| Residents of
Cedar Lake please note:
Summer, 2007
Several thefts have been reported to the Aitkin
County Sheriff's Office over the last few days from an
area on the southeast side of Cedar Lake. It is believed
that the suspect(s) were in a boat and traveled along
the shoreline stealing from boats and docks.
Among the items taken were: a 7 1/2 hp. Evinrude
motor, MinnKota trolling motor (with round transducer
clipped to bottom), marine gas cans, 7-foot Bucktail rod
with Pflueger reel (name Russ Peterson on rod), G-Lomis
Jerk Bait rod with Abu-Garcia 6500C reel, Abu-Garcia
6500C three-speed reel, Custom made D & R Lure Secure
tackle box with about 40 muskie lures.
If anyone observes any suspicious activity - please call
the Aitkin County Sheriff’s Office at 927-2138 or
888-900-2138
Thanks for your help.
Scott Turner
Sheriff of Aitkin County
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Notes from the
President!
April, 2007
by Phil Rzeszutek
Things have been happening over the winter. The
Tanager Bay project has been moving ahead. The original
project consisted of a 127 unit planned unit
development. The zoning department from Crow Wing County
came out and looked the property over and cut it back to
77 units. This is a 248 acre site with two incoming
streams through the property with considerable wetland.
The 77 unit development will be a conservation
development with all of the state guidelines for
setbacks being followed.
The only structure on the lakeshore that we know of
so far would be a community building with a pool and the
docks. The rest of the sites would be back from the
lake. Originally it was plotted out for 31 lakeshore
lots. These lots were mostly wetlands along the shore
and you know that these wetlands would have been changed
with homes on these sites. I feel that there is less
impact on the lake with 77 offshore lots than with the
original 31 lots.
The county board accepted the SR2 and SR2.5 zoning.
Time will tell what impact this will have on our lake.
Jay Nord who is working with the developer will speak at
our annual meeting on what is happening so far.
We experienced very low water levels last fall. I was
in contact with Lonnie Thomas with the Department of
Natural Resources (DNR) on possibly putting a gate in
the outlet of the lake to maintain a higher level. He
stated that we are no longer able to put in a removable
gate to maintain lake levels. He said that the level
would have to be changed with a non-removable structure
to make this a permanent thing and that this would
change setbacks and could make existing structures
non-conforming. So it looks like this change is out of
the picture.
We will continue to monitor the water quality of the
incoming streams this year as we have in the past. We
will also take secchi disk reading on the water clarity
in the lake. If you are interested in taking these
readings in your area of the lake contact us at the
annual meeting.
We are also looking for someone to do a loon count on
the lake in the fall. This count will go to the DNR and
be posted on their website. We seem to have a very high
population of loons on Cedar compared to other lakes. We
will also look at building loon nesting platforms to put
out on the lake.
Keep checking our website for updates.
Hope everyone has a great summer.
______________________________________________________
President’s Views
Summer 2006
by Les Martin
Those of you who attended the annual meeting have had
a chance to see the plan developed by the planning task
force to address our top five issues as defined in our
survey results. Take a look at the executive summary of
the survey. Take a
look at the plan. Both the Survey and the Plan have
links below. If you have questions, give me or any
board member a call.
Lake level was not one of
our top issues based on survey results but Mother Nature
seems to have changed our priorities. Getting boats off
lifts and access to Bay Park bay seem to be the two
biggest problems although the shallow water does tend to
keep the wake boarders out of Bay Park. The solution to
our low water problem is not quite as simple as some
folks would believe. In the short run, lake levels can
be raised but higher lake levels are just going to lead
to more shore erosion, more silt in the water and
eventually the same problems we’re seeing now, just at a
higher mean lake level. Obviously, we can’t just keep
raising the lake every time the silting problem causes
channel filling and boat lift problems. Perhaps unseen
in all this is that this silt brings with it all kinds
of nutrients that are speeding up the death of Cedar
Lake. Lake level can be raised but it’s a short term
fix. The lake level has already been raised about 4”
above the DNR set point by fill-in under the railroad
trestle but as we can see from the current problems, it
hasn’t really helped. Right now various members of the
board are exploring short term ways to address our
problems such as dredging the Bay Park entrance and
getting permission from the DNR to raise lake levels.
But I can’t say this strongly enough. Until many
more of you provide good shoreline stewardship, we will
have these same problems every time we have a dry year
while we cause water quality problems in wet years.
Break this silt cycle. If you have the resources,
re-vegetate along your shore with plants that will hold
the soils and trap run off from your lawns. There is a
short course this month at the Deerwood town hall to
learn how to do this. If nothing else, where you don’t
need access to the lake, just let the last ten feet near
the lake grow up. Don’t be part of the problem.
Those of you who use
County 28 have no doubt seen the Conservancy’s name up
in lights-headlights that is. The Conservancy has been
given the section of “28” from “210” to “117” for liter
pickup. I’d like to thank the Buhlman’s and Paul Hauge
for helping us get this section. We will be having our
first pick-up followed by a get together in September.
See the notice elsewhere in this newsletter.
Hope you’ve all enjoyed
the summer on the lake as much as we have this year.
Swimming has been wonderful. Hopefully we can get a good
winter recharge to bring lake levels back up for next
year. Have a safe rest of the summer. If you live on
Cedar, remember to vote this fall for county offices.
Find out where the candidates stand on lake issues and
vote for candidates that understand our issues and will
factor them into any decisions they make that will
affect the lake.
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