Usually, when someone suggests to me a topic for this column, it is most usually (but not always) the “column topic kiss of death”, so to speak.

When Amanda Laliberte, Director of of Communication and Programs at the Rangeley Lakes Heritage Trust (RLHT) suggested that I interview the Trust’s new water quality coordinator, Alayna McNally, I immediately replied that I would.  There are a few good reasons for that response…

Keeping our lakes clean, clear, and healthy is a mission that is near and dear to my heart.  It is rooted in my observation, in the early-‘90s, of some of the lakes near where I grew up in Minnesota.  They were crystal clear when I was a kid, swimming and fishing in them as often as I could.  I found they were choked with invasive plants along the shorelines…mostly eurasian milfoil.  I vowed to myself then and there that I needed to do what I could to make sure that Maine’s Rangeley Lakes, where we had built a lakeside cabin a few years earlier, never reached that point.

A year or two after we decided to live year-round in that cabin in 2000, I recall going before the Rangeley Board of Selectpersons, along with Rebecca Kurtz, then a staff member at the Trust, to educate the Board about the invasive aquatic plant threat that had at that time only affected a couple of lakes in southern Maine, yet was destined to reach the Rangeley area unless we instituted some preventive efforts that could use some funding support from the town at a time when prevention would be much less expensive than trying to remove the plants after the fact.

Thinking back to that time, I am reminded of a similar state of affairs late last year and earlier this year when knowledgeable physicians and scientists were sounding the alarm about Covid-19 and the need to, as a nation, take cost-effective preventive steps before the threat reached our shores.  We all know (or should know) how that lack of response and leadership and substituted denial is playing out, don’t we?

Fortunately, the Town of Rangeley selectpersons listened to the facts and the projected consequences, and subsequently dedicated some funds to get our preventive actions going.  As I recall, one or two of the plantations contributed their fair share that year as well.  The Rangeley Lakes Heritage Trust, and especially Rebecca, took the lead of our local effort at that time….and others continue to do so very effectively to this day.  Other areas in southern Maine where out-of-state fishing and boating pressures with invasive plants on their hulls, trailers, and props were greater, have not been so fortunate.  Lakeshore property values have taken a hit in the Sebago Lake region, and in the Belgrade Lakes area to name just two.  Mitigation of the expanding invasive plant growth efforts have been costly, and just marginally effective.

I have, since that select board meeting almost 20 years ago, tried to do my part here in the Rangeley Lakes, initially doing boat checks on Sunday mornings at the Town Park boat launch as a volunteer, and during two recent years for two days per week as a paid staff person.  I have been an active member of the statewide organization, The Maine Lakes Society (now called Maine Lakes) for years, and a member of its Board of Directors for a 3-year term (2018-2020) doing statewide lake advocacy testimony in Augusta primarily, and originating the organization’s LakeSmart project on Gull Pond.

And for the past two summers, I have been a certified Lake Water Quality Monitor through the Lake Stewards of Maine based near Auburn Lake and have been doing Secchi Disk water clarity testing on Gull Pond as well.  This all brings us back to Amanda’s call, and my subsequent interview with the Trust’s young water quality coordinator this summer, Alayna McNally.

I met with this very pleasant young woman last week at the Trust’s offices on Main Street.  We talked while seated at a proper distance from each end of a long conference table.  I learned that she is a 2020 graduate of the University of Southern Maine with a major in environmental science.  This native of New Jersey got her feet wet (literally as well as figuratively, I am sure) in Maine’s lakes as a research assistant for one of the program’s faculty members who was doing a study on Highland Lake, near Sebago Lake.  She enjoyed the work, and like most of us, fell in love with Maine’s lakes.

This led to her position as RLHT’s water quality coordinator funded at least in part by the Maine Conservation Corps/Americorps program.  Alayna started in May with a full plate of responsibilities; coordinating the water quality monitoring program that includes checking dissolved chemicals such as phosphorus as well as clarity testing, the invasive plant patroller program, the courtesy boat inspectors at town and state public boat launches, the local loon count program of the Maine Audubon Society, and organizing a water quality conference (on Zoom, of course).

 

Alayna has been busy, but I suspect she has been up to the many tasks.  She noted the Trust’s current efforts to create a Community Conservation Corps involving a developing cadre of lake-minded volunteers and those with other valuable community interests.  Alayna was emphatic when she noted that “volunteers are so important” insofar as maintaining our local lakes’ health is concerned.

What is in Alayna’s future?  Good things, I am sure.  She remains unsure if that future will be with the Trust next year.  Like many things, concerning non-profit organizations especially, it depends largely on funding. This year’s appointment concludes in October.  I certainly wish her the best of luck, and hope that Alayna is able to return next year to the Rangeley Lakes Region.  I know that others at the Rangeley Lakes Heritage Trust feel the same.

One other thing I forgot to note in my “lake quality resume’ “ above:  Over the course of my many years writing this North by NorthEast column, I have certainly sprinkled those years with columns in support of the good and important environmental stewardship of the Rangeley Lakes Region in general….and the good, and important, work of the Trust in that regard, in particular.  This column is just the latest installment of that series, but I am sure it won’t be the last!

We need to write, otherwise nobody will know who we are.

                                                                Garrison Keillor

Respect Science, Respect Nature,

Respect Each Other.   VOTE 2020

Per usual, your thoughts and comments are more than welcome.  Simply launch an email in the general direction of:  allenwicken@yahoo.com  Thank you, in advance.

 

 

« Previous

Letter to the Editor

Next »

Property Spotlight: Affordable Dream Home!