BUCKEYE LAKE

Lake Cumberland bounced back after years of lower water

Anna Bisaro
abisaro@gannett.com

LAKE CUMBERLAND, Ky. – When the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers lowered water levels in Lake Cumberland in Kentucky by 40 feet in the spring of 2007, the public originally thought it would be a three-year project.

Jason Wesley, park manager of Buckeye Lake State Park, and John Wisse, communications manager of ODNR, walk along the edge of the Buckeye Lake Dam in April while looking for any new damage that has occurred.

The lake levels remained low until 2014.

"It was catastrophic," said Janette Marson, director of tourism for Russell County. "I can't even think of how many millions of dollars were lost."

Marson said Russell County is the largest county on Lake Cumberland. Some marinas and businesses did close because of the lack of regular visitation to the lake.

Lake Cumberland is one of Kentucky's deepest and largest lakes and, before the draw-down of the water levels, attracted about 4 million visitors every year, Marson said.

But it wasn't necessarily the water levels being dropped 40 feet that hurt the economy, she said. It was the public's perception of the problem.

"It was a public relations nightmare," Marson said. "People were picturing a (empty) bathtub."

Many people thought that the lake had been drained, when in fact much of it still had a depth of 100 feet, she said.

Wolf Creek Dam in Lake Cumberland is about 240-feet high and about 1 mile long. The dam has a concrete core surrounded by earthen materials. According to news accounts from The Courier-Journal, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers lowered the lake levels to reduce pressure on the dam and limit seepage underneath the structure until the dam could be fixed.

The Sommerset Pulaski Convention and Visitors Bureau tried to keep marketing positive in the years of lowered lake levels on Lake Cumberland, executive director Carolyn Mounce said.

The group focused on visitors being able to see, walk on, and even camp on the banks of the lake.

The biggest group to suffer was marina owners, Mounce said. They had to move their docks out to adjust to the lowered levels and then remove those lengthened docks when the water came back up seven years later. Some marina owners did not survive that, despite getting help from federal loans.

Mounce added that the lowering of the lake occurred right before the recession in 2008. The spike in gas prices, downturn of the economy, and lowered water levels made the situation on Lake Cumberland that much worse.

"Since water has been back up, it's been very good," Mounce said.

Marson said that visitation numbers at Lake Cumberland are climbing back to the 4 million mark before the water levels were lowered. The Corps put in another marina to replace one that had gone out of business during the draw-down, Marson said.

"Bad news travels fast, but good news takes a while," she said.

abisaro@gannett.com

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