The Devils Lake Water Improvement District held its September board meeting in the District offices on Thursday, September 2nd, 2010. The meeting was attended by approximately 10 interested parties.
Hot Topics.
Executive Session of the Board: The Board of Directors held an Executive Session preceding their regularly scheduled meeting.
Public Comment: Members of the public provided comments on several items. These included; concerns on the cost of the Erosion Study, suggestions that the District should remove the logs currently in the river, a request for an explanation on the current lake level management plan, and some discussion on the District’s comments with OWRD on the City water rights application.
Lake Level Update: The Board discussed the current lake level, it was reported that the lake has been manually dropped in the month of August by the Lake Contractor and will continue to be dropped through the month of September. This is being done in an effort to comply with the conditions of our permit that state that inflow and outflow must be equal during this time of the year. The request for a waiver on the inflow/outflow requirement was discussed and it appears that the District has repeatedly contacted Water Resources via email, on the topic and has not hear back. The Board advised that it remains the policy of the District to begin the season at 9.53′ and continue to balance in accordance with the permit.
Erosion Study RFP: The District released an RFP for an erosion study to determine if and how the lake level impacts erosion on properties surrounding Devils Lake. The full RFP is available on their website. Submittals were due August 25th 2010 and they received four responses. Staff provided an overview of their formal review and provided recommendations to the board. Bids received ranged from $24,414 to $69,588. The Board discussed the proposals and decided to take more time to review the proposals.
Save our Shoreline: The Save Our Shoreline campaign is currently recruiting property owners for projects to be planted this fall, as of the meeting 3 properties are under consideration for phase two projects. It was recently discovered from the Department of State Lands (DSL) that homeowners can apply for a free general authorization permit from DSL to plant aquatic vegetation to prevent erosion. A good rule of thumb is that if the project only consists of planting or maintenance on an existing structure, a permit is not necessary. The District has received a prototype of the of a medallions to place at shoreline sites where a SOS restoration has occurred or where the property owner has either left the property natural or has done a native planting project.
Thompson Creek: The District has concluded two days of special sampling on Thompson Creek. From the E.coli results on those two days, they were not able to make a definitive conclusion as to the source. It was reported that they will continue to sample for E.coli at as many sample sites as practical, and prep the samples for DNA work at the same time. If a pattern forms in the samples, the samples will also be analyzed for DNA.
Sewer LID: Brian Green and Randy Weldon have been working on the creation of a LID near Regatta Grounds that would pave roadways and construct a 2” effluent removal system to connect to the City sewer system. A letter has been sent to all residents who are candidates for the project and they await their response. Based on this work there has also been interest in doing a similar project in Neotsu on NE Johns Loop and 34th. Sewer does exist relatively near and thus a grinder pump sewer option may also be feasible. There are approximately 100 parcels south of where the current line.
Many More Topics: Several other items were discussed including reports by the Lake Manager on many important topics.
The District has received the 100 new copies of the Native Planting Guide. A mailer is being developed to be sent to the lakefront property owners and to local landscapers with information about the guide. The Shoreline Planting Guide has also been published online. Five copies of the guide have been provided to the Driftwood Library for circulation and for permanent reference.
A presentation was made of a short video that could be made available online and on public cable access. The Board approved the creation of 3 videos to promote the SOS program.
The Septic Tank Revitalization Program continues to be stalled in City Hall with the initial draft of the ordinance not yet begun. The City of Lincoln City and Lincoln County Board of Commissioners recently held a joint meeting in which the septic tank inspection ordinance was discussed. The Board requested staff draft a letter encouraging the City to raise the priorty of the program.
The major component of the Lake Managers time is being spent worked on the completion of the Devils Lake Plan. Recent additions and revisions have been provided to the board. The current focus as requested by the Board was to provide estimates of the workload each of the Action Items contained in the draft.
Water quality at the D River Wayside has recently been the focus of a number of articles in the local papers due to some higher than normal bacterial readings. What might be the cause? The Lake Manager reported that he did find a dead seagull near the dam, which he removed, and reported that he has seen a lot of feathers in the water lately suggesting the birds are congregating upstream of the dam.
