by Eric Howe, Director of the Lake Champlain Basin Program January felt COLD at the LCBP office in Grand Isle. Will Lake Champlain freeze over this year? That is one of the big questions bouncing around the LCBP office, and among enquiring visitors to the LCBP Resource Room at ECHO Leahy Center.
If you missed it, we forecasted—based on a century of trend data—in our 2021 State of the Lake Report that by the year 2050, the Lake may freeze fully just once per decade. We shall see what Mother Nature has in store for us for the rest of the winter!
This is an important year for the LCBP and for Lake Champlain. October 2022 will mark the 50th anniversary of the Clean Water Act, which authorizes the LCBP to do the work we do. It also marks three decades of grants awarded by the LCBP to groups across the watershed to implement projects that help improve and protect the health of the Lake Champlain ecosystem.
Over those 30 years, the LCBP has awarded more than $14 million in grants to help achieve our goals for the watershed. Staff have been busy processing grant applications and working to prepare new projects for the upcoming field season. Stay tuned for an announcement later this month summarizing the suite of projects that LCBP will be supporting in the coming year.
This will also be the final full calendar year that Senator Leahy will be in office, championing support for Lake Champlain and healthy ecosystems across the country. The legacy of Marcelle and Patrick Leahy will be everlasting on Lake Champlain.
We also have been busy updating our comprehensive management plan, Opportunities for Action. We are on track to publish this plan this summer. Stay tuned for announcements for public meetings and a formal public comment period this spring.
We will continue to emphasize perennial priorities in the updated plan, including supporting monitoring programs, grant programs to partners, research and implementation projects to address nutrients, and aquatic invasive species. The plan also will reflect feedback we received from partners last summer by establishing climate change and access to underserved communities as overarching themes.
Enjoy the Lake, and if you go out on the ice, remember that no ice is safe ice!
Eric Howe is the Director of the Lake Champlain Basin Program & Champlain Valley National Heritage Partnership.