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Meeting Summary
June 18, 2007
Our general session meeting was attended by 65 people. The Osprey Pointe Pavilion in Morse Park and Beach was a great central location for those who attended. Thanks you to Ford Hebner for arranging its use free of charge to our group.
Entering our 3rd year, our membership has now grown to 384 households. Of the 384, 344 are included on our email distribution. It’s simply to join our group. Tell your neighbors to go to our web site www.morseh2o.org and signup. We will keep you informed of Morse events and more importantly the opening and closing of the dam valves.
Safety
Awareness Days will be held on June 30th
and July 1st.
We have a good response on volunteers to signup helping to hand out materials at
Morse Marina over this weekend. We could use a few more people for either day
between the hours of 2:00 and 4:00pm. Email me jim.schneider@insightbb.com
if you can help out. I will be sending information to all volunteers early next
week.
Water Level Update on Indianapolis Water Company (IWC) and Veolia Water initiatives. Roger Goings represents the city of Noblesville on the advisory council board of IWC. Roger has been active in our group since the beginning and keeps us abreast of IWC/Veolia activities and programs.
The basic fact is that Morse is a “reservoir” and exists to support the water company and its customers. Neither Noblesville nor Cicero are IWC customers and get their water supply from other sources. When there is a lack of rain to keep the White River at a specified flow level, then the valves at Morse dam are opened to supply the required flow.
Roger had 2 key
messages for us on Monday night. First, we are in a drought year so far. Thanks
for the rain earlier this week which has allowed for more inflow than outflow to
the reservoir. The reservoir level has remained fairly constant this week about
5-6 inches below the top of the dam. Usually the water is flowing over the dam,
so it may appear that the level is down more like 12 inches from normal pool.
This early morning’s rain fall gauged at .68 inches will help immediate needs.
However, our the region is still behind about 3 inches on the year in rain fall,
which is producing some disturbing facts listed below as discussed by Roger.
Recent surface water flow rates per the USGS flow meters for last week:
White River at Anderson - 30 % of the median flow for the last 62 years
White River at Noblesville -40 % of the medial flow for the last 59 years
Cicero creek at Arcadia - 10 % of last years flow (input to Morse Reservoir)
Fall Creek near Fortville - 40 % of the median flow for the last 65 years (input to Geist Reservoir)
The second message is that Veolia and the Water Company are working to develop new sources of water for future water requirements. There are programs to be funded that will be drawing underground water near Waverly to support growth south of Indianapolis. This is important source of water, since this could eliminate future increase demand on the water plants north of the city supplied by the White River and supported by Morse in time of drought.
Additional action being taken by IWC is making changes at the White River plant in Carmel to improve the water intake flow, thus minimizing the amount of water flow required by the White River. These actions are in addition to the new valves installed last year at the Morse dam, which allow the water company to more accurately gauge and control the amount of water flowing from the valves. We have already experienced great amount of relief since these new valves were installed.
Veolia has done an excellent job this year in getting Indianapolis residents to comply with the voluntary ban on lawn watering. Their PR efforts have really paid off to help alleviate stress on their system and requirements from Morse. Veolia spokeswoman Amy Dye informed me that customers are actually calling Veolia customer service as informants on non-complying neighbors.
Water Quality is becoming more of an issue as discussed by Mike Murphy. Mike. Mike has been working as on this subject for nearly 2 years, is a member of the River Watch program and has asked for help from the association. He had 9 volunteers signup after the meeting to assist him in his efforts to learn more about Morse water quality and to develop an action plan for our group to help ensure Morse water quality. In the future, we will be asking for donations to help fund some of these initiatives.
Last year the Little Cicero Creek which feeds the Morse Reservoir was tested and results studied. It was determined that there are issues which need to be addressed going forward. Here are the goals which were established from the study.
Little Cicero Creek Management Plan Goals
Goal 1:
Reduce storm event concentrations of e. coli in the watershed by 50 percent by 2010, with the ultimate goal of meeting the state standard of 235 colonies/100mL by the year 2015
Goal 2:
By the year 2015, the annual nutrient load entering Morse Reservoir from Little Cicero Creek will be reduced by 50 percent.
Goal 3:
Reduce the sediment load to the Little Cicero Creek watershed by 50 percent over the next five years
Increase stakeholder participation in implementation of the Little Cicero Creek WMP by forming a watershed group
To find out more about how to accomplish these goals, go to our web site.
If you want to assist Mike in his water quality assurance, please give him a call
Contact:
Mike
Murphy (984-4571 phone) email: mpmurphy@insightbb.com
Dock Address Signs will be distributed free of charge to all homeowners on Morse Reservoir courtesy of donations from the Town of Cicero, City of Noblesville, the Hamilton County Sheriff’s Department and Marina Limited Partnership who manages the Morse Marina. Sgt. Kim Jowitt of the Hamilton County Sheriff’s Department has been planning this project for a couple of years and is ready to get it implemented. This safety program is designed to identify locations quick and easily on the reservoir for emergency responses to 911 and other calls. The dock address signs will be a unique number for each dock on the lake, but will be cross referenced in the database to the home owner’s street address for response by land and/or water.
You should go to our web site to verify that you and your neighbors have a number assigned to your home address. If not then contact Kim this week at the Hamilton County sheriff’s department kjj@co.hamilton.in.us
The signs, which are similar in size to your car license plate, will be distributed within the next 2 weeks and will come with mounting hardware. Thanks to Autografix of Noblesville for making this possible with a very affordable and accommodating pricing structure.
In conjunction with the sheriff’s department, Cicero and Noblesville, Morse Waterways Association will assist in distribution and affixing signs as needed. The existence of our association has made it possible for this program to be implemented. Let’s make sure we get the signs attached to all the docks.
Lt.
John Williams of the Noblesville Police Department attended our meeting
to answer many questions from the audience. John has been patrolling Morse
Reservoir for numerous years and is very familiar with what is happening on a
daily basis. We thank Lt. Williams for his attendance on short notice. Sgt.
Shane Ginnan is in charge of the Morse patrol program and scheduling for the
Noblesville police department. Feel free to call the Noblesville Police
Department with any water or land related problems. 776-6340.
The DNR was unable to attend our meeting this time due to the pressing investigation of the recent accident. The DNR is extremely supportive of our efforts on Morse and are always willing to help our cause. Here are the 2006 top violations on Morse which the DNR has recently sent to me.
Morse status for 2006
4 – Boating Accidents
168 – Arrest
116 – Warnings
Arrest:
37 – speed zones – violation of zoning restrictions/idle zones, etc.
18 – Registration – failure to produce motorboat registration
14 – fishing without license
12 – boating while intoxication .08% or higher
Warning:
34 – speed zones – violation of zoning restrictions/idle zones, etc
12 – fishing without license
10 – life jacket violation
7 – lights – white stern light required
6 – gunwale/bow decking
If you have questions for the DNR, their phone number is (765) 473-9722.
Donations are needed.
We don’t need a lot of money, but we need some funds to operate our programs. Our checking account balance is getting low. If members and friends could contribute $10-20 or more, this could go a long way. This is a voluntary donation. Make checks payable to Morse Waterways Association. You can send your check to Morse Waterways Association c/o Bill Steves, 520 Bayswater Ln. Cicero, In. 46034.