THE REAL ISSUE IS BETTER CONTROL OF PHOSPHATE MINING IN THE STATE OF FLORIDA. The DEP, without proper analysis of documents of financial capacity prior to permitting and licensing, did permit and license Mulberry Phosphates to conduct a business without consideration of environmental concerns in the State of Florida. In February 2001 when Mulberry Phosphates went bankrupt, they simply walked away leaving the costs for cleanup of two gyp stacks at Piney Point to the taxpayers in the State of Florida. The taxpayers in the State of Florida will expend $160+ million to clean up one phosphogypsum stack at this site. The DEP has had ample time since February 2001 to resolve this problem and they have not. (There are currently about 1 billion tons of phosphogypsum stacked in twenty-four stacks in the state. About 30 million new tons are generated each year. This does not bode well for the future of Florida's environment.) The problem of cleaning up the phosphate sites in the State of Florida is so large, the state is basically ignoring it. It is time to put a moratorium on all phosphate mining and permits and evaluate the current problems in the state. Otherwise, the taxpayers are going to continue to continue to pay for one environmental problem after another! Tallahassee: The Florida Legislature this month considered bills that call for waiving liability for "Good Samaritan" companies that help during environmental emergencies. Both failed. If the FDEP truly believed that the water they intend to dump into the Gulf of Mexico was environmentally safe, why would they need such bills? Liability of course! Additionally, an amendment to one of these bills called for a state law to mandate phosphate chemical companies to draft emergency manuals to "tell the state how to operate the plants in the event the companies go bankrupt." The FDEP does not require Emergency Manual Procedures of the four phosphate companies currently conducting business in Florida: IMC Phosphates Company; Cagill Fertilizer, Inc.; PCS Phosphate-White Springs; and CF industries Inc.) Under the emergency permit for disposal, the DEP is considering a plan that would call for commercial fishermen to assist with the monitoring by collecting and documenting samples when they travel in the gulf. Southern Fisheries Association includes roughly 500 companies in five states, spokesman Bob Jones stated: We do not know what the bottom and the quality of the water looks like now. If you are going to have any recourse if something goes wrong, we need to have an idea of what things looked like before. Some commercial fishermen and marine environmental experts object to the monitoring proposal. They say despite their extensive knowledge of gulf waters the DEP needs input from fishermen but they (fisherman) are not qualified to provide the kind of scientific monitoring needed. Those who have studied the Gulf should conduct the monitoring. For example, Florida State University biologist Felicia Coleman and Chris Koenig who have studied grouper and redfish spawning habitats in the gulf for twelve years. Felicia Coleman said some of the protected fishing habitats could be in jeopardy because they abut areas where wastewater dumping is planned. She states: it is the state's job to protect those resources for those people who use them. IN THE NEWS April 28, 2003, State Rep. Gus Bilikrakis, R-Palm Harbor, said we'll do everything we can to prevent it (the disposal plan). St. Petersburg Times April 28, 2003, Ready for a fight, Several groups from Tampa Bay's sponge, shrimp and commercial fishing industries want county, state and local officials to pressure the Florida Department of Environmental Protection to reconsider its disposal plan and listen to them. I was outraged knowing that they had done this without an environmental impact study of any facts or input from the fishing industry stated one multistate industry representative. We're astounded that the state fast-tracked this without any public debate and without give out all the facts, stated another. The government has a responsibility to get them the facts.... They (DEP) have to show us what helped them make the decision stated one county commissioner. St. Petersburg Times MAY 25, 2003, excerpt from article printed in Tampa Bay paper. A controversial plan to dispose of the wastewater in the Gulf of Mexico has been getting the industry some much-deserved bad press. We can only hope the broader picture is not ignored. This episode will hopefully get the “potential consequences” message across to the public in general. At stake are thousands of acres slated to be mined in the future and the byproducts they will produce. The public needs to make an informed decision. Do the possible long term ecological consequences justify temporary jobs and revenue? By Rusty Chinnis May 27, 2003 Charlotte and Sarasota County Commissioners meet in Sarasota to discuss phosphate mining. Update to come.