"The
wrong of unshapely things is a wrong too great to be told; I hunger
to build them anew and sit on a green knoll apart, With the earth
and the sky and the water, re-made, like a casket of gold..."
-- William Butler Yeats
The Department's Water
Programs are responsible for protecting the
quality of Florida’s drinking water
as well as its rivers, lakes and wetlands,
and for reclaiming lands after they’ve been mined
for phosphate and other minerals. The Programs establish the technical basis for setting the state’s
surface
water and ground water quality
standards, and also implement a variety of programs to
monitor
the quality of those water resources.
The Programs
conduct permitting, compliance and enforcement programs for Florida’s
more than 3,000 domestic and 1,000
industrial
wastewater facilities, its 6,300 drinking
water systems, and a myriad of activities in
wetlands and
other surface waters. The programs also develop the rules and guidance for
implementing these programs consistently throughout Florida.
In addition, the Water Programs also
provide
$100-200 million yearly to
build or improve domestic wastewater
and drinking water facilities, to
reclaim mined lands, and to implement stormwater
and other nonpoint source management projects.
Explore this website for
more information on Water Programs, or call our office
at (850) 245-8335.