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A record-breaking wet winter last year also led the district to tweak projects that put more water in the park, where decades of drying out are threatening valuable mangroves and peat that help protect Florida's water supply.

But that progress hasn't stopped the perpetual debate over restoration plans. Adding to the confusion in this year's debate, the water management district and environmentalists actually agree on the need for a reservoir south of the lake.

"The District has clearly stated (as is well documented in the CERP) that we need storage north and south of Lake Okeechobee — as well as East and West," district scientist Paul Warner said in an email.

But when it gets done and how big it is has the two sides at fierce odds. A bill backed by Negron, a Stuart Republican, would require the district to buy $1.2 billion in land from willing sellers or exercise a land purchase option negotiated by former Gov. Charlie Crist in an ambitious plan that initially called for buying 180,000 acres — all the fields owned by the U.S. Sugar Corp. In 2010, the district bought 26,800 acres, but in 2015 rejected a purchase option for 46,800 acres. An option to buy the remaining land expires in 2020.

U.S. Sugar and other politically influential growers are pushing hard to derail the Negron plan. And the district says the state needs to stick to a plan hammered out this year that starts reservoir work in 2021 — with the location and size yet to be decided. The existing schedule also focuses efforts north of the lake, away from land owned by powerful sugar companies. District governing board members have also argued that storage to the north allows them to better control the flow of water into the lake, which fills up six times faster than it can be emptied.

This week, the district also drew attention to an old solution long on the books but now coming up for planning under the schedule: deep wells that dump water in the Floridan aquifer north of Lake Okeechobee. The wells, called ASRs for Aquifer Storage and Recover, were originally conceived as a vast network that would provide the bulk of storage for restoration, with more than 300 ringing the lake and in clusters near the Caloosahatchee basin and along the eastern edge of water conservation areas. After an 11-year study, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers determined that drilling so many would likely create problems with pressure inside the wells and cut the recommended number to 131.

Scientists also say the chemistry can change in stored water, posing a risk to plants and animals. In 2015, the NAS recommended more research on those effects before using the technology.