Peter Schorsch
Following a report from the Tampa Bay Times’ Craig Pittman regarding the sinkhole that opened up on Mosaic Fertilizer’s property in late 2016, the company sent out a scathing rebuke to media alleging Pittman “continues to provide a platform for false information.”
In the report, Pittman interviewed Don Rice, a former hydrologist from the U.S. Geological Survey, who alleges the company should have seen the signs of a sinkhole forming.
Jackie Barron, a Mosaic spokeswoman, said the claims made in Pittman’s article are “fundamentally wrong.”
“The water level increases cited in his article were observed in a location that is in no way related to the recent sinkhole at Mosaic’s New Wales facility,” Barron wrote in a memo to media.
The company is also taking issue with the newspaper’s failure to check the facts before reporting.
“Responsible journalists check facts from multiple sources to get to the truth before they accuse a company of negligence,” said the memo. “That did not happen here.”
In a separate release, the Florida Department of Environmental Protection claims allegations by Rice are wrong because they reference a section of Mosaic’s property where a sinkhole did not form.
“This is false because the data they are referring to is from the North stack,” the release said, “which while continuously monitored and intact, has been closed and non-operational for nearly 12 years.”
The DEP also takes issue with the Times’ failure to disclose the data used by Rice as the basis for his allegations.
“After multiple requests for the Tampa Bay Times’ reporter to provide the data being referenced, DEP was pointed to one chart on Page 5 of a July 2016 monitoring report, which DEP had reviewed and posted online Aug. 11, 2016,” the statement said. “DEP has posted monitoring reports for the two stacks, North and South, at the Mosaic New Wales facility dating back to 1994, and these reports have been available online since 2013.”
Last week, Mosaic employees began work filling the sinkhole. As part of the effort, Mosaic employees plan to work 24 hours per day with a six-day workweek.
Mosaic estimates the sinkhole will be filled by the rainy season.
3 comments
Glen Gibellina
February 10, 2017 at 6:24 pm
Just say NO to Mosaic
If Manatee County approves Mosaic’s requests for a re-zone and Master Mining Plan at Wingate East, it will be sending 40 million tons of toxic and hazardous waste into communities outside the county over the years the mine is in operation.
How can this be allowed to happen, you may ask? Surely there is some public benefit that offsets the potential for shipping a mountain of disease-causing waste to neighboring communities, contaminating the state’s drinking water, permanently destroying native Florida habitat, and turning the east county into a wasteland? Good question.
The short answer is no. Phosphate mining is a net economic loss to the people of Florida, and a catastrophic loss of the ecological functions embodied in the 800-plus square miles of native habitat, home to many threatened and endangered species, ruined forever during the strip-mining process.
Read more here: http://www.bradenton.com/opinion/opn-columns-blogs/article126350574.html#storylink=cpy
Dale Gulden
February 10, 2017 at 10:06 pm
Like FPL and other corporate criminals, Mozaic is operating as they reap profits for stockholders and the enrichment of their executives.
Both Co.s have the support of our questionable State Governor who cares nothing for the environment, less fortunate, and normal Florida folks, but caters to Corp criminals in a get what you pay for system of Government. Don’t back down, stand your ground in opposition!
Candy Luther
February 14, 2017 at 2:04 am
Jackie Barron, spokeswoman for Mosaic, is a liar as I commented at the first day of the hearing in Manatee County. She lied about why the date of the hearing initially scheduled in September was rescheduled. I quoted this from an article printed in the Bradenton Herald on Sept 29, 2016, “Mosaic spokeswoman Jackie Barron said the decision to change the hearing date has nothing to do with a sinkhole that opened up at the Mosaic Co.’s Mulberry, Fla., facility last week. “The two are completely separate,” Barron said. “Mosaic officials did not want to separate the hearing into two days unless they were consecutive,” Barron said, and Manatee County didn’t have a two-day block available until January.” We all know there was only initially one day scheduled for this hearing. The decision to extend to a second day was not made until the day of the hearing. Sorry Jackie, I am calling you out. Clearly these people will do anything to get their way. A quote from The Bradenton Herald dated Jan 22, 2016 reads, “Mosaic plans have an even bigger presence in Manatee County in the coming years. Its planned 40,000-acre DeSoto mine straddles DeSoto County and southeastern Manatee County. About half of the acreage is in Manatee County. All of it, including 9,000 acres owned by others where Mosaic owns the mining rights, may well be mined in coming decades as the company pursues the raw materials it needs to make its fertilizers.” Seems to me if the rezone is approved, they will also be claiming land that now belongs to citizens because they own mining rights to the citizen’s land. We can’t believe anything they say to be true considering they blatantly lie to news media.
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