South Florida Program (SFP)

Funding Assistance

The South Florida Program offers funding assistance to eligible entities on a competitive basis.

The Environmental Protection Agency’s South Florida Program (SFP) aims to protect and restore the quality of south Florida’s waterways. In south Florida you can find coral reefs, seagrass meadows, beaches, estuaries, lakes, rivers, canals and wetlands. The health of these waterways is very important for the wildlife they support, but also for the economy of south Florida. Each year the SFP offers a competitive grant funding opportunity to the public to advance community education and outreach and improve the understanding of water quality issues in south Florida. Our goal is to provide resources to reduce pollution impacts to waterways and restore water quality to south Florida.

The EPA’s South Florida Program includes a large portion of Florida beginning south of Orlando, running down the center of the state about 75 miles and then reaching to each coast including the southern part of the Indian River Lagoon on the east and Charlotte Harbor on the west, Lake Okeechobee, the Everglades, and through the Florida Keys to the Dry Tortugas National Park. The entire area, including land and open water, is over 21,000 square miles and is intimately linked to water.

Program Overview

Funding

SFP Boundary Area

National Estuary Program

Everglades

Florida Keys

The SFP includes portions of two Estuaries of National Importance. To learn more about the great work being accomplished through these programs, visit the EPA’s NEP website and the local Florida NEP webpages:

The Everglades is the largest subtropical wilderness in the United States. To learn more about the restoration and monitoring work the EPA is doing in the Everglades, visit EPA’s Restoration of the Florida Everglades website.

The Florida Keys are a chain of islands that include mangrove islands, the largest documented seagrass meadow in the world and North America’s only coral barrier reef.

To learn more about water quality protection work being done in the Florida Keys, visit: Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary Water Quality Protection Program.