Plymouth Leaders Tout Two More Lakes Removed from Impaired Waters List

Plymouth saw two more of its lakes removed from Minnesota’s Impaired Waters List this year, with Bass and Pomerleau Lakes joining Schmidt Lake, which came off the list in 2016. All three had gone on the list in 2002.

Plymouth’s Schmidt Lake was removed from the state’s list of impaired waters in 2016, joined earlier this year by Pomerleau and Bass Lakes.

“For the past two decades, the city has been working really hard on doing projects both within the watershed, which, generally speaking is that northeast part of the city,” said Ben Scharenbroich, the City of Plymouth Water Resources Supervisor. “We’ve been doing a lot of projects, from doing shoreline restorations to rain gardens with street projects, to street sweeping, to working with developers in the Pomerleau Lake watershed, to put in storm water best practices when development happens.”

Scharenbroich credits work to aluminum sulfate treatments for helping reduce the impact of sediment on the water in both lakes, along with awareness among homeowners and businesses within the city.

“The property that you own or that you live at or work at, you have to treat it like shoreline property, because ultimately everything does drain into the lake, at some point,” said Scharenbroich. “So its important to protect our lakes and streams, to basically treat your curb line as a shore line.”

A red-tailed hawk perched in a tree along Pomerleau Lake in Plymouth.

Plymouth | Twin Cities

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