Save Our Clean Water - Piney Point Petition to Monitor -By Jordan Cangro

My communication project consisted of a petition to request the Pinellas county government to implement additional monitoring of the Piney Point Deep-well Injection project. 

 To start, a brief history of Piney Point. Piney Point was a phosphate mine located in Palmetto Florida. The plant was decommissioned in 2001, leaving 1.2 billion gallons of wastewater unmanaged in four retention ponds. The wastewater consists of nitrogen and phosphate at levels hundreds of times beyond standard water quality. In March 2021, a leak was discovered in one of the four retention pond liners. The pressure of this leak threatened to flood the neighboring town and county jail. To counteract the leak Manatee County officials approved the release of approximately 200 million gallons of polluted water into Tampa Bay from Port Manatee. The introduction of wastewater into Tampa Bay has negatively impacted the marine environment. Causing increased red tide blooms and harm to sea life.

Piney Point still holds mass amounts of wastewater. What remains is planned to be pumped underground through the test of a non-hazardous Class I injection well by Manatee County Utilities. This course of action may also have serious environmental and human health issues. Deep well injection consists of water being pumped thousands of feet below the earth in steel and cement casing. It travels past the drinking water source into the area between rock formations. The system becomes pressurized as the water is injected. Without highly specific parameters leaks may occur. 

For my communication project, I went out to local areas in Pinellas and gathered signatures to present to Dave Adams the Pinellas director of Hydrology. My primary audience for signatures was residents of the Pinellas area. I used the frame of clean water to aid in informing locals of the issues associated with the deep-well injection. 

The topic of Piney Point is constitutive. Meaning that introducing people to this issue incites emotion and personal perspective. Boaters made the connection between last year's red tide and the water dumped into Tampa Bay more quickly than others. Eckerd college students were willing to sign as Piney Point is a topic most students earn about in class. And the catch-all was clean water. No person is against maintaining a clean natural resource that is relied on for life. 

I used supplemental resources to attract signers. After contacting Print St. Pete a local letterpress print shop, they offered to donate posters to help attract possible signers. I also created tri-folds to hand out to people walking by. They have information on Piney Point as well as contact information. 
Petition signs donated by Print St. Pete





December After petitioning for several weeks and achieving 100 signatures I attended a meeting on December 7th with Dave Adams and his colleagues at Pinellas county utilities department. we discussed both of our views on the plan for deep-well injection. 
Unfortunately, Mr. Adams was very adamant about his stance. He also was concerned with the cost of implementing additional monitoring as it may be a multi-million dollar project. Even though personally the risks of deep-well injection are not worth it, Mr. Adams states he could not justify the price to prevent the possibility.  
Even though, at this time, a new monitoring system is not on the table, Mr. Adams and I came to an agreement. He pledged to independently keep track of the events at Piney Point to ensure that it never goes unmanaged again. He said as a scientist himself it is his personal duty.

In summary, a large number of Pinellas county residents are now aware of the plan for deep-well injection. This allows citizens to participate in future discourse on the topic and advocate for themselves. By providing information and a way to take action citizens are inspired to use their voice in government affairs that impact them. Although the county denied the resident's call for monitoring it has shown officials that locals want to take action against Piney Point and will not accept county decisions at face value. 
If I were to do this project again I would enlist more help to gather signatures. I chose to do a paper petition rather than virtual because Piney Point and deep-well injection is not an everyday topic. As I was petitioning people would ask many questions and I wanted to be able to develop a conversation rather than promote a topic that may seem overly complex or intimidating. This was an amazing way to create a lasting impression that goes beyond the few seconds it takes to sign your name. Having more petitioners who are passionate and versed in the subject would allow my reach to go beyond what I could complete by myself. 
I would also change my strategy for who I brought my petition to and what type of campaign it was. Since deep-well injection is a highly expensive technology officials don't want to add or change any part of the process. Instead of running a hero campaign (a campaign in which the target is seen as protecting or helping the people), I would run a pressure campaign. County officials don't want to pay to ensure safety so showing them this angers voters would be more effective.





Citations 

Bausback, E., & Miller, B. (2022, April 25). Updated April 25, 2022: A rundown of the piney point wastewater leak. Florida Museum. Retrieved December 1, 2022, from https://www.floridamuseum.ufl.edu/earth-systems/blog/a-rundown-of-the-piney-point-wastewater-leak/ 

Hand, E. (2021, September 29). The toxic legacy of waste injection wells. EcoWatch. Retrieved December 1, 2022, from https://www.ecowatch.com/the-toxic-legacy-of-waste-injection-wells-1881772695.html#:~:text=Unfortunately%2C%20experience%20has%20indicated%20that,ecosystems%2C%20toxic%20leaks%20and%20earthquakes. 

Lustgarten, A. (2012, June 21). Injection wells: The poison beneath us. ProPublica. Retrieved December 1, 2022, from https://www.propublica.org/article/injection-wells-the-poison-beneath-us 

Carter, C. (2022, July 28). Millions of gallons of piney point stormwater will be released into Tampa Bay. WUSF Public Media. Retrieved October 19, 2022, from https://wusfnews.wusf.usf.edu/environment/2022-07-28/millions-gallons-piney-point-stormwater-released-tampa-bay

CBS Interactive. (n.d.). Contaminated water from Florida mining facility dumped a year's worth of hazardous nutrients into Tampa Bay in just 10 days, study shows. CBS News. Retrieved October 19, 2022, from https://www.cbsnews.com/amp/news/piney-point-mining-facility-dumped-years-worth-hazardous-nutrients-tampa-bay-10-days-study/#app

Mendoza, J. (2022, July 22). Releasing 4.5m gallons of rainwater from Piney Point into Tampa Bay concerns environmentalists. Tribune. Retrieved October 19, 2022, from https://www.heraldtribune.com/story/news/environment/2022/07/22/stormwater-release-piney-point-fertilizer-plant-into-tampa-bay-worries-environmentalists-gypstacks/10116125002/

Meszaros, J. (2022, October 7). Dying seagrasses and algae blooms found in Tampa Bay could be lingering effects of Piney Point releases. WUSF Public Media. Retrieved October 19, 2022, from https://wusfnews.wusf.usf.edu/environment/2022-10-07/dying-seagrasses-and-algae-blooms-found-in-tampa-bay-could-be-lingering-effects-of-piney-point-releases

Newborn, S. (2021, December 17). An injection well at Piney Point is given the OK by state environmental regulators. WUSF Public Media. Retrieved October 19, 2022, from https://wusfnews.wusf.usf.edu/environment/2021-12-17/an-injection-well-at-piney-point-is-given-the-ok-by-state-environmental-regulators 








 




                                                  







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