Middle St. Johns - Florida Department of Environmental Protection

66 Water Quality Assessment Report: Middle St. Johns
Update on Strategic Monitoring and Data-
Gathering Activities During Phase 2
During Phase 2 of the watershed management cycle, strategic monitoring
and data-gathering activities focused first on waters on the 1998 303(d)
list, followed by waters that were placed on the Planning List through the
IWR assessment alone. The majority of the strategic monitoring work
was conducted by the Florida Department of Environmental Protection’s
(Department) Central District staff and included both chemical and biological
monitoring and data upload to STOrage and RETrieval (STORET)
databases. Data-gathering activities included working with environmental
monitoring staff in the St. Johns River Water Management District
(SJRWMD) and local and county governments to obtain applicable
monitoring data from their routine monitoring programs and special water
quality projects in the basin.
Twenty-three waterbody segments on the Planning List and the 1998
303(d) list needed further data to verify impairment. Parameters included
silver, cadmium, iron, lead and selenium. Also included were biology
(based on bioassessments), biological oxygen demand (BOD), DO, fecal
and total coliforms, unionized ammonia, nutrients and their indicators
(nitrogen, phosphorus, and chlorophyll a), turbidity, and total suspended
solids (TSS).
Fifty-eight waterbody segments were verified impaired for at least
1 parameter in the Middle St. Johns Basin as the result of strategic monitoring
and data-gathering activities in Phase 2. Table F.1 in Appendix F
provides the updated impairment status of the basin through April 2004.
Sources of Data
The assessment of water quality in the Middle St. Johns Basin includes
an analysis of quantitative data from various sources, some of which are
readily available to the public. These sources include the U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency’s (EPA) Legacy and “new” STORET databases,
the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), and the Florida Department of Health
(DOH). The STORET databases contain water quality data from a
number of sources, including the Department, water management districts,
local governments, and volunteer monitoring groups. Appendix E
contains a detailed description of STORET and the methodology used to
develop the Planning and Verified Lists, based on the IWR.
Table 3.1 summarizes the individual data providers who contributed
to the IWR 2002 Database for the Middle St. Johns Basin for the period
of record used in this assessment. Figure 3.1 shows the contribution of
each provider by year. Data providers that contributed the largest amount
of data for this assessment are SJRWMD (34 percent), Orange County
(22 percent), and Florida LakeWatch (16 percent).
The Department created the IWR 2002 Database to evaluate data in
accordance with the methodology prescribed in the Identification of IWR