Local officials attend water quality meeting in Fort Myers
With the impending wet season ready to return in two to three months, local officials have remained active during the dry season by keeping the pressure on water management officials when it comes to water quality in Southwest Florida.
Each summer, heavy rains fill Lake Okeechobee causing high flow regulatory freshwater releases to be discharged from the lake into the Caloosahatchee and St. Lucie rivers. This creates a disproportionate mix of fresh and salt water that eventually creates damage to the estuaries’ coastal habitats. The lake releases are also known to involve back-pumped nutrient-rich water with large amounts of phosphorus and nitrogen that negatively affects water quality.
Chaired by state DEP Secretary Herschel Vinyard, the meeting in downtown Fort Myers included DEP Communications Director Kendra Parson; SFWMD board member Mitch Hutchcraft; Cape Coral Mayor Marni Sawicki; and Sanibel Environmental Biologist James Evans. The meeting was requested by Sanibel Mayor Kevin Ruane, who couldn’t attend because he was in Tallahassee, and Fort Myers Beach Council Member Alan Mandel. Both officials were stranded in Washington D.C. during the prior scheduled engagement.
Mandel said all officials were mindful that poor water quality is not only detrimental to our ecology but to our economy and tourism industry.
“I think they are aware of the environmental side of it and the economic side of it as well,” he said.
“It’s a matter of some assurances for us so that we don’t get too much or too little (regulatory flows). Whatever we get, we are hoping it is better quality.”
SFWMD and the Army Corps of Engineers are known for owning a 50/50 partnership in managing the decisions for the Greater Everglades system, which includes Lake O and many of its estuaries.
Mandel said Vinyard opened the meeting by making a baseball reference which basically asked what could be done at a lower, yet more efficient level to somewhat resolve some of the issues.
“He said, ‘what can we do to get some singles to resolve the problems we are having’,” Mandel said. “It really made a lot of sense, because there is no appropriation yet for it (in Washington D.C.).”
Mandel called for ‘adaptive flexibility’ in water level management, beginning with the Kissimmee River which discharges in Lake O, and maximized storage on all private lands currently under contract by SFWMD.
“We talked about Babcock Ranch, Bassinger Grove and other C43 (Caloosahatchee River West Basin Storage) reservoir areas,” he said. “We agreed that municipalities should have their councils write a letter of support to Sen. (Bill) Nelson. We also revisited Lake Okeechobee release schedules.”
Regulation of nutrients in the upper Caloosahatchee River was also discussed.
Mandel and the other representatives of the municipalities stressed the economic significance of tourism. Numbers such as $3 billion collected from tourism in Lee County alone as well as 85,000 jobs associated with tourism and 22 percent of foreign money collected in the county were thrown around.
Long-term projects are still being looked into, such as acquiring more land for the C-43 reservoir (designed to hold 170,000 acre feet of water), Central Everglades Planning Project (reconnect Lake O south with Everglades National Park, but water needs to be treated/cleaned) and the restoration of Herbert Hoover Dike (to enhance structural integrity and provide additional storage).