A Piney Point settlement is reached between the state and environmental groups
They filed the federal lawsuit after around 215 million gallons of wastewater was discharged into Tampa Bay in 2021. It said the discharges caused harmful algae blooms and fish kills.
Environmental groups and the state have reached a settlement to end a federal lawsuit over management of a former phosphate plant site that leaked millions of gallons of wastewater into Tampa Bay in 2021.
The Center for Biological Diversity, Tampa Bay Waterkeeper, Suncoast Waterkeeper, Manasota-88 and Our Children’s Earth Foundation and the state Department of Environmental Protection filed a joint notice of settlement Monday involving the Piney Point site in Manatee County.
The environmental groups said in an announcement that the settlement includes the Department of Environmental Protection drafting a Clean Water Act permit “that will require more robust oversight of pollution from the Piney Point phosphate facility.” Also, the state will pay $75,000 for the Tampa Bay Estuary Program to monitor water quality in the area where Piney Point’s discharges enters Tampa Bay.
The lawsuit, filed by the groups in May 2021 in the federal Middle District of Florida, alleged the Department of Environmental Protection and other defendants long mishandled the site.