Editorial: Dripping sound is fed movement on Everglades

The U.S. Senate’s mid-September vote to move forward nearly $2 billion toward Everglades restoration is the proverbial glass half-full, glass half-empty in a long overdue push to improve southern Florida water quality.

The $1.9 billion Central Everglades Planning Project, part of a broader $10 billion of national water resources projects, passed the Senate 95-3 and goes to the House.

Florida U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson’s office said in a statement the Everglades money in the water resources bill is for “engineering projects designed to reduce the need for harmful discharges from Lake Okeechobee by sending more water south into the Everglades instead of east and west into the St. Lucie and Caloosahatchee rivers.”

Nelson issued the glass half-full statement, calling it “a big win for Florida.” Indeed, it is. Yet we see the half-empty part of the glass in the historical view and the fact this isn’t yet a done deal.

It was 16 years ago, September 2000, when the U.S. Senate voted 85-1 for Everglades restoration. The initiative then was projected to cost $7.8 billion total and be finished in 35 years. Are we nearly halfway there? Not even close. This $1.9 billion won’t in itself get us there.

Incoming state Senate President Joe Negron, R-Stuart, wants to leverage the federal money by acquiring additional water storage land south of the lake, but we expect a showdown in the 2017 legislative session. The state so far is putting in about $2 for every federal dollar on what was supposed to be a 50-50 proposition.

So we’ll see the glass moving closer toward full when we see swift passage of the water resources bill in the U.S. House. The historical view shows land and projects aren’t getting cheaper. For the future of the western Everglades, and both the Caloosahatchee and St. Lucie watersheds, we can’t afford to keep coming up half-empty.