August 26, 2002
Ms.
Sherry Scott, P.G.
Water
Policy Coordinator
South
Florida Water Management District
3301
Gun Club Road
West
Palm Beach, Florida 33406
Re: Draft White Paper on “Reservation of Water for the Environment and Assurances
for
Existing Legal Sources Consistent with Federal and State Law”
Dear
Ms. Scott:
The Southwest Florida Watershed Council appreciates this opportunity to comment on the Draft White Paper on Reservations of Water for the Environment and Assurances of Existing Legal Sources Consistent With Federal and State Law. The Watershed Council is a grass roots, multi-county coalition of individuals, organizations, agencies and businesses that have come together to address issues affecting the Caloosahatchee and Big Cypress watersheds. We have a strong interest in reservations of water for the environment, both as part of the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Program (CERP) process and as an independent state process for protecting the valuable estuarine and coastal watershed resources of our region.
We
believe that the reservation of water for the environment is a key issue in
Everglades restoration. Because of increasing demands and current water shortfalls,
we are deeply concerned that by the time CERP projects are in operation, there
may not be enough water available to reserve for the environment.
Some watersheds, such as the Caloosahatchee, may be over-permitted now,
and there is concern that natural systems have not been protected in the
consumptive use permitting process. We
believe that there is a need to reserve water for the environment today --
before the design and construction of CERP water projects.
While
the Water Resources Development Act of 2000 (WRDA) and the federal-state
agreement require existing consumptive uses to be protected, focusing too
fervently on existing consumptive uses today could lead to little water for the
environment tomorrow. CERP
projects should be designed to deliver water for the environment, first and
foremost, and then be expanded or modified as necessary to satisfy consumptive
uses.
We
have been encouraged by language in the White Paper and by discussions with
staff from the South Florida Water Management District (SFWMD) that the SFWMD is
considering “pre-
The mission of the Southwest Florida Watershed Council is to protect, conserve, manage and/or
restore the land and water resources of the Caloosahatchee and Big Cypress Watersheds through participation and cooperation of all stakeholders in consensus building, planning, and decision making to meet the
economic, natural and cultural needs for this and succeeding generations.
CERP”
reservations for protecting fish and wildlife in estuaries in the region.
For the Caloosahatchee and its estuary, especially, we strongly urge you
to expedite this process to ensure that the allocation of “baseline” water
solely for existing users does not destroy the resource before additional water
is made available from CERP projects in the basin.
Any baseline for the Caloosahatchee should include enough water to make
protection of natural systems a reality today.
It
is not just the natural system that will suffer if the resources provided by the
Caloosahatchee and other coastal estuaries are destroyed.
The economy of the region will also suffer. It has been estimated that the Caloosahatchee estuary alone
contributes $147 million to the regional economy.
Specific
comments follow that are referenced to the page number and line number of the
White Paper:
Page
6, lines 28-42:
We
would like the White Paper to clarify whether the language of the WRDA
“savings clause” in Section 601(h)(5) means that the water necessary for
fish and wildlife in the Caloosahatchee, for instance, will be considered an
“existing legal source of water.” How
and when will the amount of this water be determined?
If this is considered as part of the baseline, how is this water
protected now? This water has not
been reserved, nor has it necessarily been adequately protected through the
Consumptive Use Permitting (CUP) process to date.
Protection of this water should not have to await the construction of
CERP projects.
Page
7, lines 11-20:
We
would like the White Paper to explain how the District intends to implement
Section 373.1501(5)(a). Will this
analysis and evaluation proceed now or after the operation of CERP projects for
additional water?
Page
7, lines 22-28:
Section
373.1501(5)(d) protects “existing legal users,” but this term has not been
defined in either the statute or the District’s rules.
Can “existing legal users” include water necessary for fish and
wildlife, as it does under WRDA?
Page
8, lines 13-14:
We
believe that certain “existing legal uses” in the Caloosahatchee basin are
contrary to the public interest, as evidenced by extensive low flow impacts and
Minimum Flows and Levels (MFL) rule exceedences.
These conditions have resulted from an operation schedule for Lake
Okeechobee that emphasizes storage for uses other than the estuarine
environment.
Page
10, lines 36-38:
CUP criteria do not prevent harm to Caloosahatchee water resources up to and including the one in ten year drought frequency. These problems need to be resolved before the pre-CERP reservation can be effectively determined.
Page
12, lines 30-34:
While
this principle includes the quality of the water for the baseline, and WRDA
speaks in terms of quantity and quality of water for the environment, there is
no discussion in the White Paper about how the quality of the water that is
reserved for protection of fish and wildlife will be ensured.
This has been an issue in the Okeechobee/Caloosahatchee system, with
polluted back-pumped agricultural runoff used to provide freshwater flows for
the estuary.
Page
13, lines 1-9:
This
principle needs to be clarified, particularly for a pre-CERP baseline for water
necessary for fish and wildlife. If
the Caloosahatchee River, for instance, had ample freshwater flow in 1995, but
not in December 2000, what would the baseline be for water for fish and
wildlife?
Page
13, lines 19-40:
If
projects and operations in place as of December 2000 are considered part of
baseline, will MFLs also be considered part of baseline?
Page
13, line 42-46:
It is unclear how local rainfall, surface storage, and runoff can be regional sources of available water. If these local sources were allocated to the region, then they would no longer be available locally.
Page 14, lines
4-5:
While sources may vary with precipitation and hydrology, we do not believe that they should be assigned priority based on manipulation of the sources for human needs. This could mean that the environment is always assigned the least reliable sources.
Page 14, lines
7-16:
We disagree with the principle as stated. We strongly support a principle, as discussed in the issue statement, that demands should be based upon permits in use.
Page
14, lines 26-29:
We
support the inclusion of MFLs as demands.
Page
14, lines 30-37:
We
support the inclusion of demands for water deliveries for wetland protection,
aquifer recharge, other resource protection, and fish and wildlife.
It is unclear whether the use of the term “regional environmental
areas” is intended to restrict fish and wildlife “demands” to certain
specific areas or whether the term is used generally.
Does this mean that water necessary for fish and wildlife in other areas
cannot be considered a demand?
Page
14, lines 39-42:
Historic
operational deliveries under federal regulation schedules have caused extensive
impacts from low flows to the Caloosahatchee Estuary and, as such, should not
represent fish and wildlife demands.
Page
15, lines 9-17:
It
is unclear how the definition ties in with the definition of “demands” on
page 14. Instead of demands, the
term “of which there was a dependence” is used.
Is this synonymous with “demands”?
We
support the inclusion of resource protection and protection of fish and wildlife
as existing legal sources. The
problem, however, is that these sources are not necessarily being adequately
protected now. We want to make sure
that these sources are protected prior to the CERP reservations, so that they do
not have to compete with Everglades restoration.
Existing
legal sources, as defined, may not be consistent with the “presently existing
legal uses of water,” particularly if the SFWMD interprets this second term as
including permits not in use, as opposed to permits in actual use.
Page
15, lines 19-28:
Would
the operational conditions that existed in December 2000 determine the amount of
water reserved for fish and wildlife in the Caloosahatchee, for instance, even
if the operational conditions as of that date resulted in reduced freshwater
flows that were much less than those that prevailed under previous operational
conditions?
Page
16, Table and Figure 3:
We
are concerned that the Caloosahatchee has been classified as an agricultural
legal source user basin. Was this
based on hydrology, water use, or economic activity?
The water naturally flows to the estuary, serving fish and wildlife.
Most of the economic activity is urban.
We
request that both the Caloosahatchee estuary and Estero Bay be classified as
legal source user basins for environmental purposes.
Page
17, lines 4-16:
The
pre-CERP baseline is going to estimate the amount of water available to the
environment. Yet, the proposal is
to exclude “regulatory discharges,” because these have not been historically
depended on by the natural system. The
term, “regulatory discharges,” is not defined in the document, but the term
has been used to refer to discharges from Lake Okeechobee based upon the U.S.
Army Corps of Engineers schedule for regulating lake levels.
Regulatory discharges from Lake Okeechobee, including
discretionary releases under the WSE schedule, are often the only sources of
water to maintain the Caloosahatchee Estuary during dry season conditions.
Regulatory discharges are an important component of flow maintenance for
compliance with the MFL Recovery and Prevention Plan to the Caloosahatchee
Estuary during the dry season and as such should be included in the volume
probability curve. We
also believe that there is no basis for assuming that higher wet season flows
have not been historically depended on by the natural system.
Wet season flows of freshwater in the Caloosahatchee would have been
historically higher than dry season discharges prior to the installation of
control structures and implementation of regulatory releases, leading to fish
and wildlife dependence on these fluctuations.
Does this proposal mean that only the dry season flow can be considered
as necessary for fish and wildlife?
Pages
18-24:
While
WRDA and state law provide that the water reserved for natural systems from CERP
projects should meet water quality standards, the discussion of how CERP
reservations will function only deals with quantity and not quality.
We are concerned that nutrients and other pollutants delivered to
estuaries through restored flows in the Everglades may create more damage to
those ecosystems.
Page
21, lines 9-39:
This
section on pre-CERP water reservations for the environment focuses on water for
the Everglades Protection Area. We
believe strongly that other pre-CERP reservations should be made for estuaries
and coastal watersheds throughout the region.
Page
26, Figure 1:
The
line in the figure for “Existing Environmental Performance (2000)” should
not be the baseline for the environment. This
line should include a pre-CERP reservation for the environment that is
sufficient to protect fish and wildlife.
Page
28, Figure 3:
The
figure should also show the western part of the Caloosahatchee basin.
Page
42, lines 29-31:
We
again suggest that permits in use be viewed as a demand condition assumption.
Page
42, line 40:
Tidal
discharges that are necessary to protect fish and wildlife should be included in
demands.
Page 43, lines
1-3:
Again (note page 14 comment), historic operational deliveries have been damaging to fish and wildlife in the Caloosahatchee Estuary and should not be considered appropriate demands for fish and wildlife.
Page
49, lines 42-45:
How
are the boundaries of these “environmental areas” defined?
Do they include upstream areas and flow ways?
As
a last, generalized comment, we would like to encourage you to move away from
the idea of using either actual use or amounts permitted for
baseline numbers, and instead use permitted amounts -- where progress toward
the permitted use has been demonstrated.
This will provide for entities issued permits who are actively
planning for additional use.
On
behalf of the Watershed Council, I request that you incorporate these comments
in a redraft of the strategy in the White Paper.
Please inform me of the District’s response to these comments and let
me know what the next steps will be in the process.
Sincerely,
Noel Andress
Chairman
