Lakes conference kicks off
This aerial view shows a massive home under construction on Flathead Lake’s Shelter Island south of Lakeside. The effect of growth on water quality is one topic being explored today at a conference in Polson on large lakes. Karen Nichols/Daily Inter Lake
POLSON - The Flathead Valley is not alone in its efforts to protect water quality, as rapid development has prompted similar and even more aggressive efforts in other western communities.
That was the opening theme for the Large Lakes Conference on Wednesday at the Kwa-Taq-Nuk resort. The two-day event - sponsored by the Flathead Basin Commission, the Confederated Salish-Kootenai Tribes and the Flathead Lakers - attracted more than 200 people from California to Alberta and North Dakota.
Most represent state, tribal, federal or local governments, but many belong to grassroots organizations and businesses with a stake in preserving water quality. Flathead and Lake counties have heavy representation at the conference, "Lessons of the Lakes: Promoting Water Quality Amidst Community Growth."
Speakers from Lake Tahoe, Lake Couer D' Alene and the Montana's Big Hole basin were among the panelists that discussed efforts to manage growth and pollution to protect water quality in those areas.
John Singlaub, executive director of the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency, described how the states of California and Nevada, along with five counties and one incorporated city, have been working together to manage a "huge surge" in development around the lake that started in the 1960s.
By 1969, he said, septic systems had been banned around the lake, replaced by expensive and complex sewer systems to pump waste outside the basin. But that did not put a stop to other impacts on the lake.
Singlaub said there has been a "large turnover" in fish species, with introduced species such as lake trout and kokanee salmon having negative impacts on native species.
Water quality protection efforts have largely been aimed at maintaining clarity in the lake. More than 50 agencies have been implementing various water quality projects in the Tahoe basin, where there has been relentless development pressure because of its proximity to large population centers such as San Francisco.
"We are almost at build-out" because available open shoreline is so scarce on Lake Tahoe, Singlaub said.
But that doesn't mean there isn't building activity around the lake - there has been a boom in redevelopment, with landowners taking down old cabins and lake houses and replacing them with expensive and often spacious new homes, Singlaub added.
Phil Cernera, director of the Couer D' Alene Tribe's Lake Management Department, described contentious relationships in efforts to manage the lake and implement Superfund work to cleanup mining pollution that flowed into the lake over most of the last century.
The tribe has long been engaged in legal battles with the state of Idaho and other parties over management jurisdiction on the lake. A Supreme Court ruling granted the tribes jurisdiction over the lower third of the lake in 2001. Now, the tribes and 25 other stakeholders are trying to develop a lake management plan, a process that has been difficult so far, Cernera said.
For the tribes, he said, the Superfund work is a priority.
"We have 75 million tons of contamination at the bottom of Lake Couer D' Alene," he said.
Increasing nutrient flows into the lake threaten to eventually cause heavy metals and other pollutants to resurface, he added.
Noorjahan Parwana, executive director of the Big Hole Watershed Committee, talked about successful cooperative water quality protection efforts that have developed among diverse interests in the Big Hole Basin.
The committee had to work with Beaverhead, Anaconda-Deer Lodge, Butte-Silverbow and Madison counties in developing a basin-wide strategy for water quality protection.
"Those counties do not share the same political theologies, but they work together very well," Parwana said.
The cooperative work led to an agreement requiring a 150-foot setback for any construction from the hugely popular fishing river, along with floodplain mapping, a push for conservation easements in the floodplain and other features.
The cooperative work was successful, Parwana said, because it was driven by ranchers and other landowners rather than government agencies.
The conference continues today with Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer starting off the day's panel discussions.
Reporter Jim Mann may be reached at 758-4407 or by e-mail at jmann@dailyinterlake.com