Save Our Lagoon projects in South Brevard

The SOIRL projects that the draft state lagoon plan and Palm Bay records list for South Brevard are two Micco septic-to-sewer jobs, septic upgrades, two nitrogen-removal media retrofits, the Palm Bay Bayfront pond, a Palm Bay plant upgrade and a Turkey Creek sewer area.

SOIRL is the short name Brevard County uses for its Indian River Lagoon program, which is funded by a half-cent sales tax (Brevard County SOIRL program).

The list comes from two official records. The first is the April 2025 draft Central Indian River Lagoon Basin Management Action Plan (BMAP) from the Florida Department of Environmental Protection, whose project table lists SOIRL among the partners on each row used here (FDEP draft Central IRL BMAP, Table B-2). The second is the City of Palm Bay's January 18, 2024 council presentation on its septic and wastewater remediation plan (City of Palm Bay remediation plan presentation). Every page of the state plan is headed as a draft, so its project rows, dates and costs are draft figures, not an adopted plan. Brevard County's own project plan pages for the program could not be read for this page, so county figures here are the ones the state and the city publish.

The county describes the program behind these rows as a voter-approved initiative funded by a half-cent sales tax to reduce excess nitrogen and phosphorus pollution in the Indian River Lagoon (Brevard County SOIRL program). Its story map shows where all the SOIRL plan projects are located.

Micco has two SOIRL septic-to-sewer jobs in the draft state plan: the Micco Sewer Extension, connecting 29 properties and underway with a 2025 estimated completion, and Micco Zone B, a planned 2028 project to connect 229 properties at an estimated $15 million.

The FDEP draft BMAP lists Brevard County as lead on both. The Micco Sewer Extension (BC-34) is described as connecting 29 properties from septic to sewer, with DEP, the Indian River Lagoon National Estuary Program and SOIRL as partners and a cost estimate of $4,870,536 (FDEP draft Central IRL BMAP, page 113). Micco Zone B Septic to Sewer (BC-38) lists DEP and SOIRL as partners and is planned for 2028 (FDEP draft Central IRL BMAP, page 114). The nitrogen and phosphorus credits for both are still marked TBD in the April 2025 draft.

Both Micco projects are credited to Project Zone SEB. FDEP describes that zone as covering more than 117,881 acres, with urban land the largest share at 22.5 percent, and lists Brevard County, the City of Palm Bay and the Town of Grant-Valkaria among its stakeholders (FDEP draft Central IRL BMAP, page 30). Barefoot Bay, next to Micco, appears in the same plan only as a wastewater facility, Barefoot Bay Advanced (FL0042293), in its lists of wastewater facilities in the lagoon basin (FDEP draft Central IRL BMAP, page 36).

In Palm Bay, SOIRL money has gone to the Bayfront stormwater pond completed in 2017, $3.6 million of nutrient-removal upgrades at the North Regional Water Reclamation Facility, and a planned septic-to-sewer area along Turkey Creek.

The FDEP draft BMAP lists the Palm Bay Bayfront Stormwater Project (BC-22) as a Brevard County project with Palm Bay and SOIRL as partners, tagged CITY SOIRL, SOIRL-15, completed in 2017 with a $300,000 estimate (FDEP draft Central IRL BMAP, page 85). The City of Palm Bay's January 2024 remediation presentation reports that the North Regional Water Reclamation Facility was upgraded to nutrient removal in 2022 with SOIRL program funded upgrades of $3.6 million (City of Palm Bay presentation, page 13).

The same presentation lists Area A (SOIRL) Turkey Creek as one of four Palm Bay septic-to-sewer areas, with 99 connections, an estimated $12 million and a status of design to start; the other three areas, with 1,066, 1,773 and 395 connections, carry no SOIRL label (City of Palm Bay presentation, page 10). The city's septic inventory names Brevard County SOIRL GIS as one of its data sources (City of Palm Bay presentation, page 8).

Palm Bay also asked the state for septic-to-sewer money. Its December 13, 2023 Senate funding request sought $5,000,000 to help about 400 Palm Bay households connect to city sewer, put the average connection cost at $12,000, and noted that on October 5, 2023 the Palm Bay City Council agreed to waive all city utility connection fees except the $100 meter and deposit fee (Florida Senate LFIR 2005, City of Palm Bay).

For Brevard homes that stay on septic, including those in Malabar, Grant-Valkaria, Micco and Barefoot Bay, the county's upgrade grants pair SOIRL money with state money to replace a conventional system with a nitrogen-reducing one.

Brevard County's fiscal year 2024-25 Senate funding request, dated December 12, 2023, for at least 100 septic upgrades lays out the split: state grant funding would pay up to $9,000 for each upgrade, and the SOIRL program would provide up to $9,000 more, for a maximum cost-share of $18,000 per property (Florida Senate LFIR 1982, Brevard County). The upgrades are to NSF-certified aerobic treatment units or in-ground nitrogen-reducing drainfields, and the request reports that about 190 properties took part from 2020 to 2023.

In Project Zone SEB, where the Micco sewer projects are credited, the FDEP draft BMAP records 8 completed septic upgrades in 2023 under BC-35a, to systems meeting at least 65 percent nitrogen reduction, credited with 274.13 pounds of nitrogen a year at a cost of $165,995 (FDEP draft Central IRL BMAP, page 114). An earlier 2021 round, BC-35, is listed with its 87 pounds of nitrogen credit counted in the county's credit-sharing project because it was 100 percent funded by SOIRL (FDEP draft Central IRL BMAP, page 113).

State law sets the deadline for septic owners across the plan area, Malabar and Barefoot Bay included. Under section 373.469, Florida Statutes, by July 1, 2030, any commercial or residential property with an existing septic system in the Central Indian River Lagoon BMAP area must connect to central sewer if available or upgrade to an enhanced nutrient-reducing system, and since January 1, 2024 new septic systems have been prohibited where sewer is available, unless previously permitted, with only enhanced nutrient-reducing systems allowed where it is not (Section 373.469, Florida Statutes).

The FDEP draft BMAP's SOIRL Split rows for 2017 to 2023 share SOIRL nitrogen and phosphorus credit among Brevard County and its towns and cities, giving Palm Bay 3,127.1 pounds of nitrogen a year, Grant-Valkaria 150.8 and Malabar 80.8.

Each row is listed as a credit-sharing entry completed in 2023 (FDEP draft BMAP, Palm Bay PB-46; Brevard County BC-42; Brevard County BC-43; Grant-Valkaria GV-01; Grant-Valkaria GV-02; Malabar MAL-05). Grant-Valkaria's two shares add up to 150.8 pounds of nitrogen a year (94.5 plus 56.3).

The shares are small next to what the state requires. FDEP's draft Table 16 sets Grant-Valkaria's required nitrogen reduction at 25,600 pounds a year and Malabar's at 12,386, and assigns Brevard County 19,940 pounds in Project Zone A and 27,987 in Project Zone SEB (FDEP draft Central IRL BMAP, Table 16). Grant-Valkaria's SOIRL share, 150.8 pounds, is about 0.6 percent of its 25,600 pound target (150.8 divided by 25,600).

Three older county stormwater projects in the draft plan, Valkaria Lakes, Micco I and Wheeler Flemming Grant, were completed in 2014 and 2016 and list no SOIRL partner.

The FDEP draft BMAP lists Valkaria Lakes (BC-07), borrow pits converted into stormwater detention ponds, completed in 2014 with DEP as partner, credited with 1,132 pounds of nitrogen and 256 of phosphorus a year at $261,000 (FDEP draft Central IRL BMAP, page 83). Micco I (BC-09), an exfiltration and denitrification treatment train, was completed in 2016 at $175,599 (FDEP draft Central IRL BMAP, page 111).

Wheeler Flemming Grant (BC-13), a DEP-partnered wet detention pond beside Fleming Grant Road in southeastern Brevard County, was completed in 2016 at $645,073 and is credited with 553 pounds of nitrogen a year (FDEP draft Central IRL BMAP, page 112). Four years later, in 2020, the SOIRL project Flemming Grant BAM (BC-26), with a $181,000 cost estimate, added nitrogen-removal media and is credited with 448.88 pounds of nitrogen a year (FDEP draft Central IRL BMAP, page 112).

Palm Bay, Malabar and Micco residents can attend the SOIRL Citizen Oversight Committee, which meets on the 3rd Friday of each month, next on November 20 and December 18, 2026.

Meetings run from 8:30 to 11:30 a.m. in the Florida Room, Building C, 3rd Floor (Brevard County SOIRL program). Reports on the progress and finances of the SOIRL projects are presented at those meetings to the committee and the general public. The county page also carries the ballot question for the November 2026 election, which asks whether Brevard County should renew the existing SOIRL half-cent sales tax for ten years, with revenue kept in a trust fund and continued citizen committee oversight and annual independent audits.

For Palm Bay, Malabar and Grant-Valkaria, the state plan is the other place to watch: the April 2025 draft BMAP is the version that lists the Micco Zone B and Babcock @C54 projects with 2028 and 2025 dates, and FDEP writes that it will reevaluate and, if necessary, adopt another iteration of the lagoon BMAPs, most likely before 2030 (FDEP draft Central IRL BMAP, page 14). Last verified: October 18, 2026, on the Brevard County SOIRL program page and the FDEP draft Central Indian River Lagoon BMAP.