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Submit comments in support of the W&W Comments

At the public meeting it was evident that combining the creation of the Watershed Plan with the related work of helping FEMA update the Floodplain maps has caused a lot of confusion among residents. SMC is sponsoring the watershed plan, and has extended the timeline for it to overcome the confusion.

While the Watershed Plan and the FEMA maps are separate and distinct programs and documents, they are intimately linked. Conservation Chair, and Antioch resident, John Massman rose to point out that increasing the amount of impervious surface in the watershed is responsible for a rising floodplain, and those concerned about rising insurance costs should be concerned about preserving the absorbent soils in the watershed.

The Watershed Plan needs to address much more than flooding. Man made drainage affects the health of the watershed at least as much by inducing droughts as by causing floods, and pollution and aquatic habitats are even more important. Jim Bland, who wrote our comments, reminded residents how special Sequoit Creek is, with 5 of the state's endangered fish species. He stressed the importance of including the watershed hydrology model in the Plan.

 Our goal is for the Watershed Plan to make the data, and the tools to understand the data, available to the public so that we can verify SMC's interpretations, and form our own in the future. If SMC says the water quality is improving, we'd like to see proof. If the water quality is threatened by polluted runoff, we'd like to know how much impervious surface is in each watershed reach, the pollution levels presently in the Creek, and the impact it, and other stresses, are having on the aquatic life. Without the data, and a model to make sense of it, we will not have a Plan that we can use.

Please review the Plan and our W&W Comments and submit your comments to Sara Agahi, the SMC Watershed Planner responsible for the Sequoit Creek Watershed Plan, with a copy to us.

Wednesday, September 22, 2003
7:00-9:00 p.m.
Antioch Township Hall
1625 N. Deep Lake Road
Lake Villa

Ask for SMC to address the shortcomings of the Draft Plan raised in our W&W Comments below. Print them out and take them to the meeting.

Local elected officials, residents and business and land owners in the villages of Antioch and Lake Villa, and in the townships of Antioch and Lake Villa are invited to a public meeting sponsored by the Lake County Stormwater Management Commission (SMC) on the draft Sequoit Watershed Management Plan and the separate floodplain mapping project.

• Unsupported, rosy characterization of water quality trends;
• Impacts of street salting ignored;
• Total dissolved solids and conductivity information lacking;
• Misleading sediment toxicity characterizations;
• Omission of threats from hazardous material facilities;
• Incomplete Ammonia pollution characterization;
• Omission of lake management activities (weed harvesting, etc.) and impacts;
• Confusing presentation of Phosphorous pollution data;
• Omission of watershed model to evaluate pollutant and runoff impacts of present and future development;
• Omission of assessment of impervious surface area, a key harbinger of watershed stress;
• Neglect of critical shoreline habitat concerns for Endangered and Threatened native fish species;
• Omission of predator fish stocking impact on native and game fish;
• Questionable watershed boundaries
• Hydrologic data and models, critical for evaluation of high and low flow conditions, are completely lacking. 

Draft Plan
2MB