LAKEPORT ? The Lakeport City Council met Tuesday for its regular meeting.
Mayor Ron Bertsch was absent because he is “headed to Sturgis,” according to a member of council. Sitting in as Mayor Pro Tem was Jeff Irwin who added resolution number 2268 to the agenda as a clean-up resolution.
Carolyn Ruttan, water resources program coordinator of Lake County, gave a quagga mussel demonstration on PowerPoint opening by handing out vials filled with dead quagga and zebra mussels. She seeks an A-rating for the invasive species.
“To get an A-rating takes almost an act of God. But we”ll get there,” Ruttan said.
An A-rating according to the California Department of Agriculture is applied when “an organism of known economic importance subject to state (or commissioner when acting as a state agent) enforced action involving: eradication, quarantine regulation, containment, rejection, or other holding action.”
Ruttan said that the hydrilla has an A-rating. She said that $1.6 million is spent every year to eradicate hydrilla, an invasive weed.
She also pointed out that boats carrying quagga mussels may not be seen by the human eye. Veligers are the larval stage of quaggas and should be cleaned by using washing stations.
Quagga mussels were brought to the United States into the Great Lakes on a boat from the Ukraine.
She said that $5 billion has been spent on the East Coast to clean pipes. Councilmember Roy Parmentier laughed.
Ruttan said that the A-rating would apply to all of the Lake County lakes, not just Clear Lake.
The presentation lasted approximately 20-minutes and there was no citizen input. The council showed interest in Ruttan giving the presentations about quagga mussels.
Councilmember Suzanne Lyons asked Ruttan, “Where does the sticker money go?” Ruttan shrugged her shoulders.
A federal grant for the Lakeport Police Department (LPD) will allow LPD to hire a new police officer.
LPD was one of 7,200 law enforcement agencies nation-wide to apply for a COPS Hiring Recovery Program grant, part of the American Recovery and Investment Act of 2009.
LPD was among approximately 1,000 agencies that got the grant. The grant for $241,237 fully funds one police officer position. The city of Lakeport has to retain the officer”s position for a one year after the grant ends.
Police Chief Kevin Burke asked the council for an exemption from the hiring freeze to fill the new officer”s position.
Lyons supported accepting the grant, citing that the city would get “a police officer with benefits for less than $20,000 a year.”
The council voted to accept the grant 4-0.
Roy Mulhauser was granted an extension on curb, gutter and sidewalk on his Third Street property until October following a decision about the cell tower location. Council voted with 3-1 with Irwin in dissent.
