Toxic Algae Update

As health districts downplay risks, Avista moves swiftly to try to address concerns at Long Lake.

When last we visited with Lake Spokane (a.k.a. Long Lake) resident Scott Chaney, he struggled to find the right words to describe how alarmed and frustrated he was upon learning that the water his kids had only recently been swimming in was contaminated with high concentrations of toxic microcystin.

The poison in the water was from late season blooms of toxic blue green algae (cyanobacteria) growing in mats and clumps in the lake. Scott had reported the clumps to the Department of Ecology in mid-September and had been asked by the agency to collect a sample and send it to a laboratory in King County. Not all blue green algae is toxic, but the batch Scott sampled was fiendishly poisonous, containing concentrations of microcystin more than 3,000 times the threshold of concern.

News accounts of Scott’s discovery did get the attention of Lake Spokane users, including Corie Boley, a 21 year old Tum Tum area kayaker who, along with his nineteen year old brother, both experienced persistent rashes after kayak outings on the lake earlier in the summer. Corie says he ultimately sought help from his doctor after over the counter medications failed to heal the rash.

“He gave me a potent steroidal cream,” Corie says, “but even that took a week and a half to work.”

Corie says he’s also curious about a severe intestinal ailment experienced by one of his friends, also a kayaker, after his friend inadvertently swallowed lake water this summer while kayaking. The literature on microcystin poisoning lists skin, gastrointestinal, and respiratory effects among the symptoms.

Since hearing about Scott Chaney’s findings, Boley has been in touch with a toxicologist with the State Department of Health who, he says, told him she will file a report about the incident.

“She told me this information will hopefully help them with research and awareness,” he said.

To its credit, the Department of Ecology took swift action, after the  results of Scott Chaney’s sample were known, to alert people to avoid the lake.

“Life just doesn’t work that way,” Scott Chaney says admiringly about an Avista environmental manager’s visit to his home on a Saturday morning. “I found that really encouraging, to have somebody show up on your doorstep saying they are committed to helping solve your problem.”

But Ecology’s actions were in stark contrast to the clear lack of urgency displayed by both the Spokane Regional Health District and the Northeast Tri-County Health District. The two agencies have public health jurisdiction over the Spokane County and Stevens County
portions of the lake, respectively. Neither agency issued its own health warnings after the test results were known, and when contacted by the Center for Justice, neither agency said it plans to actively monitor algae in the lake in the future.

Julie Graham, a spokesperson for the Spokane Regional Health District, said the issue of toxic algae on county lakes has been discussed recently primarily because of reported blue green algae outbreaks at Newman Lake and Liberty Lake. But the district’s health specialists, she said, determined that the risk for humans was “very low” because the problem usually occurs late in the year and would likely only arise if a person ingested a large amount of water with the toxin in it. She says the district revisited the issue after learning about Scott Chaney’s discovery, but still came to the same conclusion, that “we are not in a position to prioritize that” given the other demands on the district’s resources.

In Stevens County, environmental health officer James Matsuyama of the Northeast Tri-County Health District said he did send a staff member out to visually examine the lake near Suncrest after getting reports of Chaney’s sample results. The staffer, he said, didn’t see the algae blooms that a Spokane television station photographed with Chaney and, thus, did not collect a sample or post warning signs. Nor did they contact Chaney.

“If we went there and had seen what they showed on KXLY,” he said. “Then we would have posted.”

Asked if the health district was considering a sampling problem, Matsuyama said, “No, we’re not.” Matsuyama said that the district “looks at it from a public health standpoint” and because it sees the risk as low and its funds limited, “we don’t have the resources to do it.”

Somebody was listening to Scott Chaney’s concerns, though, and his name is Elvin “Speed” Fitzhugh.

Fitzhugh is the relicensing project coordinator for Avista Corp which operates Long Lake Dam, the structure that is tangibly responsible for the 23 mile long reservoir also known as both Lake Spokane and Long Lake. To make a long and complicated story short, Long Lake Dam is one ingredient in the conditions causing the algae blooms. The other main ingredient is phosphorous from waste water treatment plants, upstream, that provides the main nutrient that induces the algae growth.

Much to his surprise, Scott met Speed Fitzhugh on his doorstep just west of Suncrest on Saturday morning, October 3rd.

Fitzhugh says he was moved by the frustration Scott had expressed to reporters and he wanted to move quickly to assure him that Avista was concerned about the algae problem and committed to working on it.

“We’re not the solution to every problem,” Fitzhugh said, “but we can be part of the solution to many of them.”

When asked if Avista was responding to address the algae issue because  it may be obliged to do so under the terms of its new federal and state hydropower relicensing requirements, Fitzhugh said he didn’t see it that way.

“We’re doing it on our own,” he said, adding that Avista wanted both to listen to what Lake Spokane residents are observing about the algae formations, and to have a dialogue about how lakeside properties might be better managed to prevent phosphorous from reaching the lake from lawn fertilizer and other sources.

Fitzhugh and Avista convened a meeting for Lake Spokane residents on Wednesday May 7th where, Chaney confirmed, a discussion on how Avista would help to address the algae issues was initiated.

When asked if he thought Avista was  sincere it its expressed commitment to working on the issue, Scott replied: “Absolutely. He  (Fitzhugh) said they will do whatever the experts tell them needs to be done to test for algae toxicity.”

“Life just doesn’t work that way,” Scott said with admiration and surprise about Fitzhugh’s
visit to his home on a Saturday morning. “I found that really encouraging, to have somebody show up on your doorstep saying they are committed to helping solve your problem.”

“I really have to applaud Avista for taking the initiative on this,” said Spokane Riverkeeper Rick Eichstaedt. “Given the funding limitation of the Department of Ecology’s sampling program and the lack of action by the County Health Departments, what Avista has stepped forward to do is really commendable.  But it’s also clear that this is a problem all of us need to pay more attention to so we can prevent exposure to ourselves or our pets when these algae bloom form and turn toxic.”

Over the next year, the Spokane Riverkeeper will work on a number of actions to help reduce phosphorus inputs into Lake Spokane, which contribute to algae blooms, including working with other groups in the state on legislation addressing the impacts of phosphorus in lawn
fertilizer. To contact the Riverkeeper, go here, or call (509) 835-5211.

–Tim Connor