The forum was organized by Emerald Coast Keeper Chasidy Hobbs after the Environmental Working Group (EWG) released a study stating out of the 100 largest water suppliers in the United States, the ECUA was ranked last. Hobbs’s goal is to move past this and focus on what is going to be done.
“This panel was organized in order to move past the Environmental Working Group study,” Hobbs said.
This is Hobbs’s first major job as newly appointed Coastkeeper.
Seven other speakers, including both ECUA and EPA employees as well as Environmentalists, attended.
EPA’s Region 4 Drinking Water Section Chief Dan O’lone was first to speak. He began with the history of water regulations working his way to the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA). The SDWA was enacted on December 24, 1975 and has been amended two times (1986 and 1996) since then.
“There were 19 contaminates in that first round of regulations, one microbiological, there were 6 organic, 10 inorganic and turbidity, turbidity is just the murkiness in the water, and radiological gross output was regulated.”O’lone said.
There are 5800 public water systems in Florida, and in the panhandle there are 432, drinking water supervisor John Pope said. There are three types of systems that are regulated by the DEP. The most focused on system is Community water systems, followed by schools, factories, and daycares, and then gas stations, restaurants, and interstate rest stops.
In the 1970’s 20 contaminants were monitored, in 2010 80 contaminants are monitored including Nitrate and Nitrite, Inorganic contaminants, organic contaminants, synthetic organic contaminants, lead and copper, radiological contaminants, bacteriological contaminants and chlorine and pH levels.
Chlorine is sampled for daily, where as bacteria are sampled monthly from multiple sites, and chemical and radiological are tested quarterly, annually, or longer, according to Pope’s PowerPoint.
“Panhandle residents have some of the safest and most abundant potable water in the world,” Pope said.
Briefly discussing the study conducted by the EWG was Bill Johnson, an ECUA employee for nearly 20 years.
“When I saw the report on television one night a few weeks ago about a claim of worst drinking water, I was frankly astounded concerned, and finally angry,” Johnson said.
Johnson agrees with Pope that ECUA’s drinking water is perfectly safe and said that the fear the public is feeling is an “irrational fear.” He said that the risks faced from drinking water, are far less than those of smoking cigarettes or flying on a plane.
“I have been on airplanes, I have eaten peanut butter, but just as Dr. Sisskin said, that was my choice,” Jason Godwin, an environmental science major at the University of West Florida, said. “You have to have water to survive.”
Godwin attended the forum with high hopes, but was left feeling slightly unsatisfied and unimportant.
“Although they presented a lot of valuable information, I was left feeling overheard,” Godwin said. “I feel that ECUA heard our complaints and breezed right over them.”
Dr. Enid Sisskin, a biology instructor at UWF, was asked to speak about the health effect of low quantities of chemicals found in ECUA’s water. Her response was simple, “We don’t really know what a lot of the health effects are.”
The test that are actually conducted to find out the effects, are conducted with only one chemical, she said, whereas the public drinking water contains many chemicals at once.
“There have been very, very, very few studies done on combinations of chemicals,” Sisskin said.
ECUA uses a Sand and Gravel aquifer which, although convenient, are highly vulnerable to contamination.
“The most prevalent material in the wells was inorganic,” Carl Mohrherr, Research Associate for Center for Environmental Diagnostics and Bioremediation, said.
“There’s an indication that the soil is an incredible treatment device in itself” Drew Richard, Director of Engineering ECUA, said. That is not all that is needed, that is why they have treatment plants.
After the speakers of the forum were through, the floor was open to questions from the audience, many with the same response. “Irrational fear?” Tim Hauck, concerned citizen and father, was one of those with the same response.
“Irrational fear! What is he talking about?” Hauck said. “Look at the number of deaths caused by cancer in our area. Look at their ages, this is not an irrational fear, this is a legitimate fear.”
To take a stand, there are many things that can be done on day to day bases that will help, including not using chemicals, Mary Gutierrez, environmental planner, said.
“Many commonly used chemicals around the home are toxic,” Gutierrez said.
For more information on what you can do to help visit www.emeraldcoastkeeper.org
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