CAPE CORAL, Fla. — Nobody likes to see damaging discharges down the Caloosahatchee River, but how water releases from Lake Okeechobee are being done by U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is about to change.
“I am thrilled to announce that after 5 years of dedicated communication and collaboration with our partners and stakeholders, we have received a signed record of decision on Lake Okeechobee Operating Manuel or LOSOM,” said Col. Brandon Bowman, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Jacksonville District Commander.
LOSOM, which originally was expected to be signed last summer, now replaces the previous operating manual called LORS08.
“Think of LOSOM, for Lake Okeechobee, as you would an operating manual for your car, to serve as the guide for water managers to provide recommended options in vast variety of scenarios,” said Col. Bowman.
Under LOSOM, Col. Bowman says the corps will have more flexibility in how lake releases are done.
“With LOSOM, it's going to provide us a lot more flexibility to take a lot more things into consideration when we are making our release decisions and one of the big ones is going to be the health of the estuary,” said Col. Bowman.
Sanibel Captiva Conservation Foundation Environmental Policy Director Matt DePaolis says LOSOM gives us a lot of certainty with how the water from Lake Okeechobee will be disturbed.
“When the lake is at a reasonable height and we aren’t at risk of flood danger, that provides that operational flexibility to the Army Corps to decide how and when to provide beneficial flows,” said DePaolis.
And while LOSOM won’t stop damaging water releases, it will change how they are conducted.
“We are going to get releases,” said DePaolis. “They are probably going to be larger than the releases we have seen in the past, but they are going to be of shorter duration and there is going to be less of them. So, the thinking is the estuary can take brunt of that release and recover quicker.”
But fewer releases come at a cost. While the lake can be held higher with improvements to the Herbert Hoover Dike, a higher lake will impact the lake’s ecology. South Florida Water Management District is looking to combat with the installation of turbidity curtains as Fox 4 reported on Thursday.
