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Many area water violators escaping citations
By DAN DeWITT © St. Petersburg Times, published November 16, 2000 L.C. Alexander, a Citrus County water activist, lives next to a pool of the Tsala Apopka chain of lakes that has been mostly dry for the past year -- long enough that its bed now supports a tall, woody stand of pig weed. "All anybody has to do is walk the bottom of this lake here, which in essence feeds the aquifer, and it would be very plain how serious the problem is," said Alexander, the former president of the water conservation group Too Far. "The lakes are as low as they have ever been, and if people don't start thinking about it, we're going to be in a very bad situation." Alexander is exactly right, according to the Southwest Florida Water Management District. With the rainy season seven months away, the ongoing drought is more dangerous now than it was last spring, when the flow in the Withlacoochee River dropped to an all-time low and lakes all over Citrus, Hernando and Pasco counties dried up entirely, said Swiftmud spokesman Michael Molligan. If enforcement of the district's watering restrictions is an indication, that message is not getting through to local governments. All three counties have issued far fewer citations proportionate to their populations than the bigger counties and cities in the Tampa Bay area. This is true even though local officials acknowledge that violations are probably common. "I think a lot of people are doing it the right way, but I'm sure there's some folks that aren't," said Frank McDowell, Hernando County's code enforcement director, whose agency is primarily responsible for upholding the rules in Hernando. Of the three counties, Citrus' enforcement is the most relaxed. "We have not issued a citation," said Gail Tierney, spokeswoman for the Sheriff's Office, which enforces the restrictions in Citrus. The department's deputies have issued warnings, but those are not documented. In Hernando County, 143 warnings have been issued since late August, as well as three citations, all of which came in November. Pasco issued 88 water-restriction warnings and 16 citations in September and October, said Mike Nastasuk, acting code enforcement supervisor. Though statistics are not available for November, "the activity is picking up as we get deeper into the dry season. I made seven (water-related) stops today," Nastasuk said Thursday. Although Pasco is strict compared with Citrus and Hernando, it lags behind Hillsborough County and the city of Tampa, for example, which together have issued more than 1,500 citations. Unincorporated Pinellas, home to fewer people than unincorporated Pasco, issued 63 citations in October alone. All three North Suncoast counties, as required by Swiftmud, imposed once-a-week watering restrictions last year. Citrus also lowered the fine for a first offense from $500 to $25, to make enforcement more feasible. This was all in response to one of the worst droughts in the state's history. The northern region of the Swiftmud district, which includes all of Citrus and Hernando counties and part of Pasco, received less-than-average rainfall for 20 straight months, until the streak was broken in June. The first quarter of this year was the driest this century. Lawns went brown, wells went dry and long stretches of the Withlacoochee turned into a dusty road. Though the area received exactly the historical average rainfall, 29 inches, during the summer rainy season, it was not nearly enough to repair the landscape. And the current dry season started out very dry. Many parts of the northern region of the water district went without a significant rainfall for seven full weeks, from Sept. 20 until last week. The regionwide average of 0.06 inches of rain last month made this the driest October ever. Lakes in the district are now nearly 4 feet lower than they usually are at the end of the dry season; groundwater levels are 1.67 feet below the bottom end of the normal range. Added to that, the National Weather Service is forecasting a warm, dry winter. "We request local law enforcement to enforce the restrictions as vigorously as possible because we are entering a very dangerous dry season,"Molligan said. Officials in all three counties say they are aware of that. "As far as I'm concerned, we need to be extremely aggressive in our enforcement," said Citrus County Commissioner Gary Bartell. Why hasn't the county been aggressive? Maybe some sheriff's deputies don't realize how severe the current situation is, Bartell said. Also, for a long time, Citrus' fine for first-time offenders, $500, seemed so unreasonable that it was seldom enforced. That was reduced near the end of May to $25 for the first violation and $50 for the second. The summer rains began a short time later, and deputies never got into the habit of issuing citations, Bartell said. All three counties should be tougher on violators, Alexander said, because of what is at stake: the state's main source of water. "It is absolutely not adequate," he said of Citrus' enforcement. "I don't think our commission has come up against the fact that they may be looking at something beyond a normal dry period. All the aquifer data shows a downward trend, long- term, and it's dropping like a stone right now."
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