Okoboji Protective Association

Spring, 2006

President's Message

Dear Members of the Okoboji Protective Association,

The Okoboji Protective Association must and will grow in numbers this year. Our organization has a long and proud history and we must act now so that the OPA will be a force in the Iowa Great Lakes area for the future. Members should be proud of 2005 accomplishments, described below.

The OPA joined efforts with the Iowa Great Lakes Water Safety Council to establish a nighttime speed limit, and the OPA gave a one-time gift of $5,000 to the Safety Council to support invasive species monitoring at public boat ramps this summer. This will continue in future years when the increase in boat license fees begins in the next fiscal year. The timing is urgent for zebra mussels were found in Clear Lake last summer, and we need to intensify education and monitoring efforts. Read more about this in Phil Peterson's report on the Water Safety Council.

The OPA also provided lead gifts to the Maritime Museum to install a lake-friendly parking lot. The lot will be ringed with rain gardens to retain and filter runoff before it goes into the lake, and it includes data monitoring to measure the reduction of pollution going into the lake. Construction will begin this spring. The OPA has been a leader in reestablishing many other Low Impact Development (LID) demonstration projects that will begin this year. Read more in Steve Anderson's Clean Water Alliance report.

Speaking of the Clean Water Alliance, the OPA is an active member and reports they will be conducting a watershed assessment and plan in the next year, and integrating all the data collected in the past year, and the water quality monitoring and research the OPA has helped support over the years at Iowa Lakeside Lab. Jim Fredericks, a soil and water scientist, will be working with Mike Hawkins of the DNR to compile this in the next year. Thanks largely to OPA efforts, especially the late and great Ace Cory, this will be the first watershed assessment to address urban as well as the agricultural components of our watershed. And speaking of Ace Cory, who was a wonderful advocate for the lakes, please see the poem in tribute to him by Phil Brown in this newsletter.

The OPA continues in its long-term support for the water monitoring of West Okoboji by the Cooperative Lakes Area Monitoring Project, coordinated by Iowa Lakeside Lab, and this summer we will partially support a unique project to develop tools to reconstruct historic water quality, before sampling was conducted, as far back as 100 to 10,000 years ago by using a special kind of preserved alga, called a diatom, as bioindicators of past water quality conditions. You will hear more about the results of that project in our fall newsletter.

A subcommittee of the board has already met this spring to prepare for this summer's projects. We invite you to come to the board meetings held the last Saturday of each month, April - September, at Iowa Lakeside Laboratory. Topics we discussed for the upcoming meetings include:

• Question and answer meeting with the marina owners about boating safety and latrine issues.
• Invitation to mayors or their representatives of the municipalities on West Okoboji to tell us what they are doing for water quality.
• Invitation to the Iowa Heritage Foundation about the Angler's Bay project on Big Spirit (see article this newsletter).
• An update and maybe a tour of the parking lot at the Amusement Park.
• A meeting with our state representative and senator to find out what they are doing about water quality.

Become an active member in the OPA today! Renew now and invite your neighbors, family, and friends to join!

Hank Miguel
OPA President