Letters to the editor May 1
Lake level
Anyone notice Flathead Lake is down 1.5 feet from normal for this time of year? Why?
There is no doubt we have had a wacky winter/spring from warm to cold and wet and dry. If you look up in the basin’s mountains all the low level and some of the mid-level snow has disappeared. Yet, our overall snowpack snow water equivalent is a healthy 94% (about 21.5 inches of SWE).
What has Energy Keepers, the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes company that operates the SKQ Dam, so spooked?
Yes, it is true if we had a rapid warm up and a significant rain-on-snow event, this would be worrisome. Think the flood of 1964.
On the Energy Keepers website the latest data from April 7 shows a rather dramatic decline in basin inflow and increased outflow. With current warm conditions and recent rainfall there is about 15,000 cubic feet per second coming into the lake and about 13,500 cfs discharging from the lake.
Energy Keepers latest Flathead Lake data also shows they are expecting a healthy runoff peaking a couple of times in June of around 60 to 70,000 cfs. This is more than we have recently observed in the past five to 10 years of around 35 to 50,000 cfs.
Is the forecast for a very warm June, July and August? Yes. There is no doubt managing lake levels in this basin is complicated given all of the sometimes-competing variables as well as a changing climate. It takes accurate models and forecasts to manage the lake.
Is publishing their lake data weekly at times enough? Energy Keepers needs to be a little more accountable and transparent to the public as well as all the basin’s stakeholders.
Only time will tell whether they made the right call.
— Robert Storer, Bigfork
Pope’s message
We just lost a powerful leader, “The People’s Pope.” His power stemmed from his connection to all people; religious or not, black or white, poor or wealthy.
Tenderness was his strength. Francis, humble and full of grace, challenged us individually and as world citizens to be better people. I invite you to read his words:
On DEI: “Diversity is a richness, never a reason for exclusion.”
“We are all equal – all of us – but this truth is not recognized.”
“Inclusion should be the first ‘rock’ on which to build our house.”
On immigration: “A person who thinks only about building walls…and not building bridges is not a Christian.”
“We need to strengthen the conviction that we are one single human family.”
On climate change: “Our common home is being pillaged, laid waste and harmed with impunity. Cowardice in defending it is a grave sin.”
“...the climate crisis…” does not…“interest the great economic powers whose concern is with the greatest profit possible at minimal cost.”
On leadership: “This is important: to get to know people, listen, expand the circle of ideas.”
“The primary responsibility of leaders is to promote the well-being of people, not themselves.” “The worship of the golden calf of old has found a new and heartless image in the cult of money and the dictatorship of an economy which is faceless and lacking any truly human goal.”
We all suffer self-doubts, failures and divisions. But this pope was a light for our individual darknesses. Let’s ponder his words and find that “spark of divine light within each of us.”
— Nancy Teggeman, Polson
Form letters
We keep being told to write our Senators with any questions or concerns.
I have written to Sens. Steve Daines and Tim Sheehy twice in the last month. Both times, from both senators, I got a form letter that said the same thing following both letters.
I feel that both senators are not reading our letters and don’t even care what we at home think or about our concerns. A form letter that I received didn’t address the issues that I wrote to them about. No one even mentioned my question or concern.
I question how much representation we actually get from them.
— Karen Hill, Kalispell