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Spring Lake recovery slow

Spring Lake recovery slow

Written by SUN contributor on . Posted in Community News, Holmes Beach.

HOLMES BEACH – The city’s leaders are hopeful for the recovery of Spring Lake’s waters but warn residents that a full recovery is going to take some time.

Mayor Judy Titsworth briefly touched on the issue in her state of the city address Oct. 8 during a commission meeting, saying that she feels the lake is on the road to recovery, though recovery will be slow.

Though the newly-installed aeration system is running 24 hours a day now, Development Services Director Eran Wasserman said the lake is expected to improve more rapidly but that it will still take time to see the water begin to clear. He asks that lakeside residents just be patient with the process as the city’s staff and contractors work to oxygenate the water and mix the water column using the aeration system to make it a healthier environment for fish and for good bacteria to grow to help eat away at the “muck” on the bottom of the lake, comprised primarily of decayed organic matter.

During public comment, commission candidate Terry Schaefer said he feels the city needs more expert information on the water quality at Spring Lake in order to address the toxicity issues in the water. Speaking on behalf of an anonymous friend who previously worked for the EPA for 30 years, Schaefer offered the friend’s services as a water quality expert to the city at no cost. He asked only that all previous reports on the water quality at Spring Lake be shared with his friend if the city’s leaders decided to work with him.

Titsworth said that the city is currently under contract for water testing at Spring Lake and suggested that Schaefer or his friend contact newly-appointed Wasserman to see if a different expert opinion could be beneficial to the cleanup efforts.

“We appreciate you bringing this to our attention,” she said to Schaefer.

Lakeside resident Tim Gibson also spoke during public comment, saying that he hopes city leaders will consider opening the WaStop valve in the pipe from Spring Lake to the grand canal. Opening the valve would allow for more tidal flow in and out of Spring Lake, replenishing the water. Titsworth said during a previous commission meeting that she’s uncomfortable allowing the toxic water in Spring Lake to filter into the healthy water in the bay. City Engineer Lynn Burnett previously said that opening the valve, which blocks some tidal waters from entering the lake, would make the surrounding residential properties more vulnerable to flooding with exceptionally high tides and king tides.

During an Oct. 2 discussion with The Sun, Wasserman said that there are some tidal waters coming into Spring Lake, but he’s unsure of how many gallons move in and out of the lake per day.

For now, city leaders say they plan to stay the course and give the aeration system time to work while city staff considers additional options for clearing the lake waters.

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Officials hope for Spring Lake recovery

Officials hope for Spring Lake recovery

Written by SUN contributor on . Posted in Community News, Holmes Beach.

HOLMES BEACH – Spring Lake may still have some brown water for now, but newly appointed Director of Development Services Eran Wasserman is hopeful that continuing to aerate the lake will result in clean, clear water soon.

Wasserman said that he is observing the lake visually every day and providing updates to city commissioners. What he’s looking for in these observations is water clarity, fish kills, if there’s any odor and how strong the order is, if present.

Also, he is working with representatives from Aquatic Systems to determine what the best way forward is to monitor the water quality in Spring Lake. During a September meeting, commissioners instructed him to work with City Engineer Lynn Burnett and Aquatic Systems representatives to develop a comprehensive recovery plan for the lake.

“What we see is a tremendous improvement,” Wasserman said. “There are no more fish kills as of Tuesday (Sept. 24), I can say for sure.”

The fish kill that took place over the weekend of Sept. 20-22 Wasserman said was the worst that residents could have expected to happen. Now that it’s over and there are a few fish jumping in the lake, he said the focus is on getting the water clear.

Since it’s been almost two weeks since a fish kill was observed in the lake, Wasserman said he would be recommending to city commissioners to go from running the newly installed aeration system overnight to running it 24 hours a day to speed up the oxygenation process for the toxic water lurking on the bottom of the lake. After speaking with a representative from the Florida Department of Environmental Protection, he said he doesn’t believe there was anything more that could’ve been done to prevent the fish kill in September and that they’re on the best course of action to help clean up the lake. Though he did add that he’s open to considering any additional ideas to help clear the lake water, if it’s a method that would be approved by FDEP and if it can logistically be applied to Spring Lake.

“We are monitoring this, we do see improvement, but it’s unlikely to see a rapid improvement in water quality due to the fact that we are dealing with the lake and organic matter that was accumulated over there for the past 50 years or so,” he said. “So, this is where we are right now. So, all in all, we see a positive improvement and we are going to monitor this with our specialists that eventually will come up and will figure out whether there is an improvement and whether the aeration system works.” He added that among experts the aeration system is the best way to deal with the toxicity levels in Spring Lake. A contract for water testing with Aquatic Systems is expected to be presented to commissioners at a future meeting.

In the meantime, Wasserman did address two concerns from residents, one concerning the WaStop valve that prevents tidal waters from traveling from Grand Canal to Spring Lake via an outflow pipe and the second regarding the infiltration trenches surrounding the lake.

Wasserman said that the WaStop valve is still in place, but that Spring Lake receives tidal waters through two other smaller pipes coming into the lake. He said that the seawall where the WaStop valve is located is compromised, causing a safety hazard with accessing the valve. He said that he doesn’t know how many gallons of water come and go with the tides in the lake.

“This lake at this time is not completely sealed from the Bay,” he said.

To address resident concerns that the stormwater infiltration trenches around the lake are harming the lake water, Wasserman said it’s untrue.

The infiltration trenches were designed to capture stormwater runoff from the homes surrounding the lake. During a Sept. 24 commission meeting, one resident said that the trenches were having the opposite effect, filling with water and pushing stormwater and sediment into the lake.

Wasserman said that the concerns were unfounded and that he provided a letter to city officials stating that the type of infiltration trenches installed capture the pollutants that might otherwise find their way into the lake.

Another update on the condition of Spring Lake is expected at the Oct. 8 commission meeting, after press time for The Sun.

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Progress made on park improvements

Written by SUN contributor on . Posted in Community News, Holmes Beach.

HOLMES BEACH – City engineer Lynn Burnett gave a presentation on capital improvement projects during the June 27 commission meeting and gave commissioners hope that progress will soon be seen in city parks.

Burnett opened her presentation with a bit of surprising news: Holmes Beach property owner Nora Scholan is willing to donate 26 acres of waterfront property to the city to extend Grassy Point Preserve. Burnett said all that Scholan asks in return is access through a city right of way to a half acre buildable plot of land adjacent to the land being donated. Burnett suggested the new addition be named Hames Preserve after Scholan’s family.

“I think this is a great, great opportunity,” Commissioner Carol Soustek said. “We do appreciate it very much.”

Commissioners agreed to the deal and Burnett said she’d bring contracts back to the July 9 meeting.

At Spring Lake, Burnett said the water would soon be bubbling as the aeration system is scheduled for installation and is expected to be operational by the end of July. The aeration system will push air bubbles to the surface of the water, helping to refresh the water column and dissipate some of the remaining acidity in the water.

Burnett also said that work is scheduled to begin on grading and installation of stormwater drainage at the new location for the city’s dog park following the July 9 meeting. With work getting started, the hope is that the park will be fully operational before the winter season begins.

Progress made on park improvements
This mockup of the new Holmes Beach skate park is about to be replaced with an updated design of what the park will look like.

Drainage and ground preparation work also are beginning following the July 9 meeting for the Holmes Beach Skate Park. Burnett said that new designs for that park will be delivered to commissioners during the July 9 meeting, including designs for the additional bowl area for which she said a donor may have been identified to help fund.

Commissioners continued discussions about the possibility of adding a 900-square-foot splash pad to the entrance to the city park complex. With major concerns about safety, maintenance, high cost and maintaining the health of people who use the splash pad, commissioners eventually dismissed the idea with Commissioner Jim Kihm the only one in favor of continuing discussions.

“Well, I tried,” he said when the consensus was taken to not move forward with a splash pad.

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Spring Lake cleanup options presented

Spring Lake cleanup options presented

Written by SUN contributor on . Posted in Community News, Holmes Beach.

HOLMES BEACH – The situation at Spring Lake isn’t likely to resolve itself and commissioners want to explore all of their options before deciding how to proceed with a cleanup.

During an April 9 meeting, City Engineer Lynn Burnett and fellow LTA Engineers representative Eron Wasserman gave commissioners an update on the effort to clean up the pollution in Spring Lake.

Burnett said that the algae on the bottom of the lake has eaten away the solid waste pollution on the bottom of the lake, leaving approximately three feet of sediment and sludge. To remove one foot of the sludge by dredging, Burnett said it would cost the city about $245,000 for the dredging and an additional estimated $196,000 to haul the dredged material to a landfill. Part of the issue, she said, is that there’s limited access to the lake and limited area to lay out and dry the dredge material before it can be taken to a landfill.

Another option is to find a type of sealife that can survive in the acidic, brackish water and use it to clean the water. Burnett said she’s still attempting to find out what kind of organism would be best suited to the task.

Wasserman said that one thing that would help the lake water almost immediately would be to install an aeration system. The system would mix the water and add oxygen to it, reducing the amount of acid in the water. Burnett said that the constant movement would create a more uniform water column in the lake. She anticipates that an aeration system would cost $8,800 to install, including the first year’s maintenance, with an additional $744 in annual costs.

Wasserman said that if commissioners approve the aeration system, what’s planned is to place a compressor on an existing cement pad on Palm Drive and use the storm water system to run pipes underground to the lake. A second system would be located on the opposite side of the lake and a third would possibly be installed with pipes in the middle of the lake. The pipes would push air bubbles up through the water to mix it.

Burnett said that with oxygenation and the right marine life installed to eat the existing algae on the bottom of the lake, it could leave Spring Lake with a layer of clean sand and sediment.

Commissioners asked Burnett to bring back plans and a contract for the aeration system to their next meeting for further consideration and possible approval.

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Holmes Beach year in review

Written by SUN contributor on . Posted in Community News, Holmes Beach, Special Sections, Year in Review.

HOLMES BEACH – The year 2018 was filled with court cases, city renovations and a highly-contested election for city commissioner and mayoral seats. Here are some of the highlights from this past year.

Treehouse

  • The treehouse case, concerning a two-story treehouse built in an Australian pine with additional supports on the erosion control line in front of the Angelinos Sea Lodge, began the year with a refusal by the United States Supreme Court to hear the case. Though city leaders pushed to have the unpermitted structure removed, the treehouse ends the year still aloft in its perch overlooking the Gulf of Mexico. Owners Lynn Tran and Richard Hazen filed court documents in mid-December seeking a temporary injunction to prevent demolition of the treehouse. The case goes back to court in early January 2019.

Spring Lake

  • Pollution at Spring Lake in Holmes Beach has remained an issue not only for the residents surrounding the man-made lake but also for city leaders seeking ways to clean up the lake and prevent future pollution. Currently, the previously brackish lake is acidic and cannot support marine life. City Engineer Lynn Burnett is presenting commissioners with a survey determining the amount of solid pollutants in the water and options for removal to return the lake to a healthy saltwater or freshwater state.
Spring Lake
Brown water and silt fill the once-clear basin of Spring Lake in Holmes Beach. – Kristin Swain | Sun

Skate park

  • The city’s skate park has been closed for renovations throughout 2018. At the beginning of the year, city officials were considering rehabilitation of the current park. By the first of December, commissioners voted unanimously to move the skate park to run along Marina Drive with an enlarged concrete park design, costing a budgeted $150,000. If an additional $100,000 can be raised in the next eight months, a skate bowl will be added to the park.

Dog park

  • One of the most controversial conversations of the year concerned how to improve the city’s dog park. After nearly a year of deliberation between city leaders, dog park users and the city’s parks and beautification committee, a design was created that allows the small dog park to remain where it is and relocates the large dog park to a section of the baseball diamond, which will be repurposed as a part of larger plans to remodel the city field complex. Construction is set to begin in early 2019.

City Field

  • Plans to renovate city field underwent several renovations themselves. Now with a set rough layout for the park complex, renovations are expected to begin early in the new year. The tot lot is being relocated to the opposite side of the park, from near Marina Drive to adjacent to the existing park pavilion. The baseball diamond will be remodeled as part of the dog park renovations and pick up games can be played in the larger multi-use field. With the skate park being relocated, the staging area will be moved to the old skate park location near public works. The only hitch in Burnett’s plans for the park is the newly planted city Christmas tree, located in an area she’d planned as a grand entrance to the multi-use field. Mayor Judy Titsworth vowed to work around the tree to prevent moving and potentially killing the 10-year-old blue cypress.
Holmes Beach city field update map
After months of debate, Holmes Beach commissioners have agreed to a revised layout for the city field complex, as shown in this rendering by City Engineer Lynn Burnett. – Lynn Burnett | Submitted

Bert Harris

  • Holmes Beach received its first Bert Harris case win in court as the court upheld the city’s occupancy restrictions of six people or two per bedroom, whichever is greater, in short-term rental properties. More cases are set to be heard by Manatee County Circuit Court judges in 2019.

City manager

  • Over the summer, commissioners voted not to put a charter amendment on the ballot in 2019 to allow Holmes Beach voters to decide if they want a city manager or not. Instead, commissioners agreed to leave it up to the newly elected charter review committee to place on the ballot. If charter review members decide to not address the issue, commissioners agreed to reconsider before the deadline to submit charter amendments for the November ballot.

City election

  • The 2018 election brought several newcomers to the table, including Joshua Linney who challenged Judy Titsworth for the mayoral seat, and Kim Rash, who, along with Don Purvis, went head-to-head with incumbent Commissioner Pat Morton to claim one of two available seats on the city commission. Rash was elected with the highest number of votes, Morton was re-elected to another two-year term and Titsworth won a term as mayor in a landslide against Linney.

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Deciding the future of Spring Lake

Written by SUN contributor on . Posted in Community News, Holmes Beach.

HOLMES BEACH – Commissioners aren’t sure about what to do for the future of Spring Lake, and they’re hoping the lake’s residents will step up to help them make a decision.

City Engineer Lynn Burnett presented commissioners with a water quality report and lake assessment for Spring Lake during an Oct. 9 meeting. Burnett said she agreed with the assessment made by Aquatic Systems Lake and Wetland Services to install an aeration system to improve oxygen levels in the polluted lake and monitor the water quality periodically.

Burnett also suggested dredging the lake to remove pollutants on the bottom and adding a connection to a freshwater well to refill the lake as needed. Two things that city commissioners weren’t sure about with the plan are the cost to dredge the lake and whether the currently saltwater lake should be cut off from tidal waters and made into a freshwater lake.

The report listed the lake’s waters as well over the recommended levels for phosphorus, nitrogen and ammonia, with levels significantly higher at the bottom of the lake than at the top. The oxygen level in the lake is listed as critically low and unable to support aquatic life. The lake’s waters also have high levels of chloride, salt, dissolved solids and suspended solids.

Burnett said that pollution in the lake is caused by a number of things including fertilizers and sediment washing in from nearby houses, dumping into the lake and leakage from a nearby waste station, the same one that had a massive leak more than two years ago, dumping around 30,000 gallons of wastewater into the lake.

With the lake being a man-made structure created from a natural freshwater wetland system, Burnett suggested cutting off the saltwater intrusion to the lake, removing pollutants, dredging the bottom, installing an aeration system, and connecting the lake to natural artesian wells to make the lake a freshwater system. She said, if the residents want it, the lake could be stocked with freshwater fish for fishing. The catch for residents is that to keep the lake clean of pollutants, residents surrounding the lake would not be able to fertilize their rear yards because of runoff into the lake system.

“It’s beautiful back there,” she said. “I hope the residents would want to protect and preserve it.”

Commissioners Judy Titsworth and Carol Soustek were both concerned about dredging at the lake. Titsworth said she understands dredging to be expensive and there’s a lack of access to Spring Lake. She also questioned where materials would be dumped after removal from the water. Soustek questioned if it would be possible to remove pollutants over time with aeration and pellets designed to break down the pollutants in the water. Burnett said she’d have to get quotes and speak with experts to be able to come back to commissioners with options for viable solutions.

“We need to find a way to fix it,” Soustek said of the lake.

Lake resident Melissa Williams gave commissioners an impassioned plea during public comment to allow the lake to remain saltwater, as it has been since the 1950s, calling it “a wonderful mistake.”

Titsworth noted the lake would be easier to maintain if it was left as a saltwater lake and questioned if it would be possible to clean the lake then restock it with fish.

Burnett said she would look into the possibility to present commissioners with all of the options. To allow the lake to remain tidal, she said the WaStop valve on the outflow pipe at Grand Canal would have to be removed and the lake’s residents would then be subject to flooding from king tides and sea level rise. While she understands that the lake has been a saltwater lake since it was turned from wetlands without permits in the 1950s, sea level rise makes it a different situation for surrounding residents in the coming decades.

The matter will come back before commissioners on a future work session.

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Spring Lake pollution continues to be a problem

Spring Lake

Spring Lake pollution continues to be a problem

Written by SUN contributor on . Posted in Community News, Holmes Beach.

HOLMES BEACH – After residents voiced their concerns to city hall, Mayor Bob Johnson said the city plans to address the issues at Spring Lake.

The once-clear saltwater lake, located between Clark and Palm drives, is a man-made feature built over a bubbling spring where residents used to be able to swim and fish. But the days of stepping in the water are over, at least for now. The water is murky, full of silt and a Manatee County engineering analysis of the lake showed highly elevated levels of dissolved solids, chloride and salt in the dark waters.

Palm Drive resident Boyd Grayson, in a letter to Holmes Beach commissioners, said that before the water turned brown and murky, fish were abundant in the lake along with blue crabs, families of ducks and many other types of birds, all making Spring Lake a desirable place to live.

Part of the pollution problem now stems from an incident that happened in late 2015 when a county lift station leaked more than 20,000 gallons of sewage into the lake. When the sewage leaked, it created a large fish kill and left debris on the bottom of the lake that killed vegetation.

Though Manatee County had the lake cleaned and deemed the water suitable once again for fishing, few fish came back to Spring Lake. One reason is that piping that connects Spring Lake to the waters of the bay, running underneath homes and streets to the large canal near Gloria Dei Lutheran Church commonly known as Grand Canal, is partially blocked.

The piping is a part of a project by the city to replace aging and failing infrastructure. The pipe is scheduled to be cleaned out and slip-lined with a new pipe before being fitted with a WaStop valve. The valve is designed to prevent debris and tidal waters from entering the pipe from the bay but will allow water out of the pipe.

While this means that silt won’t be able to enter Spring Lake through the pipe anymore, it also means that the waters of the lake won’t be replenished with fish or water from the bay.

Johnson said in an October commission meeting that he’s in the preliminary stages of coming up with a system to agitate the water in the lake, similarly to the way the spring underneath the lake used to bubble up. Because the fresh water lens underneath the Island is depleted, uncapping the spring is unlikely to bring any new water to the lake at this time. He said a benefit of the city’s new stormwater drainage system is that it’s supposed to help replenish that freshwater lens.

Commissioner Carol Soustek said she recently visited Spring Lake with code enforcement officers and wants to find a way to clean the sediment from the water.

Commissioner Judy Titsworth agreed.

“I think it’s horrible,” she said of the situation at the lake. “We need to make an effort to get it back into shape.”

She suggested using bags of oysters to help filter the water while city leaders come up with a more permanent solution to the problem.

Johnson said he hopes to have a formal discussion with commissioners at an October meeting to determine how to best clean the lake and repair any ongoing pollution issues.