To The Reader’s Forum:

Recently, I attended an informational presentation sponsored by the Chautauqua Lake Partnership. The CLP is a private coalition of concerned citizens including property owners and lake users. The panel presented an informative and science-based presentation on the history of the lake, and in particular, the science supporting their objective: using herbicides to control invasive aquatic vegetation.

Last week, Dr. Thomas A. Erlandson, a well-respected scientist and retired JCC professor, submitted an article to the Journal in which he essentially concluded that harvesting is no longer a viable, sensible answer to the lake weed problem.

I was heartened and gratified that the science presented by the CLP and Dr. Erlandson supports the observations of a majority of those people, like me, who have had a decades-long, intimate relationship with the lake. I recently “paced off” the weed growth, which starts about 10 yards from the shore between Griffith’s Point and Point Stockholm, stopping at the end of my dock, and estimating the distance to the weed line as it was 20 years ago, I calculated that my once weed-free shore, dock and swimming area had been choked out by approximately 150 feet of weeds that previously didn’t exist on the clear and sandy bottom.

Meanwhile, the Chautauqua Lake Association, the de facto lead agency of the several groups whose declared mission is to the health of Chautauqua Lake, continues to issue Pollyanna-like reports on the splendid water quality and success of their harvesting operation. The only conclusion I can draw is that the CLA has lost sight of its mission and is so heavily invested in equipment and personnel that it is impossible for it to change its business model. Its mission now seems to be the health of the association rather than the health of the lake.

Let me be the first to declare: “the king has no clothes.”

Philip A. Cala

Sheldon Hall