Water use restrictions will remain in South Florida for the foreseeable future. South Florida Water Management District officials said today/Friday that rainfall amounts in Lee and Collier Counties are above normal so far this summer season. But that’s not the case in some other parts of the 16 county water management district.

Water Resource Manager Pete Kwiatkowski said ground water levels haven’t rebounded from the prolonged drought that gripped the region.

“We were in quite a rainfall deficit district-wide that started last October and just started turning around in June when we started to get rainfall but we still have quite a deficit that we’re trying to overcome,” he said.

Meanwhile, officials urge residents to turn off home irrigation systems because there’s sufficient rainfall to keep lawns green. About 50 percent of regions potable water goes on lawns so turning off the sprinklers will hasten the recharge of groundwater levels.