MIAMI — Environmental advocates hope Everglades restoration won't have to wait another seven years for a federal water projects bill like the one expected to clear Congress this week.
The House passed the Water Resources Reform and Development Act on Tuesday, and the Senate could vote on it later this week.
The bipartisan legislation authorizes over $1.8 billion for four Everglades projects, along with 30 other water projects nationwide. It's been seven years since Congress last considered a similar bill.
When a massive, multibillion-dollar Everglades restoration plan was approved in 2000, Congress took up water projects bills every two years. Few of the roughly 60 projects originally included in that plan have been authorized for federal funding.
Some of the original projects have been absorbed into a $1.9 billion Central Everglades Planning Project that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is reviewing. Environmental advocates had hoped it would be included in this water projects bill so that it wouldn't languish for years without authorization.
The advocates say the lag between authorization bills and federal bureaucracy in project planning forces the state to shoulder more of the funding burden up front and keeps Everglades restoration to incremental progress.
"In order to have more things to work on, we needed this bill," said Julie Hill-Gabriel, director of Everglades policy for Audubon Florida.
"There has to be a more efficient way of doing things," she added.
In general, the state and the federal government each pay half the cost of Everglades restoration projects.