161031-a
5 Things to know as Georgia-Florida water wars trial begins
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution – by Dan Chapman
October 31, 2016
Is Atlanta hogging the Chattahoochee River ? Is Georgia responsible for the demise of Florida’s oyster industry ? Will metro Atlantans be able to water their lawns in the future?
These and other critical questions undergird the “water war” between Georgia and Florida set to begin this morning in a bankruptcy courtroom in Portland, Me. Nearly three decades of litigation and government (in)action come to a head before a no-nonsense Yankee judge appointed by the U.S. Supreme Court.
Here are five things you need to know about the trial:
1) It’s very important. Florida accuses Georgia of keeping the Chattahoochee and Flint rivers from flowing abundantly into the Sunshine State to the detriment of its oyster industry, economy and environment.
2) It’s in Portland because a courtroom in Washington, D.C. wasn’t available for the two months the trial might endure. The Supreme Court appointed Ralph Lancaster as the special master to adjudicate the case. Lancaster lives in Portland.
3) The burden of proof rests with Florida which first must convince the master that it’s environment and economy have been harmed by too little water from Georgia.
4) Florida unspools its case first this morning. Georgia is expected to follow. Witnesses will then be called, including Harold Reheis who ran Georgia’s water programs from 1992 to 2003.
5) It may not end here. Even if the Supreme Court takes up the case upon Lancaster’s recommendation there’s still time for Georgia and Florida to work out a deal.

161031-b
Everglades advocates promote reservoir as part of federal restoration plan
WUSF.org – by Amy Green
October 31, 2016
Everglades advocates are calling for the construction of a reservoir south of Lake Okeechobee. Their visit to central Florida on Thursday is part of a 20-city bus tour promoting the reservoir.
The reservoir would alleviate large discharges of excess, polluted water from Lake Okeechobee to coastal estuaries, where the influxes have triggered toxic algae blooms.
It’s part of a multi-billion-dollar federal restoration plan, which includes the state as a partner.
Eric Eikenberg of the Everglades Foundation says the restoration plan is the biggest in the world and includes 68 separate projects.
“The second project that was authorized by the Congress back in 2000 is the reservoir south of Lake Okeechobee.”
Everglades advocates are calling on state and federal leaders to fund the reservoir.
Opponents of the reservoir say Everglades restoration should focus instead on completing existing projects.

161030-a
Everglades bus barnstorms through South Florida
Miami Herald - by Kevin Wadlow
October 30, 2016
Water flowing south through the Everglades and Florida Bay eventually reaches the Florida Keys, where an 11-day awareness campaign ends Nov. 6.
“As part of Everglades restoration, we’re calling for the water to be sent south through the ’Glades and into Florida Bay,” Everglades Foundation chief executive Eric Eikenberg said Friday from the Orlando stop of the Now Or Neverglades bus tour.
“This water needs to hit Florida Bay so we want to end the tour in Islamorada, one of the southernmost spots of the bay,” he said.
Everglades Foundation staff and volunteers were at Zoo Miami on Saturday, then headed over to Florida International University’s football game to collect signatures on a Now or Neverglades declaration that calls for using “Amendment 1 funds to increase storage, treatment and conveyance south of Lake Okeechobee.”
In addition to raising awareness of the Everglades, tour organizers advocate for creating a large water-storage reservoir south of Lake Okeechobee.
That would require a large tract of agricultural land to be acquired, a proposal that has generated opposition from the state’s sugar industry and others.
Proposals to create a reservoir north of the big lake have been raised, but most environmental groups insist on having the storage area below the lake.
“A northern reservoir does nothing for Florida Bay, nothing for the Keys,” Eikenberg said. “When it fills up and Lake Okeechobee fills up, the water would still be dumped” off the state’s eastern and western coasts.
“Our message is to the people we meet is that a water crisis anywhere in Florida is a crisis everywhere in Florida,” Eikenberg said.
Bus tour stops include the Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show on Friday, the University of Miami football game next Saturday and the Miami Dolphins game Nov. 6. The bus will be at the World Wide Sportsman in Islamorada from 4 to 7 p.m. Nov. 6.

161030-b
Everglades Foundation looking to gain support on restoration plans
CBS12.com – by Yaremi Farinas
October 30, 2016
WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (CBS12) — The Everglades Foundation is looking to gain support as it continues its #NowOrNeverglades bus tour.
Sunday marks the fifth day of the 12-day bus tour with stops in 20 cities in Florida.
Early Sunday, West Palm Beach resident Marty Straton visited the South Florida Science Museum to check out the bus tour.
“I am just very interested to know what's going on with our water in Florida,” Straton said.
She is one of at least 32,000 Floridians who’ve signed the #NowOrNeverGlades declaration. The declaration is a legislative action plan to increase water storage south of Lake Okeechobee by constructing a reservoir in the Everglades agriculture area.
“What's lacking is the capacity to store that water south of the lake so we can send it back to the Everglades,” said Steve Davis, Everglades Foundation ecologist.
While the proposal has generated some opposition, Davis explained why he believes sending water south of Lake Okeechobee will significantly reduce the amount of toxic blue green algae threatening Florida’s Treasure Coast.
“That will alleviate discharges to the east and the west and provide the fresh water flow needs all the way down to Florida bay and the Florida Keys,” Davis said.
The foundation hopes by spreading the word it’ll put pressure on state and federal lawmakers to act now, before Florida’s water quality issues worsen.
“People come here as tourist to go out on boats, to fish, to hang out at the beach, and the quality of water in those areas is directly tied to the quality and quantity of water that flows across the peninsula,” Davis said.
Davis said restoring the Everglades ensures a sustainable water supply for Floridians who depend on it such as Straton, who now currently purifies all the water at her home.
“With eight million people plus in Florida it’s very important that we have clean water,” Straton said.

161030-c
Who’ll perform CPR on Everglades? South Florida chokes on guacamole
Orlando Sentinel – by Eric Eikenberg, CEO, Everglades Foundation
October 30, 2016
magine that one of Florida's most important flood-control structures has been ruptured, and that every day, 1.5 billion gallons of toxic water is gushing into two of Florida's most popular sport fishing, boating and tourist areas.
Soon, a dark, smelly blue-green algae bloom forms in the waterways, with the consistency of guacamole. Below the surface, the algae is suffocating sea grass where sport fish breed; exposure to the water is toxic to wildlife and pets. For humans, simply inhaling the air near the water results in symptoms similar to asthma. People are getting sick. Those who work near the water are wearing respiratory gear.
If this were the result of a natural disaster, the news coverage would be nonstop. Cameras would be trained on the spillways as the Niagara of polluted water gushed forth; the media would post daily updates.
People would demand answers of their elected officials, and rightly so.
Yet these are the very conditions that are going on, right now, in South Florida — but they are not caused by an act of God.
The cause is the decades-long failure of both the federal and state governments to implement solutions that Washington and Tallahassee set in motion nearly 20 years ago. They know what's needed to solve the problem, and they have the money. What's lacking is political will.
While the politicians dawdle, Florida continues to labor under a "state of emergency" that Gov. Rick Scott was forced to declare this summer, after the algae blooms were spotted in 44 different locations along both our coasts.
We have so altered the natural plumbing of South Florida that we have blocked the slow southerly flow of most of the water from Lake Okeechobee to the Everglades; as a result, the Army Corps of Engineers is forced to open the spigots whenever lake levels get too high.
Besides the catastrophic algae blooms that are the direct result of these discharges, we are wasting billions of gallons of freshwater that is desperately needed during the dry season, exacerbating drought conditions across South Florida during the winter months.
Instead of irrigating South Florida, more than two-thirds of the freshwater rainfall that used to flow south into Florida Bay is instead being flushed, untreated, into the St. Lucie Estuary and the Caloosahatchee River, where it is doing incalculable damage.
We know the solution to this crisis. Hundreds of scientists and water experts have for decades all prescribed greater water storage south of the lake to hold the excess lake water so it can be cleansed and gradually sent south to irrigate the Everglades and recharge the aquifers that provide drinking water to millions.
For nearly two decades, both the federal and state governments have committed to build a reservoir south of Lake Okeechobee for that purpose: Congress directed construction of this reservoir 16 years ago and ordered the federal government to assume half the cost, but we still don't have a reservoir – and time is wasting.
It's not a question of money: funding for Florida's acquisition of the land to build the reservoir is there, thanks to voters who in 2014 passed Amendment 1, the Florida Water and Land Conservation Initiative. By a margin of 3 to 1, voters established a dedicated source of revenue to purchase environmentally sensitive land for Everglades restoration projects like the reservoir, so we have more than ample dollars to move forward.
In the wake of this summer's emergency declaration, the federal government signaled its renewed willingness to speed up the planning process for the project, but the water management district is dragging its feet, refusing to start planning for the project now.
Incoming state Senate President Joe Negron has proposed expediting the reservoir south of Lake Okeechobee, and from Fernandina Beach to Key West, thousands of Floridians are signing the #NowOrNeverglades Declaration to tell the politicians to do their jobs: build the reservoir before it's too late, and send the water south.
The project will add billions of dollars to the Florida economy and create thousands of new jobs, but most important, it will save a unique quality of life in this very special place — and it will protect the water we need for life itself.
Florida faces an environmental disaster, no less newsworthy than if it was caused by a natural disaster or the acts of terrorists — and we know what's needed to stop it. It's time to move forward, use the money that 75 percent of voters set aside, and build the reservoir south of Lake Okeechobee.

161029-a
’Glades bus campaign heads toward Islamorada
FLKeysNews.com - by Kevin Wadlow
October 29, 2016
Water flowing south through the Everglades and Florida Bay eventually reaches the Florida Keys, where an 11-day awareness campaign ends Nov. 6.
“As part of Everglades restoration, we’re calling for the water to be sent south through the ’Glades and into Florida Bay,” Everglades Foundation chief executive Eric Eikenberg said Friday from the Orlando stop of the Now Or Neverglades bus tour.
“This water needs to hit Florida Bay so we want to end the tour in Islamorada, one of the southernmost spots of the bay,” he said.
Everglades Foundation staff and volunteers will be at Zoo Miami until noon today, then head over to Florida International University’s football game to collect signatures on a Now or Neverglades declaration that calls for using “Amendment 1 funds to increase storage, treatment and conveyance south of Lake Okeechobee.”
In addition to raising awareness of the Everglades, tour organizers advocate for creating a large water-storage reservoir south of Lake Okeechobee.
That would require a large tract of agricultural land to be acquired, a proposal that has generated opposition from the state’s sugar industry and others.
Proposals to create a reservoir north of the big lake have been raised, but most environmental groups insist on having the storage area below the lake.
“A northern reservoir does nothing for Florida Bay, nothing for the Keys,” Eikenberg said. “When it fills up and Lake Okeechobee fills up, the water would still be dumped” off the state’s eastern and western coasts.
“Our message is to the people we meet is that a water crisis anywhere in Florida is a crisis everywhere in Florida,” Eikenberg said.
Bus tour stops include the Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show on Friday, the University of Miami football game next Saturday and the Miami Dolphins game Nov. 6. The bus will be at the World Wide Sportsman in Islamorada from 4 to 7 p.m. Nov. 6.

161029-b
We are all stakeholders in water quality
News-Press.com – by Mike Jung, president of The News-Press Media Group
October 29, 2016
On Wednesday, The News-Press convened 400 stakeholders, including 20 subject matter experts, at our first-ever The News-Press Market Watch Save Our Water summit.
Yes, I consider those that attended the sold out event as “stakeholders” because we all have skin in the game.  As a number of the speakers mentioned, the quality of our water system affects economic development, conservation and preservation of land and endangered species, boaters, swimmers, the fishing trade and tourism. In other words, water impacts everyone.  FGCU professor Edwin Everham summed it by saying, “The smell of dead fish will ruin any good marketing plan.”
The scientists, researchers and panelists that spoke used data and facts to tell their story.  I know I came away a little more informed and a lot more curious about what to do.
Speaking of learning, acronyms like CERP (Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan) and EAA (Everglades Agricultural Area) were used often but not everyone in the room, including me, knew what those abbreviations meant.
There are a number of credible, objective sources of reports available and two that are mentioned often are the University of Florida Water Institute’s Report, March 2015:
http://www.flsenate.gov/UserContent/Topics/WLC/UF-WaterInstituteFinalReportMarch2015.pdf
Caloosahatchee Watershed Regional Water Management Issues Document, also known as the City of Sanibel White Paper:
So now what ?  Personally, I have been guilty of attending a conference or training, finding inspiration only to succumb to the “daily routine” back on the farm and not following through on the newly-identified topic of most importance.
That’s where you come in.   Help us shape the plan to take action.  We have our early thoughts regarding stories and editorials, town hall meetings and visits to Tallahassee and I would like to hear from you on suggestions going forward.  Send a note to:  Publisher@news-press.com
Water quality impacts are not restricted to the Gulf Coast or the East Coast of Florida, as the entire state has a vested interest in clean water. The Gannett complement of papers spans the Sunshine State – Naples Daily News, Treasure Coast Newspapers, Florida Today, Pensacola News Journal, Tallahassee Democrat and The News-Press – and we are poised to take action.
Let’s take the curiosity created at Save Our Water and develop an actionable plan that will preserve our most precious natural resource.

161028-a
Everglades bus tour to stop in Palm Beach on Monday morning
PB Daily News - by David Rogers, Staff Writer
Palm Beach’s Town Hall is one stop on The Everglades Foundation’s #NowOrNeverglades bus tour this month.
The 12-day tour through Central and South Florida plans to stop at Town Hall, 360 S. County Road, at 9 a.m. Monday.
Tour organizers and volunteers will urge residents to push Congress, the next president and state lawmakers to support building a water reservoir in the Everglades Agriculture Area. Such a water storage structure would reduce the “damaging discharges” of untreated water from Lake Okeechobee into the area’s coastal estuaries and increase the flow of fresh, clean water to the Everglades and Florida Bay, according to organizers. And that could help protect the supply of drinking water for 6 million Floridians while aiding the environment, the foundation reports.
On Sunday, the tour bus will be at the South Florida Science Center from 9:30-11 a.m.
For more information and/or to sign the #NowOrNeverglades declaration of support, visit http://www.evergladesfoundation.org/NoworNeverglades-Declaration/

161028-b
Mosaic hopes to plug massive Polk sinkhole by spring
TheLedger.com – by Tamara Lush and Jason Dearen The Associated Press
October 28, 2016
A massive sinkhole at a fertilizer plant should be plugged by spring, months after contaminated water and waste began flowing into Florida's main drinking water aquifer, the company said Friday.
TAMPA — A massive sinkhole at a fertilizer plant should be plugged by spring, months after contaminated water and waste began flowing into Florida's main drinking water aquifer, the company said Friday.
In an email to The Associated Press, Mosaic spokeswoman Callie Neslund said the company recently finished a survey of the sinkhole cavity.
"Based on the survey results, the company now has a better understanding of the sinkhole dimensions — which is a critical step in remediating the sinkhole," she wrote.
See related stories at http://www.theledger.com/topics/mosaic.
Neslund said the upper cavity is between 140 feet and 150 feet in diameter at its widest point, and about 220 feet deep.
Mosaic — one of the world's largest producers of phosphate and potash for fertilizer — previously acknowledged that the contamination had spread to groundwater around the sinkhole.
The Minnesota-based company's announcement about plugging the sinkhole comes after it reached a deal with the state Department of Environmental Protection earlier this week. Mosaic is required to put up $40 million, and if it fails to follow through on the cleanup, the company will face fines of up to $10,000 per day.
Meanwhile, state environmental officials said that contaminates found in private wells near the site are not believed to be related to the sinkhole.
Agency spokeswoman Dee Ann Miller said in an email that private wells near the Mosaic site where high levels of contamination have been found may be associated with "natural geologic deposits and processes.
"In other cases, it may be related to the construction of the water well itself," she wrote.
Neslund said that the company has not detected elevated levels of contamination in wells elsewhere on its property. It is working to pump out tainted water from a well near the sinkhole.
A Mosaic employee discovered the water loss caused by the sinkhole Aug. 27 and the state and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency was notified the next day, as required by Florida law, according to David Jellerson, the company's senior director for environmental and phosphate projects.
However, homeowners near Mosaic's New Wales plant weren't first notified by Mosaic or the state agency until Sept. 19, after news of the sinkhole broke the previous week. After that, Mosaic began providing them with bottled water.
By then, a huge wastewater pond had mostly disappeared through the hole in the massive pile of phosphogypsum, a fertilizer byproduct that contains minute traces of radiation.
Mosaic stacks the chemicals in hill-size piles that can be hundreds of feet tall and visible from space.
Neslund said as of Friday, the facility received about 5 inches of rainfall since the beginning of October.
"We have not determined how much of that rainfall entered the sinkhole," she wrote. "The recovery well continues to pump about 5 million gallons of water each day. Onsite groundwater monitoring confirms that any impacted water is being recovered."

161027-a
Everglades advocates promote reservoir as part of Federal restoration plan
WMFE - by Amy Green
October 27, 2016
Everglades advocates are calling for the construction of a reservoir south of Lake Okeechobee.
Their visit to central Florida on Thursday is part of a 20-city bus tour promoting the reservoir.
The reservoir would alleviate large discharges of excess, polluted water from Lake Okeechobee to coastal estuaries, where the influxes have triggered toxic algae blooms.
It’s part of a multi-billion-dollar federal restoration plan, which includes the state as a partner.
Eric Eikenberg of the Everglades Foundation says the restoration plan is the biggest in the world and includes 68 separate projects.
“The second project that was authorized by the Congress back in 2000 is the reservoir south of Lake Okeechobee.”
Everglades advocates are calling on state and federal leaders to fund the reservoir.
Opponents of the reservoir say Everglades restoration should focus instead on completing existing projects.

161027-b
FPL’s Turkey Point fix won’t solve pollution problems, group says
Palm Beach Post - by Susan Salisbury, Staff Writer
October 27, 2016
Just weeks after Florida Power & Light began work to clean up an underground plume of extremely salty water and other toxins stemming from its Turkey Point nuclear plant, a clean energy advocacy group says the plan will not work.
“The solutions that FPL and the Florida Department of Environmental Protection have proposed will not stop the pollution. It will only clean up the old pollution,” said Laura Reynolds, a consultant for the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy.
In fact, new findings provided by Miami-Dade County indicate water from the cooling canals is likely seeping into Biscayne Bay, Reynolds said this week.
“We have suspected these natural springs to be contributing to the problem for five years,” Reynolds said. “There are natural caverns within the limestone that connect groundwater to surface water. You can’t cover those up or fill those in.”
The plant about 25 miles south of downtown Miami has a two-mile by five-mile unlined cooling canal system adjacent to Biscayne Bay. The system circulates billions of gallons water daily to cool the plant’s two nuclear reactors.
FPL began a 10-year $206 million project to inject up to 15 million gallons a day of hypersaline polluted groundwater into ... read more
In late September, FPL began a 10-year $206 million project to inject up to 15 million gallons a day of hypersaline polluted groundwater into the boulder zone below the Biscayne Aquifer. The project includes making some of the canals that are not part of the cooling system more shallow.
FPL spokesman Peter Robbins said the company is in compliance with administrative orders issued by the Florida Department of Environmental Protection and the Miami-Dade Department of Environmental Resources Management.
“FPL continues to work closely with regulatory agencies and key stakeholders to address concerns. The company will ensure our approach meets all requirements set forth by the state’s consent order and the county’s consent agreement and addendum. FPL continues to build on the progress it has already made to improve the water quality of the canals,” Robbins said.
In July SACE and Tropical Audubon Society filed a federal lawsuit against FPL saying that the discharge of polluted water from its Turkey Point plant’s cooling canals into Biscayne Bay and ground water violates the federal Clean Water Act.
The underground plume extends at least four miles west of the cooling canal system and is consuming potential drinking water supplied from the Biscayne Aquifer to 3 million South Floridians.
Reynolds said that new data obtained from DERM shows that groundwater is seeping through the porous limestone under the canals and into Biscayne Bay. DERM is still analyzing the water.
Robbins said FPL has not received the new data.
FPL and DERM have been more closely monitoring Biscayne Bay and surface waters connected to it since 2010.
In an amended complaint filed earlier this month, SACE, the Tropical Audubon Society and Friends of the Everglades assert that this year DERM discovered additional “upwellings of groundwater” into Biscayne Bay at new monitoring locations that are flowing at lowtide and during high rain events.
SACE has advocated for FPL to abandon the cooling canal system for cooling towers, which FPL has said don’t make sense financially or environmentally. As long as the cooling canals operate, 600,000 pounds of salt is escaping each day into the canals.
“The plan they have in place may actually cause harm,” Reynolds said. “Models that have been run show they will damage the wetlands and Everglades restoration project unless they do it slower to avoid a drawdown of the water table in the area.”
If the work is done more slowly, FPL will not be in compliance with a Florida Department of Environmental Protection consent order issued in June.

161027-c
Managing Everglades system isn't cheap, and it won't be anytime soon
News-Press.com – by Chad Gillis
October 27, 2016
The costs for clean water in South Florida keep coming.
Taxpayers have spent billions on Lake Okeechobee and the Everglades water system to store, move and clean water before it flows off to the sea.
The problem is the bill never gets fully paid. The dike rimming the big lake, the canals, pumps and filter marshes all need to be maintained. And then there's money and work needed to restore all the ecological damage that's piled up over the last century or so.
The state budget for managing water and planning and building water control and quality structures is just under $727 million for 2017. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is in the middle of a $1.6 billion Herbert Hoover Dike repair that's expected to better protect the 40,000 or so people who live in rural farming communities south of Lake Okeechobee.
The C43 reservoir, also called the Caloosahatchee reservoir, will cost about $600 million and will hold 170,000 acre-feet, or about 55 billion gallons, of water and is the largest Everglades restoration project in Hendry County near the Lee County line.
Congress approved what's known as the Water Resources Development Act of 2016 in September, sending more than $100 million to Collier County for an Everglades restoration project there.
From utility bills to county taxes to federal flood protection projects, we pay to push water so we can live in what many consider paradise, and those costs aren't going away anytime soon.
We've created an artificial system that requires large-scale management between local, state and federal agencies.
But if it weren't for the 143-mile Herbert Hoover Dike and the massive South Florida Water Management District drainage system there would not be 8 million people living in the historic Everglades – which stretches from just south of Orlando to Florida Bay.
So what do we get for the money, and how does fixing a dike in the middle of the state improve water conditions in local fishing hot spots like Pine Island Sound?
For one, the Corps is already storing a few extra inches of water because it has more confidence in the dike's structural integrity.
"We’ve done a lot of remediation with the dike already, which made us more comfortable (during Hurricane Matthew)," said Lt. Col. Jennifer Reynolds, who is over Corps operations in Florida. "The lake stage was quite high, and if it had been as high 5 or 8 years ago, I think we would have done much larger releases all summer long to feel conformable enough with the hurricane season, so this year we were able to hold the lake a few inches higher than in past."
That few inches of water translates into smaller Lake Okeechobee releases to the Caloosahatchee and St. Lucie rivers, which means it likely kept their estuaries healthier.
Long legacy of costs
The dike was a necessity from the beginning, when the federal government gave Florida statehood with the caveat of draining the Everglades for development and farming.
The first water structures were just piles of sand, muck, sticks and debris, and the lake water overflowed in 1926 and again in 1928, which caused more than 2,500 deaths.
The Army Corps built more than 80 miles of levees, mostly on the south end, between 1932 and 1938, but major hurricanes in the 1940s blasted across the lake and much of the state. Fifty-three people died during the 1947 hurricane season in Florida, and property impacts were estimated at $135 million ($1.5 billion in today's money), according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or NOAA. The next year, Congress passed comprehensive legislation to start a functional water management system around the lake.
The latest rendition was completed in the 1960s, and the lake is considered to be one of the most dangerous water control structures in the country.
The $600 million Caloosahatchee reservoir (a 50-50 cost share project between the Army Corps and South Florida Water Management District) will help, some.
Designed to capture some of the water that falls in the Caloosahatchee watershed during the rainy season, the reservoir will hold about 55 billion gallons of water.
"A good portion of the water we receive does come from the Caloosahatchee watershed, on average about 50 percent," said James Evans, natural resources director for the City of Sanibel. "So we need to complete the C43 (Caloosahatchee) reservoir, but we also need to look at additional storage in the area between the Moore Haven lock and between the Ortona lock."
The Moore Haven and Ortona locks are between Lake Okeechobee to the northeast and the Caloosahatchee estuary.
Then there's the water  management district, which doesn't fund Lake Okeechobee management but does have input into how the Corps operates it.
The funding crunch
Bubba Wade, a former South Florida Water Management District governing board member and U.S. Sugar executive, said there are plenty of water quality projects on the drawing board, but that the most critical aspect is funding. Wade serves on the district's Water Resources Advisory Committee, an advisory committee aimed at building public consensus about district projects and initiatives.
"First and foremost is money," Wade said. "The water management district has a priority plan of 43 projects with $5.5 billion. You’ve got billions of dollars of priority projects and there’s a limited amount of money to get it done."
The district's budget for 2017 is just under $727 million; and while that may sound like a lot, the district's budget was $1.4 billion in 2007. Some taxpayers in this region have asked the state to raise taxes so that water quality projects could be more quickly completed.
More money did come from Congress in September, when federal lawmakers set aside $1.9 billion for what's called the Central Everglades Planning Project, or CEPP.
A facet of Everglades restoration, CEPP will focus on water storage and quality projects between Lake Okeechobee and Everglades National Park for storage and water quality projects.
Another $113 million was set aside for the Picayune Strand restoration project, a Collier project that removed roads and berms built during a swampland scam.
On the state level, Sen. Joe Negron, R-Stuart, proposed a bill earlier this year that would set aside $2.4 billion to purchase land south of Lake Okeechobee for an Everglades restoration project. Half of the money would come from the state and half would come from the federal government.
Negron and his supporters want to use Amendment 1 money (which was approved by voters in 2014 to buy environmentally sensitive lands) to buy up farm lands and build a reservoir capable of storing 120 billion gallons of water.
Everglades restoration plans call for similar reservoirs to be built north, west and east of the lake as well, with the end goal of being able to store about 325 billion gallons, or 1 million acre-feet, of water during periods of heavy rain and high flows.
In the end, Florida lawmakers set aside less than $89 million of the $740 million, generated by one-third of excise taxes, for actually buying land. Excise taxes are charged on specific items, such as gasoline.
Lee County spends a considerable amount ($300,000) just maintaining the filter marshes it has built to help improve local water quality.
Roland Ottolini, the county's natural resources director, said some money can be saved by lowering the amount of fertilizers and nutrients that wash off our landscape and into the local estuaries, and eventually the Gulf of Mexico.
Some of the water management and quality projects will be operational for at least several more decades as it will take 100 years or more for Lake Okeechobee to be as clean as it once was, water quality scientists estimate.
"It’s a lot cheaper to prevent it from coming into the water column in the first place," he said. "(If) your nutrient concentrations aren’t super high, that means you’re capturing a lot of water and storing it and containing it. Source control is the cheapest option."
SAVE OUR WATER
What: The News-Press Media Group is hosting an educational and engaging summit focusing on the water quality crisis in Southwest Florida. Experts from around the region and state will speak on a variety of topics, a moderated panel representing agriculture, tourism, business, U.S. Sugar and real estate will discuss the economic impacts, and we will unveil five unique water-themed experiences so the learning can continue beyond the summit.
When: Today, noon-6 p.m.
Where: Sanibel Harbour Marriott Resort & Spa
Tickets: Sold out
Live coverage: You can follow live coverage on news-press.com
Twitter: Join the conversation using #saveourwater
More coverage: For stories, video and more about the Lake Okeechobee Water Crisis.
Water shortage? Even though we get nearly 5 feet of rain each year, our water table is dropping. Here’s why.
Business impact: Keeping the river clean is good for business, say business folks along the river and beaches.
Many people want the state to buy land south of Lake Okeechobee to help solve water woes, but the truth is land is needed in every direction.
Trouble blooms: Algae occurs naturally, but the frequency and duration of events is often tied to human activities.

161027-d
Support those who support the Everglades
Miami Herald – by Don Jodrey, former senior policy adviser in the US Dept. of the interior, currently on a sabbatical teaching at Wake Forest
October 27, 2016
As Floridians go to the polls, they face clear choices of whether the leaders they ultimately elect will have the political will, knowledge and skills necessary to restore the Everglades. After advising top political appointees since 1992, I know the same thing that South Floridians know: The clean water necessary to fuel the region’s economy and ensure its environmental sustainability must move south to the Everglades and not be wasted by flushing it out to tide.
Our ability to reverse the trajectory of ecological decline in the Everglades is therefore not just a test of our scientific knowledge, engineering smarts and our determination to never give up, but it is also about the choices we make to elect leaders who are able to address the most important challenges of our times, including global change. Electing leaders who lack leadership skills will surely halt the incredible progress that the restoration partners have made to date. Do Floridians want a restored Everglades or not?
The most important issue isn’t what we must do next. That question is already answered and is uncontroverted scientific fact: Send more clean water south to the Everglades and Florida Bay.
Restoration scientists — including our independent scientific watchdog, the National Academy of Scientists — believe this to be so thereby avoiding harmful discharges to Florida’s coastal estuaries. Given our progress to date and recent state decisions to not move forward with planned land acquisition to provide for more water storage and treatment in the Everglades Agricultural Lands, the partners must work with all stakeholders to find the necessary lands in the EAA to ensure that the Everglades gets the water it needs.
The restoration partners and stakeholders agreed on the need to move water south when we enacted federal legislation in 2000 to “restore, preserve and protect the South Florida Ecosystem (the Everglades) while providing for other water related needs of the region.”
Given that we know what to do next, we are left with ballot box choices. Which leaders understand that the most important element of this multi-decade effort is a partnership? Former Gov. and Sen. Bob Graham does, and analogizes restoration to a marriage which is a romantic partnership. As most of us know we do not appreciate being trashed or abused by our romantic partners!
So since I began my sabbatical from government earlier this year, I have listened with great dismay as the executive director of the South Florida Water Management District has trashed my federal team and several non-governmental organization partners.
He attacked U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service career staff over the Endangered Species Act and stewardship of the A.R.M. Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge. These attacks resembled the unacceptable hate speech uttered during the Presidential campaign and state officials know the attacks are not true. Are these officials just trying to influence ballot box choices or intimidate their federal partners?
Similarly, the attack was directed at Florida Audubon and the Everglades Law Center staff who have worked for years to find reasonable solutions that ensure win-wins to ensure clean water, restore more natural water flows, establish new refuges in central Everglades and ensure continued conservation by ranchers and other private sector stewards and promote responsible local land use. Why?
I urge Floridians to find candidates of any party who recognize the value of partnerships and who eschew baseless attacks against restoration partners. Candidates of any party who demonstrate that they can unite and not divide and support communities struggling to lead the way on climate change or clean up their estuaries are key.
Before I moved to Washington D.C. and landed in government as a career civil servant, I was a Floridian. I watched my dad, an immigrant and decorated World War II veteran, serve the public as mayor of Belleair Beach, a small Gulf Coast community. I learned that public service is a privilege and a demanding job. So let’s elect leaders like my dad who know this.
Nathaniel P. Reed, a native Floridian and national conservation icon, recently told a crowd of school children that we can restore the Everglades. I believe Nathaniel, so let’s elect leaders who will get support the partnership so we can get to work to get the task done.

161027-e
When scientists STAND their ground
Florida Weekly – by Roger Williams
October 27, 2016
What happens when scientific truth collides with political might ?
WHETHER HE KNOWS IT OR NOT, when Marc Edwards whistles out of the southern mountains of Virginia to land at Florida Southwestern State College for a public appearance on Nov. 3, he’ll find himself standing in the Sunshine State crossroads of science, politics and that often unruly town crier, art.
Not for the first time, either.
Here, where Florida’s water system from Orlando south is now in dire straits — here where political and economic interests often seem to clash with the science that points to an expensive but effective water fix for the vast Everglades ecosystem — he might feel right at home. (For an in-depth look at Florida’s water problems and the solutions, see “The Fix,” Florida Weekly, Sept. 28.)
Mr. Edwards is a professor of civil engineering at Virginia Tech, where he teaches environmental engineering, applied aquatic chemistry and engineering ethics.
But as reputations go, that’s the least of it. Doing lab work on corrosion in buildings and “opportunistic premise-plumbing pathogens,” he’s become one of the most celebrated and coincidentally reviled academic activists in American science.
“I don’t feel I’ve had a choice,” he says.
He helped prove, for example, that people were being forced to drink lead-infused water from utility pipes in Washington, D.C., at the beginning of the last decade; he was one of Time magazine’s four most important “innovators” in international water issues and dubbed “The Plumbing Professor” in 2004; a paper on lead poisoning of children in Washington was named outstanding science paper by Environmental Science and Technology, a prestigious trade journal, in 2010; in 2013 he received a premier award for “courageously defending the public interest at great personal risk;” and this year Fortune and Time both named him one of the most influential people in the world, according to his biography.
Mr. Edwards was also a 2007 winner of a MacArthur Foundation Genius Grant (recipients get $500,000 to do what they want in furthering science or art that might help humanity).
So what could be wrong with that picture?
A lot, according to his critics, who include both public officials and some academic colleagues. They didn’t like it when Mr. Edwards stepped back into the public fray in 2014, forcing federal, state and local officials in Michigan to acknowledge actions that poisoned and perhaps killed people drinking from lead-leeching pipes in Flint.
Those officials were also forced to admit they understood the problem long before they acted, an act Mr. Edwards calls “criminal,” and a conclusion drawn by the inspector general of the Environmental Protection Agency, reported Oct. 14 by The New York Times. The EPA could have ordered state and local officials to quit supplying water passing from the Flint River through improperly treated pipes as early as June 2015, but instead waited until January of this year, the inspector general concluded.
The result in Michigan has been both dismay and huge and ongoing change; for Mr. Edwards, the consequences have been unexpected and disturbing.
“Maybe my academic career is over,” he says — in spite of his fame and his tenure as a professor at Virginia Tech. “For me to have to defend myself for exposing an environmental crime … I am dumbfounded.”
Married and with two children, he admits he has paid a costly personal price for being a do-good activist. That’s a truth anybody who attends the play “Paragon Springs” at FSW is likely to discover during the talk-back after the 8 p.m. opening-night performance Thursday, Nov. 3, in the Black Box Theater on the college’s Fort Myers campus.
Based on the Henrik Ibsen play, “An Enemy of the People,” this 2010 work by Stephen Dietz — to be produced and directed by FSW theater professor Stuart Brown — describes what happens to a man who discovers the highly profitable tourist waters of a town are toxic and makes the information public.
Mr. Brown was born and raised near the Caloosahatchee River, has watched politics ignore science as the quality of the river declined with excessive water releases from Lake Okeechobee, he says, and decided to bring both the play and Mr. Edwards to the region.
“A discussion about what happens to scientists when their work gets challenged in the political arena is overdue,” he explains.
“The first wave of climate scientists was all but obliterated by personal attacks and political pressure and other dirty tricks.,” he adds. “Science and politics have antithetical processes and yet, in today’s world, they seem ever more violently thrust into the same space. Should we be doing anything to equip our science majors to confront the bewildering political challenges they may well face in the normal course of their careers?”
That’s the troubling but insistent question that art — a painting, a play, a book, a photograph — can raise even if others don’t, when politics and science clash, says Mr. Brown.
Mr. Edwards, an incarnate answer to the question, perhaps, appears to have stepped straight from the pages and stages of Ibsen and Dietz, and he knows it.
In his forward to a David L. Lewis book, “Science for Sale,” he quotes the Ibsen play:
“Mayor: The matter in question is not a purely scientific one; it is a complex affair; it has both a technical and an economic side … As a subordinate official, you have no right to express any conviction at odds with that of your superiors.
“Dr. Stockman: What I am doing, I am doing in the name of truth and for the sake of my conscience.”
After Mr. Edwards had conducted the tests and in 2014 drawn his conclusions in Flint, once again federal, state and local officials, joined by some academic colleagues around the country, criticized him. They questioned his motives, they questioned his reputation, and they insisted first that he was wrong (he wasn’t, as subsequent events show) and second that as a scientist and academic, he should have stayed out of the fray and let others solve the problem.
Thus, so the argument goes, he might remain objective, and government grants to universities and scientists might not be put at risk.
The chill Mr. Edwards feels from both colleagues and officialdom has not lifted, nor has his unequivocal criticism of both civil servant and academic scientists who pass by opportunities to right environmental wrongs, part of the code of engineers and planners all are sworn to, he says — a scientists’ version of the Hippocratic oath taken by doctors.
Their view, he argues, is based on a flawed model of proper behavior for good scientists.
“A pinnacle of scientific evolution upheld to my generation was Mr. Spock on ‘Star Trek’ — half human and without emotion, supposedly full of logic,” he explains.
“This is a very dangerous model. My life experiences have shown me that overemphasizing technical knowledge, even at the expense of being human, is very dangerous.”
Such danger suggests how important a so-called liberal education — looking into the temperaments, behaviors and experiences of others — might be, he argues.
“While I would not force a liberal education on anyone, we can try to better inspire students to seek one out on their own. I once thought that the humanities were for losers — I had to learn the hard way at age 40 (he is now 52) that was not the case. That to protect innocent kids and fulfill my professional obligations as an engineer, I had to learn about both the worst and best of humankind.”
When colleagues criticized him in the journal Environmental Science and Technology, he responded with comments that implied a massive hypocrisy on their parts.
They “teach our students that they must risk their un-tenured professional careers and risk their livelihood to ‘push back when faced with injustice,’” while at the same time arguing that this obligation does not apply to tenured academics because our funding is “too precious to lose.”
He then draws this conclusion and repeats it often when he speaks to reporters: “This is the very definition of cowardice.”
We are, he says, “the greatest generation of cowards,” often too comfortable in our secure lives to do the right thing.
“I think this is about the relationship between science and society, and the trustworthiness of our civil service. The environmental police we pay to protect us — what do we do when they turn into environmental criminals? There is no plan for environmental justice when environmental crimes are perpetrated by civil servants and engineers.”
The Sunshine State
For many, perhaps, Mr. Edwards describes conditions in Florida, as well as Washington D.C., or Flint.
Here scientists and officials have been fired for questioning or criticizing the state’s progress in solving a water crisis. Such purges started before Gov. Rick Scott’s administration, says Catherine Wilkins, an instructor of humanities at the University of South Florida’s Honors College in Tampa who teaches “Florida: A Cultural History of Place.”
“Lou Toth, the chief scientist on the restoration of the Kissimmee River, and his organizer Paul Whalen were both fired for making comments about the slow pace of change,” she recalls.
When Gov. Scott arrived in Tallahassee he fired more than 200 regulators and officials in the state’s Department of Environmental Protection, and the South Florida Water Management District (among others) backed off regulations designed to protect water quality. The governor forbade state employees even to use the term “climate change” in describing what will happen in coastal Florida in the next few decades.
When state DEP lawyer Chris Byrd became vocal about climate change in 2013, he was fired, Ms. Wilkins says.
When University of Florida scientists at the Water Institute produced a lengthy 2014 study pointing the way to restoration of the Everglades system from Orlando south, lobbyists and representatives of conflicting economic interests — those ranging from officials for sugar companies or corporate farm operations to environmental groups — seized on the report to show either why they should not have to be part of the fix, or why some groups should, says Wendy Graham, director of the UF Water Institute.
But she and Thomas Frazer, acting director of the Water Institute this year (Ms. Graham is on sabbatical), stuck to their science guns, no matter which politician or what group might have preferred otherwise.
“Our report said, ‘This is a big problem with hydrologic, legal, infrastructure complaints,’” Ms. Graham noted. “There is no silver bullet that will solve the problem. We’ll need (water) storage north, south, east and west of (Lake Okeechobee) and maybe more in the lake to make it work.
“None of the projects taken one at a time can solve the problem. Individually they don’t show benefit across the system. It will take all the projects to achieve restoration goals for the estuaries, the lake and the Everglades.”
But politicians and lobbyists left the scientists alone, too, says Mr. Frazer. Asked if anyone criticized him or the Water Institute for the findings or tried to sway what the study might report, he replied, “That’s an easy one to answer. The answer is ‘No.’”
Such experience in Florida has not been a given.
Brian LaPointe, a marine biologist and researcher at the Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute, part of Florida Atlantic University, says for years nobody wanted to hear about his research into the pollution cause by septic tanks both on Florida’s west coast in the Caloosahatchee River and Charlotte Harbor, and on the east coast in the Indian River Lagoon.
“Finally,” he says, “they began to pay attention” when his studies of nitrogen levels resulting from human waste could not be ignored.
For Melanie Ulrich, a microbiologist and professor at FSW who with her husband also owns and operates a commercial fishing vessel seeking blue crabs in the Caloosahatchee River, public reaction to her discovery that blues crabs were dying suddenly in huge numbers in the lower reaches of the river earlier this year was surprisingly hostile.
As a crabber, she reports size and quantity of catches to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission. But as a scientist, she also began to study the locations of the dead crabs, ultimately getting a grant to let her students participate and do the science.
“Crabs are pretty hardy, but we saw not just a decline in numbers, but death in the crab pots. They crawled in and in several days they were dead. We took pictures because it was kind of disheartening. There’s a major problem (in the lower Caloosahatchee south of I-75).”
She and her students are now studying the problem in greater depth, but it takes time. “You can’t assume that the ecosystem will balance it out, and it will be okay.”
And you can’t assume that people will embrace the science and its results. When her observations were reported in the daily newspaper, some people reacted with hostility, inviting the Ulriches to pick up and go back to Maryland where they’d come from in 2012, she recalls.
“In 2014 there was still profit and reasonable crabbing in this,” she says. “But then we see a 58 percent reduction in blue crabs. There’s runoff from fertilizers, nitrate imbalances and so on, but from crab perspective, it’s probably the salinity.
“The reality of the science is, you want to watch this over multiple years, but you don’t want to wait until you say, ‘We’ve looked at it for a decade — there’s a problem.’ So you have to act.”
You have to act.
Or you can remain a coward, in the view of Mr. Edwards, loyal to your appointments, your grants, your political masters.
But there are other ways to be courageous, suggests Ms. Wilkins.
“I believe Marc Edwards embodies a particular type of heroism that is necessary, but there are ways other people who may not have the sorts of advantages or positions of power that he had when he began this, can act.
“It takes leaders like Mr. Edwards, but additionally it takes consensus and movement in society,” she adds. “And people demonstrate courage or become activists in smaller ways: maybe they boycott a product, say sugar, or cast a ballot based on principle, or have an important conversation with a family member, or as a teacher simply pass to students a value that encourages them to question authority.”
Or they can discover a great play, find the hero who seems to walk out of its pages from the past into the present and future, and present both of them to any who still believe art, politics and science may be one for all and all for one — and not a rancorous collection of misfits. ¦
>> What: “Paragon Springs” by Stephen Dietz
>> When: Nov. 3-5 and 10-12, 8 p.m. (Saturdays at 2 and 8 p.m.)
>> Where: Black Box Theatre, Florida Southwestern State College, Fort Myers
>> Special guest: Marc Edwards 3 p.m. Nov. 2 to talk about his experience in exposing lead-toxic tap water in Flint, Mich., and Washington, D.C. 9 p.m Nov. 3 for a talk-back after the 8 p.m. performance of “Paragon Springs”
>> Tickets: www.brownpapertickets.com

161026-a
Caloosahatchee River summit draws hundreds to discuss Lake Okeechobee releases
News-Press.com – by Eric Staats, USA Today Network
October 26, 2016
Caloosahatchee River water quality concerns drew hundreds of people to a daylong summit Wednesday to hear — and often debate — ways to protect one of Southwest Florida’s most important natural assets.
Some 400 people — fishermen, farmers, hoteliers, environmentalists, Realtors — attended the “Save Our Water” event sponsored jointly by The News-Press and the Naples Daily News at the Sanibel Harbour Marriott Resort and Spa.
The mood was set early as the event began with attendees standing and calling out in unison the message on the placards they held in the air: “Save Our Water!”
The Caloosahatchee, like the St. Lucie River on the state’s east coast, acts as a relief valve for Lake Okeechobee when water in the lake gets too high and risks breaching a levee that protects farming communities on the lake’s southern edge.
Those discharges have been blamed for choking the St. Lucie estuary with guacamole-thick algae blooms and sending plumes of brown water into the Caloosahatchee estuary, upsetting the balance of fresh and salt water, killing sea grasses and oyster beds and chasing away fish and crabs.
This year has been particularly devastating, as heavy rains already have sent 55 percent more water into the lake than in all of 2015, prompting weeks of ongoing discharges.
“It’s enough to make a grown man cry, shameful, and it should be criminal,” said Sanibel Island Realtor David Schuldenfrei, a member of a panel discussion Wednesday.
But not all, not even most, of the water coming down the Caloosahatchee comes from the lake, according to figures cited by speakers at Wednesday’s summit.
Engineer Gary Goforth cited figures that 36 percent of river flows since 1971 have come from Lake Okeechobee, with 63 percent coming from off land north and south of the river’s stretch through Lee County.
Regardless of where it comes from, though, 50 percent of the time, the river’s man-altered watershed means flows are either too low or too high to sustain a healthy ecosystem, Goforth said.
The solution, almost everyone agrees, is to build huge reservoirs along the Caloosahatchee and St. Lucie rivers and north and south of Lake Okeechobee to control flows so they more closely mimic nature.
Such reservoirs are not cheap. The Caloosahatchee River reservoir, known as the C43, would be built in Hendry County and cost $600 million to store 55 billion gallons of water.
Florida Senate President Joe Negron, R-Stuart, is pitching a plan to set aside $2.4 billion in state conservation money to buy sugar land south of Lake Okeechobee and build a reservoir to store water.
The road map for Everglades restoration calls for starting construction on the reservoir south of the lake in 2021
Critics have said the state is not acting quickly enough to buy the land from U.S. Sugar.
U.S. Sugar Vice President Bubba Wade told the summit the proposed reservoir would be too small to make a worthwhile dent in the volume of water being sent to the estuaries in years like 2016.
“If you think you’re going to solve the estuary problem in these wet years, it’s not going to happen,” Wade said.
He said the focus should be on completing parts of Everglades restoration already on the books and finding places to store water north of the lake.
Sierra Club organizer Cris Costello said storage north of the lake is a “red herring” — as is blaming pollution on septic systems along the river and raising concerns that sending water south from the lake would flood endangered sparrow habitat in the Everglades, she said.
 “We have to keep our eyes on the prize,” Costello said, referring to the reservoir south of the lake. “We cannot let ourselves be distracted.”
Conservancy of Southwest Florida natural resources policy director Jennifer Hecker said plans for a reservoir south of the lake should be expedited and planned at the same time as storage north of the lake.
“Whether it’s a little or a lot, we need it all,” Hecker said.
Hecker drew cheers when she called on all sides of the Caloosahatchee River water quality issues to work together to find solutions.
Schuldenfrei, the Sanibel real estate agent, echoed Hecker.
“We all have to stay involved,” he said. “When water is nice and blue and we’re happy, nothing happens. We have to keep the fire burning.”

161026-b
Dispute over invasive fern threatens National Wildlife Refuge
WMFE - by Amy Green
October 26, 2016
Arthur R. Marshall Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge. Photo courtesy U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
An invasive fern is at the heart of a dispute threatening a national wildlife refuge in the Florida Everglades.
The South Florida Water Management District owns the Arthur R. Marshall Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service manages the 144,000-acre refuge, but now the water management district is threatening to terminate its 65-year lease. Here’s Charles Lee of Audubon of Florida.
“It’s what we would consider to be unprecedented action that does not fit in with the norm in terms of how the states and the federal government have cooperated on national wildlife refuges.”
The water management district says Fish and Wildlife has failed to manage invasive species like the Old World Climbing Fern.
“They’re failing miserably with their invasive plant control,” says Randy Smith, a water management district spokesman. “They understand the money is necessary yet they haven’t even bothered to even go to Congress in the first place to secure the money.”
Fish and Wildlife says invasive species are a problem throughout the Everglades.

161026-c
Restoring the ecosystem and its connection to the government
HomeTownStations.com - by Ty Batemon, 5 and 10 PM Anchor/Producer
Ocobert 26, 2016
ADA, OHIO - A noted researcher discusses restoring the ecosystem as part of the Keiser Distinguished Lecture Series in the Life Sciences.   
Doctor Alan Steinman's topic was "Ecosystem Restoration from the Everglades to the Great lakes: fact, fiction, and (occasional) frustration. Steinman's research shows there is one solution to restore the everglades but it is difficult to find one solution for the great lakes because they all differ from one another. 
The Great Lakes are 20 percent of the world's surface fresh water and Steinman calls it the most valuable resource on the planet. For the average person, helping the Great Lakes could come down to staying educated and voting wisely on the topic.
"It ties into the president. It ties into local elections as well, where a lot of decisions are made effecting our Great Lakes and so it's really important to educate yourself on the issue, find out what the position of those candidates are and make sure those positions align with your own thinking," stated Dr. Alan Steinman, Director of the Robert B. Annis Water Resources Institute and professor of water resources at Grand Valley State University.   
Doctor Steinman will continue meeting with students on Ohio Northern University's campus tomorrow (10/27) and he will give another presentation that evening geared toward the general public about how science can inform restoration plans. 

161026-d
'Save our Water' panel tackles range of water quality issues
News-Press – by Chad Gillis
October 26, 2016
The fishing's been really bad this year, so have home sales and hotel rentals.
Dark waters and algal blooms have plagued this coast since January, and panelists from the fishing, tourism and farming industries told about 400 people at The News-Press Save Our Water summit that everyone needs to be on the same or at least similar pages if our water quality issues are ever going to be solved.
Malcolm "Bubba" Wade, a U.S. Sugar executive; Daniel Andrews, an organizer with Captains for Clean Water; Colleen DePasquale, with the Greater Fort Myers Chamber of Commerce; John Lai, with the Lee County Hotel Association; David Schuldenfrei, with Florida Realtors and Everglades Foundation; and Gene McAvoy, with the University of Florida's Institute of Food and Agriculture Sciences, talked about Everglades restoration projects, water releases to the Caloosahatchee River and overall water quality.
Schuldenfrei said the way to clean up Florida waters is to keep pressure on elected officials until they fund restoration projects.
"There's been plenty of laws and things that have been voted on and approved and they haven't been funded," he said. "We need to keep the pressure on to make sure they fund these things."Lai said water quality has an impact on hotel reservations and that owners try their best to inform visitors before they come to Southwest Florida.
"What we try to do is stick to the facts," he said. "We're able to educate our guests online. (But) it's a double-edge sword. We want to let them know that the water is not blue or green, quite frankly it's brown."
DePasquale said some tourists left the area this year but that others stayed to enjoy non-water related amenities.
"When people came down this season, the water didn't look great," she said.
"Some left earlier but some stayed because there are a ton of things to do. But now we're worried about next year, and I know the VCB (Visitor and Convention Bureau) is putting money behind marketing, and we've not really had to do that in the past."
Wade said the bad water is not from U.S. Sugar, and that many people in this area and other parts of Florida simply don't understand the issues.
The News-Press Market Watch Summit 'Save Our Water' was held at the Sanibel Harbour Marriott Resort & Spa. "It's not my water in the lake that's causing the problems," Wade said. "We're not stopping water going to the Everglades or coming from the lake (south)."
McAvoy said the farming industry is doing it's part to fix the problems.
"In the past we used to put out large amount of nutrients once or twice throughout the season and now we put those nutrients out through drip irrigation systems where you're actually spoon feeding on a daily basis what that plant needs," he said.
Andrews said the entire region needs to work together to buy more land south of Lake Okeechobee to help the Caloosahatchee River estuary.
"If you look at the UF (University of Florida) study, it's pretty clear in the study that we need more storage throughout the entire system, and it's also clear that southern storage is critical. It's not everything but it's a piece," he said.
Wade said the science does not show a need for more land south of the lake to be purchased, and he challenged other panelists and presenters to prove him wrong.
"People keep saying the science shows this and the modeling," he said. "If people have the modeling and the science, let's see it."

161025-a
Everglades Foundation bus touts water storage plans
Naples Herald – by NH Staff
October 25, 2016
The Everglades Foundation on Wednesday intends to start a 12-day bus tour across Central and South Florida to push state and federal lawmakers to fund water-storage plans south of Lake Okeechobee.
The bus tour, which will start with an event in Miami, is scheduled to roll into Orlando on Thursday and Tampa on Friday. The tour will support the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan, which was signed into law by then-President Bill Clinton in 2000.
Also, it will support a $2.4 billion proposal by incoming state Senate President Joe Negron to buy 60,000 acres of sugar-farm land south of the lake to help reduce toxic algae blooms in Southeast Florida waterways.
“We face deadly algae in the wet season and droughts in the dry months. Years of neglect are wrecking our coasts, starving the Everglades and jeopardizing the water we all drink,” Everglades Foundation CEO Eric Eikenberg said in a prepared statement.
Negron’s proposal, which would require a 50-50 funding match between the state and federal government, already has drawn opposition from a number of Panhandle lawmakers, who view the proposed funding as a potential shift of money away from protecting waters in North Florida.
Additional foundation stops on the tour are planned for Islamorada, Boca Raton, Bonita Springs, Coral Gables, Dania Beach, Fort Lauderdale, Fort Myers, Miami, Naples, Palm Beach, Port St. Lucie, Sanibel, Stuart, West Palm Beach, Weston and Winter Park.
The tour will make stops in Naples, Bonita Springs, Ft. Myers and Sanibel on Tuesday and Wednesday, November 1 and 2.

161025-b
More than 3,000 acres of environmentally sensitive ranch land preserved in Polk, Okeechobee
Florida Trend
October 25, 2016
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — The Governor and Cabinet today unanimously approved the preservation of more than 3,000 acres of environmentally sensitive agricultural lands in Polk and Okeechobee counties, while allowing the land and agriculture operations to continue to contribute to Florida's economy. The purchases are a part of the Rural and Family Lands Protection Program, which partners with Florida's farmers and ranchers to preserve active agricultural operations and their immense economic and environmental benefits through cost-effective conservation easements.
Today's partnerships increase the total land preserved by the program to 25,343 acres over 30 conservation easements. Since 2011, 23 projects totaling 21,758 acres have been acquired by the current Governor and Cabinet, a more than 500 percent increase in acres preserved by the program. The perpetual conservation easements will preserve 1,619 acres of Lake Hatchineha Ranch in Polk County and 1,410 acres of the Pelaez & Sons ranch in Okeechobee County.
“Florida's farmers and ranchers are our state's original conservationists, and partnering with them through conservation easements is the most cost-effective way to preserve these invaluable pieces of our rural economy and environment for future generations,” said Commissioner of Agriculture Adam H. Putnam.
Lake Hatchineha Ranch is a cow/calf operation in Polk County that is within the Catfish Creek Florida Forever Project and surrounded by multiple large tracts of conservation lands, including: Allen David Broussard Catfish Creek Preserve State Park (8,000+ acres); South Florida Water Management District's Kissimmee Chain of Lakes; K-Rocker Rural and Family Lands Protection Program conservation easement (789 acres); the Everglades Headwaters National Wildlife Refuge and Conservation Area (1,111 acres); Hatchineha Ranch Mitigation Bank (2,057 acres) and Disney Wilderness Preserve (11,500 acres).
Pelaez & Sons ranch is a cow/calf operation in Okeechobee County just east of the Kissimmee River. The property is adjacent to a federal wetlands reserve program easement and is in close proximity to multiple South Florida Water Management District conservation lands.
The Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services created the Rural and Family Lands Protection Program in 2001 and has acquired 30 perpetual easements totaling 25,343 acres. The easements protect working agricultural lands threatened by other uses, such as development.
The goals of the program include:
●  Protecting valuable agricultural lands;
●  Creating conservation easements that ensure sustainable agricultural practices;
●  Preventing conversion to non-agricultural land uses in the rural base of Florida; and
●  Helping to protect natural resources in conjunction with these agricultural operations.
Florida agriculture has an overall economic impact estimated at more than $120 billion annually, making it the state's second largest industry. The agriculture industry supports more than 2 million jobs in Florida.

161025-c
State reaches remediation deal with Mosaic over sinkhole spill
SaintPetersBlog – by Michael Moline
October 25, 2016
Florida regulators announced a consent order Monday with Mosaic Fertilizer LLC over a Polk County sinkhole that released 215 million of toxic, radioactive water into groundwater supplies.
The deal provides for substantial fines if the company fails to meet its promises of remediation.
The Florida Department of Environmental Protection “will hold Mosaic accountable for repairing the sinkhole, recovering all discharged process water, providing continued assurances that no off-site impacts have occurred and, if any off-site impacts do occur, ensuring that Mosaic rehabilitates the impacts,” Secretary Jon Steverson said in a written statement.
“If the company does not follow the entire order, they will be fined up to $10,000 per day,” he continued.
The company released a statement by Senior Vice President Walt Precourt.
“Ensuring the safety of our community and employees, and the proper management of environmental resources, continues to be our top priority as we remediate the sinkhole,” he said. “From the beginning, Mosaic has been committed to keeping the water from the sinkhole on-site with no community impacts, and we continue to fulfill that commitment.”
Mosaic agreed to make sure similar accidents don’t happen at its other facilities. The company one of the world’s largest producers of phosphate and potash for fertilizer.
“DEP will continue to maintain strict oversight of all aspects of the response, recovery and remediation actions, including groundwater and drinking water monitoring,” Steverson said.
Mosaic must put up $40 million to ensure it carries through with the remediation, off-site monitoring and any off-site rehabilitation at its New Wales facility, near Mulberry.
“Mosaic must increase the financial assurance if cost estimates for the actions increase,” the department said.
The deal requires Mosaic to permanently seal the sinkhole and verify the seal’s effectiveness long-term; operate a recovery well to remove contaminated water from the Floridan Aquifer; install a standby well for use if the first one fails, and monitor the recovery and verify that the contamination doesn’t spread.
The company must remediate drinking water supplies to consumers or provide alternative supplies, and look for other potential sinkholes or geological anomalies near its phosphogypsum stacks located near Bartow, Riverview and Plant City.
“In addition, we’re requiring Mosaic to take steps at all their facilities in Florida to prevent future incidents like this one,” Steverson said. “DEP will continue to maintain strict oversight of all aspects of the response, recovery and remediation actions, including groundwater and drinking water monitoring.”
Related:           DEP making Mosaic pay $40 million, more for cleanup        Bradenton Herald
DEP works out deal with Mosaic requiring sinkhole cleanup            Tampabay.com

161025-d
Tom Rooney, April Freeman disagree on Everglades solution
News-Press.com – by Ledyard King
October 25, 2016
WASHINGTON -- Florida’s sprawling 17th Congressional District encompasses cattle farms, citrus groves and some of Florida’s fastest-growing communities, from the Tampa suburbs, south to Lee County and east to the edge of the Treasure Coast.
But its identity is tied to the Everglades and Lake Okeechobee, the massive – and much maligned – reservoir whose overflows have contributed to environmental disasters along both coasts in recent years.
The chief combatants for the district in November – incumbent Republican Tom Rooney and Democratic challenger April Freeman – strongly disagree on how to fix a problem that’s drawn national attention for befouling shorelines and spurring toxic algae blooms.
Freeman wants President Obama to declare the area a national monument, forcing the sale of private farmland at a “fair market price” and giving the federal government full control of cleanup efforts.
Putting Washington in charge would improve control of water flows from the lake, expedite repairs to the Herbert Hoover Dike, and speed completion of myriad projects to store water and push it south, away from coastal communities, she said.
“This should be a four- or five-year project, tops, if we had the money the way we need it and when we need it,” said Freeman, whose time frame is much shorter than other estimates. “The state of Florida has just failed as far as taking care of the lake and the people around it. Our economy’s going to suffer if we can't fix it quicker.”
Rooney opposes such a “taking” of land, saying the slow pace of efforts to fund Everglades restoration projects is bearing fruit, though not as fast as he’d like. He said it's “extremely naive” to blame Congress for inaction on an ambitious, immensely complex project involving multiple partners.
The chief problem, he said, is that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has been in charge of deciding which components of Everglades restoration should get funding. He wants to change that by restoring Congress’ ability to earmark specific projects within the Corps’ oversight.
 “What’s been frustrating is that the Army Corps, which April Freeman I’m sure is aware of, is part of the administrative branch, and the administrative branch gets to make the priorities of where these funds are spent every year,” Rooney said. “So if she wants to blame somebody, she should blame Barrack Obama because he’s in charge of the Army Corps.”
He and Freeman are running in a district that was slightly reconfigured by a court's requirement that congressional boundaries be redrawn across the state. A third candidate, Independent John W. Sawyer III, also is on the ballot.
Freeman, 52, of Cape Coral, doesn’t even live in the district. She ran, and lost, two years ago to Republican Curt Clawson in the 19th District that encompasses most of Southwest Florida, including her home. She said she’s planning to move soon to Punta Gorda in the 17th District to be closer to her parents, regardless of the election result.
Political handicappers give her a slim chance of defeating Rooney, a four-term incumbent and Army veteran whose family owns the NFL’s Pittsburgh Steelers. He’s not related to Republican Francis Rooney, who is favored to win the neighboring district where Clawson is retiring.
Tom Rooney, 45, is a fiercely conservative member of Congress when it comes to protecting gun rights, opposing abortion and limiting immigration. But as a member of the Appropriations Committee, he’s also a pragmatist on spending matters, such as the issue of Corps of Engineers earmarks.
And he clashed with members of the hard-line conservative House Freedom Caucus over their successful fight to oust former House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, and their willingness to shut down the federal government to oppose a long-term spending bill.
The Lugar Center-McCourt School Bipartisan Index ranks Rooney the 53rd most bipartisan member out of 438 members of the House (including delegates from U.S. territories).
Freeman, a former Republican, describes herself as a moderate on key issues.
She says her support for expanded firearm background checks is a “responsible” position for gun owners like herself (she owns a .22 caliber handgun), and said a former campaign worker who was gunned down during a home invasion in August might still be alive had he been armed. Most Democrats, she said, support the right to bear arms.
She also said she doesn’t like the Affordable Care Act’s requirement that consumers buy coverage. But she wants to “fix” the law, not scrap it.
Freeman dismissed Rooney as a partisan lackey, pointing to his votes to repeal the health care law and his opposition to expanded gun background checks.
 “He just votes straight down party line,” she said. “He has taken no initiative to get anything real done and that’s the problem.”
Rooney counters that he’s been a diligent steward for his district, working to get relief for orange growers whose trees have been afflicted by citrus greening, inserting language in last month’s spending bill that includes mosquito control money to fight the Zika virus, and boosting aid to help cut wait times for veterans seeking health care.
Now he’s hoping to return to Congress for another term to accomplish what might be his toughest task: convincing GOP colleagues to exempt Army Corps of Engineers projects from a congressional ban on earmarks so Congress can speed restoration of the Everglades, including progress on the Herbert Hoover Dike, and address other priorities across the nation.
The ban, Rooney recently told the House Rules Committee, has essentially reduced lawmakers “to being cheerleaders” for badly needed projects in their own districts.
“We can’t do anything for our own constituents that pay federal taxes and expect us to get things done for them,” Rooney told the panel. “Let us be able to go home to our people and say, ‘What’s important to you? We’ll get that done,' if I feel like it’s the right thing to do, rather than just begging the administrative branch to do it for us.

161024-a
Altered, ailing river at center of ecology, economy
News-Press.com – by Chad Gillis
October 24, 2016
Water flowed slowly from Lake Hicpochee to the Gulf of Mexico for thousands of years, meandering through winding oxbows and a vast, natural filtration system.
The trees, aquatic vegetation, massive oyster bars and seagrass beds cleansed the water of any impurities, and water along the beaches was clear as gin.
Rae Ann Wessel, with the Sanibel-Captiva Conservation Foundation, wrote this about the river:
"Water would settle first in Lake Hicpochee, then Lettuce Lake and Bonnet Lake, until it reached, Lake Flirt above the Caloosahatchee valley. At the western end of Lake Flirt a rock formation created a quarter mile of rapids which fed the Caloosahatchee. Below the falls, the Caloosahatchee was a crooked, winding river that slowed the flow and provided natural filtration as the water moved slowly downriver."
Yes, the Caloosahatchee had rapids and waterfalls, but all that splendor began to fade after developers cut a canal through Hicpochee in order to drain Lake Okeechobee and the historic Everglades to make way for farming and development.
Today the river functions mostly as a canal, a way to get water and excess nutrients off the upstream landscape as quick as possible. It works, too well at times. Now, the focus is on undoing damages inflicted over the past century – reversing the past water management strategy in favor of cleaner water.
But it will take plenty of planning, money and political will to get that done. And that means it's not likely the Caloosahatchee will be unhooked from Lake O anytime soon. That's bad news for those living and playing downriver.
"The Caloosahatchee has two issues: we have too much water and too little water," said James Evans, Sanibel's natural resources director. "When we’re receiving too much we can see impacts to the sea grass beds as well as the oysters and our local economy when it comes to the quality and color of water along our beaches."
More than 11 million pounds of nitrogen comes down the river each year, and blue-green algal blooms are a regular occurrence.
The vast majority of nutrients come from outside of Lee County.
"A lot of the loading is from the east of us," said Roland Ottolini, Lee County's natural resources director. "(Florida Department of Environmental Protection data) shows about 85 percent is coming from east of the (W.P.) Franklin Lock (and Dam), but 15 percent is coming from here so we have our fair share of work to do."
So while half or more of the water coming to the estuary may very well be local rainfall, the nutrients are largely coming from the upper reaches of the river, Lake Okeechobee and beyond.
Storing water that drains west of Lake Okeechobee but east of the Caloosahatchee Estuary, which is mostly Hendry County, is part of the Everglades restoration.
The C43 reservoir, also called the Caloosahatchee reservoir, will cost about $600 million and will hold 170,000 acre-feet, or about 55 billion gallons, of water. It's the largest Everglades project for Lee and Hendry.
"A good portion of the water we receive does come from the Caloosahatchee watershed, on average about 50 percent," said Evans, the Sanibel official. "So we need to complete the C43 reservoir but we also need to look at additional storage in the area between the Moore Haven lock and between the Ortona Lock"
The costs don't stop after building reservoirs and water quality projects. Lee County spends $300 million a year on filter marshes alone.
These marshes are re-creations of wetland systems that are designed to address the issues found in the downstream waterbodies. Designing, building and maintaining these man-made wetlands is costly as well.
Nitrogen is problematic in the Caloosahatchee River, but it's not a scenario in which the county can throw technology or money at the problem and watch it go away.
"There’s not a lot of science that’s put in nitrogen removal in overall larger projects of treating stormwater," Ottolini said "Nitrogen is not as easy to remove (as some other nutrients), and it’s a function of being able to retain the water, allow those nutrients to be uptaken by the plants we install and maintaining that system."
Impacts from nitrogen range from algae blooms to fish kills to losses in real estate values.
The poor water quality hits beach islands like Sanibel and Fort Myers Beach hard because people come there largely to play on or near the water.
"The color of water can impact people’s ability to enjoy beaches but the color of the water can also impact sea grasses, which are important to our fishery," Evans said. "What you don’t see is the change of salinity. When it’s too low that can have an impact on the sea grasses, the oysters and a lot of our important estaurine fishes respond to the salinities as well. And that has an impact."
The estuary gets harmed when flows through the Franklin Lock and Dam get to 2,8000 cubic feet per second. Flows this year have been at 7,000 cubic feet per second and higher.
At the southern end of the system, tens of thousands of acres of seagrasses died this year because of a lack of freshwater.
"The bottom line is we need a very large amount of storage throughout the system – north, south, east and west," Evans said. "We need to store that water and treat that water and convey it down to Everglades National Park and Florida Bay. Florida Bay is starving for freshwater now."
Florida Bay is downstream of Lake Okeechobee, too, and this is where the giant freshwater flows went, historically. Today it's impossible to send large amounts of water to the bay because the water doesn't meet federal water quality standards for Everglades National Park.
So what can the average resident or homeowner do to help fix the problems?
"Source control is something the general public can handle," Ottolini said. "It’s their (the public's) responsibility to fertilize smart. Don’t put them down during the rainy season because that’s when we have the most rain and don’t put anymore than the grass can uptake. And don’t spread it near water bodies. And pick up after your pets."
In the end, Evans said he and others are simply asking that the adversities be shared by all of South Florida.
"It’s not the coastal communities versus the inland agriculture communities," Evans said. "But the Caloosahatchee is receiving the lion’s share of flow. We’ve been getting more than 50 percent this year and that is unequitable and something that needs to be fixed."
And what of Lake Hicpochee and the rapids?
Part of Lake Hicpochee will be restored by the South Florida Water Management District ($18.4 million), but the rapids were permanently removed when the river was channelized.

161024-b
Everglades advocates launch 'NoworNeverglades' tour to win support for land buy
Tampa Bay Times/Herald – by Mary Ellen Klas, Tallahassee Bureau
October 24, 2016
Can the Florida Everglades become a political weapon? The Everglades Foundation, a non-profit that is banned from campaigning, hopes to find out this week as it launches a 12-day bus tour to drum up public support for its No. 1 priority: the purchase of sugar land south of Lake Okeechobee to be used for water cleansing marshes.
With a shrink-wrapped bus emblazoned with the words NoworNeverglades, the organization is hoping to seize on the public's election-year focus and crisscross the state to win support for the post-election policy -- Everglades restoration, said Eric Eikenberg, director of the Everglades Foundation.
"It's that season and everybody is focused on the election,'' he said. "People are tired of toxic algae in the water and we are calling attention to the role clean water, and our water supply has on economics and tourism."
The foundation is urging people to sign the #NoworNeverglades Declaration in which people "affirm their support for added water storage in the [Everglades Agricultural Area] to help alleviate damaging discharges into coastal estuaries, increase the flow of clean fresh water to the Everglades and Florida Bay, and protect the drinking water supply for 6 million Floridians." 
The bus will begin its tour Wednesday at Gramps Restaurant in Miami's Wynwood district and the make its way north, through South and Central Florida. Events include stops at the University of Central Florida, Rollins College, Zoo Miami, the Naples Zoo, Bass Pro Shops the Audubon Assembly Conference and even the Halloween on the Mile event in Coral Gables.
The bus will be stopping at football games along the way -- from the University of South Florida's match with Navy on Friday to the Miami Dolphins v. Jets game on Nov. 6. The foundation will be collecting the names and social media contacts of its supporters as it prepares to enlist legislative support for the land buy in the March legislative session, Eikenberg said. 
"We want an army of people to weigh in on buying the land when the Legislature starts and decides whether to get the money in the budget,'' he said. "Everybody wants to protect the Everglades. The question is, how are they actually going to do it?" 
Incoming Senate President Joe Negron, R-Stuart, as said he is going to make buying the land, using money already available through environmental preservation funds, a top priority. 
The sugar industry, however, has vigorously opposed the land buy as unnecessary and considers it an attempt to undercut the future of the industry in Florida. 
“Surely there are better ways to advocate for the environment than driving a fossil fuel-powered luxury bus 12 days across South Florida while spreading half-truths about how our water system operates and how to manage Lake Okeechobee discharges,'' said Judy Sanchez, U.S. Sugar spokesperson. 
"These activists would be better off meeting with the farmers in the EAA that have worked to reduce phosphorus by an average 55 percent over the last two decades and see the hard-working people of the Glades they are trying to ignore. They should also stop to consult with the water quality experts and scientists at the South Florida Water Management District, Department of Environmental Protection, and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, who have thoroughly discredited the ‘buy the land, send the water south’ bumper sticker science.”

161024-c
State grants will help springs
Ocala.com - by Fred Hiers
October 24, 2016
Marion County's cut: more than $700K
Marion County’s springs restoration efforts will get more than $700,000 worth of help from the state's “Florida First” funding.
The Florida Department of Environmental Protection has awarded the St. Johns River Water Management District $1.5 million to help fund three springs restoration projects. Marion County will get $716,250 of that. The rest will go toward a Longwood Island Lake septic tank removal project.
Of Marion County’s share of the money, the water district targeted $475,000 to help groundwater recharge and surface water at the newly created 4,900-acre Silver Springs Forest Conservation Area.
The restoration project at the forest preserve is estimated to remove about 13,000 pounds of unwanted nutrients annually that would otherwise make their way into the aquifer and Silver Springs. The project will also allow the county to conserve as much as 5 million gallons annually that will go toward restoring the flow of Silver Springs and recharging the area aquifer.
The project involves constructing a passive recharge well and using existing recharge basins to avoid turbid water from making its way to Silver Springs. The passive recharge process will reduce the amount of nitrogen that enters the groundwater.
Florida land and water agencies, along with help from private organizations, bought the conservation area last year for $11.5 million. The property is open to horseback riding, bike riding and trail hiking.
The property is off County Road 315 and connects the Indian Lake State Forest to the northwest, the Cross Florida Greenway to the south and the east, and Silver Springs State Park to the south. It was purchased from the Rayonier Corp., an international lumber company.
The project is being overseen by the St. Johns River Water Management District, not Marion County.
The rest of the Marion County money will be used to retrofit two water retention ponds in Silver Springs Shores. The ponds are in the Silver Springs recharge area.
Each recharge area is about one acre. That project is overseen by county engineers.
The retention ponds currently capture stormwater and return it to the aquifer before bacteria have a chance to remove unwanted nitrogen from the water. The nitrogen is the “pollutant of concern,” said Gail Mowry, Marion County’s stormwater engineer. That’s because it causes unwanted algae and vegetation in Silver Springs and changes the Silver River’s chemistry.
The retention ponds currently don’t create an environment that allows bacteria to break down nitrogen, Mowry said.
The county will rebuild the retention ponds with a lining made up of clay, sand and used tire particles. The new lining will better hold the water and create and oxygen-free environment in which bacteria can denitrify the unwanted pollutant.
“And it’s passive, so we don’t have to do anything to it except mow it,” Mowry said.
The design allows for water to enter the ground more quickly in case of flooding, but under normal conditions removes about 70 percent of the nitrogen, “which is an astounding number,” she said.
Other retention ponds without the lining typically remove less than 5 percent of the nitrogen before the water makes its way into the ground, Mowry said.
The new design still allows the water to drain about a quarter of an inch per hour, or 6 feet a day, Mowry said.
Four other similar retention ponds are currently under construction. Two are in the Dunnellon area and two are already in Silver Springs Shores.
The money is part of a larger effort by the FDEP and four state water management districts to assist 35 springs with $56.6 million from the 2016/2017 Florida First budget. The money is being matched with $33.1 million in state and local funding for a total spring’s restoration budget of $89.7 million this fiscal year.

161024-d
Trump talks Everglades, Lake O at Naples rally
Health News Florida - by Matthew F Smith
October 24, 2016
With just 15 days until Election Day, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump kicked off a three-day tour of Florida cities Sunday with a rally in Naples. 
Several thousand people gathered at the Collier County Fairgrounds for his 6:00 p.m. speech. Many waited for hours, and while the line was long and there was evident antipathy for Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton, many said the mood was light even if their concerns for the country were not.
Lee Bostick owns a fishing charter business on Marco Island. She and her husband made the trip to northern Collier County to support Trump. Bostik cited concerns about corruption and immigration heading into the election, but her biggest worry is healthcare, and the rising costs she said her business and family can’t afford.
“My health insurance has gone up over 100 percent," Bostick said. “For me alone, we pay over $1,100 a month just to cover my health insurance. And it’s almost impossible for me to afford a plan.”
Trump flew into the rally ahead of schedule, landing just yards from the podium in a helicopter with the real estate mogul’s name emblazoned on its side. Trump was introduced by congressional candidate Francis Rooney, and was joined at the podium at former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani, but Trump's speech rang familiar bells: condemning trade deals like NAFTA, pledging to build a wall along the Mexican border, and lambasting what he called President Obama's and then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s mishandling of Iraq and ISIS.
But the Republican candidate also focused on issues specifically geared to southwest Florida.
“A Trump administration will also work alongside you to restore and protecting the beautiful Florida Everglades,” said Trump. “Our plan will also help you upgrade water and wastewater, so that the Florida aquifer is pure and safe from pollution. We will also repair the Herbert Hoover Dike in Lake Okeechobee.”
Trump also laid out a plan for the first 100 days of a Trump administration, what he called a “100 day contract,” vowing to re-freeze the thawing relationship between the U.S. and Cuba, and laying out a plan to bolster defense spending and enforcement nationwide. Trump promised those efforts would see deployment in Florida waters.
“New Navy and Coast Guard ships will patrol the Florida coast to prevent drugs, and terrorists, from entering our shores,” Trump said.
Shortly after finishing his speech, it was back to the Trump helicopter. The candidate took off and headed east, where he moves on to two more days of Florida events. He has rallies in St. Augustine and Tampa on Monday, with stops in Sanford and Tallahassee on Tuesday.
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton campaigns in Coconut Creek on Wednesday. Her VP pick,Tim Kaine, is in Miami and Palm Springs Monday.
Related:           Trump urges faithful in Collier to vote early  Naples Daily News
Donald Trump asks Florida crowd if he was right to run for president         Tampabay.com

161023-a
State's option to buy sugar land expires in 2020
News-Press.com – by Chad Gillis
October 23, 2016
Send water south.
Few phrases stir up as much controversy in South Florida, and it's been flying off the tongues of east and west coast residents and business owners for years.
The idea is simple: create an expanded drainage system south of Lake Okeechobee in order to send lake waters where they flowed for thousands of years – to what is now Everglades National Park and Florida Bay.
The execution, however, has been slow, and the state says it's not planning to start planning for water storage south of the lake until 2020
The subject heated up again in August, when State Sen. Joe Negron, R-Stuart, proposed $2.4 billion to buy farm lands south of Lake Okeechobee and turn some of the land into water storage reservoirs for Everglades restoration. His proposal, which he would bring to the 2017 Legislature, has met resistance from the sugar industry, which is opposed to giving up additional, productive land, saying it could shutter refineries and lead to job loss.
Building a reservoir south of Okeechobee has been discussed for 20 years or more, since the state and federal government agreed to reverse damage done to the Everglades and River of Grass over the past century or so.
Today Okeechobee levels are lowered primarily by sending water down the Caloosahatchee and St. Lucie rivers, which were artificially connected to the lake in order to drain the Everglades for farming and development.
Instead of forcing freshwater to the coasts, the system would keep some water on the landscape longer, which naturally improves water quality while also replenishing drinking water aquifers.
"We’ve replumbed those two rivers to be disposal conduits and we need to move the water back where it historically flowed and is needed, which is south," said Jennifer Hecker with the Conservancy of Southwest Florida.
But the "send water south" train is barely on the tracks, and a former South Florida Water Management District governing board member and current sugar executive says the land buy is unlikely.
"We pretty much know it’s dead in the water," said Malcolm "Bubba" Wade, of U.S. Sugar in Clewiston. "When you look at the priorities and the $5.5 billion for reservoirs (and other Everglades restoration projects), nobody’s even thinking about buying 154,000 acres of land with no plan to do anything with it. The chances are close to zero."
Wade resigned from the water management district governing board in 2008, when then-Gov. Charlie Crist announced a plan to buy U.S. Sugar lands and all its assets.
Today the agency is moving in the opposite direction, saying other projects must first be funded and completed.
"The current timeline of planning is a proven and reliable compass that guides restoration projects and maximizes the benefits of all Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan efforts," Randy Smith, South Florida Water Management District spokesman, wrote in an email. "A proposed amendment to this schedule is a distraction that could prove harmful to ongoing efforts and should be carefully considered only in the context of a public process."
At the time, the state purchased some farm lands but did not have the money to buy out all of U.S. Sugar, as was the original plan. The original deal was $1.8 billion for 194,000 acres of U.S. Sugar lands and assets.
Instead, the state spent $197 million for 28,000 acres.
The state has an option to buy the company in 2020, but the deal would require the state to buy all the assets up front.
Wade said the cost would be well over $1 billion.
Caroline McLaughlin, with the National Parks Conservation Association, told the water district board in August that moving water south has the support of the Corps of Engineers and leaders in the Legislature already: "The missing piece is the support from the district and leadership of Gov. Scott. We again ask the district join the Corps to initiate planning for storage, treatment and conveyance of water in (farm lands south of the lake) and to holistically look at storage options both north and south of the lake."
More than 1 million acre-feet, or 325 billion gallons of storage, is needed north, south, east and west of the lake to make the Everglades restoration a success.
The Army Corps of Engineers, the federal agency in charge of Everglades restoration, said earlier this year it is willing to consider buying land south of the lake for Everglades restoration projects.
"A study (of agriculture lands) will investigate opportunities to create water storage (in) areas south of the lake," reads a July letter from Jo-Ellen Darcy, assistant secretary of the Army. "The Army is prepared to initiate this study quickly, once a non-Federal sponsor for the study is identified."
That non-federal sponsor would have to be the South Florida Water Management District, which has reversed course on the idea over the past decade.
Hecker and other groups support Negron and his proposal to purchase the sugar land.
"All the analysis that has been done, even with buying the bundled assets at fair market value, it is by far the cheapest and most effective solution," she said. "We don’t want to wait to see if there’s anything better."
Local fishing guide Daniel Andrews said the state should buy the land and focus on recreating the historic flows of the Everglades.
"From the big picture, no matter what we do there’s no way to stop the water coming down the Caloosahatchee River from the lake and satisfy the minimum flows to the Everglades," Andrews said. "There’s no other way to do it than to send water south."
Hecker said the decision to not buy the land is based on politics, not facts.
"The science hasn’t changed," Hecker said. "The administration has changed."
Proponents of buying farmland to convert to water storage and flow are concerned that if the land isn’t purchased soon, it will be developed, rather than preserved, in the future.
But Wade said buying the land and sugar’s assets is a waste of taxpayer money.
“I think you’re looking in the rear-view mirror and moving on,” Wade said. “Purchasing that land doesn’t solve anything.”

161023-b
The comeback of the American alligator becomes big business
Naples Daily News - by Patrick Riley
October 23, 2016
NAPLES — The hum of Jim Rinckey's 15-foot Carolina skiff cut through the silence on Lake Trafford. His two handheld spotlights sliced through the darkness.
Rinckey grew impatient. He and his hunting partner, 63-year-old Mark "Doc" Markisen had been gliding across the murky, rippling waters in the boat for nearly two hours.
"Target-rich environment and we can't kill," Rinckey grumbled to no one in particular. "We're sorry gator hunters."
As midnight neared on that breezy September night, Rinckey, a 37-year-old professional hunter and fisher, kept his crossbow cocked.
"I'm telling you it always happens after midnight," he said, his gaze fixed on the beam of light on the water, scanning the surface for glowing reptile eyes.
They flickered in the darkness, sometimes changing colors like a traffic light, going from red to orange to green. Other times, those eyes glared back at the boat in a cold blue gaze.
Although Rinckey and Markisen had the 1,500-acre lake to themselves that night, they were not alone in their pursuit of the ancient reptile. The quiet lake was teeming with alligators.
Rinckey and Markisen are part of a small army that wades into lakes, canals and swamps for two months every fall in Florida to hunt the state's most iconic creature.
This year, more than 6,000 hunters received the coveted permits from the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, which oversees the annual public hunt. More than twice as many people applied through the agency's lottery system. Each permit, which costs residents $272 and out-of-state applicants $1,022, allows a hunter two alligator kills per season.
Last year's harvest of more than 6,700 alligators is less than 1 percent of the estimated 1.3 million alligators roaming the state. The reptile has been hailed as a conservation success story.
Alligator hunting was outlawed in the early 1960s after the alligator population had taken a steep dip. The creature was classified as an endangered species later that decade.
By 1987, alligators had rebounded so successfully that they sometimes have become a dangerous presence, tragically illustrated this year when a gator killed a 2-year-old boy at Disney World. The state decided to help manage the growing numbers by implementing a statewide harvest program in 1988.
The public hunt — which runs from Aug. 15 through Nov.1 — has become a boon for the state, generating about $1.5 million in annual revenue.
The state uses that money to support a variety of research, law enforcement, conservation, and fish and wildlife management efforts, including the alligator management program itself, FWC spokeswoman Tammy Sapp said.
The private sector, too, has profited from the reptile's remarkable recovery.
Since the advent of public hunts in the late 1980s, small family businesses and international conglomerates alike have broken into the growing market for alligator meat, skins, leather, hunting and tourism.
After growing up in Traverse City, Michigan, and spending much of his spare time in the outdoors with his dad, Rinckey made his hobby his profession at age 24. He leads groups on hunting and fishing trips, anywhere from Alaska to Florida, as a guide for A&B Charters in Naples.
But for him, hunting alligators, which he started doing about five years ago, is still strictly recreational.
"It's one of the most enjoyable hunts that you can actually go on," Rinckey said. "It's not like sitting in a tree stand where you might see a deer, one deer, in six hours."
On the waters of Lake Trafford in the middle of the night, Rinckey and his partner got their fill of excitement. They came close to catching an alligator.
Twice, the arrow, which is tied to a small buoy, wiggled loose at the last moment. Once, the white buoy disappeared into the dark night too quickly to track it down.
Had the arrow stuck in the reptile's skin, the hunters would have slowly reeled in the alligator and burrowed a spear — which is attached to a rope — into the animal's flesh. Then, they would have pulled it closer and used a bang stick, a pole that fires a bullet upon contact, to kill the alligator.
And so nearly five hours and a number of misses later, the two hunters were ready to call it night. They would go on to catch a 7-foot and a 9-foot alligator the following evening. But this time, the duo left the lake empty-handed.
"That's hunting," Rinckey said. "Let's go home."
It was 6:30 a.m. and Brian Wood was wide awake. He had alligator meat on his mind. It was packed in a freezer more than 100 miles away and had Wood sick to his stomach.
"As quick as it's over, we want it to be there again," said Chris. "We don't know what to do with ourselves."
As a boy, Carl Nicholson joined the rest of his family, crammed into a Mercury station wagon one summer day in 1997 for the move to Southwest Florida.
His dad never said why, but Nicholson figured it was just who he was.
"If you ever knew my dad, if you ever met him, you'd know he didn't stay put for very long," Nicholson, 35, remembered as he sat in his little office at Wooten's Everglades Airboat Tours, about 6 miles outside of Everglades City.
Within a year of arriving in the Everglades, Nicholson's father — Michael Sturgill, a carpenter from West Virginia — found a job at Wooten's, where visitors go for boat rides and alligator shows. Curtis Smith was manager then.
"Dad applied here as basically a handyman. 'Well,' Curtis said, 'We don't need a handyman. We need an alligator handler,'" Nicholson recalled. "And dad being dad said, 'Yeah, I've handled alligators my whole life.' He's from West Virginia."
Sturgill soon became "Gatorman Mike."
"Dad kind of started the gator shows here," Nicholson said. "Handling the alligators, talking to people and just teaching."
Nicholson soon followed his dad's lead, taking on a summer job at Wooten's, doing everything from cleaning bathrooms and animal cages to fixing airboats and leading tours.
And, of course, taking part in alligator shows.
And if visitors don't get to see a wild alligator during the 30-minute tour, they can hold a small one during the alligator show or watch some of the bigger ones amble around the fenced-off pond behind the gift shop. Here, Nicholson plans to build a mechanism that would hang meat from a zip line across the murky, olive-green water.
"We're going to try to get these gators to lunge up and grab chicken off of a rope," he said.
Much of the little zoo at Wooten's, which includes exhibits for lions, tigers, raccoons, cougars, American crocodiles and sea otters, has Nicholson's fingerprints on it. He built many of the pens, enclosures and cages. And some, like the original wrestling pit where the first shows were held, have his dad's imprints on them, too.
"This is where it started," Nicholson said, standing in front of the pit, a hint of nostalgia seeping through his thick West Virginia accent.
The pit is still there. His dad isn't.
Sturgill died on June 7, after a half-year bout with esophageal cancer. Three days before he was diagnosed he was still doing shows at Wooten's. He was 62.
"It's tough," Nicholson said, tears running across his sunburnt face and into his orange beard. "There's a lot of Dad here."
Despite the daily reminders of his loss, Nicholson said he wants to carry on his dad's mission and continue to educate visitors about the Everglades and alligators.
"Just teaching people that you can cohabitate with alligators is probably my biggest thing," Nicholson said. "And then passing that on."

161022-b
Tiny organisms; big problems: too much algae fouls our water
News-Press.com – by Amy Bennett Williams
October 22, 2016
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For now, Mary Ann Parson’s canal isn’t the color of peas, guacamole or Oscar the Grouch — all shades it’s turned during past algae blooms.
“It was bright green this summer,” Parsons says, and she knows it will be again.
Noxious algae overgrowth is one of Southwest Florida’s chronic water woes.
But just because the Cape Coral retiree expects the cyclical return of algae doesn’t mean she’s resigned to it. As a volunteer Lee County Master Gardener who teaches Florida Yards & Neighborhoods classes, Parsons uses her bully pulpit to both educate her students (many of them newcomers) about Southwest Florida’s chronic water challenges, and to exhort them to help turn the  tide.
Red tide, toxic microcystin blooms and poop-colored drift algae are all caused by different life forms, but what they have in common is the potential to make residents and visitors sick — figuratively as well as literally.
Some, like blue-green algae, are photosynthesizing microorganisms with no cell nuclei. Others, like red drift algae form large tangled plumes that wash up on beaches.
Though these algae-like organisms occur naturally in the environment, when they proliferate, or “bloom,” the public health consequences can range from irksome to dangerous, says epidemiologist Jennifer Roth.
"Red tide algae, for example, can cause respiratory effects (and) people with asthma and other respiratory conditions can be affected and they could have trouble breathing," Roth says. "Other people can feel a stinging or burning sensation, and usually the effects are correlated with how much red algae there is and how close it is to the shore."
Cyanobacteria, a huge group of organisms commonly called blue-green algae, can be dangerous as well. "Limit your contact with water if you see it," Roth says. Cyanobacteria toxins can cause symptoms ranging from sniffles to liver failure — even death, if ingested in large amounts.
And it’s not just human health that can suffer; the animals that live in and near water are affected as well.
The state’s manatees are undergoing what scientists call an “unusual mortality event” that’s already killed more than 150 manatees, according to the nonprofit Save the Manatee’s Club’s Director of Science, Katie Tripp. Partly to blame is a die-off of algae-shaded seagrass linked to algal blooms. “There are concerns that these prolonged blooms will shade and kill seagrass, eliminating the manatees' primary food source, and an important habitat for other marine species.”
Too much algae can make the economy queasy too. Earlier this year, as algae blanketed Florida’s east coast and slimed the Caloosahatchee, Gov. Rick Scott declared a state of emergency. Charter captains and hoteliers reported lowered bookings as some real estate professionals lost sales, blaming the fouled water.
Algae blooms are nothing new. Centuries-old historical reports refer to red tide, for example, and research scientist Rick Bartleson of the Sanibel-Captiva Conservation Foundation says cyanobacteria blooms almost every year in the Caloosahatchee, but their increasing frequency and severity point to human interference with natural systems.
Parsons says many of her students are "amazed to learn that our storm water is not treated first before it goes into our canals and the Gulf."
They also learn proper use of fertilizers and pesticides as well as effective natural treatments. "This program was developed by the University of Florida to combat water pollution and algae growth, Parsons says, though she's worried because Lee County laid off the Florida Yards and Neighborhoods agent in 2013.
"If the Lee County Master Gardener volunteers ... do not teach the proper use of fertilizers and pesticides, who will?" she asks. "If this program dies, then expect the algae problem and water pollution to get worse."
About algae
Algae is a blanket term for a number of organisms that naturally live in Southwest Florida. Here are a few that often make news:
Red tide is caused by an organism called Karenia brevis, which is visible only through a microscope and produces a powerful toxin which can kill fish and other aquatic creatures. It also can be harmful to people with respiratory issues.
Cyanobacteria, or blue-green algae, is a large group of organisms that photosynthesize but have no nuclei. High temperatures and water polluted with excessive nitrogen and phosphorus can feed their blooms, according to the federal Environmental Protection Agency’s website. Some produce toxins that can cause health problems ranging from hay fever-like symptoms to death.
Red drift algae, also called macroalgae, forms large feathery mats. These nontoxic organisms can be seen (and tripped over) when they wash up on the beaches. Their challenges are mostly aesthetic, since some consider them unsightly and they do become pungent with age.

161021-a
Cleanup to save the Caloosahatchee
EagleNews.org - by Romina Combe
October 21, 2016
Billy Creek was established – and named after the Seminole chief Billy Bowlegs, who was coerced into surrendering there by the United States forces in the year 1858.
Since then, it has become a very important part of Lee County, and remains a key part of our local environment today.
The scenic Billy’s Creek contains a variety of wildlife and huge amounts of important mangrove vegetation which plays a very important role in water filtration in Lee County.
Combined efforts to boost the water quality from various government agencies helped with the creation of the Billy Creek Filter Marsh and neighboring nature park.
The artificially-created filter marshes at this preserve serve as a natural cleansing system for Billy’s Creek, before it continues downstream into the Caloosahatchee River.
Billy’s Creek and the Caloosahatchee River are two important waterways that feed into the restoration and preservation of the Everglades, and, for this reason, FGCU students and Riverwatch are once again coming together to keep the waterways clean.
On Nov. 4, both partners will be hosting a cleanup of Billy’s Creek from 9:00 a.m. to noon at 2937 Palm Beach Blvd.
The clean-up, which is being organized by fellow FGCU student, Felicia Nudo, will allow students and volunteers to earn service learning hours by cleaning up Billy’s Creek.
In the process, those students will be protecting the endangered Caloosahatchee River, ensuring that everyone in Lee County maintains good water quality.
In the past, volunteers were able to remove about 330 pounds of litter and waste from Billy’s Creek – a feat that shows the great impact that people can do through service and dedication.
This is also a great opportunity for people to gain  knowledge and hands-on experience with the filter marsh, its purpose and its environmental benefits.

161020-
Everglades mangroves worth billions in fight against climate change
Miami Community Newspapers
October 20, 2016
When it comes to storing carbon, scientists have put a price tag on the value of mangroves in Everglades National Park and it’s in the billions.
Based on a scientific cost estimate, the stored carbon is worth between $2 billion and $3.4 billion, the researchers found. It is a relatively small price when considering the cost to society if the carbon currently stored in these mangroves were ever released into the atmosphere, according to the scientists.
“Although the Everglades National Park is a protected national treasure, the National Parks Service doesn’t have much control over freshwater flowing into the park,” said Mahadev Bhat, co-author of the study and professor in the Department of Earth and Environment. “If there isn’t enough freshwater flowing through the Everglades, we may eventually lose some of the mangroves. And once you let stored carbon out, that same carbon can lead to increased global warming and cost society a lot more.”
In addition to removing excess carbon dioxide from the air, mangroves provide a variety of other benefits, including flood control, storm protection and maintaining water quality. The billion-dollar price tag reflects the cost to preserve the park’s mangroves and their ability to hold organic carbon intact by restoring freshwater flow to the areas that need it the most.
The mangrove forests of the Everglades National Park are the largest in the continental United States. Although protected, the Everglades is affected by sea level rise, hurricanes, changes in water flow and other environment events. Decreased funding for Everglades restoration is also problem.
“Preventing the loss of stored carbon in mangroves could become a critical component of the nation’s climate change mitigation strategies,” said Meenakshi Jerath, the lead author of the study and researcher in FIU’s Extreme Events Institute. Jerath also earned a master’s degree from the Department of Earth and Environment.
“Having an inventory of the stored organic carbon and its potential economic value is key to designing such strategies that secure funding to warrant their conservation and research work, and, more importantly, further awaken the public interest and understanding of the mangroves’ socioeconomic importance.”
The study was published in the journal of Environmental Science and Policy. The study was done in collaboration with researchers at Louisiana State University and the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory. It was funded by the National Science Foundation’s Water, Sustainability and Climate Program and the Florida Coastal Everglades Long Term Ecological Research Program.

161019-a
Lake O release volume can be more dangerous than water quality
News-Press.com – by Chad Gillis
October 19, 2016
Billions of gallons of freshwater flow down the Caloosahatchee River every year, and it carries tons upon tons of harmful nutrients to the river's estuary and coastal beach islands like Sanibel.
The impacts range from a discoloration of water to fish and marine mammal kills, as well as beach closures, hotel cancellations and a loss in local property values.
Some politicians and tourism industry groups said the brown water blanketing the coast earlier this year was harmless, that it was just a lot of water carrying a lot of natural things. But the flow of water and nutrients is far from natural, and the result is often fish and marine mammal kills, beach closures and hotel cancellations.
So is it the sheer amount of water coming down the river that leads to algae outbreaks and fish kills, or is the devil in the details – the numeric values given to nutrients that flow from Lake Okeechobee and the river's watershed?
Water quality scientists say both can devastate estuaries, which are the foundation of the entire marine ecosystem. No healthy estuary, no world-class fishing.
"If the water we were getting was like distilled water, that’s probably a larger effect because all the freshwater we’re getting is killing off the saltwater organisms," said Rick Bartleson, a water quality scientist with the Sanibel-Captiva Conservation Foundation. "It’s way more than the system downstream can take, and the freshwater plume goes well out into the Gulf of Mexico and kills organisms that can’t move out of the way. So we’re basically making a big dead zone when there are high flows like this."
These scenarios typically play out during the late summer and early fall, when few visitors are here.
Locals bear the brunt of the damages – lost beach time, no fish for dinner, crumbling home values – but this year a unique thing happened: flooding and bad water quality came during the tourism season.
A strong El Nino system brought record rains to much of the state in January, which caused federal and state water managers to release billions of gallons of Lake Okeechobee water to the east and west coasts.
Water from the lake blew out the estuary – creating freshwater conditions – and eventually made its way north to Georgia.
Lee and Collier counties saw 11.54 inches of rain, which is 9.54 inches, or 577 percent, more than average for January, which is 2 inches, according to South Florida Water Management District records.
January is often a time when the Caloosahatchee is starved for water from Lake Okeechobee. Although the lake wasn't historically connected to the Caloosahatchee, the river sometimes needs flow from Okeechobee because the river's watershed – lands to the north and south of the river – have also been artificially drained.
Had El Nino not been in place, it's possible that local agencies and environmental groups would have pleaded with the Army Corps to release lake water, not store it or send it south.
Instead, upwards of 4 billion gallons a day of water was released to the river and its estuary.
By May, blue-green algae (also called cyanobacteria) started to bloom on the east side of the lake, and the bloom eventually made its way to the St.Lucie estuary via lake releases.
Conditions were so bad there that many people working on or near the water wore surgical masks, even gas masks.
Although some blooms are said to be harmless to humans, the Florida Department of Environmental Protection said this bloom was extremely toxic.
But is it dangerous ?
The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission says this about blue-green algae: "Recreational exposure by direct contact with a cyanobacteria bloom ... have been reported to cause hay fever-like symptoms and dermal reactions at high concentrations. Ingesting contaminated water can cause gastrointestinal distress (diarrhea, abdominal pains, nausea, vomiting). Low level chronic exposure of contaminants through water or fish have yet to be studied.
"Livestock and domestic animals can be poisoned by drinking contaminated water, and fish and bird deaths have been reported in Florida water bodies with persistent cyanobacteria blooms. It is important to remember these toxins have no known antidotes and cannot be removed by boiling."
Had the lake bloom been on the west side of the lake, Southwest Florida could have seen similar devastation, which is what happened a decade ago.
Sanibel residents galvanized to fight the excessive discharges and force the state and federal government to stop pollution at its source after a nasty outbreak in 2006.
"We’d go months on end where we’d see accumulations on our beaches as high as 2 or 3 feet, and that had a devastating impact on our economy because people who went to the beaches had to smell the drift algae," said James Evans, natural resources director for the City of Sanibel. "Normally, we have a no-raking policy; but when you have piles and piles of algae on the beaches it’s not providing a benefit to the shore birds."
A smaller freshwater bloom hit Cape Coral and the mouth of the Caloosahatchee River in July, forcing the city to close it's most popular swimming beach in July.
Brown-to-black, smelly waters have blanketed Lee County since January.
The organisms that cause algal blooms occur naturally but are fed by excess nutrients from farm lands and homes.
Water quality scientists say the amount of nitrogen flowing down the Caloosahatchee River each year is enough to fill about 600 freight train cars, or about 14 million pounds. And about 85 percent of the nutrients come from outside of Lee County, according to South Florida Water Management District reports.
Some home sales on the island have fallen through because of poor water quality (local Realtor Shane Spring said he lost a $6 million sale because of poor water quality), and a 2015 report from Florida Realtors says property values in Lee County have been suppressed by more than half a billion dollars due to poor water quality.
Guides and the fish they chase get hit by the bad water as well.
While tannins from broken-down vegetation are natural, when the tannins are so concentrated that it blocks out and kills marine life, it's not natural.
Seagrasses and oyster beds, which need a specific mixture of fresh and saltwater, died, and local fishing guides were forced to take clients 10 miles or more just to catch a few fish.
"If you depend on those resources to make a living and they’re depleted, it makes you worry about what your future is going to be like," Andrews said. "And most people that are guides, that's what they grew up doing and that’s all they know how to do."
Bubba Wade, a U.S. Sugar executive and former South Florida Water Management District governing board member, said there are ways to get rid of the excess water and prevent some of the damages to the estuaries.
Pumping water to what's known as the boulder zone could be an answer, he said. It's a common practice for utility plants.
"What you’re starting to see rising to the top is the deep well concept, put it down 3,000 or 4,000 feet and just get rid of it," Wade said. "From what I understand, all this volume (is) coming (from) north of the lake, you could put it down deep wells and get rid of 80 to 90 percent of the discharges. That would be a win-win because you could use those for the local basin runoff as well."
Deep well injection may or may not solve the high-flow end of the equation. But what will Southwest Florida do during droughts?
"In dry times you’d be like you always have been," he said. "You’d be struggling and people (homeowners and golf course managers) would go on restrictions and we (the farming industry) would go on restrictions."
For Andrews and others, though, there isn't time to wait on an answer that may or may not come over the next decade or so.
His answers: buy property and build water quality and storage projects. Southwest Florida has historically been one of the best coastal fishing spots in the world, and the public deserves to have that asset protected.
"It’s not a 9-to-5 job. It’s something you dedicate your life to," Andrews said. "You’re working on the boat until midnight and you don’t have family time and there’s tackle and your office is dying. Are you going to relocate or find a new job? I don’t know that it’s something we’ll see in the next year or two but it (finding a different job) could be reality soon."
Our series:
The News-Press is publishing a series of water-issue stories leading up to the Market Watch: Save Our Water event on Wednesday.
TODAY: Volume and quality: The two main problems for the Caloosahatchee River and its estuaries are massive amounts of freshwater and the amount of nutrients such as nitrogen in that water.
FRIDAY: Water shortage? Even though we get nearly 5 feet of rain each year, our water table is dropping. Here’s why.
SATURDAY: Business impact: Keeping the river clean is good for business, say business folks along the river and beaches.
SUNDAY: Many people want the state to buy land south of Lake Okeechobee to help solve water woes, but the truth is land is needed in every direction.
MONDAY: Trouble blooms: Algae occurs naturally, but the frequency and duration of events is often tied to human activities.
TUESDAY: Lake link: The connection to Lake Okeechobee will not be severed soon because the watershed no longer naturally stores the water that would have normally been available during dry times.
WEDNESDAY: Taxpayers have paid billions over the years on a water system that is still a financial drain.

161019-b
Scotts® introduces 50% slow release nitrogen lawn fertilizer for all Floridians to help protect local waterways
GlobeNewswire.com
October 19, 2016
Statewide product rollout is met with praise from prominent environmental leaders in Florida; Company will expand partnerships for environmental innovations with key groups across the state.
WEST PALM BEACH, Fla., Oct. 19, 2016 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Recognizing the importance of protecting the environment, particularly protecting Florida’s water resources, Scotts today announced it has introduced new 50 percent slow-release nitrogen lawn food products throughout the entire state of Florida.
This unique-to-Florida lawn fertilizer will help consumers play a role in protecting the state’s critical water resources.  In properly caring for the lawns around their homes, these spaces can act as barriers to counteract the many sources of urban nutrient runoff. The product innovation builds on Scotts’ nationwide phosphorus-free lawn maintenance fertilizer initiative completed in 2013 as well as a multi-year Smarter Solutions for Cleaner Waterways initiative that began in 2014 and culminates this year.
“As leaders in lawn and garden, we have an on-going commitment to innovation that helps gardeners nurture plant life in ways that work in harmony with the world around them,” said Jim Hagedorn, Chairman and CEO of parent company ScottsMiracle-Gro, who is a resident of Florida.  “Florida’s water bodies make our state a truly amazing place and we view it as our responsibility to help Floridians be confident that they are doing their part to protect our most valuable natural resources. We began a three-year program in 2014 that dedicated support for groups conducting research, restoration and greenspace projects around many of the state’s most sensitive water bodies and will expand this work with environmental leaders across the state beyond 2016.”
More than five years ago, Scotts made the groundbreaking announcement that it would remove phosphorus from all its lawn maintenance products nationwide in order to improve the environmental impact of its lawn care products.  This innovation lead to a 10,000 ton reduction in phosphorus use nationwide, leading to an approximate 500 ton reduction annually in Florida. The introduction of 50 percent slow-release nitrogen products to the entire state of Florida signals a new milestone in the Company’s national “Water Positive Landscapes” initiative aimed at protecting waterways by providing homeowners with actionable ways to responsibly use water when working in their lawns and gardens.
“Water quality remains a concern throughout Florida as algae blooms increasingly threaten the health of Florida’s water bodies,” said Josh Peoples, Vice President and General Manager of Scotts brand products.   “We have taken this step to continue our pursuit to provide consumers the best products for their lawns so that they can that positively impact the environment around them.”
“We have watched ScottsMiracle-Gro prove they are committed to being part of the solution in restoring water bodies like the Everglades by removing phosphorus from their products years ago and, now, in taking another important step to help residents across Florida improve their nitrogen footprint when working in their own yards. The Everglades Foundation applauds Scotts’ ongoing efforts to implement nutrient solutions in our state,” said Eric Eikenberg, CEO of the Everglades Foundation.
Benefitting Florida’s Unique Environment
This will be the first 50 percent slow release nitrogen product that uses Scotts’ patented All-In-One Particle® technology for even feeding across lawns. When nutrients, such as nitrogen, are slowly released over an extended period of time, it enables lawns to stay consistently healthy and properly serve as a barrier to runoff particularly during heavy rains, such as the ones that occur during Florida’s summers.
More than $8 million and five years were invested into the research necessary to develop a reliable slow release nitrogen technology, uniquely designed with Florida’s climate, sandy soil composition and year-round gardening in mind.
“There is simply no question about whether or not the level of nutrients, particularly phosphorus and nitrogen, in our waterways is contributing to the problems we are seeing in the Indian River Lagoon and other water bodies,” said Dr. Edith “Edie” Widder, Founder of the Ocean Research and Conservation Association (ORCA). “Providing Floridians with a means for reducing their environmental footprint will go a long way to restoring the health of these delicate and precious ecosystems.”
Furthering the Commitment to Innovation and Environmental Stewardship
In June, ScottsMiracle-Gro announced a nationwide Water Positive Landscapes initiative, which is equipping homeowners with educational and actionable resources to help them use water responsibly in their lawns and gardens. The initiative is also focusing on product innovation, such as 50 percent slow release nitrogen, and continued research on the intersection between lawn care and gardening and water stewardship.
This latest water protection initiative follows the Company’s "Florida Smarter Solutions for Cleaner Waterways” initiative that sponsored in-state water quality research, habitat restoration, consumer education and green infrastructure improvements. ScottsMiracle-Gro funded an independent research project by the Ocean Research & Conservation Association to determine the sources of pollution in the Indian River Lagoon. The results of this research will help create solutions to improve the lagoon’s water and wildlife, and also create a model that can be replicated for other polluted waterways.
Through its partnership with Tampa Bay Watch, more than 20 acres of salt marsh plants will be restored in Tampa Bay. Grants to community gardens, farms and greenspaces throughout Florida have protected more than 47,600 square feet of land.
“As a partner in the ScottsMiracle-Gro ‘Florida Smarter Solutions for Cleaner Waterways’ initiative and a participant in the ‘Water Positive National Partner Network’, we have seen, first-hand, their willingness to listen to stakeholders and work with nontraditional allies to identify solutions,” said Peter Clark, President of Tampa Bay Watch. “Scotts is being responsive to Florida’s water quality issues as proven by their significant investment in research and restoration projects throughout the state.”
About ScottsMiracle-Gro
The Scotts Miracle-Gro Company is passionate about helping people of all ages express themselves on their own piece of the Earth.  With approximately $3 billion in sales, the Company is the world’s largest marketer of branded consumer products for lawn and garden care. The Company’s brands are the most recognized in the industry. In 2016, the Company ranked in Forbes 100 Most Reputable Companies in America for the second year in a row. To learn more about the Company and our initiatives, visit us at www.scottsmiraclegro.com

161019-c
The Big Sugar Sham
SandsPaper.com
October 19, 2016
A strange state-level issue spilled into an awkward mess during a recent Pensacola City Council Meeting, when local officials were asked to back a somewhat odd effort to get legislators to dedicate more conservation funding for north Florida.
Something didn’t feel quiet right. And it wasn’t just the dire warning from a local environmental advocate that a “shadowy entity” was about to “dupe” council with a “sham” resolution. It was also the weird phone calls.
“When I started getting calls, the interesting thing that I noticed was that the calls weren’t from here,” noted Councilman P.C. Wu. “I’m thinking, wait a minute, people in south Florida are calling me, telling me they want money up here in north Florida. I’ve never seen — you know, we’re not sitting here saying, ‘We should send more money to south Florida.’ So I thought it was quiet puzzling to see people from south Florida calling, telling us they wanted to make sure that we get our fair share.”
The council was being asked to approve a draft resolution urging state legislators to spread conservation funding generated via a 2014 constitutional amendment equally throughout the state. The draft had been provided to the city by an organization called Stand Up North Florida.
Nick Loffer, a representative from Stand Up North Florida, told city council members that legislators were likely to squander Amendment 1 money in South Florida. He implored them to put the pressure on state lawmakers to spend the funds on projects in other areas of the state.
Specifically, Loffer said that money should be diverted from the Lake Okeechobee region, where legislators are considering purchasing property to create a reservoir in the Everglades Agricultural Area. The reservoir would be designed to divert harmful discharges from Lake Okeechobee, which have been blamed for fouling coastal estuaries.
The Stand Up representative described the potential Everglades project as having “limited tangible results.” In addition to being ineffective, he argued, the “longterm, multi-billion dollar project” would monopolize the conservation funds in question — “more money’s out the door”  — and that would be “unfair” to the rest of the state.
“We don’t see how any massive water project, that doesn’t clean water, that’s gonna take over a decade to build is gonna solve any problems down there,” Loffer stressed to the city council.
But local environmental advocate Christian Wagley said that council should look carefully at Loffer’s request before jumping on board. He questioned Stand Up’s motivation and said he suspected the newly formed organization was “masqerading as something that it’s not.”
“Let me begin by saying, very simply, that this resolution, and this effort is a sham,” said Wagley, telling council that “this appears to be an attempt to dupe us.”
Wagley pointed to the fact that no one knows who is funding Stand Up North Florida. And cited an article from the online publication “Politico,” which described the organization as a “new mystery entity” and “a shadowy entity” with possible ties to the sugar industry, which opposes the resevoir being considered for South Florida.
“This doesn’t pass the sniff test in any way, whatsoever,” Wagley said.
Wagley went on to deride Stand Up’s lack of transparency — “they will not tell you who their funders are, who their donors are” — and tell the council he believed it was “being used” by a less than straightforward organization with goals beyond equitable conservation.
“This appears to be a front group, funded by the sugar industry to derail a plan that appears to have legitimacy to solve the major environmental issues they’re having in south Florida,” Wagley said.
Loffer bristled at such a notion, writing off Wagley’s concerns as “conspiracy theories.” He described such suspicions as “quiet ironic.”
“The individuals levying these conspiracies have annonymous donors,” Loffer said. “And they’re the same groups that want more and more money to go down to one massive project in south Florida.”
Loffer assured council he wasn’t connected to south Florida agricultural interests — “I am not Big Sugar” — while also remaining securely tethered to his bottom line: don’t waste money on the south Florida resevoir project.
“If you start throwing around these big projects that don’t deliver the solution that people in south Florida need, they’re not going to be helped, the rest of the state of Florida is going to be disadvantaged,” he said. “They’re going to be asking for more and more money from this fund, and that’s where we’re going to be at, because that’s how the math adds up.”
But several council members had begun to look at Loffer sideways. And they noted that Wagley — who has served on both Pensacola and Escambia County environmental advisory boards — had earned their trust through his “stellar record of being a staunch defender of our environment” and suggested the city heed his call to dig deeper into the resolution request and its origins.
Plus, those phone calls were really creeping council members out.
“I received about five or six phone calls,” relayed Councilwoman Sherri Myers. “It was confusing. I would ask, ‘What are you talking about? Explain it to me.’ They would just hang up. It was so frustrating because they didn’t seem to be really familiar with what they were asking me to do.”
“I too received phone calls that didn’t allow me to ask questions,” added Councilman Brian Spencer. “They didn’t leave return numbers, it was a very unique way in which I was contacted for support.”
Council eventually pulled the resolution off the meeting’s agenda in order to further research the issue. Other local governing bodies, including the High Springs City Commission and Alachua County Commission, have also pulled the resolution request from meeting agendas after concerns were raised.
A phone call to Loffer from SANDSpaper to clarify Stand Up’s position and, more particularly, the group’s backers was not returned. Though Loffer is apparently traveling the state to lobby local governments for support, that basic information has remained illusive.
When asked during a Sept. 19 meeting of the High Springs City Commission who was funding Stand Up North Florida’s efforts, Loffer sidestepped the question: “We would be more than happy to let our donors tell you who our supporters are when they wish to be named.”
The “Politico” article Wagley cited connected Loffer — who is listed as Stand Up’s manager in limited liability corporation paperwork filed in September — to the conservative group Florida for Americans For Prosperity. The group, backed by rightwing mega-donors the Koch brothers, confirmed that the former field director left in early 2015.
Following Loffer’s appearance at the Pensacola meeting, Wagley continued to press for specifics outside of city council’s chambers.
“I followed him outside,” Wagley said. “I asked him probably a half dozen times: ‘Tell me who your donors are.’ He just ignored me, he wouldn’t tell me.”
The environmental advocate said that Stand Up’s efforts amounted to an attempt to draw the rest of the state into “a sugar industry fight in South Florida.” He compared it to efforts this season to pass a solar power-related ballot initiative that environmental organizations have roundly criticized as an energy-industry backed initiative that would negatively impact the growth of the solar industry.
“It’s just like Amendment 1 we’re fighting in November,” he said. “They know how to package something to make you think it’s something good.”
During their discussion outside Pensacola City Hall, Wagley said he let Loffer know he better pedal Stand Up’s resolution elsewhere.
“I was polite,” Wagley recalled, “but I was firm with him. Like, ‘Don’t you come back here with this.’”

161019-d
Vote yes on Lee County 20/20 Referendum
Fort Myers Beach Bulletin, Fort Myers Beach Observer - Letter to the Editor by Rep. Matt Caldwell, North Fort Myers State House District 79
October 19, 2016
I subscribe to the mantra that if one cannot say something nice, it is best to say nothing at all. It saddens me that this is not the way that political speech is conducted today. Unfortunately, this paper has become a platform for scurrilous lies in the letters to the editor that must be addressed.
One attack is that I led the subversion of the Constitution in implementing Amendment 1 from 2014, the amendment that sets aside money to "Acquire, Restore, Improve, and Manage" conservation land. Every dime of this money has been spent on those four purposes. What is managing, if not paying park ranger salaries? In fact, that is exactly what the original sponsors of the amendment said managing was! Those who claim malfeasance by the Legislature are either uninformed or purposely misleading.
Another laughable attack is that I helped subvert the "1996 Polluters Pay" amendment. That would be quite the feat, as I was in 10th grade. I did sponsor renewal of the Everglades Forever Act in 2013, a bill that imposes the only double tax in the Everglades, specifically on the farms in the EAA.
Another claim outlined supposed actions against the League of Women Voters. Setting aside this childish charge, it is laughable to use the League as a sympathetic figure, after they have been shown in open court to have colluded with part of the national Democratic Party in drawing legislative maps!
Overall, these letters have been critical of my support for Everglades Restoration projects that the writers deem unworthy. Let me be very clear: "clean water" advocates who obsess over a single solution that will magically "send water south" can never achieve what they are promising and will condemn our River to decades of disaster!
I am committed to finishing the projects in CERP/CEPP, Mod Waters, and Decomp, all of which will actually send water south to the Park and Florida Bay, and I have not wavered from that position despite the ugly attacks on my character.
The latest false attack by my opponent is that my candidacy is bought by corporate and PAC donations, but are we then to believe that he is not being bought by his union and PAC donations? These attacks are lazy and unserious politics for those that cannot win on the merits of the issues.
All of these accusations are worn thin, focus group tested attack lines provided by dark money groups who refuse to make their donors public. If the readers of this paper do have any questions about the issues "addressed" in these letters, I am more than happy to discuss their details. My direct, personal e? mail remains matt@votecaldwell.org. I look forward to chatting with you about this or any other topic on your mind.
Let us hope that this letter will bring a permanent close to this chapter of liars and political obsessives. Also, vote "Yes" on the Lee County 20/20 referendum!

161018-a
Everglades Foundation to hold bus tour to promote EAA reservoir
Florida Sportsman Newswire
October 18, 2016
Events will build support to influence next President, congress, Florida lawmakers.
The Everglades Foundation will hold an 11-day bus tour throughout Central and South Florida from October 27, 2016, to November 6, 2016, to help persuade the next President, Congress and Florida lawmakers to support the construction of a water storage reservoir in the Everglades Agriculture Area (EAA) that will protect Florida’s water and help restore the Everglades.
The tour will also help build public support for the #NoworNeverglades Declaration, with organizers and volunteers at each stop asking people to join the more than 31,000 supporters who have already signed on.
Signers of the #NoworNeverglades Declaration affirm their support for added water storage in the EAA to help alleviate damaging discharges into coastal estuaries, increase the flow of clean fresh water to the Everglades and Florida Bay, and protect the drinking water supply for 6 million Floridians. The full declaration is available at EvergladesFoundation.org/NoworNeverglades-Declaration.
What: The Everglades Foundation 11-day Bus Tour
Where: Destinations are expected to include Orlando, St. Petersburg, Tampa, Miami, Boca Raton, Stuart, Port St. Lucie, West Palm Beach, Coral Gables, Naples, Fort Myers, Dania Beach, Ft. Lauderdale, Miami Gardens and Islamorada.
When: October 27, 2016, to November 6, 2016. Precise schedules will be announced later.
The Foundation is dedicated to protecting and restoring America’s Everglades. This unique ecosystem provides economic, recreational and life-sustaining benefits to the millions of people in Florida who depend on its future health. Through the advancement of scientifically sound and achievable solutions, The Foundation seeks to reverse the damage inflicted on the ecosystem and provide policymakers and the public with an honest and credible resource to help guide decision-making on complex restoration issues. To learn more about The Foundation, please visit EvergladesFoundation.org.

161018-b
Estero signs 'Now or Neverglades' declaration
NaplesNews.com – by Maryann Batlle
October 18, 2016
State Rep. Heather Fitzenhagen wants more Floridians to talk about cow poop.
A 1,000-pound dairy cow can produce 80 pounds of manure a day. Florida has about 123,000 of them. All that dung has to go somewhere.
Too often, dairy farmers keep cow waste in pits, where the nutrient-rich discharge runs the risk of escaping and polluting water supplies, said Fitzenhagen. There is technology that can pipe the manure to the roots of crops on nearby farmland, which would cut back on chemical fertilizer use and remove the risk of dairies polluting water, she said.
"It'll have a double benefit," Fitzenhagen said. "It's a win-win, and I think it's just a question of getting it started. So I'm going to hopefully encourage some farmers to try this so that others will follow suit."
That is one of a few mundane but consequential aspects of Florida life that Fitzenhagen said she has explored in her quest to protect water quality in Florida.
"Without clean water, no one can live. We can go without a lot of things, but water is not one of them," she said.
The question of how to preserve Florida's inland and coastal waters has been at the forefront of many a policy conversation this year. An unusual soggy dry season led the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to flush billions of gallons of stormwater run-off from Lake Okeechobee down the St. Lucie and Caloosahatchee Rivers, which has overburdened estuaries and marine life on both sides of the state.
"If people can't use their boats in recreation, they can't fish, they can't go sit out on the beach, or they don't have enough water to grow their crops, we're gonna be in for a very, very big economic downturn in the state of Florida, which I don't want to see happen," Fitzenhagen said.
As part of her efforts to clean up the Caloosahatchee River and Estuary, Fitzenhagen has asked local officials to sign the "Now or Neverglades Declaration," a petition in support of "increased storage, treatment and conveyance" of Lake Okeechobee water southward into Everglades National Park, Florida Bay and the Florida Keys.
Last century, settlers to the state built canals and dams, including the Herbert Hoover Dike around Lake Okeechobee, to detour water flows. Their actions made it possible to farm, work and live in south Florida, but it led to an unsustainable future, Fitzenhagen said.
"This problem has been a long time in the making, but it was because people were well-intentioned," she said. "If you have that in place, and then you add on the unusual weather events that we had this year, you find yourself with the perfect storm."
The Now or Neverglades declaration argues that returning to a system where more water is sent south of the lake and into the Everglades would cleanse polluted discharges and quench Florida Bay, which has been suffering from high salinity after being cut off from replenishing freshwaters. By joining the petition, supporters are also urging state lawmakers to use funding from a public conservation program, known as Amendment 1, to buy land in the Everglades Agricultural Area for water storage and conveyance.
More than 30,000 people or organizations have signed the declaration as of Tuesday afternoon, according to the petition's website. Fitzenhagen said lawmakers can use the signatures as proof that residents care about restoring natural water flows in South Florida.
Earlier this month Estero's Village Council signed the declaration. The Village Council wants to keep attention on the problems Lee County has faced because of the Lake Okeechobee discharges, Mayor Nick Batos said.
"It's affecting our beaches. It's affecting our fishing on this coast," Batos said.
The visible consequences at the mouth of the St. Lucie and Caloosahatchee Rivers — such as aggressive algal blooms and murky brown waters — after the Lake Okeechobee discharges began this year has brought a constant stream of attention to water woes, Batos and Fitzenhagen said.
Keeping that momentum going as the discernable effects ebb can be a challenge, Batos said.
"If people don’t see the water turning color or the algae, they think less of it,” he said. “But the problem doesn’t go away.”
The risk of development sprouting south of the lake, on what is now farmland, looms over every plan to send the water south, which is part of the reason the petition's name plays on the saying "now or never," Fitzenhagen said.
"We are on the frontlines here in Southwest Florida," she said.
***
NOW OR NEVERGLADES DECLARATION
Source: http://gladesdeclaration.org/
I support the 200-plus Everglades scientists who believe that increased storage, treatment and conveyance of water south of Lake Okeechobee is essential to stop the damaging discharges to the coastal estuaries; to restore the flow of clean, fresh water to Everglades National Park, Florida Bay and the Florida Keys; to improve the health of Lake Okeechobee; and to protect the drinking water for 8 million Floridians living in Monroe, Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties.
Using Amendment 1 and other funds, we must identify and secure land south of the lake without delay, before development in the Everglades Agricultural Area (EAA) or other uncertainties condemn our waters to irrevocable destruction.
Three nationally vital estuaries are in long-term collapse due to the damming, diking and draining of the River of Grass. The Herbert Hoover Dike that contains Lake Okeechobee prevents fresh water from following its historic path southward through the Everglades.
Today, Lake Okeechobee is treated as an impounding reservoir constantly at risk of overflow. To manage lake levels, too much untreated fresh water is discharged into the Caloosahatchee and St. Lucie estuaries. Consequently, the lack of fresh water flow through the Everglades makes Florida Bay, the largest contiguous seagrass meadow in the world and crown jewel of Everglades National Park and the Florida Keys, too salty.
The resulting salinity imbalances in all three estuaries cause seagrass die-offs, dangerous algal blooms, multi-year ecosystem collapse and economic hardship. Florida’s $9.7 billion fishing industry (129,000 jobs), $10.4 billion boating industry (83,000 jobs) and $89.1 billion tourism industry (1.1 million jobs) need healthy estuaries.
Additionally, sending water south would improve the water supply for 8 million people (1 out of 3 Floridians) by reducing the threat of saltwater intrusion into drinking wells and the Everglades.
The solution to all these problems is stated simply in a petition signed by 207 respected Everglades scientists on March 12, 2015:
“As a scientist working in the Everglades, it is my scientific opinion that increased storage and treatment of fresh water south of Lake Okeechobee, and additional flow from the lake southward, is essential to restoring the Everglades, Florida Bay, and the Caloosahatchee and St. Lucie estuaries.”
Estimates of land required are approximately 15 percent of the EAA, neither eliminating farming nor harming Glades communities. This amount is less than half of the acreage that U.S. Sugar has offered to sell to the State of Florida, in an agreement that remains in effect until October 11, 2020.
Water storage, treatment and conveyance in the EAA is the best option to reduce the damaging releases to the St Lucie and Caloosahatchee estuaries and to improve the water flow south. Especially considering the recent devastation to the coastal estuaries and ongoing massive seagrass die-off in Everglades National Park, planning for EAA projects must be expedited and be given top priority over planning for other new Everglades restoration projects.
We can’t keep kicking the can down the road. The costs and risks of further delay are staggering. Development plans in the EAA threaten to change the region, permanently severing the link between Lake Okeechobee and Florida Bay.
The science is settled. The money is available thanks to 75% of Florida voters who, in 2014, voted for Amendment 1. Identify and secure the land.
It’s now or never.

161018-c
When will Lake Okeechobee discharges to the St. Lucie River end ?
TCPalm – by Tyler Treadway
October 18, 2016
"You can't do anything about the weather, you just have to try and manage it," said Orville Macomver, of Palm City, about the Lake Okeechobee discharges coming through the St. Lucie Lock and Dam near Stuart on Thursday. To keep the lake at a certain level, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers orders water discharges to canals to the east and west of the lake. "Frequent rain in the area has caused the lake to resume its rise," said Corps Jacksonville District Operations Division Chief Jim Jeffords in a news release
Lake Okeechobee discharges to the St. Lucie River could decrease again Friday, but likely won't stop yet.
At a conference call Tuesday with government and nonprofit agency scientists from throughout South Florida, Army Corps of Engineers officials seemed ready to accept requests to cut discharges from 1.16 billion gallons a day to about 750 million gallons a day.
It's a significant drop: Blue-green algae from the lake started blooming in the river in early summer, just after discharges were raised to 1.1 billion gallons a day.
Algae blooms aren't as likely now thanks to cooler water and shorter days.
The corps could also return to “pulse” discharges designed to mimic the natural flow of water through the river after heavy rains: sending no lake water through the St. Lucie Lock and Dam over the weekend and increasing the flow through the week. The pulses were credited with helping increase salinity and preserving oyster colonies in the river during the late summer.
The corps is expected to announce the discharge rate for the coming week Thursday, but don't expect releases to end completely, said corps spokesman John Campbell.
"I don't think we're there yet," he said.
But we're close. Consider:
●  Lake Okeechobee's level is dropping and on Tuesday was less than 5 inches higher than the corps' preferred level for this time of year.
Since peaking at 16 feet, 1⅞ inches Oct. 8, Lake O has been dropping slowly but surely. The lake elevation was 15 feet, 10¾ inches Tuesday morning. The corps prefers to maintain the lake between 12 feet, 6 inches at the beginning of summer — so there's capacity to store water from summer rains, tropical storms and hurricanes — and 15 feet, 6 inches in mid- to late fall — so there's stored water for irrigation through the winter dry season.
The 15½-foot maximum isn't a hard and fast rule: In 2014, a year with no discharges, Lake O reached 16 feet on Oct. 23; and the corps held off on discharges, noting the start of the winter dry season was just around the corner.
This year's dry season may be just around the corner.
A cold front expected in South Florida this weekend could signal the end of the summer rainy season. "Could" is the operative word, said Tony Cristaldi, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service in Melbourne.
"The front probably will be the first real push of cool, dry air into the area," Cristaldi said, "but as for saying it's the end of the rainy season, that's a bit premature."
The rainy season typically ends around this time of year, Cristaldi said, but there could be a few days after this coming front that are typical of the rainy season: hot and humid with afternoon showers or thunderstorms.
Unfortunately, although the rainy season might be ending, the hurricane season still looms until the end of November.
"We're not calling the season over yet," said Dennis Feltgen, a meteorologist and spokesman for the National Hurricane Center in Miami. "We've still got six weeks to go."
In fact, during eight of the past 10 years, Feltgen added, "we've had at least one named storm in November."
To make the point, Feltgen noted a low-pressure system southeast of the Bahamas has "a 60 percent shot" of developing into a tropical system. The corps is keeping an eye on that weather system, too, Campbell said.
Since starting Jan. 30, discharges have dumped more than 208 billion gallons of Lake O water into the St. Lucie River. That's enough to cover the city of Stuart with about 116 feet of water.

161017-a
Lake O pollution, Obamacare key issues in Jupiter-Martin district
Palm Beach Post - by Tony Doris, Staff Writer
October 17, 2016
The race for Florida House District 82 this year pits two women against each other who vied for the spot four years ago: MaryLynn Magar, the Republican incumbent, and Mary W. Higgins, Democratic challenger.
Magar opposes the Affordable Care Act and wants to lure companies to Florida by increasing collaboration between state universities and employers. Lake Okeechobee’s pollution should be addressed by finding water storage and filtration land north of the lake.
Higgins hopes the Legislature will reverse itself and accept the federal money that would come through Medicaid expansion and the Affordable Care Act. “It’s our taxpayers’ money,” she says.
As for attracting companies, they won’t come to the district until the state addresses the blue-green algae crisis aggravated by discharges from Lake Okeechobee. To fix that problem, the state needs to acquire reservoir land south of the lake to create a flow-way into the Everglades, Higgins said. She also supports mandatory criminal background screens for gun purchases, which her opponent does not.
District 82 includes all of Martin County, as well as Tequesta and Jupiter in the northeastern corner of Palm Beach County. With 156,533 residents, the district added nearly 30,000 residents between 2000 and 2010, an increase of more than 23 percent. Its population is about 80 percent white, 13 percent Hispanic and 4 percent black.
Magar said her decision to run four years ago came partly because, “I got sick and tired of seeing my friends’ kids move out of state for good jobs.”
She wants to see Florida universities collaborate more closely with employers, to “expand our economic diversity not just in the service industry but in life sciences, science, aerospace manufacturing.”
The third-biggest state needs to build a top 10 university by acquiring the best professors and scientists, she said. “We need to make sure we have opportunity and that we have something to offer in the way of building a life here.”
She opposes “just writing checks” to lure companies to the state. Rather, she’d push to better fund universities to work with companies. And if a company leaves, she’d like to see the state “hold the assets,” such as a piece of the action of discoveries made with the help of the universities.
A small-business owner opposed to the Affordable Care Act, Magar would push for more health care savings accounts through employers. She also would push for more transparency from hospitals and other health care providers to make sure people about to undergo a medical procedure understand the costs upfront, she said.
By contrast, Higgins said that by accepting millions of dollars in federal tax money to expand Medicaid and accept the Affordable Care Act, 567,000 more Floridians would be insured. She supports the efforts of incoming Senate President Joe Negron — a Republican — to do that. “It is the moral and ethical thing to do.”
She also would work across the aisle and support Negron’s efforts to halt the polluted discharges that are clogging the district’s waterways with toxic blue-green algae. That requires buying land for a reservoir and flow-way south of the big lake, she said.
“In District 82, businesses are not going to come here with the environment the way it is. The algae bloom got international attention this summer. Until we fix that, we can’t do anything else.”

161017-b
Water messages of significance
The News-Press – by Editorial Board
October 17, 2016
The $800 million Kissimmee River restoration project created a meandering
waterway and flood plain from a what was a a straight canal.(Photo).
The News-Press editorial board has focused on water – its past, its present, its future, its quality, or lack of it - for several years.
Over the past year, the board has met with representatives of U.S. Sugar, Alico, the South Florida Water Management District, scientists and environmentalists, like those at the Conservancy of Southwest Florida, elected government officials and other community stakeholders. We have documented their words and offered our opinion on Everglades restoration efforts, the harmful water flowing from Lake Okeechobee into the Caloosahatchee and its estuary. From 1,000 feet in the air, we have witnessed the various projects designed to store, treat and disperse water to help improve and regulate what flows into and from the lake, into the Everglades and Florida Bay.
We have seen and written about the vastness of Lake Okeechobee, the continuing work there to reinforce the Herbert Hoover Dike and build a series of new culverts, but also realizing its sheer size – the second largest freshwater lake in the contiguous 48 states at 730 square miles – makes any project to clean our water, limit what flows into the Caloosahatchee or keep focused on moving more water south, an immense undertaking.
Daily, we hear the accusations of how U.S. Sugar is to blame for our polluted water, how our elected local and state leaders are cowering to their land interests and to the farming communities in order to receive election campaign donations and putting our waterways in even more peril. We listen and report on those who say the water management district and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers are mismanaging lake discharges, leading to the pollution, algae blooms and costing Southwest Florida thousands of dollars in lost tourism and business.
We have read and discussed and reported on the problems and solutions detailed in the comprehensive 143-page University of Florida Water Institute Report on our water crisis. This document appears to be the go-to guide for everyone associated with water, because of its thoroughness, objectivity and the fact it was prepared by knowledgeable scientists.
All of this has helped build the foundation for what we believe will be one of the most comprehensive programs on water ever assembled, featuring experts from across the state gathered for the first Save our Water Market Watch summit hosted by The News-Press. The six-hour event is Wednesday, Oct. 26, at Sanibel Harbor Marriott Resort and Spa and will draw over 400 people.
This event continues an exploration into our water quality problems and solutions, creating an impact and action steps that last well beyond what is discussed on this day.
Our speakers represent agricultural and land interests, the science behind why we are in a water crisis and what can be done to solve it, those who work daily to bring awareness to the importance of preservation, and how communities, tourism and business are impacted.
This is a complicated environmental puzzle – one that requires finishing current water storage, treatment  and restoration projects. It involves several environmental plans, including framed mandates set forth in the Central Everglades Restoration Program and the Central Everglades Planning Project. It involves money, and plenty of it, with approximately $8 billion in state and federal money needed to complete current projects and begin new ones. The Legacy Florida Act, passed this year by the state legislature, will help, providing $200 million annually for the various projects through Amendment 1 money.
The ultimate goals: clean and disperse the water north before it reaches Lake Okeechobee, reduce bad water flows into the Caloosahatchee and St. Lucie rivers, continue building 1 million acre feet of storage and treatment areas and continue to move water south where it is needed for the Everglades and Florida Bay.
Although the goals may be similar, how each of the people and groups represented at the summit achieve them is different.
For instance:
South Florida Water Management District
The district says the north is the “missing piece of the regional storage puzzle.” Northern storage lags behind other projects in the state as only about 25,500 acres, holding water about one feet deep, has been completed or is planned. The west has completed 170,000, with 1,000 planned; the south 228,000 completed or under way and 82,000 planned and the east – 63,000 completed or underway and 98,000 planned.
The benefits, they say, are treatment areas that reduce the harmful nutrients flowing into the lake. About 92 percent of the phosphorous flows and 87 percent of the nitrogen enter the lake from the north, the district says. The district also believes the storage provides flexibility for water releases into the Caloosahatchee and its estuary during the dry season.
One of the jewel's of the district's projects is the $800 million restoration of the Kissimmee River. This project entailed back filling the channelized river, returning water flow to its original meandering state and restoring the natural flood plain over what had been farmland. The district also announced this week that it would start holding about 100,000 acre feet of water in the Kissimmee Chain of Lakes to only help fill the floodplain during dry season, but also reduce the flow of water into Lake O.
What the district says is needed and what can be done through federal and state funding is a different matter. Currently, $3.6 billion is invested in projects completed or underway but another $3.3 billion is needed for future projects.
Lee County Natural Resources
What’s happening locally with other crucial waterways is just as important. The county has committed $37.2 million to water quality projects, including the 20-acre filter marsh at Powell Creek Preserve, the filter marsh and sheet flow restoration on a 307-acre parcel on Popash Creek Preserve, the meandering flow way at Lakes Park and hydrology restoration on the Deep Lagoon Preserve. Most of the county’s water quality projects also include nutrient load reductions into the watershed.
Conservancy of Southwest Florida
The group is pushing for more storage in the Caloosahatchee basin, including the Caloosahatchee Reservoir (C-43) project, which has a target date of 2021 to finish the first phase and once completed could hold 55 billion gallons of water; more flow south of Lake O, water treatment areas north and south of the lake revisiting Lake O distribution protocols.
As do many environmental groups, the conservancy wants the state to acquire more land in the Everglades Agricultural area to store and treat water and funding for the USEPA/DEP Water Quality Plan to build additional water treatment areas.
The conservancy also believes U.S. Sugar is responsible for much of the pollution and calls for the company to stop “pollution at its source,” meaning any polluted water that flows from pipes into waterways.
Sanibel-Captiva Conservation Foundation
A big concern is the pollutants (pesticides, herbicides, road way oil and grease) that flow into the Caloosahatchee estuary from surface water run off, mainly from canals and drainage ditches, resulting in abnormally high algae blooms, and leading to the killing of seagrass, tape grass, oyster beds and scallops. The SCCF laboratory already has projects underway to restore sea grass and tape grass and replenish oyster beds.
The SCCF advocates replacement of septic systems, route rain to fallow farmlands and pastures, fertilizer minimization, livestock fencing and manure management.
VIEWS INSIDE ON A33
Bubba Wade from U.S. Sugar
Pete Antonacci from SFWMD
BREAKOUT
SAVE OUR WATER
What: The News-Press Media Group is hosting an educational and experiential summit focusing on the water quality crisis in Southwest Florida. Experts from around the region and state will speak on a variety of topics, a moderated panel representing agriculture, tourism, business and real estate will discuss the economic impacts, and we will unveil five unique water-themed experiences so the learning can continue beyond the summit.
When: Wednesday, Oct. 26, noon-6 p.m.
Where: Sanibel Harbour Marriott Resort & Spa
Tickets: Limited number of tickets available. Go to news-press.com/saveourwater
Coverage: You can follow live coverage of the event on news-press.com and more coverage in The News-Press
Twitter: Join the conversation that day using #saveourwater
Facebook: facebook.com/thenewspress
Special Page: newspr.es/SaveOurWater
Line up of speakers: http://newspr.es/SOW

161016-a
King tide reigns over the flooded streets
Miami Herald - by David J. Neal
October 16, 2016
Streets across Florida went underwater Sunday as king tides and early rain swamped the region.
And the not-so-royal treatment will likely continue into Monday.
Drivers in Miami Beach, Wynwood, Hollywood and Fort Lauderdale cascaded through the water over the weekend, meeting it with a mix of rage (from a flooded shop) to humor (a neighbor who posted a no-wake sign).
The rising tide could result in fresh flooding on Monday morning, when more cars and people hit the road for work and school. And Sunday’s sogginess “could cause more problems when the tide rises again,” National Weather Service meteorologist Ian Lee said.
Lee said the rain chance was 60 percent Sunday but will drop to 30 percent Monday and 40 percent Tuesday.
The king tides are expected to reach their peak on Sunday night and Monday morning, bringing water levels between three and a third and three and a half feet higher than usual in coastal Miami areas, according to the National Weather Service.
The heavy Saturday night and Sunday rains combined with the annual high tides to create mini-flood zones across South Florida. Some Wynwood corners, especially those with vacant lots, could have passed for ponds. Las Olas Boulevard also saw sidewalks and streets at levels that soaked pant legs.
Rip current and coastal flooding advisories are in effect until 8 a.m. Tuesday, according to the National Weather Service.
Around noon on Sunday, Miami Beach police removed cones placed around flooded areas Saturday night intended to prevent drivers from sloshing through.
Along 18th Street in South Beach, TKS Miami owner Morgan Blittner found himself squeegeeing the floor of his kayaking and surfing store at 1784 West Ave. Miami Beach’s pumps turned on too late, Blittner said, and didn’t prevent several inches of rain from pooling on his store’s floor. The pumps also malfunctioned on Oct. 3.
Said Blittner: “We cannot run a business like this.”
For those who are still thinking of heading to the beach this week, local officials are urging caution. Beachgoers should wear shoes or sandals to avoid being injured by debris swept ashore during the king tide, said Miami-Dade Fire Rescue spokeswoman Erika Benitez in an e-mail. King tides often flip over garbage cans on public beaches, and visitors should be on the lookout for nails, broken glass and other potentially dangerous items. Benitez also cautioned parents to keep their children out of the water during king tides.

161016-b
Mosaic: 50k gallons of process water spilled
ABC 7 WWSB
October 16, 2016
PLANT CITY, Fla. (WWSB) - As Mosaic continues to clean up their mess from a massive sinkhole that dumped toxic waste into a Florida water supply, now the company has to worry about another fifty thousand gallons of process water that has been spilled.
During routine plant operations on Saturday morning at the manufacturing facility in Plant City Mosaic reports that a pump that circulates processed water spilled within the plant.
Mosaic officials say the process water was captured on site and there were no off site impacts.
Complying with the 24-hour public notice of pollution rule that Governor Rick Scott implemented following the water supply spill, Mosaic informed the Florida Department of Environmental Protection of the recent spill.

161015-a
Can coastal wetlands survive sea level rise ?
SummitCountyVoice.com - Staff Report
October 15, 2016
New USGS study IDs path for wetlands migration
Ecologically critical tidal wetlands along the U.S. Gulf Coast are being swallowed up by rising sea level and coastal development, but they expand inland if planners consider climate change in their equations.
“Tidal saline wetlands along the northern Gulf of Mexico are abundant, diverse, and vulnerable to sea-level rise,” said Nicholas Enwright, USGS researcher and lead author of the study. “Our findings provide a foundation for land managers to better ensure there is space for future wetland migration in response to sea-level rise.”
Tidal saline wetlands include mangrove forests, salt marshes, and salt flats, which all provide important wildlife habitat and help buffer the impacts of extreme weather. Without areas for these wetlands to move to, people and wildlife will lose the beneficial functions they provide.
The study,  conducted from 2012 – 2015, examined the potential for landward movement of coastal wetlands under different sea-level rise scenarios. It also considered the impact of barriers to wetland migration due to current and future urbanization and examined how existing conservation lands, such as parks and refuges, might accommodate expected landward migration.
Tidal saline wetlands are an important and distinct ecosystem, yet the increase in human development along coastlines is placing a burden on the wetland’s ability to adapt to rising sea levels.
“In response to sea-level rise, coastal wetlands have historically moved across the landscape,” said Michael Osland, USGS Research Ecologist and co-author of the study. “However, coastal barriers can prevent wetland migration.”
Historically, these wetlands have been able to adjust to small fluctuations in sea level through natural processes that can increase their elevation in their current area. They have also been able to migrate inland when rapidly rising seas have overcome their ability to keep up. However, as coastal development increases – such as buildings, roads, parking lots, and flood-prevention infrastructure like levees and seawalls – the paths wetlands could take for inland migration may become blocked. But, the study does illustrate that proper urban planning could benefit these at-risk ecosystems.
“Although we found migration barriers due to urban development and levees in many areas, we also identified a tremendous amount of land in our study area that is available for future landward migration,” said Osland. “However, it’s also important to recognize that migration will occur at the expense of adjacent upriver and upslope ecosystems.”
The study indicates that three counties in Florida and six parishes in Louisiana (Collier, Monroe, and Miami-Dade counties in Florida; Assumption, Cameron, Lafourche, Terrebonne, St. Mary and Vermilion parishes in Louisiana) account for the majority of the total area available for landward migration. In other areas, higher coastlines and ridges limit the relative area available for landward migration.
Migration barriers from current and future urban development are most likely to occur around Tampa, Florida, extending along the coastline toward Fort Myers, Florida. Barriers also exist in leveed areas, concentrated in South Florida near the Everglades, in south Louisiana, and in eastern Texas. Some of the undeveloped areas within these levee areas could be made available for landward migration through carefully planned levee breaching, which could give these wetlands room to expand.
Coastal resource managers will now have the information outlined in this study as an additional tool to help them develop conservation strategies that will enable these wetlands to better adapt to future change.
“We are hoping that this study will stimulate regional conservation and land-use planning discussions regarding landward migration corridors for tidal saline wetlands,” said Enwright. “Migration corridors can be incorporated into landscape conservation design plans.”

161015-b
Let's stay focused on science, not sound bites
News-Press.com – by Malcolm "Bubba" Wade Jr. - senior vice president of corporate strategy and business development for U.S. Sugar and serves as a member of the South Florida Water Management District’s Water Resources Advisory Commission (WRAC).
October 15, 2016
Over 20 years ago, stakeholders in South Florida set out to accomplish an ambitious goal of restoring the Everglades, one of the most treasured watersheds on the planet. Achieving this goal would involve an unprecedented commitment from everyone involved, including those living in communities stretching from Orlando to the Florida Keys.
For district engineers and scientists, accomplishing this goal meant developing a comprehensive suite of projects scientifically-designed and proven to clean and store more water. For elected officials, it meant committing billions of dollars to construct those projects, which are still in progress today. For farmers living south of Lake Okeechobee, it meant adopting innovative, nutrient-reducing farming solutions known as Best Management Practices (BMPs) as well as making many other sacrifices.
Since that time, U.S. Sugar has helped reduce the phosphorus in the water flowing off our farms by an average of 55 percent – well above the state and federal requirement. Our BMPs, developed with the University of Florida, have helped ensure that 95 percent of the Everglades is meeting the stringent 10 parts per billion water quality standard for phosphorous today.
These BMPs are 100 percent paid for by farmers. Through a tax of $25 per acre, EAA farmers have paid their share of building and operating the Stormwater Treatment Areas (STAs) to clean the balance of the water flowing south. This tax has raised $200 million for Everglades restoration in addition to the $200 million farmers spend for research and on-farm, BMP water clean-up efforts. This is more than any other private group – environmentalists included – has committed to Everglades restoration in history.
Additionally, farmers south of the lake have given up 120,000 acres of productive farm land to the state, of which approximately 30,000 acres have been used to design or construct the A-1 and A-2 reservoir projects south of Lake Okeechobee. Before any new land is purchased, these new projects could be re-designed to store more than 97 billion gallons of water.
Somewhere along the line, activists turned their focus away from solutions and toward attacking Florida’s farmers and calling for the purchase of more of their land. This misguided attempt has set a dangerous precedent and put decades of progress in Everglades restoration at risk. State and federal studies have concluded that additional storage south of the lake will not significantly reduce the harmful discharges from Lake Okeechobee.  Yet, environmental activists keep calling for the purchase or seizing of additional farm land, taking more land out of food production and destroying jobs in our farming communities.
In 2016 alone, nearly two million acre-feet of water has been discharged from Lake Okeechobee.  The proposed reservoir south of Lake Okeechobee would only provide a few days’ worth of storage (300,000 acre-feet), and during wet conditions, constraints in the Everglades would not let the water flow south the Everglades.  At a cost of over $3 billion this is not a viable nor economically cost beneficial solution.
We look forward to participating in The News-Press’ “Save Our Water” summit and sharing scientific data about the water quality and quantity issues of the Everglades and Lake Okeechobee system. By staying focused on the science – rather than sound-bite rhetoric – we can ensure that the restoration goal started more than two decades ago can become a reality.

161015-c
Water district continues work on critical projects
News-Press.com – by Mitch Hutchcraft - a member of the South Florida Water Management District Governing Board.
October 15, 2016
Thankfully, Hurricane Matthew did not strike Southwest Florida with its potential ferocity. But the storm offered water managers at the South Florida Water Management District an excellent opportunity to test drive our emergency preparedness plan. I am pleased to report that the agency executed its storm-related work with great pliancy and thoroughness to help protect millions of residents, visitors, businesses and our environment.
That same degree of diligence drives this agency in its work on your behalf to develop, design and complete projects to improve regional water resources in the short term and into the future. On behalf of our governing board, the Fort Myers News-Press is to be congratulated for the opportunity to highlight some of these key projects and inform its readers how SFWMD is investing their tax dollars.
Through a very public process, the Board made one of its largest investments in a project that addresses the number one environmental concern of Southwest Florida: the health of the Caloosahatchee River and Estuary. With the board’s full support, the $600 million Caloosahatchee River (C-43) West Basin Storage Reservoir broke ground in 2015, and progress is being made every day. The massive project will provide essential freshwater flows to help maintain estuary health during dry seasons and at times when the river flow falls below the minimum required to maintain its ecology.
Along with these primary benefits, the reservoir will aid in capturing and storing basin stormwater runoff and regulatory water releases from Lake Okeechobee, reducing the number and volume of harmful discharges to the estuary.
The entire project will provide 170,000 acre-feet of deep storage. Phase 1 will provide 90,000 acre-feet of storage with scheduled completion set for 2020.
Just up the Caloosahatchee is a project developed in conjunction with Lee County to test ways to clean nitrogen in the watershed. Located on 1,770 acres, the science developed at the Water Quality Treatment and Testing Facility will provide water quality treatment strategies that will be vital in designing future projects.
And in Glades County, Lake Hicpochee is being transformed into a 6,000-acre marsh that closely resembles its natural condition. The Florida Legislature appropriated money, and the Board has invested approximately $18.5 million to rehydrate the lake bed, improving water storage and quality in the watershed. The required construction permit has been issued, and the project is scheduled for completion by November 2017.
Additionally, SFWMD is working with the Legislature, which allocated $47.8 million, and the Florida Department of Environmental Protection on public-private partnerships to store water and provide regional water quality and quantity benefits. Collectively, these projects may add up to 272,000 acre-feet of new water retention and storage per year around Lake Okeechobee.
Because water storage is such a critical issue, SFWMD is well underway with work on the Lake Okeechobee Watershed Planning Project. The primary goal of this effort with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is to identify water storage and treatment opportunities north of Lake Okeechobee. Plans call for creating 200,000 additional acre-feet of northern storage. This is consistent with the 2015 University of Florida Water Institute recommendations and Gov. Rick Scott’s 20-Year Plan to fund Everglades restoration.
Like hurricane preparation, protecting the Caloosahatchee River and Estuary and the Southwest Coast’s water resources is a work in progress over the long term.  The Board’s goal is to keep Southwest Florida residents informed about these efforts to improve water quality and storage and protect the ecosystems that drive your everyday lives.

161014-
Corporate welfare with an environmental cost
Gainesville.com - by Dave Denslow, a retired University of Florida economics professor.
October 14, 2016
County Commissioner Robert Hutchinson has noted Alachua County’s low rank in the share of land under conservation management, 37th among Florida’s 67 counties.
Using the August 2016 update of the Florida Natural Areas Inventory, I calculate that 30 percent of Florida’s acreage has been set aside for conservation. For Alachua County, that share falls just under 20 percent. The leader is Monroe with 96 percent. Others with more than 60 percent include Miami-Dade, Collier and Broward. If you think you see a pattern there, you’re right. Each of those counties has enormous Everglades acreage under federal or state management.
Rounding out the counties topping 60 percent are Franklin and Liberty. With their forest preserves, they too have large acreages under state and federal management.
Where Alachua comes out ahead is in the share of conservation land under local management, with more than 3 percent. That’s better than double the state average and ranks us 10th among counties. None of the nine counties with more than half their land being conserved has more than 1 percent of the total under local management. As to state control, Alachua places at the state average at close to 16 percent.
We fall short by having no federal land. OK, not zero, 190 acres. The lesson is clear. Convince our county commissioners to persuade the federal government to buy more of our land and take care of it for us, taking us from our current 0 percent to the state average 12 percent under federal management. Surely we have areas that warrant federal preservation. Ideally, our future congressional representative will help.
That brings me to another way to help sustain the environment, especially the Everglades. Vote for Ken McGurn for U.S. representative from Florida’s 3rd District. We’re lucky to have two effective candidates, McGurn and Ted Yoho, and you have likely made your choice in keeping with your political views.
But I nonetheless call your attention to a particular bill that Yoho authored, because it’s about a nemesis for those who love the Everglades and detest corporate welfare, Big Sugar. In fact the bill looks like it could have been drafted by Jack Roney, the policy director for the American Sugar Alliance. To be clear, I don’t know that it was. But much of the language matches earlier position papers appearing under Roney’s name.
Yoho introduced the bill as a House resolution on February 27, 2015. It calls for the president to go after all countries that export sugar and negotiate with them to agree to drop all subsidies “direct and indirect” for sugar producers. Once all of them — everyone of them including India, Thailand, Colombia and Cuba — have agreed to that, the president is to “propose to Congress a zero for zero sugar subsidy policy.”
“Zero for zero” is Yoho’s (and Roney’s) phrase for if all other countries stop subsidizing sugar, the U.S. will think about it. In other words, we’ll consider eliminating our own subsidies and import quotas when pigs fly. You can see why the American Sugar Alliance loves it. For over-the-top amusement, watch Yoho’s video about his bill, featuring three children who are shorted on candy when trick or treating because of foreign sugar subsidies. What? One of the kids kills a subsidy zombie with an arrow through the head.
What does the U.S. sugar policy that Yoho is defending do for his constituents? Perhaps it’s good for our health, since it forces us to pay more for sugar and sweets, though the effect is too small to help much. It also gives other countries a comeback — look at your own sugar program — when our trade negotiators try to open up foreign markets to U.S. food products. As a result, our local farmers earn a little bit less.
But those are not the main issues. The main issues are the Everglades and corporate welfare. The conservative National Review calls the billionaire Fanjul brothers, major Florida sugar producers, “the First Family of corporate welfare.” It’s time to send a message that we’re fed up with letting our representatives subsidize those who least need it at the cost of our environment and at the expense of the rest of us.

161013-b
King tides rise again, South Florida under a coastal flood advisory
PalmBeachPost.com – by Kimberly Miller
October 13, 2016
A full moon Sunday coupled with pounding surf from Category 3 Hurricane Nicole has pushed gurgling Intracoastal water into South Florida streets once again.
The annual so-called King tides showed themselves in force this morning when high tide rose around 7 a.m.
Check The Palm Beach Post radar map.
Streets in West Palm Beach along Flagler Drive were submerged this morning to the curb in some areas, but the most impacted regions in Palm Beach County tend to be in Boca Raton and Delray Beach where fish swim in front yards and cars are forced from driveways for fear of saltwater damage.
Flagler Drive in West Palm Beach as high tide peaks on the morning of Oct. 13, 2016
Forecasters predicted higher tides this month as the full moon, plus its close orbit to Earth, teased them beyond boundaries built by man.
The so-called “nuisance” flooding is temporary, some forecasters said it’s likely an eye-opener for people who may not have realized what a few inches of water can mean to a coastal area.
NOAA measurements taken from a buoy off Lake Worth show sea levels rising at 3.36 millimeters per year, or 1.10 feet in 100 years. That’s similar to readings at Marathon Key that show a 3.34 millimeter increase per year, and Tampa, which is measuring an annual increase of 3.15 millimeters.
It’s considerably below New Orleans, which is experiencing a 9.03 millimeter rise in sea levels per year, or 3 feet over 100 years.
Still, the impact on South Florida is evident any time more than one power combines to embolden coastal waters.
“A few inches matters in South Florida when we have such a low land elevation,” said Jayantha Obeysekera, chief modeler for hydrologic and environmental systems at the South Florida Water Management District last year.
In West Palm Beach this morning, flooding on Flagler Drive greeted rush hour drivers and water crept into George S. Petty Park on Flagler between Belvedere Road and Southern Boulevard.

161013-c
Sorry, Bullsugar.org: Patrick Murphy is NOT our champion for clean water
SunshineStateNews - by Nancy Smith
October 13, 2016
If ever there was a tainted and misleading candidate endorsement, it's Wednesday's Bull Sugar (Bullsugar.org) endorsement of Democratic Senate candidate Patrick Murphy. Maybe you saw it.
Bull Sugar, founded in 2014, claims to be "dedicated to stopping the damaging discharges into the St. Lucie and Caloosahatchee estuaries and restoring the flow of clean freshwater to Florida Bay." But these gung-ho folks aren't your run-of-the-mill environmentalists. More about them later.
No matter who or what Bull Sugar is, if they want results, how can they favor Murphy over incumbent Sen. Marco Rubio?
Rubio pulled off in one day more good for Lake Okeechobee and the algae-oppressed people of the Treasure Coast and Lee County -- and disintegrating Florida Bay, come to that -- than Murphy has in all of his four lacklustre years in Washington.
As reported in The Miami Herald in March, Rubio convinced Sen. Jim Inhofe, R-Okla., the powerful chairman of the Environmental and Public Works Committee, to back a suite of Everglades restoration projects expected to cost about $1.9 billion and aimed at stopping the kind of crisis that gripped South Florida over the winter when El Niño dropped record rain.
Inhofe, by the way, was the only vote against the master plan to fix the Everglades in 2000.
“Marco showed me this (Comprehensive Everglades Planning Process) was different," Inhofe told the Herald. "And I wouldn’t have gotten into it if Marco hadn’t talked to me. When Marco said one out of three Floridians are affected, I thought that wasn’t right.”
Inhofe supported it, CEPP funding passed in committee and from there in September, it moved on in the Senate.
So, please, let's not talk about Rubio's attendance record. Or who contributes to his campaign. Or how many meetings in Stuart he attends. This is a senator other senators listen to. Which is something Florida is going to need desperately when the November dust settles. Look at the whole picture: Persuading Inhofe isn't all Rubio has done to move water south, restore the Everglades and work for a clean water supply. See a timeline of his water management projects here. 
Florida's other senator, Democrat Bill Nelson, periodically shows up on the Treasure Coast to survey the green water and coo his concern.  And doesn't the local press shower him with kisses. Trouble is, Nelson then disappears back to Washington and does ... what ?  
Meanwhile, Murphy's water-accomplishment record, or lack thereof, speaks for itself. I wonder if Bullsugar.org even looked at it before anointing him.
Certainly, I have to give the congressman who represents the Treasure Coast credit for showing up.  The man turns up for everything. On the other hand, nothing attracts an ambitious politician faster than the sure knowledge he'll be on the business side of a camera lens. Murphy also talks a good game. For instance, in 2013, to loud applause, he told Florida Sen. Joe Negron's Senate Select Committee on the Indian River Lagoon and Lake Okeechobee Basin that he would take a bottle of polluted river water to Washington to deliver straight to the president. But, did he? Did President Obama ever get a look at that bottle? If he did, we never heard. Nor did we get a squeak of an indication of support from the Oval Office.
Murphy since has shipped many more bottles of dirty water to Washington, and he even hand-delivered one to Gov. Rick Scott's office. 
In April, Murphy wrote a letter to the president, enlisting the support of the White House, requesting additional emergency federal assistance to residents impacted by Lake Okeechobee discharges and fast-tracking critical Everglades restoration projects. You may remember how that worked out. Apparently the president was otherwise engaged.
What about water bills Murphy sponsored in the House? In four years there have been three. Total.
On July 14, in this 114th Congress -- apparently doing the Everglades Foundation's bidding -- Murphy and Republican Rep. Curt Clawson introduced H.R. 5870: Federal Partnership for Clean Water Land Acquisition Act of 2016. The bill would direct the Environmental Protection Agency to establish a grant program for land acquisitions made to improve water quality, and "for other purposes." It authorizes $750 million each fiscal year for buying private land -- yes, it's part of the Foundation's buy-the-land-move-the-water-south agenda. You only have to look at the text here.
H.R. 5870 might sound good to some of the beleaguered people of the Treasure Coast, but this bill is as phony as a $3 bill. Filed for show. Filed to say, "Hey, Florida, look what I'm doing for your environment." 
Why am I so cynical? Because PredictGov, the site that keeps its finger on the pulse of bills in Washington, gives H.R. 5870 a 1 percent chance of passage. ONE percent. That's a snowball's chance.
Murphy's only other water-related bills during his years in Washington went nowhere fast: 
H.R. 5631 (113th Congress): To authorize the Central Everglades Planning Project, Florida, and for other purposes. Introduced Sept. 18, 2014. DIED.
H.R. 5289 (113th Congress): Indian River Lagoon Nutrient Removal Assistance Act of 2014. Introduced July 30, 2014. DIED.
If you want to see Murphy's full congressional record in the 113th and 114th Congresses, click here.
Bottom line: Patrick Murphy has been ineffective for the environment. Nothing of what he's done has moved legislation or even the conversation -- at least, not where it counts, in the U.S. Capitol. 
Yet, somehow, he wins the support of South Florida environmentalists, and now Bullsugar.org -- a militant group the anti-Bullsugar.org website Southern Exposure calls "a wacko environmental group."
In fact, Southern Exposure calls Bullsugar.org "one of the phony astroturf protest groups secretly founded by New York billionaire hedge fund hustler Paul Tudor Jones to put farmers out of business."
Jones, the force behind the Everglades Foundation, has long been rumored to be Bullsugar.org's financier. But I have never seen any concrete proof of that. I do know the organization's board members are all connected to each other through the Indian Riverkeepers, River Warriors, Captains for Clean Water and Tarpon and Bonefish Trust.
As of the 2014 tax return filed by the Everglades Foundation, I see no direct funding to Bull Sugar or Bullsugar.org. But I do see funding going to its supporters. 
Bullsugar.org recently changed its tax status from a 501(C)3 to a (c)4, making it legal for the group to perform advocacy work. And it is indeed active, particularly on social media.
It's also clear Bull Sugar's messaging is identical to the Everglades Foundation's, and that someone is masterminding the various entities that all push for the "Now or Neverglades" resolutions and buy-the-land-send-the-water-south rhetoric. Have a look at a rundown and description of Bull Sugar board members and draw your own conclusions.
It just seems obvious to me, no matter who's behind Bull Sugar or what its ultimate motives, Murphy didn't earn its crown as water champion. He lives in the right neighborhood for photo ops, that's about it. But deserving promotion based on his successes for the environment? There haven't been any

161013-d
Water managers launch test, to reduce harmful flows to Treasure Coast
CBS12.com – by Chuck Weber
October 13, 2016
WEST PALM BEACH (CBS12) — Water managers on Wednesday, announced a test project, designed to prevent another toxic algae crisis on the Treasure Coast.
The announcement was made by the South Florida Water Management District at its headquarters near West Palm Beach.
Staffers at the agency say they have started holding significantly more water in the Kissimmee Chain of Lakes, which stretches from State Road 60 to the Orlando area.
The lakes drain into the Kissimmee River, which in turn flows into Lake Okeechobee.
The idea is holding more water north, releasing it more slowly into the restored wetlands of the Kissimmee River flood plain.
This should give water managers the flexibility to slow down flows into Lake Okeechobee, and hopefully reduce the need to send water from Lake O to the coasts-- specifically the St. Lucie River.
The unusually wet year led to toxic algae blooms, which devastated the environment and economy in the Stuart area.
Holding more water in the Kissimmee Chain of Lakes was always part of Kissimmee River restoration plans.
Water managers they moved up the test of the concept, because of the unusually wet year.
Most recently, Hurricane Matthew has left Lake Okeechobee nearly a foot above average for this time of year, presenting the threat of larger releases to the coasts.

161012-a
Donald Trump has very bad ideas about how to manage Lake Okeechobee
Miami New Times – by Tim Elfrink
October 12, 2016
Yesterday Hillary Clinton joined Al Gore at Miami Dade College's Kendall campus to give a serious, policy-heavy speech about her plans to tackle climate change and other environmental issues. It was one of the wonkier moments in her campaign and a breath of science-heavy fresh air amid all the mudslinging.
A few hours later, Donald Trump took the stage in Panama City and also threw out some ideas about environmental management. His thoughts were, shall we say, slightly less scientifically sound.
"My administration will address important environmental priorities like the Everglades and ensure water quality all across America, including the fixing of water problems like Lake Okeechobee," Trump told the crowd, sounding reasonable enough.
Then he continued, "It's amazing. You know, Lake Okeechobee, they're always letting the water out. Do you ever notice we always have droughts ? They're always letting the water out. Keep it in ! We won't have any droughts."
Now, there are plenty of complaints about the Army Corps of Engineers' handling of Florida's giant water basin. The Corps has been accused of letting water levels get dangerously high as Hurricane Matthew approached, and of polluting coastal waterways with discharges.
But Trump might be the first person ever to blame droughts on water being let out of Lake O. Is there any truth to his claims?
Not so much, says Dale Gawlik, professor and director of Florida Atlantic University's Environmental Science Program. Gawlik has spent years studying avian ecology and wetland ecosystems and says Trump's idea of keeping water levels high in Okeechobee would be a disaster for the environment. 
"If you were completely uncaring about the ecology of Lake Okeechobee and the fish and birds that live there and just view it as a big holding tank of water, what he's saying could have some merit," Gawlik says. 
Most Floridians, though, care about Lake Okeechobee's ecology — especially nearby residents who depend on it for most of their economy. Commercial fishermen and tourists into bird watching and bass fishing depend on a healthy lake. The survival of its animals and plants depends on keeping the lake at a "sweet spot" of depth — between 12 and 15 feet.
In the late '90s, Gawlik says, the Army Corps actually did let water levels get higher. The result ?
"When you don't let the water go down, the vegetation all died off. There were very few small bass left at the end of that period," he says.
Beyond the ecological impacts, there's also a basic safety issue at work. The 1928 Okeechobee hurricane breached the lake's southern edge, killing at least 2,500 people as water surged 20 feet high through nearby towns.
"The lake can't go above a certain level because of the structural integrity of the lake, so you're capped out there," Gawlik says. "We're already almost there."
So, in short, the water level can't be allowed to rise too high because the lake will literally burst, and unless it's periodically drained to the 12-to-15-foot range, an ecology that fuels the local economy would crumble.
"What he's suggesting is you throw out all the ecological importance, which is tied to a lot of tourism and industry there, and just look at drought alone," Gawlik says.
Related:           Inside Donald Trump's Ugly, Litigious History in Florida
Federal Judge Extends Voter Registration Through October 18, Deals Blow to Rick Scott

161012-b
U.S. House passes bill to aid Lake O releases, restoration of Everglades
Florida Weekly
October 12, 2016
On Sept. 28, the U.S. House overwhelmingly passed its version of a major water bill, clearing the way for work needed to restore the Florida Everglades.
In a 399-25 vote, representatives approved the Water Resources Development Act that includes the Central Everglades Planning Project, a suite of key projects intended to target work in the central marshes. (See “The Fix,” Florida Weekly, Sept. 28)
In September, the Senate passed a similar bill. The Miami Herald reported that supporters are hopeful the two houses will work out differences after the presidential election in November, quoting Julie Hill-Gabriel, director of Everglades Policy for Audubon Florida. “The path ahead looks clear,” she told the Herald. “That will be such an important step for the Everglades and really get that central Everglades project in the ground and start to address the problems we’ve seen this year.”
Passing the bill, known as WRDA, also signals that Congress may be on track to resume passing regular water bills needed to keep up with restoration work, Hill-Gabriel told the Herald. The American Sportfishing Association said in a statement that the use of wetlands, dunes and other natural features over man-made fixes to control flooding was a welcome change.
“It should be encouraging to sportsmen that Congress is making definitive moves to advance important conservation measures with major impacts for fish, wildlife, and water quality at a time when they are tasked with so much,” said Steve Kline, director of government relations for the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership.
“Today, we celebrate the strong bipartisan leadership of Congress in its commitment to Everglades restoration. Authorization of the long-awaited Central Everglades Planning Project in the Water Resources Development Act of 2016 is a critical step toward reconnecting Lake Okeechobee south and restoring natural water flows in the Everglades,” said Everglades Foundation CEO Eric Eikenberg.

161012-c
Vote ‘yes’ for filthy water
Island Reporter, Captiva Current, Sanibel-Captiva Islander – Letter by Charles Sobczak, Sanibel, FL
October 12, 2016
Election day is just around the corner and I would like to take a moment to remind everyone to vote "yes" for another decade of polluted water coming down the Caloosahatchee and destroying our estuaries. I know there isn't a ballot for this specific issue so, in order to keep the water unsafe, un-swimmable and toxic please vote for these two biggest political proxies instead.
First, make sure you vote for the re-election of Senator Marco Rubio. Senator Rubio's largest donors are the from Big Sugar, including the Fanjul family. Rubio has consistently supported the continuation of sugar subsidies and has done his best to introduce legislation that allows polluters to continue their back-pumping. He has historically opposed any buyouts of the lands south of Lake Okeechobee. His re-election guarantees at least another six years of unmitigated pollution.
Secondly, please check off a "yes" for Matt Caldwell for Florida House of Representatives in the 79th district, which includes Lehigh Acres and Alva. Although this is not my district, Congressman Caldwell helped sponsor and pass the House version of the most environmentally damaging anti-clean water bills on record: HB 7005 and SB 552, and continues to take donations from Big Sugar and other known polluters.
Caldwell, among many other Florida representatives, helped to make sure that Amendment No. 1 (The Florida Water and Land Conservation Initiative, 2014) was never enacted. Even with the overwhelming support of 75 percent of all Floridians, it was completely ignored. Part of the money it was supposed to generate was earmarked to be used in an option to purchase thousands of acres of the Everglades Agricultural Area, giving us some long-term hope of relief from Lake O's releases. Luckily for all of us who support dirty water, the option expired.
With huge PAC money taking out most local clean water candidates except John Scott, who is running as a clean water candidate against Matt Caldwell in District 79, you only have two choices to ensure more dead fish, more blue-green algae and more filthy water for years to come. Vote "yes" for pollution and be sure to re-elect Rubio and Caldwell in November !

161011-a
Save Our Water: Meet the expert speakers and panelists
News-Press.com – by Mark Brickel
October 11, 2016
Meet the impressive line-up of expert speakers presenting at Save Our Water, Oct. 26 at the Sanibel Harbour Marriott Resort & Spa.
The News-Press Media Group hosts "Save Our Water" on Wednesday, October 26, 2016. The event puts the spotlight on the water quality crisis in Southwest
The News-Press Media Group is hosting "Save Our Water"  on Wednesday, October 26th to put the spotlight on the water quality crisis in Southwest Florida. The mission of this event is to educate the public, through the voices of expert speakers from around the region and the state who will address key aspects of the crisis -- from the pollutants that are plaguing our waters to updates on restoration projects underway to restore the Caloosahatchee River and estuary and more.
THE SPEAKERS (In order of appearance)
GARY GOFORTH
Gary Goforth, P.E., Ph.D. has more than 35 years of experience in water resources engineering, encompassing strategic planning, design, permitting, construction, operation and program management.  For the last 30 years, his focus has been on large-scale environmental restoration programs in the Kissimmee-Okeechobee-Everglades ecosystem.   Between 1994-2005, he was the Chief Consulting Engineer during the design, construction and operation of the $700 million initial phase of the Everglades Construction Project, containing over 41,000 acres of constructed wetlands.  Since 2005 he has been the Principal Engineer of his own water resources engineering consulting firm.
RAE ANN WESSEL
Rae Ann Wessel is a limnologist and marine scientist with over 35 years of experience working in corporate, government, private and nonprofit sectors in South Florida dealing with water, environmental and land use issues at the local, regional, state and federal levels. For the past 11 years she's served as the Natural Resource Policy Director for SCCF, the Sanibel-Captiva Conservation Foundation.
In 1994 Rae Ann assisted with a News-Press-sponsored community forum on issues related to the Caloosahatchee. Since that time, she has been researching and identifying critical Caloosahatchee issues and building support for sustainable solutions. She is involved in oxbow research, historical documentation and education projects and guides river tours on the Caloosahatchee and its estuary.
Rae Ann serves as a: Commission appointee to the Conservation 2020 Conservation Lands Acquisition and Stewardship Committee, member of the Everglades Coalition, representative of the Environmental Advisory Council for the Everglades Foundation, past appointee to Lee County's Local Planning Agency and a 1992 graduate of Leadership Lee County.
She has received numerous awards for her environmental work. In 2012 she was selected one of the Women Who Make Southwest Florida. In 2013 she received the Citizen of the Year award from the Sanibel Committee of the Islands (COTI) for her work as a “Tireless Scientist for the Environment”. In 2007 she received the Richard Coleman Aquatic Resources Award from the Florida Lake Management
Society. In 2013 she received the inaugural Charles Edgar Foster Conservation Education Leadership Award and in 1998 the Conservationist of the Year from Audubon of Southwest Florida.
EDWIN "WIN"  EVERHAM
Dr. Win Everham is Professor of Marine and Ecological Sciences at Florida Gulf Coast University.  He teaches courses at a variety of levels across the discipline, including: General Ecology and Environmental Biology; a graduate level course in Advanced Ecology, Simulation and Modeling, area studies courses, Caribbean Environments and African Environments: and our science methods courses, Scientific Process and Environmental Research Methodologies. His research interests center on the response of ecosystems to a variety of different disturbances. This work has included: modeling landscape climate patterns in the Adirondack Mountains; hurricane disturbance dynamics in the Caribbean; and old field and fire succession in the Blue Ridge Mountains.  In SWF his research has included: the impacts of exotic invasion and exotic removal in wetlands; fire ecology in exotic infested systems; ecological dynamics of stormwater ponds; freshwater lake restoration and recovery; changes in herpetafauna communities through time; impacts of mosquito control on non-target species; and the response of ecosystems in SWF to hurricane disturbance.
Since arriving in Florida in 1996, Dr. Everham has served in a variety of capacities on community organizations including:  Chairman of the Estero Bay Agency on Bay Management, member of the Fort Myers Beach Marine Resources Task Force, member of the Conservancy of Southwest Florida Environmental Education Committee, Board Member for the Calusa Nature Center, member of the Big Cypress National Preserve Off Road Vehicle Advisory Committee, and member of the Institute for Food and Agriculture Immokalee Field Station Agroecology Advisory Board. 
RICK BARTLESON
Bartleson earned a B.A. in biology from the University of South Florida, an M.S. in the Systems Ecology program in the Environmental Engineering Sciences Department of the University of Florida, and a Ph.D. from the Marine, Estuarine and Environmental Studies program at University of Maryland, College Park. His thesis, dissertation and post-doctoral work involved seagrasses (effects of flow and nutrients), ecosystem dynamics and modeling. His past projects included a Chesapeake Bay ecosystem simulation model, microcosm research on the effects of submersed plants on nutrients, a simulation model of submersed plants on nutrients, and effects of seagrass beds on water flow. He has worked for Mote Marine Lab, Florida DEP, Rookery Bay Marine Lab, Florida Audubon Society, the University of Florida, the University of Maryland, and the South Florida Water Management District, and is currently a research scientist at Sanibel-Captiva Conservation Marine Lab.
Bartleson‘s main interests are the effects of water quality on seagrass ecosystems and the ecosystem services of seagrass communities. At SCCF he has been working on research, monitoring and restoration projects in collaboration with government agencies, non-profits, and universities and he is a Courtesy Faculty at Florida Gulf Coast University. His projects at SCCF Marine Lab include tape grass restoration, phytoplankton, cyanobacteria and red tide monitoring, monitoring fish for man-made toxins, nutrient removal with submersed plants, nutrient source tracking with stable isotopes, hypoxia monitoring and ecosystem modeling. He provides input into a weekly Caloosahatchee conditions report which documents effects of water management practices on water quality in the Caloosahatchee and Estuary.
BRIAN LAPOINTE
Dr. Brian Lapointe obtained a B.A. in Biology from Boston University, a M.S. in Environmental Science from the University of Florida, and a Ph.D. in Biology from the University of South Florida. Brian has worked at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Skidaway Insitute of Oceanography, and is currently a Research Professor at Florida Atlantic University - Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute in Ft. Pierce, FL. Dr. Lapointe has extensive experience in assessing water quality and marine ecosystem health in Florida and the Caribbean region. He was the first researcher to develop a “ridge-to-reef” water quality monitoring program in the wider Caribbean region. He also pioneered the use of stable nitrogen isotopes to identify nitrogen sources supporting algal blooms, and has worked on the ecology of phytoplankton and macro algae blooms throughout South Florida. Although his current work focuses on the Indian River Lagoon, he continues his long-term (1984-present) water quality monitoring at
 Looe Key reef in the lower Florida Keys. Dr. Lapointe has published over 90 scientific papers and was a contributing author of the book Clean Coastal Waters: Understanding and Reducing Nutrient Pollution published by the U.S. National Academy of Sciences. He has received numerous awards for his work, including the Sigma Xi Outstanding Research Award, inclusion in Who’s Who in Scuba Diving and Underwater Research and Who’s Who in America, Science and Engineering, the Millennium Edition. Brian is a member of the editorial board of the journal Harmful Algae.
CRIS COSTELLO
Cris has been organizing the grassroots for the Sierra Club since May 2007.  She is the lead organizer for the Sierra Club Our Wild Florida Campaign, which encompasses the Everglades Restoration, Red Tide, and Stop Sugar Field Burning campaigns.
She coordinates the Sierra Club’s water quality campaign to prevent harmful algal blooms in both coastal and inland waters in Florida by eliminating point and non-point sources of fertilizer, sewage and animal manure pollution.  Cris works with partner environmental organizations, local government staff and officials, homeowner associations, and landscape maintenance professionals around the following issues:  Everglades restoration, springs protection, local and state-level urban fertilizer management policy, and water quality standards for Florida’s fresh and estuarine waters.
In November 2013 Cris organized the Citizens’ Clean Water Summit in Orlando, where 253 activists from 121 organizations gathered to make plans for a higher level of collaboration among the state’s water quality and water quantity advocacy community.  Cris coordinates the result of the Summit, the 156-partner Floridians’ Clean Water Declaration (FCWD) Campaign Coalition.
Prior to joining the Sierra Club, Cris was a rural and urban grassroots community organizer, a Peace Corps Volunteer in Honduras, an organizer and negotiation/arbitration specialist in a seventeen year career in the labor movement, and a consultant to the Gulf Coast Community Foundation in Venice, Florida.  She holds a Bachelor of Arts degree from Grinnell College in Grinnell, Iowa.
ROLAND OTTOLINI
Roland Ottolini attended the University of Delaware and received his bachelor’s degree in civil engineering in 1984. He is a registered professional engineer in Florida and Maryland.
He began his civil engineering career in 1984 with Williams and Broome, Inc. of Exton, Pennsylvania, where he served as design engineer for water resource projects including dam, water supply and hydropower projects.
Ottolini continued his career with McCrone, Inc. of Easton, Maryland, in 1987 where he was a project manager for residential, commercial, and marine development. This included design and construction of water management facilities in compliance with the new Chesapeake Bay water quality initiatives.
He came to Lee County government in 1989 to head up the stormwater management program. He became the Director of the Division of Natural Resources in 1996 where his responsibilities expanded to overseeing programs in flood protection, water pollution control, water conservation, underground storage tank monitoring and clean-up, environmental laboratory, beach renourishment, inlet management planning, artificial reef development, and manatee protection. The division has a staff of 52, including biologists, engineers, environmental specialists, hydrogeologists, lab professionals, and technicians.
Ottolini has served on the Board of Directors for the Florida Shore and Beach Preservation Association. He was also appointed and served on the Lake Okeechobee Water Resource Advisory Committee and currently serves on the Working Group of the South Florida Ecosystem Restoration Task Force. He provided testimony at the Florida Senate Select Committee on the Indian River Lagoon and Lake Okeechobee Basin and United States Congressional Briefing on the State of St. Lucie and Caloosahatchee Waterways on related water management issues.
PETER ANTONACCI
Peter Antonacci became Executive Director of the South Florida Water Management
District in October 2015. He brings more than three decades of extensive experience in Florida state government, finance and law to this leadership role. He served as General Counsel to Governor Rick Scott from 2013 to 2015 and previously as State Attorney for the 15th Judicial Circuit in Palm Beach County. He served as a Governing Board member at the Northwest Florida Water Management District from 2006 to 2012. From 1991 to 1997, he was Bob Butterworth's Deputy Attorney General where he managed major litigation involving a variety of issues,
including state lands. Raised in Hialeah, he attended Hialeah High School and Miami Dade College. He also attended Florida State University where he earned a Bachelor of Arts as well as a master's degree in Urban and Regional Planning. He earned his Juris Doctorate from the Florida State University College of Law. As executive director of the state's largest water management agency. Antonacci leads the District in carrying out its mission to balance and improve flood control, water supply, water quality and natural systems across the region. Under his direction, the agency provides flood protection to South Florida through one of the largest water management systems in the world; works with utilities and stakeholders to develop long-­‐term water supply plans; and is implementing landmark restoration strategies to improve water quality, expand water storage and restore more natural flows to America's Everglades.
JENNIFER HECKER
Jennifer Hecker, Director of Natural Resource Policy, Conservancy of Southwest
Florida.
As the Director of Natural Resources Policy of the Conservancy of Southwest Florida Environmental Policy Division, Jennifer Hecker oversees the natural resource policy work for a five-county area and specializes in water resource policy, listed species policy, everglades restoration, natural resource extraction, environmental lands acquisition and natural resources legislation. Hecker holds an undergraduate degree in Environmental Studies from Prescott College and a graduate degree in Tropical Biology and Conservation from the University of Missouri. Prior to joining the Conservancy twelve years ago, Hecker was a project ecologist for WilsonMiller, Inc. and worked for Hillsborough County, Fla. as an environmental specialist in the Environmental Lands Acquisition and Management Program. Jennifer Hecker was selected by the Florida Weekly as a Southwest Florida “Power Woman” in 2011, is an alumnus of Leadership Collier, was appointed and served on the Florida Department of Environmental Protection’s Stormwater Technical Advisory Committee, and serves on several boards including the national Great Waters Coalition, Southwest Florida Watershed Council, Everglades Coalition, and Corkscrew Regional Ecosystem Watershed Trust.
JAMES EVANS
James Evans is the Director of Natural Resources for the City of Sanibel, where he has worked as a biologist and resource manager for the past 16+ years. Prior to working with the City of Sanibel, James was employed by the Center for Environmental Studies where he monitored seagrass, oysters, and water quality in the Caloosahatchee as part of the South Florida Water Management District’s Valued Ecosystem Component Study. He has a B.A. in Environmental Studies and a M.S. in Environmental Science. He completed his graduate work at Florida Gulf Coast University, where he investigated the influence of freshwater inflow on larval fishes and gelatinous predators in Estero Bay. James is a board member and past Chairman of the Southwest Florida Watershed Council and has been working on water resource issues in Southwest Florida for more than 18 years. He was also the primary author of the Caloosahatchee Watershed Regional Water Management Issues white paper.
DANIEL ANDREWS
Daniel Andrews is a full-time inshore fishing guide, born and raised in Southwest Florida. He fishes out of a flats boat for tarpon, snook, and redfish from Sanibel Island to Boca Grande. Daniel has witnessed the decline of the Caloosahatchee estuary growing up fishing these waters. He has spent tens of thousands of hours fishing and hunting across South Florida, in the Everglades, and in the Florida Keys. Passion for the outdoors is his driving force which
keeps him fighting hard to protect the Everglades and estuaries that shape his way of life. Daniel founded Captains for Clean water to bring people together on an issue that has plagued South Florida for his entire life.
COLLEEN DEPASQUALE
Colleen DePasquale is the current Executive Director of the Greater Fort Myers Chamber of Commerce.  Colleen worked in Hospitality industry for over 30 years before making the career change for the Chamber position. As is typical in the industry, her hotel career that ascended from the entry to executive level position in many different locations. The most notable opportunity was being on the opening staff and becoming the Director of Rooms Operations for the Moscow Marriott Grand hotel, the first Marriott product in Moscow in the 1999. From there, Colleen moved to Southwest Florida, working with McKibbon Hotel Management group for 12 years. Over time, Colleen was the General Manager of 3 hotels in the portfolio and responsible for the sales efforts for all 4 hotels.
Colleen is active in the community, sitting on the following boards: United Way, Lee County Hotel Association, Edison Ford Winter Estates, Lee County Sports Organizing committee, SWFL Alliance of Chambers, FGCU Hospitality & Resort board and the South Fort Myers High School Athletic Boosters. Colleen is also an appointee by the Board of County Commissioners for the Tourist Development Council, RESTORE advisory council and the Coastal Advisory Council.
GENE MCAVOY
Gene McAvoy is the County Extension Director for the Hendry County Extension Office and hasserved with the University of Florida/IFAS Extension Service for the past 19 years as a Regional Specialized Vegetable Agent with the commercial vegetable industry in southwest Florida.
McAvoy holds a BS and MS in Horticulture from Rutgers University and has over 40 years’ experience in the vegetable industry.  After leaving Rutgers, he spent nearly 14 years working with and training vegetable famers in West Africa, South Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean.  He moved north to Florida after 6 years in Jamaica in 1989.
He is active in a number of areas including pest and disease management publishing the highly acclaimed biweekly South Florida Vegetable Pest and Disease Hotline.  He also works closely with growers in areas of WPS compliance, worker safety training, food safety, fertilizer and irrigation Best Management Practices, water quality and quantity and other areas of concern to the vegetable industry.
Gene was president of the Florida Association of County Agriculture Agents in 2004 and served on the Board of Directors for the National Association of County Agricultural Agents from 2010-2014.  He currently serves on the Board of Directors of the Hendry Glades Farm Bureau, Hendry County Cattlemen’s Association, and the Florida Farm Bureau Vegetable Advisory Committee.
Gene has earned numerous regional and national recognition and awards in his field. In 2008, he received the Distinguished Service Award from the National Association of County Agricultural Agents which highest honor a County Agent can receive.
DAVID SCHULDENFREI
David L Schuldenfrei has been selling Sanibel & Captiva Islands real estate for 40 years and is the longest practicing Realtor on the Island. He was President of the Sanibel & Captiva Association of Realtors in 2014, 2004, & 1995 as well as Realtor of the Year in 2014; 2007; 2004 & 1995.  David is a graduate from the University of Miami Business School and has earned the prestigious Real Estate designations of GRI; CRS; SCIS.  In addition David is the General Manager of VIP Vacation Rentals a 150 unit vacation rental company on Sanibel Island.
David has been heavily involved in the fight for clean water for over 20 years and has recently participated in the 2015 development of the “Impact of Water Quality on Florida Home Values” report compiled by Florida Realtors Association’s Brad O'Connor (economist for Florida Realtors based in Orlando) and the Everglades Foundation. 
BUBBA WADE
Malcolm S. Wade, Jr. is Senior Vice President, Corporate Strategy and Business Development of U.S. Sugar. He has been employed by the company for more than 33 years and has been a member of the senior management team for over 25 years. Wade, a Certified Public Accountant, joined the company as Director of Internal Audit in 1982 and subsequently was named Director, Vice President and Senior Vice President of the Administrative Service Group and Senior Vice President of Sugar Operations.
For more than 25 years, Wade has been involved in developing and overseeing the company’s environmental responsibilities. Through his appointments by two governors and the South Florida Water Management District to working on groups on South Florida environmental issues, Wade has helped shape public policy regarding Everglades restoration.
In March 2005, then-Gov. Jeb Bush appointed Wade to a four-year term on the South Florida Water Management District’s Governing Board, a position he resigned from in 2008 due to the state’s proposed acquisition of U.S. Sugar.
Previously, Wade was a member of the team representing South Florida farmers that spent more than a year negotiating with the Interior and Justice Departments, the state of Florida and the South Florida Water Management District to resolve legal disputes over Everglades restoration. He represented farmers on the technical mediation committee that crafted the Technical
Mediate Plan for Everglades Restoration, which was adopted by the Florida Legislature in the spring of 1994.
Wade was appointed by then-Gov. Lawton Chiles to the Governor’s Commission for a Sustainable South Florida, which worked for four years to establish a consensus plan for Everglades restoration. The work of the commission became the framework for the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan (CERP) approved by Congress that is currently being implemented throughout South Florida.
Wade’s work on restoration issues continued with his appointment by then-Gov. Jeb Bush to the Governor’s Commission for the Everglades. He is a past member and Co-Chair of the South Florida Water Management District Water Resource Advisory Commission (WRAC) as well as a past member of the district’s Lower East Coast Water Supply Planning Committee and the Budget Review commission. In addition, Wade served on the South Florida Agricultural Council Water Commission and the Caloosahatchee Water Management Advisory Committee and is currently the Chairman of the Everglades Agricultural Area Environmental Protection District.
A native of Long Island, N.Y., wade grew up in Miami and is a graduate of Christopher Columbus Catholic High School. He received his B.S. in accounting from Florida State University in 1976, and became a Certified Public Accountant in 1979 and a Certified Internal Auditor in 1984.
Wade is a member of the Leadership Florida XII (1993-94). He and his wife, Jennifer Matthews Wade, live in Clewiston, Fla., and have one grown daughter, Morgan Christine Lang, and two grandchildren.
More speakers and segments to be determined.  Read more water crisis coverage from The News-Press:
http://newspr.es/SaveOurWater

161011-b
Toxic algae blooms in Fl. linked to too much fertilizer and to climate change
Christ.Sci. Monitor - by Hannah Walhout, Food Tank
October 11, 2016
Recent blooms of toxic algae in southern Florida led Gov. Rick Scott to declare a state of emergency.
Recent blooms of toxic algae in southern Florida, which have provoked Governor Rick Scott to announce a state of emergency, may be tied to fertilizer chemicals from agricultural and residential origins.
Waterways and beaches along Florida’s Treasure Coast, Lake Okeechobee, and the Everglades have been experiencing massive blooms of toxic algae since May. The cyanobacteria algae—described as thick, pea-green, and foul-smelling—is intensely toxic and poses health risks to people and wildlife in the area. At its peak, the bloom in Lake Okeechobee covered 33 square miles—or about one-third of the lake's surface. One source estimates the total area of the algae to be roughly the size of Miami.
The impact of these algae blooms has already proven disastrous. Tourism, a main source of income for residents around Lake Okeechobee and along the coast, is down. Contact with toxic algae blooms “can affect the gastrointestinal system, liver, nervous system, and skin.” Fish are dying, and many have raised concerns about manatees and other large wildlife in the area.
Recommended: Five hopeful signs global energy is getting cleaner
So what caused this massive outbreak? The blooms spread, in part, due to flood-control measures taken by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers; to prevent Lake Okeechobee from overflowing earlier this year, the Corps released large amounts of water from the lake into nearby estuaries. According to a statement, these actions “upset the freshwater-saltwater mix in the estuaries” and contributed to the spread of the toxic blooms.
But the key factor seems to be high levels of nutrients (like nitrogen and phosphorous) in the water. According to a spokeswoman for Earthjustice, speaking to CNN:  "The algae outbreaks are triggered by fertilizer sewage and manure pollution that the state has failed to properly regulate. It's like adding miracle grow to the water and it triggers massive algae outbreaks."
Essentially, the water in Lake Okeechobee is contaminated by nutrient-rich manure and waste-filled runoff from nearby farms and houses. Exacerbated by hot summer weather, these conditions create an ideal habitat for toxic algae. Some fear that, once the algae die off, large swaths of affected water could turn into oxygen-deficient “dead zones.”Over-fertilization and poor land management, coupled with various manifestations of climate change, mean that algae blooms are becoming much more than a seasonal annoyance: these blooms are threatening ecosystems and biodiversity in the region.
The Army Corps of Engineers has drastically reduced the amount of lakewater flowing into nearby estuaries, but the root of the problem—the cause of the high nitrogen and phosphorous levels—is less immediately remediable. Next steps include a focus on responsible agriculture and gardening practices to reduce fertilizer runoff, as well as efforts to combat climate change.
In light of these recent events, the Everglades Foundation has launched a ten million dollar prize for developing a cost-effective, sustainable technology to reduce phosphorous levels in the water.

161010-a
Miami Commission to debate effects of fracking on water supply
WaterOnline.com - by Peak Johnson
October 10, 2016
Fracking continues to stoke debate in certain parts of the country, with officials in Miami-Dade County, FL, proposing a ban on the practice.
A county commission will debate this issue tomorrow, according to the International Business Times. The suggestion of the ban comes months after the state Senate failed to pass legislation that would have prohibited local governments from regulating fracking by themselves.
“This is about our water supply,” Daniella Levine Cava, a commissioner and the sponsor of the ordinance, told the Miami New Times. “In this kind of acid fracking, the chemicals are potentially very dangerous and not disclosed. The risk of them entering into our water supply through our porous limestone substrate is too high.”
According to the International Business Times, fracking is highly controversial in Miami-Dade County because the land sits upon the Biscayne Aquifer, which supplies water to a large number of Floridians. Fracking in the county would require penetrating that aquifer.
Scientists have said that if that water supply were polluted by any source then it would remain polluted forever, according to the International Business Times.
Hydraulic fracturing, as it is also known, produces wastewater that is often pumped into underground wells for disposal. This practice has been linked to a growing number of earthquakes in Oklahoma, Colorado, Ohio, and other states, according to The Washington Post.
Ohio, Texas, and Oklahoma are the only states to have made it illegal for local governments and communities to ban fracking.
The International Business Times reported that fracking became formally legal in Florida earlier this year. Much of the state sits atop “fragile aquifers and the state has a sponge-like geology” and residents have been proactive in voicing their concerns.
The EPA found last year that fracking does not pose a huge danger to drinking water, and the agency has been criticized over that conclusion.
To read more about fracking visit Water Online’s Produced Water Treatment Solutions Center.

161010-b
Scientists: DEP should increase St. Lucie River testing for toxic algae
TCPalm.com - by Tyler Treadway
October 10, 2016
The thick, noxious mats of blue-green algae that blanketed parts of the St. Lucie River this summer are gone, but their toxins may not be.
If flecks of blue-green algae can be seen in the water, there's "a fairly high probability there are toxins being produced," said Ed Phlips, an algae expert and professor at the University of Florida.
A suspected blue-green algae bloom was reported a week ago, spreading across the mouth of Krueger Creek, a river tributary just east of downtown Stuart.
"The whole creek near our house was covered with bright green streaks," said Christine Wickstrom, who lives close to the creek's mouth at the river. "It looked like the river did just before the blooms got really bad."
Patches of possible blue-green algae also were reported Sept. 28 at several sites around the river.
The recent round of sightings started about a week after the Army Corps of Engineers increased Lake Okeechobee discharges to the river to more than 1.1 billion gallons a day, the same amount of water that preceded the widespread blooms in June and July. And since Saturday, the corps began discharging as much water as possible to counter the increased flows into the lake because of Hurricane Matthew.
On Saturday and Sunday, discharges totaled more than 3 billion gallons. Discharges total more than 204 billion gallons since starting Jan. 30.
"Since the corps ramped up the discharges, the (Florida Department of Environmental Protection) should ramp up testing for algae," said Mark Perry, executive director of the Florida Oceanographic Society in Stuart.
All the extra freshwater from the lake, as well as local runoff from Matthew, lowers salinity and dumps nutrients — mostly nitrogen and phosphorus from fertilizer — into the river. Both low salinity and high nutrient levels help cause algae blooms.
Fortunately, fall's cooler water temperatures and shorter daylight hours help curb blooms.
"I don't see large algae blooms coming back unless the river's water temperature heats up again," Perry said.
To be sure water in the river is safe, the DEP should be looking for blue-green algae in the estuary at least once a month — "twice a month would be better" — throughout the year, Phlips said.
That's not DEP's standard operating procedure, said spokeswoman Dee Ann Miller. DEP reviews reports of algae blooms received via its online reporting form and hotline — 855-305-3903; be patient, it's a long intro recording — and coordinates with other agencies that also do sampling to determine which should respond to the site, including the South Florida Water Management District and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission. Samples are taken for testing only if algae is seen.
Algae blooms "are generally short-lived or transient in nature, which is good because it means the blooms will disperse in most systems and conditions will improve," Miller said. "Conditions can vary greatly over the course of just a few hours."
That doesn't explain the sometimes wildly varying results in algae tests by the DEP and other agencies. Algae testing at Central Marine, a marina on the St. Lucie River's north shore in Stuart that was chock-full of algae in mid-summer, illustrates the problem:
• Aug. 10: DEP found no toxins in samples taken there.
• Aug. 16: Martin County found the toxin microcystin at a level of 1,255 parts per billion,125 times the level deemed hazardous.
• Aug. 17: DEP found no toxins.
"It doesn't make sense," Perry said. "DEP finds no toxins one day, the county finds extremely hazardous levels of toxins at the same site a few days later, and then DEP finds nothing the very next day. What's going on?"
It's a "location issue," said Deborah Drum, ecosystem manager for Martin County. "If we see algae, that's where we're testing, right in the worst of it. … We want to find out what's the worst the toxicity could possibly be in terms of the potential risk to human health."
DEP collects "representative" samples, Miller said, to show the general condition of a water body, like the St. Lucie River.
"If a small area of shoreline has some algal scum accumulated, but the vast majority of the water body is free of algae, the sample would be taken in the open water," she said.
One sampling method is not superior to the other, Miller said. "It is a matter of what the intended purpose of the sampling is."

161009-
Fort Meade company aims to transform global phosphate production
Newschief.com - by Kevin Bouffard
October 9, 2016
JDC raised about $50 million so far to build and operate its first demonstration plant. Since then, it has run only in short spurts because technical problems arose.
FORT MEADE – A local start-up company is sitting on technology that could transform the global phosphate fertilizer industry.
It just needs to raise another $10 million from investors to prove it works.
“This is a turnaround new technology in a transformational age of new technologies,” said Theodore “Tip” Fowler, chief executive officer at JDCPhosphate in Fort Meade. “We all believe we have an opportunity to change an industry in a positive way.”
The new technology is called the “Improved Hard Process” – originally named not for its level of difficulty but after Robert Hard, a chemical engineer who developed the process in the 1980s.
The late Joseph Megy, one of Hard’s colleagues and a founding partner with Fowler at JDC, is the person who improved the original Hard Process. He died in May 2015 while refining the improved process.
“The reason we’re all here is we have the opportunity to change an industry globally – not just in Florida, globally,” said James Trainham, who succeeded Megy as JDC’s chief technology officer. “It (the improved process) changes the whole supply chain.”
The Improved Hard Process manufactures phosphoric acid, the key ingredient in phosphate fertilizers, from phosphate ore. It makes significant improvements over the current technology, called the “wet acid process,” used in global phosphate fertilizer manufacturing.
One major benefit of the new technology is that it doesn’t create environmentally hazardous phosphogypsum, or gypsum.
The radium in gypsum makes it slightly radioactive, rendering the gray, powdery substance unusable for any kind of commercial byproduct. As a result, it must be stored in large, hilly structures called gypsum stacks, usually near a phosphate fertilizer plant.
That benefit became particularly relevant last month, when a sinkhole opened up underneath a gypsum stack at the Mosaic Co.’s New Wales fertilizer plant south of Mulberry. The sinkhole swallowed about 215 million gallons of contaminated water from a pond on top of the stack, an accident that Mosaic officials acknowledged could cost up to $50 million to clean up.
The accident also has become a public relations disaster for Mosaic, which delayed telling the public about it for nearly three weeks. Residents near the plant protested that the gypsum stack water could contaminate their drinking wells, which Mosaic officials say is unlikely.
Florida currently has 24 gypsum stacks with more than 1 billion tons of phosphpgypsum, according to Florida Industrial and Phosphate Research Institute in Bartow. Companies add about 30 million tons of new gypsum to the stacks annually.
“The logical question is: Is there a process that doesn’t produce phosphogympsum?” Fowler said.
Another proven benefit of the improved process is that it can manufacture phosphoric acid from low-grade phosphate rock reserves that can’t be used by the current technology, Fowler said.
That could dramatically extend the life of Florida’s phosphate reserves, which by some estimates will be exhausted in 30 to 40 years, said Fowler and Brian Birky, executive director of the Phosphate Research Institute. The institute has worked with JDC over the past several years.
Mosaic’s current corporate strategy calls for it to extend phosphate mining gradually from current locations around Polk County south into Hardee and DeSoto counties.
But the company can mine only high-grade ore reserves just below the surface, Birky said, because the wet acid process can’t handle the low-grade reserves farther down.
“If you’re looking at 30 to 40 years of mining with the upper level material, you could easily double that by mining the material below,” he added.
Birky also agreed with Fowler the Improved Hard Process manufactures a purer grade of phosphoric acid that would produce more and better fertilizers.
The new technology also would reduce the cost of manufacturing the higher quality phosphoric acid by 20 percent, Fowler said.
Birky, a public and environmental health researcher, had no opinion on production costs. But he added there’s reason to believe the improved process would be cheaper, mainly in that it uses less water and comes with fewer environmental costs associated with maintaining and monitoring gypsum stacks.
Having overcome many obstacles in eight years since JDC’s founding, the Improved Hard Process faces one last hurdle: Proving the technology can operate continuously over an extended period of time.
“We’re making the assumption that after six months of continuous production, we’ll have enough confidence in the production data to scale up,” said David Blake, vice president of operations and engineering.
The demonstration plant has an annual production capacity of producing 12,000 tons of phosphoric acid. A viable commercial plant would need to produce at least 200,000 tons a year, Trainham said.
That’s where the additional $10 million in new investment comes in.
JDC raised about $50 million so far to build and operate its first demonstration plant, which began production in 2013, Fowler said. Since then, it has run only in short spurts, the longest almost two months, because technical problems arose.
The biggest problem was the accumulation of dust in the kiln that’s the central part of the process, he said. The dust clogged up the system.
“That was a problem that, if we didn’t solve, we were toast,” Fowler said. “If we didn’t solve that, we didn’t have a process.”
Fowler credited Blake and Trainham with solving the dust problem. Blake began as a consultant in November 2013 and joined JDC full time the following May, and Trainham joined the company in June 2014.
But the solution involves installing a second production kiln and other equipment at a cost of more than $10 million, the JDC officials said.
Once the money is raised, it would take about a year to install the new equipment, followed by several months of testing, then continuous production, Fowler said.
After JDC demonstrates the Improved Hard Process is a viable and economical technology, plans call for licensing it to companies interested in building a full scale commercial plant, the officials said.
A full scale plant would probably take three to five years to build, Blake said.
“It’s not a process for tomorrow,” Fowler said. “It’s a process for a number of tomorrows.”

161008-a
Florida picks up the pieces after Hurricane Matthew
USA Today – by Karl Etters and Mike Braun
October 8, 2016
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Two days of torrential rain, hurricane force winds and historic storm surge accompanied Hurricane Matthew as it raked Florida’s east coast.
As cities up and down the coast awoke to start assessing damage Saturday, others pushed to get back to their homes within mandatory evacuation zones, wondering what was left.
Matthew’s jog about 20 miles to the east Friday was the difference between more widespread damage.
The storm never made landfall in the Sunshine State, instead, it finally came ashore near the Cape Romain National Wildlife Refuge in South Carolina on Saturday afternoon.
The mess Matthew made of St. Augustine on Friday improved somewhat on Saturday, as floodwaters that covered much of the historic city receded enough for residents to come home.
Dawn DiMeglio, a St. Augustine resident who spent Thursday and Friday safely tucked in the hurricane-resistant insurance office where she worked, said Saturday afternoon she was headed home soon.
“The water has totally receded,” she said. On Friday, Saragasso Street, the road her office is on, was under at least 3 feet of water.
“People downtown are able to go home,” she said. “It is amazing ... like night and day compared to yesterday.”
The massive influx of water from the storm caused rivers and creeks in the area to overrun their banks and flood nearly all side streets in the city and almost all of the historic downtown area.
By 4 p.m. Saturday, all the city’s bridges had reopened and all residents were welcome to return to the city, said St. Johns County Administrator Michael Wanchick, City Manager John P. Regan and Sheriff David Shoar said in a joint statement.
The statement, which cautioned residents to beware of wild animals such as snakes forced out of their normal habitat, also said residents would likely find conditions “not perfect.” Residents, they said, could expect trees and branches to be strewn about and debris everywhere.
An aerial survey of the city and surrounding area on Saturday revealed police and national guardsmen still stationed around the area at certain locations, such as A1A Beach Avenue and Pope Road, which was under water Friday.
Also seen from the air was significant beach erosion from Daytona Beach to St. Augustine Beach and beyond.
The beach damage included sand erosion, pilings from homes being exposed, decks and stairways to the sand destroyed and building debris. A number of boats, both powered and sail, also were marooned on dry land after waters receded.
Saturday morning, Florida Gov. Rick Scott said the state was “blessed” that Matthew took an unexpected turn eastward as it barreled up the coastline.
“If it had a direct impact hit, it would have been a lot worse for our families,” said Scott, who warned as Matthew approached that the storm was “going to kill people.”
More than 1.5 million Floridians were under a mandatory evacuation. Not everyone listened, holding tight to their coastal homes.
Weather officials are predicting Matthew could swing out into the Atlantic Ocean and double back in the coming days, making a more direct impact along the same coast it grazed.
Scott cautioned Floridians who decided not to heed warnings that if the storm comes a second time, they should think about the gravity of a more direct hit.
“That's what I worry about now,” Scott said. “You look at the loop of this thing. It's going to come back around, maybe. Are people going to take it seriously enough?”
Jacksonville-area beaches did not see the severity of damage that St. Augustine did, despite the second highest tide since 1898 — 5.22 feet pushed by storm surge recorded near the mouth of the the St. Johns River.
By nightfall, 175,000 customers were without power in Duval County. City officials were working to clear drainage channels in low lying areas. They warned flooding along the St. Johns River would persist for a week.
Matthew’s high storm surge was something even life-long residents hadn’t seen before. But the damage was not as widespread as expected.
Greg Pratt moved chairs back onto the patio of his beach-side restaurant, Sneakers Sports Bar, waiting for the power to come back on so he could open to anxious football fans.
He didn’t heed the evacuation warnings, staying at his house along the beach. He came out unscathed, pointing to the undamaged neon signs on his porch.
 “I’ve worked my whole life to build this restaurant and I have to protect it," Pratt said. "It’s my career. This is my restaurant.”
As Matthew moved north Friday night, Jacksonville officials warned access to the beach communities could be stalled until Sunday.
Katherine Stehl, her young son and their golden retriever were one of the first in a line of cars stretching for miles along Beach Boulevard.
In front of them, police cars blocked the entrance to the bridge spanning the Intracoastal Waterway. Behind them, tensions flared as people clamored to see what Matthew left in its path.
Stehl, who evacuated her home near Ponta Vedra Beach late Thursday, had been sitting in line for more than three hours when the bridge opened around 1 a.m.
The 26-year-old left behind four horses. She was unsure how that had made it through the storm. Her husband was traveling by boat to get home as fast as he could.
“We waited until the last minute on Thursday because we have animals and we really want to make sure they’re safe,” Stehl said with a touch of desperation, unsure of the condition of her own home. “I just really want to get home and take care of my horses. They gotta let us through.”

161008-b
Keystone Heights water summit explores potential solutions to region’s water woes
Jacksonville.com - by Teresa Stepzinski
October 8, 2016
KEYSTONE HEIGHTS | City officials will host a water summit Oct. 18 intended to bring together state, local and federal officials as well as residents, environmental authorities, industry leaders and others to discuss potential water management strategies to restore and sustain adequate water levels in the Keystone Heights area chain of lakes.
Keystone Heights in southwest Clay County is at the heart of the Etonia Chain of Lakes — six lakes serving as a major recharge area for the Floridan aquifer supplying drinking water throughout Northeast Florida.
Located on a high sand ridge, the lakes receive stormwater runoff, inflow from upstream lakes and groundwater infiltration from the surficial aquifer system.
The lakes lose water primarily through evaporation and seepage into the Upper Floridan aquifer, according to the St. Johns River Water Management District, which has taken part in past and present initiatives to try to remedy the situation.
The water summit led by Keystone Heights Mayor Tony Brown and City Council will be 9 a.m. to noon Oct. 18. City Manager Scott Kornegay said participants committed to attend include U.S. Rep. Ted Yoho, state Sen. Rob Bradley and Bobby Payne, 58, of Palatka. Payne won the GOP primary Aug. 30 and will face a Democrat and two write-in candidates in the Nov. 8 general election to represent state House District 19, which includes Keystone Heights.
On behalf of the city, Kornegay appeared before the Clay County Commission on Sept. 27 to personally invite it to the water summit.
He said also expected are officials with the St. Johns water district, local business leaders as well as representatives of Save Our Lakes Organization, (SOLO) a nonprofit all-volunteer citizens group that has worked for years — via research and common-sense advocacy — to address water management issues in the region.
Representatives of Camp Blanding and the Chemours Trail Ridge Mine should be there as well, he said.
The purpose, Kornegay said, is to bring key stakeholders and top decision makers — both elected and appointed — together to hear a presentation then discuss ideas and projects aimed to restore lake levels in the Keystone Heights area.
The focal point will be a presentation by hydrologist Peter Schreuder of Schreuder Inc. of Tampa. A widely known water resources and environmental consultant, Schreuder detailed potential measures intended to restore and sustain the lakes’ water levels in a report commissioned by SOLO.
Released in April, the “SOLO Report: Integrated Regional Water Management,” focuses on the Trail Ridge-Etonia Corridor, which basically is from the Trail Ridge over to the Bradford-Clay County line.
In the Schreuder report, SOLO lists several potential projects running the gamut from small-to-large scale intended to achieve the following goals:
  Prevent flooding in Bradford County
  Improve surface water levels in lakes Brooklyn Geneva and Crystal
  Increase recharge into the Floridan aquifer
  Augment surface water flow and spring flow in the Santa Fe River
 “After that presentation is made, we’ll go into a group discussion and talk about specific projects that could possibly be implemented and also to develop a course of action to restore our lakes to their full potential,” Kornegay said.
Kornegay also told commissioners that the summit “has really gotten legs” around the area with all the commitments from decision-makers both elected and appointed. Interim County Commissioner Buck Burney, whose district includes Keystone Heights, recommended inviting State Department of Environmental Protection leaders to the summit.

161007-
Hurricane Matthew aftermath: SFWMD flood control system did its thing
SunshineStateNews -  by Nancy Smith
October 7, 2016
With recovery efforts from Hurricane Matthew underway, water managers at the South Florida Water Management District (SFWMD) report the regional flood control system is responding as designed to move stormwater runoff as efficiently as possible.
According to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the Lake Okeechobee water level is 15.93 feet, up only 0.03 from Thursday.
"Although we were fortunate with this storm, the flood control system built over decades worked magnificently," said SFWMD Governing Board Chair Dan O'Keefe. "The Governing Board's commitment to the flood
control system continues to pay dividends for the 8.1 million residents who live in South Florida."
SFWMD meteorologists reported District­wide average rainfall around an inch through Friday morning. The heaviest rains fell in St. Lucie, Martin and northern Palm Beach counties, with an average of 2­3 inches and local maximums of 4 inches.
Water managers said in a statement on the District's website that they continue to operate the regional system at full capacity to enhance the ability of local drainage districts, counties and municipalities to discharge any excess stormwater runoff out of secondary canals. The District is also continuing to move water out of Water
Conservation Areas 2 and 3 to reduce high water levels that may affect Everglades wildlife.
"The flood control system was well prepared in advance to accommodate forecasted rainfall from Hurricane Matthew," said SFWMD Chief Engineer John Mitnik. "Water managers and pump station crews worked around the clock to ensure the system performed at optimal levels."
Recovery teams have been deployed on the east coast to assess any potential damage to water management structures and canals. An assessment of infrastructure in the Kissimmee River Basin will begin later today after the storm has cleared the District's northern boundary. 
In advance of Hurricane Matthew, pre­storm preparations by the District included these:
Lowering regional canal levels to create capacity for expected heavy rainfall
Inspecting key parts of the flood control system
Ensuring adequate fuel supplies for pump stations and other equipment
Readying staff and equipment for storm assignments
For updates on recovery efforts from Hurricane Matthew, staff advises residents and visitors to follow the District's emergency management Twitter feed (@SFWMD_EM) or visit www.sfwmd.gov.

161006-a
Nearly 2M urged to evacuate as Matthew edges toward U.S.
The Yucatan Times
October 6, 2016
MELBOURNE BEACH, Fla. — Hurricane Matthew marched toward Florida, Georgia and the Carolinas, and nearly 2 million people along the coast were urged to evacuate their homes, a mass exodus ahead of a major storm packing power the U.S. hasn’t seen in more than a decade, the AP reported.
Matthew was a dangerous and life-threatening Category 3 storm with sustained winds of 115 mph (185 kph) as it pounded the central Bahamas early Thursday Oct. 6. Forecasters said it’s expected to strengthen over the coming day or so into an even more potent Category 4 hurricanes as it approaches Florida’s Atlantic coast. At least 16 deaths in the Caribbean have been blamed on the storm, with heavy damage reported in Haiti.
The storm was forecast to scrape much of the Florida coast and any slight deviation could mean landfall or it heading farther out to sea. Either way, it was going to be close enough to wreak havoc along the lower part of the East Coast, and many people weren’t taking any chances.
Florida urged or ordered about 1.5 million to leave the coast, said Jackie Schutz, spokeswoman for Gov. Rick Scott. Georgia had around 50,000 people told to go.
In South Carolina, Gov. Nikki Haley reversed the lanes of Interstate 26 so that all lanes of traffic were headed west and out of Charleston. It was the first time the lanes had been reversed. Plans to reverse the lanes were put in place after hours-long traffic jams during Hurricane Floyd in 1999.
The governor planned to call for more evacuations on Thursday, which would bring the total to about 500,000 people in the state.
The last Category 3 storm or higher to hit the United States was Wilma in October 2005. It made landfall with 120 mph (190 kph) winds in southwest Florida, killing five people as it pushed through the Everglades and into the Fort Lauderdale and Palm Beach area. It caused an estimated $21 billion in damage and left thousands of residents without power for more than a week. It concluded a two-year span when a record eight hurricanes hit the state.
As of 2 a.m. Thursday, Matthew was centered about 295 miles (480 kilometers) southeast of West Palm Beach and moving northwest at 10 mph (17 kph), according to the National Hurricane Center . Hurricane-force winds extended 45 miles (72 kilometers) from the center, it said, adding Matthew is forecast to strengthen over the next day or so and become a Category 4 hurricane while approaching Florida’s Atlantic coast.
“When a hurricane is forecast to take a track roughly parallel to a coastline, as Matthew is forecast to do from Florida through South Carolina, it becomes very difficult to specify impacts at any one location,” said National Hurricane Center forecaster Lixion Avila.
Florida can expect as much as 10 inches of rain in some isolated areas.
President Barack Obama visited the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s headquarters Wednesday to be briefed on preparations. FEMA has deployed personnel to emergency operation centers in Florida, Georgia, South Carolina and North Carolina.
For complete story click here.
Related:                       There are too many related news-paper articles.

161006-b
Q&A: Polluted water in sinkhole at Mosaic fertilizer plant
Associated Press
October 6, 2016
Hurricane Matthew's heavy rains are predicted to soak much of Florida, and that could complicate efforts to manage the pollution flowing into a sinkhole that opened up beneath a fertilizer plant's massive pile of toxic waste.
The plant's owner, Mosaic Co., is pumping out water through a well while preparing to plug the huge hole under one of its gypsum stacks. But millions of gallons of contaminated water have already drained into Florida's main drinking-water aquifer.
So far, the company and state environmental officials say no contamination has migrated off Mosaic's property. The company says test results on 260 private wells have shown contaminant levels within legal drinking water standards. Still, more than 850 concerned neighbors want their wells tested for contaminants and radioactivity.
Here are some questions and answers about the situation.
What are gypsum stacks and why do they exist?
Mosaic and other fertilizer makers use sulfuric acid to break down phosphate rock. This creates phosphoric acid and a radioactive byproduct called phosphogypsum that contains small amounts of naturally occurring radium and uranium. The stacks also can release large concentrations of radon gas. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency allows a small amount of phosphogypsum with low radioactivity to be used as a soil additive in peanut farming, but the rest must not be reprocessed or used for other purposes, so it's stacked in piles as high as 500 feet that cover hundreds of acres.
How many of these gypsum stacks are there in the U.S. ?
There are at least 70 gypsum stacks in the United States and about 27 in Florida; of these, about 20 are located within the sinkhole-prone region of west-central Florida, and the older ones among them are unlined, according to the USGS. Six of the Florida stacks were actively being used last year; other active stacks are in Idaho, Louisiana, North Carolina and Wyoming.
Who makes sure this waste is contained?
The industry is responsible for managing the pollution flowing from these piles during storms. Both the Florida Department of Environmental Protection and the EPA regulate the companies under the Clean Water Act. Newly constructed stacks are required to have liners underneath to keep waste from seeping into groundwater. Mosaic settled a nearly $2 billion environmental lawsuit with the EPA last year over company-wide management of pollution, including its New Wales facility where this sinkhole formed. In the settlement, EPA cited a need for the company to prevent the release of hazardous, highly corrosive wastewater, and to improve its detection of potential leaks and spills.
Why does Florida have so much phosphate mining and fertilizer production ?
More than half of the U.S. reserves of phosphate rock are found beneath Florida, which has about 63 percent of the country's production capacity ty, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. The mineral is a key element of fertilizer used in commercial agriculture, and is an important building-block of the nation's food supply. "Not enough can be said about our food security and this industry," said Guerry McClellan, an emeritus professor of geology at the University of Florida. "Fertilizers and smart farmers have kept our on-table food the cheapest, percentage wise, of any country."
Have gypsum stacks leaked pollution before ?
Yes. A major spill during Hurricane Frances in 2004 near Tampa Bay sent an estimated 65 million gallons of acidic waste from a gypsum stack into nearby waterways, killing thousands of fish and other marine life.
Another sinkhole in Polk County, Florida, in 1994 opened underneath a gypsum stack and sent tons of waste into the Floridan Aquifer. That hole was eventually plugged and tests on water afterward found the contamination fell to pre-accident levels quickly and never violated drinking water standards, according to a 1997 study.
Toxic waste from fertilizer production was also dumped directly into the Mississippi River in Louisiana for years until the 1972 Clean Water Act banned the practice. Later, the city of New Orleans and others had to fight to stop a renewed effort to dump such pollution into the city's chief drinking-water source. Mosaic now owns some of these polluted sites, and while it admitted no fault when settling the lawsuit with EPA, it has assumed responsibility for their environmental management.
How environmentally dangerous is the pollution from the current sinkhole ?
The waste pile in Central Florida contains radioactive radium and uranium, radon gas, sulfates and other contaminants, according to the EPA. So far more than 200 million gallons of wastewater have been dumped into the Floridan Aquifer, a key drinking-water source for millions of people. The company has found contaminants in a well being used to recover polluted water that is within a quarter mile from the hole, which means the contaminated water has reached the aquifer. The company and state officials say there is no indication that the pollution has migrated from below the company's property, but testing continues.
How will Mosaic stop the flow of water into the hole ?
Plugging a sinkhole in the middle of a gypsum stack presents difficult engineering challenges, said geologist Sandy Nettles, a sinkhole expert. Mosaic announced plans to inject a concrete mixture into the "neck of the sinkhole" to plug it from above. In the 1994 sinkhole that opened beneath another gypsum stack in Florida, contractors had to shoot gravelly concrete through pipes that extended 400-feet beneath the pile to stop it up. Mosaic said it is studying the depth and contours of the current sinkhole. Water has continued to flow across the gooey, quicksand-like waste pile and down the hole, which could complicate the effort. If this hurricane season's weather sends heavy rains to central Florida, much more contaminated water could flow through the unplugged hole.

161006-c
Rising seas bring heavy burden to Florida coastal economy. Can it adapt ?
WKYC.com - Karl Havens, University of Florida, The Conversation
October 6, 2016
Florida is a coastal state. Nearly 80% of its 20 million residents live near the coast on land just a few feet above sea level, and over a hundred million tourists visit the beaches and stay in beach-front hotels every year. The coastal economy in Florida is estimated to account for 79% of the state’s gross domestic product, a measure of direct revenue into the economy.
People living and working on the Florida coast face threats from hurricanes and storm surge, sometimes more than once a year. Scouring of beaches by wind and waves takes away sand, and beaches must be nourished with new sand, as often as yearly, in areas with high erosion. Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties now have problems obtaining near-shore, low-cost sand. This means that they will have to use considerably more expensive alternatives to native sand that may negatively impact sea turtles or beach plants, diminish the quality of the beach environment and have adverse impacts to local communities that pay for beach re-nourishment.
The threats aren’t reserved just for coastal residents. People in south Florida who live farther inland have homes and businesses on former wetlands that were drained in the middle of the 20th century. After a heavy rainfall, canals carry water to the sea. Should those canals fail, there would be massive flooding. Those canals also maintain a freshwater “head,” or buffer, that prevents salt water from intruding into the well fields that supply drinking water to the millions of residents.
In this precarious situation, how is sea-level rise affecting coastal Florida, and what can we expect in the future?
Inches matter
An important reality is that sea-level rise is not a future phenomenon. It has been happening slowly over the past decades, at about one inch every ten years. That’s a half foot since the 1960’s and already it is taking a toll. Areas of Miami now have flooding at high tide – a situation not observed in the past. The drainage system in south Florida is starting to fail. Flood control structures that take away rainwater by gravity sometimes cannot flow when the ocean side of the flood gates have a higher level of salt water than the upstream fresh water sides.
Why does one inch matter? When I lived in coastal Florida, one time a major rain event coincided with high tide, which made it difficult for water to quickly exit to the ocean. When water levels rose one half of an inch from the storm, my entire neighborhood flooded and water nearly entered my house. As we hastily tried to block all of the doors with tape and towels, it hit home what a difference one more inch of sea level would have meant – the difference between no damage and perhaps thousands of dollars of damage to our home. However, over many decades, we are looking at feet, not inches of rising sea levels.
What we know now
Three years ago, leading researchers convened at a climate change summit hosted by Florida Atlantic University, the research program Florida Sea Grant and the University of Florida to discuss the future of Florida under projected climate change and sea-level rise conditions. The picture these researchers paint is bleak. Between now and 2100, floods that happen every 100 years are projected to start happening every 50, then every 20, then every 5, until large areas of coastal Florida are under water.
These experts’ discussions considered such dire things as: how to strategically abandon large areas of the Florida Keys; how animals that now live in low-lying areas will move to higher ground when human populations are vying for the same territory; and even how to reconfigure Miami into a series of islands on a historical ridge along the southeast Florida coast, knowing that at some point, even those ridges will be part of the ocean.
A report by the Florida Oceans and Coastal Council, a body established by the state’s legislature and on which I serve, developed a comprehensive report on the probable and possible effects of sea-level rise on coastal Florida. Major findings of that report included:
Sea level is likely to rise by 20 to 40 inches by 2100. If there is major melting of polar and glacier ice, sea level could rise as much as 80 inches this century
During hurricanes, higher sea levels may boost storm surge, causing greater scouring of beaches and in the worst case scenario, inundation of barrier islands and loss of coastal properties
There will be increased pressure to armor shorelines with seawalls to protect buildings from waves, but at some point this may not be effective because of escalating costs and the porous rock that underlies most of Florida, which will allow sea water to seep under seawalls.
Rising seas will shift the beach inland, imperiling coastal roads, homes and businesses.
Rising seas will stress coastal infrastructure (buildings, roads and bridges) because salt water will affect structural integrity.
Saltwater intrusion will become more common in freshwater well fields near the coast. A sea rise of just six inches will require water conservation, waste water reuse, stormwater storage facilities and alternative water supplies including desalinization.
It now is widely accepted that climate change is causing an unprecedented rise in sea levels around the world, and that locations such as Florida, where huge infrastructure and large populations live right on the coast, are especially vulnerable.
As noted in the Oceans and Coastal Council report, the risks compel us to seek a more thorough understanding of the impacts, and provide current and future generations with the information needed to adapt. Ignoring climate change or dismissing it as ‘not settled science’ will only lead to more costly and complex decisions in the future and cause greater harm to our people and our economy.
Future communities
While the challenges presented by climate change and sea-level rise are great, challenges also bring opportunity.
As Florida seeks to adapt to the changing future, it is an opportunity for us to engage in vibrant discussions at the local, regional, state and federal levels about the nature of our communities, how we want them to look in the future, and how to achieve our goals. Engaging in such conversations will help us learn and work together for the best possible future for our communities.
Many communities around the state are already doing this. Southeast Florida has its Climate Change Compact, northeast Florida is working together under the Public Private Regional Resilience Initiative, southwest Florida and Punta Gorda as far back as 2009 developed the City of Punta Gorda Adaptation Plan. With such work, we can move towards a future which, while filled with challenges and different than the past, need not be only about loss, but also about what we can accomplish.
Karl Havens, Professor, Director of Florida Sea Grant, University of Florida
This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

161005-a
Florida Power & Light begins salt plume cleanup at Turkey Point nuclear plant
UtilityDive.com - by Robert Walton
October 5, 2016
Dive Brief:
●  Local media reports Florida Power & Light has begun working to fix a plume of salty water leaking from its Turkey Point nuclear plant into Biscayne Bay.  
●  Over the summer, the utility reached an agreement with the Florida Department of Environmental Protection, the Palm Beach Post reports, to install a recovery system to capture hypersalinated groundwater and store it away from drinking sources.
●  The (Florida Keys) Citizen reports FPL has  begun the process of drawing back the salt plume. According to Associated Press, the Biscayne Bay aquifer supplies 17 billion gallons of drinking water each day for the Keys. 
Dive Insight:
Florida news outlets report FPL has begun working to eliminate the salt plume emanating from its Turkey Point  nuclear plant, located about 25 miles from Miami. The news follows the utility signing a consent agreement with state regulators, and a lawsuit filed in July by environmental groups.
The utility's plan calls for installation of a recovery system to capture and store hypersalinated groundwater away from drinking water sources. FPL spokesman Peter Robbins said in a previous interview that "the majority of the plume will be retracted within the first five years. Our goal is to get it all. We think that will take longer.”
Robbins said the goal is to “pull it back to the boundaries of the cooling canal system."
It's not clear if environmentalists will be satisfied. The Southern Alliance for Clean Energy and the Tropical Audubon Society filed a lawsuit in a U.S. district court, asking a judge to determine FPL is in violation of the Clean Water Act.
"We think that it does not solve the problem going forward, and we have real concerns about its ability to effectively remediate the problem that has been generated over the past 40 years," said SACE Executive Director Stephen Smith said this summer.
The water quality issues have not helped FPL's push to construct two new units at the Turkey Point facility. Florida Senate committees have held hearings this year to investigate the environmental impacts from the existing plant. In April, the 3rd District Court of Appeal in Miami reversed the state's decision to allow the reactors.
Related:           FPL begins retracting saltwater threatening Keys supplies    Associated Press:

161005-b
Seminole Tribe seeks halt to water standards
JAXdailyRecord.com - by Jim Saunders, The News Service of Florida
October 5, 2016
After losing an initial legal round, the Seminole Tribe of Florida is asking a judge to block the state Department of Environmental Protection from moving forward with controversial new water-quality standards while an appeal plays out.
The tribe, in a document filed in the state Division of Administrative Hearings, requested a stay and pointed, in part, to concerns that the new standards would allow higher levels of some chemicals that could affect fish and other wildlife eaten by tribal members.
“For certain pollutants, the Seminole Tribe’s own analysis is already finding levels of the chemicals in the tissue of species that the Seminole Tribe eats as part of its cultural practices above the screening levels identified as levels of concern in DEP’s (the Department of Environmental Protection’s) own technical documents,” the tribe filing said.
“Relaxation of the standards for those chemical constituents is likely to lead to an increase in the levels of these chemicals in the fish and aquatic animals that the Seminole Tribe consumes as part of its cultural practices, thereby depriving the Seminole Tribe of consumption rights that are secured both by federal law and by settlement agreements to which both the Seminole Tribe and the state are a party,” the filing continued.
“The exacerbation of environmental contamination of a food source that is an important part of tribal culture and that is expressly recognized as a secured right of the Seminole Tribe constitutes a significant, concrete harm that is irreparable; once the traditional food sources are contaminated, there is no easy way to alleviate the contamination and restore the Seminole Tribe’s cultural rights,” the ruling said.
The request for a stay came Friday as the tribe filed a notice that it was appealing a decision last month by Administrative Law Judge Bram D.E. Canter, who rejected a series of challenges to the water-quality standards.
The tribe filed the notice in the 2nd District Court of Appeal. The city of Miami, which also challenged the standards before Canter, has appealed in the 3rd District Court of Appeal.
The standards, which were developed by the Department of Environmental Protection and approved July 26 by the state Environmental Regulation Commission, have been controversial for months.
They involve new and revised limits on chemicals in waterways, with the department saying the plan would allow it to regulate more chemicals while updating standards for others.
Canter tossed out challenges filed by the Seminole Tribe, the city of Miami, Martin County and Florida Pulp and Paper Association Environmental Affairs, Inc. Canter sided with the Department of Environmental Protection in ruling that the challengers did not meet a legal deadline for filing the cases in the Division of Administrative Hearings — a position disputed by the tribe and the city of Miami.
The standards are technically known as a rule, which has to go through an adoption process. In the request for a stay, the Seminole Tribe said the Department of Environmental is expected Monday to formally file the rule for adoption.
The department then will be required to file the rule with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for review under the federal Clean Water Act. The EPA can approve or reject the rule.
The tribe is seeking the stay to at least temporarily halt state adoption of the rule amid the appeal.
In the document filed Friday, the tribe said that “if the EPA review process is completed before the appeal, the proposed rule will authorize higher levels of certain chemical constituents to enter waters in which the Seminole Tribe has a right to frog, hunt, and fish.”
As of Tuesday morning, the state Division of Administrative Hearings website did not include any filings in response to the request for a stay.

161004-a
Hurricane Matthew threatens to test Lake Okeechobee's dike
Sun Sentinel – by Andy Reid
October 4, 2016
Hurricane Matthew could worsen South Florida flooding threats from swollen Lake
Okeechobee.
Inspectors are checking Lake Okeechobee's troubled dike and water managers are draining canals out to sea to try to lessen flooding threats as Hurricane Matthew churns toward South Florida.
The swollen lake's water level is already higher than the peak range officials try to maintain. The heavy rainfall associated with Matthew could risk the stability of the 30-foot-tall mound of rock, shell and sand surrounding the lake.
"The lake at its current position is not comfortable but ... there's no immediate threat of failure," Army Corps of Engineers spokesman John Campbell said.
The Army Corps tries to keep the lake between 12.5 and 15.5 feet above sea level to ease the strain on the 143-mile long dike – considered one of the country's most at risk of failing.
The lake level on Tuesday was 15.78 feet. Erosion problems and other stability threats are more of a risk when the lake level rises above 17.5 feet, according to the Army Corps.
The problem is, the lake fills up much faster than South Florida's vast system of canals and pumps can drain water out to sea. Just one tropical storm can boost the lake 3 feet.
Increased dike inspections, which started last month and continued Tuesday, are meant to identify spots where erosion threatens to allow water to burst through the earthen structure and flood lakeside communities.
Boulders and other materials already positioned near the lake are available to strengthen areas where inspectors find signs of wear or if damage occurs during a storm.
"The goal of the inspections is to identify any issues as early as possible (and) take any action possible to ensure the dike would not fail," Campbell said.
The Army Corps advised people living and working around the lake "to be prepared to take action should conditions warrant."
New plan for fixing Lake Okeechobee's troubled dike takes until 2025
After four years of delays, federal officials have finally finished a plan tofix Lake Okeechobee's faulty dike and protect South Florida from flooding.
Yet the new $830 million rehab proposed Aug. 30 for the lake's leaky dike — considered one of the country's most at risk of failing — sticks with...
After four years of delays, federal officials have finally finished a plan to fix Lake Okeechobee's faulty dike and protect South Florida from flooding.
Yet the new $830 million rehab proposed Aug. 30 for the lake's leaky dike — considered one of the country's most at risk of failing — sticks with...
Evacuations of lakeside communities, such as Pahokee, Belle Glade and South Bay, could be called for if dike failures emerge or are considered imminent, but current conditions haven't required that, Campbell said Tuesday.
Lake Okeechobee's waters once naturally flowed south and replenished the Everglades. Now, after South Florida development and farming overtook half of the Everglades, an extensive network of canals, pumps and levees drains away much of that water.
The South Florida Water Management District since Friday has been draining canal water out to sea to get ready for the soaking Hurricane Matthew could deliver.
"We are trying to make room for storage of excess water," district spokesman Gabe Margasak said. "The key is to get ahead of it."
The district's 2,000 miles of canals are the regional flood-control arteries that collect water draining in from community canals.
The Lake Worth Drainage District, with canals in central and southern Palm Beach County, is one of the local drainage systems that sends water into the district canals.
The Lake Worth Drainage District's main canals started draining water at full capacity after heavy rains in Palm Beach County on Monday night and planned to keep it up as Matthew approaches.
Despite the preparations, Mother Nature can still deliver more rain than South Florida's canals and pumps can handle, said Tommy Strowd, Lake Worth Drainage District operations director.
"There always can be flooding, no matter what you do," Strowd said.
Water levels from Lake Okeechobee to the Everglades have been higher than normal this year due to a rainier-than-usual winter and spring preceding the summer-to-fall storm season.
Lake Okeechobee's dike, built in the 1930s, is in the midst of a decades-long rehab, which limits how much water can be held in the lake. The slow-moving dike repair is expected to take until 2025.

161004-b
South Florida prepares for Hurricane Matthew, prays it stays away
Bradenton Herald - by David Smiley
October 4, 2016
It’s been more than 10 years since a hurricane last slammed into South Florida, and millions across Broward and Miami-Dade County crossed their fingers Tuesday, hoping that streak won’t end this week.
But the region also spent the day bracing for the worst as Hurricane Matthew churned through the Caribbean and into the Atlantic. As of Tuesday’s 8 p.m. advisory, the storm remained on a path that could see the category 4 storm sideswipe the state — or possibly strike South Florida or somewhere farther up the coast should it veer westward.
“I know that we have not been hit by a storm in 11 years and it can be easy to become complacent and think these things may miss us, but this is very serious,” Broward County Mayor Martin David Kiar said Tuesday evening. “You have to be prepared.”
Prepare South Florida did.
With a hurricane watch stretching as far south as Golden Beach and a tropical storm watch descending south to the Florida Keys, demand spiked so much at grocery stores that Winn Dixie shipped an extra 117,000 cases of water and 12,000 gallons of milk to South Florida. Some gas stations expected to run out of gasoline. And Florida Power and Light positioned crews and equipment around the region and hired 2,000 extra employees to prepare for inevitable power outages.
Meanwhile, local governments checked storm drains, drained canals into the Atlantic and Florida Bay and took stock of their shoreline amid expectations of beach erosion. Gov. Rick Scott prepared to deploy hundreds of members of the National Guard across Florida. And the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers inspected the Hoover Dike at the uncomfortably swollen Lake Okeechobee, where Matthew’s 140 mile-per-hour sustained winds can create complications should the storm come ashore.
“This is a powerful and very strong storm and it should not be taken lightly,” Lt. Governor Carlos Lopez-Cantera said in Doral Tuesday evening.
Though meteorologists and local emergency managers said it was still too early to predict with certainty or specificity Tuesday afternoon how the hurricane would affect South Florida, the National Weather Service said Matthew could begin pummeling the region with tropical storm-force winds and conditions as early as late night Wednesday. Concerns of coastal flooding were tempered — though in Miami Beach the city was already struggling with high tides and rain Monday evening — but the storm was expected to strengthen as it emerged north of Cuba.
“As of right now for sure we’re looking at very strong winds and heavy rainfall. Isolated tornadoes are possible,” said meteorologist Maria Torres.
As the hurricane approached, Broward County Schools announced classes would be closed Thursday and Friday, and the Miami-Dade School Board said it was still mulling whether to do the same. Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez urged residents to prepare but said no evacuation plans were underway. His counterpart in Broward said the county would announce the locations Wednesday storm shelters able to accomodate people with special needs, pediatric special needs, general population and pets.
At the same time, engineers with the South Florida Water Management District continued draining some 2,000 miles of canals and waterways to help avoid flooding in anticipation of between four and eight inches of rain in the area around Lake Okeechobee, which itself remained under a hurricane watch.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers conducted a regularly scheduled inspection of the dike at the massive lake Tuesday and found no problems. Spokesman John Campbell said there is some concern about the level of the lake, which is just shy of 16 feet, about a foot below where problems begin to arise with the dike. But he said there was no imminent threat.
“People should be assured right now the dike is in no imminent danger of failure,” he said.
South Florida residents were probably more worried about their own homes Tuesday. Stanley Delva, a nurse who works in Boca Raton and lives in Port Saint Lucie, admitted he was “a little nervous” as he filled up his car around 3:30 at a Glades Road gas station just off the Florida Turnpike.
“Everybody is getting crazy now. I’m getting prepared,” he said.
In Kendall, Shell gas station customer John Thurbon said he was grabbing gas before helping his parents put up hurricane shutters and prepare their generator. Thurbon, who was around in 1992 when Hurricane Andrew devastated Miami-Dade, said he wanted to be prepared.
“I did nothing before Andrew, and I’m not going to let that happen again,” he said. I’m not taking any chances.”

161004-c
Young People's Burden
Earth System Dynamics – by James Hansen 
October 4, 2016
 Requirement of Negative CO2 Emissions, by twelve of us1, is being made available as a "Discussion" paper in Earth System Dynamics Discussion on 4 October, as it is undergoing peer review. We try to make the science transparent to non-scientists. A video discussion by my granddaughter Sophie and me is available. Here I first note a couple of our technical conclusions (but you can skip straight to "Principal Implications" on page 2): 1) Global temperature: the 12-month running-mean temperature is now +1.3°C relative to the 1880-1920 average in the GISTEMP analysis (Fig. 2 in above paper or alternative Fig. 1 below). We suggest that 1880-1920 is a good choice for "preindustrial" base period; alternative choices would differ by only about ±0.1°C, and 1880-1920 has the advantage of being the earliest time with reasonably global coverage and reasonably well-documented measurement technology. Present 12-month running-mean global temperature jumps about as far above the linear trend line (Fig. 2b in the paper) as it did during the 1997-98 El Nino. The linear trend line is now at +1.06°C, which is perhaps the best temperature to compare to paleoclimate temperatures, because the latter are "centennially-smoothed," i.e., the proxy measures of ancient temperature typically have a resolution not better than 100 years. The present linear trend (or 11-year mean) temperature is appropriate for comparison to centennially smoothed paleo temperature, because we have knowledge that decadal temperature will not be declining in the next several decades.
Fig. 1. Global surface temperature relative to 1880-1920 based on GISTEMP analysis (mostly NOAA data, cf. Hansen, J, R Ruedy, M Sato, and K Lo, 2010: Global surface temperature change. Rev. Geophys., 48, RG4004.
1 J. Hansen, M. Sato, P. Kharecha, K. von Schuckmann, D.J. Beerling, J. Cao, S. Marcott, V. MassonDelmotte, M.J. Prather, E.J. Rohling, J. Shakun and P. Smith
Fig. 2. Estimated average global temperature for the last interglacial (Eemian) period (McKay et al 2011; Clark and Huybers 2009; Turney and Jones 2010), the centennially-smoothed Holocene (Marcott et al 2013) temperature as a function of time, and the 11-year mean of modern data (Fig. 2). Vertical downward arrows indicate likely overestimates (see text in "Young People's Burden" paper).
2) The growth of the three principal human-caused greenhouse gases (GHGs: CO2, CH4, N2O) are all accelerating. Contrary to the impression favored by governments, the corner has not been turned toward declining emissions and GHG amounts. The world is not effectively addressing the climate matter, nor does it have any plans to do so, regardless of how much government bureaucrats clap each other on the back. On the other hand, accelerating GHG growth rates do not imply that the problem is unsolvable or that amplifying climate feedbacks are now the main source of the acceleration. Despite much (valid) concern about amplifying climate-methane feedbacks and leaks from "fracking" activity, the isotopic data suggest that the increase of CH4 emissions is more a result of agricultural emissions. Not to say that it will be easy, but it is still possible to get future CH4 amount to decline moderately, as we phase off fossil fuels as the principal energy source. Principal Implications A. Global temperature is already at the level of the Eemian period (130,000 to 115,000 years ago), when sea level was 6-9 meters (20-30 feet) higher than today (Fig. 2). Considering the additional warming "in the pipeline," due to delayed response of the climate system and the impossibility of instant replacement of fossil fuels, additional temperature rise is inevitable. Earth's history shows that the lag of sea level change behind global temperature change is 1-4 centuries for natural climate change (Grant et al 2012, 2014)2. It is unlikely that response would be slower to a stronger, more rapid human-made climate forcing; indeed, Hansen et al (2016) infer that continued high fossil fuel emissions could lead to multi-meter sea level rise in 50-150 years. The desire to avoid large ice sheet shrinkage and sea level rise implies a need to get global temperature back into or close to the Holocene range on the time scale of a century or less. B. "Negative CO2 emissions," i.e., extraction of CO2 from the air is now required, if climate is to be stabilized on the century time scale, as a result of past failure to reduce emissions. If rapid phasedown of fossil fuel emissions begins soon, most of the necessary CO2 extraction can
take place via improved agricultural and forestry practices, including reforestation and steps to improve soil fertility and increase its carbon content. In this case, the magnitude and duration of global temperature excursion above the natural range of the current interglacial (Holocene) could be limited and irreversible climate impacts could be minimized. C. Continued high fossil fuel emissions place a burden on young people to undertake massive technological CO2 extraction. Quietly, with minimal objection from the scientific community (Anderson, 2015, is a courageous exception), the assumption that young people will somehow figure out a way to undo the deeds of their forebears, has crept into and spread like a cancer through UN climate scenarios. Proposed methods of extraction such as bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS) or air capture of CO2 imply minimal estimated costs of 104-570 trillion dollars this century, with large risks and uncertain feasibility. Continued high fossil fuel emissions unarguably sentences young people to either a massive, possibly implausible cleanup or growing deleterious climate impacts or both, scenarios that should provide incentive and obligation for governments to alter energy policies without further delay. Personal Opinions About the Relevance of this Paper A. The Paris Climate Accord is a precatory agreement, wishful thinking that mainly reaffirms, 23 years later, the 1992 Rio Framework Convention on Climate Change. The developing world need for abundant, affordable, reliable energy is largely ignored, even though it is a basic requirement to eliminate global poverty and war. Instead the developed world pretends to offer reparations, a vaporous $100B/year, while allowing climate impacts to grow. B. President Obama seems not to understand that as long as fossil fuels are allowed (to appear to the user) to be the cheapest reliable energy, they will continue to be the world's largest energy source and the likelihood of disastrous consequences for young people will grow to near certainty. Obama proudly states that his EPA regulations can actually produce a greater emissions reduction than would his initial nearly-worthless proposal of a cap-and-trade "scheme". Obama salves his conscience by noting his agreement to share information with China on carbon-capture-and-storage, which neither nation will ever employ at the scale needed to deal with the climate problem, and his plans to be a climate ambassador in his old age. C. Technically, it is still possible to solve the climate problem, but there are two essential requirements: (1) a simple across-the-board (all fossil fuels) rising carbon fee2 collected from fossil fuel companies at the domestic source (mine or port of entry), not a carbon price "scheme," and the money must go to the public, not to government coffers, otherwise the public will not allow the fee to rise as needed for phase-over to clean energy, (2) honest government support for, rather than strangulation of, RD&D (research, development and demonstration) of clean energy technologies, including advanced generation, safe nuclear power. D. Courts are crucial to solution of the climate problem. The climate "problem" was and is an opportunity for transformation to a clean energy future, but for the worldwide lack of
2 Do not be misled by politicians' use of the phrase "price on carbon" or "carbon price." This is almost always a code phrase indicating they have worked out a "scheme" with special interests, or plan to work out a "scheme."
executive leadership and well-paid subservience of legislatures to the fossil fuel industry. The heavy hand of the fossil fuel industry works mostly in legal ways such as the "I'm an Energy Voter" campaign in the U.S. Failure of executive and legislative branches to deal with climate change makes it essential for courts, less subject to pressure and bribery from special financial interests, to step in and protect young people, as they did minorities in the case of civil rights. E. "Equal Rights" and "Trust" justifications are both needed. The first lawsuit filed by Our Children's Trust against the U.S. government (Alec L et al v. Jackson et al), with science based on our Plos One paper (Hansen et al, 2013)2 lost in the United States DC District Court, on grounds that we had not made the Constitutional basis clear enough. Our new case in the U.S. District Court in Oregon (Juliana et al v. United States) puts comparable emphasis on the "Atmospheric Trust" concept developed by Mary Wood and "Equal Rights" concept in the "Equal Protection of the Laws" and "Due Process" clauses of the U.S. Constitution. Julia Olson, founder and leader of Our Children's Trust, gave a brilliant, compelling presentation on 13 September. Principles for the trust concept, as discussed in John Davidson's declaration that I noted earlier extend back to Greek and Roman law articulated by Cicero, through intergenerational rights and justice articulated by English theorists such as John Locke, to a concern of American Founders for "unalienable rights" of future generations, expressed in their letters, the Virginia Bill of Rights, and in our Declaration of Independence and Constitution. Sophie, my oldest grandchild and a fellow plaintiff in the federal lawsuit, and I are especially attracted by the simple concept of equal rights, with its preeminent position in the minds of our nation's founders, the Declaration of Independence beginning "... We hold these truths to be self-evident: That all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness;" while the Constitution begins "We the People of the United States, in order to...secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution...". The 5th and 14th Amendments together assure equal protection of the laws and due process, people should not be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law. While these are U.S. centric, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which is generally agreed to be the foundation of international human rights law, describes similar rights. The trust and equal rights concepts are stronger together. In some countries one or the other may be more fitting, so it is worth developing both of them. F. Assertions and insights at the hearing. The transcript makes clear, I believe, that the defense is grasping at straws and will fail in their effort to get the case dismissed. As just noted, however, it is important to see on what basis the case is allowed to go forward. The presiding judge, the Honorable Ann Aiken, was prepared on all arguments from both sides and provided insights about some of their flaws. The defense argued that young people do not have standing to sue, because the government has done nothing to make them a "suspect class" that can be discriminated against. Young people are created in the usual way, and the government need not do anything to make young people
and future generations different than the generation that is running the government and making decisions that can dramatically affect the former's life, liberty, property and pursuit of happiness. The older generation is now burning the fossil fuels, getting the benefits, and wittingly leaving a mess for young people to try to clean up. As Sophie says: "that's not fair." (see video) The defense insists that the government could only be blamed for creating danger for young people if the government had taken "affirmative action" to create that danger, and, they say, the government took no affirmative action. Apparently, as Julia Olson points out, they do not want to count permits for extraction, drilling, exports and imports, transmission lines and pipelines, all to accommodate the fossil fuel energies, as part of the totality of national energy policies that the defendants are responsible for. And this is not to mention the military forces used to protect fossil fuel supply lines, most of which was never paid for, but was left as debt for young people to somehow pay for in the future, all for the benefit of the old and the problem of the young. Judge Aiken noted the phrase "all deliberate speed," which played an important role in civil rights, a careful statement in the 1954 Brown v Board of Education decision. The Court could not meddle in the details of lawmaking and administration, but it could require that the other branches of government take actions that provide for civil rights with all deliberate speed, a phrase that was associated with the much-respected Oliver Wendell Holmes. However, after 10 years Justice Hugo Black declared in 1964 that "the time for mere 'deliberate speed' has run out," because the phrase was being used to delay compliance with the Court order. "All deliberate speed" will be a dominant issue for climate. Our governments have not accepted the reality dictated by the laws of physics and climate science: we must phase out fossil fuel emissions rapidly. Mother Nature will not wait for bumbling half-baked government schemes for reducing emissions. It will be essential that the Court not only demand all deliberate speed, but continually examine the reality of what the government is accomplishing, and that the government have both short-term and long-term plans of action. G. Funding for worldwide carbon sequestration and trace gas reductions. Young People's Burden makes clear that rapid reduction of fossil fuel emissions is the most important requirement to assure prospects of young people, but it is not enough. It is also necessary to have a large drawdown of atmospheric CO2 via improved agricultural and forestry practices, and to have multiple actions that limit the growth of or even achieve a reduction of other trace gases. These actions will need to occur nearly worldwide, especially in developing countries, and, even though there are some local benefits of many of these actions, substantial resources will be needed to see their realization. Here is where legal action is almost surely required. Just as the tobacco industry was required to pay compensation to the public for health damage of smoking, so the fossil fuel industry should be required to pay, in view of the great largesse it has received from the public and the damage it is inflicting on young people and worldwide. Administration of these funds should be such as to continually evaluate and reward those countries that are most successful in taking the needed actions that store carbon and reduce trace gas abundances, thus avoiding graft and funds misuse.

161003-a
Everglades help
Miami Herald – Letter to the Editor by Maggy Reno Hurchalla, Kendall, FL
October 3. 2016
The Oct. 2 article on the Senate race and the Everglades, “Who is a better friend of the Everglades, Rubio or Murphy?”, made it clear: If you hope to see the Everglades restored in your lifetime, or even in your children’s lifetime, Patrick Murphy is your candidate.
If you just don’t care or you believe that U.S. Sugar is an environmentally sensitive organization dedicated to saving the Everglades, Marco Rubio is your candidate.
The Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan , the University of Florida Water Institute, 207 Everglades scientists, the U.S. Interior Department and the Corps of Engineers agree that Everglades restoration won’t work if we don’t buy land south of Lake Okeechobee to send massive amounts of clean water south.
What the article didn’t touch on is why Miami-Dade County should care. Residents in the Keys and the coastal estuaries became angry environmentalists as they watched their waters get trashed.
Millions in South Florida depend on the Biscayne Aquifer for their drinking water. Sea level is rising and threatening the aquifer with salt intrusion. Sending water south won’t stop climate change, but it will give South Florida breathing time and drinking water while we figure how to deal with it. Miami-Dade residents should be angry environmentalists, too.

161003-c
Fracking water pollution: Miami pushes ban to protect Florida water supply
IBTimes.com - by Clark Mindock
October 3, 2016
Citing concerns that fracking in their county could ruin the water supply, officials in Miami-Dade County, Florida, have formally proposed banning the natural gas extraction method outright.
A county commission will debate the measure Tuesday during a public meeting. The potential ban comes just months after the state Senate failed to pass legislation that would have prohibited local governments from regulating fracking on their own.
“This is about our water supply,” Daniella Levine Cava, a commissioner and the sponsor of the ordinance, told the Miami New Times. “In this kind of acid fracking, the chemicals are potentially very dangerous and not disclosed. The risk of them entering into our water supply through our porous limestone substrate is too high.”

161003-e
Winner of Florida's U.S. Senate race could influence progress of Everglades work
TampaBay Times – by Mary Ellen Klas and Kristen M. Clark
October 3, 2016
For all their differences on national issues, how Republican Marco Rubio and Democrat Patrick Murphy handle one uniquely Florida issue — pollution from Lake Okeechobee — could have a profound impact on the future of the state.
The two U.S. Senate candidates both say they’re committed to Everglades restoration — and boast of accomplishments in Congress to prove that dedication — but they differ on how the problem should be solved.
The issue has been teed up as a pivotal one in the next two years as incoming Florida Senate President Joe Negron, R-Stuart, announced in August that buying land south of the lake in the heart of the Everglades Agricultural Area is essential to solving what he called the state’s “environmental emergency.”
Negron said it will be his top priority to get state and federal approval for $2.4 billion to buy the land so it can store and clean the lake water and prevent harmful, phosphorus-laden discharges.
Whoever is elected Florida’s junior senator in November could greatly influence the congressional debate when Negron makes that pitch

161002-a
A million dollars well spent
News Herald - by John Lewis, Special to The News Herald
October 2, 2016
To the RESTORE Act Advisory Committee and to the Bay County Board of Commissioners: A rousing “Well Done for your decision to include the feasibility study of reopening the East Pass as one of the Restore Act implementation plan activities.
There is certainly no other RESTORE Act activity that more readily fulfills the stated eligibility requirements of “Restoration and protection of the natural resources, ecosystems, fisheries, marine and wildlife habitats, beaches and coastal wetlands of the Gulf Coast region.”
Those of us who have watched the gradual deterioration of our water quality over the years see this as one last opportunity to restore our estuary system to at least a semblance of the pristine aquatic environment that existed before the “Old Pass” closed.
To understand how our once bountiful estuary system began the inevitable decline to the point where today we have an unhealthy water exchange system - one that has diminished the types and number of fish and virtually eliminated the once prolific scallop - we must go back to 1934.
It was then that the West Peninsula was cut through by the Corps of Engineers to provide a deep water channel from St. Andrew Bay to the Gulf of Mexico. Historically, prior to that time, the natural entrance to the Bay was a wide expanse of open water that extended from just east of an area known as Spanish Shanty to Crooked Island. The entrance shifted through the years with storms and tidal flow but for the most part this natural entrance provided a huge water exchange between the Gulf waters and our bays and estuaries. Old timers will tell you that in those days, you didn’t even have to go out into the Gulf to catch fish such as snapper and grouper; that they were plentiful and readily caught right in the deep waters of the bays.
It was expected - and in fact part of the planning for the ship channel - that the old (East) pass would close off in a few years, thereby providing increased flow and scouring of the new pass, thus requiring less dredging to keep it open to deep draft vessels. The pass did diminish gradually as the new “Shell Island” expanded eastward.
But the pass surprisingly stayed open until nearly the end of the 20th Century when the last vestiges of the pass finally closed. What had been a vibrant waterway of clear Gulf waters began a rapid decline until within a few years St. Andrew Sound had become little more than a stagnant western arm of St. Andrew Bay.
There are those who oppose the spending of a million dollars on this study. Their reasons seem to fall into one of two categories.
1. That it would not be “natural”
2. That even were the study to find it feasible, there is no source for the continuing cost of maintaining the pass.
To the first argument I would simply draw ones attention to the 1855 U.S. Coast Survey Map of St. Andrew Bay, Florida to see what “Natural” really means.
As to the second and more profound objection let me point out that the ship channel was dredged in order for Panama City to realize its potential as a deep water port. To that end it has been and continues to grow as our Port Authority and end users of the channel have prospered.
The ship channel has to be seen as a great success by any measure. Since it was opened more than 80 years ago it has contributed hundreds of millions of dollars and thousands of jobs to Bay County and the surrounding areas with the attendant taxes going into the public coffers. A recent News Herald article points out that our port has brought $1.4 billion dollars in revenue to Bay County
While the St. Andrew Bay ship channel was and is a resounding success, what is the cost to our precious estuarial environmental system? Without being marine scientists, those who have fished or boated, crabbed or scalloped in our bays and bayous know the cost. Since the closure of the old pass, the reduced tidal current has rendered many areas virtual dead water pools.
I believe that in the further reaches of our estuary system, little or no fresh sea water is ever exchanged but simply flushes back and forth. We must not allow further degradation of our marine ecosystem. With the present and future growth and development of our area we must set aside tax monies to ensure future generations are not going to be subjected to a dying ecosystem.
And it needn’t be prohibitively expensive or difficult to maintain the pass. One need only look to Mexico Beach with a far smaller tax base and budget to see what can be accomplished with careful planning and stewardship. They have kept their pass open for over 40 years.
There is no reason Bay County cannot do as well as that small community. Let’s not wait for future generations to take on this challenge.
Open East Pass Now!

161002-b
Funding for CEPP clears Congress
Okeechobee News - by Katrina Elsken
Ocobert 2, 2016
OKEECHOBEE — The Water Resources Development Act, which includes $1.9 billion in funding for the Central Everglades Planning Project (CEPP), passed the United States House of Representatives by a vote of 399-25 on Sept. 28.
The Senate version of the bill passed Sept. 15 by a vote of 95-3.
According to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the Central Everglades Planning Project will identify and plan for projects on land already in public ownership to allow more water to be directed south to the central Everglades, Everglades National Park and Florida Bay.
Allowing more water to flow south will help reduce the amount of water that has to be released to the east and west coasts. Releases of freshwater from Lake Okeechobee have been blamed for contributing to toxic algal blooms in the coastal estuaries.
“With Congressman Tom Rooney’s continued stewardship, we have seen significant progress toward restoring the Everglades,” said South Florida Water Management District Chairman Daniel O’Keefe. “Approval of the federal water bill by the full Congress, followed by appropriating funding, is vital to complete the Central Everglades Planning Project.”
The bill received widespread support from agricultural industries and environmentalists.
“The Farm Bureau believes having an efficient and reliable inland waterway system linked to competitive ports is vital to America’s ability to provide affordable agricultural products domestically and to compete internationally.
Passing the Water Resources Development Act of 2016 will contribute to U.S. economic growth, jobs and global competitiveness for generations to come,” said Zippy Duvall, President of the American Farm Bureau Federation.
“The Water Resources Development Act of 2016 is essential to continue the important water quality improvement projects related to Lake Okeechobee and Everglades restoration,” said John Hoblick, President of the Florida Farm Bureau.” The State of Florida needs the federal government to step up and shoulder their responsibility in the 50/50 commitment to restore the remnant Everglades. Additionally, farmers, ranchers, and communities south of the lake deserve to feel safe and secure in their homes. Only a fully repaired Herbert Hoover Dike can accomplish this and this year’s WRDA is a step in the right direction.”
The Water Resources Development Act is also supported by more than 60 member organizations of the Everglades Coalition.
CEPP is a component of the Central Everglades Restoration Plan (CERP).
In addition to CEPP, the broader water bill also includes other projects important to Florida, such as:
• Port Everglades dredging – the bill authorizes $322.7 million to deepen the main shipping channels at Port Everglades from 42 feet to 48 feet.
• Flagler County Hurricane and Storm Damage Reduction Project – the bill authorizes a $30.78 million beach renourishment project that will extend an existing dune in central Flagler Beach 2.6 miles to help protect State Road A1A, which is the only north-south hurricane evacuation route for communities along the coast.
• Picayune Strand Restoration Project – the bill authorizes an additional $113 million for the Picayune Strand Restoration Project to fund new features and improvements to the original design. This amount is on top of the funds originally approved in 2007, bringing the project’s total authorized cost to $618 million.
• Daytona Beach Flood Protection project – the bill authorizes the Army Corps of Engineers to conduct a feasibility study for the Daytona Beach Flood Protection project.
In other lake news …
OKEECHOBEE — Storing water north of Lake Okeechobee, and cleaning the water before it enters the lake, are part of a proposed plan that could reduce harmful lake releases to the east and west.
The proposed Lake Okeechobee Watershed Restoration Project (LOWP) has the potential to reduce not just the number of months per year in which excess Lake Okeechobee water would be released to the coastal estuaries, but also to reduce the number of years in which any high discharge months occur, according to data presented at the LOWP delivery team online meeting held Sept. 21.
LOWP could use a combination of storm water treatment areas, reservoirs, aquifer storage and recovery (ASR) and deep injection wells to clean and store water north of Lake Okeechobee.
The models, which were based on adding 250,000-acre feet of water storage north of the lake, used data from a broad range of years including years with little rain (in the 1970s), wet years (the 1990s) and hurricane years (2003-2005). According to the presentation, the LOWP projects could cut the number of months in which excess lake water would be released to the coasts by 50 percent, and reduce by almost 25 percent the number of years in which excess discharges would occur even within one month.
The models also showed the greater the water storage north of the lake, the less likely harmful discharges would be required to the east or west.
NOTE: Not all lake discharges are harmful. The Caloosahatchee River relies on water from Lake Okeechobee to prevent salt water intrusion during the dry season. Before the Caloosahatchee River was channelized, it was not unusual for the river to be shallow enough to wade across during the dry season, according to historical accounts.
In addition to reducing harmful releases to the coastal estuaries, water storage north of the Big O could benefit the lake itself and the water supply for South Florida during drought years.
Also last week, the 2016 Water Forum was held in Orlando, sponsored by Associated Industries of Florida. Some speakers at the Sept. 22 and 23 forum pointed out that releases from Lake Okeechobee are just one factor contributing to the algal blooms in the estuaries. While the freshwater from the lake lowers the salinity levels, much of the nutrient load problem is coming from the coastal watersheds.
“I don’t see that buying land south of the lake is going to have a big effect in the wet season,” said professor Brian Lapointe, of Florida Atlantic University’s Harbor Beach Oceanographic Institute.
Dr. Lapointe was part of the team that conducted the 2015 Watershed to Reef study in Martin County, which found pollution from septic tanks not only contributing to the excess nutrients in the lagoon, but also threatening the health of the ocean reefs.
“I think it’s very clear that every septic tank that gets connected to sewer is going to make a measurable improvement in quality,” Dr. LaPointe stated at the Water Forum.
Water Forum panel moderator former Florida Department of Environmental Protection Secretary Herschel Vinyard agreed.
“What we have found is that we have thousands and thousands of wonderful, wonderful homes along that beautiful lagoon and they have these septic tanks,” he said. ”It’s because these very wealthy local governments failed to extend sewer lines to those homes. So now we’ve got a problem on the Indian River Lagoon.”

161002-c
Indian River drowning in sea of apathy
DaytonaStateINmotion.com - by Richard Brown
October 2, 2016
I would like to focus attention on the unfortunate and incredibly massive fish kills occurring in the Indian River Lagoon recently and to stress how important it is that we act quickly to prevent total devastation of the most ecologically diverse estuary in North America.
From its beginning at Ponce Inlet, the Indian River Lagoon runs south 156 miles to Jupiter Inlet and is home to over 4,000 species of plants and animals. Sadly due to our ignorant pollution and poor water management tactics, these once pristine waters have become tainted with sewage and agriculture run-offs, fertilizers, and other harmful chemicals. Most of these chemicals will never dissolve and eventually make their way into the bodies of marine wildlife.
I came across a startling example of this in dolphins while watching a video by Marty Baum, head of the Indian Riverkeeper, an environmental organization dedicated to protecting and restoring the waters of the Indian River Lagoon.
In the video Baum addresses the chemical pollution impacts on local dolphin populations, he says that “Nearly every first-born dolphin dies, it takes a female dolphin around seven to eight years to reach maturity and in those years she accumulates toxins, then dumps those toxins all into the body of her first-born and they die.”
Females live longer than the males by about five years because they are able to dump their toxins. Lagoon dolphins live 10 years less than Atlantic dolphins located just a half-mile away on the other side of the barrier island. Dolphins in the Lagoon have high nicotine levels as well from all the cigarette butts being thrown into our waterways.
It’s not hard to see how negatively chemicals and fertilizers affect local species, even the mammals. This, however, is not the main cause for the massive spring fish kill, called the worst in Indian River Lagoon history. Fish kills are nothing new for the Lagoon and they are caused by algae blooms that deplete water’s oxygen causing the fish to suffocate. Blooms are naturally occurring phenomena and have been documented many times over the years.
The Florida Fish and Wildlife Research Institute says that while fish kills happen all the time, the most recent one was particularly massive. The warm “El Nino” winter coupled with Florida’s high January rainfall, about triple its average, created a perfect storm for rapid algae growth. As a result of rainfall, Lake Okeechobee had its highest water level in 10 years, forcing the Army Core of Engineers to discharge billions of gallons of freshwater into surrounding waterways to prevent flooding.
Not only does this affect the salinity of the estuaries, but this water is tainted with harmful pollutants and agricultural fertilizers. The toxic water is devastating to the health of the vital sea grass and oyster beds. Eventually making its way off the coast, it also negatively impacts on coral reefs. Scientists are apprehensive about this year’s bloom occurring so early in spring, fearing the bloom will continue through the coming months resulting in more fish kills. If left unchecked, this algae could completely wipe out the Lagoon’s important sea grass meadows, which have already disappeared more than 50 percent, according to Florida Wildlife Conservation.
Among the top three most bio-diverse ecosystems in the world, after tropical rainforests and coral reefs, sea grass meadows provide habitat and protection for hundreds of marine species. From the large manatees that rely on the grass as their only food source to tiny juvenile fish and who depend on its protection, healthy sea meadows are vital to the total Lagoon ecosystem, as well as many ocean dwelling creatures who travel inland to spawn and reproduce.
Ultimately, maintaining the health of the 156 mile Indian River Lagoon is imperative not only to just our native wildlife, but also to state and local economies that depend on its tourism and the bountiful seafood it provides. If we fail to save this tremendously important and remarkably beautiful ecosystem, Florida’s future tourism and seafood industry will surely suffer.
So whether it be challenging local or state officials to tighten environmental laws or just picking up someone else’s litter, all of us should make the effort, however small, to reverse this growing ecological problem. Although it may seem impossible for one individual to have an impact on such a large problem, each of our daily decisions have rippling effects. From choosing to buy one product rather than another to even informing your close friends how to reduce their carbon footprint, each action will cause another domino to fall in the right direction. We can make a change; we just have to act before it is too late. Mother nature has the ability to heal herself, we just need to give her time.

161002-d
Water from Lake O must go south
TCPalm.com – Guest column by Mark Perry, Florida Oceanographic Society
October 2, 2016
'You can't do anything about the weather, you just have to try and manage it,' said Orville Macomver, of Palm City, about the Lake Okeechobee discharges coming through the St. Lucie Lock and Dam near Stuart on Thursday. In order to keep the lake at a certain level, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers orders water discharges to canals to the east and west of the lake. 'Frequent rain in the area has caused the lake to resume its rise,' said Corps Jacksonville District Operations Division Chief Jim Jeffords in a news release
We are now at 247 days of constant discharges from Lake Okeechobee, totaling more than 216 billion gallons into the St. Lucie Estuary and southern Indian River Lagoon.
More than 400 billion gallons have gone to the Caloosahatchee River Estuary from the lake during this same period. The destruction to the environment and the economies in these coastal communities has been devastating, including threats to human health from contact with the waters.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers reported inflows to the lake of 909 billion gallons since January and, even with record rainfall on the lake of 528 billion gallons, an almost equal amount — 580 billion gallons —left via evaporation and seepage.
So how much water from the lake went south to the Everglades? Only about 12 percent of the outflow, or 160 billion gallons.  Both the Army Corps and the South Florida Water Management District stated sending water south from the lake in 2016 has been limited by high rainfall in the water conservation areas. These areas are in and south of the 700,000 Everglades Protection Area (about 480,000 acres of which is sugar cane farms).
The agencies claim the water conservation areas are flooded 1 foot above their schedule for this time of year, so they can’t take any more water from the lake. What they fail to mention is that since January, the EAA has discharged 327 billion gallons of its basin runoff into the water conservation areas.
In fact, the three outlets going south from Lake Okeechobee (known as S-351, S-352 and S-354), operated by the South Florida Water Management District, have been closed while the EAA basin has been sending 1.4 billion gallons per day through the state-owned and operated stormwater treatment areas, into the water conservation areas, keeping the its own water table down to 10 feet elevation. Perfect drainage for the farms in the EAA.
It is also amazing that during this devastating time of unprecedented rainfall and lake discharges, the EAA had one of the longest and largest sugar cane harvests in recent history — resulting in 2.15 million tons of sugar, up from 1.98 million tons in 2014-15.
In August, state Sen. Joe Negron, R-Stuart, stepped up to the plate and announced a plan to purchase 60,000 acres of farmland in the EAA. Thank goodness, this is exactly what 4.2 million Florida voters asked for back in 2014 when they approved a 20 year, $16 billion land acquisition fund.
The land would be used for an Everglades Agricultural Area water storage project that is already on the Army Corps schedule and part of the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan. The project would provide storage, treatment and conveyance of water south from Lake Okeechobee to the Everglades.
Together with projects underway or planned south of the lake, including Restoration Strategies and the Central Everglades Planning Project, the result would be  more than 528,000 acre-feet (172 billion gallons) of water storage.  The University of Florida Water Institute Study, released in March 2015, recommended 1 million acre-feet of storage north and south of the lake.  The study also outlined detailed storage north of the lake, in the Lake Okeechobee Watershed, of 576,733 acre-feet (188 billion gallons).
If the Lake Okeechobee Watershed project and the EAA Storage project were completed, along with the existing projects in the works, we could have reduced the flows into the lake and moved lake water south over the past  eight months so that the Everglades would have gotten clean water slowly and none would have gone to the northern coastal estuaries.
The “River of Grass” can run slowly, giving the Everglades and Florida Bay clean water during the times they need it, and stopping the damaging discharges to the northern estuaries.
This can happen. This is possible. So, during these difficult and frustrating times, let’s work together to buy the land, complete these projects and save our waters for our future, for our children and grandchildren.

161001-a
Agriculture commissioner Adam Putnam: Water is 'everybody's problem'
Orlando Weekly - by Brandon Larrabee, News Service of Florida
October 1, 2016
Florida must be even more proactive financially with local governments as water crises grow, Agriculture Commissioner Adam Putnam said this week.
Putnam, who is expected to run for governor in 2018, said the state should consider cost-sharing programs with local governments to ensure clean drinking water and clean beaches for residents, as well as for the health of economic development, real estate and tourism.
"It is everybody's problem, not just one municipality or county," Putnam said Wednesday while addressing the Florida Chamber Foundation's "Future of Florida Forum" in Orlando.
Putnam added that the state can't afford to find itself having to fend off negative media similar to the crisis in Flint, Michigan, where drinking water was contaminated with lead.
"You couldn't print enough money to recruit a company to Flint, Michigan," Putnam said. "There isn't an economic development person in the world, not since P.T. Barnum has there been an economic development official who could persuade you to move your corporate headquarters to Flint, Michigan, because they failed at the most basic function that local government should provide."
Florida has pumped money into Everglades cleanup efforts the past few years. However, it now is dealing with a sewage spill in Pinellas County and a massive sinkhole south of Lakeland that sent toxins into the aquifer. Those issues have joined concerns over pollution-filled releases from Lake Okeechobee into waterways on the east and west coasts, along with the declining condition of Apalachicola Bay and the state's natural springs.
"If they [Pinellas] can't afford to make those [sewage] improvements, how are Glades and Hendry counties going to make those improvements?" Putnam said.
Part of an approach Putnam revived is the establishment of a long-term roadmap for addressing different water issues, similar to the Florida Department of Transportation's five-year work program, which prioritizes funding for highway and bridge projects.

161001-b
Clean water is more than just cool
ChronicleOnLine – by Harriet Heywood, Homosassa
October 1, 2016
Right now the phrase of the season, especially among those seeking public office, is “Clean water is cool.”  Forget about recent votes cast to take away home rule so Texas speculators would be enabled to frack Florida, or the state reps who publicly said just last year that “fracking is safe and that Sabal Trail is a done deal,” not to mention one of ours sponsoring a bill that would have given landscape corporations a pass on fertilizer regulations. Thankfully, that bill died.   
Incumbents and challengers are falling over themselves to make the case for cleaning up our springs. They know water matters to voters, but what about the biggest plan for clean waters — prevention? And what about our friends and family living over the Marcellus Shale who are experiencing increased cancers and infant deaths as a result of fracking — all because a few corporate LLC’s want to send fracked gas for export to ports in Florida that take shortcuts directly over our beautiful aquifer with its sensitive karst geology? Collateral damage by corporations registered in Delaware, and their puppets in public offices.
The politicians have gone down the rabbit hole where fantasy is fact and reality is not even an option. It doesn’t really matter which side of the aisle you are if you sell out our state. 
Rick Scott’s DEP is trying to increase the acceptable amount of fracking chemicals in our waters, above the EPA-advised limit, while Clearwater gets rid of its sludge as we become “fertilizer recipients.” So much for our clean water pipedreams. 
Meanwhile, a huge sinkhole opens at a Mulberry phosphate fertilizer mine, leaking toxins into the aquifer, where the public wasn’t told for days and the responsible company, Mosaic, will be testing well water at resident request.
And on top of it all, Sabal Trail Pipeline LLC was approved for construction by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, an agency that is funded by those it regulates, over the objections of everyone who cares about clean drinking water and future health of our environment and tourist industry. The project was approved despite discrepancies in Sabal Trail’s reports to FERC and realities on the ground. At the time of this writing, FERC is being challenged by 182 organizations, led by the Delaware Riverkeeper Network, whose members are calling for congressional review of an organization that is supposed to be protecting the environment and waters but instead, for years has been a rubber stamp for the oil and gas industry. 
The madness is everywhere. The Bakken or Dakota Access Pipeline is slated to ​gouge through American Indian lands and burial grounds threatening major water sources and the lives of millions of people. The only difference is the American Indian has been a victim of injustice since day one, and they’re not about to lay down now. This is a time when we must all stand together and demand our representatives do more than talk about saving our waters because, after all, clean water is more than cool, it is life itself.

161001-c
FWC monitoring red tide bloom in southwest Florida
TBNweekly.com - by Suzette Porter
October 1, 2016
Fish kills are happening from Pinellas to Lee counties thanks to a new bloom of red tide occurring offshore and alongshore the southwest Gulf coast.
As of Sept. 30, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission was reporting fish kills affecting multiple species, as well as respiratory irritation, in locations along Pinellas, Manatee, Sarasota, Charlotte, Lee and Collier counties.
Red tide, a naturally occurring microscopic alga with the scientific name Karenia brevis, has been documented in the Gulf of Mexico since the 1840s. Blooms occur when concentrations of algae are higher-than-normal. It is fairly common for blooms to occur in the Gulf of Mexico during late summer and early fall, according to FWC experts.
Blooms can cause the water to turn red or brown. It usually develops offshore and wind and currents drive it inshore. K. brevis produces a neurotoxin, called brevetoxins, which sickens or kills fish, seabirds, turtles and marine animals. It also can kill fish by depleting the water of dissolved oxygen. The toxins can affect humans by causing respiratory irritation if air-borne toxins are inhaled or shellfish poisoning if contaminated shellfish are consumed.
Researchers first began to detect background to low concentrations of red tide in water samples, which are collected weekly, Sept. 13 in Sarasota County and the first report of a fish kill was received Sept. 16 from Longboat Key in Sarasota County. Water samples collected Sept. 19 and 20 found high concentrations of red tide in Longboat Key, Lido Beach and Siesta Key in Manatee and Sarasota counties.
By Sept. 23, red tide had been found in background to low concentrations in water samples taken in Pinellas, Lee, Charlotte and Collier counties. Background to high concentrations were found in Manatee and Sarasota counties.
On Sept. 24, FWC received its first report of a fish kill in Pinellas County coming in from St. Pete Beach. Since that time, reports have come in of dead fish lining the beach at John’s Pass, Treasure Island, Sunset Beach and other south beach locations.
The fish kills correspond to the locations where the highest concentrations of red tide were found in water samples taken alongshore Sept. 24 and 26. Concentrations ranging from very low to high were found in nine samples. The lone sample with high concentrations was found south of John’s Pass and medium concentrations of K. brevis were found in a sample from the north jetty of John’s Pass and Sunset Beach.
Low concentrations were found alongshore St. Petersburg Beach and Bunces Pass, and very low concentrations were found in samples taken from Conception Key, Mullet Key Bayou, Fort De Soto beach and Mullet Key Gulf pier.
The Red Tide Status Line is available to callers throughout the state. Florida Wildlife Research Institute updates the recording each Friday by 5 p.m. Call 1-866-300-9399 inside Florida and 727-552-2448 outside Florida. You can also check the status of red tide at Facebook.com/FW­CResearch

161001-d
Officials hope deep aquifer can ease looming water shortage
Daily Commercial – by Livi Stanford
October 1, 2016
CLERMONT — For the past three years, south Lake County officials have debated and analyzed how they will provide water to a skyrocketing population.
Water experts caution south Lake now has less than three years to find an alternative water supply before withdrawals from the Upper Floridan Aquifer begin impacting lakes, wetlands and springs.
But officials are getting closer to solidifying an alternative water source, which they say will meet some, but not all, of the future water needs. They say other efforts, such as water conservation and storm water capture, must also be implemented.
Most of the water consumed by Floridians is drawn from the upper aquifer, a meandering reservoir that sits just below the surface of the earth. However, water experts say the upper aquifer cannot supply a growing state.
Since 2014, south Lake officials have been studying the lower aquifer, acknowledging that little is known about the water source.
Yet other communities that are pioneering research into the lower aquifer — Clay County, the city of Ocala and Orange County — have been withdrawing water from there, and St. Johns River Water Management officials say it is proving successful without harming lakes, wetlands and springs.
South Lake officials remain optimistic they will get the same results, beginning with the city of Clermont.
Clermont recently began drilling two exploratory wells in the lower aquifer to gauge the water quality and to verify whether the upper aquifer is hydrologically isolated from the lower. Officials want to ensure the Upper and Lower Floridan are not part of the same aquifer system.
“The Floridan aquifer system is made of multiple hydrogeologic units, some more transmissive than others,” said Danielle Spears, spokeswoman for the St. Johns River Water Management District. “The amount of connection varies, and the Lower Floridan Aquifer testing program must provide evidence that aquifers above the Lower Floridan aquifer and natural systems at the surface are not negatively impacted under pumping conditions while at the same time producing water at sufficient quality to meet the intended treatment process requirements.”
Paul Roy, environmental services director for the city of Clermont, said he is optimistic the water quality will be good in the Lower Floridan.
“I spent 20 years out west and I am well aware of all the issues they are having with water,” he said. “To be able to find another source and to use that source: a lot of places in the world don’t have that opportunity.”
James Kinzler, Clermont’s assistant city manager, said the city will be monitoring some of the city’s upper Floridan wells to see how they are impacted by pumping from the Lower Floridan.
“This will allow them to establish how much connectivity there is between the upper and lower,” he said.
Roy said the city will know more in the next four to six months.
“We are hoping to get enough water for Clermont for the future,” he said.
Kinzler said the Lower Floridan “could be a really good indicator of the future of viable water resources for south Lake County.”
Clermont City Manager Darren Gray agreed.
“This is a very good opportunity for the city of Clermont to invest in their future water supply,” he said.
Officials acknowledge the alternative water source comes with a cost, but it is much more affordable than having to take water from Yankee Lake and process it into drinking water, officials said.
Clermont’s project is funded by a $1.9 million grant from St. Johns. The grant was secured through the work of the South Lake Regional Water Initiative (SLRWI), a coalition that includes the cities of Clermont, Groveland, Minneola, Mascotte, Montverde, the South Lake Chamber of Commerce, private utility companies and the county. The coalition has been working in conjunction with the Central Florida Water Initiative for the past five years to find an alternative water supply.
Lake County Commissioner Sean Parks, co-founder of SLRWI, said while the Lower Floridan holds promise for an alternative water source, it cannot meet all the future water needs.
“The exploratory wells and Lower Floridan are only part of the solution,” he said. “What we need is a serious change in water conservation habits.”
Parks said it is projected that by 2035 there will be a need for an additional 12 to 15 million gallons of water per day and the Lower Floridan cannot fill that gap. This is where conservation and other methods come in, he said.
The SLRWI has drafted a landscape ordinance that would require Florida-friendly landscaping and limit irrigation for landscaping in new developments to non-potable water source. The ordinance, which must be approved by the cities and the county, limits irrigation to only 60 percent of the landscape within residential subdivision lots that are one acre or less. It also requires new developments to embrace Florida Water Star, a landscape design program that calls for site-appropriate, drought-tolerant plants and turf grasses to reduce the need for irrigation.
Groveland Mayor Tim Loucks, co-founder of the SLRWI, said the Lower Floridan is a more sustainable source because it is supplied by ocean and rain water.
By contrast, the Upper Floridan is “supplied by solely rain water,” he said.
He added the aquifer in the south Lake area is separated by a thick confining unit.
“The thicker that confining unit, the less water that can be transferred between the Upper and Lower Floridan,” he said.
But at the same time, Loucks said he is concerned if the county withdraws too much water it could affect the springs.
Loucks said projected water demands will be based on the population growth estimates that come out soon. This may increase or decrease the water demand.
James Hollingshead, hydrologist for St. Johns, said withdrawing from the Lower Floridan still affects the lakes but not to the same degree as withdrawing from the Upper Floridan.
“It spreads out the impacts to a larger area,” he said.
Hollingshead said it is also simply too early to tell whether the Lower Floridan is a sustainable water source for the future.
“We are constantly doing things to look into the answer to that question,” he said. “I think it is a good step to know what we have and what we have available right here because other sources are much more expensive. If we can get some water from there, it will be a good thing for the citizens and the county.”

161001-e
Scott, Cabinet poised to buy 11,000-acre parcel for conservation
Tallahassee Democrat – by James Call
October 1, 2016
The fence went up more than a decade ago - closing off 10 springs to researchers and a section of the St. Marks to kayaking. Scott and the Cabinet will consider buying the land Tuesday.
The property features almost every Florida habitat- from hardwood swamps, sandhills and coastal flood plains. Public access was closed more than a decade ago.
The barbed wire fence and no trespassing signs would come down.  Behind them sits a cropping of palms lining the shore of a stream bubbling up from an underground spring.  The palms are in the sunlight while the cola-colored water flows in the shade of cypress before disappearing into a dense forest of palms, oaks, and maples. The water will eventually find its way to Wakulla Springs, or the St. Marks River while continuing a journey to the Gulf of Mexico. Scientists just don’t know how or where it’ll flow.
They may know more soon. The fence may be coming down. And that will provide an opening to learn more about Florida’s unique limestone aquifer.
Gov. Rick Scott and the Cabinet are poised to set off a celebration among conservationists and outdoor enthusiasts. On the agenda for Tuesday’s meeting is the purchase of 11,000 acres along the St. Marks River in Leon County above Natural Bridge Rd.
“It’s a beautiful stretch of river. Scenic, canopy, a very wild stretch of river,” said nature writer Doug Alderson, a Tallahassee native who has kayaked much of the state. “It’s amazing how close it is to Tallahassee and being so remote feeling – totally undeveloped.”
Miracle for Wakulla Springs
The parcel is less than four miles south of Capital Circle and features several springs, sinks, streams and a section of the St. Marks River. It is bordered roughly by Tram, Natural Bridge, and Plank roads. On the east, it abuts land owned by the Nature Conservancy linking it to the Aucilla Wildlife Management Area.
If the state purchases it through the Florida Forever program it would create a wildlife corridor from about south Tallahassee through Wakulla and Jefferson and around the Big Bend into Taylor County. Scientists say the parcel is key to protecting and cleaning water that flows into Wakulla Springs and the Gulf of Mexico.
“This is like a miracle for Wakulla Springs,” said Sean McGlynn of the Wakulla Springs Alliance. “This land, the Horn Springs area, is the hydrological focal point of the region.”
And conservationists are hopeful that approval of the purchase signals an end to a near drought in spending money to preserve wild Florida. The $16 million price tag is more than the state has spent on buying conservation lands in five of the last seven years.
“It is clearly the largest and most significant Florida Forever purchase in quite a few years,” said Charles Lee of Florida Audubon. “It is the kind of significant state land buy that was seen regularly under the Florida Forever program before funding was slashed in 2009.”
Lee said the purchase has been a long time in the making.  It nearly completes a St. Marks River corridor project began in 2003. If Scott and the Cabinet vote yes on Tuesday, then 91 percent of the land targeted 13 years ago will have been bought by the state.
"DEP has had its eye on this ball for a long time," said Lee. "A lot of credit should go to DEP and Gov. Scott."
Land with value
The parcel would appear to be a poster child for the land buying program. It meets just about all of Florida Forever’s goals including:
  Biodiversity protection
  Water supply protection
  Recreational opportunities
  Preserving archaeological sites
  Preserving historical sites, and
  Maintaining forestland
Lee and others will celebrate for an additional reason. They see the land buy as an important step in a long-range goal to create a wildlife corridor from Tallahassee to the Gulf of Mexico.  It’s a vision George Willson embraced around the turn of the century. The St. Joe Company owned the land then and Willson was the company’s vice president for conservation. He said given the area’s unique geology, it is important that the parcel remains undeveloped.
“This is a big deal. It is a project much bigger than the sum of its parts,” said Willson, now a board member of Tall Timber Research Station and Land Conservancy – a land trust based in Leon County.
The region sits on a karst plain. The lack of surface clay enables rainwater to filter quickly into the aquifer.
Hydrologists say North Florida sits atop a water-saturated rock. The sponge-like limestone is riddled with caves, caverns and tunnels creating an underground network of connections linking lakes, streams, rivers and springs.
Focal point
Cave divers have mapped much of the system between Leon County and Wakulla Springs. Their work around the turn of the century proved water from the
Tallahassee wastewater spray field eventually bubbled up in Wakulla Springs.
Further study of the underground flow of water to the spring have been blocked.
About four miles south of Capital Circle is a barbed wire fence barring the public from what McGlynn called the region’s hydrological focal point.
“The whole Woodville area spring shed goes right through there and we have not mapped those caves,” said McGlynn. “This (will) give us access to the caves and caverns to explore and connect the dots. Gather data on direction and flow.”
Virgin forest
Others are excited about the proposal for a variety of reasons. Lee said there is virgin forest on the  property and almost every kind of habitat found in Florida, hardwood swamps, coastal flood plains and sand hills.
The land had been the frontier for much of written history. Native Americans, Spanish explorers, African slaves, Civil War combatants all have left evidence of their presence. The Florida forest conceals the remains of ancient settlements, cemeteries for slaves and forgotten villages. The land is next to the battlefield where a contingent of Tallahassee-based Confederates beat back an invasion of Union soldiers shortly before the war’s end.
The property is just south of what may have been the largest antebellum plantation in the Southeast. The Chaires Plantation ruins was a popular hangout for Tallahassee teens for years.
Both McGlynn and Alderson are middle-aged and remember roaming its springs and rivers in the woods south of Capital Circle as teenagers and recall giant cypress in swamps. McGlynn said they were as “wide as cars.” Alderson recalls a hollowed cypress in which “five people could fit.”
Alderson has written about kayaking this nine-mile section of the St. Marks in two books. In "Wild Florida Waters" he recalled artifact looters being busted and fishermen being startled by apparent cave divers in scuba gear surfacing near their fishing spot.
Although anglers, hikers, kayakers and outdoors people, in general,  applaud the proposal, water advocates stress the proposal is about protecting water and further understanding how it flows in and out of the aquifer as it makes its way to the sea.
They explain the lack of clay on the surface allows water to quickly percolate into the aquifer. They are not exactly clear on what happens next but say a lot can be learned by mapping its flow through underground caves.
When asked his thoughts on the proposal, Gov. Rick Scott expressed a commitment to clean water. He declined further comment other than to say he and Cabinet members were looking forward to a public discussion Tuesday.
The environmentalists are also looking forward to the discussion. They’ve been practicing their talking points since long before the agenda was set.
“This will protect estuaries along the northwest Gulf coast,” said Willson about the purchase. “Forest land is the best land use for water resources.”

Latest Actions:

• On Sept. 29, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers announced it would maintain the amount of water flowing from Lake Okeechobee. The target flow for the Caloosahatchee is 4,000 cubic feet per second (cfs) and the target flow for the St. Lucie is 1,800 cfs. Click here for more information.
• On July 1, following a directive from Governor Rick Scott, DEP launched a toll-free Bloom Reporting Hotline and established an online reporting form for residents to report algal blooms. Residents are able to call in reports to a new toll-free number at 1-855-305-3903, as well as report information online at www.reportalgalbloom.com..

For more information about the State of Florida's actions on Lake Okeechobee, click here. Lake Conditions - OCTOBER 3, 2016: Current Lake Level 15.76 feet Historical Lake Level Average 14.93 feet Total Inflow +8,446 cfs cubic feet per sec. Total Outflow  (by structures operated by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers) -6,450  cfs cubic feet per second Evapotranspiration/Rainfall over the Lake -The Corps has announced that they will no longer be providing this data. Net 1,996 cfs cubic feet per second Lake level variation from a week ago +0.10  feet
Lake Conditions - SEPTEMBER 1, 2016: Current Lake Level 14.83 feet Historical Lake Level Average 14.22 feet Total Inflow +3,300 cubic feet per second Total Outflow  (by structures operated by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers) -1,130 cubic feet per second Evapotranspiration/Rainfall over the Lake -1,860 cubic feet per second Net -2,1700 cubic feet per second Lake level variation from a week ago then +0.16 feet

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