“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.
