If you follow anything to do with building or drilling in Central Florida, you probably saw something this month about the Southwest Florida Water Management District changing its permit system.

Here is the short version for anyone planning a well: your well permit did not move.

That is the whole answer for most homeowners. But the change is worth understanding, because permits are the part of a well job that people find most confusing, and there is a fair amount of bad information going around about what happened.

What actually changed

Starting July 7, 2026, the district moved its Environmental Resource Permitting to a new online system called Appian. Any new Environmental Resource Permit application, any change to an existing one, and any pre-application meeting request now goes through that new system.

Environmental Resource Permits are usually called ERPs. They cover things like stormwater systems, wetland impacts, and land development work. If you are building a subdivision, putting in a retention pond, or doing anything that changes how water moves across a piece of land, that is ERP territory.

For a homeowner drilling one well on one lot, ERP has nothing to do with you.

What did not change

Well Construction Permits stayed exactly where they were. So did Water Use Permits. Both still run through the district’s older system, called the Water Management Information System, or WMIS.

That is the system your driller has been using for years, and it is the system they will keep using. Nothing about how a well permit gets pulled, reviewed, or approved changed on July 7.

So if someone told you the permit process for your new well just got harder, or slower, or moved somewhere new, they were mixing up two different programs.

Why a well needs a permit at all

This part trips people up, so it is worth laying out plainly.

Every new water well in our district needs a Well Construction Permit before anyone puts a drill bit in the ground. That is not a local rule that changes county to county. It applies across all sixteen counties the district covers, which includes Hernando, Pasco, Citrus, and Hillsborough.

The permit is not a formality. It sets conditions on how the well gets built. Minimum casing depth is the big one. Casing is the pipe that lines the upper part of the well, and the permit tells the driller how deep that casing has to go on your particular property. In some areas the district requires deeper casing than normal because of what is happening underground nearby.

The permit also creates a record. Years from now, when someone buys the house, that record shows the well was built legally and to code.

Who is supposed to pull it

Your driller.

A licensed well contractor pulls the Well Construction Permit as part of the job. It is their license on the application. It is their responsibility to build the well to whatever conditions the permit sets, and to file the completion report afterward.

If a contractor tells you to pull your own permit, or tells you the job does not need one, stop and think hard about that. Unpermitted wells are a real problem in Florida. They show up later, usually at the worst time, which is when someone is trying to sell the house or refinance it.

At All-Tech we file the permit as part of every job. It is built into the price and into the schedule. When we quote a new well installation, the permit work is already in there. You are not chasing paperwork on your own.

What this means if you are drilling this year

Practically speaking, nothing changes for you.

Permit review times on well construction have not shifted because of this. The usual timeline still applies, which is a few days on the front end before the rig can set up. That is why we tell people a new well takes one to three days of actual work but a bit longer start to finish.

The one thing worth watching is that the district’s online systems have posted hours. The ePermitting system and permit map are available from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. on weekdays and from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. on weekends. If your contractor tells you they could not get into the system at eleven at night, that is a real thing, not an excuse.

If you need to talk to a person about a permit, the district’s ePermitting help desk answers at 352-754-3456, Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.

How to look up permits yourself

This is the part most homeowners do not know about, and it is genuinely useful.

The district publishes a public well construction permit search. You can look up permits by county, by owner name, or by parcel number. If you are buying a house on well water, this is one of the fastest ways to find out whether the well was permitted, roughly when it went in, and how deep the casing was set.

A well with no permit record is not automatically a bad well. Plenty of older wells predate the current rules. But it is something you want to know before closing, not after. Pair that lookup with a real water test and you have a decent picture of what you are buying.

Parcel number is the most reliable way to search. Owner names change, addresses get entered inconsistently, but the parcel number stays put. You can get it from your county property appraiser.

The part nobody mentions

Permits get treated like red tape, and it is easy to see why. Nobody enjoys them.

But the casing depth requirement on a permit is the single thing standing between your drinking water and whatever is soaking into the ground above it. Lawn runoff, septic seepage, surface water after a hard rain. The casing and the grout seal around it keep that out of the aquifer your pump is pulling from.

We have seen wells that were drilled fast and cheap by someone who skipped the paperwork and skipped the casing depth that went with it. They work fine for a while. Then the water goes off, and the fix costs more than the well did.

The permit is not the district being difficult. It is a floor, and it is a low one.

Getting your well done right

If you are planning a new well anywhere in Hernando, Pasco, Citrus, or Hillsborough, the permit is our job, not yours. We pull it, we build to it, and we file the completion paperwork when the well is done.

Everything else stays the same too. Free site walk, written estimate, and a one year warranty on labor and materials across the whole system.

Have a look at how we handle well drilling from first phone call to first hot shower, or get in touch for a free estimate and we will come look at your property.