NAPLES -Candidate pledges to restore Naples Bay are as much a part of Naples City Council campaigns as fundraisers and yard signs.

This year's crop of candidates say they too have the will to improve the bay's water quality and restore seagrass, mangroves and oysters, but they differ on whether the city is moving quickly enough to fix the city's No. 1 environmental challenge.

Mayor Bill Barnett, running for a council seat, Councilwoman Dee Sulick and former Councilwoman Penny Taylor say the poor economy and budget shortfalls are making progress necessarily slow.

Councilwoman Teresa Heitmann, though, said the city too often uses its budget woes as an excuse not to consider the cost-effectiveness of bolder action.

"I think we've made small increments (of progress)," Heitmann said. "I'm looking for a larger commitment."

Nobody has put a cost estimate on cleaning up Naples Bay and, even if money were no object, no miracle cure exists for Naples Bay's ills, Barnett said.

"I think the city is doing everything we possibly can," he said.

Naples Bay's problems stem from decades of abuse. Mangrove forests have been destroyed to make way for waterfront development. Seagrass beds and oyster bars have been dredged up.

Too much freshwater from the Golden Gate canal system, which drains 130 square miles of inland Collier County, upsets the bay's natural balance, chasing off marine life that once thrived there.

Closer to its shores, stormwater runoff is blamed for carrying pollutants into the bay, which doesn't meet state water quality standards for dissolved oxygen, copper and fecal coliform.

The City Council has passed fertilizer restrictions to keep nutrients out of the bay and banned copper sulfate, an algaecide used in some city lakes. The state later overturned the ban.

But after five years of water quality testing, a city report in 2011 showed little to no progress on lowering pollutant levels.

That prompted some council members to suggest that the city overhaul its approach, including abolishing the city's Natural Resources Department. None of the City Council candidates support that move, which they say would be counterproductive.

The candidates all back the city's ongoing study of how to improve the filtering capacity of the city's stormwater lakes and applaud the city's landmark 20-year plan to take water from the Golden Gate canal, pump it underground and use it for irrigation.

Councilwoman Dee Sulick also cites the city's recent exercise of setting five- , 10- and 20-year goals for improvements to Naples Bay.

"The time for lip service has stopped in this community," Sulick said. "It has been a priority for this council."

The pace of restoration might be slow, but finding the right solution and making it fiscally prudent also have to be priorities, she said.

"That's where the rubber meets the road," Sulick said.

Taylor agreed that the city doesn't have "a lot of extra money to throw" at the bay's problems.

"There's no quick fix here," Taylor said. "It didn't happen overnight."

Taylor said the slow pace is frustrating, but the city's approach eventually will pay dividends, she said.

"Things are going to move a little slower but we can't lose focus," she said.

Naples engineers are looking at the cost-effectiveness of dredging city lakes to store more water and treat it better. A report is due in March.

Barnett said he expects dredging will be too expensive and won't make enough difference to be worth the cost.

"I don't think we're going that route," Barnett said.

Heitmann, who said she welcomed the cost-benefit analysis on lake improvements, said the decision shouldn't be just about money.

"I don't think that's the way to address water quality issues," she said.