Jupiter’s Jones Creek is a filthy quagmire and neighbors desperately want it cleaned up - but that’s not so simple
JUPITER — Tour Jones Creek — but be careful to stay in the boat — and you’ll see what all the commotion is about.
The near-stagnant water, thick canopy of mangroves and slightly pungent stench are all there, with trash, mangrove seedlings and coconuts scattered throughout. Signs around the creek warn of poor water quality.
Stephen Dodson, who keeps a small boat docked behind his Sioux Street house, loves the creek and the access it provides to the Loxahatchee River. But the waterway needs work, he said.
“That’s what this (creek) normally looks like, this grayish brown,” Dodson said from behind the wheel of his Carolina skiff on a recent morning. He greeted a neighbor in a nearby yard then added: “Far from the blue waters underneath the lighthouse.”
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He and others in the Jupiter River Estates neighborhood see a path toward cleaning up the long-challenged waterway. They are trying to set up a small taxing unit that waterfront homeowners would pay into for regular maintenance of the creek.
Since summer, Dodson and others have circulated a letter among neighbors telling local officials they are willing to pay up to $400 annually for upkeep, provided that the town help with an initial trimming of the vegetation that covers the waterway — which could cost $400,000.
Pockets of the creek, which is both natural and man-made and winds south of Indiantown Road, are impassable because of the thick cover of mangroves.
The trees are part of the problem, preventing light from penetrating the creek and allowing bacteria in the water to flourish, Bud Howard, director of information services at the Loxahatchee River District, has said.
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So far Dodson said he and his colleagues have lined up about 70 signatures collected among the nearly 200 waterfront properties pinpointed for the taxing district.
Dodson’s neighborhood, Jupiter River Estates, has no homeowners association. But across the creek are two communities, The Colony and Maple Isle, that are both are led by HOAs. That has complicated matters, said Heath Wintz, a leader in the signature effort who lives close to Dodson on Sioux Street.
County records indicate the Maple Isle Homeowners Association and Maplewood Property Owners Association each own portions of the creek. Records from the 1990s say the Maple Isle HOA holds responsibility for maintaining part of the waterway. A Maple Isle property manager didn’t respond to request for comment and a Maplewood property manager couldn’t be immediately reached for comment.
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Elsewhere, the waterway falls under individual or town control.
It’s a legal mess at the moment and Jupiter needs to help sort things out, Wintz said.
“It’s my hope that town legal counsel will reach back out to our group and help us navigate these murky waters of property ownership and authority to accept responsibility for maintenance costs so that we can develop a comprehensive plan and get this thing off dead center,” Wintz said.
Councilman Ron Delaney wants the town to look into the matter more than it already has, but he hesitates to devote too many public resources.
“The property owners all own to the middle of the creek so it’s not really conducive to having all the taxpayers in town help out with cleaning their waterfront property,” Delaney said.
While Dodson and his colleagues continue their effort, the Loxahatchee River District and the Florida Department of Environmental Protection are winding down months of research examining what exactly ails the creek.
The district compiled initial results in a report last month that described issues with the water’s murkiness, algae activity and bacteria levels.
At worst, the district says, there are more than 5,000 colonies of fecal-indicating bacteria per 100 milliliters of water in the creek. For context: Beach advisories are issued when bacteria levels top 70.
“Bacteria is one of those like ’Holy cow those are crazy numbers,’” Howard said in a recent interview.
But the bacteria levels are not high enough to suggest a large sewage leak, he added. And samples didn’t turn up high levels of acetaminophen, or Tylenol. (Tylenol would indicate human excrement is around because the human body excretes it in urine). The district thinks that means there probably is not a lot of human waste in the creek.
The district is still trying to pinpoint exactly where the pollution is coming from, Howard said. There are some leads, but nothing concrete.
"There’s no smoking gun to say ’It’s coming from this house,’“ Wintz said.
There’s a variety of factors at play, Howard said. The low flow, decaying vegetation and overgrowth of mangroves all hurt the water quality.
And there is a human element to the problems. The district’s researchers have seen dead lobster and fish that were likely dumped into the creek, Howard said. In the fall, a poached alligator carcass showed up in the waterway behind Sioux Street, Dodson said.
“I use the word stewardship,” Dodson said. “We have to take care of this or else it will go away.”
Check out the creek at low tide and you’ll smell how foul it gets, said Michele Newell, who is working with Dodson and Wintz and lives on Pawnee Street.
“It just needs to be taken care of,” she said. “It’s part of Jupiter.”
Delaney is sympathetic to the residents’ plight, saying the creek has “a vicious cycle of stagnant water.” Dodson took him for a tour of the waterway about a year ago, and Delaney recalls it being a bit of a mess.
Dodson said town officials should view it as an investment.
A cleaner creek will drive up property values, he said, which will bring in more tax revenue for Jupiter.
There’s also the concern that the mangrove trees could hurt water flow during hurricanes or floods. The creek functions as a stormwater drain, Dodson said.
“They have a huge vested stake in this,” he said.
Delaney places part of the blame on homeowners who haven’t pruned their mangroves that abut the waterway, which also frustrates Dodson.
Though water-quality issues have lingered for years, the councilman is still optimistic.
“It’s sort of a unique situation they’re in,” Delaney said. “We'll figure it out somehow.”
Post staff writer Hannah Morse contributed to this report.
