Memorial Day; Reason for the Season

Coolest Memorial Day weekend in 12 years: Skilling

Staff report

1:38 PM CDT, May 27, 2013

Three straight days of temperatures in the 60s, mostly cloudy skies and scattered rain have made this the coolest Memorial Day weekend in about 12 years, says WGN-TV meterologist Tom Skilling.

The high temperature today was expected to reach only 66 or 68 degrees, with scattered showers or thunderstorms.

The last time it was this cool on Memorial Day was 2009, when the mercury reached only 67 degrees. Today will be about 27 degrees cooler than last year's Memorial Day, which was a scorching 95 degrees.

There will be several rounds of showers and thunderstorms threatening outdoor activities today. And southeast winds 12 to 22 miles an hour will keep temperatures even cooler along Lake Michigan -- about 60 degrees.

It will be cloudy overnight with scattered showers and thunderstorms, and low temperatures in the upper 50s and lower 60s.

Tuesday will be warmer and more humid, with high temperatures in the low 80s, winds up to 25 miles and hour and heavy downpours possible.

RKLD Annual Meeting Date Set

2013 Annual Meeting

Saturday, August 10th

Registration of Electors, 8:30am

Program, 9:00am

Fort Atkinson High School

Aqua Jays cancel Sunday, Monday shows

We all hate high water hanging around on Memorial Day
Weekend...

________________________

JANESVILLE—The Rock Aqua Jays will not perform their
 previously scheduled 7 p.m. Sunday, May 26, and 1 p.m.
Monday, May 27, Memorial Day shows due to the elevated
river levels.

The decision was made during a board meeting Thursday
night, said Dave Rezin, show director.

“If the river levels should continue to recede, it is our hope
to begin practice on Tuesday (May 28) evening and our
first show on Wednesday (May 29) at 7 p.m.,” he said.

Raffle Tickets available at Harbor Recreation, your Boat Patrol Officers or other businesses around Lake Koshkonong.

Rock River Safety Patrol

Benefit Raffle 

Benefit Raffle to purchase new safety equipment.  

A $10.00 donation could win you 

1. $1,000.00 or (4) $500.00 prizes.

Drawing will be July 13, 2013 1:00 PM 

at Harbor Recreation

807 Harbor Dr. Newville, Wi.

Come early and share something to eat and drink with the officers and get a free boat safety check

Tickets available at Harbor Recreation, your Boat Patrol Officers or other businesses around Lake Koshkonong.

Message from RRSP

Hello Brian,

We will be getting the boat out this weekend but it looks like the weather and water levels are not going to help the boaters. The RRSP is selling raffle tickets to help raise money for equipment for the patrol.  We want to replace our boat lift for a larger one to accommodate our new boat and we also need to replace our boat trailer, which is also too small for the new boat.

I attached a copy of our flyer, if you can post it on you blog and maybe help us sell some tickets that would be great.  You can put my phone number along with the flyer if anyone wanted to get some tickets.  (608) 290-1465

Thanks

Henry

 

Capt. Henry Sautin
Rock River Safety Patrol
25 E Deer Run Park Road
Edgerton, WI 53534
608 868-3660
rrsp748@yahoo.com

22 days on Lake Koshkonong

May 1st = 781.39

Today = 779.42

DOWN just 2 feet in May

Another Slow Week On Lake Koshkonong

May 15th = 779.97
Today, 5-22 = 779.42

Loss of 6.6 inches

Lake Koshkonong; Top 15 Water Levels all time

#1    6/21/08    15.12**

#2    1959          13.00*

#3    4/23/13    12.39

#4    4/25/93    12.23

#5    1979          11.74*

#6    4/18/08    11.65**

#7    6/05/04    11.49

#8    6/07/00    11.02

#9    4/07/07    10.58**

#10  8/30/07    10.46**

#11  4/23/98      9.77

#12  4/28/99      9.73

#13  3/23/90      9.45

#14  3/21/94      9.19

#15  3/14/97      9.02

 

*Estimate using flow chart

**Two month’s or more between levels 

Who wins? Lake Koshkonong!

Reviewing the mounds and mounds of paperwork required to win the $100k grant from the WI DNR for the experimental dredge project.

Thanks to Rob Montgomery and his team at MA-RS for designing the schematics and submitting the app - a two year process!

Bob Venske = No Show

Despite including the Town of Albion on our meeting agenda last night, despite personally emailing the town hall to personally invite Mr. Venske to address the RKLD Board, despite his making time for his secret, locked door private meeting at the Albion Town Hall Wednesday night, despite his time spent lobbying town board meetings around the lake -- despite all the time he dedicated to his crusade in trying to impugn the integrity of the RKLD and our volunteer Board of Commissioners, Mr. Venske could NOT make time to attend the RKLD Board meeting last night.

It is the Bob Venskes of the world who discourage good, honest, reasonable people from wanting to serve in local government.

Bob Venske's Secret Meeting

Allegedly - based on reports from several town supervisors - Mr. Venske held a closed-door (locked door) meeting among town chairmen last night in a public facility; the Albion Town Hall.

If the REAL concern is RKLD operations, then why not simply invite an RKLD Board member to the Albion Town Hall?

RKLD has included an agenda item for Mr. Venske on our agenda.  An emailed invitation has been extended.  No reply has been sent.

These tactics are really very.....secretive.

And will likely result in Albion Town taxpayers funding their lawyer, as well as forcing the RKLD to dedicate our team of lawyers to talk to their lawyer -- leaving taxpayers paying for both sides of an argument that never needed to be started.

Nice move.

Very Little Lake Level Loss this week

May 8th = 780.32
May 15th = 779.97

Lake Koshkonong drained just 4.2 inches during the past week - due to rain throughout the watershed north of Fort Atkinson.

Transparency - Our Motto

It must also be noted to our electors, that each of the townships - Fulton, Milton, Sumner, Albion, Koshkonong - receives our agenda as a Public Meeting Notice to be posted at their town halls.

We also publish the meeting notice in the Edgerton Reporter and Milton Courier, as well as being posted at the Administrative Building of the CKSD.

So, it is an inaccurate claim that our elected colleagues in local government do not know when or where we hold our Board meetings.

We invite all to participate in our local unit of government and help us protect and promote the lake and river for ALL user groups.

Agenda Makes Time for Bob Venske

RKLD Board Meeting is tomorrow, Thursday and the agenda has been posted on the MEETING INFO Tab on the website -

HERE

We have included an agenda item for the Town of Albion, and RKLD has also extended an invitation - via the town clerk - to Mr. Venske to address his concerns.

Mr. Venske has circulated letters and (reportedly) personally attended town board meetings, expressing his concerns about RKLD, so we fully expect the courtesy of his attendance Thursday.

We have no doubt that once we learn what it is that is troubling Mr. Venske, RKLD will answer those concerns with complete transparency.

USACE Monitoring Requirements of Dredge Area

Just as a reminder, I am attaching RGL 08-03.  This lays out the preferred format of monitoring
reports (see pages 5 and 6) that will be submitted to the Corps of Engineers for this project. This will allow for greater consistency, making Corps reviews more efficient.  Although this project is seen as self-mitigating by the Corps, the guidelines on pages 5 and 6 of the RGL should still be followed.

Please be sure reference the Corps permit number in any correspondence you send to the Corps regarding this project.

Thank you in advance for your cooperation.

Keep me posted when you plan to meet.

Best regards,
Stacy Marshall

_________________________

The form will be posted on the PAS page on the website at the CURRENT ISSUES tab
HERE

Addressing more misconceptions about the Experimental Dredge Project

This is why RKLD pays consultants - experts - to perform planning duties...because what we do, and what we want to do, and what our electors/property owners want us to do, requires MOUNTAINS of paperwork and follow-up to insure we are in complete compliance with DNR and USACE codes, ordinances and statutes.

Travis and all:

Yes we would like to meet. It might be best to meet on-site, but I suspect we will need to wait until June sometime for the water levels to be low enough that we can walk in. However, that would good timing, because we could also discuss startup of the wetland vegetation seeding.

I suggest the following:

We will send you the description of the carp gate attachment details and the net and floats that we have on order

We will also send you the wetland restoration seeding and monitoring spec (consistent with the spec that the Corps of Engineers and DNR approved in their permits)

We can correspond with the group about carp gate management, the carp harvesting contractor, and how we can work with the Bark River Hatchery

Then we can all meet on-site to confirm our action plans.

Responding to Ryan's comment about passage of motorboats, the design we now have will accommodate passage of water craft over the barrier but care will need to be taken regarding lifting the motor. We are anticipating posting signage at the carp gate describing the reasons for the gate and asking for cooperation from boaters – as some of you know, there have been issues in the past regarding dismantling of the previously installed carp barriers.

Update on the Experimental Dredge Project - Next Steps

As you know, the dredging and wetlands restoration fill is complete. We are moving along with the wetlands vegetation seeding, which we hope to complete in June if water levels cooperate. 

We will communicate with DNR with copy to the Corps of Engineers and Jefferson County on this process. 

The monitoring and maintenance of the wetland vegetation will extend for three growing seasons, based on the wetland restoration and monitoring plan included in the permit application and referenced in the permit approval by the Corps of Engineers.

We also have been working on the "carp gate" to separate Mud Lake from Lake Koshkonong. 

We sent photographs out in February of the metal anchorages that we installed on the precast concrete blocks to allow installation of a floating barrier that will have weights on the bottom and floats on the top to allow boat passage over the barrier. 

Steve Hjort, the ecologist on the team working for RKLD, has ordered a net assembly to use as the barrier. 

Considering Lake Koshkonong and Mud Lake are still connected by floodwater, we will plan on the barrier being operative in the spring of 2014.

Steve Hjort has also been in contact with Laura Stremick-Thompson about the carp harvesting contractor on Lake Koshkonong and on approaches to collaborating on stocking of Mud Lake using the Bark River Fish Hatchery. 

We plan to meet with Laura sometime in the near future. 

We want to make sure we have a communication loop with you for all of the things that we are trying to complete in 2014, which are:

1.      Completion of the seeding of the wetlands restoration fill

2.      Planning for operation of the carp gate barrier for 2013 – 2014

3.      Planning for coordination between RKLD, the wetland owners adjacent to Mud Lake, and the Bark River Hatchery on stocking of Mud Lake as well as Lake Koshkonong, to the extent that you want to be involved.

Safety Chain at Indiandford

The safety chain was lowered off the bridge and into the river yesterday.

RKLD Website Costs

So, 30 seconds on those pages with spending reports, showed that we spent $2,895.00 in 2011 on the website.

For 2012, we budgeted $5,000.00.

Looking at prior annual disclosure reports, the website spending was so insignificant, that the category was lumped-in with something called "Public Information."

Public information is the cost of publishing public meeting notices, etc - and it was/is still FAR below the (alleged) claim that the website cost $40,000.

Anyone who knows anything about websites - and the town of Albion does not have a website - but for those of us who rely on websites, knows $40,000 is a LOT to spend.

But to provide full disclosure to our electors, we have included a stand-alone category called website.

If only EVERY elector had email and were willing to share their email address with the RKLD - we could forego the cost of printing 4,000+ newsletters every year - and the cost of mailing them to 4,000+ addresses every year.

Comments on Bob Venske

We are hearing so many comments attributed to this guy, Bob Venske.  He is (allegedly) making some wild accusations about the finances of the Lake District.

To be clear, everyone who pays property taxes in the boundaries of the lake district receives our annual newsletter, mailed to the very same address that the property tax bill is mailed to.

Within the annual newsletter, as mandated by state statute, is a complete explanation/spreadsheet of all revenues received, and all expenditures by category -- including monies received from Rock and Jefferson counties for accepting ownership of the Dam, and all grant monies received from the WDNR.

Everyone who attends the annual meetings - something our records indicate this Venske guy has never attended - everyone receives a detailed verbal explanation from our attorneys and consultants on how much and where our public tax dollars are being spent - such as the experimental dredging project that was conducted jointly between RKLD, WDNR and the US Army Corp. of Engineers.

Electors are then asked to vote on taxing themselves - setting the annual special charge - that then funds the projects and spending we have presented as a board.

Sound familiar Mr. Venske?  Sounds like the annual town hall meeting, doesn't it?  Electors at the annual RKLD meeting - just like at the annual town hall meeting - can make motions to amend the budget, or amend the mil rate.

Does Mr. Venske abide by state statutes?  I suggest he does, just as the RKLD does.

So then why would this Bob Venske guy (allegedly) claim the RKLD has a government credit card?  We don't.

So then why would this Bob Venske guy (allegedly) claim the RKLD spends $40,000 on a website?  We don't.

Bob Venske may ask RKLD, why don't we just give him what he is asking for?  We already have.

Sample 1 on our "expensive" website

Sample 2 that Bob Venske (allegedly) failed to look for

Heck - Look at any year, any monthly meeting minutes here...

And you will see a complete disclosure of where monies are being spent.

Always have - always will.
_____________________

I am told that this Bob Venske is a member of the Thibeau Hunting Club....hmmmm, probably don't need CSI Koshkonong detectives to find motive.....

Just because Bob Venske may oppose the efforts of the Lake District, just because Bob Venske may hunt Thibeau, just because Bob Venske may like ducks more than boaters, skiiers, fisherman, or the RKLD - that is no reason to be an (allegedly) rude neighbor.

New Page on Website Menu

Go to Dam Info Tab

Then Look for Hydro Power page

Another Week, Another Foot Down

May 1 = 781.39
May 8 = 780.32

So, we lost another foot of water level during the past week.

Depending on rain, we should lose another 1ft during the next week, then begin gaining speed.

But likely, Memorial Day weekend will be a SLOW NO WAKE boating holiday weekend.

Common Question on Lake Koshkonong Flood Storage

We get this one every time there is high water or a flood stage - if we increase the operating orders for the summer by 7 inches, would the flood of 2013 be that much worse - 7 inches higher than what is was at crest?

Hydrology simplified; 

7 inches = 6,000
Flooding = 1,000,000

Flooding brings 167x more water than what our modest request for 7 inches would bring.

This is taken from the FAQ page.

_________________

...The reason for this is the contrast between the volume of water occupied by the proposed water level increase and the very much larger volume of water contained in a large flood on the Rock River, combined with the hydraulic characteristics of Indianford dam. 

Specifically, if the Lake water elevation was at the proposed target -- 7" higher than the current operating order target, the increased volume of water of water in the lake would be approximately 6,000 acre-feet -- 7 inches over approximately 10,000 acres. 

In comparison, the 2008 flood volume that flowed through the Rock River was over 1,000,000 acre feet. Because the flood volume is so much larger than the storage "lost" in the lake due to the proposed operating order change, the water level in the lake at the beginning of a flood has little effect on the peak discharge that moves out of the Lake. 

In summary, the proposed summer target water level increase is an infinitesimal fraction of the typical flood flow, meaning that peak discharge in the Rock River would be unaffected, and the Lake levels at flood time would be controlled by the inoperable crest of the Indianford dam and the Rock River downstream, and not the gate settings associated with the revised operating order.

From Town of Sumner's Annual Town Mtg

It was very amusing reading this coverage of a town meeting - to the best of my knowledge, the RKLD has NEVER explored the feasibility of wind turbines on Lake Koshkonong.  But the flying geese issue given as the reason for deciding against them?  That might be near the bottom of 100 reasons why it can't be done.

One week ago today...

Lake Koshkonong crested at 782.39

Today 781.39

Down 1 ft, or 1.7 inches per day.

When we get closer to 2.25 to 2.5 inches per day, we will be off the bank and dropping from the channel.

Still 5 feet OVER summer Max of 776.3

DNR Mandated Winter Draw Down Ends TODAY

Like it makes a difference.

Gates were last closed on OCTOBER 22, 2012