This commentary is by David M. Roth of St. Johnsbury, an agricultural entrepreneur who chairs the Lake Fairlee Association.
I appreciate the Vermont Department of Environmental Conservation’s work to develop a new Use of Public Water rule to regulate wake boats. However, I believe its decision to propose a 500-foot operating distance from shore, rather than 1,000 feet from shore, for wake boats engaged in wake sports weakens an otherwise sensible rule.
In response to a petition filed last March by the citizen group Responsible Wakes for Vermont Lakes, the Department of Environmental Conservation began the lengthy process of determining where wake surfing behind these 350- to 600-horsepower artificial wave-making machines could take place.
The petition, submitted with 54 pages of supporting documents and studies, clearly outlined a reasonable “wake sport zone” where wake sports can take place that is 1) 1,000 feet from shore, 2) in water at least 20 feet deep, 3) on lakes and ponds with minimum acreage of 60 acres.
Responsible Wake’s goal has been simple: allow wake sports only in appropriately sized bodies of water.
In addition to citing safety, environmental and economic concerns, the petitioners argued that granting unencumbered rights to wake boat owners infringed on the enjoyment of a much greater number of people engaged in traditional water activities: swimming, kayaking, canoeing, paddleboarding, sailing, fishing and waterskiing.
Based on Responsible Wake’s recommendations, which include an operating distance of 1,000 feet from shore, 15 of Vermont’s 69 inland motorboat lakes would qualify to host wake sports, as would Lake Champlain, Lake Memphremagog and the Connecticut River reservoirs.
The Department of Environmental Conservation draft rule’s operating distance from shore of only 500 feet would allow wake sports on 31 lakes, more than the 26 lakes where less environmentally damaging jet skis are allowed.
The good news is that, by proposing a draft rule this January, the department has demonstrated it agrees that wake boat sports require regulation. In fact, in one regard, the DEC draft rule exceeds and improves the Responsible Wakes proposal by establishing a “Home Lake Rule” requiring a wake boat to stay on one lake per year unless its ballast tanks undergo a certified decontamination to prevent spreading invasives between lakes.
However, the Department of Environmental Conservation draft rule falls significantly short by reducing the recommended 1,000-foot distance from shore for wake boat operation to only 500 feet. This change would more than double the number of lakes eligible for hosting wake boats. Lakes as small as 205-acre Sunset Lake in Benson could find itself plagued with wake boats plowing the water and waves crashing on the shore.
By doubling the number of eligible lakes, the DEC rule would tear at the fabric of small lake communities, including my own on 457-acre Lake Fairlee. Lake Fairlee is home to five summer camps that are the backbone of our summer recreation and tourist economy, a state-sponsored loon nesting raft that has fledged six chicks over the past seven years, and a very successful state program called Lake Wise that encourages shoreline planting to reduce runoff and protect fragile shorelines.
Additionally, Lake Fairlee has partnered with the decades-old state campaign to battle Eurasian milfoil and benefits from a remarkable group of citizen scientists who weekly collect water samples for analysis by the state to identify the source of high phosphate levels and pollution. A 1,000-foot operating distance from shore will better protect all lakes’ shorelines, ecology and wildlife while providing more room to safely enjoy traditional uses.
Why on earth would the state of Vermont threaten all that it has invested in our, and many other, lakes by permitting these outsized boats to disrupt the ecology, economy and tranquility of our cherished lake community?
How does the Department of Environmental Conservation intend to enforce its rules on these smaller lakes? Enforcement will be easier and less needed on the 15 lakes under the Responsible Wakes proposal, where the wake sport zones are much larger and farther from shore, thus decreasing the likelihood of conflict with other lake activities.
For small and medium-sized lakes such as mine, a simple course of action is not to permit wake boat use at all. In the 1990s, Lake Fairlee did just that by successfully petitioning the state to prohibit the use of personal watercraft (jet skis).
I applaud the Department of Environmental Conservation for crafting what is, for the most part, a sensible set of rules. But halving the distance from the shoreline — and thereby doubling the number of eligible lakes — does a grave disservice to the lakes the Agency of Natural Resources and its Department of Environmental Conservation division are meant to protect. And ironically, it would threaten so much good that the state of Vermont has already done regarding shoreline protection, aquatic invasive species treatment, loon restoration, and water quality.
The Department of Environmental Conservation is holding a public meeting on Feb. 15 at the Highland Center for the Arts in Greensboro and online to obtain feedback on the rule it has drafted. Please attend the meeting in person or virtually and sign up in advance to make a comment to support the rule drafted by the Department of Environmental Conservation with an important improvement — request the rule be strengthened by increasing the wake boat operating distance from shore to 1,000 feet rather than the proposed 500 feet. The 1,000-foot distance is needed to protect Vermont’s lakes and traditional recreational uses for current and future generations.
