The $10 billion spending bill signed Wednesday by President Obama provides $183 million for Everglades restoration projects, including $4.5 million earmarked for the Indian River Lagoon.

The legislation was approved Tuesday night by the U.S. Senate; the House of Representatives approved the bill in late February.

Nanciann Regalado, spokeswoman for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers office in Jacksonville, which is overseeing the Indian River Lagoon project, said it wasn’t clear Wednesday evening where the money would go. She said the Corps has asked Congress for $4.5 million to design a reservoir and stormwater treatment area for the C-23 and C-24 canals, which drain much of St. Lucie and northern Martin counties.

“We’re still determining exactly how the money will be used,” Regalado said, “but it definitely will go toward the Indian River Lagoon Plan.”

Kevin Henderson, head of the St. Lucie River Initiative and a member of the Rivers Coalition, said approval of the money “is a step in the right direction in what’s been a painfully slow process.”

Henderson said the project was conceived nearly 10 years ago, and Congress approved it — without appropriating money to pay for it — in 2006.

The project is designed to reroute and clean fresh water before it enters the brackish St. Lucie River estuary and the lagoon.

The system also would “rehydrate the North Fork (of the St. Lucie River) and keep the estuary stable,” Henderson said, by holding back water during wet season and releasing it during the dry season.

Because the C-23 and C-24 canals are not connected to Lake Okeechobee, the project would not impact the damaging periodic releases of nutrient-rich fresh water from the lake into the estuary and lagoon.

Money still has to be appropriated to build the reservoir and, in the final stage of the project, clear out muck from the bottom of the lagoon.

The legislation also includes:

• $60 million for bridges along the Tamiami Trail.

• $28 million for Kissimmee River restoration.

• $74 million for Hoover Dike reinforcement.

By Tyler Treadway, TCPalm.com

Tags: Army Corps of Engineers, bridge, canal, everglades, housing, Indian River Lagoon, lake, money, Obama, Okeechobee, restoration

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