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Falling water level puts squeeze on marinas
Lanier may approach record low by fall
By Debbie Gilbert
FCN regional staff
A marina has to serve its
customers, come hell or high
water.
Or in the case of Lake
Lanier, low water.
The outlook appears
increasingly bleak for
Georgia’s largest lake. The U.S.
Army Corps of Engineers now
predicts that Lanier will hit
1,053.2 feet above sea level by
Labor Day weekend, and by
Sept. 5, the level is expected to
reach 1,052.8 feet.
Normal full pool is 1,071.
The lowest Lanier has ever
been since it was constructed
and filled is 1,050.79 feet,
recorded last Dec. 26.
Unless the weather pattern
changes, within a few weeks
the lake will be just 2 feet
above that historic low.
The lake has never reached
this level during the summer
recreation season, and the
impact now is far greater than it
would be in December.
“It’s a lot different (in sum
mer), because people are still
using their boats,” said Vemita
Loveridge, area vice president
for Westrec, which operates
Holiday and Sunrise Cove
marinas on Lanier,
Most of the lake’s marinas
are located in coves, and as the
surface area shrinks, there is
less water for docks to float on.
“It does get a little tighter as
GREEN from IB
ular cemetery, only it won’t
look like one,” Bell said.
Byars said there are no
current plans for a “green”
cemetery in Forsyth County.
But his funeral home will be
an approved provider for the
“green” cemetery, which
means it can offer the option
of a “green” burial to cus¬
tomers.
Pending approval from
TOURNEYS from IB
and a spaghetti-a-thon at his
eatery said increased food
costs and surcharges have
caused him to cut back on
golf tournaments this year.
“We have done a boatload
for everybody in Cumming,
but I’ve got to say ‘no’ to
some people or we’re not
going to be here much longer,”
Norman said. “We are like
everybody else in this world
and are in a giant ‘try to save
program’ and try to get
through this.
“It’s funny, even the
Norman’s Landing donation
box for ping-pong-it’s normal¬
ly about $100 every three to
four weeks, and now I look in
there and there’s like $23 in
there.”
Unlike previous years,
Norman won’t be participating
in the sixth annual Ted Paxton
Golf Tournament, which bene¬
fits Georgia Sheriff’s’ Youth
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— FORSYTH COUNTY NEWS — Thursday, August 21,2008
Mil
m
f
the water gets lower,” said
Rhonda Kondo, spokeswoman
for Aquamarina Lazy Days
near Buford.
Lazy Days has 61 “wet ...
slips, mostly for houseboats,
and 570. spaces for dry-stack
storage. Customers who use
dry storage can launch their
boats from the courtesy dock,
using a forklift to lower the
craft into the water.
“Last August, there was no
water in the ‘well,’ the area
where the forklift launches
boats,” Kondo said. “We had to
launch boats by trailer.”
To address that problem,
Lazy Days has dredged the
cove and bought a new, larger
forklift.
“The old forklift could only
go down 12 feet (below full
pool),” Kondo said. “This one
can go 18 feet. 47
the Milton City Council,
Byars said, the cemetery
could be ready in about six
months. He’s already getting
calls from interested volun¬
teers.
“We’ve had a lot of sup¬
port on this,” Byars said.
“People who are environ¬
mentally conscious are
excited. We’ve had many
calls.”
Homes. He said he likely will
donate money and gift certifi¬
cates, but “we can’t play” in
this year’s tournament.
[The word] ‘No’ and I
don’t go along very well, but
I’ve got to learn to say no,” he
said. “I can’t fool myself and
do all of that.
Capt. Frank Huggins, event
organizer, said the sheriff’s
tournament has become too
popular in the county to take a
hit.
I don’t expect the turnout
to be much less than previous
years,” he said. “Our event is
very, very popular ... and we
don’t expect our enrollment to
be down, because it’s well
established, it’s well promoted
and we have had a lot of sup¬
port over the years.
But even a popular event
could require more work this
year, as the Cumming-Forsyth
County Chamber of
Holiday Marina has also
done some dredging, down to
the 1,050-foot line.
“We’ve already extended
docks and added more footage
to walkways. We’ll do some
more if necessary,” Loveridge
said. “We’ll also be putting
some smaller boats in dry stor¬
age.”
Normally, Holiday Marina
has 1,238 wet slips available.
“Right now, 140 are unus¬
able,” Loveridge said. “(The
boats) were either moved to
other slips or the owners took
them home. ■
She said shuffling boats
from one slip to another can be
difficult and time-consuming,
because often there are old
anchors left in the slips that
have to be pulled up by a barge,
If the water level drops
extremely low and space
becomes more limited, she
said, it’s possible to put two
small boats in one slip.
“We haven’t had to do that
yet, but we will,” she said.
Rearranging slips uses man
power and resources, but when
a slip can’t be used, the marina
can’t earn income from it.
“There’s an added expense
and also an added cost, in lost
revenue,” Loveridge said. “But
we’re trying not to pass that
along to our customers.'
Aqualand Marina manager
Len Jemigan said they’ve spent
about $600,000 moving docks
around. The marina also hired
Contact
For more information on
“green” burials, go online
at www.greenburialcoun
cil.org.
Approval comes from the
Green Burial Council, which
acted as consultants in the
planning stages, Bell suick
Commerce is discovering,
The Chamber Membership
Golf and Tennis Challenge is
entering its 21st year. While
some members are scaling
back their donations, others
are stepping up, said spokes
woman Kris Carroll,
M While fundraising across
the board is requiring more
phone calls this year than per
haps years past, we’re still
finding we have a number of
chamber members that want
to associate themselves with
the chamber and the cham
bet’s events,” Carroll said.
Kevin Johnston, organizer
of the Putting for Pets Golf
Tournament, remains opti
mistic that the Humane
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Photos/FCN regional staff
Above, workers at Aqualand Marina use two work barges to move a dock from lower
water to a location with a higher water level. Aqualand Marina has moved nine docks
in the past four weeks. Left, the dock is moved to a higher water level. At this loca
tion, the boats and the dock will be protected for another 19 feet,
an engineering firm to design a
$40,000 drought management
plan, modeled after the hurri
cane plans that coastal marinas
use.
The plan kicks in when the
lake is at 1,057 feet, and it
specifies which of the marina’s
35 docks will be moved as the
water level continues to drop.
We’re fortunate at
Aqualand because we’re out on
a peninsula rather than in a
cove like most marinas,
Jemigan said. “We’ll be able to
function all the way down to
1,035.”
According to its Web site,
the Green Burial Council has
been “working since 2005 to
make burial sustainable for
the planet, meaningful for the
families and economically
viable for the provider.”
Economically, Byars said
a “green” burial can cost
about $3,000 to 4,000, much
less than a traditional burial.
Funeral costs have esca¬
Society of Forsyth County
event will fare as well as
years past.
The tournament, once an
annual event, returns after a
hiatus of a couple years.
Knowing the gap could hurt
its popularity, Johnston is
staging this year’s event at
Polo Golf & Country Club.
.. I stepped it up,” he said.
“This is a private course and
there are people out there that
can’t play this course unless
they play in a tournament.”
Jolie Vaughan, regional
tournament sales manager for
the Heritage Golf Group,
which operates the Polo club
said this year is busier than
last,
As the water line recedes in
a cove, docks have to be crowd
ed closer together. But at
Aqualand, docks near the shore
can be detached, moved out
toward the open lake, and reat
tached to the ends of docks that
are already there.
Jemigan said they’ve been
moving one or two docks per
week, but it’s a major effort,
The dock has to be physically
cut apart and its electrical con¬
nections severed.
Then the electrical lines
have to be reconnected to an
existing dock, the relocated
lated so much in the past few
years,” Byars said. “From a
cost standpoint, people may
want to go in that direction.”
A portion of the money
spent on “green” burials will
go toward green space for the
city of Milton, he said.
Bell said people will go
for “green” burials because
“they’re just tired of putting
so much money into the
“We’ve actually adde^l
events,” she said. “We have
two new tournaments in
September we’ve never had
before and two new ones in
October.
April, May, September and
October are the busiest
months for golf tournaments,
she said, because of the “per¬
fect weather and golf course
conditions, *•
Because it’s a private
course, Polo is open to tour
naments only on Mondays, so
availability is limited,
As the operator of a
Goodyear store,'Johnston said
he relies heavily on his ven
dors and business contacts for
Humane Society events.
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dock has to be anchored, and a
new walkway built,
It’s too big a job for marina
employees, so Aqualand has
hired local contractors to do the
work._Jemigan said there are
no immediate plans to raise
customers’ rates, and he hopes
the plan will allow nearly all of
Aqualand’s 1,767 slips to
remain usable.
■ It’s a cost of doing busi¬
ness,” he said. “Everybody’s
doing what they can. All the
marinas are being as responsi
ble to their boaters as possi
ble.”
ground. It’s just wasteful.”
Byars said for some the
allure lies in the idea’s sim
plicity.
“A lot of people don’t
want the frills and thrills of a
full-fledged funeral service, "
he said. “I want to give peo¬
ple choices.”
E-mail Frank Reddy at
frankreddy@forsythnews.
com.
While donations across the
board have slipped, Johnston
said people feel strongly
about the Humane Society,
and will continue to serve the
organization.
“My wife and I have been
with the Humane Society for
11 years,” he said.
It depends on what you’re
passionate about ... whether
it’s to animals that need help
in our county, or children, or a
blood drive, or whatever, it
depends on how you feel
about the individual donation.
It just depends on where your
heart goes.”
E-mail Jennifer Sami at
jennifersami@forsythnews.
com.