New Plan For Lake Okeechobee Releases Still Raising Concerns

FORT MYERS, Fla. (AP) — Dozens of scientists, environmental groups, elected officials and agency heads met online Oct. 26 to talk about recent changes to a still controversial plan to govern Lake Okeechobee releases.

Paul Gray, Audubon Florida’s director of science, offered a cautionary tale about becoming strictly wedded to policies that don’t necessarily make ecological sense.

He recalled a time when lake levels were sufficient so there was “zero chance” of having inadequate water supply stores, yet because of rigid policy dictates, “the Caloosahatchee had been cut off from all water.” Gray challenged the then-managers. “I could see they were very uncomfortable, but they wanted to follow their policies.” His takeaway: “Rationing natural systems could get policy makers into trouble in the future.”

Army Corps officers started off the meeting by taming expectations, saying a lake release schedule can’t solve all of South Florida’s mounting water issues.

“There’s only so much an operation schedule can do,” said Col. James Booth. “Ultimately the continued projects we put in the ground are going to meet a lot of expectations in South Florida. But a change to the schedule can make major improvements even if it doesn’t get everything we want immediately.”

The Army Corps calls the group the Project Development Team, or PDT, and its purpose is to act as a sounding board for Army Corps modelers, planners and decision-makers.

Team members include elected state, local or tribal government leaders, or someone acting on their behalf.

Called the Lake Okeechobee System Operation Manual, or LOSOM, the proposed regulations are expected to govern lake releases until at least 2030.

Eve Samples, Friends of the Everglades executive director, thanked the Corps for delivering a plan “less out of balance,” compared to the one that spawned disastrous algal blooms in 2018, but she said two things give her nonprofit pause: “We’re not sure how much a lake recovery mode might increase discharges east and west,” and in what’s called a conservation mode, she said, “We would urge you to send water south in every subzone” even when managers are dealing with a shortage.

The Army Corps has spent the past several weeks “optimizing” the LOSOM plan to address concerns over everything from too much water flowing to the Caloosahatchee River during heavy rain events to holding Lake Okeechobee at levels that will further damage the lake’s ecology.

Excess releases to the Caloosahatchee River during the summer will throw off the delicate brackish balance needed to maintain the river’s estuary and will send Lake Okeechobee water to Southwest Florida when blue-green algae blooms are most likely to occur.

Lake levels are currently regulated by the Lake Okeechobee Regulation Schedule, or LORS, which was adopted by the Army Corps in 2008.

LORS typically keeps the surface levels of Lake Okeechobee between 12.5 and 15.5 feet above sea level to provide flood protection and water supply for agriculture, urban areas and natural systems like lakes and rivers.

LOSOM will allow lake levels to get to 17 feet, and many critics say that will further damage the lake’s ecology by killing submerged aquatic vegetation.

Nyla Pipes of the nonprofit One Florida Foundation called the meeting “incredibly dense.” Her main concern: Stakeholders weren’t given enough time to understand and evaluate “some 240,000 model runs to go through and try to make sense of,” she said. “I’m really overwhelmed and I know I’m not the only one.”

Her recommendation: “Tapping the brakes.”

The Caloosahatchee and St. Lucie rivers were connected to Lake Okeechobee to drain the Everglades for farming and development.

The Caloosahatchee needs water from the big lake during the dry season to help balance its delicate estuary. People on the St. Lucie side say they don’t need or want discharges.

Too much water released during the summer rainy season presents several problems for the Caloosahatchee.

Heavy flows can cause salinity levels to plummet and occur most often during the summer rainy season.

Before the meeting, Calusa Waterkeeper John Cassani said the LOSOM plan will deliver a disproportionate amount of harm to the Southwest Florida coast.

“I can’t get excited about any of the tweaks I’ve seen coming from the plan and as long as there’s going to be more water discharged to the estuary in the wet season, then it’s never going to be a balanced plan,” Cassani said. “It has to (perform better) than what they’re proposing now to be a balanced and equitable plan.”

Cassani said the extra water that will come down the Caloosahatchee River under LOSOM should instead go south and into Everglades National Park and Florida Bay.

“There needs to be some infrastructure modifications, but I don’t see that as a limiting factor,” Cassani said.

The final decision for the optimized lake schedule will be released to the public on Nov. 2.

From there the Army Corps will develop what’s called an Environmental Impact Statement, or EIS, in order to assess environmental and ecological impacts to the historic Everglades system.

The draft EIS will be released in April with a finalized version coming in August.

A final record of decision is expected in December of 2022, which is when LOSOM will be implemented.