During the first week of Florida’s annual legislative session, the Florida Legislature passed a key bill revising the state’s water laws.
Passage of the bill was a high priority for House Speaker Steve Crisafulli, Senate President Andy Gardiner, and Florida Commissioner of Agriculture Adam Putnam.
The bill had been nearly agreed upon in 2015, when the legislative session ended abruptly because of a dispute over medical care funding. Passage during the first week of session in 2016 symbolized the importance of passing the bill to the Legislature’s leadership.
What's in the water bill?
The bill is 134 pages long and contains 39 different sections. It includes significant policy changes and protections, and affects every region of Florida.
State water permitting in the Everglades has been overhauled to more closely follow water permitting under the federal Clean Water Act, as it is done elsewhere in the state.
In central Florida, the state has codified the results to date of the effort by the state’s water managers and stakeholders to meet the long-term water needs of that region in the Central Florida Water Initiative (CFWI) and set out requirements for regulatory consistency in this area.
North Florida’s springs also received abundant attention, with timelines included for identifying protected spring zones and for springs clean up and recovery.
What's next?
The governor now has seven days to sign or veto the bill (or it can become law if not acted on within that time).
The passage of the bill during the first week of the session, therefore, has more than symbolic importance by providing the Florida Legislature a chance to override any veto without having to reconvene for that purpose. Any override would require the support of two-thirds of both the Florida House and Senate. It passed the Senate and House in overwhelmingly bipartisan votes of 37-0 and 110-2, respectively.
If made law, it takes effect July 1 and significant rulemaking from Florida’s agencies will follow.
The rulemaking will, among other things, be related to Florida’s springs and water supply regulations in central Florida.
Deciding how much water is needed to protect individual springs, how to pay for the cost of cleaning up the springs, or how to develop uniform water supply regulations is sure to prompt heated debate in the months and years to come.
Some environmental groups opposed the bill but have promised to advocate changes to the laws in the future and will be staying engaged in the upcoming rulemakings.
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For more information, please contact Gunster attorney Greg Munson.
Greg Munson is the former general counsel and deputy secretary for water policy at the Florida Department of Environmental Protection, and the former chairperson of the CFWI Steering Committee. Since 2013, he has been a shareholder practicing environmental law and government relations at the law firm of Gunster in Tallahassee. In 2016, he was recognized by his peers and honored with inclusion in the Best Lawyers in America list.
