Florida threatens lawsuit in water wars

By Billy House, Media General News Service
Published: June 22, 2008

Florida officials are threatening to sue the federal government unless the Corps of Engineers reconsiders its plan to withhold more water from federal reservoirs and lakes in Georgia.

More flow is needed into Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint River Basin, state officials warn, or the Gulf Sturgeon fish and three varieties of federally protected mussels in the Apalachicola River and bay will be further jeopardized.

“In sum, the Corps has committed both procedural and substantive violations of the (Endangered Species Act),” asserts a 60-day Notice of Intent to sue letter, signed by Florida Department of Environmental Protection Secretary Michael Sole.

The seven-page letter adds: “The purpose of this letter is to put the Corps on notices of those violations and provide it with an opportunity to take corrective measures.”

The Corps will not comment on any possible litigation, said E. Patrick Robbins, a spokesman from its Mobile, Ala., district office, after the letter’s public release Friday.

Sole’s letter is the latest chapter in a long-running water war between Florida, Georgia and Alabama, exacerbated by two years of regional drought conditions.

At issue now is a new drought plan allowing operators of federal dams in Georgia to withhold more water for metropolitan Atlanta at the expense of downstream areas.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has already determined that retention of more water from the reservoirs north of Atlanta would have some adverse effects on Gulf Sturgeon and three types of endangered mussels—the fat threeridge, Chipolaslabshell and the purple bankclimber.

But the agency also had determined it won’t endanger the continued existence of those species.