The Economy of Seneca Lake

I've written before about Seneca Lake here in the Finger Lakes of New York State. I've written about her beauty, her depth, her recreational assets and her threats or stress.

I recently attended the annual meeting of the Seneca Lake Pure Waters Association where reports on the health of the lake were given and discussed. I've also been attending a number of meetings as a member of the public of the Seneca Lake Inter-Municipal Organization. The latter group is an attempt to bring all of the municipalities that share the waterfront of Seneca Lake together to work on cooperative actions relative to the protection and stewardship of the watershed. It's a great idea and effort but participation by the 40 or more municipal entities surrounding the lake has been difficult to organize between time constraints, meeting schedules and priority setting.

Seneca Lake, according to experts, is in a very slow recovery from an enormous amount of sodium that entered the water sometime in the mid sixties to the early seventies. The recovery is part of a natural flushing that will take years to complete. At the same time Seneca is being threatened by increased phosphorus levels primarily from agricultural expansion and practices on the land above the lake. These levels have lead to the threat and reality of increasing instances of blue green algae, a dangerous pea green slime that can cause serious health threats to animals and humans.

Few people really seem to grasp the economic impact of Seneca Lake on the region. This impact is broad and huge in scope - from tourism to scenic vistas, fisheries to wineries, hotels and restaurants. Yet one of the biggest economic drivers, real estate and real estate taxes from lakefront residences is hardly ever discussed. Elected officials, economic developers and Chambers of Commerce keep looking for that brass ring of more, more and more development. Sadly, they don't seem to realize that their biggest cash generator, property taxes on lake front properties, is or could be threatened by both green blue algae or another huge influx of sodium into the lake.

It really is about time for economic developers, Chamber presidents and lake experts to sit down in a room together and really learn about and discuss solutions to the problems that the lake faces. Everyone needs to work together on this and the sooner the better.