TRPA board asked to approve more piers on Lake Tahoe

LAKE TAHOE - The agency which regulates development here asked its governing board Thursday to consider approving 230 new piers on Lake Tahoe and to not allow grandfathering of unpermitted buoys.

The bi-state Tahoe Regional Planning Agency has been trying to find a way to regulate piers, buoys and motorboats on the lake since 1987, but its efforts have been consistently stalled by public outcry.

During Thursday's workshop at CalNeva Resort, the agency revealed the contents of its proposed Alternative 6A, which it tested on the governing board and the public for feedback.

It's clear TRPA is banking on this shorezone plan, the seventh in two years.

"We plan to put out the regulations based on what we've given you today, unless we get another direction from you," said TRPA lead lawyer Joanne Marchetta.

The agency did not release the actual final environmental review and Alternative 6A document. When it does, the board has agreed it will allow 60 days of public review before voting on it.

The board directed agency staff to look into ways to grandfather buoys and allow more flexibility for development on publicly owned land.

Since releasing a controversial shorezone proposal last summer, the agency has dropped its suggestion to limit motorboat traffic in Emerald Bay on weekends and a requirement to remove buoys each winter from Lake Tahoe. It lowered buoy permitting fees from $5,000 to $500.

What has stayed in their proposal is the number of new piers, 230, the number of new buoys, 1,862, the cost to permit a pier, $100,000, a boat sticker program, and an item banning further development in a large portion of Tahoe's publicly owned lakeshore.

The Forest Service and the California and Nevada state lands commissions both complained about the lack of flexibility in the proposed Shorezone Protection Areas, which would restrict their ability to build trails, piers or buildings on their land abutting the lake.

"We don't think it's reasonable to restrict the public and their public land as a mitigation for allowing development on private land," said Pamela Wilcox with Nevada State Lands.

Jay DeBenedetti, president of the Lake Front Property Owners Association, vowed to fight the public trust doctrine.

"We would strongly oppose and challenge the right to public access to the areas along the high to low water mark," DeBenedetti said. He also questioned the necessity of a $100,000 pier permitting fee.

Several entities have argued allowing more piers and buoys will increase boat traffic on Lake Tahoe, so those new structures must have mitigations to protect the environment.

Conservationists scoffed at the revised proposal and its lowered mitigation fees.

"This further weakens a plan that the League believed was already too costly for Lake Tahoe," said John Friedrich with the League to Save Lake Tahoe.