Special Meeting – February 17, 2007
Agenda: No Agenda is available Titled Goal Setting Workshop
Visitors : None
Minutes: A goal setting meeting that includes items such as; Write press releases for the local newspapers that will lay the groundwork for the public to accept the need for the District to do something about the cyanobacteria and the weed control, i.e., SolarBees. Request a SolarBees brochure from Mr. Eilers that will enable the District to “sell” the idea of their purchase and installation to the public, then all other entities who need to approve the installation. Considerable discussion about SolarBees, minutes are a transcript and make interesting reading.
Links: Complete Agenda, Complete Minutes
For excerpts from the Minutes select
Decisions:
Drop the consideration of building a boathouse due to building and maintenance cost that would not pencil out over a $115 storage fee.
The Board members will take tour of the lake to allow them to determine where any problem issues might be.
Robertson will seek the help of another intern for the summer.
Action Items:
Ongoing toxicity monitoring, sampling, beginning in April.
Winchester to write (with Robertson’s assistance) a letter to the city with copies to the mayor and city council enquiring about the city’s monitoring of lake contamination activities and offering the assistance of the District again. Possibly include photos.
Follow up with the County on ordinance for boathouse/dock standards.
Monitor progress on D River dredging project.
Create additional signage for remaining public boat launching areas.
Continue with Outreach programs—Erosion Control Seminar, Tuesday radio program, speaking at local service clubs—Kiwanis, Rotary, Chamber of Commerce luncheons.
Continue participation in local events—SOLV cleanup, Senior Fair, “Get the Lead Out” program, etc.
Write press releases for the local newspapers that will lay the groundwork for the public to accept the need for the District to do something about the cyanobacteria and the weed control, i.e., SolarBees.
Purchase toxicity monitoring equipment with grant funds or with $5,000 from budget item for weekly monitoring to generate results within a four-hour period.
Goals:
Create Lake Management Plan to include information on cyanobacteria testing, SolarBee study, grass carp issues, warm water fishery, salmon fisheries, septic tank pollution, monitoring of wetlands, etc.
Investigate grants for home repair with an eye to septic tank revitalization within the watershed area.
Research available land parcels for the possibility of creating a Devils Lake research center with partnerships such as Dr. Sytsma’s group and the Lincoln City Visitor and Convention Bureau.
Request a SolarBees brochure from Mr. Eilers that will enable the District to “sell” the idea of their purchase and installation to the public, then all other entities who need to approve the installation.
Investigate the possibility of obtaining a matching or full grant for purchase of the SolarBees.
Research obtaining matching or full grants [total cost might be approximately $3,000 for cleaning up large debris around the lake—docks, dilapidated structures. Take photos, contact DSL and contact homeowners to request permission.
Research the possibility of subsidizing the purchase of organic fertilizers to acquaint the public with the benefits of it.
Robertson said he had completed an agenda. He wanted to take a look at the past goals, look at accomplishments and set priorities for the future. He has goal settings back to 1991 to compare to if the Board wishes after completing the brainstorming session today to evaluate both old and new ideas. Discussion began regarding the lake Association’s DOE grant application for Klamath Lake as a project to test SolarBees. It appears that the reservoir near Hepner was chosen as the location because it is in a rural setting and a lot of home owners will not be objecting to the study that is to determine if they work, do they move the water around and do they work in the system? Robertson doesn’t know anything about the lake.
Green: I’m having hard time understanding the DOE grant. How does this doctor fit into the study. Can the District get the same kind of grant for Devils Lake? It seems that if it worked for our environment, it would be a good thing for the world to know.
Robertson: The thing they are studying is renewable energy for lake treatment.
Green: He has to come up with some sort of idea of how many times a day they turn or what kind of affect they have on the lake. What does the DOE care about the affect on the lake?
Robertson: They don’t care; they just have grants on studying renewable energy. That’s marketable enough for them as a reason to study and prove it. Because then they aren’t DOE, but EPA grants will say, “Yes this renewable energy works.” At that point, we are decreasing the amount of energy we are using. [After the study, if DOE could determine that they work, then EPA might embrace the technology and provide incentives.]
Strayer: Is there a reason for a different type of bacteria in Klamath Lake. Could we eventually get the same?
Robertson: Most cyanobacteria do pretty well wherever they are. There is probably a strain in the bottom of the lake if we dug far enough. Why we have one and not the other, I don’t know.
Strayer: I’d want a study as close to this place as you can get. Hepner is a long way away.
Robertson: They recruited somebody out of Boise State. Joe Eilers is out of Bend. So, it’s a SolarBee study.
Robertson: I just wanted to talk about goal accomplishments.
Number 1. Identify the cost and effectiveness of all known reasonable mechanisms of weed control in the lake within one year.
We had a goal to compare weed control and it was basically completed by November of 2006 and certainly by February 2007 we were through that. That included the comparison sheets. It wasn’t a difficult thing to bring it into one place. It was a good tool to give us a cost benefit.
Green: We can’t ignore the cyanobacteria, it is an immediate problem. Maybe the weeds will become more of a problem when the carp are gone.
Winchester: Are we going to accept the denial on the grass carp or do we need to do more?
Strayer: We need to have a vegetation management plan.
Aschenbrenner: What is the difference between a lake management plan and a vegetation management plan? Strayer: I guess I see the vegetation issue as more the problem we have. Lake management can include everything.
Aschenbrenner: At one time we considered that we would get Dr. Sytsma down here and he’d help us make one and we never completed it. Would it be worthwhile? Would you be able to do a lake management plan? Robertson: It certainly wouldn’t be something I would shy away from.
Aschenbrenner: We could tie together the testing, SolarBees, warmwater fishery, salmon fisheries, septic tanks, not fertilizing. We should have something completed for when we go for any type of grant.
Green: Paul has developed a good working knowledge of the lake. He should put something together that is simple and general that can be refined. Not time consuming. He probably has a plan in mind from working on these all issues. Some kind of a flow chart as a start. We could even give this to a graduate student.
Strayer: I think we wouldn’t want to give a blank check to a student without putting out an outline of what we think should be in it.
Juenke: Yes, we should consider economic factors. A graduate student would base it on technology rather than all aspects of the situation.
Green: At some time if we felt that Paul could come up with a good plan, we could have someone take a look at it. Maybe for five grand.
Strayer: The people he [Dr. Sytsma] has working there don’t have that type of focus.
Aschenbrenner: The other thing on grass carp management, I’ve made a copy of one of your emails talking about the three different ways to go with the grass carp and it ended up with different methods of conflict resolution.
Strayer: That was from the minutes from one of the warm water meetings. Do you know the Diamond Lake Situation? They never had any fish. They have had a lot of groups involved and had a project resolution.
Robertson: The decision makers have an interest in selling licenses.
Juenke: This is a good example where economic forces have completely dominated. I don’t see anything wrong with that if it pencils out.
Robertson: It’s one of those things—the lake was pretty good until they introduced fish and have gone through the different cycles. The human aspect is best served by having fish. They have come to this decision in ten years. These things are slow and arduous.
Strayer: It is a beautiful lake.
Green: To relate to the thing from the email about the warm water working group.
Strayer: These are people who are interested in the fishing. I went there yesterday and they said their first priority is the salmon. If the fish start going down, that’s it.
Green: We are effectively reducing grass carp by allowing them to die out. You stick the SolarBees in there and that allows the native vegetation to come back. If that doesn’t work, then we are in a better position to say we tried this stuff, and we can come back to option 2. We are in a better position then. Hopefully they work. We have cyanobacteria control and native vegetation control and everybody is happy.
Robertson: These were the comments I made to the Fish and Wildlife Commission. The other option would be the state legislature.
Winchester: That is how the District was created.
Green: We could have a lot of angry property owners.
Robertson: How do we make a case for needing grass carp when we have no grass? And, there have been a lot of negative aspects of grass carp because of toxicity problem associated with cyanobacteria. There is a much higher concentration of cyanobacteria now. Joe Eilers has proven that. He did it because we asked him to.
Green: That was many years ago.
Robertson: In 2005; previously 1994.
Juenke: How do we know the cyanobacteria have increased?
Robertson: Akenites in the sediment. It’s like pollen is a marker for a tree. Pollen doesn’t biodegrade. They’ll last hundreds of thousands of years. Also, the sediment samples. The top layer is the most recent. Eilers did carbon dating. I’ll have to show you the whole thing.
Green: There was an increase from 94 to 05?
Robertson: It was exponential. [He showed the graph to the Board that showed the increase.]
Green: So he is saying the sediment is increasing and the cyanobacteria are also increasing.
Robertson: The newest sediment is on the top. There is a steep increase in cyanobacteria and it is accelerating. In 1994 the weeds were gone. We have nutrients since the beginning of the lake, but intensive since the 1950’s. We have constant inputs. Houses that have septic systems are dumping into the lake. We know that there are nutrients in the watershed. When you know you have nutrients and you remove the largest source, Sitka spruce, milfoil or what have you, you still have nutrients and the bacteria are making use of it. When you take wolves out of Yellowstone, you get coyotes. We’ve taken weeds out, and something is going to fill the void.
Green: If you introduce the SolarBees and give the green algae more of an advantage, will the natural vegetation have a natural advantage?
Robertson: Native plants are more apt to utilize the scarce nutrients. Nonnative plants don’t do very well generally because they are not suited for the environment. Your more competitive organisms are more apt to live here. When a nonnative does take root it does very well because there isn’t anything to keep it in check, no natural predators. We have milfoil running amok through the lake. When you get rid of the nutrients going into the weeds, where will they go? Nature says here green algae.
Juenke: One of the aspects of the lake is its natural circulation system—the wind, except in August when we get the cyanobacteria.
Robertson: We don’t have the button for it. And the economy suffers for that.
Juenke: I keep wondering why when the carp did their thing it looked as if the green and blue algae disappeared. My observation is that we are no longer parents of kids who were waterskiing. It doesn’t seem to show anywhere near as bad as it showed forty years ago.
Robertson: We really had a glut of nutrients then. Forty years ago, we had raw sewage going into the lake.
Green: You said your problem 40 years ago was worse than it is now.
Robertson: Our nutrient levels are really high. We have more cyanobacteria than we had in 1994 and 1904. The one threat that we look at now is cyanobacteria. It’s a real threat. A dog that dies would be bad, but if you have a kid that dies you can forget it.
Green: Is there any kind of model that you can look at and say we are getting to the dangerous point? Can you extrapolate when we are going to hit that point?
Robertson: The state has advisories for 100,000 cells per millimeter. It depends on what kind of cyanobacteria they are and where they are but they are guessing because it is based on numbers not on toxicity. If they are in the center at that concentration, you should have closed the lake ten years ago. It’s like a horror movie. For us it’s here today and gone tomorrow. It just moves around, but it is somewhere. If you have green scum you are way over that limit.
Strayer: Is there some criteria that they base that upon?
Robertson: There are, but I don’t have that off the top of my head.
Number 2. Define and implement a monitoring program to insure water quality and the process for dealing with substandard waters.
Winchester: As to number two I think we are doing pretty well.
Robertson: We have done pretty well with the monitoring program. We are still implementing it. The cyanobacteria are being sampled for monitoring it. To “insure” water quality should be changed to trying to “improve” water quality or “observe.” That would be the goal.
Winchester: What about this toxicity monitoring and the Salmon Drift Creek Watershed Council.
Robertson: Haven’t heard yet. If we can get toxicity monitoring we can then show whether or not the lake is showing toxicity and take appropriate action
Winchester: Would you share results it with the State?
Robertson: They’ve given us authority to make the decisions of whether or not to close the lake. Should I be the one saying to close the lake? Am I a PhD in toxicology? No. It is not a perfect system by any means
Juenke: What about the monitoring?
Robertson: We are using visual indicators. It‘s a good indicator if you have blooms. That is weekly.
Juenke: Is that through the summer?
Robertson: April is when it starts. It’s a visual thing. If we see blooms and reduced clarity and things are warmer, we try to create some sort of predictability. At that point, we grab a sample and ship it off. And find out if our concentration is high. We are 48 hours late in putting out a warning. This toxicity monitoring could produce results within four hours in our lab when we could discover if there is toxic water. The goal would be to monitor every week until it dissipates. That’s the goal. That’s how we wrote the grant. Last year we put in $5,000 to buy the equipment. If the grant doesn’t come through, we need to do it on our own.
Green: Anytime the scum appears, the lake should be closed.
Robertson: Where are people getting in and out? Is it Regatta Grounds? It’s on the shoreline where the boats are and they are touching the fishing line then eating their sandwiches. This is not good.
Aschenbrenner: If it moves, is it somewhere else in the lake?
Robertson: In the morning when the wind is gone, they are rising to the top and they multiply with the sun, then when the wind comes up or the temperature changes, they move along, or they move to the bottom.
Aschenbrenner: If the temperature goes down, does it make it disappear?
Robertson: The temperature could make a current which could move it around.
Aschenbrenner: Is it just as toxic on the bottom of the lake as it would be on the surface?
Robertson: If it is at the same density, it’s still dangerous.
Green: So, it moves from top to bottom. It gets sun and on the bottom it gets nutrients.
Strayer: What happens when it goes to shore?
Robertson: It will continue growing because it’s at the top, then it will stop growing because it has shaded itself out. Then it will die. Then it will start growing, and then it will die out and sink. This causes oxygen depletion as the cyanobacteria biodegrade. That’s why there is no oxygen at the bottom of the lake.
Juenke: So, when you disperse the scum, it also kills the cyanobacteria? The count in the water remains the same?
Robertson: In that instant when you turn the [SolarBees] on, it does. Once the cyanobacteria move around, you are bringing it to the bottom and it will not do as well without the sunlight. You are trying to challenge its ability to get sun. Maybe it won’t be that feasible in Devils Lake because it’s not that deep and they can still get sun. I don’t think there’s any 100% answer.
Number 3. Identify and prioritize all controllable items that effect water quality. A short list was provided.
Strayer: Should add sewer spills to the list.
Winchester: How did we do on number 3?
Robertson: We didn’t invest very much time in it.
Number 4. Identify and aggressively pursue all blatant sources of contamination into the lake.
Robertson: We have been doing pretty well.
Winchester: Is the city doing any better (referencing Erosion control)?
Robertson: No. We offered them another employee and they do not seem willing to accept help. You would think they would at least place signage on the sites. They had one blast about two months ago, writing all the enforcement letters. I don’t know what to do about it. They have the funding.
Winchester: Is it feasible to send another letter? Green: Yes, we should send a letter.
Robertson: We could ask for a report on how well they’re doing—like selfreporting. “Can you tell us what you have done?”
Winchester: I think you should send a copy of it to the council and the mayor. The mayor claims to be an environmentalist.
Aschenbrenner: Maybe it should be from Winchester rather than from Robertson.
Winchester: We could say we offered to give them some help; we are willing to continue the offer.
Green: We should back it up with photos. You are allowed to do what is considered by law as a citizen’s arrest. We have the added benefit of being a governmental body.
Juenke: We are the Devils Advocate.
Green: We could tell the city we could go cite them if they don’t.
Winchester: We didn’t say we were gone to be police officers, but would help them.
Robertson: One thing they said is there is nothing stopping the District from running their own enforcement thing, but we do not have the authority.
Winchester: Maybe we could do a joint inspection. It would help the contractor to learn.
Green: What about giving them a cyanobacteria “award.”
Juenke: Maybe we need to sew a badge on our jackets.
It was determined that Winchester would write a letter.
Number 5. Promote Sewering of the rest of the properties inside the city.
Winchester: Kind of a tough one
Robertson: This is a good goal from 1991. One thing that would be worth investigating would be septic tank revitalization inside the watershed. I found a grant this week for lowincome home repair. It isn’t a real good one, but is something worth investigating. Whatever tools we can hand to people needing repairs to handle it. We can start doing this.
Strayer: I went to a PADL meeting years ago before we were annexed. Lila Bradley said you should be part of the city to be sewered, but nothing has happened. They said they are not doing sewers. They are not going to do anything on sewers. All they did was raise our taxes.
Robertson: They have had some activity. There is a little enclave near the LDS church where I think they were trying to put together a local improvement district. There is one on the point between the hospital and the lake with a couple of exceptions is not sewered. This goes back to the power outage thing—they are sewered by virtue of power for pumping. If it was properly sewered it would be the city that would be responsible for pumping—not individual homeowners. There has been some talk, but they haven’t actually sewered anybody.
Strayer: In 1982 they said it would be about five years until they would be sewered.
Winchester: They don’t have to ask people [to be annexed] in The Dalles. But, you can put off three years putting in sewer and water.
TASKS.
Robertson: In 2006, we completed these tasks. Building a Boathouse. We established a usable site and got Ron Ploger to sign off. Robert investigated readymade structuresTuff Sheds. It kind of sat there. A Tuff Shed is not going to be good enough for Regatta Grounds. If it is at Regatta Grounds it has to look good and $10,000 or $15,000 is not going to buy a boathouse. It has to look as good as any boathouse. We don’t want to be the next Oceanlake wave.
Winchester: If we try to build it too crummy they might not allow it.
Green: Do you know what the dimensions need to be? Can we get some bids?
Winchester: We need to talk to some contractors and obtain bids. Would it work just as well over near the house to the east near the boat ramp?
Robertson: He didn’t want to give up that space.
Strayer: There might be lots of moisture if it was underground.
Robertson: I don’t think we had a real solution. It would save us $115 a month. But, I don’t know how to go about building a boathouse. We would have to get a standard set of plans.
Winchester: Jim Davis would have the skills to do it.
Aschenbrenner: Maybe you should approach the city on the D River property. You could put up a less elaborate building. Half of it is open and the other half is urban renewal. Maybe a Tuff Shed would be alright there. It would be less obtrusive.
Strayer: Could you launch from there? Robertson: No. It is debris laden. It is a kayak launch.
Green: Could you try to get a bid on the draft? Get another bid besides Jim Davis.
Juenke: We are inviting all kinds of problems to build a boathouse. How often do we use the boat?
Robertson: 30 times.
Green: We should have the ability to get out on the lake and do our job.
Robertson: Maybe $115 a month is cheap. Originally the idea of a boathouse was to have access to the lake. He accomplished that by getting a truck.
Green: That is cheap compared to the cost of a boathouse.
Strayer: If we had a research center, that would be a good place for it and if we built it in one place we might not want it there in the future. Would reduce our flexibility.
Winchester: So we will just put it on hold?
Robertson: I’ve actually got a place that has a dock. Other people have docks. We could potentially park it there from June on if we have a cover.
Create boathouse/dock standards with the County.
Robertson: I would like to have this completed. I talked to Jerry Warner said he talked to Matt and he is working on a mailer and they are continuing on it.
Interface with government agencies.
Winchester: Robertson is doing great at this.
Retrofit Rock Creek Dam.
Winchester:That was completed.
Erosion Control Seminar.
Winchester: These are being completed.
Push Up Dam Removal.
That one’s completed.
Power line.
Winchester: We did the best possible.
D River Dredging.
Winchester: That is moving along.
Knotweed Eradication.
Winchester: Is that the bamboo looking one? Robertson: Running through the process we determined we didn’t have much of a problem. Completed.
D River Graffiti.
Robertson: That was completed.
Signage.
Winchester: I’m happy with the new signs. I’ve always thought we should do something about those signs.
Land Use Issues.
Robertson: These things are important and they are things I work on all the time.
Green: What site plan reviews do you sit in on?
Robertson: The larger ones that are in the watershed. They might send something from Taft and I don’t participate. Just if it involves the lake.
Outreach.
Winchseter: We are on Channel 4 a lot.
Strayer: And, the Tuesday radio program. Did you mention the restocking of trout? You might get a bunch of hits.
Robertson: I will do that.
Aschenbrenner: What day will the stocking take place? That could be another trivia question.
Robertson: Great idea.
Events.
Winchester: Could we help VCB with fishing tournament?
Robertson: SOLV was completed for the second time.
Robertson: We’ll have the third Erosion Control Workshop.
Robertson: We need to decide if we should do the Senior Fair again.
Strayer: We need to get some more interesting photos for the displays.
Robertson: We worked on the Get the Lead Out program.
Intern.
Winchester: Do you need another intern this year?
Robertson: My greatest fear was finding enough work for [Kevin] to do, but his skill was so great, he did so many creative things.
Other Ideas.
Aschenbrenner: I would like to find out if Thompson Creek is polluted or whether it really maters whether it is or not. Is it important to find out?
Juenke: There isn’t a dairy operation up there any longer, is there? Winchester: There are now horses up there.
Juenke: Originally, it ranked just behind the city sewer system in pollution.
Strayer: We need some sort of lake management plan so that we can use it to apply for grants. This would show we are on a course and are not just reaching. We can outline it and hire somebody else to fill in the details. I was also thinking it might be beneficial to work on making Devils Lake a research center and partner with Center for Lakes and Reservoirs and Dr. Sytsma’s group. We could work toward obtaining a research center. It seems like there is a lot of state park land that could be used—you could put up a study building.
Green: Yes, it is something we should be looking at.
Strayer: We could ask Dr. Sytsma to help. It would be a way to start.
Robertson: Regarding the parcels around the lake I was thinking of the Blue Heron Marina which is up for sale. We could get a partnership with the VCB or something, if Hawker goes after the funding. It would save [Noal’s] property for the community.
Strayer: Do you know how much it is up for? It’s kind of shallow.
Robertson: It is probably quite a bit if they are planning on building condos on it.
Strayer: I think the people who bought it are turning the existing building into a home and are trying to sell the rest of the property.
Robertson: It’s got access and visibility.
Winchester: Sandy Pfaff has been interested in buying the old Copeland building. The owner was trying to put in storage units, but it didn’t work out.
Green: The elephant in the room is the SolarBee and circulators decision. The first question is there any other options? Doing nothing is an option.
Strayer: Right now SolarBees are the best option I’d like to see a grant or someone else helping.
Green: We need some kind of guarantee from the SolarBee folks that they are not going to move and that they’ll put them back as often as they need to be put back. We would provide a lot of benefit to them if we bought them. We’d become a poster child, hopefully, for them to sell a lot more of them. And, we’d want to be. We’d need to carefully work out all the details. More important than negotiating price would be those kinds of details.
Winchester: I don’t think six months would be long enough to decide if they are good.
Green: Another thing about the weed aspect is that they seem to stabilize the weed growth. All the existing places where they are placing them have weeds. We have a situation where we have little or no weeds and it could be the major part of the natural vegetation issue.
Strayer: If we do that it gets back to the research issue. We have a tremendous public relations issue to deal with. There are a lot of people who won’t like those 18 SolarBees, even though they might work. We have so many people to clear it with, the marine board, state lands, ODFW.
Robertson: The populace will be a big one. Even if we spent the money today, we’d still have to have the public buy in.
Green: Have Eilers come up with a brochure and a publication explaining the data such as it is as it has to be sold to the public on the basis of weed control and cyanobacteria. Everyone is focused on weed control. I don’t want to create some kind of panic with cyanobacteria. [To Robertson]: What is your confidence level that the SolarBees would fix the cyanobacteria problem?
Robertson: It’s 65-75%. If you don’t have any other options, it’s a pretty good bet.
Green: Have they worked anyplace? Any place with a program similar to ours?
Strayer: There’s always been a reason they don’t work. Steilacoom and Blue Lake.
Juenke: Are the recreational lakes?
Strayer: Yes.
Green: Paul and I went up to see Steilacoom Lake to see what they looked like in the lake. They were unobtrusive.
Juenke: Would ski boats hit them?
Green: They would need to have a flag and a light.
Robertson: They are big enough and they are small enough. People don’t run over fishing boats, and they are bigger than that.
Green: The diameter is about 20-30 feet with three arms sticking up.
Robertson handed a brochure on SolarBees to Juenke.
Green: Could we get a grant like the DOE?
Strayer: What is to stop us from applying for a grant?
Robertson: We would need a hook. Like, do they work on the coast? They are looking at a $300,000 grant.
Green: Even if we could get a match that would be great.
Aschenbrenner: We’ve got a good record. We are the only lake on the coast that has carp and its own water district. We’ve done all this and we want to do more and we just need some money.
Green: This is how the discussion started. Clean lakes and clean water program for the feasibility study that ended up with carp being placed in the lake. We applied for it and it was granted. We were just PADL then since it was 1981. Now we are a much stronger entity.
Green: I ran some numbers—weren’t they about $750,000? We got those figures when discussing how to finance. Knowing what we had in the bank, I figured $150,000 down with $600,000 to finance. They have a 15 year useful life. It’s fair to amortize them over 15 years of their life. We’d pay $50,000 at 3%, 53,000 at 4% and 56,000 at 5%. I’ve been wondering how much it’s going to cost us and I seem to remember we could get those rates.
Robertson: We had looked at subsidizing out of the general fund, contingent upon going for a loan. We looked at $20,000 per year for payments. We have more now and we could put $250,000 down.
Green: It seems like at some point we should have some idea of what the cost would be. I think we should look at grants. The thing that bothers me is that we should be looking at something for the cyanobacteria and weed control due to the graph issue. We need to do something as soon as possible. I think the weeds could come back pretty fast. Don’t we need to assume that the roots are there?
Robertson: Seed bed at and then there are boats and trailers one bad afternoon and the weeds will come back.
Green: If they germinate this summer and the following summer the weeds are here, it’s going to be too late.
Robertson: Yes, and then we have the public that is asking, “What are you doing with the money?”
Green: Maybe the carp are going to take care of us this summer and next summer.
Strayer: They are looking real healthy at this time. We stopped at the resort last summer and Neal said they feed them there—there were about 200 carp and they were really big and healthy.
Juenke: I have about 40 or 50 of them around my dock.
Green: The other thing is to approach Eilers and say, “Do you have any new information on weed control?” I don’t know when was the last time we talked to him, but they now have a lot of lakes from which to get more information.
Robertson: They probably have nothing new that they are selling on or they would have been in contact about it.
Green: Just on the basis of cyanobacteria control seems to be enough reason in itself.
Educating the public without a solution is not a good thing.
Strayer: We should educate the public on it. Initially, make sure the kids and pets don’t want to go into the water.
Green: Educating without a solution though is pretty bad.
Robertson: Do we want to see yellow tape going up around the lake?
Green: The one thing we should do is try to get a grant. See how far and how quickly we can get one. Clean water and clean lake and the DOE. We have also done a good thing trying to get grass carp and were turned down.
Juenke: It’s a priority, but if you are going to start with getting grants, you are going to have to have a plausible lake management plan so that you can say, this is the plan. It is important for the grant be plugged into it. On developing a lake management plan—I don’t think it needs to be elaborate, a statement that emphasizes the things we would like to see accomplished. It is going to be different than the quality of water in someone else’s lake. In addition to that we need to continue to pursue things concerning cyanobacteria, and third, we need to get hopping on the grants that would help us get the information necessary to make the right decision.
Strayer: Do you think we should look for something to do with a research center?
Juenke: Yes, I think there are some situations that exist that would indicate we should place the research center on Devils Lake instead of placing it inland. Smokey has indicated a very strong dynamic water district with five outstanding board members and a leading manager.
Robertson: Yes, there is a need to make the case and we have a strong one.
Juenke: My wife’s cultural center group has hired a grant writer to help them obtain grants. They stopped applying until they created a plan and now they are going for grants in six figures.
Green: The plan is probably written with obtaining grants in mind. Sort of like writing a business plan.
Juenke: Robertson’s gathered great knowledge of the things that need to be taken care of in the last three years [Robertson: last December was two years].
Strayer: Should we have an agenda item on the plan to start with a lake management plan? Paul, every month we can give you feed back and until you get it completed. Then we can get a grant writer or a helper on it.
Juenke and
Robertson: I think it could come together quickly.
Aschenbrenner: It doesn’t have to be elaborate, and then we can go for matching grants and that would be a big plus.
Winchester: The public thinks we do okay right now.
Green: [To Paul] Maybe you could start feeding The News Guard news releases about applying for grants, problems with cyanobacteria and weed control, so that when we have to keep the kids out of the lake it won’t be a big shock. Just some short press releases periodically as we progress. The first thing would be to talk to the clean lake/clean water and DOE people and determine what they want for the grant and creating the plan. Ron Ploger might help with obtaining a grant.
Strayer: Could you get a column in the paper where you could insert items once a week?
Robertson: It is something the District has done in the past. From a practical point, it is probably better to do it as press releases need to come out periodically rather than ongoing. We are definitely setting the stage for a working lake management plan. I could call Patrick at The News Guard and Oregon Coast Today would help.
Robertson: Things that I place priority on are cyanobacteria and toxin monitoring. Funding a bacteria source tracking study of the D River, the septic tanks are a problem in some places, but they are not reaching the D River as proof seen in the Campground having consistently good water quality. Nye Beach has a problem every week and theirs is always sewer related. The D River problems are intermitent and the state is not finding problems in the winter, so likely the source is birds or slower water—all those things aggravate it. Source tracking for D River and Thompson Creek. HazMat training for Lincoln City. The largest partner would be the Fire Department. It’s ongoing training. You have to stay up on these things. SOLV, Erosion Control Seminar, the Senior Fair, Get the Lead Out to continue, Oregon Lake Association, probably coming to Devils Lake in 2009. Support the improvement of the website.
New ideas:
Continuing with the research center.
D River Dam Repair Phosphate-free fertilizer program. Maybe it should be banned.
Bioswales and Rain Gardens. Different storm water retention items.
Storm drain cleanout. The City could flush it down the drain (in September) and suck it up and all that summerlong grease and oil flushes out. The sewer foreman is the one to talk to about this.
Septic system revolving grant fund. Home owners in the city limits with a failing system could get a commercial grant to help replace existing ones.
Intern or AmeriCorps— similar to the Peace Corps.
Large Debris cleanup. There are large things in the lake—docks that re junky and decaying. The DSL said you might remove something that people actually wanted.
Green: Take photos of the items prior to removing the bad stuff.
Robertson: We would be taking out manmade things that are dilapidated structures.
Winchester: I would like to take a tour of the lake. We did this a few years ago and it was a three-hour trip. Would anyone else be interested? All expressed an interest in taking a tour.
Robertson: It would be about a $3,000 budget item to remove old structures tires, etc. We would contact the homeowners first.
Green: There is a nuisance abatement ordinance that the city has—a requirement to remove these types of items. It might be broad enough to cover it.
Juenke: I think you would at least want to make sure that the people who owned the dock had not obtained a permit for it.
Robertson: We’d take photos, contact DSL, contact the homeowner and ask them if they are aware of it, then do it.
Green: So, we will develop a plan that includes the foresight of looking at grants, seeing that there are grants available. A lot of times the grants that are matching will allow you to do an inkind match. Sometimes they would put up the money and inkind would be our share in monitoring, etc.
Juenke: I think there is a huge turnover in property owners and residents around the lake.
Strayer: Every five years the entire lake turns over.
Juenke: That means that 75% of the people living around the lake today have never been contacted about the phosphate fertilizer.
Robertson: Maybe the District could subsidize the organic fertilizer for the first few years. We have resources that we could provide a 50% discount or free fertilizer. Funding it would probably be a requirement. We need to try to get people to stop using Roundup. Herbicides, fungicides, etc. are inherently detrimental.
The Meeting was adjourned at 12:0 p.m.
Respectfully submitted, Linda Burt
