If you look at the dynamics in play with both our politicians and the Corps, we as residents and businesses around Lake Thurmond have the upper hand. The sources of power are money and votes. If the question of what to do is opened for discussion we fair well on both points. Our problem is the question is not open for discussion. Hence the politicians' fear of business interests and city government interests downstream win out as long as our interests remain silent.
From an economic standpoint our position is strong. Looking just at real estate values of residences that draw their value from having beautiful lake views and lake access the figure is staggering. Being conservative every lot on the Lakes has at least $200,000 in added value. How many lots border the affected lakes in Clark Hill, McCormick, Lincolnton, Thomson, Clemson, Anderson, and the areas north of Lake Hartwell. If it's 1,000 properties, the added value would be in excess of $200 million. And this does not take into account businesses affected by the Lakes or recreational values. Right now by their own admission the Corps is ready to totally destroy all this by allowing the Lakes to return to original creek beds if the drought continues. This is economic foolishness. The businesses affected downstream will spend far less than what we stand to lose in engineering solutions to operate with only the flows generated by rainfall during droughts. And the engineering costs for cities downstream to obtain acceptable drinking water and handle their wastes during droughts should be much lower than the costs we are experiencing as the lakes are being destroyed.
From a political standpoint our position is equally strong. How many votes do the paper companies and the nuclear power companies have. And how many votes do the environmentalists have. Compare these to the votes of all the residents and businesses located around Lake Thurmond, Lake Hartwell, and Lakes upstream of Hartwell. If we all vote together we could have a huge impact on the futures of our congressmen both state and federal. Right now we are a sleeping giant and the politicians are ignoring us. We need to wake up to our potential. No congressman should be permitted to hold office who refuses to help with our plight. Any who oppose our interests should be unanimously opposed by us. Who would our politicians listen to then?
One of the first things we need to do is organize so we can speak in unison. We may already have in place two groups that could unite and pull this off. But at present the goals are not clear and agreement on what to do hasn't been established. Once a group is in place we need to ask each politician in our domain what they intend to do to protect our interests. I've seen them at meetings held by the Corps and I've heard them express concern but I have not heard one proposal yet on how to stop this nonsense. In my opinion we should not accept less than a proposal to establish bottoms for Lake Thurmond and Lake Hartwell of no more than 5 ft below normal fill. And we should insist on reviews by our congressmen of what would be required downstream to implement such a ruling. At present no one is even looking at what the costs would be to implement such a policy. My guess is it would be very doable and the costs would be less than those currently being experienced by interests around the Lakes.
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