The Everglades must be restored. We need your help, President Trump.

President Trump must help secure the South Florida economy by investing in Everglades restoration. The Everglades is more than just one of the world’s unique ecosystems, it is vital to the prosperity of this region. The Everglades supports South Florida’s economy because it is our primary source of drinking water and it sustains the tourism, recreation and real-estate sectors of our economy.

Yet the Everglades is struggling to survive. More than a century of drainage and development, including an outdated and unsustainable flood management system have degraded this fragile ecosystem, placing tens of thousands of jobs at risk and jeopardizing the drinking water supply for 8 million Floridians.

The solution is comprehensive Everglades restoration, a long-term infrastructure program approved by Congress 18 years ago. The goal is to overhaul the flood-management system to reverse the damage it inflicts on the Everglades, while sustaining South Florida’s 21st-century tourism, real estate and recreational economy. Without a modern sustainable flood-management system, no other infrastructure is sustainable. To fail to restore the Everglades is to put the future of this region at risk.

The restoration program is under way, but it has suffered in the past from bureaucratic inertia and, currently, from inadequate and uneven federal funding. The government has been working in recent years to reduce its red tape. The challenge now is funding, which Trump can overcome if he takes on Everglades restoration as a priority. The president’s first two proposed budgets included less than half what the restoration program requires.

Everglades restoration requires $200 million of federal investment every year to match the annual commitment already made by the state of Florida. Restoration is a 50-50 partnership between the state and federal government, an unusual arrangement that was established almost 20 years ago. That means that every dollar Trump invests in this program results in $2 of total investment.

The investment is destined to be a profitable one, as economists estimate the return on investment (ROI) of Everglades restoration to be 4 to 1, meaning that $4 of economic benefit are produced for every dollar invested.

The Everglades is a national treasure, and South Florida is one of the most important economic regions in the country — two reasons why the federal government and the White House have played leadership roles in this program since the late 1980s.

While we are encouraged by the recent Senate passage of the America’s Water Infrastructure Act of 2018 (WRDA), including provisions authorizing the Everglades Reservoir, we must double our efforts to insist on full restoration — not decades from now, but at the earliest possible opportunity — noting the environmental, economic and public health emergency caused by much-publicized statewide algae blooms.

While red tide blooms do not originate in the same manner as blue-green algae blooms, our scientists feel very strongly about the fact that the presence of blue-green algae on our shores acts as an accelerant to intensify and prolong red tide. In short, our situation only worsens with inaction.

Furthermore, our restoration plans would not only significantly reduce the blue-green algae plaguing Florida’s waterways and economy, its elimination means that this algae would no longer perpetuate the seemingly never-ending red tides afflicting our coasts.

The president can help secure South Florida’s future by adequately investing in Everglades restoration. If he fails to do so, the Everglades and the South Florida economy may never recover.

Carlos de la Cruz Jr. is the chairman-elect of the board of directors for The Everglades Foundation.