A public meeting will be held this Sunday to plan a citizens' lobbying trip to Montgomery in support of a bill that would reopen Mobile's Big Creek Lake to recreation.
The meeting is at 3 p.m. Sunday at Hill Spring Baptist Church in West Mobile. The public is invited. No ticket or RSVP is needed.
The bill being supported is HB473 by State Rep. Shane Stringer (R-Citronelle). It would prohibit water systems from stopping fishing, boating, and other recreational activities on public lakes. Springer is scheduled to speak at the March 30 planning meeting.
The meeting and lobbying trip are organized by Mobile-based group "Take Back Big Creek Lake from MAWSS."
The group is encouraging citizens in favor of reopening the lake to attend and speak at a hearing on Wednesday, April 2. It will be at 10:30 a.m. in room 123 of the Alabama State House.
Citizens can sign up there to speak at the hearing before the House Boards, Agencies, and Commissions Committee. State Rep. Margie Wilcox (R-Mobile) chairs the committee and is listed as a co-sponsor of the bill.
The bill is statewide in its wording and effect. It was triggered by the closing of Mobile County's Big Creek Lake to recreation. The Mobile Area Water and Sewer System, ordered the closure Feb. 4.
The text of HB473 can be found here.
For citizens who cannot attend the April 2 hearing, the 11 members of the committee and their contact information are listed here.
Citizens are encouraged to email or call any committee member in their county.
Stringer, the bill's sponsor, represents a large district in north Mobile County, which contains Big Creek Lake. The lake is known for two things: it is the water supply for 70% of the greater Mobile area and is a popular recreation lake for fishermen and boaters.
Those two things appeared to conflict, and the Mobile Area Water & Sewer System (MAWSS) voted to ban recreational use of the lake on April 4.
"Suddenly declaring an entire lake off limits without offering specific reasons or justification is unfair and hurts the quality of life for everyone who lives in the area. The residents of House District 102 are angry and upset at this bureaucratic nonsense, and I share their reaction, so if MAWSS refuses to reverse its decision, the Legislature can certainly step in and reverse it for them," Stringer said.
Under the provisions of HB 473, a water or sewer board "may not in any way restrict the public's recreational use of a body of water, or portion thereof, owned or controlled by the board, including for fishing and boating."
Public health departments, environmental agencies, and similar departments governed by other portions of the Code of Alabama would retain their authority to declare health emergencies and take necessary actions to safeguard the public from contaminated bodies of water and other threats.
The group leading the support of HB473 has posted a Facebook page to organize the efforts. The FB group now has over 2,600 members. Electrical contractor Matthew Frazier organized the group.
Citizens wanting to reopen the lake have created a GoFundMe page.
There appear to be three different strategies to reverse the lake's closure—one political, one legal, and one legislative. The political strategy is to get public officials to push the MAWSS board to reverse its decision. The legal strategy would be to sue to invalidate the decision. Stringer's legislative strategy is to pass a state law preventing the closure of public lakes by water systems.
Members of the MAWSS board that ordered the lake closed include State Rep. Barbara Drummond, chair; Maria Gonzalez; Linda St. John; John Williams; Jay Weber; Raymond Bell; and Tommy Zoghby.
Jim' Zig' Zeigler writes about Alabama's people, places, events, groups and prominent deaths. He is a former Alabama Public Service Commissioner and State Auditor. You can reach him for comments at [email protected].
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