Thirsty developers will drain the St. Johns River
Mon, 08 Oct 2007
If you are at all concerned with the health of the St. Johns and Ocklawaha rivers, the cover story of last week’s Folio Weekly should be on your reading list. Link here: This Sucks - Folio Weekly (large pdf file)
Draining millions of gallons per day from these slow moving rivers will result in an ecologic disaster. While it may temporarily quench the thirst of rapid, unsustainable growth, these rivers will be less able to flush away the streams of pollution which invariably enter the system, allowing harmful contaminants to accumulate. Fragile ecosystems will be stressed to the breaking point.
Conservation efforts seem limited to mailing out brochures, and to broadcasting Public Service Announcements on lawn-watering. Given our ever-growing need for this limited resource, a sane water management policy must include a rigorous effort toward conservation. The toothless program currently in effect does little to curb waste. None of the counties that would receive water from this project have meaningful conservation programs, with only Volusia enforcing any mandatory restrictions.
St. Johns Riverkeeper is preparing the case for conservation vs. unchecked greed:
This Sucks - St. Johns Riverkeeper
We are gearing up to address this issue by creating a public awareness campaign and a water conservation program. Riverkeeper is also researching Florida water law to better understand our legal options, and we are assembling a team of scientists to review the St. Johns River Water Management District studies that are being used to justify the withdrawal. We also hope to put together a coalition of concerned citizens, businesses, and orginizations. We’ll keep you posted about how you can get involved and join the effort to promote Conservation First.
Keep an eye on the St. Johns Riverkeeper blog as this goes forward.
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