California Tahoe Conservancy: Progress Report

The Conservancy's experience has shown that it can make a significant contribution. A great deal more needs to be done, however, to preserve and restore the natural environment of the Tahoe Basin and to reverse the processes that are degrading the lake's clear waters and wildlife habitat, and also to make the lake more accessible to the public.

Entering the next millennium, the Conservancy will continue its efforts to help usher in the age of restoration at Lake Tahoe.

It will continue to address the highest priority needs within all of its programs including the acquisition of environmentally sensitive lands, and it will place increased emphasis on private/public partnerships involving all interests in the Tahoe Basin, who share mutual goals, for the needs of Lake Tahoe can only be met by all parties and agencies working together.

A major challenge, too, will be to find funding for this host of needs.

Through its planning process, the Conservancy has identified several high priority needs which can be addressed through its current programs:

Soil Erosion Control - Based on the regional water quality plan for the Basin, there is a need for erosion control projects in more than 100 project areas. These could help cut the sediment load entering Lake Tahoe by up to 30,000 tons a year, a reduction of about half of the estimated present inflow. This would aid substantially in stabilizing Tahoe's steadily deteriorating water quality.

Public Access - There is a need to acquire up to 150acres of lakefront and other priority lands and to improve access to a mile and a half of lakefront and more than 1000 acres of recreational lands. There is also a need to construct more than 100 miles of hiking, biking, and cross-country ski trails, and to provide interpretive facilities at the "gateways" to the Basin and other locations.

Wildlife Habitat - There is need for additional wildlifeenhancement projects designed to improve more than 50miles of in-stream habitat, to restore up to 1,500acres of marshes, meadows, riparian areas and other lands important to wildlife, and to enhance habitat for bald eagles, peregrine falcons, and other species of wildlife and native plants that are classified as endangered or of critical concern.

Watershed Restoration - There is a need to restore more than 750 acres of watershed land, much of it in sensitive stream environment zones located in highly urbanized areas. This would be an important step toward restoring the capability of existing watersheds to absorb the impact of development activities as well as providing for other resource benefits.

These efforts will be costly, and will take time to implement. More than $400 million dollars in needs have been identified, and additional needs will undoubtedly be identified in the future. But to preserve the irreplaceable resource values of Lake Tahoe and assure its accessibility to the public for generations to come would seem worth many times the investment required.