UNFILTERED – The Truth About Oysters: Florida Climate Week Screening & Panel | Tuesday, October 6 | 5:30-7:30 | Highlands Regional Library (1826 Dunn Avenue)

Hosted by COJ Sustainability Department – St. Johns Riverkeeper – Jax Oyster Conservation

You’ll never look at an oyster the same way again.

This Emmy award-winning documentary reveals the oyster’s hidden double life. On our plates, they’re a delicacy and a livelihood. Beneath the surface, they’re one of nature’s most powerful tools — a keystone species that filters and cleans vast volumes of water, buffers shorelines from storms, and anchors entire estuary ecosystems.

But the reefs are vanishing. Ninety percent of the world’s ancient oyster reefs have collapsed in the last thirty years, and Florida’s own Apalachicola Bay is slipping toward the same fate under the pressures of pollution, coastal development, and overharvesting. The film makes a hopeful case: shell recycling, artificial reefs, and freshwater management can still turn the tide.

That work is already underway right here in Jacksonville. Along the Ribault, Trout, and St. Johns Rivers, we’re putting these same nature-based solutions into practice — building Pervious Oyster Shell Habitat (POSH) modules and Vertical Oyster Gardens to restore living shorelines, and helping launch a recycled oyster shell collection system that gives discarded shells a second life as new reef. Every oyster we return to the water is another filter cleaning the St. Johns.

RSVP

This event is free, but reserve your spot here.

After the Film: Panel Discussion

Stay for a conversation with local panelists who are harnessing the power of oysters to restore and filter the St. Johns River – and learn how you can get involved. The filmmaker will be in attendance, and East Coast Oysters will have oysters available for sale.

Meet the panelists:

Josh McLawhorn: Director/Editor of UNFILTERED

Unfiltered: The Truth About Oysters is Josh’s debut feature-length documentary. A member of the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, Josh’s work as a cinematographer and editor has earned eight Suncoast Emmy Awards. He operates Level Up Digital Media, a firm which produces commercials, corporate and nonprofit films, and television programs.

Josh’s 2014 short film Almost Ready won first place nationwide in Nikon’s Everyday Cinema Contest, and his commercial work has earned several Gold Addy Awards at the Tallahassee chapter of the American Advertising Federation, including a Judge’s Choice Award in 2016, and an FPRA Image Award in 2019.

The topics addressed in Unfiltered: The Truth About Oysters are close to home for the inhabitants of coastal communities around the world, and Josh is no exception. A native of Florida’s panhandle, he grew up eating oysters harvested from the Apalachicola Bay estuary and swimming in the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico. He hopes Unfiltered: The Truth About Oysters will attract public and political interest to the ecological crisis facing oysters, and help supercharge reef restoration efforts.

Learn more about Josh at levelup.media.

Chucha Barber: Executive Producer of UNFILTERED

A member in good standing with the Producers Guild of America, filmmaker Chucha Barber has been creating documentary films for more than 30 years on topics as diverse as art, paleontology, high-profile murders and auto racing. She has produced more than 29 documentaries in partnership with network-owned stations including NBC, CBS, ABC, Univision and Telemundo.

Past chair and founder of the Tallahassee Film Festival, Chucha owns and operates Chucha Barber Productions, which creates television programs and documentary films. Chucha’s work as a producer has earned seven Suncoast Emmy Awards, a Girl Scouts of America Women of Distinction Award, and two Gracie Awards from the Alliance for Women in Media.

Chucha’s influence and interest extends beyond filmmaking. Appointed by a former Florida governor as a Commissioner of Volunteer Florida, Chucha is a past chair of the Volunteer Florida Foundation. She has served as a board member of the Leon County Tourist Development Council, instructed students as a guest lecturer at Florida State University, co-chaired the Tallahassee Heart Ball, and founded the Florida Wine Festival.

In addition to Unfiltered: The Truth About Oysters, she is currently working on her first television series and a documentary about the current and historical significance of Black churches to societal change.

Learn more about Chucha Barber Productions at www.chuchabarber.com.

Hunter Mathews: Founder and Director for Jax Oyster Conservation

Hunter was born and raised in Jacksonville, Florida. Growing up, his love for Florida’s beaches, springs, and waterways sparked a passion for Florida’s ecosystems and conservation. He received his master’s degree in biology from the University of North Florida, where he focused on oyster reef restoration ecology, leading the first biological studies of a novel oyster reef restoration method, Pervious Oyster Shell Habitats (or POSH). Hunter founded Jax Oyster Conservation in 2024, motivated to provide an on-going oyster shell recycling program for local restaurants, citizens, and events, to reduce our landfill contribution and provide oyster shell to supply more coastal restoration and resilience projects in northeast Florida.

Kevonne Phillips: Eastcoast Oysters

Kevonne Phillips is a well-known Florida oyster Shucker, now residing and servicing Jacksonville and surrounding areas with his own mobile raw bar called Eastcoast Oysters. Kevonne has over 10 years catering experience, with a rich history of high-end events such as Formula 1, Miami Oyster Fest, Welcome to Rockville, Hulaween, Ritz-Carlton private parties, with weddings, holiday gatherings, and local vending in between.

David Wandel: Episcopal AP Environmental Science Faculty Member

David Wandel embodies a combination of environmental stewardship and education. For 14 years, David has dedicated his professional career to environmental education at The Episcopal School of Jacksonville, helping young people understand not only how natural systems function, but why protecting those systems matters. Outside of the classroom, he has transformed those same principles into direct environmental action through oyster restoration and, most recently, the development of Matanzas Oyster Company, a sustainable oyster aquaculture operation with its first harvest anticipated in spring 2027.

David holds a degree in biology from Penn State University and has pursued specialized training in oyster aquaculture through the Virginia Institute of Marine Science. His interest in oysters extends far beyond their commercial value. At the center of his work is a genuine fascination with the oyster as an ecosystem engineer and a desire to help others understand the extraordinary role oysters can play in the health and resilience of coastal ecosystems.

Through sustainable oyster aquaculture, David is demonstrating how responsible food production and environmental stewardship can coexist. Although the farm’s first commercial harvest is anticipated in spring 2027, its foundation has been built on years of education, specialized training, community partnership, and direct participation in oyster habitat restoration.

David’s work demonstrates that meaningful environmental protection does not have to occur in only one setting. It can happen in a classroom, along the shoreline of the St. Johns River, in the leased water column of the Guana River, through community restoration projects, and through environmentally responsible local businesses. His career and community service reflect a sustained commitment to protecting Northeast Florida’s waterways while inspiring others to understand and value the ecosystems around them.

Trey Ford: Strategic Partnerships & Programming Coordinator for St. Johns Riverkeeper

Trey leads the Resilient Ribault Initiative in Northside and Westside Jacksonville. He coordinates the organization’s oyster restoration and living shoreline work in the Ribault, Moncrief, and Trout River watersheds, including a Vertical Oyster Garden program with more than 300 gardens installed on residential docks and the Pervious Oyster Shell Habitat reef modules at the Riverview Park living shoreline — work carried out with Jacksonville University’s Marine Science Research Institute, CCA Florida, and the Riverview Collective Community Organization. He is also an elected Supervisor on the Duval Soil & Water Conservation District and the founder of Florida Fish Pepper Co. — Growers Alliance. A film producer and programmer, Trey is interested in how oysters connect water quality, working waterfronts, foodways, and the Gullah Geechee cultural history of this coast.