The St. Johns River Water Management District’s governing board on Tuesday declared a water shortage for parts of the region overseen by the District, including in Marion County.
There, in Marion, the Southwest Florida Water Management District had already declared a more serious water shortage is in effect for The Villages and Dunnellon. The move from St. Johns Tuesday places all of Marion County under declared water shortages.
In Central Florida, the initial declaration covering The Villages in Marion County also applies to all of Polk and Sumter Counties, plus parts of Lake. That declaration, identified as a Modified Phase II “Severe” Water Shortage, is in place from Feb. 8 through July 1, 2026. During that timeframe, residents living in the affected areas must water their lawns no more than once per week.
The declaration from St. Johns Tuesday is for a less severe, Phase I “Moderate” Water Shortage. According to a District memo prepared ahead of the governing board’s Feb. 10 meeting:
“Conditions have not yet reached the point where there is an insufficient amount of water to meet anticipated user demand and protect the water resources in the District. However, water users should voluntarily reduce water use and prepare in the event that conditions worsen.”
As Central Florida’s population grows, so does the region’s water demand. By the year 2045, the region will be short on groundwater by about 96 million gallons a day (MGD), according to a plan recently approved by the Central Florida Water Initiative. The collaborative, future water supply planning effort is focused on addressing water needs in Orange, Osceola, Seminole, Polk and southern Lake counties.
The CFWI plan outlines “additional alternatives to fresh groundwater” that must be developed in order to meet the region’s projected water demands. Those alternative water supplies are planned to include surface water, taken from sources like the St. Johns River; and recycled water, wastewater that’s reclaimed and treated to drinking water standards.
RELATED: Drinking recycled water? In Central Florida, the day will come
As water shortage concerns grow, so do concerns about wildfire risk: an issue that’s only expected to grow in the eastern United States, due to climate change.
Erica Smithwick is a Penn State University geography professor focused on land management and wildfire risk. In the past nearly two decades she’s spent in that role, Smithwick said, she never expected to be studying wildfires in the eastern U.S.
“But what we have seen now is that there's increasing variability in the climate, and increasing intensity of extreme events. So yes, that means that we might get more flooding, but we're also more likely to get longer periods that are drier and hotter,” Smithwick said.
Another risk factor: more people in the eastern U.S. live in forested environments, compared to those living out West, Smithwick said. The wildland urban interface, or WUI, refers to the “zone of transition” where unoccupied, natural lands intersect with human development.
“The density of the wildland urban interface (in the U.S.) is actually greater in the east than in the west, so even smaller fires can carry with them greater potential risks to infrastructure and to the built environment, and to our communities and our homes,” Smithwick said.
After California and Texas, Florida has more homes within the WUI than any other state, according to the U.S. Forest Service.
RELATED: Florida recognizes Prescribed Fire Awareness Week
Many ecosystems are naturally fire-dependent, including in Florida. Land managers conduct careful, controlled burns at regular intervals, generally every three to five years, depending on the specific area’s needs. Those controlled or prescribed burns promote the healthy growth of new vegetation. They also help reduce the risk of a wildfire breaking out unexpectedly.
Smithwick is the lead investigator on a new, three-year project aimed at tracking and addressing rising eastern wildfire risks, funded by the National Science Foundation. It's called the Eastern Fire Network.
“We are proactively looking at future wildfire risks across the entire East. And this extends from Florida up until Maine, and out into the Midwest as well,” Smithwick said.
The U.S. Census Bureau released data last year identifying which Census Tracts in the U.S. are most socially vulnerable to certain natural disasters. Among the top 100 tracts most vulnerable to wildfire risk are 20 in Florida, including three in Central Florida:
The Florida Forest Service has an interactive burn map showing where different prescribed burns are happening in real time. It also keeps a map of active, county-enacted burn bans.
