'Absolute nightmare': Chautauqua Lake homeowners voice concerns over weeds

CHAUTAUQUA COUNTY, N.Y. (WIVB) -- Homeowners on Chautauqua Lake are voicing concerns over the rapid growth of weeds that have taken over the lake throughout the past few years.

During the Fourth of July weekend, The Lomas family, who has a place on Chautauqua Lake, said the Fourth of July weekend is typically busy for the bay they're in.

"Last year we had the boat out. We had the kids tubing in the lake. My grandson had his jet ski out in the lake and having a good time taking the little ones for a ride," Nancy Lomas said. "We did none of that this weekend, none of that — just couldn't get the boat out. There were very few boats. If there were, they were trying to get out of our bay."

The Lomas family has had a place on Burtis Bay for 26 years. Nancy said this weekend she tried to take the boat out, but it got clogged with weeds and started to overheat.

"When we bought it, there were some weeds, but it was nothing like this. I mean [it's an] absolute nightmare," Steven Lomas said. "We were backed up. Everybody sat and just looked at the weed growth."

Burtis Bay is the southern basin of Chautauqua Lake, and the Lomas' are not the only homeowners in the bay that are feeling left in the weeds.

"Everything that the Chatauqua Lake Association harvests and cuts comes in here," said Lisa Masters, a homeowner on Burtis Bay. "Last year, the lake was perfect, the boating was clear, everything was great. This year, it's horrible."

As of Jan. 1, Burtis Bay was designated as a wetland.

"We want a healthy lake. We are not against wetlands, but this is a developed area," said Kathy Yanus, a homeowner on the bay. "It does not make sense. The wetland regulation does not make sense for every little area of this lake. It has to change."

Senator George Borrello believes the wetlands were not a setback, saying they issued more herbicide permits this year than they ever have. 

"The fact that for the first time, the Chautauqua Lake Association was required to get permits to to harvest the weeds and didn't do so, I think it's the major contributor to the problems of Burtis Bay right now," Borrello said.

"They told me they were delayed a little bit this year in being able to harvest that area because there were herbicides applied to that zone earlier and you have to wait until a certain amount of time passes before you can put any type of mechanical devices on there," said John Shedd, the vice president of campus planning and operations at the Chautauqua Institution. 

Borrello believes there needs to be more cooperation and more accountability for the organizations who are working on the lake.

"The most toxic thing isn't the harmful algal blooms in Chautauqua Lake, it's the politics of all the lake organizations that can't get along," he said. 

"There's a lot of people working to solve this and we're all working in a pretty coordinated effort," Shedd said. "It's just going to take a while. People have to have patience because it took hundreds of years to create this problem and we're going to have quite a few years to solve it."

Shedd said there are a bunch of organizations working together for Chautauqua Lake, including the Watershed Management Alliance, the Jefferson Project, the DEC, the Army Corp of Engineers, researchers from SUNY Fredonia, Bowling Green University and North Carolina State.

"We're all working together. There's a bunch of organizations," he said. "Most of us are working under an organization called Chautauqua Lake Water Shed Management Alliance, which is a county entity that has a board and they provide funding through different funding sources grants, states and local funding."

WIVB News 4 has reached out the Chautauqua Lake Association requesting an interview and has not heard back from them at this time.