Legal Challenge Prompts Revisions to Wekiwa and Rock Springs BMAP

The Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) held a workshop on September 24, 2024, to discuss the update of the Basin Management Action Plan (BMAP) for Wekiwa and Rock Springs, which is scheduled to be completed in July, 2025. DEP now estimates that the Nitrogen load to groundwater must be reduced by 76 percent to achieve the Nitrate concentration goal of 0.286mg/L in the spring vents. The 2018 BMAP recommended that the Nitrogen loading only be reduced by about 20 percent, or 209,000 lb/year. The proposed update would require a Nitrogen load reduction of about 922,000 lb/year – over 4 times the earlier recommendation and closer to what the Friends of the Wekiva River determined was necessary to improve water quality in the springs. This revision was a result of the legal challenge of the 2018 BMAPs brought by Florida Springs Council (FSC).

Another change that was prompted by the FSC challenge is the allocation of Nitrogen load reductions to responsible entities. The BMAP update will allocate the 922,000 lb/year reduction of Nitrogen loads to groundwater among the various cities and counties within the Wekiwa and Rock Springs springshed. The draft allocation proposes that Orange County must reduce the Nitrogen load to groundwater by over 500,000 lb/year. For perspective: Orange County’s $123 million septic to sewer program in the Wekiwa Springs area is expected to take 12 years and only reduce Nitrogen load to groundwater by about 20,000 lb/year! According to DEP, these kinds of projects are only aspirational. and there are no consequences for not meeting the projected goals.

Now the challenge – the attached graph shows that Total Nitrogen in Wekiwa Springs is still about 4 times the DEP recommended goal, and is actually trending higher, despite the numerous projects identified in DEP’s 2015 Wekiva River Basin BMAP and the 2018 Wekiwa and Rock Springs BMAP. According to DEP’s calculations for the 2025 BMAP update, reducing the Nitrogen load to groundwater by 922,000 lb/year would require connecting all the existing septic tanks in the springshed to sewer and eliminating all urban turfgrass (i.e., lawn and landscaping) fertilizers! So don’t be expecting any quick improvements to water quality in Wekiwa and Rock Springs or the Wekiva River!!