DNR Meeting

Over 200 people were at the Lesterville school gym for the second monthly meeting conducted by DNR about the restoration of Johnson's Shut-Ins State Park and the Black River below Lesterville. Those of you in St Louis had some TV coverage of the meeting as the satellite trucks from 2, 4, and 5 were set up to send in their reports. After some opening remarks about the work over the last four week a DNR spokesman presented a slide show about the work at the park. The primary work has been cleaning up all the downed trees and removing all the soil that covers the roads and parking lots. They described the current work as environmental stabilization. trying to build barriers to keep the silt out of the river. There is no fresh water or waste water treatment at the park now and it will be a while till these are available. They are still trying to get the park open to the public for day use by summer.

Questions that have not been answered are.

Are they going to treat the lower reservoir with chemicals to remove the fine clay that is clouding the water.

Is there anything that can be done about the river below Highway 21 near the lodges and campgrounds. They did say that testing has not turned up anything bad in the river, it is just
ugly with a lot of fine clay clouding the water.

Will they rebuild the campgrounds at the Shut-Ins on higher ground.

The next meeting is February 9 at the Lesterville school. I will continue to try to find links to informative artices about the progress at the park and the condition of the river.

There is a lot of local concern that those of you that come to Lesterville each summer might sit this year out because of the condition of the river. I hope you reconsider because many of the local businesses probably could not survive a bad summer season. So come on back, just don't buy a new swimming suit.