Okaloosa County Commissioners voted unanimously Tuesday morning to ask the Florida Department of Environmental Protection to lead a multi-agency investigation into the source of water quality problems in Cinco Bayou.
- The resolution requests that FDEP jointly lead a “Cinco Bayou WBID 843 Source-Identification and Restoration Investigation.” It follows an Aug. 2 event in the Fort Walton Beach bayou that killed fish and crabs, and the recurring health advisories for elevated bacteria issued since.
Chairman Trey Goodwin, who brought the item to the board, said the August event subsided without anyone determining exactly what happened.
Since then, Goodwin said, the Natural Resources Team at the county’s Tourist Development Department has collected weekly water samples at three locations spread across about three and a half miles of the bayou.
Those tests have returned recurring high bacteria levels, which require the Okaloosa Health Department to issue health advisories, Goodwin said. He said the results are not a repeat of what happened in August, and that some are not unexpected after heavy rainfall.
“I think it’s important for our constituents to know that they’re seeing more water quality notices about this bayou because we are taking the extra effort to do the testing,” Goodwin said.
Goodwin said residents have been asking what the county will do about the results, and he described the resolution as the next step in that process.
- “I think we’ve been treating, to some extent, some of the symptoms, but not always knowing what all the causes are, and this would help us get there,” Goodwin said.
He said the issue is bigger than Okaloosa County because at least two cities sit on the bayou, along with the state and its road network. Goodwin said the goal is to get help from FDEP while county staff stay engaged, not to send a letter and hope the state takes it on.
The resolution encourages FDEP to designate a technical team that includes the health department, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, the Northwest Florida Water Management District, the Choctawhatchee Bay Estuary Program, the Florida Department of Transportation’s District Three, affected local governments and utilities. It states the county is prepared to partner with FDEP and support the effort financially and in-kind.
Deputy County Administrator Craig Coffey told commissioners that several agencies have studied and tested Cinco Bayou and other county waterways, but that the work has not reached root causes or solutions. He said the Cinco Bayou effort could serve as a model the county repeats from one bayou to the next.
- Goodwin named Poquito, Garniers, Boggy and Rocky bayous as others that probably need to be looked at, noting that all of them affect Choctawhatchee Bay.
Coffey said an earlier board set aside a little more than $1 million for capital costs tied to the estuary program, and that more than $400,000 of it has been spent on a comprehensive estuary management program. He said the remaining money could potentially be paired with funding from other agencies. The agenda request also notes that RESTORE Pot 1 funding the board has set aside for water quality could potentially support the investigation and any resulting projects.
Commissioner Paul Mixon made the motion to approve, which Commissioner Drew Palmer seconded. Mixon’s motion amended the resolution to name the county’s Natural Resources team among the participants. The motion also added the request to the county’s legislative priorities list.
Commissioners asked John Mead, a former Fort Walton Beach city councilman, to take the resolution to the city of Fort Walton Beach for its support. Goodwin said he would take it to the Town of Cinco Bayou.
Mead, who spoke during public comment, said he came home Aug. 2 to find the bayou gray, with dead fish everywhere and crabs coming to the surface. He said city and county crews were on the bayou within hours, and that the city dye-tested and visually inspected its high-pressure sewer line and hired a Jacksonville company to examine it independently, but found nothing.
- “The county’s done amazing work immediately, and so has the city, but it’s not enough,” Mead said.
Commissioner Carolyn Ketchel thanked Goodwin for following up on the issue. “You have my full support,” she said.
An exhibit attached to the resolution lays out a recommended minimum scope of work for the investigation. It includes:
- An inventory of all outfalls and sanitary infrastructure connected to Cinco Bayou and its contributing subwatersheds, including Gap Creek.
- Coordinated dry-weather and wet-weather sampling.
- Testing designed to identify human and animal sources of bacteria.
- Continuous monitoring of dissolved oxygen, temperature and salinity.
- Evaluation of the bayou’s sediment.
- A rapid-response protocol for odor, discoloration, fish kills or bacterial exceedances.
- A final report ranking sources and recommending corrective measures and funding options.
The scope also asks the state to reconcile its 2022 assessment, which said human-related sources had been identified, with 2026 testing that did not attribute a human signal.
According to the agenda request, FDEP classifies Cinco Bayou as impaired for Enterococci bacteria with a high priority for developing a Total Maximum Daily Load. The bayou did not appear in the agency’s published 2026-2028 draft prioritization list.
The resolution states that the data used for the state’s assessments ended before the events of August and September. The county said in the agenda request that the bayou’s condition since then warrants FDEP’s reconsideration.
The health department issued its first advisory for Cinco Bayou on Aug. 7 and lifted it Aug. 19. A second advisory was issued Aug. 21 and lifted Sept. 1, and another followed tests completed Sept. 17.
In early September, the county said low dissolved oxygen likely caused the loss of marine life and that a dying algae bloom likely contributed to the discoloration and odor. It said the bacteria behind the advisories was not of human origin and was most likely tied to stormwater runoff and the agitation of sediment.
The resolution took effect immediately upon adoption.
