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We Get an Update on the Herbert Hoover Dike

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Herbert Hoover Dike near Canal Point

The Herbert Hoover Dike is comprised of 143 miles of levees around Lake Okeechobee, the nation’s 10th largest lake. It’s existed in its current form since the 1960s, and has done its job of protecting those living near it from catastrophic flood events like the ones in the 1920s which killed more than 3000 people. 

The US Army Corps of Engineers maintains the dike, and since 1999 have been working to rehabilitate it as age takes its toll, but there is still work left to do. Today we’re going to get an update on those ongoing efforts, and what extra state and federal dollars recently approved mean to the overall project timeline. We're joined by John Campbell, he's Acting Chief for the Corps' Communications office in Jacksonville. We're also joined by Tammy Jackson-Moore, she's Co-Chair of the advocacy group #FixTheDike.

Rachel Iacovone is a reporter and associate producer of Gulf Coast Live for WGCU News. Rachel came to WGCU as an intern in 2016, during the presidential race. She went on to cover Florida Gulf Coast University students at President Donald Trump's inauguration on Capitol Hill and Southwest Floridians in attendance at the following day's Women's March on Washington.Rachel was first contacted by WGCU when she was managing editor of FGCU's student-run media group, Eagle News. She helped take Eagle News from a weekly newspaper to a daily online publication with TV and radio branches within two years, winning the 2016 Society of Professional Journalists Mark of Excellence Award for Best Use of Multimedia in a cross-platform series she led for National Coming Out Day. She also won the Mark of Excellence Award for Feature Writing for her five-month coverage of an FGCU student's transition from male to female.As a WGCU reporter, she produced the first radio story in WGCU's Curious Gulf Coast project, which answered the question: Does SWFL Have More Cases of Pediatric Cancer?Rachel graduated from Florida Gulf Coast University with a bachelor's degree in journalism.