News Articles
Environmental, financial ‘siege' challenges Florida officials facing untamed Gulf oil slick
Palm Beach Post, May 11, 2010
PENSACOLA — The surface fight against BP's uncontrolled, undersea gusher was fought on multiple fronts Monday, with state officials preparing legal defenses in Tallahassee, while at this Gulf Coast city the state's environmental chief, Mike Sole, sought to organize disparate responders' strategies against what has become "a siege."
BP's failure to cap the 210,000 gallons spewing daily into the Gulf of Mexico mean the Sunshine State is in for a long haul, Department of Environmental Protection Secretary Mike Sole told lawmakers in a conference call Monday afternoon.
"A lot of times, in the emergency management realm, we say 'this is not a sprint, it's a marathon,'" Sole, the state's lead official in charge of the Deepwater Horizon disaster response, said. "Sadly this is not a marathon, because I don't know how far we're going to run. This is a siege."
Sole is trying to coordinate and in some cases rein in local officials' efforts to protect the coastline from the spill, which he says will result in tar balls and staining of the state's prized beaches. Wind and waves have bought the state time, by so far keeping the slick 60 miles off Florida shores.
Sole discouraged locals and private homeowners from placing floating boom barriers without authorization from him, lest the barriers make it harder to remove the mess. "While the desire to protect Florida's beaches is understood, some solutions could do more harm than good," he said.
Boom has been staged in six Panhandle counties. The rest of the coast south of those counties is on alert, should winds shift and the Gulf Loop current catch the slick and carry it toward Florida and the Keys, Sole said.
The economic impact is starting to be felt. BP has received 493 claims for damages caused by the spill in Florida, and to date and has paid about $44,000, Sole said. The average claim has been for about $4,000, with a maximum set by the company at $5,000.
The $25 million BP pledged to Florida to defray the state and local governments' costs of preparing for the spill -- money that won't be spent on damage claims -- won't last long, DEP's Sole said, He said he expected to learn Tuesday how much counties have already spent and that "we plan to ask for more" when that runs dry.
The uncertainty of when the oil slick might infiltrate Florida shores is wearing on everyone from charter fishing boat captains to Gov. Charlie Crist, who with Attorney General Bill McCollum announced the creation of a bipartisan oil spill legal team, headed by former attorneys general Bob Butterworth, a Democrat, and Jim Smith, a Republican.
"We want the best legal team from the private sector possible to come together..., so we don't have anything we're overlooking in the way of advising private citizens or advising the state in preparing whatever we have to prepare for the claims we are going to be making," McCollum said at a press conference with Crist, Butterworth and Smith Monday afternoon.
"We would hope at the end of the day, that there would be no litigation, that everything will be able to be worked out," Butterworth said. "But obviously we have to be prepared if there is to be litigation."
In the Panhandle, where the spill is expected to have the first impact in Florida, businessmen and women expressed their fears to Crist over the weekend about a federal law capping how much BP will have to pay in damages at $75 million.
McCollum said that cap does not apply to the state.
"There is no preemption in that law of state law. So... we have the right to recover whatever we need to do," McCollum said.
Crist said BP executives have been "very encouraging" regarding their willingness to cover costs for damages. "We all continue to hope and pray that this doesn't impact our state in a negative way, although probably already has been some economic impact," Crist said.
Meanwhile, though, environmental secretary Sole was at a loss to say how confident he was in the oil giant's ability to stem the gush of oil from the Deepwater Horizon rig on the ocean floor before a relief well is completed as late as three months from now.
Rep. Greg Evers, R-Baker, asked Sole if he could ballpark the chances of success before then.
"That's an excellent question. The answer is, no I don't," Sole said, followed by a lengthy silence.
Copyright © 2010 The Palm Beach Post
