Great Bend city officials understand how important Veterans Memorial Lake is to the community and they want residents to understand what is happing with the popular recreational area.
That is the purpose of a letter being mailed to all city residential utility customers, City Administrator Howard Partington said. “We want people to be aware.”
The city has battled toxic blue-green algae in the lake for years. The City Council approved lasts month contracting with a consulting firm, CH2M Hill, of Englewood, Colo., to remediate the problem. The informational letter outlines the steps being taken.
“These efforts will begin pretty quickly,” Partington said.
“As you are probably aware, Vet’s Lake has experienced a serious problem with blue-green algae for the past few years,” the letter reads. “This has led the Kansas Department of Health and Environment to place the lake under a warning status that encourages people and pets to avoid prolonged contact with the water. As time has passed, it has become increasingly clear that the lake will not ‘heal’ itself and it is necessary for us to take certain steps to correct the situation.”
In the near future, the city will begin focusing on a number of efforts. These include the following:
• Obtaining public understanding and support for restoration efforts is critical to the success. “We will attempt to keep you informed as we move forward with this effort. We may use a combination of direct mail, the media, and/or our City website at www.greatbendks.net to help keep you informed.”
• They will attempt to reduce the amount of phosphorus (the ingredient that feeds the algae) in the lake. This will need to be accomplished in two ways. First, they must make an effort to make the lake less inviting to the goose population because phosphorus is concentrated in their waste. It will be necessary for the city to make a sustained effort to harass the geese and encourage them to move on.
“If we don’t remove the geese, we will never reclaim Vets Lake,” Partington said. On this subject, while the harassment efforts are taking place, they plan to relocate the swans to the Great Bend Brit Spaugh Zoo.
Second, they need to reduce the amount of phosphorus entering the lake through storm water runoff which occurs primarily through the introduction of lawn and crop fertilizers, washing of grass clippings and leaves into storm drains, etc. In addition, they will be looking at ways to make long-term improvements to the watershed that drains into the lake .
• The city will plan to establish a baseline monitoring system to document the current condition of the lake and to assess the effectiveness of our restoration efforts over the course of time .
• The city will introduce an alum micro-floc chemical dose into the lake to reduce the phosphorus and improve water clarity. This should help in the short-term, but it is not intended as a permanent solution to the problem. The alum micro-floc has been determined to be safe and effective and has been approved after conferring with KDHE.
• Once the algae problem has been resolved, the city will begin looking at re-balancing the lake ecosystem and restocking the lake with fish for recreational purposes. Vet’s Lake will still prohibit swimming and wading as it has in the past.
“All of these efforts will take time before the problem is eventually resolved,” the letter reads.”We appreciate your patience as we try to ‘take back’ our lake and make it a safe and enjoyable experience for everyone.”