Thank you so much for joining
us here at 6:00 o'clock.
I'm Carolina Lee.
And I'm Dave Wagner.
The crystal clear waters of Florida
Springs are a natural wonder,
but that bubble from the aquifer
gives us refreshing water to
drink and scenic places to enjoy.
But pollution and excessive pumping
are putting these gems at risk.
There are laws in place to
protect these natural resources,
and state agencies are supposed to enforce.
But 10 investigates Emerald Morrow found.
That's not happening the way
lawmakers said it.
Should.
A tropical paradise.
We have over 1000 artisans springs
flowing from an underwater world. That's the
largest concentration of springs,
these RTS springs and the whole world.
Beautiful doesn't even begin
to describe these gyms.
If there was a National Park for springs,
it would be right here in North Florida.
But slowly the springs are suffering,
they're at risk, some of them are dying,
and they're all pollute. Almost every
one of them is polluted.
On an early summer morning in
Gilchrist County, a leisurely paddled.
Along the Santa Fe river.
This is been called the last
pristine river in Florida because
there's no wastewater treatment
plants discharging near this river.
There's no pipes withdrawing
water directly from this river.
But it's not healthy because of the things
that are happening around the river.
The springs are being
loved to death. When
we used to have hundreds of people
on a river at a time,
now we have 10s of thousands
of people on a river.
Rum Island Spring is one of more than
36 springs that feed the Santa Fe.
This is classified as impaired
spring by the state because
of the nitrate. Concentrations
and just a little farther down the
river. Past another spring run.
So these are artesian springs.
That's why we call them artesian
springs. Like artesian water.
Bob Knight of the Florida Springs
Institute takes us to Gilchrist Blue,
where the beauty abounds but
the pollution is even worse.
Nitrate is chronically
toxic to humans. It's acutely toxic when
it's high enough concentration. So this
is the same water that we drink
and we should be worried about
that. But spring supposed to be like one
of our most pure forms of water well.
Groundwater is supposed to be,
and that springs, that's all they have,
is the groundwater.
But no, we've contaminated with
our groundwater to levels that
are said to be safe to drink by
our public health departments,
but are anywhere from 20 to 100 times or
more higher than the natural levels of
nitrogen in our in our natural groundwater,
unpolluted groundwater.
And that again comes from the fertilizer,
fertilizer and septic tanks,
septic tanks, animal waste.
Two hours S where the Weeki Wachee
River glistens a glowing green,
its namesake spring pumps out
more than 170 million gallons
of water a day. It's beautiful.
Thousands of people take in
this beauty every single year.
But the nitrates have polluted
the water here as well.
We went to Weeki Wachee Spring
with the Hernando County Health
Department for their weekly sampling
to see how bad it really is.
2 tests for bacteria, but we also
want to test for nitrates. So.
We also want to take a sample. Sure.
We put the sample on ice for
accurate results and drove it
straight to a lab in Tampa.
Workers there prepped the
sample for testing and sent
it to the lab for analysis.
This is what we would run
it on so this afternoon.
Probably about 4:00 o'clock,
he'll start running because you got to
catch everything that's going out of hold.
So if you've got a good nitrate hit on this,
you're going to see a kind of a deep
blue color, right? Interesting.
So not dissimilar to what you see there.
Michael Cammarata is the lab manager at
Advanced Environmental Laboratories.
He predicted increased levels
of nitrates in our spring
water sample. Spring seemed to be going up.
Why is that? And it's because
of the urban and agricultural
Florida's growing so fast, right?
And when you like, when the Urban
Development encroaches around that area,
then those natural areas that were
built through the water before it made
it down to the springs, that's gone.
So that's kind of disappearing.
Plus you have agricultural livestock.
And septic tanks.
So all those things together,
we're kind of seeing an increase
in the spring.
And I don't know if it's going to go
down because Florida is a growing state.
The Florida Department of Environmental
Protection set a limit for nitrates
of .35 milligrams per liter.
Our testing of the Weeki
Wachee Spring came back at .8.
That's more than twice the limit.
Nitrate, you can't see it,
you can't smell it, you can't
taste it, but it's in the water.
We also tested the water
at Rum Island Spring,
where we first started.
Those results came back at 1.95.
Milligrams per liter,
more than five times the limit.
Bob Knight says it's even
higher at Gilchrist Blue.
It's actually at a concentration
that's high enough to cause illness
in humans and possibly even cancer.
Nitrate is is chronically toxic to people.
I mean, are people in danger
when they're out here? No.
If if they if they drank this water day in,
day out, they could be
a serious concern. But who's
doing anything about it?
We have strong laws that
are not being enforced.
37 years, 0 nays. Mr.
President, you vote the bill.
In 2016, the legislature passed
the springs and Aquifer Protection
Act to find sources of nitrogen
pollution and left the Department of
Environmental Protection in charge of
what's called Basin Management Action
plans to clean the pollution up.
But Bob Knight says DEP is not doing enough.
Their plans don't work,
and they know that they've been told.
They've been showed the data
and and the public has tried
to do something about it,
but unsuccessfully.
It's very difficult to fight your state.
Good afternoon, your
honor. But some groups are trying.
The Florida Springs Council,
the Sierra Club and some other
environmental groups across the state
are now challenging DEP on this law,
also saying the state's plan to
clean up the polluted springs within
20 years do not work. They're very
far short. They're very far short. DEP
is fighting back, though.
Petitioners in this case have a strong
belief as to what the law ought to be
and what the law ought to require the
department to do with an when in an
exhibit basin management action plan.
But that's not what the law is.
But those who came up with the law disagree.
We need to be especially,
especially protective of our springs.
David Simmons was a Republican
senator representing District 9.
He's one of the lawmakers behind the
2016 springs and Aquifer Protection Act.
And he says. EPA is not following
the law the way he and his Co
sponsors intended his DEP right
now breaking the law.
I don't believe that the DEP right
now has followed through on the
directive of the Florida legislature,
and that's a simple fact.
Under this law, DEP is supposed to make
sure when cities and companies pump from
the aquifer it doesn't cause any harm.
But Simmons says the department has
not properly defined what harm is
the language that.
I saw that they have been using
for the last, you know, six years.
Is is not the appropriate language
and it's not in accordance with
the directive that was given.
Simmons says he's been meeting with
DEP and just submitted a new set of
proposed rules for defining harm to
better protect our water resources. You
cannot withdraw so much water that
it is going to be not replenished.
Water is a treasure.
For for Florida, we have a lot
of it. We need to make sure that
it's clean and that we preserve
it and that, in fact, it is here
for ourselves and for our
children and our grandchildren.
We've reached out to DEP multiple
times and invited DEP to sit
down with us for this story,
but never got a reply.
If you want to learn more about
the challenges facing our springs,
head 210 tampabay.com.