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Solution nears on Lake Pendleton silt

By JOHN THOMPSON
jthompson@TheCitizen.com

It now appears that residents around Lake Pendleton in Tyrone may soon have a silt-free lake.

During a workshop meeting in Tyrone last week, several different groups met to discuss the deposits of silt that have clouded up the lake and given residents fits.

Representatives from Pendleton Lakes subdivision, the town of Tyrone, Scarbrough and Rolader Development, the Hobgood estate, and developer Burt Clark all gathered around the table to try and hammer out an agreement to clean up the lake. The Fayette County Board of Education was invited to the meeting, but did not send a representative.

“We last met in October. You’ll notice there’s no attorney with us, because we want to drop litigation from the discussion,” said Pendleton lakes representative Bill Brown.

Brown said his group had a study showing that 480 cubic yards of silt and sediment needed to be removed from the lake. The cost estimate he provided was close to $50,000.

The various entities gathered around the table were groups who had developed near the lake and were believed to have caused some of the erosion problems that led to the sediment being deposited in the lake.

The school board was asked to be at the meeting because homeowners have maintained that some of the sediment came from when the school system was building a new auditorium at Sandy Creek High School.

Developer Bob Rolader offered a solution that most of the participants said sounded sensible.

“There’s six groups involved here. Let’s get a final cost and split this up. We’re willing to work with anybody,” Rolader said.

Rolader said nearly $20,000 might be deducted from the final cost because the problem has been occurring for years and the homeowners would have to agree that some of the sediment appeared in the lake because of natural occurrences.

A representative from the Hobgood estate said he would have to talk to his board of directors, but everyone else seemed amenable to the idea.

The homeowners are looking at a vacuum-type system that would suck all the sediment out to trucks that would haul the dirt away.

But where would the dirt go?

“I might have a location that could work,” said Clark.

The homeowners group agreed to get a final firm price on the work and report back to the town. The town would then contact the other groups to see if a contract could be signed that would outline each group’s fiscal responsibility.