped in phosphogypsum stacks – while outdated rules prevent us from putting those resources to good use.

For decades, state and federal regulations have forced phosphate companies to pile up these byproducts into towering “gypstacks” instead of repurposing them for agriculture, construction, and, critically, reducing America’s dependence on China for rare earth elements (REEs). The FSU report suggests that Florida’s leaders should modernize these regulations, allowing industry and researchers to develop ways to reuse this material.

Garcia’s spin, of course, is that such policies would help big companies like Mosaic, which he doesn’t trust on the grounds that he’s basically a communist and profits are evil. Fortunately, he seems to grasp the fact figuring out a solution to the gypstack question would help all of Florida, not just one company. Instead of treating phosphogypsum like radioactive nuclear waste, state leaders should be pushing for policies that promote innovation, resource recovery, and strategic independence from foreign mineral suppliers. Even Garcia agrees that “we all have an interest in finding something to do with this waste.”

Florida accounts for 60% of the nation’s phosphate production, and that phosphate is vital to U.S. agriculture and food security. Figuring out a way to use cutting-edge technology to process and repurpose the byproducts, rather than stacking them into regulatory purgatory, is the kind of 3D chess move we need to come up with to put Florida in the driver’s seat as the most forward-thinking state in the nation.

And here’s the bigger picture: phosphate isn’t just an agricultural necessity – it’s a national security issue. Some experts have called for it to be added to the critical minerals list. Why? Because the world’s largest phosphate producer is China, which controls 42% of global production. The U.S., in contrast, produces less than a quarter of that and still relies on imports to meet demand. If you think reliance on China for rare earth elements is already problem (and it is), imagine adding phosphate to that list.

The good news is that with Washington’s renewed focus on securing domestic supply chains, Florida has an opportunity to work with the federal government to modernize outdated rules and encourage American industry to reduce dependency on adversarial nations.

Florida’s leaders should act now – because keeping billions of dollars in critical minerals buried under red tape isn’t just bad economics. It’s bad policy. And on top of that, Jason Garcia probably won’t complain as much as usual when lawmakers get this sorted out.