What Can We Do As Individuals?

We can write letters! And don't forget: If you get socked with the $600 charge and the cost of the yearly inspections or if you die from something the terrorists put in the drinking water by way of the backflow valves and you didn't write any letters, galaxy law forbids you from ever complaining!

Please write to the Secretary of the Florida Dep't of Environmental Protection., our elected representatives, our county officials, the government people involved and to the newspapers and TV stations and tell them what you think about being required to buy the $600 valve.

Government officials ignore form letters (and petitions). Having read through the website and thinking about how the forced installation of a backflow valve will affect you personally, choose one or more of the points below and write about it. Please do not just do a "copy" and "paste" of the points. If we can't persuade the "powers that be" to change the law, it's going to cost each of us $600 to comply. That should be a strong enough incentive to take the time to compose a letter from the heart and spend $1.64 for four stamps. Give the letter a Subject that includes the word "backflow" plus whatever you might want to express. Don't threaten - they already know that if they don't come through for us, they'll lose our vote in the next election. Don't rant & rave - be civil. And keep it short - long letters don't get read in their entirety.

If you think DiCecco will hunt you down for writing letters, don't sign the letter with your name and address - and say that you fear retribution. And retribution is not out of the question: One resident made the mistake of calling DiCecco who then called a plumber, who then appeared at the resident's home the next day offering to install a backflow valve for $695!

Some points that you could make are that you don't like the idea of being forced to buy the backflow valve because:

• The valves have a high cost: $600.


• The valves have an additional yearly cost of an inspection by a certified inspector.


• The valves, being above ground and typically incorporating union connections, are ripe for quick theft because of their brass and copper content. To see a TV news story about that, click here.


• The valves are bureaucratic overkill in a residential area.


• The valves are only there for the very remote, future possibility of cross-connection.


• The valves don't protect you against anything.


• The valves provide direct and easy access back into your county's water supply. So-called "tamper-proofing" devices for the valves are easily compromised. They involve a key to lock and unlock the valve. Both Home Depot and Lowe's now sell a Universal Key that will unlock the valve. The cost is under $3!


• Backflow contamination in residential areas is insignificant. Factories and farms account for almost all of the horror stories.


• We're doing the County a favor by saving them from having to build more infrastructure and finding more water resources for us.


• Because the valves are in an exposed location at the front of our lawns, the first hard freeze will cause them to burst.


• The plumbing at the front of each of our yards will degrade the appearance of our properties and make it that much harder to sell when we go to a nursing home or the great retirement village in the sky.


• The Florida Dep't of Environmental Protection and the Hillsborough County Building Services Division are beating-up on old people! For shame!

Letters are better. But if you want to use email, the easiest way to compose and then send email letters is to compose them in your favorite word processor program. When your letter is perfect, click on Edit > Select All, which will highlight everything. Then click on Edit > Copy, which will put you letter into the "scratch-pad" where it becomes available to all other programs. Click on one of the options below and you will be presented with an empty email form that has the names of the recipients. Give the email a title with the word "backflow" in it plus whatever you might want to add. Tab down to the message area. Click on Edit > Paste, and your letter will appear in the message area. If you don't understand these instructions, ask your child or grandchild for help.

Your first and most important letter should go to Michael Sole. The Florida Statutes give him the authority to decide when it is not necessary to install a backflow valve. Here is his contact information:

Michael W. Sole, Secretary
Florida Dep't of Environmental Protection
3800 Commonwealth Blvd
Tallahassee, FL 32303-3123
Phone: (850) 245-2011, Email: michael.sole@dep.state.fl.us.

Your second letter should go to Governor Crist. He is Michael Sole's boss. Here is the Governor's contact information.

Governor Charlie Crist
Office of the Governor
The Capitol
Tallahassee, FL 32399-0001
Phone: (850) 488-7146, Fax: (850) 487-0801, Internet contact form.

Your third letter should go to your State Senator who can work to change the Florida Statutes, to guide the authority of Micahel Sole. You can locate the contact information for him/her by clicking here.

If you live in Sun City Center, your State Senator is:

Senator Ronda Storms
313 E. Robertson St.
Brandon, FL 33511-5253
Phone: (813) 651-2189, Fax: (813) 651-2188
Email: storms.ronda.web@flsenate.gov

Your fourth letter should go to your State Representative who can work to change the Florida Statutes, to affect the authority of Micahel Sole. You can locate the contact information for him/her by clicking here.

If you live in Sun City Center, your State Representative is either:

State Representative Seth McKeel (District 63) - representing homes south of 674.
250 E. Highland Drive
Lakeland, FL 33813-1725
Phone: (863) 647-4896, Email: seth.mckeel@myfloridahouse.gov.

or

State Representative Ron Reagan (District 67) - representing homes north of 674.
7011 15th Street E, Suite B-1
Sarasota, FL 34243-6205
Phone: (941) 727-6447, Email: ron.reagan@myfloridahouse.gov.

Your remaining letters should go to your local elected officials.

Here in Hillsborough County we have seven Commissioners. Four of them (Ferlita, Hagan, White & Higginbotham) are assigned to specific districts. And three of them (Norman, Blair & Sharpe) are at-large and represent everybody. The same address is used for all the Commissioners:

Hillsborough County Commissioners
PO Box 1110
Tampa FL 33601-1110

To send the same email to your particular Hillsborough County Commissioner, the three At Large Commissioners, the County Administrator and all the County and State officials who should be concerned with backflow valves, just click on the particular Commissioner's name who serves your District: Rose Ferlita, Ken Hagan, Kevin White, or Al Higginbotham. Please note that this generated email form will not include the Governor and your State Senator and Representative, so they'll have to be done separately. It is important to write to those three because they are the ones who can change the law to keep backflow valves out of residential areas.

If you want to send a Letter To The Editor to a newspaper (and please keep in mind that newspapers prefer short, succinct letters), click: The Tampa Tribune , The St. Petersburg Times , The SCC Observer & Observer News , The Sun & South Shore News or The News of Sun City Center or All five newspapers.

You might want to suggest requiring backflow valves in residential areas as something to be investigated by your favorite TV station. I think all of the Tampa-St. Pete stations have a Contact Form on their station's website for their investigative team. You could suggest http://cbs13.com/video/?id=18545@kovr.dayport.com&cid=6 as a news story about backflow valves that was done by a TV station out in California. And you may certainly cite my page, http://www.suncitydave.info/backflow.htm , as a source for background material.

Webmaster:

David Brown
1805 Burlington Circle
Sun City Center FL 33573-5219
(813) 634-6048 (available 24/7)
dbrown28@tampabay.rr.com

Go thou and write those letters!