SFWMD is currently recruiting for two hydrogeologist and two Geographer (GIS) positions (see below, as excerpted from www.sfwmd.gov) to accomplish our core mission (water supply) in case you know anyone that would be a good candidate.

Working Title: Senior Hydrogeologist

Auto req ID: 658BR

Organization: WR4204232 Hydrogeology Unit

Location: WPB Adm Headquarters (B2)

Job Description: Two positions available. Position requires technical expertise in hydrogeology and is responsible for planning, executing, and documenting projects related to hydrogeology and groundwater identified in SFWMD’s strategic plan. Job duties include data collection and review; planning and conducting regional hydrogeologic investigations; developing statements of work and technical specifications; overseeing well drilling contractors; conducting aquifer tests and interpreting results; uploading and QA/QC of hydrogeologic data into the SFWMD DBHydro database; balancing and appropriately prioritizing assigned workload; and other field and office duties as assigned. Position will also provide hydrogeologic support including data analysis, interpretation and report writing for the regional water supply plans. Floridan Aquifer experience is strongly preferred.

Candidates must possess advanced knowledge of hydrogeologic principles and inter-relationships, including the hydrologic cycle. Also, advanced familiarity with field methods used in hydrogeologic data collection and research (e.g., lithologic and water quality sampling techniques, groundwater measurements, geophysical logging and log interpretation, etc.) is desired. Specific skills required include advanced knowledge of (1) monitoring well networks including purpose, design and implementation (2) drilling methods, well design and construction (3) geochemistry and (4) aquifer test design and analysis. Familiarity with Microsoft Office software is required. Strong technical writing and communication skills are necessary. Senior-level staff are required to perform independently including interacting with the contractor, data interpretation, and report writing.

This position requires both office and fieldwork duties. Fieldwork (such as aquifer performance testing, field sample collection, well drilling oversight, etc.) is conducted periodically throughout the year, sometimes under adverse weather conditions (hot, humid, wet). Travel to remote locations in a 4-wheel drive vehicle may be required periodically to conduct field activities and may involve daily and overnight excursions throughout the 16-county SFWMD geographic area. Some field events may require the employee to remain at the test site overnight and assist with manual labor. The candidate must be able to lift 40 pounds.

Employment guidelines include a Bachelor’s degree in Geology with 6+ years of related advanced experience, and a Florida Professional Geologist license or license from another state that has reciprocity with the State of Florida.

ONE POSITION MAY BE FILLED AT THE LOWER SCIENTIST 4 – HYDROGEOLOGY LEVEL: Employment guidelines include a Bachelor’s degree in Geology with 4+ years of qualifying experience. Florida Professional Geologist License preferred.

Salary Minimum: $59,966.40

Salary Midpoint: $71,281.60

Salary Maximum: $102,793.60

Working Title: Geographer 3

Auto req ID: 660BR

Organization: WR4204231 Model Processing Unit

Location: WPB Adm Headquarters (B2)

Job Description: This position provides advanced GIS services and analysis supporting the needs of the Water Supply Bureau. GIS services include development, mapping and analysis of a wide variety of spatial data related to water supply utility service areas, census data, current and future land use and land cover, monitoring data, model input and output, District and other agency project boundaries. This position also acts as data steward of the Public Water Supply Utility Service Area boundaries.

Employment guidelines include a Bachelor’s Degree or higher in Geography, GIS or a closely related field and at least two (2) years qualifying experience. Experience using ESRI ArcGIS applications to produce maps from various data sources is required. Skills needed to develop and manipulate spatial data using ESRI’s Spatial Data Engine (ArcSDE) as well as proficiency with Personal and File Geodatabases are also required. Valid State of Florida driver’s license is required.

SECOND POSITION AVAILABLE: GEOGRAPHER 1

Salary range: Minimum: $40,580.80, Midpoint: $48,235.20, Maximum: $69,555.20.

This position provides GIS data collection to develop spatial databases and maps supporting the needs of the Water Supply Bureau. Employment guidelines include a Bachelor’s Degree or higher in Geography, GIS or a closely related field and up to one (1) year of qualifying experience. Successful candidate must have proficient GIS skills utilizing ArcGIS and other software such as MSOffice, AutoCAD and Adobe Photoshop. The position may also provide support for Global Positioning System (GPS) in the field and office as well as support other staff’s use of GPS for data collection. Valid State of Florida driver’s license is required.

Salary Minimum: $46,987.20

Salary Midpoint: $55,848.00

Salary Maximum: $80,516.80

Gasses emanating from a landfill in Escambia County were found to have significant concentrations of chlorinated and non-chlorinated organic compounds. These compounds were contaminating an unsaturated sand horizon above a water table aquifer as well as the underlying groundwater.

A team was led — first for Condor Earth Technologies and later with Gallet & Associates — to implement a landfill gas recovery system. Once the gas migration stopped, plume expansion of the contamination came to an end, which allowed for the groundwater underneath to be cleaned.

Groundwater near a St. Augustine dry cleaning company was found to have an abundance of chemicals that were above state norms. Dry cleaning solvents were also found in soil vapor just underneath the business.

Groundwater samples were collected at the four corners of the dry cleaner structure, and an additional five samples were collected inside the business itself through a slab using a handheld rotary hammer drill.

Five air samples also were collected.

The research demonstrated the possible environmental impacts of dry cleaning solvents polluting the ground around and under the business.

An ongoing environmental project designed to restore groundwater in Pinellas County, which had been contaminated by chlorinated solvents.

Electrical resistive heating and steam-enhanced extraction was used to remove contaminated material and soils as well as to inject microbes. This includes nutrients and amendments designed to accelerate naturally occurring breakdowns of the contaminants.

The project allowed Pinellas to stop the spread of contaminants through drinking water supplies, and return the land to beneficial use.

Jorge took a very active role in FAPG/AIPG for many years. Most recently, Jorge was an instrumental part of FAPG/AIPG serving as the Tallahassee Regional Coordinator, locating facilities and speakers for our various meetings in Tallahassee. His service to FAPG/AIPG was invaluable, and although he leaves a significant void in our organization, we wish him the very best of luck.

• Performance Based Cleanup
• Green Remediation
• Technical Review (improvement to remediation/assessment strategies, ways to close sites faster/cheaper, potential topics for Rule or policy modification/exploration, and RBCA)
• Tanks/Compliance
• Overall/Other Topics (ways to improve consistency and identifying areas for improvement, ways to improve the Contractor Designation Process, etc.)

FAPG/AIPG will continue to work closely with FDEP to help fulfill their mission. The last several legislative sessions have clearly demonstrated that a successful FDEP-Industry partnership is critical to Florida job retention and creation, natural resource protection, and safeguarding of citizen welfare. If you would like to get involved in one of the FDEP BPSS Workgroups, please contact Joe Fuhr or Jamie Hirsch; or you may email Robert Brown directly at Robert.C.Brown@dep.state.fl.us.

Expertise in geology, acquired through education and professional licensing, is critical to utilizing and managing Florida’s mineral, energy, and water resources. This unique geological expertise and perspective is not duplicated by other licensed professionals such as engineers, landscape architects, etc. The meaning is clear: remove the professional licensure requirement from the practice of geology, and strip away a fundamental layer of public protection and expertise that our citizens currently have…

• Protection and expertise for properly design, permit, and extract mineral resources such as aggregate and fossil fuels
• Protection of groundwater aquifers that supply more than 90% of our drinking water
• Protection by properly designing and constructing drinking water wells that provide safe drinking water and fire protection
• Protection and expertise when a property owner has to address a sinkhole issue
• Protection and expertise when an entire city’s water supply is threatened by contamination moving through a complex geology riddled with faults and solution caverns
• Protection and expertise when an engineer needs geologic suitability information to design a building or bridge
• Protection and expertise to properly site and construct a levee with walls that won’t fail
• Protection and expertise for when accurate and reliable geological reports are needed by government agencies for public use
• Protection and expertise to help design a landfill that won’t leak toxic waste into groundwater
• Protection for when deep municipal waste water injection wells have to be designed and installed that won’t leak into drinking water aquifers.

Professional Geologists have the unique training, supervision, the requisite years of technical knowledge and expertise, and the sworn ethics to provide these protections with the highest level of professionalism. Unqualified geologists, who are employed in jobs that affect the public, place an undue risk on the health, safety and welfare of that public. The risks include the possibility of an error that will cause a loss of life or property; the higher costs of supervision; the costs of repeating incorrect and incomplete work; and lower cost/benefit ratios brought about by an inability to do efficient work.

The Florida Association of Professional Geologists urges the immediate withdrawal of HB 4133 – a bill designed to take away critical protections that, if passed, potentially places every citizen at risk.

Following is the contact information for the committee members. Please call and write with your request that the member remove any and all reference to the Board of Professional Geologists, and to Professional Geologists. Information explaining the importance of maintaining professional licensure is attached; please get this to the committee members.

• Rep. Joe Abruzzo (D-Wellington) – joseph.abruzzo@myfloridahouse.gov   850.488.4791
• Rep. Larry Ahern (R-St Petersburg) – larry.ahern@myfloridahouse.gov   850.488.6197
• Rep. Frank Artiles (R-Miami) – frank.artiles@myfloridahouse.gov   850.488.9550
• Rep. Esteban Bovo (R – Hialeah) – esteban.bovo@myfloridahouse.gov   850.487.2197
• Rep. Steve Crisafulli (R-Merritt Island) – steve.crisafulli@myfloridahouse.gov   850.488.4669
• Rep. Eric Eisnaugle (R-Orlando) – eric.eisnaugle@myfloridahouse.gov   850.488.9770
• Rep. Tom Goodson (R-Titusville) – tom.goodson@myfloridahouse.gov   850.488.3006
• Rep. Mia Jones (D-Jacksonville) – mia.jones@myfloridahouse.gov   850.488.6893
• Rep. Jeanette Nunez (R- Miami) – jeanette.nunez@myfloridahouse.gov   850.488.7897
• Rep. Jimmy Patronis (R-Panama City) – jimmy.patronis@myfloridahouse.gov   850.488.9696
• Rep. Ken Roberson (R-Sarasota) – ken.roberson@myfloridahouse.gov   850.488.0060
• Rep. Darrell Rouson (D-St. Petersburg) – darryl.rouson@myfloridahouse.gov   850.488.0925
• Rep. Irv Slosberg (D-Boca Raton) – irving.slosberg@myfloridahouse.gov   850.488.1302
• Rep. Cynthia Stafford (D-Miami) – cynthia.stafford@myfloridahouse.gov   850.488.0625
• Rep. Dana Young (R-Tampa) – dana.young@myfloridahouse.gov    850.488.2770

Once again, the FAPG/AIPG Executive Committee, needs your help, and thank you in advance.

Best Regards,

Joe Fuhr, P.G.
FL Section President, FAPG/AIPG
813-523-5408
jfuhr@geosenvironmental.com

Mike Alfieri, P.G.
FAPG/AIPG FL Section Secretary

Honorable Representative XXXXX,

I appreciate this opportunity to discuss Professional Geologists in Florida, the importance  of our profession to several industries in Florida, and why we as licensed professionals believe that the deregulation of the professional practice of geology via PCB BCAS 11-01 is a mistake and will impact the health, safety, and welfare of the citizens of the State of Florida. Respectfully, please remove references to Professional Geologists from the proposed bill and keep Professional Geologist licensure intact.

The Florida Association of Professional Geologists, a Section of the American Institute of Professional Geologists (FAPG-AIPG) represents over 2,100 Licensed Professional Geologists in Florida and many more that have not yet met the requirements of experience and testing to receive their license. The Fundamentals of Geology Examination and the required five to seven years of practical experience necessary to take the exam is a requirement for any geologist to become a Professional Geologist in the state of Florida. About half of the candidates that take the exam pass. It is worth noting that the Board of Professional Geologists is self-supporting, and has operated “in the black” since at least 2007.

Much of what professional geologists do on a day-to-day basis is unseen by the public, and is therefore out of mind; we at the FAPG are working to better inform the public of the services that we provide, and the necessity of continuing to support geological sciences in junior high school, high school and at the university level. Because most people are not aware of our expertise and activities, we have prepared a broad outline in this letter.

Licensed Professional Geologists in Florida have expertise in many areas including drinking water resources, environmental permitting, contamination assessments and remediation, coastal processes, phosphate and limestone mining, springshed assessments, and sinkhole investigations.

Chapter 492 of the Florida Statutes requires licensing of geologists to perform certain activities in the state, and it requires that geologic work be signed and sealed by a licensed professional geologist. By enacting the chapter, the legislature has recognized the need for geologists in the state.

Additionally, there are several Florida statutes, Florida Department of Environmental Protection (FDEP) regulations, and water management district rules that either require or authorize a licensed professional geologist to perform the work described in the particular rule or statute. Specifically, Chapter 373, F.S., which has the short title “Florida Water Resources Act of 1972” established the water management districts in Florida and state water policy. Only licensed professional geologists and professional engineers are authorized under the Act to perform the duties described.

The FDEP requires professional geologists to sign and seal their work related to the testing and/ or design of effluent disposal ponds, injection wells, and contamination assessments and remediation.

The water management districts (there are five in Florida), require that all hydrogeologic investigations and work of a geologic nature be signed and sealed by a professional geologist. Over 90% of Florida’s drinking water supply comes from groundwater sources, and we in the geologic profession conduct extensive geologic and hydrogeologic testing to determine whether the aquifer system(s) can safely produce the quantities required and meet the regulatory requirements of the water management districts. Florida and many other states in our nation are facing water supply issues where the balance between the water needs of the environment and man is becoming more and more critical.

Licensed Professional Geologists are the first link in the chain of the public receiving high quality drinking water. We design the water supply wells used for testing and producing the water; we work with the water well contractor in ensuring a properly designed and construct well; and then we work closely with the engineers in providing them the water quality and other data to design the water treatment facilities.

With respect to the water resources of Florida and safe, reliable drinking water, Licensed Professional Geologists are critical.

Notwithstanding our expertise in water resources, Licensed Professional Geologists are essential in the exploration and development of phosphate, heavy minerals, and limestone. These minerals are essential for the production of fertilizers, paints (titanium dioxide), staurolite for sandblasting material, zircon for refractory industries and ceramics, and road base materials. Many industries such as Rinker (Cemex), Vulcan (which recently purchased Florida Rock Industries), Mosaic, etc. have a need for Licensed Professional Geologists.

Contamination assessments of groundwater, surface water and soils are conducted by geologists and engineers. The FDEP has several rules that require such contamination assessments be conducted by licensed professional geologists or engineers. The remediation of contaminated soils, groundwater or surface, are also conducted by licensed geologists and engineers. Business owners, land developers, home owners, etc, require these services when purchasing or selling land. Lenders require environmental site assessments, which can include contamination assessments and remediation. City and county governments that want to take advantage of the Federal Government Brownfields program of remediating contaminated property for public use also have the need for Licensed Professional Geologists.

Proposed legislation over the last few years has included springshed evaluations and the creation of a task force. In each of these proposals, a professional geologist was required. More specifically, Pasco County has implemented a geologic hazards ordinance that requires a professional geologist to perform certain aspects of the investigation of geologic hazards. Pasco County has a high incidence of sinkhole activity, and the County Commissioners found it necessary that in order to protect the public safety, the geologic hazards ordinance was required.

The Florida Legislature enacted specific legislation that formally defines a sinkhole, the testing that should be done to determine the presence of a sinkhole, and how the insurance industry must investigate sinkhole damage claims. In West-Central Florida, and not just Pasco County, sinkhole investigations are very important as the populated areas of the area expand. The FAPG worked with the Legislature to write portions of the “sinkhole bill.” The input came from many Licensed Professional Geologists working in the field, and the FAPG acted as the conduit to the Legislature.

Two other issues of importance to Floridians are climate change and geosequestration of carbon dioxide from power plants. Licensed Professional Geologists at consulting firms and at the state and Federal level are working on these issues. Climate change and the potential impacts not only on the land surface but also on salt water intrusion into freshwaters must be investigated, and dealt with.

Improvements in air quality begin with reduce the green house gases, and storing or disposal of carbon below ground. Geosequestration is the disposal of carbon dioxide in geologic strata that can contain the carbon. Licensed Professional Geologists are one of the core disciplines that can make these assessments.

In summary, expertise in geology, acquired through education and professional licensing, is critical to utilizing and managing Florida’s mineral, energy, and water resources. This unique geological expertise and perspective is not duplicated by other licensed professionals such as engineers, landscape architects, etc. The meaning is clear: remove the professional licensure requirement from the practice of geology, and strip away a fundamental layer of public protection and expertise that our citizens currently have…

• Protection and expertise for properly design, permit, and extract mineral resources such as aggregate and fossil fuels
• Protection of groundwater aquifers that supply more than 90% of our drinking water
• Protection by properly designing and constructing drinking water wells that provide safe drinking water and fire protection
• Protection and expertise when a property owner has to address a sinkhole issue
• Protection and expertise when an entire city’s water supply is threatened by contamination moving through a complex geology riddled with faults and solution caverns
• Protection and expertise when an engineer needs geologic suitability information to design a building or bridge
• Protection and expertise to properly site and construct a levee with walls that won’t fail
• Protection and expertise for when accurate and reliable geological reports are needed by government agencies for public use
• Protection and expertise to help design a landfill that won’t leak toxic waste into groundwater
• Protection for when deep municipal waste water injection wells have to be designed and installed that won’t leak into drinking water aquifers.

Professional Geologists have the unique training, supervision, the requisite years of technical knowledge and expertise, and the sworn ethics to provide these protections with the highest level of professionalism. Unqualified geologists, who are employed in jobs that affect the public, place an undue risk on the health, safety and welfare of that public. The risks include the possibility of an error that will cause a loss of life or property; the higher costs of supervision; the costs of repeating incorrect and incomplete work; and lower cost/benefit ratios brought about by an inability to do efficient work.

I appreciate the opportunity to send this letter to you, and the time that you have taken to read it. If you have any questions about the profession of geology, or any of the subject areas listed in this letter, please call me at any time. My office telephone number is listed below.

Thank you again for your time.