River Task Force wants swift solution to sewage spills

Published 11:09 am Thursday, January 31, 2019

LAKE CITY, Fla. — For the past 10 years a Valdosta, Georgia, sewage plant has dumped millions of gallons of raw sewage into the Suwannee and Withlacoochee river system which flows through several Florida Counties. Two of these spills caused fish kills in 2009 and 2013 as well as endangering fisheries in Levy County. 

To mitigate these events, officials of the counties served by the North Florida Regional Planning Council formed the Middle and Lower Suwannee River and Withlacoochee River Task Force. This group made up of representatives of Hamilton, Suwannee, Columbia, Madison, Lafayette, Gilchrist, Levy, Taylor, Alachua and Dixie counties met Thursday in Lake City to form an action plan to end this problem.

“It’s a health issue, it’s an environmental issue, it has a negative impact on tourism, and we’ve lost some businesses because of it,” Madison County Commissioner and Chairman of the group Rick Davis said.

One issue discussed at length was a timely notification of affluent spills and having that notice given to the affected counties promptly.

“Their definition of a timely notification does not coincide with our definition of what a timely notification is,” Davis said.

Valdosta officials must report to their EPA within 24hours but further notification to others have none, and it can take up to three days before Florida concerns know of the spill.

The members of the task force want this particular concern changed. When a spill occurs, the flow can already have passed Hamilton, Suwannee and Madison counties before local officials are told and the concern is people do not have any idea the rivers have been affected which causes a health concern for recreational use and fishing. By the time the water management and health departments are notified it’s 72 hours later and depending on the flow and speed of the river, the contaminants from the spill have passed through the affected counties. According to task force members, TV and social media know of the spills way before those who need to know about them do.

“Our citizens and the public who recreate in the river and around the river have no idea this stuff is going on during this time,” Davis said.

During a December meeting just before Christmas with members of the task force, the Valdosta city manager promised to notify them but called it “a band-aid and not a solution.”

In 2013, Valdosta officials built a new plant to replace the existing one that was within the flood plain of the Withlacoochee River to another location after negotiating with the Georgia Environmental Protection Division a plan to address this and say this is a high priority.  However, the new system, which was designed to handle the city’s sewage stream, did not take into account that during significant rain events an old sewage collection system allows millions of gallons of stormwater to invade the system and overload it causing that untreated water to go directly into the watersheds that flow into Florida.

“It’s the stormwater infiltration into their sewer lines,” Davis said. “So if you ask me how often does this occur, that’s mother nature. If they get a large rain event of 3 to 5 inches, then we have a spill.”

Columbia County Commissioner Ronald Williams agreed and said there were promises made to fix the problem but have not.

“We understand the issue is the integration of the water into their system, and that was to be addressed immediately, but I don’t care how many sewer treatment plants are built if they do not tackle that first they cannot build enough,” he said.

Records show that there are plans to address this and are expected to spend nearly $162 million over the next 10 years to solve the stormwater infiltration problem as well as other issues linked to the spills during rain events and until these improvements are completed Florida will still have to deal with future spills during significant events.

Suwannee County Commissioner and Task Force Member Don Hale said he was excited to see the concern and having the attention of state officials and our local state representative Chuck Brannon.

“I think we need to continue to lean hard on them for the support and guidance to help assist this task force as well as the counties affected by these spills,” he said.

Part of the task force’s plan of action is to get the attention of the Georgia EPD and Florida EPA as well as state and federal legislators to aid Valdosta in obtaining the necessary funding and permits to stop these overflows. Another way to get the attention of those needed to get the solution from paper to concrete is to file a civil lawsuit. However, task force members are reluctant to do this if it can be avoided.

“We would like Valdosta to know we would like to help them and we’re not here to be adversarial with them or stir up controversy, but we’re not automatically tossing out the possibility of litigation,” Hamilton County Commissioner Beth Burnham said.

One item decided at Thursday’s meeting is to arrange an in-person meeting with the Valdosta City Council to seek positive solutions, including requesting federal aid to stop the spills before going to court. Members feel that Valdosta officials are doing what they can to fix the problem and care about the effect of those spills, but funding is an issue where help from this task force is needed and wanted. 

Hale is concerned with the time it will take between approving action and the eventual construction and feels that continued attention focused on getting the solution to reality is very important.

“Unfortunately, 10 years is too long to wait to have this solved,” he said. “The situation needs to be dealt with now so we need to continue to lean on both Georgia and Florida officials as well as legislative leaders to come up with a solution and action plan to end these spills.” The task force also agreed to garner better coordination between the two state governments and the federal government but said it should be the Florida governor and EPA to be the lead in this issue.

“With our strategies hopefully we come up with and how important this is to our region the State of Florida should be the one to tote the sword for us,” Levy County Commissioner John Meeks said.