Miami Herald: Water ruling is expected to produce ripple effect

[La_Serpiente]

Water ruling is expected to produce ripple effect

Without the big pumps, a swath of western Broward County that is home to 136,000 people would flood within days -- just from the water ceaselessly trickling from under the Everglades.

Sitting atop a levee that engineers carved across the marsh a half-century ago, the pumps slurp water from the C-11 canal on the suburban side and spill it into a confluence of more canals flowing into the sawgrass west of U.S. 27 near Everglades Holiday Park.

But in the process of keeping the streets of Weston and other cities dry, the pumps also inject pollution into the Everglades, mostly traces of fertilizer and pesticide that keep lawns so green.

That problem has elevated a lawsuit by the Miccosukee Tribe over a pumping station known as the S-9 into a major and closely watched test of federal water quality law. The U.S. Supreme Court hears arguments Wednesday.

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Water ruling is expected to produce ripple effect