by Mike Sharkey
Staff Writer
The Jacksonville Waterways Commission was advised, even warned, to start paying very close attention to what’s happening to the St. Johns River in Central Florida.
No matter how small, every permit applied for and granted by the St. Johns River Water Management District that will allow Central Florida communities to draw potable water from the river will affect Northeast Florida, Riverkeeper Neil Armingeon told the commission Thursday.
The pending permit that would allow Seminole County to tap the St. Johns for an average of 5.5 million gallons of water per day — with a maximum of 11 million gallons a day — for the proposed Yankee Lake facility may mark the beginning of what many conservationists in Northeast Florida have feared.
Armingeon said he has asked State Rep. Charles McBurney to look into possibly legally challenging the permit. While the 5.5 million gallons represents a tiny fraction of the total maximum daily load of the river, Armingeon said he is worried this permit will lead to others, despite the fact a Water Management District official recently told a Waterways subcommittee that the District wouldn’t permit any new withdrawals until it completes a $2 million, two-year study on the effects of Central Florida raiding the river for upwards of 255 million gallons a day.
Armingeon lauded the official for presenting a detailed PowerPoint presentation on how the draining of water from the river by St. Johns County will affect Northeast Florida. However, Armingeon also said when the official was asked specific questions regarding the study and the issuing of new permits, he was “evasive” and vague.
“It’s the nose of the camel under the tent. We fully intend to fight this permit,” said Armingeon, adding his organization spent several weeks looking into the permit and requesting public records only to be stonewalled time and again. Eventually, Armingeon said, he had to threaten legal action in order to obtain records that fall under the state’s Sunshine Laws. “Make no mistake. This is not an open process.
“This threat is real, it is not hypothetical. Counties in Central Florida fully intend to take water from the river,” he said.
Waterways Chair and City Council member Bill Bishop asked James McCain of the Office of General Counsel to look into legally preventing the permit from being issued.
“What are our options?” said Bishop.
Waterways Coordinator Jim Suber talked about the river summit held a couple of weeks ago at the World Golf Village during which elected and appointed officials from both Central and North Florida talked about the future of the St. Johns. Suber said the meeting overall went well, however he detected an air of distrust between those from North and Central Florida.
“I think this is going to be monitored extremely closely,” said Suber. “The dialogue was extremely strong. We will have to sit and wait and see what happens.”
A statewide panel will be formed to look at the final proposal. That panel will consist of several experts on water usage, however they will not have a stake in the issue. Dr. Quinton White of Jacksonville University has been asked to look over the resumes of some that may serve on the panel.
“Some of them are very good, but I have concerns over some,” he said. “I will relay my concerns to the District.”
In other news from the meeting:
• The Commission approved an ordinance that will provide $92,925 in City funding for an elevation project at Clark’s Fish Camp Restaurant in Mandarin. That sum represents 25 percent of the total cost with the rest coming from the Federal Emergency Management Agency. The money will be used to elevate an existing storage building that floods during high tides.
• The Commission also approved $25,000 worth of funding for a boat traffic study that will help identify boater traffic patterns and assess the adequacy of the County Manatee Protection Plan’s Motorboat Speed Zones and Marina Safety Criteria. Overall, the study will cost a little more than $115,000 with the rest of the funding coming from the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission’s Florida Boating Improvement Program.
• Suber said the City’s water taxi service bid was likely going to be awarded Thursday afternoon. Suber said a few changes were made to the original request for proposals including the requirement that the service provider offer more seats and boats.
• A company will be at Metropolitan Park Marina Feb. 27 to demonstrate how its credit card kiosk works. The City is looking for a method to provide water and power to those who want to dock at the marina without having to provide those services 24 hours a day. According to Suber, the company is one-of-a-kind in the country and the kiosks allow boaters to pay for 24-72 hours of power and water at a time, regardless how much they actually use.
“We hope to have this in place within the next year,” said Suber.