Media Release

May 13, 2013

SEAS applauds SLIPP water quality report

Last week, the Shuswap Lakes Integrated Planning Process (SLIPP) released the executive summary for the 2011 water quality report that provides a concise look at the results from the first year of its three-year water quality monitoring program. The results clearly indicate that the lakes are being negatively impacted from various sources of pollution with the greatest impact coming from agriculture.

“SEAS applauds the efforts underway by SLIPP to better understand the threats to Shuswap water quality,” said Jim Cooperman, Shuswap Environmental Action Society president.  “This initial report should serve as a call to action, as the results clearly show that a major effort is needed to reduce the nutrient loading in the Shuswap Watershed.”

The report concludes that “Without efforts to stabilize nutrient inputs from the river’s drainage basins it is very likely that Mara Lake, in future years, will continue to exhibit annual flagellate blooms of growing amplitude and duration, perhaps yielding to late summer/fall blue-green algal blooms with a few decades which would have severe implications for drinking water quality and public health issues.”

Other areas of concern include the nutrient loadings and E.coli from the Salmon River and Canoe, Newsome and White Creeks; pollution likely from houseboats, and elevated concentrations of nitrogen and E.coli in the North and South Shuswap.

When the three-year project is completed this year, the results will provide decision makers with the information they need to improve watershed management and thus reduce the amount of pollution entering the lakes.

“This report shows that we need a watershed-wide organization similar to Okanagan Water Basin Board that for 45-years has achieved remarkable success in watershed management,” stressed Cooperman. “The success of SLIPP now needs to be channeled into a permanent organization that will continue to allow for collaboration and cooperation between all levels of government and public stakeholder groups,” Cooperman added.

see the SLIPP_2011_Water_Quality_Report_Executive_Summary
Graph showing phosphorus inputs from the Shuswap River also attached below (likely from manure during spring run-off)

Learn more about SLIPP at www.slipbc.ca