Lakes panel talks budget

BELLA VISTA — The Lakes Committee met in person at the Property Owners Association board room for the first time since March.

Members discussed jug fishing and wake boats.

General Manager Tom Judson, in his report to the committee, said the lakes aren’t open to the public, although he’s received email complaining they are. Very few events have been approved for nonmembers, he said. Lake rangers have been very busy removing nonmembers.

Last year, between January and August, some 1,354 nonmembers were removed from association lakes. This year the number of nonmembers removed was 3,680, an increase of more than 2,300 people.

The rangers are being very aggressive, he said. Recently, they have found fewer nonmembers, he said, adding that nonmembers may have learned not to try and use association lakes.

A member emailed about the practice of “jug and limb fishing” and suggested that it should be banned. The member, Dave Routon, kayaks on Loch Lomond and has stopped to pick up litter and found jug lines instead. In one case he found a turtle hooked on an abandoned line. A ranger found a catfish that had been left on the line for much longer than allowed.

Jug fishing — using baited lines suspended from floating jugs — is allowed on association lakes during nighttime hours. The lines and jugs should be picked up each morning. Limb fishing — hanging the baited hook from a branch — doesn’t have the same restrictions. Committee chairman Matthew Champagne asked members to consider the practice so they could discuss it at future meetings.

Rick Echols, lakes and parks superintendent, said a city ordinance would be needed to ban the practice. Arkansas Game and Fish will enforce a city ordinance but not a association policy.

Echols reported about an ongoing project to study the effects of wake boats is underway.

A video study had just been completed.

“We’re going to be studying the results of this for the next month or so,” Echols said.

The committee is recommending the purchase of a new truck and a new boat in 2021 and possibly additional parking at Lake Avalon.

The final category, “Nice to Do’s,” includes enclosing porta-potties, improving the Lake Windsor ramp, and adding a guard rail on the backside of the Lake Brittany Dam.