What are you doing at noon Thursday? If you’re working from home, as I am, I hope you’ll grab a sandwich and tune in live to our next Clean Water Conversation, streamed via Friends of the Everglades’ Facebook page. 

The topic: What’s up with the EAA Storage Reservoir? No concept has dominated the conversation about Everglades restoration more than this project, and we have some important new developments to discuss.

The $1.8 billion reservoir south of Lake Okeechobee is intended to send clean water south to the Everglades, while delivering a degree of relief from toxic Lake Okeechobee discharges to the northern estuaries.

But the EAA Reservoir, as planned, is a shadow of the 60,000-acre undertaking once envisioned for the Everglades Agricultural Area. It will be built on 16,500 acres — and now even that shrunken-down project is in danger of being delayed.

Why is it being delayed? Can we use the extra time to improve the project?

You’re invited to join us as we tackle those questions and more during our Clean Water Conversation at noon, Thursday, May 21. Visit the event page to RSVP now. 

I’ll be talking with two people who have followed the EAA Reservoir for years:

Jacqui Thurlow-Lippisch, member of the South Florida Water Management District Governing Board
Diana Umpierre, organizer for Sierra Club’s Everglades Restoration Campaign
Both Jacqui and Diana are well-informed and passionate. They have different views on the EAA Reservoir, and that’s why this will be such an interesting conversation.

Hope to see you live at noon tomorrow. And if you can’t sneak away to join us at lunch, you can always watch the replay at Everglades.org. If you missed our April 23 livestream about Lake Okeechobee, you can watch the replay here. 

Your support enables us to continue Everglades advocacy in the footsteps of our founder, Marjory Stoneman Douglas. If you have given recently, we thank you. If it’s been a while, please consider making a donation today.

Stay well,

Eve Samples

Executive Director, Friends of the Everglades