City sues to keep 3 rivers' levels up

Apalachicola says its oyster industry already is affected.

JACKSONVILLE - The city of Apalachicola has sued the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to block any future reductions in water flowing from the Chattahoochee, Flint and Apalachicola rivers, arguing they could devastate the oyster and shrimping industries in Florida's Big Bend.

"Our entire economy is dependent on that bay remaining healthy," Mayor Van Johnson told the Associated Press Thursday.

The 97-page lawsuit filed by City Attorney Pat Floyd asks Chief Judge Robert Hinkle in Tallahassee to declare unlawful the corps' recent actions to reduce flows to respond to drought, and to prohibit it from making future reductions.

"The Army Corps of Engineers has not provided a formula of what Apalachicola Bay needs to remain healthy," Johnson said.

Pat Robbins, a spokesman for the corps in Mobile, Ala., said it doesn't comment on ongoing lawsuits.

Floyd said he expected the case to the transferred to federal court in Jacksonville and joined with other lawsuits against the corps involving water from Georgia and Alabama flowing into Florida.

Apalachicola is the first Florida city to turn to the courts over the region's water. Both Columbus and Gainesville, Ga., have been parties to other lawsuits challenging the corps' management of water from Lake Lanier outside Atlanta.

The Florida suit argues that a tightening of freshwater inflows and resulting salinity already has disrupted and in some cases devastated Apalachicola Bay's most productive oyster beds.

The commercial fishing industry brings in $30-million to the state's economy and affects about 1,300 families of third- and fourth-generation oystermen.

[Last modified January 17, 2008, 22:43:07]