Paperwork won't cure Lake Merced

TOM STIENSTRA
EXAMINER OUTDOORS WRITER
Nov. 2, 1997
©1999 San Francisco Examiner

LAKE MERCED in San Francisco is in desperate need of a radical overhaul to restore it as a first-class urban facility for fishing and recreation - within a 15-mile range of 2 million people who have no other nearby lake to turn to.

But with $1 million available in bond money, what is now proposed is just a bunch of studies outlined in the new Lake Merced Management Plan, released last week by the City of San Francisco.

Under the best case, by the time the proper medicine is prescribed, this patient will be long dead. That's why the lake's operator, Urban Park Concessionaires, is near certain it will pull the plug on its operations when its contract ends in early 1999, another step backward for what was once the nation's best example of a city lake for fishing, boating and recreation.

"Lake Merced could be a jewel, but it's an embarrassment," said Chris Senti, who has overseen operations at Lake Merced since 1984 as vice president of Urban Park Concessionaire.

"The way I read this, nothing is going to happen for two or three years at the earliest," Senti said. "We work with park districts and water districts in the Bay Area and elsewhere who put money, time and manpower into their facilities, and it hasn't happened in San Francisco at Lake Merced."

Marvin Yee of the San Francisco Recreation and Parks Department said he hopes the new plan will inspire Urban Parks to continue operations at Merced in the style the operator has fashioned at San Pablo Reservoir near Orinda, Del Valle Reservoir near Livermore and several other lakes. No chance, says Senti. The problems are not being solved.

Consider water quality and lake levels, for instance: Lake levels are now down 17 feet and the Impoundment is nearly empty from overpumping from a high-power well that takes water from the Merced aquifer and delivers it to the Olympic Golf Club. In addition, because of heavy use of fertilizers on the adjacent Harding Park Golf Course, the taste of the trout from the North lake is often so nauseating that even a starved cat wouldn't swallow a bite after a few blanching chews.

Guess how the Management Plan advises solving these issues? Right: Study them. The plan recommends a series of 17 studies over water quality in the next three years that will cost $500,000.

Action? Almost none. In one section of the plan, it is recommended the lake be refilled but does not say when this will happen or how to resolve overpumping by the Olympic Club.

"I've been at Lake Merced for 13 years, and there was a $200,000 study five ago that recommended many of the same things, including refilling the lake, and nothing was ever done," Senti said. "As concessionaire, I'm skeptical as to how much of this will actually take place. The previous plan was not followed through on at all."

Two other key issues are not addressed in the plan: the lack of shoreline access to the South Lake and the number and size of the guppy-like trout stocked by the Department of Fish and Game.

Because of low water for so many years, tules have filled in 10 to 20 feet across on much of the shore of both lakes, vastly reducing shoreline access, ruining the low-cost fishing opportunity at the South Lake for youngsters who could ride their bikes to Merced. Urban Park recommended clearing some of tules, just as has been done many times in the past 50 years, yet the word "tules" does not appear even once in the entire management plan.

The quality of trout stocks by the DFG is not mentioned either. With a quality trout stocking program, the City of San Francisco and the DFG could potentially affect 250,000 youngsters living within nearby range of the lake.

The long-awaited Lake Merced Management Plan was hoped to be a salvation. Instead it is one of the biggest disappointments in the lake's 120-year history, a precious opportunity that is being squandered.

Copies of the Lake Merced Management Plan are available by phoning (415) 554-1859.