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Opinion | Lake Allegan Association board supports Consumers dam sale
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We are members of the Lake Allegan community. We live on the shores of Lake Allegan, a 1,587-acre impoundment made in 1936 by the Calkins Bridge Dam. Our lake is a sanctuary for a diverse population of wildlife: 97 bird species, including herons, kingfishers, sea gulls, ducks and geese, as well as two species of endangered mussels, one endangered butterfly, turtles, bluegill, catfish, bullhead, and northern pike, and of course a couple of dozen carp. Often, when we are on the water or in our yards, we stop to watch bald eagles soaring overhead or perched high up on a tree branch. Life on Lake Allegan epitomizes our state’s motto: Pure Michigan.
Since the lake’s founding in 1936, thousands of people have invested in the surrounding land, desirable for its gorgeous vistas and access to the city of Allegan, the resort towns Saugatuck and Douglas, and the more urban Kalamazoo and Grand Rapids. Our 22 miles of shoreline are lined with docks, boats, jet skis, barbecue pits, and playgrounds, used by families made up of young marrieds and four-generation homesteads. Visitors and residents take advantage of the lake’s stable water levels to swim, fish, sail, ski, and recreate. There is a particularly robust, devoted fishing community that is made up of people from across the state.
The proposed sale of the 13 dams from Consumers Energy to Confluence Hydro is being challenged partially on grounds that the interests of the people who live around these lakes are irrelevant and subservient to the need to purify the rivers to return them to their natural state. This shortsighted view demeans and devalues the lives, livelihoods and liberties of the people who have made these lakes their home.
This is not merely an emotional argument. Our community, and the Allegan community at large, risk significant economic consequences if the dam is removed.
Based on public tax records, the market value of Lake Allegan frontage and backlot properties is approximately $124 million, generating $2 million in property taxes in 2022. Owners of Lake Allegan-adjacent property pay 45% of Valley Township’s tax revenues.
Our analysis, drawn from a parcel-by-parcel review, shows that a 30% loss of frontage-property value, coupled with a more conservative 10% backlot value loss, would reduce annual property tax revenues by more than $500,000 — of which some $338,000 would no longer go to our schools. Moreover, this loss does not include lake owners’ and users’ contributions to area businesses, which would be casualties of the economic domino effect should Calkins Bridge Dam be removed.
Lake Allegan is not the only community exposed to economic dam-removal jeopardy. We are in active dialogue with leaders from dam communities across the state. Consistently we are told that if the dams were removed, the tourism and second-homeism that support lake and pond communities would evaporate. Imagine the ripple effects of destroying a dozen local economies across Michigan. Schools, hospitals, businesses… the economic ecosystems of our communities would collapse. The State — having broken these communities — would have to step in to fix them.
It is fitting that retaining a man-made lake requires stewardship by men and women. To keep Lake Allegan, we need a party that owns our lake and the dam that creates it. We have long worked with Consumers Energy as our landlords and stewards, sometimes happily. We know that Consumers Energy desperately wants out of the hydroelectric power business; we prefer an enthusiastic landlord rather than one who is just not that into us. We believe we have found that with Confluence Hydro.
We have had several meetings with all of the senior leaders of Confluence Hydro, including scientists, a lawyer and the person who lives and breathes hydroelectricity. We approached them skeptically and were ready to oppose their purchase of our lake and Calkins Bridge Dam. But, in spite of our resistance, we liked them and feel confident in their ability and willingness to take, safeguard, improve and carry on the work of generating power at Calkins Bridge Dam and managing Lake Allegan. We found them passionate about renewable energy, including this strange, ancient version.
They have told us they are in this for the long term, not just the 5-10 years before us. They have assured us that this is not merely a buy and flip transaction. They have traveled to meet with us, taken and answered our questions, and have committed to serving as a responsible, responsive steward of the ecology and community in and around Lake Allegan.
We’re with Confluence Hydro, and we urge the Michigan Public Service Commission to approve the sale.
This commentary was written by the Lake Allegan Association board members Carol Doeringer, Maureen Esposito, Stacey Harbour, Tim Miller, Angela Parsons, Coco Soodek, Carol Zigulich and Phil Zigulich.
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