The Town-Crier
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May 3 - May 9, 2013 Page 7
NEWS
Environmental Expert: Keeping Canals Clean Not An Easy Task By Ron Bukley Town-Crier Staff Report Palm Beach County Environmental Program Supervisor Brian Gentry explained how the state plans to clean up water bodies including the C-51 Basin during a presentation at the Loxahatchee Groves Landowners’ Association meeting Thursday, April 25. The C-51 Basin has been deemed impaired for excessive nutrients by the Florida Department of Environmental Protection, but no action is expected for several years, until water managers figure out what the regional canal system should look like, Gentry said. “They are putting that on hold, and the reason isn’t too surprising,” he said, explaining that the Florida Department of Environmental Protection has not developed sensible rules for the C-51 Basin. “They’re good with rivers and streams, and pretty good with estuaries when it comes to setting criteria. But when they come down here and look at our canals, they scratch their heads and don’t know what to do.” The Florida Department of Environmental Protection is developing a South Florida canal study spearheaded by the state with support from the South Florida Water Management District with the goal of developing good management guidelines. “Even though the C-51 West Basin is impaired, for the next two or three years I don’t see anything [happening] until this canal study is completed,” Gentry said.
Florida adopted water quality standards in 1979 and has been adapting and amending them ever since. “If you have certain water bodies that aren’t meeting standards, something has to be done about it,” he said. “Around 2001, the state adopted the Impaired Waters Rule. It lays out how many times a water body can fail to meet a standard. If it fails to meet a standard a certain percentage of the time, it’s put on a planning list.” Data gathering has improved over the last 10 years and it is continuing to improve, Gentry said. When a water body fails to meet the standards, it goes through additional review before being verified as being impaired by the secretary of the Florida Department of Environmental Protection. The next step is the development of a total maximum daily load (TMDL) to place limits on how much pollution — in the case of the C-51 Basin, the amount of nutrients — would be allowed in order to meet the standards, and the state has had difficulty knowing how to address canals. The criterion used to measure the impairment of the C-51 Canal and the water bodies that drain into it is the amount of chlorophyll A in the water. Chlorophyll A is the green pigment found in algae and other green plants that allows plants to use sunlight to convert nutrients into organic compounds. “Chlorophyll A is actually a surrogate for nutrients because they didn’t have standards for nutri-
ents,” Gentry said. “Unfortunately, this is the same criteria used for rivers and streams, and canal managers have long said you can’t view our canals under the same criteria as you do natural rivers and streams. It’s not fair; we’re going to fail.” Canal managers chafe at being held to the same standard as regulators in charge of rivers and streams. “Canal managers, when it comes to this kind of criterion standards, have a bit of a chip on their shoulder, and I agree with them,” Gentry said. “They have a valid point: it’s not fair.” Standards are set for rivers and streams by looking at the biology of a creek and knowing what a healthy creek looks like. Gentry said water chemistry changes from day to day, from hour to hour, but the chemistry will dictate what kind of biology and what kinds of insects, plants and animals exist and whether they will be representative of a healthy water body or one that’s impaired by excessive nutrients. “That’s how they set their target,” he said. “This is how much nitrogen, this is how much phosphorus this creek or stream should have in order to maintain a healthy biology. That’s the approach they take; good common sense. But they come down to the canals and scratch their heads. What kind of biology do they have?” One way to determine a healthy canal might be the fish population. “If you’ve got bass and bream, they need a lot of dissolved oxygen. If you have Florida native
catfish and gar, they can handle almost no dissolved oxygen,” Gentry said. Fish kills are usually from oxygen depletion. “Generally when people see fish kills, they think the water ’s toxic. No, the fish just suffocated. Canals often have a lack of dissolved oxygen,” he said. Groundwater that seeps into the canals is very low in dissolved oxygen, but often oxygen depletion arises from excessive nutrients that algae consume then die, creating a demand for oxygen-consuming bacteria that feed on the algae. “It’s food for bacteria, and these are anaerobic bacteria, and they suck all the oxygen out, and the fish die when it gets below three parts per million,” he said. The state and the SFWMD will try to use the canal study to find some sort of biological reference point to set a target for nutrient levels, he said, reiterating that the study will not be done for several years. The county has acquired a permit for its storm sewers, Gentry said. “The county has Folsom Road, they own Okeechobee Road, therefore the county is responsible for what comes out of those storm sewers,” he said. “We are on the hook for the water quality.” Most of the nutrient discharge is from sources currently unregulated, such as some residential areas and farms referred to as “nonpoint sources,” he said. Existing issues notwithstanding, Florida is actually ahead of
Palm Beach County Environmental Program Supervisor Brian Gentry speaking at last week’s Loxahatchee Groves Landowners’ Association meeting. PHOTO BY RON BUKLEY/TOWN-CRIER much of the rest of the nation for water quality protection. Gentry explained that the DEP is developing a Basin Management Action Plan for all water bodies in the state. “Not only do you have the individuals who have a permit that are on the hook for reductions, under the Florida Statutes they can require other stakeholders to come to the table to see how we’re going to work together to reduce the amount of pollutants to meet this level. They require agricultural interests to come in,” Gentry said. The Florida Department of Ag-
riculture & Consumer Services also oversees best management practices (BMPs), which are largely voluntary but are being employed by stakeholders to reduce the amount of pollutant discharge without having to build expensive stormwater treatment or holding ponds, he said. “They’ve proven in the Everglades Agricultural Area that phosphorus [discharge] has gone down tremendously in the EAA through the ’90s and into the 2000s just because they changed their practices,” Gentry said.
June 7 Opening Day Nears For Science Museum’s Expansion When the public is invited for a free community day Friday, June 7 at the South Florida Science Museum, they will be walking into a newly expanded space under a different sign. Leadership for the more than 50-year-old institution announced its name change at a recent gala event for supporters and unveiled exciting plans for the new South Florida Science Center & Aquarium. “We are a high touch, interac-
tive center, and we wanted a name to reflect that,” CEO Lew Crampton said. “And by tripling the size of the former aquarium space, we knew that popular attraction had to be spotlighted in our name. The new South Florida Science Center & Aquarium name will be official on June 7, when we host our community day to thank the public for their role in bringing exciting change to this beloved institution.”
A rendering of the expanded museum’s front entrance.
Day Care
New Facility On SR 7
continued from page 1 at schools. We wanted separate, designated drive lanes.” Additionally, staff would be outside to direct traffic during the school rush. “There are ways of disciplining so that this is done in an orderly fashion,” he said. “It’s not like public schools; kids get three strikes and they are out. The parents can’t be there for a half an hour chatting.” Central to the daycare’s approval is a traffic light at Palomino Drive, which Wellington officials have pressed for heavily. “When we went before the council, we agreed to pay our fair share of approximately $140,000 to move the project forward and fund the light,” Schmidt said.
But because it requires payment from several other property owners before it can be moved through the system, Schmidt said that the applicant was concerned about having the traffic signal operating in time for school. “We don’t know when other contributors will come online,” he said. “It could be held up for five years until Wellington accumulates the money. So we said, ‘What if we go ahead and pay the full amount?’” Schmidt said that the applicant would pay the more than $312,000 to finance the traffic signal. “We want to move forward,” he said. Until the traffic signal is in place, Schmidt said that the number of students allowed on site would be limited. “We’re working on the numbers and what the limitations might be,” he said. PZA Board Member Carol Coleman asked for clarification. “Would the school be active be-
In addition, a $900,000 grant from the Quantum Foundation will bring blockbuster exhibits to the expanded venue over the next three years. “Quantum sees us as the anchor for informal science education in Palm Beach County,” Chairman Matt Lorentzen said. “We want to be a convener for organizations, educators and corporations interested in educating our next generation’s workforce in science, technology and math. We are grateful and excited about this partnership.” The Quantum Foundation grant will allow the museum to explore booking exhibits such as “Mythbusters” and “Titanic,” among others, in hopes of drawing new audiences and engaging all ages in the new mission of “opening every mind to science.” The Quantum Foundation also provided underwriting in late 2012 for the museum’s newest permanent exhibit, Science on a Sphere,
a room-sized global display system that uses computers and video projectors to display planetary data onto a six-foot-diameter sphere, which looks like a giant animated globe. The museum spent the past year and $5 million in capital campaign funds on increasing its exhibit space, aquarium and adding new permanent exhibits to the West Palm Beach venue. The museum will grow from 20,000 to 30,000 square feet, and visitors will see changes from the moment they park. “We’re truly grateful to the community, funders and our own board leadership for paving the way for these exciting milestones,” Crampton said. “Now it’s time for us to step purposefully into our second 50 years by serving the public and educating our children to become the scientists and engineers of tomorrow. It’s time for us to grow from a good museum into the great venue this
county and our children and families deserve.” In addition to a free chance to view the exciting expanded facilities, guests at the community opening event will be treated to the museum’s first blockbuster exhibit to open in the newly expanded space, “Savage Ancient Seas: The Ancient Aquatic Deep.” When “Savage Ancient Seas” makes its big splash Friday, May 17, guests of all ages will feel like they have taken a dive into time with the mystifying “dinos of the deep.” And divers, beware: the exhibit will educate visitors about how these ancient aquatic creatures lived and died, and which among them survived until today. The exhibit will be on display until mid-September. Exploring the water world of the late Cretaceous period, which existed over 70 million years ago, “Savage Ancient Seas” will be filled with huge carnivorous marine reptiles, with double-hinged
jaws and teeth; gigantic flesh-eating fish, big enough to swallow an adult human being whole; flying reptiles with three-foot skulls; and the biggest sea turtles to have ever lived. The waters of the earth during that time were teeming with beasts just as ferocious as their better-known counterparts on land. Arriving at the museum just in time for beach season, the popular exhibit is expected to cause more than a few Florida swimmers some curiosity about what really just brushed up against them. The museum is currently open during expansion construction. The South Florida Science Museum is located at 4801 Dreher Trail North in West Palm Beach. Museum admission through June 6 is $11.95 for adults, $10.50 for seniors 62 and older, $8.95 for children ages 3-12, and free for children under 3 and museum members. For more information, call (561) 832-1988 or visit www.sfsm.org.
fore the light is in place?” she asked. Schmidt said that though the school would prefer to see the signal operating, the applicant hoped to be able to open with a lesser number of students. “There’s a number of students we’d like to see allowed if the signal is not done,” Schmidt said. “We’re trying to open in August 2014. If the signal is not done by then, we’d look to see if we could open with maybe 400 or 600 students in the first year. We wouldn’t start with 1,200 right away.” Board members asked why he believed the signal would not be complete, and Schmidt noted that there were three agencies that needed to approve it before it could be constructed. “Wellington has to get the money and go to the county,” he said. “Then the county has to go out for bid and get permits through [the Florida Department of Trans-
portation]. Then the county has to build it. There’s a lot of lag time.” But Schmidt agreed that having the signal in place was preferred. “I think everyone is on the same page,” he said. “The light needs to be done.” PZA Board Member Mike Drahos asked whether vehicles would be crossing SR 7 without a signal. Wellington Traffic Consultant Andrea Troutman said that they would. “They could make a left turn at the driveway,” she said. “Or they can go down to Palomino [Drive] and make a U-turn.” Troutman noted that the signal is important to allow vehicles time to make those left turns. “The signal will provide gaps for the driveway that they would not have had,” she said. “When northbound traffic is stopped at the signal, there will be gaps for people turning left into the site.” There will also be access from
Palomino Drive north to the property, Troutman added. “They are required to provide access down to Palomino,” she said. “So vehicles could make a U-turn at the light, or turn left onto Palomino and then use that access.” Coleman noted that there are several properties surrounding the area that will be developed. “I think there will be much more traffic on SR 7 than what exists now,” she said. “I don’t care what delay you will have from the signal, I still think there’s going to be too much traffic.” Troutman said that the traffic study done by the applicant took into account developments approved through 2016. “They looked at all the approved projects in the area and added the proposed traffic into their analysis,” Troutman said. “There are things that have not been approved yet. There was
nothing specifically included for K-Park.” But Coleman said she still thought it would be a dangerous situation. PZA Board Chair Craig Bachove asked what would happen if the signal was delayed and traffic backed up. Troutman said drivers should go to the next available turn lane and make a U-turn. Schmidt noted that the applicant considered putting an interim signal right at the school site, but found it would be more beneficial to have the signal at Palomino Drive. “We decided we would contribute those dollars to do that,” he said. “We felt it was a much better solution.” PZA Board Member Paul Adams made a motion to approve the resolution, which passed unanimously. It is tentatively set to go before the council in June.