ANSWER TO COLONEL'S ANSWER

The Corps has demonstrated time after time that they can balance lake levels to a high degree of accuracy.  In other words they have the engineering knowledge and models, etc. to permit them to do so.  Why then do they not follow the recommendations of Save Our Lakes Now which would keep the lakes within 8-10 ft of full pool while protecting downstream interests. Why have we destroyed the recreational infrastructure on the lakes 3 times in the past decade when we know how to prevent it. For example the Corps ignored the warnings of Save Our Lakes Now when the last drought started.  We pleaded for them to drop the release rate to 3600cfs but they argued that they did not want to cause any disruption to downstream flows until they were sure we were really in a drought.  We pointed out that if we were not in a true drought the lakes would refill quickly and normal releases could be resumed but they would not listen.

In his answer to one of our reader’s letters the Colonel claims immense difficulties with controlling the lakes in a drought.  However every reason given for the Corps not having latitude is now gone.  Yet they still refuse to adopt our proposals which simply achieve better balance by not sending more water to the ocean than nature provides averaged over the span of a year. 

For the record, our recommendation is to attempt to keep the lakes within 2’ of full pool by decreasing release rates to as low as 3600cfs.  Once the lakes drop more than 2’ below full pool using this approach, go to 3600cfs immediately until the lakes refill.  There are other ways refilling the lakes can be tweaked such as stopping all releases when the river below the dams is swollen from heavy rains and using 3100cfs rather than 3600 in cold months.  But first and foremost we need the release rates dropped to 3600 immediately when the lakes can no longer be held to within 2’ of full pool.

There is one other issue the corps failed to address in their answer.  We need for them to stop the practice of dropping the lakes 4’ in the winter months.  That was a provision in place to protect against flooding back when there was only one lake catching the runoff from winter and spring rains.  Now there are 3 lakes and a drop of 2’ provides the same margin of protection 4’ used to provide.