Springs | The Stream: State of Water

Florida Conservation Coalition Calls Floridians to Action

Although the day began with the threat of rain that never materialized, more than 1400 people showed up at Silver River State Park today to join former Fla. Gov. and U.S. Sen. Bob Graham and other leaders of the Florida Conservation Coalition in a call to action to protect Florida’s water resources.

Eleanor K. Sommer

Participants at the Florida Conservation Coalition Forum, Silver River State Park near Ocala in Florida.

The day included talks, educational sessions, hikes to the river, and music by Whitey Markle and the Swamprooters. Participants also had the opportunity to learn about Florida’s springs and the Floridan aquifer from a contingent of nonprofit organizations that lined the edges of the big tent where speakers presented short talks, shared memories, and urged citizens to contact elected officials regarding Florida’s dwindling water supplies.

Eleanor K. Sommer

Former Fla. Gov. Bob Graham delivers the message about Florida's dwindling water resources.

Sen. Graham began the program by telling the audience about his family’s history in the state of Florida and his first memories of the springs. Florida’s environment, he said, is the state’s most important economic asset.

Speaker Charles Lee of the Florida Audubon Society asked the audience to identify the most wasteful use of water in the state. He then pulled out a square of turf grass to emphasize his point: unnecessary landscape irrigation.

Lee also talked about the decline of flow rates in Florida’s waterways using Silver River as an example. Since 2000, Lee told the audience, the flow rate of the Silver Springs, which feeds the Silver River, flow has dropped from 800 cubic feet per second to 250 cubic feet per second.

If that rate continues he said, the springs could disappear within two to 12 years depending on whether you use aggressive or conservative measurements based on historical flow rates.

Lee also suggested that something is wrong with the rainfall calculations in the state. He said, for instance, that the Withlacoochee River has gone dry four times in the last 80 years: in 2001, 2005, 2009, and 2012, indicating rainfall has significantly changed in the last decade.

“Unfortunately, the water management districts are still plugging into their computer models that Florida is getting 60 inches of rainfall a year. Guess what? We’re not getting 60 inches a year,” he said.

The districts must calculate rainfall measurements and manage water accordingly, which Lee said will necessitate rolling back some existing consumptive use permits that are in existence now and failing to grant futures ones.

Lee admitted such action is a “tough call.” But he said “the reality is that the future of Florida’s economic growth is dependent on water resources.”

Raking Glen Springs Back to Life

Eleanor K. Sommer

Pressure-washed message makes plea to help Glen Springs.

Volunteers showed up at Glen Springs in Gainesville, Florida, Saturday morning to restore a once popular bathing area. Never heard of Glen Springs? That’s because it’s on private property, tucked behind the Elks Lodge on NW 23^rd Avenue next to Alfred Ring Park.

Linda Califf, a member of the lodge, was inspired in the summer of 2011 to begin clean up of the headspring and the pool and was joined by other Elks lodge members and some friends. Six hours of hard work were rewarded with a sparkle in the water that replaced the formerly dense mats of algae.

Those involved in the project said the water has begun to flow more freely from the spring that is one of six that flow into the Glen Spring run and then on to Hogtown Creek.

Saturday’s clean cleanup effort attracted new volunteers. Some were curious neighbors and others came to because they remembered the pool from their childhood.

“I came here for swimming lessons back in the 1960s,” said Paul Czapiga, owner of Gainesville Pool Renovators. Czapiga donated his time and equipment to help with the restoration.

Eleanor K. Sommer

Paul Czapiga, bottom right, pool contractor volunteering at Glen Springs.

The three-tiered pool was designed by architect Guy Chandler Fulton, who also designed several buildings on the University of Florida campus including the Smathers Libraries and some of the dormitories.

Califf looked into the history of the pool and created a pamphlet to promote clean up. According to her research, the pool was built in the 1920s by Cicero Addison Pound. From the ‘20s until the 1970s the pool and the attached pavilion (now the Elk Lodge) had been a place for recreation, dancing, and swimming. Lifeguards drained and cleaned the pool every Sunday, Califf discovered.

Lesley Gamble rakes algae from bottom of pool at Glen Springs.

Springs enthusiast Lesley Gamble, who teaches at the University of Florida, donned a wetsuit and climbed into the pool to rake algae from the bottom. By the time a dozen or so volunteers had climbed in, the water had become murky.

“It will settle down again,” Califf said, pointing to the crystal clear water emerging from a little pipe out of the spring vent.

“This is living water,” Gamble said, and then began to tell Califf about a polluted river in China that was diverted as a demonstration project to show citizens how the water could be cleaned through aeration and vegetative filters.

The installation, called The Living Water Garden, she said, could be an inspiration for Glen Springs. The project brings together art, education, and community, said Gamble, who recently taught a class called Art, Water, and Ecology at the university.

A fund has been established by the Elks to help support the project. To find out more about Glen Springs, contact Califf at lindacaliff@att.net.