Greetings Members,
Here is an update on coming events and we hope you can join us!!
First Monday of Each Month- Ladies of the Lake at the Front Porch in Ellsworth at 9am. This is a great way to meet your neighbors!
Saturday, August 3- St. Clair-Six Mile Lake Nature Preserve is having a Grand Opening celebrating the recent upgrades to the old trail system built many years ago when the preserve was first established. The new trail is named in honor of Mary Behrens Sorrell, who was a member of the SMLA and supporter of the Grand Traverse Regional Land Conservancy (caretaker of the property) and who worked in conjunction with our current president, Cliff Sorrell, on this project to honor Mary. The celebration is from 1-3 and light refreshments will be provided. Please RSVP at events @gtrlc.org or call 231-929-7911. Over the years, since the preserve has been established the SMLA and it’s members have supported this worthwhile project through donations and work bees. Because of those efforts, the mile long river connecting Six Mile Lake to St. Clair Lake will be preserved in perpetuity and will remain in pristine, undeveloped condition for many, many future generations to enjoy. If you would like to donate to this project the address is 3860 North Long Lake RD Suite D, Traverse City, MI 49684 and mark your donation for Mary’s trail. If you haven’t been there, this project is really incredible. I got to tour the site with the project manager and he told me the pilings holding the trail accessible boardwalk in place are 27′ down. As we walked, there were holes dug into the freshly placed wood chipped area courtesy of egg laying turtles, which I thought would make Mary smile. And just a further note here about another Mary. When you go in to the preserve there is a large stone in memory of Mary Lawmaster. She was the very first benefactor of the preserve 28 years ago and without her, the initial project would have been much more difficult to achieve. I received a phone call from a member who asked about the stone so now you know.
Saturday, August 10th- SMLA Annual Picnic at Echo Twp Park starts at 4:30 pm. Bring a dish to pass and we are asking members to bring extra chairs just in case. Brats and viennas will be provided. Volunteers are welcome to help out with set-up, cooking, and tear down. Contact Linda at 544-6027 or Kathryn 544-1050. There will be drawing for a free membership and prizes!!!! Nominations for the board will also take place. Contact Cherie 676-9969 if interested.
On Saturday, September 14th-9am General Membership Meeting at the Pleasant Valley Free Methodist Church. Elections will take place. Our guest speaker will be Steve Murray from Great Lakes Energy. Now is the time to ask Steve lots of questions about our service here.
At the board meeting on July 11, it was determined that we need your help documenting the terrible flooding that has been occurring on Six Mile Lake since 2009 and prior. Please comment and post pictures here of the damage to shorelines, structures, crawl spaces, dead and dying trees, loss of frontage, etc. Include costs or estimates and lots of photos including spring run off, storm swells, etc. We are gathering evidence. Your board has not been idle. We have extensive documentation of what is going on. We are currently in the process of getting our numbers certified. We will make the information available to you as soon as the certification is done. It is our opinion, based on this documentation, that this flooding need not to have occurred and can be managed effectively by a qualified hydrologist, which the county does not currently have. It is our belief, based on the numbers we have, that the court ordered mandated levels are being ignored. The results of this is 264,000 feet of frontage on the Upper Chain being flooded and underwater over half of the year many years in a row. There will be much more on this and the steps the SMLA will be taking coming soon. In the meantime, start taking photos, post what you have and contact any one of your board members anytime.