ABOVE: A picture of Curly Leaf Pondweed on Hall Lake in Fairmont in the summer of 2023. The Fairmont City Council is looking at more aggressive ways to target the invasive weed.

FAIRMONT– The city of Fairmont is gearing up to address the issue of pondweed in its chain of lakes. On Monday the council heard from Hannah Neusch, a water resources technician with the city, who specifically shared some information on Curly Leaf Pondweed.

At the last city council meeting, councilor Britney Kawecki had asked for some information on the weed–which last summer was a real and visual problem in all of Fairmont’s lakes– because she was curious as to how the warm winter would affect it for the coming summer.

“We haven’t had a lot of moisture this year. The water has been a little warmer this year than normal so my guess is we’ll see quite a bit of Curly Leaf blooms,” Neusch said.

Information on the weed was shared with council and Neusch said that what distinguishes it from other pondweed is its life cycle. Curly Leaf Pondweed grows actively from February to July, but it can also grow during the winter under the ice.

A Sentinel article from June 24, 2023 states that the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR) first recorded Curly Leaf Pondweed in the chain of lakes in 1993, though it could have been here before that.

“It’s very aggressive and it basically never stops growing. As it grows and it matures in June, it creates these things called turions which are at the top of the stalk… and those turions will fall off and create a new plant,” Neusch said.

Once the weeds die in mid-summer, all of the dead bulbs will sink to the bottom of the lake and root in and create new stalks.

“We’re talking an exponential growth as far as invasive species goes,” Neusch said.

She said the DNR designates Curly Leaf Pondweed as a prohibited invasive species, making it a misdemeanor to posses, import, purchase, transport or introduce except for with permit for disposal, control or research.

However, shoreline property owners can manage it by pulling it up or raking it, piling it on their shoreline, letting it dry and then burning it in place. Neusch said there is also a way to treat it chemically, though it requires a permit from the DNR because Fairmont pulls its drinking water from the lakes.

“We’re in a unique position because there are not very many communities in the state of Minnesota that draw their drinking water from surface water. There’s less than 10,” Neusch said.

Because of that, the DNR recommends not to use a chemical treatment as a widespread way to address the issue for an entire lake.

Neusch stressed that treatment can be both expensive and time consuming. She said there are some grants available, including an invasive species grant, which carries a maximum award amount of $10,000.

“We looked very closely at this… it ended up not being a very good option. The maximum amount really isn’t a lot to manage this, especially when we have five lakes,” Neusch said.

She said the city would only be able to apply for one lake and need to decide which lake to apply for.

“The funding would require a required survey… which would cost at least $2,000,” Neusch said.

Another factor is that cities that include a plan for longevity are prioritized for the grant and Neusch admitted that the city does not yet have a plan for how to address Curly Leaf Pondweed.

However, while that wasn’t an option for 2024, Neusch said there are some other upcoming grants that she is excited about, including a source water protection implementation grant. There is potential to partner with both the Fairmont Area School District and local non-profit Imagine Martin, to paint storm drains, man holes and boat ramps to encourage people to keep these clean and thus the local lakes.

Kawecki thanked Neusch for putting together the informational presentation. She acknowledged that the lakes are important to the community in many ways. Not only does the tax base of people who live on the lake benefit the city, but the amount of tourism the lakes bring in does, too.

“To not have a plan as to what we’re going to do just doesn’t sit well with me. I asked for this to be on the agenda because I don’t think it’s sitting well with a high number of people in Fairmont,” Kawecki said.

She said that while Curly Leaf Pondweed will be a hard problem to tackle, she thinks there may be other ways to address it.

“My understanding is when we talk with the DNR, you can still treat it, just not in a certain vicinity of where we’re pulling our water from on Budd Lake,” Kawecki said.

She asked whether a pilot program could be set up dealing with chemicals around the different fishing piers.

Kawecki also suggested that some money from the lakes restoration fund could be used to protect the lakes and address the Curly Leaf Pondweed problem.

“I would like to see the city developing a plan and budgeting an amount of money for removal and control of this,” Kawecki said.

She said it was hard to hear that $10,000 wasn’t enough to address the problem because any amount of money would help.

“In the end, we need to do whatever we have to to combat the problem,” Kawecki said.

Neusch said she agreed that the city could start looking at options to address the problem but noted that there hasn’t been enough staff at city hall to create a plan.

The city’s Public Works Director, Matthew York, chimed in to say that the engineering department is currently short staffed. However, he said that there is $340,000 in the lake restoration fund and that a program could be developed, but there was still the issue of who would manage it.

“Grants are great, but grants take a lot of time to write and process. Right now, we’re short-staffed. We’re very thin… it’s not an excuse, it’s not a cop-out. It’s just where we are right now,” York said.

He acknowledged Kawecki’s passion on the matter but said he wanted to make sure there was a consensus of the council before staff started working on it.

Council Member Jay Maynard said, “I think we all agree that we need to do something but we need to do something intelligently and not just throw money at the problem. Curly Leaf Pondweed is a problem, but it’s not our only problem.”

He asked how big of a dent could be made in the various lake problems with the money in the lakes restoration fund. Neusch said that she would need time to collect data and analyze it to consider the best use of the funds.

“There was an idea of doing some sort of water quality workshop. I don’t know exactly where that is at but that’s where this might be headed,” Neusch said.

After nearly an hour of conversation York suggested they table the matter but said staff could gather more information and then set a work session for later in April to come up with a plan.

Moving to other matters, the council heard from Dustin Tino, president of the Interlake Heritage Days (IHD) committee, who shared some information on this year’s annual IHD festival, which is planned for June 7 and 8.

The council approved giving $6,000 to the festival, which it has granted in previous years.

In other action, the council:

— Approved an event permit for Grace Lutheran Church, Wednesday Worship at the Park from May to September 2024.

— Approved an event permit for the Martin County Library to hold a library family event on Aug. 7, 2024.

— Approved a renewal for the consumption and display permit for the Chain of Lakes Yacht Club.

— Approved appointing Barry Altman and Ernie Nuss to the Airport Board.