by David Ball
Staff Writer
It was standing room only at a recent meeting at the Haskell Co., where officials from the St. Johns Riverkeeper engaged local leaders in a discussion of proposed plans to draw hundreds of millions of gallons of potable water from the St. Johns River.
Officials from JEA, the Northeast Florida Regional Council and offices of several state representatives showed up to hear Riverkeeper Neil Armingeon and Jacksonville University professor Quinton White assess the possible impacts downstream in Jacksonville.
And according to Riverkeeper Executive Director Jimmy Orth, the consensus from the group was that there needs to be more leadership locally and statewide in dealing with an issue that stretches across 15 Florida counties.
“One thing that was glaring was that the only person there from the City Council was Don Redman, and there was no one from the mayor’s office,” said Orth. “I think it’s telling that we haven’t yet had anyone local willing to step up and take leadership on this issue.”
But Orth said there is still time for leaders, especially in Jacksonville, to bring their voices to the debate. For Mayor John Peyton, that may begin Thursday when he and key department heads meet with officials from the St. Johns Water Management District - the body that has developed the water withdrawal plans.
“Mayor Peyton wants to make a fact-based decision about what the impacts will be for the lower river basin, and in particular Duval County,” said mayoral spokesperson Susie Wiles. “It’s an emotional issue and one that’s gotten a lot of attention. Mayor Peyton is interested in getting facts.”
Redman said he learned quite a bit from the Riverkeeper meeting.
“I heard about Central Florida wanting to do this, but I didn’t realize all that it entailed,” he said. “I think the City Council needs to step in and voice our opinion as to our concerns and ask the State to be on top of this. But as far as the City controlling the river or the City Council being that aggressive, I don’t think we should do that at this point.”
State Rep. Aaron Bean managed to break away from the property tax special session to attend the meeting, which he said offered an invaluable perspective on the issue.
“We don’t know the full impacts of taking this water out, and that’s what’s scary,” said Bean. “I told Jimmy (Orth) I’m hoping to bring a mini presentation to the entire Duval Delegation and let them hear it as well.”
Wiles said the appropriate mayoral staff members were simply unavailable to attend the meeting, although they are already familiar with the issues and should get even more detail from the District.
“The District is engaged in some scientific modeling that we hope will yield some good data,” said Wiles. “I think the point of the water management district is to be balanced. They are scientists that are charged by the State to see what the impacts will be.”
The Riverkeeper, however, is skeptical of the District leading Northeast and Central Florida through a process the non-profit environmental group contends is happening far too quickly.
Water supply was rarely an issue in Florida until the state entered into one of the worst droughts on record from 1998 to 2001. During that time, all five Water Management Districts ordered water restrictions but new development continued to push overall water use up.
The Floridan Aquifer provides 90 percent of the state’s drinking water and was once thought to be limitless, according to the Riverkeeper. But in 2005, the U.S. Geological Survey reported that increasing withdrawals from 1950 to 2000 decreased water levels and led to saltwater intrusion.
The District performed a water supply assessment that projected population growth and water demand up to 2025. The findings: “Our ground water sources are not going to be adequate to meet our needs. We will have a 200-million-gallons-per-day deficit,” said District Executive Director Kirby Green.
Green reported his findings Thursday to the Northeast Florida Regional Council in a presentation that will likely mirror the one he gives to Peyton and his staff this week.
At the same time on Thursday, Gov. Charlie Crist was in Washington, D.C. meeting with governors from Alabama and Georgia on how droughts in those two states could lead to the drawing off of surface waters that flow into Florida, such as Georgia’s Lake Lanier that is a source for the Apalachicola River and one of the most productive estuaries on the planet.
While District officials say the situation in Atlanta is an example of what could happen if they don’t look for solutions now, Riverkeeper officials see it foreshadowing what could come.
“We use more water per capita in Florida than any other state in the country,” said Orth. “Instead of going, ‘We mismanaged this water source, let’s move on to the next,’ we need to develop alternatives that are more sustainable.”
Riverkeeper recommends increased water conservation, re-use programs, desalinization plants and sustainable building practices. All of those are included in the District’s 2005 water supply plan (including using reclaimed water), although much of the attention has gone to the six proposed surface water withdrawal projects.
Five projects could draw as much as 155 million gallons a day from the St. Johns River, and another project could draw 70 million gallons a day from the nearby Ocklawaha River. Combined, that withdrawal would reduce the average flow of the river at Jacksonville about 5 percent.
Those are maximum withdrawals the District determined based on minimum flow levels the water bodies “must maintain to ensure the ecology around these systems work,” said Green.
Green added that withdrawal levels may drop based on more research into how waste from the reverse osmosis treatment process – necessary to make river water potable – could further affect the rivers’ ecologies.
One project, at the Taylor Creek Reservoir in Orange and Osceola counties, is already being designed for a $135-$215 million plant that will pipe up to 40 million gallons a day from the St. Johns River into the reservoir for residents of Cocoa Beach, Melbourne, Orlando and other Central Florida cities.
“Our job is to present local governments with options, and they’ve chosen the next cheapest source, which is surface water,” said Green. “That’s why you are hearing about it in the local newspapers.”
But Orth said residents should have heard about these projects sooner, especially considering each one could cost up to $200 million and only provide a temporary fix to Florida’s growing water needs.
Green admitted that surface water sources would only provide a small amount of the water that will eventually be needed. The ultimate goal, he said, is to reach a cost-effective and energy-efficient seawater desalinization process as well as to further push water conservation, including the District’s Water Star program.
“I want the next generation of kids to stand at the sink with their dad and say, ‘Dad, you need to turn the faucet off when you shave,’” said Green. “We think there are standard measures that everyone should be undertaking. The more water we don’t use, the more we have to use.”
Now that’s something Orth said he and every elected leader could get behind.
Graphic provided by the St. Johns Water Management District