Political Quotes

“Just last week, the Army Corps of Engineers announced that additional money, the $514 million in disaster supplemental funding for the Herbert Hoover Dike, and that will complete that project earlier than 2025, accelerating completion to 2022, as Senator Rubio and I had requested. This funding is on top of what we have already spent over a decade and a half--$1 billion shoring up the dike. This didn't happen just yesterday. This happened 15, 20 years ago, and we have already spent $1 billion. We are going to get it accelerated all the way to 2022. That is coming in time. While getting that additional funding to speed up work on the dike is certainly good news, it is important to remember that fixing the dike is important for public safety, to protect the communities that are living around Lake Okeechobee. It is not the solution to ending the discharges, and it is not solving the algae crisis. It is one step on the road to try to stop all of this algae bloom that occurs every year. Once that dike is fully repaired, the Army Corps then expects to be able to store about 6 more inches of water. In a big lake like that, that is a lot of water. That is good news because that flexibility helps, especially during the algae bloom breakouts, because you can hold more water back in the lake and you don't have to dump it into the St. Lucie or the Caloosahatchee.…”