These represent a vision we are working to achieve, and the ways in which we hope to make that vision real.
Our Vision Statement
Partners in Protecting and Enhancing the Quality of Life in Southwest Florida
The South Florida Water Management District, through its Lower West Coast Service Center, is a community leader and partner in creating and maintaining an outstanding quality of life for present and future residents of Southwest Florida – a quality of life that is founded on regional water resources that are abundant and sustainable.
The following are some of the key characteristics of the quality of life we envision for Southwest Florida:
Water supply is healthy and abundant but the public treats it as if it were scarce, because it is precious.
Water reuse is mandatory for new developments and retrofit in older neighborhoods is financially attractive for local governments.
Water is viewed as a regional rather than a local resource, and public and private utilities cooperate to achieve the best overall solutions for allocation and development of regional water supplies.
Water resources are a primary consideration in public and private land use decisions; using existing natural systems (our ecological infrastructure) to guide growth is preferred to altering natural systems (through man-made infrastructure) to accommodate growth.
All local governments in the region have programs in place to acquire and preserve environmentally sensitive lands; and these programs have strong public support and restoration and preservation of ecological functions are a primary management concern.
The regulated public is an enthusiastic partner in the design of projects that exceed regulatory guidelines for flood control, water quality, and protection of natural systems.
Core Values and Guiding Principles
Passion: We never lose sight of our vision. The availability of water and the health of our natural resources are fundamental to an outstanding quality of life in our region. We are passionate and proactive about their protection.
Service: Customers are everyone with whom we deal. Service to our customers is central to the success of our mission. We listen to them and understand their needs. We provide them with friendly, responsive and helpful service and solution-oriented problem solving. We deliver unmatched value to our customers and make it easy for them to do business with us.
Stewardship: We respect the resources that have been entrusted to our use in carrying out our mission. We do more with less. We are lean, innovative and pragmatic. We continuously look for ways to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of our services and processes.
Collaboration: Teamwork is fundamental to our success. Working together, we place our mission first and align our efforts and contributions, regardless of our discipline or program affiliation, toward that end. We conduct ourselves in accordance with the principles of participative and consultative decision-making.
Communication: We communicate information, ideas, decisions, and provide feedback, internally and externally to the Service Center, up, down and across the organization, in a candid, timely, constructive, and clear manner.
Quality of Worklife: We treat each other with fairness, courtesy, respect and compassion while fostering an atmosphere of mutual trust and professional and personal growth. We work hard, celebrate our successes and learn from our failures. We are proud of each other and what we do. While work is an important part of life, it should also be fun.
Big Cypress Basin
Lower West Coast
