1972-09-25-sr-p6-reardan-lake-studied

September 25, 1972 Spokesman-Review Page 6:

DENNIS BIRGE

Conducting Study

Shoreline Inventory Underway

DAVENPORT, Wash.,—Lincoln County's planning agent and an Eastern Washington State College student are currently working on an inventory of stream and lake shore property under the auspices of a state act.

The act, the Shorelines Management Act of 1971, will be on the ballot in November along with another bill which calls for more strict rules.

The 1971 act, however, as passed by the Legislature, is the one under which the inventory is being accomplished.

Dennis Birge, a senior planning student from EWSC, is conducting the study. Birge, the son of Mr. and Mrs. Cecil Birge of Harrington, is working for the county under an in-service training program from Eastern, He is being paid by both the college and Lincoln County.

Birge is working with William LaDrew, the county planning agent in conducting the shorelines inventory...although he is doing most of the preparation work himself. Currently, most of Birge’s work is being accomplished in LaDrew’s office in the new engineer’s building in Davenport. He is updating and preparing new maps of major waterways within Lincoln County for use during the inventory.

Birge says the preparation is taking most of his time so far... but that he and LaDrew have finished the inventory of one body of water already as a pilot project. That was the Reardan "swamp" just north of the city limits.

The Reardan body of water falls under the criteria which the state set down for the inventory. All bodies of water of more than 20 acres or streams with a 20 cubic feet per second flow and all lands within 200 feet of these water areas are subject to the 1971 Act.

Birge said he and LaDrew trekked the stores of the Reardan lake and took notes on the various physical aspects of the shoreline. He said wildlife, condition of the water and land, and water quality all are checked in the study. He said that in the case of the Reardan lake, the water was polluted and judged the body as unfit for development at this time.

According to Birge’s instructional booklet, the information that is being gathered is essential in analyzing the immediate impact of substantial development being proposed to be located on or adjacent to shorelines.

“When combined with other planning information,” the booklet reads, 'the inventory will provide a basis for the delineations of environments.'”

Under the act, local governments such as Lincoln County are required to complete an inventory within 18 months of December 1, 1972.

Birge said all counties are going ahead with their studies anyway and the state is putting up matching funds under grants to counties to accomplish them.

What happens if neither of the acts are passed? Then, Birge said, the Legislature may just pass another one. The state, he added, needs to control development along the waterways of the state and come up with good planning to keep the developments from ruining the environment they are exploiting.

Along with his in-service project, Birge also is supposed to be doing a "directed study" course. In that, he is helping LaDrew to work on a planned unit development ordinance for the county. He admitted that little has been accomplished on that since the inventory is taking most of his time.