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Crist, Governors Agree To Work On Drought Protocol

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By CATHERINE DOLINSKI, The Tampa Tribune

Published: December 18, 2007

TALLAHASSEE - Gov. Charlie Crist, Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue and Alabama Gov. Bob Riley agreed on Monday to work together on a new "drought emergency plan" for the three states to take effect as soon as mid-March.

The question that remains: Will the new plan channel more water downstream into Florida's sensitive aquatic ecosystems, or keep it in Georgia to sustain Atlanta's sprawling metropolitan population?

The three governors met with U.S. Department of the Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne and other federal officials at the Florida governor's mansion on Monday for a closed-door summit on water rights and conservation. By day's end, they had set a mid-February deadline to finalize "a drought emergency plan" for the Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint river system.

The governors will submit their plan to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers by Feb. 15, at which point the corps will revise its current strategy and submit it to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for approval by March 15.

"Conservation is the key to our future progress, and all of us are aware and appreciate that," said Crist, who traded compliments with Kempthorne and the other governors throughout an afternoon news conference.

Absent any timely agreement between the states, Kempthorne said, federal officials will have to set emergency drought protocol themselves.

Florida, Georgia and Alabama "have now publicly committed to writing a three-state emergency drought plan," Kempthorne said. "The fact that the three states want to be the authors, and have committed to accomplish that by Feb. 15 is truly significant."

How exactly the three leaders will reach their armistice by the deadline remained unclear, given the last 18 years of feuding among their states over water rights.

The ongoing drought throughout the Southeast has rekindled the feud over water flow from north Georgia reservoirs into Alabama's and Florida's river basins. The drought has reduced water levels in the Apalachicola River and Bay.

This fall, the Corps of Engineers proposed incrementally cutting the flow further until June 1 to preserve water supplies for Atlanta.

Monday's meeting essentially reset the timeline, laying open the possibility of a very different conservation plan taking effect in mid-March.

Good, But Small Step

"It sounds like a good, very small, first step," said Kevin Begos, director of the Franklin County Oyster & Seafood Task Force. "But we need more details, to see what really comes out of the negotiations."

Water flowing from Georgia generates power for Alabama. In Florida, it feeds the Apalachicola River and Bay, home to a delicate mix of aquatic species, including oysters and federally protected mussels and sturgeon. U.S. Fish and Wildlife officials acknowledged last month that the corps' plan to cut water flow in Florida would kill some protected animals, but officials did not believe it would wipe out those populations entirely.

Poor Counties Threatened

Local officials and watermen in the Florida Panhandle say the water reduction plan would do more than threaten protected wildlife; it would decimate the economy in poor counties like Franklin that rely heavily on the seafood industry. The lower flow into the Apalachicola has harmed oyster and crab harvests, the say.

"Florida's oyster industry faces an uncertain spring, due to the current drought," Crist said. "I'm pleased that collectively we've removed the June 1 date that reduced the flow of water into Florida previously set by the army corps form our timeline. I'm concerned about the spawning season along the Apalachicola River and Bay, and I appreciate the consensus on that point ... spawning season is critical to our northwest Florida economy."

Ironically, Monday's talks followed storms that brought water flow into Florida up to a sufficient level of 5,400 cubic feet per second - 700 cubic feet more than it had been 40 hours before, Crist said. "Thank God. This is a great help for the short term, obviously."

After Monday's news conference, Kempthorne insisted that progress had taken place.

"We did not come in here with the idea that we could find a solution today," he said. "Today, we defined who the teams are that are going on to the field, and there's deadlines that must be met."

Crist has not said whether he will take his water war to court if he does not prevail in negotiations. Begos said local groups and officials in the Apalachicola area are still "exploring" the prospect of taking legal action if necessary.

Reporter Catherine Dolinski can be reached at (850) 222-8382 or cdolinski@tampatrib.com.

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