The Florida Keys. Even if you live in this magical paradise, when you hear those words it is hard not to think about margaritas, shocking sunsets and Jimmy Buffett crooning on a bar stool. As the Tourist Development Council would say, “close to perfect, far from normal.” It seems to describe us pretty well.
Surrounding our 120-mile chain of island paradise is the Florida Reef, the only living barrier reef in the continental United States and the third-largest coral barrier system in the world. It is both a natural wonder and an indispensable support system for our ocean and its wildlife.
It is also the Keys’ most vital resource, environmentally and economically. It helps protect us from the effects of tropical weather events, naturally filters ocean water to eliminate pollutants, provides a habitat and feeding ground for marine life, and helps support just about every business and industry throughout the Keys.
The economic benefit of the reef to the Keys is so far-reaching that it is difficult to quantify, but conservative estimates put it at over $500 million a year.
With so much on the line, one would think that we would do everything we can to preserve and protect our most vital resource. Sadly, 95 percent of the Florida Reef is dead.
What? How did that happen? Well, we killed it by polluting our waters to such an extent that 95 percent of the reef is now dead. That’s the simple answer. Of course, there are many causes for such large-scale pollution and destruction, but the most substantial known contributors are runoff from Big Sugar and Big Agriculture on the mainland and a history of improper treatment of sewage and wastewater. The Everglades has seen a similar demise that will take almost $11 billion and 35 years to even have a chance at salvaging.
While we salute the scientists attempting to repair and rebuild our reef, such a task is expensive, time-consuming and far from guaranteed, especially when the waters in which the reef is being regenerated are still polluted. Not only is our collective destruction of the reef morally reprehensible, but we are also shooting ourselves in the foot economically.
We have only begun to feel the impacts of the carnage of the reef that will likely occur for decades to come. Such a sobering fact may be new to some, but it is not new information to the BOCC, FKAA, FDEP, NOAA or the sanctuary, unless those agencies have been asleep at the wheel. Coral coverage has declined 90 percent in the last 30 years under their watch.
So when the state finally mandated the Keys to convert the majority of its real estate from leaky and malfunctioning septic systems to a central sewer system (a process that the county should have initiated many years before), a light bulb should have gone on for these agencies that this was the perfect opportunity to do something to protect our waters and our reef system.
The Keys could have become a leader in environmental protection by investing in the most technologically-advanced systems to responsibly dispose of human waste for decades to come while at the same time exploring avenues for reuse. This technology exists and is being implemented all over the world.
To fund this important endeavor, Monroe County citizens approved a 1-cent sales tax to be used “only for wastewater” until the projects were fully funded. Considering our reluctance for any new taxes, it was a pretty good indication that our community understood and supported the need for responsible disposal of human waste.
Instead of seizing that opportunity of a lifetime, the Board of County Commissioners, in conjunction with Florida Keys Aqueduct Authority, decided instead to design and build a central sewer system around a dollar figure instead of sound science.
Under the guise of “saving us money” (what our politicians like to stump about in their campaign speeches), they implemented a cost-saving system using a combination of gravity and grinder pumps to transport the waste from our residences and then inject the treated waste into a series of likewise cost-saving shallow well injection pumps. Those shallow well pumps inject the treated waste merely 120 feet into porous limestone below -- on a chain of islands surrounded by already polluted water.
The BOCC then promptly applied its cost savings on the sewer system and funds from the infrastructure tax to pay for unnecessary pet projects throughout the Keys.
Only Key Largo and Key West were spared the shallow well fate. Both areas have deep wells injecting effluent 2,000 feet into the “Boulder Zone,” providing near assurance of no contamination. As stated on Monroe County’s 2000 Sanitary Master Plan, “deep well injection eliminates all wastewater nutrients from the environment.” Further, Florida law requires deepwell injection whenever the volume of effluent approaches 1 million gallons a day.
Instead of seeking to eliminate all wastewater nutrients by building deep injection wells in all treatment facilities, we have now discovered that FKAA played games with the numbers so that it could install cost-cutting shallow wells, thereby satisfying the BOCC’s budget demands. Through the multiple lawsuits concerned citizens were forced to file to stop this travesty, we now know that the effluent projected for the Cudjoe facility exceeded 1 million gallons per day, one of the primary reasons we will now have a deep well.
Worse yet, the FDEP, the state agency officially charged with environmental protection, participated in the hoodwink by permitting shallow wells, not only in Cudjoe but also in Marathon with its multiple shallow wells and in other treatment facilities throughout the Keys. It has argued in the lawsuits that treated wastewater, if it does make its way into our nearshore waters, is somehow not harmful simply because it does not impact our potable drinking water.
Really, FDEP? Even water treated to Advanced Wastewater Treatment standards contains up to 10 times the nitrogen and 100 times the phosphorus than is considered healthy for nearshore waters, according to Florida law. We know that this polluted water contaminates our food supply and harms wildlife, including the reef.
When did polluting become acceptable? We find it all the more troubling considering the technology exists to easily eliminate all human waste pollutants from our environment.
Shame on FKAA and the BOCC for putting dollars and politics ahead of our most precious resource. Shame on FDEP for its failure to do its job in protecting our environment.
Shame on the sanctuary, NOAA and other agencies for not fighting for the reef and water quality. These agencies had an opportunity and an obligation to protect the precious waters of the Florida Keys and our delicate reef system. They have failed all of us.
The Florida Keys … far from perfect, situation normal.
This editorial is reprinted with permission from The Key West Citizen of Sunday, July 19, 2015, under the headline, "Far from Perfect, Situation Normal."
