Environmental Progress - Fall 1997

Lake Programs

Six Lakes Share $500,000 in Grants

The Clean Lakes Program gives financial assistance for long term efforts.

Six inland Illinois lakes will share $500,000 in the second year of the Illinois Clean Lakes Program grant program. Diagnostic-feasibility studies funding will go to Maple Lake (Forest Preserve District of Cook County), Chicago Botanic Gardens (Chicago Horticultural Society, Cook County), Homer Lake (Champaign County Forest Preserve District), Lake in the Hills #1 (Lake in the Hills, McHenry County), and Campus Lake (Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, Jackson County). An implementation project at Lake George (Richton Park, Cook County) received the sixth grant.

The Illinois Clean Lakes Program provides financial assistance for long term, comprehensive lake management to provide improved water quality and greater lake use. Diagnostic-feasibility projects involve detailed scientific documentation of causes, sources and the severity of lake impairment. This data can then be used to determine future protection/restoration practices. Implementation grants are available for this second phase of lake improvement.

Four diagnostic-feasibility projects that received grants in the first year of the ICLP funding have completed their initial studies. Data collected at Otter Lake (Macoupin County), Cherry Valley Lake (Winnebago County), Gillespie Old and New Lakes (Macoupin County) and Lake Storey (Knox County) is now being reviewed. Implementation work at Herrick Lake (DuPage County), begun in the first year's program, is continuing.

New Agency Program Targets "Priority" Lakes, Watersheds

Specific characteristics identify "priority" waterbodies.

A new Illinois EPA lake program started last July 1 will focus on protection and restoration activities at lakes that have been classified as "priority" waterbodies.

The Priority Lake and Watershed Implementation Program is aimed at lakes where causes and sources of problems are apparent, the project sites are easily accessible, project size is relatively small, and there are local entities already in position to quickly implement needed responses.

Priority lakes have been identified by the Agency in "Targeted Watershed Approach -- a Data Driven Prioritization." Generally, priority lakes are high quality recreational or unique aquatic resources, and/or lakes serving multiple uses such as recreation and public water supply sources, that require either protection or restoration.