Leaders in Chautauqua County debate how best to clean up the lake
CHAUTAUQUA COUNTY, N.Y (WIVB) -- How to handle a 13,000 acre lake in Chautauqua County has been a discussion for decades, and this summer, many residents on the southern end of the lake are feeling left in the weeds.
"We have tons of studies and not a lot of action that's been done," said Jackie Damore, a board member with Chautauqua Lake Partnership and homeowner on Burtis Bay.
Over the July 4th weekend, multiple people said that boats were getting caught in an abundance of weeds.
"The South basins a mess. I was out there Thursday, July 3rd and my son just rebuilt a boat, so proud, taking it on it's maiden voyage and it might as well have been a floating lawnmower," said Chautauqua County Executive PJ Wendel. "The weeds in the South basin were horrific, in my opinion, there's no excuse for it."
Wendel says that the Chautauqua Lake Association was in a meeting in March, where they discussed early harvesting to begin May 5th--but says the CLA applied for harvesting permits April 30th.
"We contribute $300,000 dollars to this organization and a choice was made, or a decision, faults happen, the applicants didn't get filed in what I figure is an appropriate timeline," said Wendel.
The CLA claims they were waiting to hear from the state.
"The state didn't know for certain that we would need a permit until late March, early April. They told us April 7th that they thought we should have to get a permit, they didn't give us a jurisdiction of the permit until two weeks later. We applied and all of that," said Douglas Conroe, the executive director of the Chautauqua Lake Association. "Did that affect how we started up? It affected it slightly. Would it have made a difference on what you're seeing here today? No, because the aquatic plant growth didn't come until mid to late May."
Conroe says they were harvesting in some areas before having permits as he claims that not all areas require permits, only certain depths of water.
"I've seen the lake in much worse condition, the lake is better off than I've seen it some decades ago," said Conroe.
He calls this year "kind of a perfect storm situation" for plant growth, and said that in most areas of the lake they are removing a normal amount of harvesting. In the South Basin, they're seeing more than double the removal than they normally do.
He says they are focusing on using the harvesters in the main navigation lanes and their second priority will be working around inside the docks. Homeowners can collect and remove the build up near their docks, Conroe says.
"As soon as we can get the navigation lanes, we'll be back. We've already been there this year, we've taken 30 loads of woody debris off of their shore, we have taken five loads of harvested material out front, in front of their dock." said Conroe. "We haven't abandoned them. We're dealing with 40 acres of shoreline that need to give attention to all 40 some miles, it's not fair to give it to only one area."
Wendel tells us there are three major players of the lake connection: Chautauqua Water Shed Conservancy, The Chautauqua Lake Association, which is primarily in charge of maintaining the lake, and the Chautauqua Lake Partnership, which raises money for herbicides in Burtis Bay.
"It's like the Hatfield and McCoys, and as much as I have tried to get the groups together, we do get close, and then we have something like this," said Wendel. "The problem is, you have groups that say herbicides are poison, well some people in that group were the ones putting that into the lake for decades, unpleated by anybody."
Wendel says the Chautauqua Lake Association were the only ones who did anything in the lake for more than 75 years.
"It's very frustrating that we have a lot of opposition from the very group who years and years, that I've said before, were the only ones putting chemicals into the lake and many of those people are saying, 'no, it's poison, these new chemicals are so much safer,'" said Wendel.
"We felt it was no longer appropriate to use chemicals in the lake. We learned some things as you learn later, consequences that you really didn't think happen, happened," said Conroe. "So we went away from that and started harvesting for dealing with nuisance aquatic plant growth, because harvesting is the least environmentally instructive method of dealing with them."
Conroe believes Chautauqua Lake is fortunate to have a diverse aquatic plant community, 24 different species, yet three are considered a nuisance.
"Plants are important for the fishery, we are a world-renowned fishing lake. Fish need the plants for food and habitat, plants absorb nutrients," said Conroe. "Chautauqua Lake right now is considered to be at a tipping point, it can be a plant-controlled lake or it can be an algae controlled lake. Plants can be a nuisance, algae when it gets too abundant is a harmful, toxic substance."
He says out of the 13,000 acre lake, four to five thousand acres are plant growing acres.
"There's a huge disagreement about the role of herbicide in the lake, but when it comes down to everything else, the groups are together," said Conroe. "We're not opposed to it, but we think it needs to be more judiciously used and not just 'well, let's use it to get ahead here.'"
We spoke to Jackie Damore, a board member of the Chautauqua Lake Partnership about the use of herbicides as well.
"Herbicides are just, they kill plants and the herbicides we use today compared to the herbicides we used even 10 years ago are very selective and very environmentally friendly," said Damore. "The ones that we're using today don't really have an impact on the native plants around them both reason of how those chemicals are and the timing of when they're applied. They are also virtually non-toxic to humans--neither one of the chemicals used today have any swimming or drinking water restrictions."
Damore says that Senator Borrello over stated what the CLP got granted in terms of herbicide this year. She says they were granted 450 acres for curly leaf pond weed, and only were allowed 286 acres due to DEC restricting them. They treated 172 acres of mill foil and in the past they've been able to treat 369 acres.
"They asked for herbicides and they gave them more acreage then they actually thought they would get so there was the potential, but before they do that, they make sure the weeds are there and they weren't, so those permits were then pulled back because they didn't have to do as many acres as they thought," said Wendel.
Damore tells us that both CLP and CLA hired a five year program with Dr. Robert Richardson with North Carolina State, which she said calls for a lake manager and a review board.
"I think it's critical that everybody is on the same page when we do get a recommendation, whether from a lake manager, or a lake plan, or from the Army Corp of Engineers, or even from the Jefferson Project results. When we get recommendations from these bonified sources we should be following those recommendations if we possibly can," said Damore. "I think it's really important because we are not going to get the public funding to do these things if we don't all play ball. So we've all got to accept what the experts recommend and do our part to cooperate with that."
Wendel says that the group of organizations recommended GEI and voted to bring them on as a consultant.
"There's where the real challenge is going to be ahead of us, once we get this information, will people abide by it? There's nothing stating that they have to, that's the problem," said Wendel.