Florida sells unlimited water-pumping rights in drought-stricken State Park to Nestle for $230

Cory Doctorow 1:14 am Thu Apr 10, 2008

The State of Florida has given a Nestle bottling plant the right to pump as much water as it can get out Madison Blue Springs State Park, which is presently in drought conditions. The right lasts until 2018, and cost Nestle $230 in permit fees. Florida is presently in bitter dispute with its neighboring states over a region-wide water-shortage.

The company got a permit to take water belonging to Floridians – hundreds of millions of gallons a year from a spring in a state park – at no cost to Nestle.

No taxes. No fees. Just a $230 permit to pump water until 2018…

The state did much more than fight to get Nestle the right to pump as much water as possible from the spring.

As an added incentive for Nestle, the state approved a tax refund of up to $1.68-million for the Madison bottling operation. To date, Nestle has received two refunds totaling $196,000 and requested a third tax refund.

(Thanks, Steven!)

See also: For Love of Water: infuriating and incredible documentary about world's water-crisis

(Image: The world of water, a Creative Commons Attribution licensed photo from Snap®'s Flickr stream)

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