For a third time, public outcry blocked passage of pro-sewage legislation. Bill 724, filed by Miami Senator Miguel Diaz de la Portilla, died in committee as the 2012 Florida legislative session ended at midnight March 9.
This years attempt to roll back compliance deadlines intended to end the discharge of over 300,000,000 gallons a day of inadequately treated sewage dumped into Southeast Florida coastal waters almost made it to the Senate floor for a vote. A companion bill easily passed the Florida House of Representatives without opposition from so-called pro-environmental lobbyists who were caught sleeping on the job.
In February outraged coral reef advocates and conservationists sent a joint letter to the Florida Senate urging representatives to vote against the bill. At the same time many hundreds of individuals responding to Action Alerts flooded the legislature with emails requesting the rules committee not advance the bill to the Senate floor for final passage.
It worked, for the second time in as many years the attempt to weaken the 2008 Florida Outfall law was blocked.
Sign on letter to the Florida Senate: http://www.scribd.com/doc/84820810/Sign-on-letter-SB-724