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•🧑⚖️ Who: Walton County Commissioners, Commissioner Danny Glidewell, Commissioner Donna Johns, Interim County Attorney Clay Adkinson, and local residents.
•📜 What: A 60-day moratorium on a proposed Class I landfill near Rock Hill Road.
•📅 When: Decision made during a recent commission meeting.
•📍 Where: Walton County, Florida, specifically near Rock Hill Road.
•❓ Why: Concerns over potential contamination of the Floridian Aquifer, which provides drinking water to most of the county.
Walton County residents had standing room only in the gallery as their commissioners decided to place a sixty-day moratorium on a proposal for a class 1 landfill on property near Rock Hill Road in the center of the county.
Florida defines a class I landfill as a facility that receives more than 20 tons or more of solid waste per day consisting of general non-hazardous household, commercial, industrial, and agricultural wastes.
Walton County Commissioner Danny Glidewell (R – DeFuniak Springs) explained to the rest of the commission that he had concerns about creating a landfill where the trash could affect the Floridian Aquifer, which provides Walton County with most of its drinking water.
“over 50 percent of our population’s water are [sic] in danger,” Glidewell said to the commission, “this allows putting garbage on top of the Florida aquifer.”
The commissioner told his colleagues he received water sampling reports from two monitoring wells in Walton County containing “some nasty stuff.”
Glidewell added samples from Bruce Creek, which is located south of I-10 between DeFuniak Springs and Freeport east of Highway 331, had lead traces in them.
He claimed the samples contained boron, cyanide, chromium, ammonia, and aluminum as well. “There is just about a laundry list of things you don’t want to drink,” Glidewell told the crowd, “In my opinion, this is an existential threat to Walton County, to our economy, a threat to our pursuit of happiness by our citizens. This is a danger – if we don’t have water.” He continued, [eventually] “South Walton will be a ghost town because you can’t live without water. Freeport won’t be much better. The county has a responsibility to act and act decisively to stop this. If we don’t do something to stop this, there is nobody to blame when things go south.”
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Commissioner Glidewell urged the commission to adopt an emergency ordinance to stop permitting county landfills within some distance of a water well.
Interim County Attorney Clay Adkinson recommended the commissioners impose a moratorium on landfill permits to allow them to request additional information and testing from the Florida Department of Environmental Protection (DEP). Adkinson said that after testing and evaluating the situation, the DEP could provide expert recommendations – and that other agencies could get involved in the process and string it out to a date uncertain.
About 60 residents attended the meeting and wanted to speak against the permits due to the perceived health, safety, and welfare impacts on the county and the water supply.
Because of the decision by the County Commissioners to impose a 60-day moratorium on the matter, public comment had to be withheld until the official public hearing, which is to be scheduled.
Walton County Commission Chairperson Donna Johns asked those attending the meeting who were not allowed to speak to leave their email addresses for updates regarding the issue. Commissioner Johns added that she was impressed by citizens’ outpouring concern about this environmental item.
Plans will move forward during the 60-day moratorium to gather information on the impacts and methods for best conserving and protecting the county water wells.
