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Grand Lake levels unrelated to bridge work, official says

ROGERS CITY — The Presque Isle County Road Commission has received a barrage of questions about water levels in Grand Lake and have insisted the low levels are caused by a lack of rainfall.

The superintendent and manager of the Presque Isle County Road Commission, Jerry Smigelski, said officials have received numerous calls about the lower water level in Grand Lake over the summer. Many people believed the lake had been purposefully drained to complete culvert and bridge work being done on East 638 Highway.

After many inquiries, the road commission released a complete statement about the maintenance of the lake.

Smigelski says in the statement that the legal level of the lake was established in 1953 at 594 feet above sea level, year-round. The road commission was appointed by the county board of supervisors in 1956 to control the the dam located on County Road 638 to manage lake levels.

Then, in the 1990s, the Presque Isle County Board of Commissioners, Grand Lake property owners, and the road commission came to the agreement that the road commission would “hold back” three inches of water above the legal lake level in the spring. Anything more, it was believed, would potentially cause property damage to any residents on the northwest shore. The commission was also allowed to let the lake go below the 594 feet in winter in order to prevent damage from shifting ice.

In mid-August this year, the lake was down about seven to eight inches from the legal level, and many residents believed that was done because of work on East 638 Highway, where Smigelski said three culverts classified as a bridge were to be removed so a traditional bridge could be built.

Work on that project started Sept. 10. The culverts were removed and efforts to build a new bridge were started. Smigelski said the low levels have nothing to do with that work.

He said there was no significant rainfall over the summer and, without streams or rivers that run into the lake on a regular basis, levels began to drop.

“There is about a quarter inch of evaporation a day on a very hot day,” Smigelski said.

As of Tuesday, Smigelski said about 30 percent of the bridge is complete.

The project is funded by a Federal Emergency Management Agency mitigation grant, along with funds from the road commission.

Kaitlin Ryan can be reached at kryan@thealpenanews.com or at 358-5693.

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