WHAT'S HOT

    As we mentioned in the last issue of our newsletter, the Florida state budget for the upcoming fiscal year removed funding for the muck dredging from the St. Sebastian River.  The St. Johns River Water Management District (SJRWMD) apparently has been successful in scavenging the funding needed to continue this project for the coming year. We have contacted our local state legislators to encourage them to support funding for this project.  We have also contacted Rep. Dave Weldon to ask for his support of the Water Resources Development Act (WRDA), which the Congress has not funded since 2000.  WRDA contains funding for the Everglades restoration and the Indian River Lagoon, and would allow the Army Corps of Engineers to provide funding for the St. Sebastian River dredging
    As mentioned in the email sent to our members in late August, the Florida Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) held a public workshop at the St. Johns River Water Management District offices in Palm Bay a few weeks ago.  At the meeting, the DEP laid out their plan to develop Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) values for water bodies throughout the Indian River Lagoon basin (Group 5) that are considered "impaired" and therefore do not meet the water quality standards of the EPA's Clean Water Act.
    The DEP said that they are a little behind schedule for development of TMDLs for the IRL basin water bodies, but that they expect to adopt these TMDLs in March 2008.  One of the reasons is that they had to redo their list of verified impaired water bodies because of a federal court ruling this past May.  In our July newsletter we told about this ruling against Florida's "Impaired Waters Rule" (IWR) that the state is using to verify which water bodies are "impaired".  The court ruled that they could not exclude data of mercury levels in fish as an indication of impairment of a water body.
    The IRL basin is somewhat unique in the state's waters as it is part of the National Estuary Program (NEP) and therefore many agencies and municipalities have been addressing water quality throughout the basin for many years.  The NEP required that point sources of pollution be addressed.  Throughout the lagoon, those point sources mostly consist of wastewater treatment facilities.  Therefore the state will now be spending a lot more time and resources to address nonpoint sources of pollution.  Unfortunately those sources are a lot harder to address because of their larger scale and difficulty in pinpointing.  The DEP defines nonpoint sources as "…characterized as intermittent, rainfall driven, and diffuse….  Nonpoint sources also include  pollution resulting from the things people do every day, often without thinking, like mismanaging household pesticides, fertilizers, and yard trash, and wasting water."
    In the case of the St. Sebastian River, there are several segments that are listed as being impaired and remain on the "verified" list of impaired waters.  The North Prong of the river is listed for iron and low dissolved oxygen.  Iron can be from natural or man-made sources.  Under the IWR, the state will not consider natural sources of impairment in the development of a TMDL.  In the case of the North Prong, the state considers the source of iron to be due to human activities and therefore must be addressed.
    Various other segments of the St. Sebastian River, as well as the North Prong, are listed as impaired for low dissolved oxygen.  The state considers the primary cause of low oxygen levels to be due to nutrient loading, specifically elevated levels of nitrogen, and the probable sources to be point source discharges, septic tank failure, sewer line leakage, agricultural activities and wildlife.  This would also include homeowner's use of fertilizers and pet wastes.  As mentioned previously, the NEP has done a good job addressing point source discharges to the lagoon.  So as you can see, the state will be focusing their attention more on issues that we as homeowners have much greater control over and responsibility for!
    Unlike point sources, nonpoint sources of pollution can't be directly regulated.  Therefore in many cases the problems are addressed with "Best Management Practices" (BMPs) and permit restrictions.  There are specific goals and time frames for implementing BMPs and other strategies, but the results they produce are difficult to quantify and correlate.  With Florida's IWR, each of the 5 watershed groups will be