The I-Team reviewed state data and found, since 2017, Port Richey has reported 14 spills to the Department of Environmental Protection.
Throughout 2020, Florida PEER (Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility) monitored those emergency alerts of sewage overflows across the state.
The reports are supposed to include the number of gallons spilled and cleaned up and if it impacted any body of water, as PEER pointed out in its report, released in September. But that doesn’t always happen.
The nonprofit found, looking at just 12 counties, including Hillsborough, Pinellas and Sarasota, there were 856 notifications to the state last year. That accounted for more than 126 million gallons spilled. Most of it, nearly 110 million, according to state reports, made it into the water.
