This commentary is by Peter Erb, a Hinesburg resident who is on the board of the Lewis Creek Association, a river watch nonprofit.
The taking of significant areas of Vermont’s larger lakes for the use of the small minority of citizens of Vermont who own wake boats is about to happen.
The fact that the manufactured waves that this “sport” requires are disruptive, damaging and downright dangerous is supported by science, testimony, and experience of the other users.
In an attempt to mitigate these impacts, the state is proposing to utilize setbacks from the shoreline to create zones for their use, supposedly sufficiently far from other “normal” uses — that is, those existing in 1993 by state definition that the Agency of Natural Resources is mandated to protect.
This approach is absolutely backward. Even a 1,000-foot setback from the shoreline, which will have dangerously large waves encroaching much of it, is simply not sufficient area for all the rest of us.
I spent my childhood sailing small craft, and the best and most reliable winds are always in the center of the lake, and that is where the races took place. The challenge or allure of “swimming across the lake,” the access to the deepest holes for summer fishing, the simple desire to recreate far from shore, in all but our largest lakes simply cannot safely happen whenever there is a chance of wake boats being present.
The first step should be to identify how much area should be protected for the enjoyment of the general lake-using public, and then see if there is any area left that can safely remove the wake boats, and their far-spreading wakes, from these uses. The issue should not begin with shoreline protection, but a determination of how much of the surface of our lakes should remain wake-boat and wave-free for the enjoyment of the rest of us.
Our state and private entities are spending millions upon millions of dollars to address phosphorus pollution. The propeller wash of the wake boats can churn up the lake bed to depths up to 20 feet, and possibly more, which disturbs the phosphorus deposited there over the years and provides nutrients for the increasing algae blooms threatening our lakes.
To have the recreational use of a small minority of our population jeopardize our collective immense investment is beyond belief.
If wake boats are to be allowed anywhere but the few larger lakes in our state, the Agency of Natural Resources must:
- Ban their use until it is absolutely clear what controls are necessary to ensure that they don’t exacerbate the phosphorus levels, including slow-speed travel in shallow waters, by stirring up what is presently deposited on our lake bottoms.
- Limit their use to only those areas that will not, to any appreciable extent, impact the established normal uses currently enjoyed by so many people on our lakes.
- Require that all wake boats have GPS transponders that create a record of their location at all times.
- Create a clear set of laws that will enforce transgressions.
- Set up license fees that will completely fund all necessary enforcement of their use.
- Clearly limit the size and power of any wake boats that are allowed.
- Require a certified inspection of the ballast tanks to ensure that they are completely dried out so that invasives are dead before they can move between bodies of water.