The "Dade County Aquarium and Marine Laboratory" on Virginia Key

Early planning for an Aquarium on Virginia Key envisioned a “civic institution of educational value, providing unique entertainment at a moderate admittance fee controlled by the County.”

In what now seems a rather quaint practice, the Board of County Commissioners wrote up a sales sheet of sorts to convince taxpayers to approve the issuance of $2 million in bonds to pay for the project.

Entitled, “Facts of Importance to All Property Owners” the County put it this way: “These projects are not for us. They are for you, your family and friends, the visitors who spend millions of dollars here, and for the general welfare and progress of our commmunity.”

Accordingly, the “Dade County Aquarium and Marine Laboratory” project which would be built on 40 acres of County-owned land on Virginia Key would include:

a marine biology laboratory operated in cooperation with the United States government. In addition to hundreds of varied kinds of fish and ocean life in display tanks, it would have a museum of wild life, laboratory equipment for the benefit of the public, batteries of microscopes to view minute marine life, equipment for showing scientific motion pictures and rooms for public lectures.

To convince taxpayers of the fiscal soundness of the project, they projected $175,000 annual revenue, which would be used to pay off the bonds. Not only that, but as the marine center provided an inducement to motorists to cross the newly constructed (1947) Rickenbacker Causeway, the increased toll revenues would speed up payment of the causeway to the day when the toll would be removed altogether.

Of course, the project’s appeal to tourists was touted as another plus, given that “(T)ourists are the main support of this area.”

But perhaps the greatest sales pitch was this: “As a publicly-owned institution, proper controls over its policies, prices and operation can be excercised to keep the aquarium as a recreation center for all the people.”