A year later — Lahontan, El Dorado County still at odds
By Kathryn Reed
El Dorado County Board of Supervisors say there is no way the county has the money to pay for the unfunded mandate to reduce sediment from entering Lake Tahoe. It’s the same message they delivered in 2010.
The supes met Oct. 11 in South Lake Tahoe for their once-a-year venture outside the West Slope. Just like last year Lahontan Regional Water Quality Control Board Executive Director Harold Singer addressed the five electeds.
Harold Singer
And just like 2010, it was a sparring match between he who makes the rules and those who must carry them out.
The big picture is the total maximum daily load – the EPA policy funneled to the state that regional water boards pass on to local jurisdictions. It’s about reducing fine sediment from reaching any major body of water. It’s not just a Lake Tahoe thing.
Singer, though, also brought up how the county’s stormwater permit with Lahontan expired a year ago. They are usually good for five years. It’s possible the water board will grant a new permit at its December meeting in South Lake Tahoe.
Supervisor Ray Nutting is perplexed Lahontan can have a policy when it does not know what the effects of the runoff from U.S. Forest Service owned land is. The Forest Service owns about 80 percent of the acreage in the Lake Tahoe Basin.
Nutting was visibly shocked and dismayed to learn Lahontan’s baseline year for sediment is 2003 when the state agency has been in existence since the 1960s.
Supervisor Jack Sweeney said, “I find the TMDL rather subjective. I think we are wishing for something. I’m not sure it is scientifically achievable or economically achievable. I feel bullied into this.”
Singer kept emphasizing it is the urban areas that are making Lake Tahoe less clear than years gone by, that is why the counties and city in the basin are being tasked with reducing what runs off from the land in their jurisdictions.
He said his agency would like to monitor the various types of best management practices being used in various locations to see what works so the ones with the most gains in terms of reducing sediment can be used elsewhere in the basin.
Singer also acknowledged that if significant changes made to the landscape to reduce fine sediment from reaching Lake Tahoe do no equate to substantial improvements in lake clarity, Lahontan will have to reassess what it is asking jurisdictions to do.
I agree with the supervisors …. The locals agencies are regulated to the tilt and meanwhile the usfs who owns most the land is not held to the same standard and is destroying meadow systems with heavy equipment in the name of water quality. The created policy is expensive with little known benefit to the lake.
Unfunded mandates should be treated as robbery. You want something, you pay for it.
TDML is about not about “saving” the god “Tahoe” but insuring there will be lots of government bureaucrats in your future. Science is about good research and good data, neither of which Lahontan or other agencies have, especially when it comes to improving clarity.
Their lousy science only begets more lousy science, but boy can they add worthless jobs at taxpayer expense with their scaremongering.
To Turnip Truck: Your logic and insight would destroy government as we know it. How can we get you to run for office?
I left off that Singer even said that if efforts to reduce fine sediment don’t improve lake clarity, he and Lahontan will reassess their mandates. Let Singer spend his own money on this pig in a poke while he flys by the seat of his pants.
So much for the junk science he promotes that he is already making excuses for.
How pathetic and selfish and cruel.
The last paragraph is quite disturbing. If what they want to do right now doesn’t work, they may have to do more studies to determine the right thing to do. Sure sounds like expensive experimenting with taxpayer’s money that has no known benefit. Guessing? Not now, and hopefully, not ever. Stop spending our money on intangibles and fix some roads.
I’ve never really forgiven Singer for letting his kid take the gift bicycle from Lance Armstrong after the fire. Of all the families that lost so much in that fire, that family could have afforded a new bike for the kid. The bike should have gone to someone truly in need who wasn’t insured (renters, maybe? underinsured? How many were there?) instead of to a politically connected well-to-do family looking for a photo op.
Jack Sweeney feels bullied ? Jack bullied the BOS and the taxpayers in to his Briggs to Nowhere. He can raise money for Lahonton by having a Toll to drive over his Briggs.
Interesting that one will say “Science is about good research and good data, neither of which Lahontan or other agencies have, especially when it comes to improving clarity.”
And then not produce anything to support that claim.
Please elaborate. In great detail, exactly what data they have that is bad, how the interpretation was wrong, etc. Do you disagree with the statistical processes they used?
I am curious turnip, if you actually know what kind of science they do.
It was stated by Singer, in the above article, that if this effort doesn’t work then he will try another. Sounds to me like he has weak to nonexistance evidence it will and he is covering his, well, you know what. Most failed projects are quickly forgotten and buried until they can get another chunk of your money for their new better idea, of course backed with their chunk science.
Please elaborate on what is bad with their science. Be specific. Do you not like their sampling methods, etc? Do you object to the data used for the TMDL?
Seems to me that you have no idea what you are talking about in regards to the science of this.
How is it junk science….
First major flaw… The TMDL loads were developed based on a series of hydrologically connected watersheds. We know this is not the case. Not all subdivisions and roads are equally connected to the lake…
There is a lack of standards and accountability for those working in the forest upland. The jurisditions and contractors are held to extremely tight standard and others almost none. The cost burden to local agencies and public is insane!! To much process that gets little done in this already shaky economy. What happened to clarity in 2010. Can someone explain that? Robot ?
Ok there is some good criticism from Envirowarrior.
First I would say that the detail of watersheds is pretty good and encompasses maybe type of watersheds and how they have been modified by development. You doubt how connected the smaller scale watersheds are. You question how thorough the TMDL is on smaller scales.
I don’t know how detailed the TMBL models are, not all roads, sources of erosion are equal. But the models can highlight areas that need more attention, such as roads and development on steep slopes. Especially when it comes to watersheds that are plagued by historical impacts (channelization, rerouting of streams, soil compaction, etc).
From what I know about the watersheds in the basin related to TMDL, some of the most important ones are on the West Shore. And the USFS has taken steps to deal with them. The soils in Ward, Blackwood, are really bad (for sediment loading), and the stream systems that are in place had been modified in ways to that do not allow them to function properly. Look at home many stream systems have been unnaturally channelized? 3rd Creek in incline. That system should descend from higher elevation drainages, to a place where the energy in the system dissipates over hundreds of meters, the stream should become more sinuous. And it has been channelized, enabling a lost more sediment to reach the lake.
More could be accomplished by preventing the current system and allowing the natural flow of the watershed to exist.
Currently, the single largest wetland in The Sierra has been bisected by the Tahoe Keys development. And up stream it is channelized by the airport. It is an ecological disaster, the natural system is completely compromised.
It doesn’t really matter what you do upstream from this broken system.
The largest watershed in the Tahoe Basin was once a filter by an elaborate meadow/channel system at the mouth of the truckee river.
As far as who pays for the cost of their contribution to the TMDL…
blame the keys.
Hey enviros, You can buy out all Tahoe Keys owners and restore the land to your filter. You guys should have been here in the 50’s. Whats been done can’t be undone. Quite your finger pointing and blame game and come up with solutions?
I don’t entirely agree or disagree with the comment by robot. We know the keys was a tragedy for the lake. We know wetland treat water… We also know from tmdl that the largest contributor to lake clarity loss is from the urban at a wopping 72%. The TMDL estimated a meager 4% of the clarity loss from stream channel erosion, which is a small chunk of the pie. Even if we use the most effective restoration possible we can only achieve a 4% reduction to the lake. Is that worh it from a cost benefit standpoint when 72% is still flowing to the lake . Simon has the best research on the topic and showed that the streams in Tahoe have been declining in sediment production and actually healing themselves over the last many decades, basically stabilizing. Does disrupting the system and forcing it stabilize over decades justify the expense when we still have pipes directly contributing fine sediment straight to the lake? Research has been unsuccessful at determining effectivenss from these stream efforts… Some are good some are bad is my opinion but no water quality data exists. The TMDL put the focus on stormwater and pipes and that is the best thing it did in my opinion. Now the effort needs to focus the on the connected pipes using infiltration based techniques and LID measures to reduce the volumes of polluted water from going to the lake from the urban. Working in blackwood i don’t believe will have any positive impact on lake clarity. It’s a small portion of the pie and Ltimp data is showing that in recent times is increasing in sediment production. The only thing that’s changed is that we have been working in it and disrupting a formally stabilizing system. Focus on the strormwater pipes going to the lake and it’s tributaries.. Tahoe Pipes… Pretty simple. This concept though simple, through the tmdl has become burdensome, expensive and misguided… A massive paper pushing system… We know all models are inaccurate and some are useful. Being precise but not accurate will also not get us to our goals. With no funding on the horizon, the cost to locals to pick up the tab would be insane. It’s a double edged sword with the lake held hostage..
Skier… I just did.. Focus on the pipes going to the lake and it’s tributaries using sustainable infiltration techniques . The lake will respond.