News

Be Informed.

Member Portal

Why Do We Put Up With This?

bobknight In: Why Do We Put Up With This? | Our Santa Fe River, Inc. (OSFR) | Protecting the Santa Fe River

bobkinight
Dr. Robert Knight

“The proposed Sleepy Creek Lands water-use permit is not in the public’s interest, is not reasonable or beneficial to society…”

“Now, more than ever, the public’s water is being usurped by the few for their personal profit.”

“The St Johns River River Water Management District’s modeling shows that existing water-use permits currently authorize over 30 million gallons of groundwater per day more than Silver Springs can safely tolerate, thus causing significant harm.  Nevertheless, the district is intent on adding insult to injury by continuing to issue new groundwater permits to Stronach and other for-profit ventures, rather than reducing existing permitted  amounts to avoid harm to the endangered springs.”

These are words from Dr. Robert Knight, who has today written a guest editorial in the  Gainesville Sun , “Permit Not in Public Interest” which you can read here.

It appears that those in whose hands the fate of our springs lies, i.e., judges, water managers, DEP  officials, governors, legislators, moneyed corporations, view the public interest not as people/citizens (yes, the public) who use and enjoy our unique water treasures such as Silver Springs, but as one man who will gain profit from his business.  And, one must assume,  as one judge wrote, that if this businessman is not given water to grow hay for his cattle, he will ship them up north to fatten for market, and Florida would lose some jobs.  So a few jobs justify further damaging Silver Springs.  One man and a few employees outweigh the entire Florida public and also those from out-of-state who visit because of our springs.

The authorities who dispense our water so freely and unfairly should keep in mind how tourism drives our economy, and if they can look past the dollar for the present moment they might realize that tourists will not come to Florida  to marvel at Frank Stronach’s cattle feeding on his irrigated pastures.  Nor will they come to kayak, snorkle, fish, swim or dive in the rivers and springs if our “water managers”  have destroyed them.

If you don’t want to put up with this, go to this link to find out what you can do.  It must be quick, because the Governing Board will rule on Tues.  Let them know how you feel.

You might be interested in …

2 Comments

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Skip to content