Titusville fails to certify right to clean water despite judge's ruling in favor of voters
Despite a judge's ruling that the right to clean water be encoded in the Titusville city charter, the city has still not certified the election results of the referendum more than six months after voters spoke.
The referendum giving Titusville residents a right to clean water passed with overwhelming support last fall.
But city officials delayed certifying the results, saying they were worried the local law would run afoul of state statute, prompting the Council to seek what's known as a "declaratory judgment" from a judge to determine the referendum's legality.
According to Circuit Court Judge Charles Holcomb's decision, the right to clean water does not go against the Constitution or state law and the city is now required to certify the results.
In his decision Monday, Holcomb went as far as to say voters can amend the city charter "without the approval of and even in the fact of vehement objection from the governing body."
In declaring the Right to Clean Water referendum legal, Holcomb sided with Speak Up Titusville, the environmental group that wrote the referendum and organized a petition to place it on the ballot last year.
Voters approved the measure by a huge margin — 82.57% to 17.43% — in the Nov. 8 election. The amendment gives residents the ability to sue governmental or corporate entities that pollute area waters which includes the beleaguered Indian River Lagoon.
The city previously sought a judgment that would have kept the referendum off the ballot. But because the decision would not have gone through in time, the vote went ahead.
The ballot initiative came after years of sewage spills into the Indian River Lagoon and city ponds as a result of the city's aging infrastructure. Titusville has racked up hefty fines from the Florida Department of Environmental Protection as a result.
City Council members voiced concerns that the measure could open the city up to costly and frivolous lawsuits that would detract from its ability to pay for cleanup and repairs. City officials also had expressed concern that a right to clean water could be illegal under the Clean Waterways Act, signed into law by Gov. Ron DeSantis in 2020, which prevents local governments from protecting the "rights" of nature — a law that has frustrated many local environmental activists.
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Titusville officials had looked to avoid what happened in Orange County, which saw its right to clean water charter amendment struck down by a circuit judge, who sided with builders and ruled the state Clean Waterways Act trumped the charter amendment. That amendment, which won 90% of the the vote when it was put on the ballot in 2020, was later overturned by the judge.
City Manager Scott Larese declined a request for comment Wednesday, citing pending litigation.
At Tuesday's meeting of the City Council, the city attorney Richard Broome and members of Council scheduled a closed door meeting for May 31 to discuss possible further legal action on the matter. That meeting could decide whether the results are certified or if the judge's decision is appealed.
Supporters of the Right to Clean Water measure like Toni Shifalo spoke ardently at Tuesday's meeting against any need for further discussion.
"It's just really disgusting to me that you would wait until the very end of a very long meeting to bring this up and want to have a secret meeting so y'all can discuss your strategy," Shifalo said. "What strategy is there? You're just going against all the citizens and voters who want to hold polluters accountable and save the river.""Now you're going to talk about appealing, maybe? Why don't you respect the voters and just not have the meeting. Just go home," Shifalo added.
Council member Sarah Stoeckel said the meeting would just be part of the process going forward. Closed door meetings among council members are legal in certain cases such as city litigation.
William Klein, a member of Speak Up Titusville who was instrumental in placing the referendum on the ballot, likened the city's behavior to Don Quixote tilting at windmills. "The City of Titusville thinks that they are a knight in armor alongside with Staff using the Courts like a lance to attack Speak Up Titusville instead of a windmill. They have nothing to gain no matter who wins," Klein wrote in an email. Judge Holcomb declared the city's claims of vagueness in the statute were without merit to the point of not discussing them in his final judgment. He also ruled against the city's primary claim that the measure gives natural bodies of water their own rights, running afoul of the state statute. "The adoption of the proposed amendment approved by a majority vote of the voters in Titusville, leaves only a ministerial duty to certify the amendment," Holcomb wrote. The city on Wednesday still had not certified the amendment.
Tyler Vazquez is the North Brevard Watchdog Reporter at FLORIDA TODAY. Contact Vazquez at 321-917-7491 or tvazquez@floridatoday.com. Twitter: @tyler_vazquez
This article originally appeared on Florida Today: Judge sides with Titusville voters on right to clean water, city stalls
