All water samples are now processed by students from the Green Schools Club. In 2017, the chapter moved their BWTF lab to Jupiter High School. Their first monitoring sites included a boat launch site on the Loxahatchee River a beach located within Jupiter Inlet at Dubois Park that is popular with families and snorkelers and an Atlantic Ocean beach at the Juno Pier. The chapter started by testing three popular recreational sites on a weekly basis to supplement the information provided by the state every two weeks. The resulting gaps in the state’s program motivated Surfrider’s Palm Beach County Chapter to launch their Blue Water Task Force (BWTF) water testing program in 2016 with lab space offered by the Loggerhead Marinelife Center. This has forced the Department of Health to reduce the number of beaches they test, sample less often and suspend all beach monitoring between November and March in the northern part of the state. Florida has since relied solely on a federal BEACH Act grant to fund beach water quality monitoring and public notification programs. While big agriculture, developers and industry have been taking advantage of Florida’s relaxed environmental regulations, the environment, public health, and Florida’s valuable tourism-based economy have been paying the cost.Ĭompounding these threats to public health, the Florida Legislature also eliminated state funding for the Florida Healthy Beaches Program in 2011. Policies need to be implemented that would limit the amount of phosphorus and nitrogen in freshwater systems, and at the coast, which fuel these harmful algal blooms. In addition, there has been a failure to enact and enforce effective nutrient pollution controls in Florida. Unfortunately, these releases also devastate the downstream river, estuary and coastal ecosystems by spreading toxic blue-green algae blooms. Lucie and Caloosahatchee Rivers to relieve flooding pressures.

When water levels rise during the rainy summer months, polluted water from the lake is intentionally discharged into the St. For instance, cyanobacteria proliferate in the nutrient-rich fresh waters of Lake Okeechobee in Central Florida. While the causes of Florida’s algae woes are complicated and long-standing, they are primarily attributed to mismanagement by the state and federal governments of fresh water as it flows from source to sea. This earned the affected stretch of coast the dubious nickname of ‘Guacamole Coast.’ Even though most of the state experienced a temporary reprieve from toxic algae blooms over the winter, both red tide and blue-green algae blooms have started to form along the Gulf Coast and in Lake Okeechobee as water temperatures rise with the season.Ĭyanobacteria form a green scum along the shoreline during a bloom. Florida’s governor declared a state of emergency and beaches in several East Coast counties were closed over the July 4th holiday weekend. The problems associated with blue-green algae blooms, or Cyanobacteria, received massive media attention during the summer of 2016. Public health was also affected as far as a mile inland through the release of airborne toxins from the blooms. Bloom conditions reached as far as the Atlantic Coast late last summer, which caused beach closures and fish mortalities. Red tides were particularly devastating in 20, as coastal communities along the Gulf Coast of Florida suffered through an unusually persistent and toxic red tide that lasted for more than a year. Ongoing water pollution and harmful algal blooms, including red tides and toxic blue-green algae, are putting public health at risk and causing massive die-offs of fish, marine life and sea turtles. While beach tourism drives the state’s economy, people who visit and live in the Sunshine State are losing the long-standing recreational opportunities that they cherish. Florida is well-known for its year-round warm climate and beautiful, sandy beaches.

Algal bloom red tide algae