What Do Brevard County Residents Believe The Environmental...

Research Question- To what extent do Brevard County residents believe the Environmental Protection Agency’s laws, in place, are effectively written and enforced to protect wetlands from landfills? On Florida’s Space Coast in Brevard County, the main landfill that is located on Sarno Road, is expected to exceed capacity within the next five years. Another large landfill, located in the north area of the county is expected to exceed capacity within the next twenty years. Because of the current need to fulfill the waste management needs for over Brevard County, the county has formulated a proposal to put the first cell of a Class III or construction and demolition waste, landfill, that will service Brevard County for about sixty years with the prospect of adding a more cells. This landfill will be located on land 2700 feet north of US- 192, just east of the Brevard and Osceola County border on land the county forced the Deseret cattle ranchers to sell as a public necessity, more than two decades ago, in 1991. The land was purchased for over ten million dollars by Brevard County and hundreds of thousands of dollars has been spent by the county in court, on 134 wetland c redits that were required to be purchased by the county, by the state, outside research, maintaining the land, and the drafting of the landfill proposal itself . The three thousand acres of land bought by the county currently encompasses wetlands, pastures, and a grazing area that is roughly half of the size