Hiking across a shallow channel in the Everglades Big Cypress swamp or airboating across its river of grass, it’s hard to imagine that the maze of wetlands, prairies, and cypress domes that were once the size of Connecticut are in deep trouble.
During the dry season, decades of flood control have left the wetlands starved for fresh water. When it rains, pollution from farm fields, city streets and neighborhood lawns ignite algae blooms in coastal waters or choke the inland wetlands with cattails. Add sea rise to the list, and the future for the low-lying Everglades that protect drinking water for about 8 million people looks grim.
There’s a plan to fix the marshes. But it’s way behind schedule and the cost has ballooned to $23 billion. The state and federal Army Corps of Engineers split the cost.
Now, a $1.1 billion windfall from the Biden administration could bring some relief.
"This $1.1 billion was designed for projects that could be completed start to finish or close to start to finish," said Eve Samples, executive director of Friends of the Everglades.
Samples said the mandate for the White House money is clear: Finish three smaller projects that have been dragging on for years. Also, map out costs on two bigger projects so they don’t get mired in delays.
"And politically, you can see how that might be an appealing idea, right? ," she said .
The Corps confirmed the strategy in an email but declined to be interviewed.
One of the projects helps undo some of the damage caused by the old highway that dammed up the Everglades in the 1920s and started decades of cascading problems. Without freshwater, peat soil has started to collapse and miles of seagrass have died over the years. The Army Corps and National Park Service are building a series of bridges. Now they need a bigger pump to move the water.
"It's just trying to capture those flows and steer as much of that water into [Everglades National Park] as possible, " said Steve Davis, chief science officer for the Everglades Foundation
Another project would finish a reservoir that started 15 years ago. It’s part of the larger restoration of the Indian River Lagoon, where pollution has killed off most of its seagrass and left a record number of manatees to starve to death.
"It allows us to capture some of those flashy, low water quality flows not unlike what wetlands would do naturally, " Davi s said.
Plans for a larger project that focuses on Biscayne Bay and southern marshes would restore the wetlands that fight sea rise and storm surge.
Another plan focuses on the remote western edge, where the marshes converge with the Big Cypress Swamp. Tony Pernas is a botanist who retired this winter as resource manager at Big Cypress after 40 years with the National Park Service.
"Here is this kind of like the forgotten area," Pernas said. "So nobody really paid much attention to it. "
A canal cuts across the preserve onto Miccosukee Tribal land. The canal drains farm fields to the north, carrying pollution from fertilizer.
"It's definitely something that needs to be addressed," Pernas said.
The spending is the single - largest investment ever made in the Everglades.
Florida’s Republican governor Ron DeSantis, however, has been quick to find fault.
"It was a big missed opportunity for the federal government to not have put just not even one dime that went to the EAA reservoir," DeSanti s said.
This Everglades reservoir has been championed by DeSantis as key to stopping pollution on Florida’s wealthy Treasure Coast and west coast. It’ll include pollution scrubbing marshes, which the state is paying to build. And getting it done wins a lot of political cache in Florida.
Republican Congressman Brian Mast represents the Treasure Coast.
"That's the Biden administration sending a middle finger over to Florida, and this is what we see over and over again," Mast said.
But at an estimated $2-plus billion, the reservoir is more expensive than the infrastructure plan’s entire national allotment for environmental projects. Army Corps officials said that’s what kept it off the list.
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