Glades cleanup deadlines extended

Go to USDC 88-1886-CIV-HOEVELER 

Judge William Hoeveler made it clear he felt court scrutiny was still necessary, despite overhauled state laws, ongoing construction of vast filtration ponds and an $8 billion state-federal plan to replumb and restore the struggling system.

BY CURTIS MORGAN

Thirteen years after then-U.S. Attorney Dexter Lehtinen sued Florida for allowing farm runoff to pollute the Everglades, a federal judge has issued another ruling in the landmark case.

The details of this order, the latest in the long-running and long-dormant case, aren't particularly surprising or dramatic. Senior U.S. District Court Judge William Hoeveler, who has overseen the case since 1988, largely endorsed the status quo, giving the state an extended deadline until the last day of 2006 to complete the cleanup.

But what may be most important is that Hoeveler made it clear he felt court scrutiny was still necessary, despite overhauled state laws, ongoing construction of vast filtration ponds and an $8 billion state-federal plan to replumb and restore the struggling system.

``The need for an enduring document and the availability of this forum remain just as important today as they were 10 years ago,'' Hoeveler wrote in a 37-page opinion filed late Friday.

Lehtinen -- now general counsel for the Miccosukee Tribe, which intervened in the case along with a number of environmental groups -- said he was pleased with the ruling, largely because it kept federal pressure on Florida to complete the work without further postponements.

While the judge denied the motions of environmental groups to enforce earlier deadlines, Hoeveler also said ``the court fully expects that the parties will achieve compliance.''

``Remember, it was the state that had neglected its duty,'' Lehtinen said. ``When you violate the deadlines, you'll have to answer to this court.''

So much time has passed in the case that Lehtinen has, in a way, switched sides.

He filed the original suit, which drew national attention to the declining Everglades, and signed off on a 1991 settlement, which set a series of cleanup deadlines.

Since then, Lehtinen has often turned on the federal government, which, he said, wanted to ``abandon this lawsuit.''

Many of the original settlement's deadlines have long passed, including a 1997 one to complete four storm-water treatment areas covering some 32,600 acres south of Lake Okeechobee. They're designed to absorb some four-fifths of the phosphorous that runs off farm and sugar-cane fields into the marsh, killing native plants like sawgrass and spurring the growth of exotics like cattails.

In his ruling, Hoeveler noted the state agencies named in the original suit -- the South Florida Water Management District and the Florida Department of Environmental Protection -- had made progress in the cleanup and, in fact, has expanded some cleanup plans under a 1994 law that Florida adopted, the Everglades Forever Act, in 1994, largely in response to the lawsuit.

Under that act, there will be six filtering areas covering 40,452 acres, with the last to be completed by October 2003. Four have been working since June 1999, and construction deadlines, Hoeveler wrote, ``the court is very pleased to see, have been met so far.''

The judge also granted other delays, set in the Everglades Forever Act, including one to establish final water-quality standards for state permits (Dec. 31, 2003). Imposing new deadlines, he wrote, ``would set aside years of planning.''

None of the parties involved in the complicated case -- which included the tribe and 11 environmental groups backing the federal government, and Belle Glade, Clewiston and five farm businesses and firms backing the state -- were surprised by the ruling.

Randy Smith, spokesman for the water management district, said the legal staff hadn't had time to analyze the ruling to comment. The state Department of Environmental Protection did not return a call.

Judy Sanchez, spokeswoman for U.S. Sugar, one of several agricultural businesses or groups that intervened on the state's behalf, also said she was satisfied with the ruling. The company, she said, backed the Everglades Forever legislation, and ``we hope there is no further need for federal court intervention.''

Neal McAliley, a Justice Department attorney who handled the case for the federal government, also praised the ruling.