Sarasota — Officials from Sarasota, Charlotte, Manatee, and Lee counties filed comments with the Army Corps of Engineers’ proposed area-wide environmental impact statement (EIS) on the cumulative effects of mining in Southwest Florida, saying it should be revised. They said the EIS did not take into account seasonal rain patterns when it determined proposed phosphate mining would not harm area water supplies. In addition, they said the report should have included other possible mines, which total 210,000 acres, and not just the 55,000 acres of proposed mines considered by the proposed statement. They said the EIS assumed wetlands mitigation projects would be successful, although they said they had not been in the past, that groundwater resources for coastal counties were not taken into consideration, and that consumption by other water users was not properly considered. The deadline for filing comments on the proposed EIS ended last week. Officials from two other counties, Hardee and DeSoto, which are inland and are where most of the mining will take place, were not opposed to the EIS.
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