Administrative Judge orders in favor of County and FDOT for SFWMD permitting SR7 extension. Next steps:
1. There will be 15 days for parties to file exceptions to the Administrative Order, April 15th, 2017 is deadline.
2. SFWMD has 90 days from the Administrative Order to issue their Final Order, June 28th, 2017 is deadline.
3. Once the Final Order is issued, parties have 30 days from that date to file an appeal. If the final Order is not issued until June 28th, this would mean the appeal deadline is July 28th, 2017.
4. If there is an appeal, this could tie up the matter for many more months but unless a Motion to Stay construction were granted, next steps could proceed.
5. Then the Army Corps of Engineers permit would need to be granted which could start a whole new challenge process. In addition, the Army Corps of Engineers' permit will rely on information from an environmental study as well as information from the EPA. Please see the previous response from the EPA in September, 2015.
EPA Letter dated September 2015 re SR7
So as you can see from the known timeline above as well as the possibility of further legal challenges, this project could be delayed in the best case scenario by another year and worse case, much longer. One more hurdle potentially has been passed but it hardly ends the story.
To read the full order, go here
Administrative Order dated March 31 2017 re SFWMD Permit
Palm Beach Post Story
http://eyeonpbc.blog.palmbeachpost.com/2017/03/31/county-gets-favorable-ruling-in-push-to-extend-sr7/
