Matanzas Riverkeeper Jen Lomberk, St. Johns Riverkeeper Lisa Rinaman, Miami Waterkeeper Staff Attorney Kelly Cox presented a panel on Keeping Watch Over Our Waters: Florida’s Riverkeepers, on the agenda for PIEC 25.
![[Miami Waterkeeper attorney Kelly Cox]](http://www.wwals.net/pictures/2019-02-08--piec-wka-fl/20190208_142126.jpg)
Miami Waterkeeper attorney Kelly Cox
Also in the room were Continue reading
Update 2019-02-09: Pictures.
All the Waterkeepers of Florida are gathered today and tomorrow at the 25th Annual Public Interest Environmental Conference (PIEC) at the University of Florida in Gainesville.
On the agenda in the afternoon 2PM session today:
Keeping Watch Over Our Waters: Florida’s Riverkeepers Location: MLAC Courtroom Continue reading
Possibly for the first time ever, all of the Riverkeepers of Georgia spoke at the same event.
![[All Georgia Riverkeepers]](http://www.wwals.net/pictures/2019-02-06--ga-afs-riverkeepers/99-panel.jpg)
All Georgia Riverkeepers: Flint Riverkeeper Gordon Rogers, Savannah Riverkeeper Tonya Bonitatibus, Ogeechee Riverkeeper Damon Mullis, Altamaha Riverkeeper Jen Hilburn, Upper Coosa Riverkeeper Jesse Demonbreun-Chapman, St Marys Riverkeeper Anna Laws, Satilla Riverkeeper Laura Early, Suwannee Riverkeeper John S. Quarterman (Chattahoochee had already left).
Below are links to the WWALS video of each talk, followed by a WWALS video playlist. See also the program, and a few more pictures.
Update 2019-02-08: Video.
Apparently for the first time ever, all the Riverkeepers of Georgia will be speaking at the same event. Flint Riverkeeper Gordon Rogers passed on the invitation from the Georgia Chapter of the American Fisheries Society (GA-AFS) to speak at their annual conference.
When: Wednesday, February 6, 2019
Where: Lake Blackshear Resort, 2459-H US Highway 280 West Cordele, GA 31015
What: 2019 GA-AFS Chapter Annual Meeting
Wednesday (continued), February 6, 2019 Continue reading SESSION 3: GEORGIA’S RIVERKEEPERS (SYMPOSIA)
The new water rule EPA plans to propose may be much more about all our drinking water underground in Florida and south Georgia than about anybody’s private pond.
Stacey H. Mitchell, David H. Quigley and Bryan Williamson, Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP, 11 December 2018, United States: Dipping Its Toe In The Groundwater? Supreme Court Eyes Expedited Review For Clean Water Act Case,
Specifically, the Court aims to address a circuit split among the 4th, 5th and 9th Circuits in determining whether only direct discharges to “navigable waters” (rivers, lakes and other surface waters, for example) are covered or whether groundwater that is “hydrologically connected to surface water” is subject to Clean Water Act (CWA) pollution discharge requirements.2 Groundwater—that is, water held beneath the soil or in between rock structures—does not fall under CWA jurisdiction. Nevertheless, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), for many years, maintained that pollutants that flow with a direct and immediate hydrologic connection through groundwater into surface waters are properly regulated under the CWA.3 Environmentalists agree with EPA’s long-standing position, while many in industry say that the agency is reaching beyond its scope.
Surface water interchanges with groundwater all the time here in the southeast coastal plain, where we all drink with straws from the groundwater.
Figure from same USGS study as below.
This SCOTUS case appears to be related to the forthcoming EPA rule change proposal that has been all over the news lately. More from the same article: Continue reading
Deviating from its usual practice of meeting in Live Oak, it’s going to Starke, the Suwannee River Water Management District (SRWMD) Board, Tuesday of next week, 9AM December 11, 2018, at the Governor Charley Johns Conference Center, 1610 N. Temple Avenue, Starke, FL.
I don’t see anything on the agenda especially about Bradford County, except tacked onto the end as open to the public “Following Board Meeting”: “• Projects Tour in Starke”.
I’m guessing that refers to the tree clearing project approved as an emergency several months ago, at the request of the Bradford BOCC, due to expected rains.
According to Kevin Flavin, Project Manager and Professional Water Resources Engineer,
Follow
this link for an interactive google map by WWALS.
Two stops are to Continue reading
Thursday morning, the day after Hurricane Michael passed by to the west and north of the Suwannee River Basin, only Gopher River and the New River gauge near Lake Butler were in Action Stage.
Does a place that nearly floods even when a hurricane is a hundred miles west of it seem like a good location for the HPS II phosphate mine, in Union and Bradford Counties, Florida ? Continue reading
As we’ve seen so often in the Sabal Trail docket, Spectra seems to be acting in place of FERC, responding yesterday to thousands of comments on FERC’s certificate rulemaking.
Spectra’s bottom line: a pipeline company’s bottom line matters more than the Fifth Amendment due process, or water, air, or safety. See page 25:
Contrary to some commenters’ arguments, the Commission’s public interest determinations are not rendered insufficient under the Fifth Amendment public use requirement because the Commission considers precedent agreements among applicants and affiliates to be evidence of public benefits.
Spectra repeatedly argues that FERC does not have authority to consider hardly anything other than whether the pipeline company has customers, yet FERC has authority to give eminent domain to private corporations and to let them gouge through our lands and under our rivers without local agreement or payment first.
In this election year, you can ask every candidate for statehouse or Congress whether they support Continue reading
Bring a rope in case we need to drag the boats across deadfalls, and expect low-hanging branches, as we experience the wilderness from Rowetown Church Landing to Willacoochee Landing, on the Alapaha River Water Trail, continuing Alapaha Quest.
When: 8 AM, Saturday, August 11, 2018
Put In: Rowetown Church Landing, 1291 Rowetown Church Road, Alapaha, GA 31622, River bank on private road back of cemetery, we have permission.
Take Out: Willacoochee Landing, GA 135, Atkinson County side, 2.8 miles south of Willacoochee, GA, Atkinson County.
Bring: the usual personal flotation device, boat paddles, food, drinking water, warm clothes, and first aid kit, and don’t forget the rope. Also trash pickers and trash bags: every WWALS outing is also a cleanup.
Movie: Under branches (1.0M), in
Alapaha deadfalls, by John S. Quarterman, for WWALS.net, 17 January 2015.
Free: This outing is free to WWALS members, and $10 (ten dollars) for non-members. We recommend you support the work of WWALS by becoming a WWALS member today!
Event: Continue reading
The bigger they are, the harder they fall. Mosaic Co., market cap $11.5 billion, just lost to DeSoto County, Florida, annual budget $84.3 million. Maybe this will help Bradford County to do the right thing about phosphate mines.
Craig Pittman, Tampa Bay Times, 26 July 2018, Mosaic spent 20 years planning new phosphate mine. DeSoto County has rejected it,
Mosaic Co., the world’s largest phosphate company, has spent two decades lining up a new mine in DeSoto County as part of a broader effort to move its operations south.
Photo: Jim Tatum on Southwings flight for WWALS, 2016-10-22: W across PCS Phosphate Mine, 30.4429360, -82.7851800But DeSoto County commissioners last week slammed the door in the company’s face, voting 4-1 against rezoning 18,000 acres from agricultural to mining.
A major concern: Continue reading
