Every time we get a heavy rain event in Southwest Florida, I make a little wager in my head. It’s not about how many inches of rain will be recorded, or how many homes will be flooded out. It’s how much sewage will get spilled.
Tropical Storm Debby was a major rainmaker, and my bet was 5 million gallons. Turns out I should have gone higher: Local news sources reported at least 6.6 million gallons of untreated or partially treated sewage was spilled in Manatee and Sarasota counties, most of it into local waterways.
More than half of that total — 3.5 million gallons — was spilled from a single treatment plant in Bradenton. That’s a whole lot of sewage, and it went directly into the Manatee River.
I have not seen any numbers released for Charlotte or Lee counties. But if you think that means there wasn’t any, I have a bridge to sell you.
Why does this keep happening? Because there’s no real incentive to prevent it. These rain events are “acts of God,” “unprecedented,” “unforeseeable.” Yeah, we never could have seen this coming. It’s not like we’ve had (checks notes) 81 tropical storms and hurricanes come through Southwest Florida (between Naples and St. Petersburg) since 1858. That’s one every two years.
A well-designed sewer system keeps stormwater separate from actual sewage (wastewater from homes and businesses). While accidents can and do happen — sewers comprise many miles of pipe, with lots of joints and potential failure points — they shouldn’t be so predictable. Imagine if our drinking water infrastructure failed every time there was a storm. People would flip out.
But the general public doesn’t seem to care when there are sewage overflows and spills. I don’t understand that. Living near the water is one of the main reasons people come here. When you lived up north and you imagined Florida life, did the beach and boating and fishing factor in? Of course they did.
However, enjoying those things depends on clean, healthy waterways. Dumping a few million gallons of poop water into them every time a tropical system goes past (remember, every two years on average) is not conducive to good water quality.
Even if you’re not planning to go in the water or touch anything that comes out of it, you can still be affected. You may recall that we’ve had a few major red tide blooms in this area. Red tide outbreaks are often preceded by sudden heavy rains and the sewage spills that accompany them.
While it’s impossible to say that these spills are the definitive cause of red tide, it’s true that there is significant correlation between the two. And we are sure that increasing the nitrogen in our waters is favorable to various types of algae, some of which are contributing to seagrass loss in Charlotte Harbor.
There’s no silver lining to these massive sewage spills. Let’s be honest about why they keep happening: Money. Upgrading the capacities of our sewer systems is expensive. It’s way cheaper to just let the spills happen (or, in some cases, intentionally dump sewage prior to expected rains). Oops! So sorry, didn’t see it coming, no way we could have prevented it, act of God, let’s not talk about it any more.
Not good enough. The health of our waters is too important. If you’re sick of it, the buck stops with our city and county commissioners. Let them hear it.
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