Who is the national organization that fights anti-wake regulations?

[IDBoating]

I just learned today (Saturday) about an under-the-radar effort by our county's Board of Commissioners to impose "no excessive wake" zones on all lakes in our county, in addition to the no-wake zones that already exist in the law. They announced the meeting to no one, and our local "HOA"-like improvement committee had to dig like crazy to learn that the "public" meeting is this coming Monday - just two days from now.

I recall that there is some national organization that gets involved to fight such insanity. Who is that, and how do I reach them? We'll have to do this first thing Monday morning. Due to the virus thing, they are making the meeting "virtual" and it is possible to speak at the meeting from online, so anyone with position on it can participate with very little notice. I just need to contact them and get them involved Monday.

Thanks for any contact data anyone can provide.

[Brianrzr]

Email Adam Wensink with Nautique. They have a team to help. When rumors about my lake began, I contacted him and it really hit the fan. No more problems. It was explained to me that “laws” have to go through the state. Local jurisdictions and lake associations like to BS as though they have the authority. Good luck.

[BrentP]

Curious about this. Good luck man. The city of Jonestown here in CenTex has started creating “no augmented wake” zones. So far they seem to be in reasonable places but who knows how it will turn out. Also not sure how they enforce - pull you over and ask to hit empty on the bilge tanks? Does lead count? A taps plate? Etc etc

The thing about lake Travis is the 30-60 ft cruisers that bip bop around at like 20mph create a bigger wake then every 25RZ and G25 put together, and there is no augmentation there - just someone who refuses to get up on plane.

Let us know how it goes.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Brianrzr]

When I contacted Adam, he immediately put me in touch with another man who actually is the head of American Watersports Association, or something like that. Sorry I’m going from memory. He explained to be actually enforceable, it must go through the proper state and DNR process, few ever do. Instead, local authorities act like they have the power but actually don’t, when push comes to shove. All though they can make your life hell. Being a good neighbor is a different topic. It was explained that lake associations like to sneak this stuff through, if the knowledge of opposition is known, they back down (mine did). Explain at the meeting about the loss of property values when compared to an all- sports lake, and the one largest segment of new boats being sold are tow boats. Most lake residents with enough disposable income to afford a 100-200k boat, want to use their boat, have access to lawyers, or are lawyers. I was also told, when confronted by a complaining person, be polite. Getting nasty with them only furthers the animosity and their resolve to ban us. Within an hour after contacting Adam, I had the President of the lake association calling me. The association decided not to even take a vote.

[IDBoating]

Thanks everyone. For some reason I am not receiving email notifications about replies on this thread. I thought that was strange so I manually checked back. I will follow up with Adam Wensink and AWA. Fortunately I was off by one day, the hearing is Tuesday so we get an "extra" day (don't you love all the advance notice when they're trying to screw you with politics?).

I'll report back on how things proceed. Thanks again!

[IDBoating]

Email Adam Wensink with Nautique. They have a team to help.

I checked around a bit and cannot find an email address for Adam. Worst case I can call Nautique in the morning, but I'd rather he have something waiting in his inbox (and he might read it today to get started thinking about action items).

Anyone have a valid email address for Adam? Thanks!

[Brianrzr]

I’ve got it at work. I’ll PM you with it tomorrow morning. FYI private lakes can do whatever they want.

[IDBoating]

Brian, Adam responded within minutes of my email. He's also reached out to the folks as WSIA and asked them to contact me. Hopefully we'll get something going today.

FYI, this is a public lake, though I personally own waterfront property here. But the proposed ordinance affects all public waterways in the entire county, which includes the very well known Lake Coeur d'Alene and many others. It's ridiculous.

Thanks again for your help in reaching the correct people!

[Brianrzr]

Keep us up to date how it goes.

[IDBoating]

I will, thanks. Been in contact with quite a few people from multiple boat companies today, plus WSIA, plus some local dealers. I'm also scheduled to speak at the meeting.

[BurnMac42]

Good luck man!

[Booms]

Good luck. I am very interested in the results from your meeting.

[Booms]

How was the meeting yesterday?

[IDBoating]

Just finished my notes. They're lengthy, but here they are - in two parts because it's too long for a single message on the new TO software.

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Folks, here's a summary of the Kootenai County ID meeting last night. I'm bcc'ing this to most people whose email addresses were included in emails to me on this topic. Some of you were there yourselves, and others will have watched the livestream, so my apologies for any redundancy. If you're not that interested, please simply delete this message with my apologies.

I spoke at the meeting, as did my close friend Brian E., and Tyler E. from local dealer Tobler's. These were the only people I personally knew who addressed the Board, but there were dozens of others on both sides of the issue.

Mary worked the crowd while Brian and I waited to speak. The media was there and Mary gave them our names plus a copy of my 9-page writeup that included annotated maps of our lake. So far this morning I've been unable to find any coverage in local media of last night's events, despite multiple articles leading up to this meeting.

Due to the whole COVID-19 thing, the physical arrangement for this meeting was different than in the past. There was almost no seating, and with some exceptions the only folks allowed in the room were those scheduled to address the Board. They provided two lines, one "for" and "against", and alternated between them. It was originally explained that ONLY the current speaker would be allowed in the room, but the strong turnout apparently altered their plans.

Each speaker was allowed three minutes, with a pretty firm cutoff. If you could gather signatures from nine other people (thus representing ten including yourself), you could have ten minutes to give a "group presentation". After speaking, you were directed to immediately leave the room through a separate door from the entrance and then exit the building, again through a dedicated doorway. As a result it was difficult to loiter and listen to all other comments in person.

With that background....

The chairman opened the meeting with a monologue reviewing the history of this topic. He stated that the Board has received a lot of pressure from people for about a year now. Apparently there have been attempts to "do something about this" for quite some time, but previous Board members didn't actually pursue action. For some reason, the present makeup of the Board decided "it was time" and here we are.

The chairman noted that this is a particularly contentious topic. They have received a much greater public response than for most issues (one number I heard was 380+ letters/emails/calls). He claimed the split was pretty even, but it's hard to know if that's accurate or if he was just trying to prevent a riot.

The chairman said the Board would not be voting on the proposed regulation last night. They will have a separate meeting of just the three Board members on Thursday to discuss and then vote. It was suggested that meeting will be livestreamed.

Before, and during, the meeting it became evident that the anti-wake crowd has made themselves very well known to the Board members. They all recognized and addressed each other by first names, etc. When the chairman called them up to speak he would invite them by first name in a disturbingly familiar fashion. One hopes that familiarity doesn't bias the outcome.

Without spending a ton of time on those speakers I personally heard, two major points quickly dominated the meeting: The Spokane River, and enforcement/education.

For non-locals, the Spokane River is a major river (flow can reach 45K CFS during spring runoff) which drains the entire region into the Columbia River and ultimately the Pacific Ocean. "The River" begins at the outlet of Lake Couer d'Alene and runs for many miles within Kootenai County until it reaches the state line where it leaves both the County and Idaho. Along those miles are many property owners with a variety of home styles from multimillion dollar new(er) construction to fishing shacks that have been there for decades.

From the very first person to address the Board, it became evident that nearly all of the anti-wake sentiment comes from certain residents along the River. I asked around and no one I spoke to remembers hearing anyone speak against wakes on the lakes within the County. There have been a couple of anti-wake opinion pieces in local media from lake residents, but apparently none could be bothered to come to the meeting. Obviously we have no way to know how many lake residents submitted written comments to the Board, but the good news is all lake-related commentary was pro-wake last night.

As this River-centric mentality became evident, later speakers (including me) started citing it – specifically asking why the lakes were getting swept up in something that seems so clearly a River-only issue. The Board members were offering no responses last night but hopefully they heard that point loud and clear, particularly in the case of our own lake which would be effectively choked off in three places if their proposed distance restrictions were to be imposed.

The second major point was enforcement and education, which quickly merged into a single enforcement+education topic. This was mentioned by a LOT of speakers, including our own Brian E. Several of these folks, including Brian, established their marine credentials with the Board by reciting their experience in the Coast Guard, decades of on-water experience, certifications to operate surprisingly large ships, etc.

(As a side note, I don't recall a single person with *actual marine certification* speaking against wakeboating. It appeared the more educated the person, the less they opposed wakesports. That may be a useful organizing message.)

The different speakers addressed it in different ways, but the common theme was that Idaho and the County already have numerous regulations regarding waterway navigation – and that many of those would fix this problem if actually enforced. Many speakers noted that problems magically vanished when a Sheriff's boat was in the area. Several people openly called for additional Sheriff's marine funding instead of the proposed regulations.

The best part of this point was that we had the educated, experienced people on our side. Virtually all of the anti-wake people were speaking emotionally, or at best did some vague hand-waving at "wave energy" and "studies from Australia" (!!!). From the Board's perspective, their votes count just as much as those of thinking people, but hopefully the Board is mindful of the judgement of history and the fact that everything from last night is formally in the record.

I emailed a copy of my writeup to each individual Board member, AND provided each a physical copy last night, as well as a USB drive which allowed them to project my annotated maps onto the screen which I referenced with a laser pointer during my three minutes.

(more...)

[IDBoating]

There was no way I could cover all of my material in three minutes, so I focused on two key points. The first was that their proposed wording, strictly interpreted, would outlaw all wakesports in the entire county! Here is an excerpt regarding my distance comments:

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>>"...a distance of 200 feet from shoreline or any dock, pier, or other structure or **any person in the water**" (emphasis added). The very nature of wakeboarding, wakesurfing, and similar wakesports is to have a person in the water (often with no connecting rope) within 5-30 feet of the vessel since the wake dissipates beyond that distance.

The Resolution as presently proposed would render wakesports illegal in Kootenai County since a boat would be prohibited from generating a meaningful wake within 200 feet of "any person in the water". In addition to the impact on out-of-area visitors, County waterfront property owners would be precluded from these family-friendly wakesports and the values of their real (waterfront) and personal (watercraft) property would be reduced. No provision appears in the proposed Resolution to provide just compensation for such a taking.

Surely these are not the intentions of the Board. Therefore the proposed Resolution, if adopted, should first be amended to correct this oversight as follows: "...from shoreline or any dock, pier, or other structure or any person in the water **other than those associated with the vessel in question** (emphasis on new text)".<<
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Brian, who spoke some time after me, reinforced this point. But to my knowledge we were the only two people to even realize this, let alone raise the question. Unintended consequence of zealous partisanship? Perhaps. Regardless of its origin, this language is very dangerous because it would rely on the tender mercies of whatever Sheriff's deputy you happened to get on any given day. I tried to forcefully emphasize this without being offensive, but I did use the phrase "selective enforcement" while talking about it. The deputies present were behind me while I was speaking so I could not read their expressions.

My second point was that, at least on our lake, there is one place where the proposed exclusion zones are wider than the natural navigable width. This means there would be ZERO legal width through which an operational boat could pass. There are other places where the remaining legal width would be 16 feet or 130 feet. I rhetorically asked if the Sheriff's department would recommend boats pass each other within spaces that narrow.

I also pointed out that a single boat could effectively commandeer a portion of public waters by simply stopping there. This would create a 200 foot exclusion radius around itself which, when added to the 100 foot no-wake zones on each shoreline, would prevent other vessels from legally passing.

A few other people raised the "chop up the lake" problem with the proposed distances. Some anti-wake folks used that as an excuse to justify making the entire Spokane River a no-wake zone, a few suggesting that "at least 500 feet on either side" is needed for wakes to adequately dissipate and since the River isn't that wide in many places, the "only" solution is to completely zone it off.

I could go on, but you get the idea. The people who turned out to speak were certainly passionate about their topics, but some spoke emotionally while others came from a position of knowledge, experience, and data.

The very last speaker, whom we watched on their livestream, was another person obviously well known to the Board members. He openly said he didn't take a position on the proposed regulation, but he ended with a great one-liner: "Don't let bad people dictate policy". The best part was that the chairman repeated that line verbatim, so there is no question he heard it. Let us hope he took it to heart.

It is my opinion that the political pressure on the Board is sufficient that "something" will be passed. They cannot possibly have missed the clear mandate from the meeting against excessively broad overregulation, but the chairman's review of history and the rather lengthy (and invited, and unlimited) speech by the Sheriff at the start of the meeting would make it politically difficult for them to do nothing. My hope is that they heard the reasoned, dispassionate comments from the pro-wake speakers last night and will vote for a limited response. Personally, I would address the concerns surrounding the River and leave it there for a few years to see how things work out.

It is also my opinion that the WSIA needs to review the materials they provide on this topic. Multiple anti-wake people used the WSIA materials to *support* their anti-wake positions. The most common cite was "Your wake is your responsibility", as they waved copies of WSIA flyers in front of the Board. They conveniently interpreted this as an admission by the industry's representatives that wakes are known to be damaging, a liability, a nuisance, etc. Perhaps that and other statements from the WSIA could be revised to make their points without enabling the enemy. Like the (presumbly accidental) phrasing that would outlaw all wakesports, wording must be analyzed from the point of view of one's antagonists and revised to leave them no oxygen. Nothing looks worse in a public forum than to have your own materials used against you.

Now we wait for tomorrow. Hopefully cooler heads will prevail, hopefully the Board hears the clear mandate against overreaction, and hopefully we won't have to fight this in the courts.

Richard Hartman
WakeTouch LLC