"$64 million reservoir pumps approved to deliver overdue water boost" @Sunsentinel

By Andy Reid, Sun Sentinel

Building new $64 million pumps could finally get water flowing as once intended from a Palm Beach County reservoir plagued by controversy.

South Florida taxpayers already sunk $217 million into transforming old rock mines west of Royal Palm Beach into a reservoir intended to boost water supplies and help the environment.

http://articles.sun-sentinel.com/images/pixel.gifNow, the South Florida Water Management District has approved a deal to design and construct a pumping station that has been on hold since the L-8 Reservoir was finished in 2008.

Budget problems and changes to Everglades efforts contributed to shelving pump plans.

But now the reservoir plays a key role in revamped Everglades restoration plans and more money is pouring in to get the pumps built.

"It's a very, very significant construction project," said Joe Collins, board chairman for the South Florida Water Management District. "It's something that has been a long time coming."

Even with the long-delayed pump plans getting back on track, questions remain about whether the reservoir will ever deliver the expected water supply benefits.

"They are trying to bail out a bad decision," Drew Martin, of the Sierra Club, said about the new plans for the reservoir. "It was just a bad investment."

The 15 billion-gallon reservoir built at Palm Beach Aggregates was once intended to store water that would replenish the Loxahatchee River — which had natural water flows diminished by decades of draining in South Florida.

The reservoir was also meant to supplement community drinking water supplies and provide drought relief for West Palm Beach and other areas.

While the reservoir has helped West Palm Beach during droughts in 2007 and 2011, without the pumps it hasn't delivered the water expected for the Loxahatchee River.

Also, water quality problems blamed on the depth of the reservoir and stagnation from lack of pumps have dogged the project.

Now the state's new $880 million plan for improving Everglades water quality includes sending the bulk of that reservoir water south.

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Help for the Loxahatchee River instead would eventually come from plans to store and treat water on Palm Beach County's Mecca Farms property, west of Palm Beach Gardens.

The planned pumping station would include six large pumps capable of drawing water from 40-feet deep. The reservoir's 15 billion gallon capacity is enough water to cover 34,000 football fields one foot deep, according to the water management district.

The district chose Archer Western Contractors, based in Atlanta, to design and build the pumps. Archer was the low bidder among two other competing firms. It's expected to take 2-1/2 years to build the pumping station, with construction expected to start in May.

Controversy has followed the reservoir project.

Palm Beach Aggregates ended up reimbursing the district for a $2.4 million secret "success fee" that federal prosecutors contend was paid to an engineering consultant who pushed the reservoir deal to water managers — without revealing his work as a consultant for Palm Beach Aggregates.

That fee and a Palm Beach Aggregates home development proposal factored into separate federal corruption investigations that led to the resignations and jail time for two Palm Beach County commissioners ousted by scandals.

"Florida unveils new #Everglades restoration plan" in @sunsentinel

$1.5 billion proposal aims to clean up water pollution
 

June 5, 2012|By Andy Reid, Sun Sentinel

A new Everglades restoration deal disclosed Monday proposes to clean up water pollution and resolve decades of federal legal fights, with a more than $1.5 billion public price tag.

The plan that the Florida Department of Environmental Protection on Monday forwarded to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency seeks to correct Florida's failure to meet water-quality standards in stormwater that flows to the Everglades.

Building new water storage and treatment areas along with other improvements over more than a decade could cost about $880 million, according to the South Florida Water Management District, which leads Everglades restoration for the state. 

The full cost also includes about $700 million the district already spent on farmland and unfinished reservoirs from past sidetracked Everglades restoration projects.

If endorsed by the federal government and the courts, the deal could resolve more than 20 years of legal fights and revamp stymied Everglades restoration efforts.

"This is a very solid plan. It is scientifically based and it's affordable," said Joe Collins, chairman of the water management district board. "We certainly are committed to protecting the Everglades."

The proposal includes stricter discharge limits for water treatment areas that send water to the Everglades, with plans by 2025 to meet overdue federal water quality standards that were supposed to take effect in 2006.

Audubon of Florida and the Everglades Foundation on Monday praised the proposal as a welcome sign of progress that could benefit the environment, tourism and drinking water supplies.

"The plan is clearly a major step forward," said Eric Draper, Audubon of Florida's executive director. "We are all going to benefit (from) this."

How to pay for the new plan remains a hurdle.

Florida has already invested about $1.8 billion building 57,000 acres of stormwater treatment areas to filter polluting phosphorous from water that flows off agricultural land and into the Everglades.

Big Sugar should be paying for more of the pollution clean up costs, not taxpayers, according to the environmental group Friends of the Everglades.

"We are skeptical," group representative Albert Slap said about the terms of the proposal disclosed Monday. "We consider it a step in the right direction (but) the problem is enforceability and funding."

The proposed deal is the result of months of negotiations started by Gov. Rick Scott, who in October flew to Washington, D.C., to push for a new restoration plan.

Without a deal, Florida faces the possibility of having to enact a plan proposed by the EPA and prompted by a federal judge that calls for adding more than 40,000 acres of additional stormwater treatment areas along with other enhancements the state estimates would cost $1.5 billion.

The new state proposal

includes more than 7,000 acres of expanded stormwater treatment areas — man-made marshes intended to filter phosphorus from stormwater that flows to the Everglades.

The deal calls for building a series of reservoirs near water treatment areas to hold onto more water that is now drained away for flood control and to better regulate its flow, so that the filter marshes can be effective.

The state's plan also calls for targeting pollution "hot spots," which would mean more pollution control requirements on pockets of farmland where fertilizer runoff and other agricultural practices boost phosphorus levels.

The plan would put to use some of the 26,800 acres the district in 2010 acquired from U.S. Sugar Corp. for $197 million. Old citrus groves in Hendry County would be turned into Everglades habitat, according to the proposal.

The new water storage areas in the plan would include making use of an unfinished 16,700-acre reservoir in southwestern Palm Beach County. That stalled project already cost taxpayers about $280 million before the project was shelved while the district pursued the U.S. Sugar land deal.

Similarly, the proposal calls for redirecting the water in a $217 million rock-mine-turned-reservoir west of Royal Palm Beach to help improve Everglades water quality standards. That water was intended to go north for restoration efforts, but the district has yet to build the $60 million pumps needed to deliver the water to the Loxahatchee River.

The $880 million in new costs could come from $220 million the district has in reserves, $290 million projected from property tax revenue from expected new growth as well as money from the Legislature, according to the district.

The EPA has about a month to review the state's proposed permit changes for water quality standards. State officials face upcoming court hearings June 25 and July 2, where they are supposed to show progress in restoration efforts.

More details are needed to justify the potential cost, said Barbara Miedema, vice president of the Sugar Cane Growers Cooperative of Florida.

"How much more money are we going to spend to get how much more benefit?" Miedema asked.

abreid@tribune.com, 561-228-5504 or Twitter@abreidnews.com