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Pulling the curtain behind WLRN's new podcast 'Bright Lit Place'

South Bay, Florida: Worker Jean Tidane (foreground) wades in the water while planting Bulrush for the South Florida Water Management District (SFWMD) in Stormwater Treatment Area 1 West as part of a vegetation management program. A 30-year plan to restore the Everglades impacts millions of people who live, work and play in South Florida, from fishing captains and others who make their living on the water to birders and recreationists to scientists, Miccosukees and environmentalists who have invested professional and personal lives in the world’s largest environmental restoration project.
Patrick Farrell for WLRN News
South Bay, Florida: Worker Jean Tidane (foreground) wades in the water while planting Bulrush for the South Florida Water Management District (SFWMD) in Stormwater Treatment Area 1 West as part of a vegetation management program.
Miccosukee Elder Michael Frank visits his family’s Tree Island where he spent part of his youth. A 30-year plan to restore the Everglades impacts millions of people who live, work and play in South Florida, from fishing captains and others who make their living on the water to birders and recreationists to scientists, Miccosukees and environmentalists who have invested professional and personal lives in the world’s largest environmental restoration project. Photos by Patrick Farrell
Patrick Farrell fo WLRN News
Miccosukee Elder Michael Frank visits his family’s Tree Island where he spent part of his youth.

For six months, Jenny Staletovich waded through the muck.

Jenny is WLRN’s award-winning environment reporter. Her reporting on pythons overtaking the Everglades recently won a national Edward R. Murrow Award. This time, she focused on the decades-long battle to make the Everglades work as nature intended.

To do that, Jenny put on her wading boots. She slogged through the Everglades with Miccosukee tribal elders and local fishing guides. She plodded through decades of legal wrangling in the name of Everglades Restoration.

At the end, she emerged with a new podcast from WLRN News, distributed by the NPR Network. It’s called Bright Lit Place — a sacred term for the river of grass that makes Florida special.

On the Nov. 27 episode of Sundial, we hear part of the first episode of Bright Lit Place. Afterward, we talk to Jenny in the studio to talk about the six-part series. She’ll be joined by Pulitzer-prize-winning photographer Patrick Farrell, who helped document her tireless work.

On Sundial’s previous episode, we spoke with author Carl Hiaasen before a live audience at the Miami Book Fair. They talked about his new book, Wrecker and growing up in Florida.

Listen to Sundial Monday through Thursday on WLRN, 91.3 FM, live at 1 p.m., rebroadcast at 8 p.m. Missed a show? Find every episode of Sundial on your favorite podcast app, such as Apple PodcastsStitcher and Spotify.

Carlos Frías is a bilingual writer, a journalist of more than 25 years and the author of an award-winning memoir published by Simon & Schuster.
Leslie Ovalle Atkinson is the former lead producer behind Sundial. As a multimedia producer, she also worked on visual and digital storytelling.
Elisa Baena is a former associate producer for Sundial.