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photo by Sarah Stultz
Minnesota Senate Capital Investment Committee Chairman Keith Langseth and Sen. Dan Sparks, right, listen Wednesday under the Fountain Lake Park gazebo as Shell Rock River Watershed Administrator Brett Behnke presents a request for state funding to dredge Fountain Lake. The Albert Lea request was one of several the committee will hear.
Senators tour Fountain Lake
$7.5 million request for dredging
Published Thursday, September 3, 2009
Leaders of the Shell Rock River Watershed District and several local entities on Wednesday asked members of the Minnesota Senate Capital Investment Committee to fund $7.5 million in bonding funds to dredge Fountain Lake.
The request from the city and watershed district came in the middle of a committee tour of the state to review improvement projects eligible for bonding money.
Shell Rock River Watershed District Administrator Brett Behnke said the $7.5 million request would be half of the project’s estimated cost of $15 million. It would include dredging an estimated 1 million cubic yards of sediment, taking the lake from between 5 and 10 feet in depth to a minimum of 12 feet.
Presenting the request in the gazebo of Fountain Lake Park, Behnke stressed the importance of the more-than-550-acre Fountain Lake to the community of Albert Lea. He said the lake has become central to the city’s tourism industry and identity. He added the community is proud to be known as the Land Between the Lakes, because of its location between Fountain Lake and Albert Lea Lake.
Photo by Sarah Stultz
Members of the Minnesota Senate Capital Investment Committee and other leaders of various entities in Albert Lea walk from City Hall up Fountain Street to the Fountain Lake Park to hear a bonding request on Wednesday. District 27 Sen. Dan Sparks estimated between 18 and 20 senators were in town to hear the request, which was part of a tour around the state to hear bonding requests.
Costs included in the project would be project engineering and design, sediment and dredging disposal, construction administration and acquisition of land for sediment disposal.
Behnke said the sediment is in the lake largely because of channelization, erosion, field runoff and street runoff.
The dredging project would be a major project by the watershed district, the city and other local partners to reduce the sediment that reaches Fountain Lake from upstream tributaries, he said. It would come in coordination with other recent projects aimed at increasing water quality, including the installation of rock dams and filter strips on agricultural lands, steam bank stabilization and the installation of fish barriers at various locations.
He said the dredging would be completed through a hydraulic dredging system, which includes the use of suction pumps and piping for removing and pumping out the dredged material to a disposal site.
Photo by Sarah Stultz
Albert Lea City Council member Larry Anderson, in red, talks with Senate Capital Investment Chairman Keith Langseth after hearing a request to dredge Fountain Lake on Wednesday. The senators on the committee had 30 minutes to hear the request before moving on to another request.
Watershed board member Gary Pestorious said when people come to Minnesota from Iowa, the first lake they’re going to look at is Albert Lea Lake.
“We think that’s a huge factor here, and that we qualify for these funds,” Pestorious said.
The dredging project would not be the first for Fountain Lake in its history. Between 1940 and 1942, the city of Albert Lea dredged about 1.8 million cubic yards of sediment from the main bay of the lake to improve recreation, and beginning in 1962, Dane’s Bay and Edgewater Bay were dredged.
Senators asked what the sediment is made of and how it got into the lake. They also asked if the project could be phased.
In attendance to support the request were representatives from Albert Lea, Freeborn County, the Albert Lea-Freeborn County Chamber of Commerce, the Albert Lea Convention and Visitors Bureau, the Lakes Foundation, the Fountain Lake Sportsmen’s Club and the Shell Rock River Watershed District.
The Capital Investment Committee tours the state every two years to see requests; traditionally, most bonding allocations are made during the second year of a legislative biennium, which begins February of 2010.
Albert Lea Mayor Mike Murtaugh said he thinks the dredging project will get the lake back to the point it should be at, though some of the smaller projects have already appeared to have an impact on water quality.
He said he’s never seen Fountain Lake as clear as it has been recently.
District 27 Sen. Dan Sparks said he was pleased with the turnout to hear the project.
“This is a starting point,” he said.
He noted the presentation went over well and that there were between 18 and 20 senators in attendance to hear the request.
After hearing the Albert Lea request, the senators also heard a request for updates to the Sargeant Community Center in the amount of $100,000 and a request for public housing rehabilitation from the Housing Finance Agency and the Albert Lea Housing & Redevelopment Authority.
Behnke thanked the committee for its recent support in funding for the North Edgewater Park cleanup site.
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Comments
Posted by Wildbill (anonymous) on September 3, 2009 at 9:42 a.m. (Suggest removal)
I hope this eventually continues on to Albert Lea Lake!
Posted by taxpayer (anonymous) on September 3, 2009 at 11:45 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Wildbill...I agree with you 100%. I would also hope that the city looks at the possibility of connecting the lakes and even developing the connecting channel. I would think that would be a hugh financial plus for the city. That way people would be able to stay home instead of having to go to Clear Lake plus bring in others and their $$$.
Posted by Wildbill (anonymous) on September 3, 2009 at 2:59 p.m. (Suggest removal)
taxpayer, I agree completely on connecting the lakes through the channel.
Posted by toby (anonymous) on September 3, 2009 at 3:50 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Maybe they can put a lock and dam in when they re-do Bridge St. Fountains elevation is higher than lower lake. How else could they do it?
Posted by regulators (anonymous) on September 3, 2009 at 4:31 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Great ideas however the costs out weighs the beneifts dollar wise. It's fun to dream but we need to be realistic. Besides the fact that every other city has a lake within 20 minutes it'll take more than our lakes to draw folks in. How much do tourism jobs pay? $7 maybe $8 dollars an hour? No benefits...
I see the $15M estiamte to dredge fountain... I remember the Army Core of Engineers estiamted the cost to be $45M a couple years ago. That probably included AL lake but where do you guys expect the money to come from?
Has the city or any of the lakes groups studied the cost/benefit. That would be fun to see and help learn which lake projects are worth while.
Posted by HD (anonymous) on September 4, 2009 at 12:14 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Will connecting the lakes make a difference? It would seem to me that dredging them both is what is needed and will have the impact. In fact, and I understand why the watershed is starting with Fountain Lake, if we get Albert Lea dredged, that is what will bring people in.
Posted by HD (anonymous) on September 4, 2009 at 12:15 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Would the lock and dam be the expensive part? How do you get under the railroad track?
Posted by nesaajr (anonymous) on September 4, 2009 at 9:43 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Other options vs Lock and Dam.
Mechanical rail portage, similar to what they have on various lakes in Northern Minnesota and into Canada.
On a recent trip we portage our boat through 2-mechanical rail portages, both offered access to better fishing lakes and scenery at a cost of $20 round trip on one and $25 round trip on the other.
Much lower cost and would be best if privately operated.
Why does the City or any other Government/Taxpayer funded agancy need to be involved?
I read many comments in the A.L. Trib. and hear people upset about high taxes, etc. If you are one of them, then please do not encourage the City or State to build something with your Tax Dollars and let a Private firm do it. If a private firm can get the approvals and financing, they too then will be paying taxes vs. sucking away your hard earned income.
Yes, a Lock & Dam would be very expensive. I woud venture an estimate of well above the $5 million figure, triple that if you want sailboats to pass through as then you would need very high clearance or movable bridges.
The lowest cost alternative would be just to trailer your boat from lake to lake which everyone can do now.
What would Boaters on Fountain and Albert Lea Lakes be willing to spend to use any type of tranfer system?
Another option would be to let a private firm build and run a marina off front street along the lake where people could rent slips, sell bait & accessories, sell & rent boats, etc. Once again, they would be paying taxes.
Oh, wait, thats right, the City Council squashed the last attempt by someone to start a boat reantal business on the Fountain Lake.
Posted by nesaajr (anonymous) on September 4, 2009 at 2:06 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Prior to dredging, how about creating or re-creating Wetlands or a portion thereof that were filled in the last time the lakes were dredged?
By creating or re-creating the Wetlands that were filled in will provide a natural slow water area to filter out all of the eroded sediment that has been filling in Dane Bay since the dreding ended in the 1960's.
The potential to create a couple deep basins would provide a stilling area where the stream flow could be slowed to let a majority of the sediment drop out naturally cleaning up the water prior to filling in the lake again.
Another place to stop sediment and pollution from entering the lakes is the many Storm Sewers dumping untreated runoff from the Yards, Parks, Streets and Parking Lots directly into the lakes. Installing Stormwater Filtration Units such as Storm Safe or ecoStorm along with Rain Water Gardens, etc. would go a long, long way into helping clean up the lakes.
I grew up near Dane Bay & Shoff Park and recall seeing the thousands of carp each spring floating dead on the surface and very muddy brown water with virtually every rainfall entering the darker waters of the lake.
The lakes seem much cleaner now than back in the 70's, but without treating and stopping the majority of the sediment from entering the lakes, 20-30 years from now, you'll be back in the same situation again.
Please, Cleanup the sediment generators and sources first, then work on dredging.
Posted by HD (anonymous) on September 7, 2009 at 12:05 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Nesaajr,
I agree with many of your comments. I think we have been doing a better job stopping sediment generators but there is still more work to be done.
However, if we don't dredge, I fear people will lose interest and the momentum we have going dies.
You are right on the target in calling for a marina, public or private on Front Street. I still have not heard how, even with a lock and dam, you deal with the railroad bridges.
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