STUART, Fla. — Concern over water releases from Lake Okeechobee was front and center Thursday at a Rivers Coalition meeting.
Residents voiced their frustrations while also hearing from the Army Corps of Engineers on the flooding concerns that they're looking to diminish.
"In times like now, our estuaries being flooded, it impacts our health," one speaker at the meeting said.
"When the sun heats up the nutrients in the water, and it gets hot, that algae is coming," Jensen Beach resident Megan Remick said.
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Algae spotted in Martin County days after Lake Okeechobee discharges begin
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Col. James Booth acknowledged the environmental worries.
"I know that it is a very very hard decision," Booth said to those who attended the meeting, "if I make this decision, that we are going to take water levels, and put them in the estuaries that are not environmentally friendly.”
However, he said he has bigger worries right now with Lake Okeechobee rising higher than normal because of rains fueled by El Nino this winter.
"There's a balancing act there," Booth said. "The decision I had to make was to lean more towards flood risk management."
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Environmentalists concerned about Lake Okeechobee releases to St. Lucie River
However, residents worry the balancing act means more harm along the Treasure Coast.
"Our orchards, a lot of our crustaceans, things like that, they can't get out of there, they die," one speaker at the meeting said.
Mark Perry, the president of the Rivers Coalition and executive director of the Florida Oceanographic Society, is among those worried about the ramifications of the discharges.
"The Corps of Engineers said that it's going to have to go on for probably six weeks," Perry said. "That's not going to be good because as you turn this estuary completely fresh it'll start to kill off the oyster reefs and the seagrass beds."
But some hope that the unified voice might make a difference.
"Now, they are listening. They are looking at the environment," Perry said. "They are trying to consider and make this balance."
But the balancing act has yet to be resolved and sending water south could still be months away.
