The South Florida Water Management District has approved 10 digital billboards on district land.
Last year, the state senate passed a bill that encouraged Florida's water management agencies to develop an outdoor public information system. But to do it without taxpayer money.
On Thursday, the agency finalized an agreement with two advertising agencies that will front the entire cost of the billboards.
Randy Smith, spokesman for the South Florida Water Management District, said, "The four or five hundred thousand dollars it costs to install one of these signs, it's coming out of their pocketbooks and then immediately becomes district property when they get the thing constructed. So there's no capital outlay or funding that is going to be required from the taxpayers for this."
Advertising will take up 95% of the time on the digital billboards.
The remaining 5% of the time goes to the water district. A good example, says Randy Smith, is when South Florida is under water restrictions.
"We get plenty of calls about, you know, 'what is it for my area?' Well you'd be able to localize these. If you're talking about Miami-Dade you use the billboards there in Miami-Dade", said Smith. "So it provides of generally localizing your information too."
Smith says in emergency situations like hurricanes or massive flooding, the water management district has the flexibility to go wall-to-wall with billboard instructions.
The water district will get an estimated $1 million cut of the advertising revenue.