This November, Brevard County voters will decide whether to renew a decade-long, half-cent sales tax that funds projects benefitting the Indian River Lagoon. Brevard County commissioners voted unanimously Tuesday to place the question on the ballot.
Voters approved the tax-funded Save Our Indian River Lagoon, or SOIRL, program for 10 years in 2016, after harmful algal blooms killed off massive amounts of the seagrass that manatees, fish and other wildlife in the lagoon rely on for food and habitat. More recently, another historic loss of seagrass triggered a manatee starvation event along Florida’s Atlantic coast, with a record 1,255 manatees dying between December 2020 and April 2022.
Seagrass is starting to grow back
On average, the lagoon sales tax raises nearly $59 million each year to help the lagoon. It funds projects to reduce how much pollution gets into the sensitive estuary and remove existing pollution.
Laurilee Thompson sits on SOIRL’s citizen oversight board, whose members review proposed projects and select which ones the tax should fund.
“Everything's pointing towards a huge success with the SOIRL program,” Thompson told commissioners ahead of Tuesday’s vote. “We just gotta keep steady, keep with the plan.”
Thompson, a lifelong Titusville resident, said that last summer she started seeing seagrass growing “all along” the city’s shoreline. Before then, she had been noticing more seagrass farther north in the Indian River Lagoon, in sections named the Mosquito Lagoon and North Indian River Lagoon.
“The seagrass growth is slowly working its way south,” Thompson said. “So, you guys that don't have seagrass down here yet — it's coming!”
More seagrass is growing more densely across the lagoon, according to 2025 data recently shared by the St. Johns River Water Management District. From 2023 through 2025, seagrass coverage grew by more than 7,000 hectares or about 13,000 football fields, according to the district’s analysis.
RELATED: Water regulators say more seagrass is growing in the Indian River Lagoon
Vince Lamb is co-founder and treasurer for the nonprofit Brevard Indian River Lagoon Coalition, which campaigned for the lagoon tax back in 2016. It plans to do so again, ahead of November.
In an interview following Tuesday’s vote, Lamb said seagrass restoration is critical for bringing the lagoon back to better health.
“The biggest [goal] is to put the Indian River Lagoon back to being a healthy seagrass system, not an algae-based ecosystem,” he said.
Setting a ‘high standard’ to protect the lagoon
More than a dozen people weighed in during a designated public comment period. Most were in favor of renewing the lagoon tax for another 10 years.
Martin County resident Jim Moir, who heads up the Indian Riverkeeper, said residents of other lagoonside counties envy the SOIRL tax.
“Other counties up and down the seven counties that live on the Indian River Lagoon look up to you,” Moir told commissioners. “What you guys have done truly sets a high standard for how a community really cares about the Indian River Lagoon and is willing to do something about it.”
From 2016 through 2026, county estimates show the lagoon tax will ultimately have raised more than $580 million. If it’s renewed for another 10 years, the tax will raise another estimated $800 million to help the lagoon, Natural Resources Management Director Virginia Barker said Tuesday.
Lagoon tax skeptics
Gordon Nelson, a chemical engineering professor at Florida Tech, was one of just two people who spoke against renewing the lagoon tax. Nelson said he lives in a part of south Brevard County near Lake Washington — a primary source of drinking water for Melbourne — and that homeowners in his neighborhood are being required to upgrade their septic systems, often at a large personal cost.
Over the next decade, some $233 million from the lagoon tax will go toward improving sewage treatment, upgrading septic tanks and converting septic tank users to centralized sewer systems, Nelson said. But he said that dollar amount won’t come close to being enough to solve the problem.
“The renewal and the sales tax is not ready for primetime,” Nelson said. “A rational comprehensive plan needs to be in place, and it's not yet there.”
RELATED: To cut pollution, Brevard offers more money for septic upgrades
The SOIRL program includes grant funding to help eligible homeowners upgrade to an advanced septic system. Up to $20,000 is available per property, depending on the estimated amount of groundwater pollution coming from each property’s septic drainfield. SOIRL’s interactive Septic Mapper tool allows homeowners to see how much money they might be eligible for.
Election Day is November 3, with early voting set for Oct. 19 through Oct. 31, according to Brevard County’s elections office.
