City Conduct

The City of St. Petersburg, including Mayor Rick Kriseman, Mr. Claude Tankersley - Public Works Administrator, and Mr. Carlos Frey, City Engineer and Contact for this project, have been notified via e-mail and knowledgeable about the status and concerns of this toxic cyanobacteria bloom and its lack of remediation since January 2019. They continue to engage in behavior that can be viewed as reticent or as methods of concealment (i.e. "omitting information that is important or relevant to the given context, or engaging in behavior that helps hide relevant information").

After Mr. Frey and Mr. Schemancik's departures in 2021, new City personnel, engineer, Ms. Kelly Thomas, has been named to be responsible for handling Harbor Isle Lake's project in place of Mr. Frey. City Staff, however, continue this same pattern of behavior from their predecessors. These actions continue to occur and are condoned by the City of St. Petersburg Engineering, Stormwater, and Public Works departments, lead by Ms. Dianna Rawleigh - Director of Stormwater; Mr. Brejesh Prayman - Director of Engineering; and Mr. Claude Tankersley - Director of Public Works. All of these directors are knowledgeable of this existence of this project and its problems since 2019 to present-- and they all have failed to answer and be accountable to questions.

The City has declined to comment on the following:

• The additional 2020 June micro-bubble aeration addition that appears inefficient due to lack of described engineering analysis for diffuser placement despite previous factors and suggestions given to them.

• The results and project of the 2016 Installed Micro-bubble Aeration System the City approved and helped fund in nearby Renaissance Neighborhood that was successful and confirmed at improving that lake's water quality.

• The nano-bubble system selected and installed by the City, running since December 2019, that appears deficient and unproven to reduce these toxic blooms and improve the water quality on Harbor Isle Lake's scale. *

• The Harbor Isle Lake sediment and 2001 city fill project "material" that sits at the lake's bottom that has not been tested or investigated or its info released, despite a privately contracted analysis that shows extremely high levels of nutrients. *

*Note:

The nano-bubble system has been removed in December 2021 and a sediment analysis was completed in September 2021. Both of these actions were done without public comment by the City, and the City never notified all the residents of these actions and results, or conclusions of these actions.

The City has made multiple equivocating comments in public statements and answers to questions. For example:

Harbor Isle residents received via U.S. mail a City letter dated 27 February 2020 regarding Harbor Isle Lake’s ongoing toxic cyanobacteria bloom and the City’s current situation analysis, stating “Aeration alone will not solve the ongoing concerns with the lake.” An additional April 2020 us mailed letter included the same statement.

This statement is misleading due to its vagueness. The experimental, likely insufficient choice, of a nano-bubble type aeration system installed by Solitude Lake Management (SOL) in December 2019 at the City’s request, was apparently not working as hoped/planned. The nano-bubble mechanism for oxygenation was not been proven to be effective on large and deeper water bodies, as previously quoted from SOL's website and residents sent emails concerned over these facts and others.

This statement does not mean other types of aeration, like micro-bubble, and its proven 50+ year history, would have the same result if a properly designed system is implemented.

Furthermore:

• Multiple Public City Document Requests took over a year to receive from the City in many instances, and the majority of public document requests still remain not received.

• The City still has not responded to questions regarding the City's lack of timely response to this public health issue, their dissemination of public info, the lack of/ release of water quality testing data in 2018-2019, and thorough engineering analysis.

• The City Nov 2018 Nutrient Report released in Jan 2019 failed to state and identify the blue-green algae present in the documented photos. The report fails to mention the potential risk of this type of algae and it being toxic.

• The City Nov 2018 Nutrient Report stated Reclaimed Water is a "likely source" for the algae bloom without analyzing or measuring any other potential nutrient sources, including but not limited to: organic and inorganic sediment; wildlife/ pet/ human waste, cattail vegetation.

• The City had failed to analyze the type of algae in the lake and if it was a toxic type for the 6 months prior to the citizen report to the FL-DEP in Jan 2019.

• The City failed to post public signage warning of the unknown algal bloom in the lake many months prior to the DEP-testing.

• The signs installed in Jan 2019 (below) fail to state the bloom is "cyanobacteria" or "blue-green algae" and toxic-- preventing accurate knowledge of the lake's condition to be presented to the public, or for the public to further research.

• The City had failed to take and/or disclose in a timely manner water quality data samples for monitoring throughout the past year of 2019 including but not limited to: dissolved oxygen, bacteria, turbidity, cyanobacteria amounts, chlorophyll-a, nutrients (e.g. Phosphorous, Nitrogen, Ammonia) throughout the entire water column.

• The City had failed to U.S. mail the June 2019 and September 2019 dated City statements and 2020 City Contractor Statement (linked below) regarding Harbor Isle Lake to inform all homeowners in the neighborhood of the lake's ongoing situation.

• The City has failed to follow the estimated deadlines on their own written statements. For example: The Sept 2019 letter, below, states: "Installation of the system is anticipated to begin in Oct 2019" -- this system mentioned was not installed until mid-late December 2019.

• Multiple City or City-contracted documents regarding this situation have typed errors and discrepancies between said documents (wrong names and/or no contact information, missing event information).

• The City failed to take / request a bathymetric map of lake to have better information about the water body and more accurate depths. They declined to comment on the scientific data sent to them by a resident, who contracted a bathymetric survey as well as a sediment analysis.

• The City has not taken and/or disclosed sediment samples analysis as a nutrient source. Sediment Analysis done Sept 2021, the results were not disclosed to all residents/public.

• After over 4 years of ongoing blooms -- sadly, many residents are still unaware that blue-green algae is what is in the lake, its toxic status and odors, and what progress has been made regarding this situation. The City continues to fail to properly inform and update this issue to all residents in a timely manner.

The above 2019 statements have no City employee(s) attached to them. No contact name, no signature. Why?
And, the 2020 statement has no way to contact the company personnel directly by email or otherwise. Why?

Notes:

• The City has provided a U.S. mailed letter to all residents in: February 2019, February 2020, April 2020, September 3 2020, September 29 2020, January 28, 2021 --- no other information has been given to all residents regarding the City's efforts or their responses to concerns over Harbor Isle lake, its toxic cyanobacteria blooms, and over poor water quality.

• The June 2019 and September 2019 statements linked above, were provided to the homeowner's association website only. (They are now no longer on that website.)

• There is no known City public website that provides this information as a timeline or resource for anyone to view.