Florida Court: Residents Have No Right To Clean Water

The Florida Phoenix reports:

The Fifth District Court of Appeal ruled Thursday that although 83% of voters in Titusville approved a 2022 initiative establishing the right to clean water, the city in Brevard County couldn’t enact it because of a 2020 state law preventing local government from giving rights to bodies of water, plants, and animals.

The City of Titusville had appealed a lower court’s ruling siding with Speak Up Titusville, the group behind the local ballot measure.

Republican Sen. Blaise Ingoglia [photo] spearheaded the preemption when he was a member of the Florida House in 2020. Another appellate court cited that preemptive clause in Florida law to block an Orange County clean water measure in January.

Read the full article.

All 12 judges on Florida’s Fifth District Court of Appeal were appointed by DeSantis and former Gov. Rick Scott.

Ingoglia last appeared here for his bill that would mandate teaching that Democrats were behind slavery.

Before that he appeared here for a bill to undermine teachers unions and a bill that would have banned giving water to people waiting in line to vote.

His February 2023 bill to ban the Democratic Party from operating in Florida never got a hearing.

In May 2023, the state legislature passed his bill to retroactively invalidate Disney’s agreement with its special district’s outgoing board.

Ingoglia is the ex-chair of the Florida Republican Party.

#Florida residents have no right to bodies of water “free of pollution,” appeals court rules, citing pro-pollution provision in law written by @GovGoneWild https://t.co/Mk3AZkZMQy via @LlanosJackie

— Craig Pittman (@craigtimes) December 27, 2024