P-J file photo

LAKEWOOD — The Lakewood Village Board will meet at 6 p.m. today to discuss a proposal to apply herbicides in portions of Chautauqua Lake’s south basin.

The meeting will be held in the board room of the Anthony C. Caprino Building, 20 W. Summit St., Lakewood. The Chautauqua Lake Partnership, with the backing of the towns of Ellery, North Harmony, Busti and Ellicott and village of Celoron, had applied for eight permits to use herbicides on roughly 1,000 acres of Chautauqua Lake. DEC officials issued three permits on May 15 approving herbicide use for 181 acres of the lake.

There was confusion earlier this week over the status of the DEC permits, but Chautauqua Lake Partnership officials are expecting revised permits to be approved for the same 181 acres of treatment area that were approved by the DEC on May 15.

The Busti Town Board applied for the herbicide treatment application for the portion of the lake that falls within the town’s boundaries. That decision was criticized Monday by Lakewood officials, who said they haven’t been consulted by the town or by Chautauqua Lake Partnership officials about the herbicide treatments.

“Even though we didn’t apply for a permit, the village of Lakewood still is the only person or body that could possibly approve the spraying of (herbicides) adjacent to the shorelines in the village of Lakewood,” said John LaMancuso, village attorney, during Monday’s special meeting. “Even if the village doesn’t have some sort of general authority over its own shoreline, it owns land adjacent to the shoreline and, certainly, the village should be heard if any person or purposes to spray (herbicides) into the water adjacent to the park.”

The herbicide permits were moving through the approval process in a parallel process with a Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement spearheaded by the town of Ellery and Chautauqua Lake Partnership. Nine applications were submitted by Ellery, North Harmony, Busti and Ellicott and village of Celoron for herbicide treatments. Jim Cirbus, Chautauqua Lake Partnership president, said Lakewood officials were given the opportunity to do so but declined in mid-March.

Jim Wehrfritz, Chautauqua Lake Partnership vice president, said more than 4,000 notices were sent to those owning property both on Chautauqua Lake and in areas of the lake’s watershed, so the village should have received notification. He also said the village didn’t need to be involved in the permitting process because Busti was taking the lead on the matter. Villages can choose to be involved, he said. Bemus Point chose to defer to the town of Ellery on the herbicide treatment while the village of Celoron chose to handle its permit area rather than defer to the town of Ellicott.

“They (Lakewood) didn’t really need to because Busti covers Lakewood just like Ellery covers Bemus,” Wehrfritz said.

In October 2017, the Lakewood Village Board passed a resolution to send a letter of intent to serve as a co-lead agency in the State Environmental Quality Review of the Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement to use herbicides in targeted areas of the lake, including areas of the lake bordering village’s jurisdiction. On Nov. 30, Birrittieri notified the town of Ellery that the village didn’t object to Ellery serving as the lead agency in the SEQRA process and completion of the SEIS. The board then approved a resolution on Feb. 26 that stated the village understood that Busti was going to apply for herbicide permits and that the town would notify property owners of the application and water use restrictions and of their right to object.

The Village Board, at that time, reserved a decision until the end of the SEQR process but authorized Busti to apply for the permits. That resolution was then rescinded on March 12. Board members felt the Chautauqua Lake Partnership officials had told the board the village could pass the Feb. 26 resolution while still possibly opposing the herbicide treatment later. LaMancuso told the board that was not the case.

“This conflicting information is of great concern to the Board of Trustees because the Board of Trustees has not authorized the spraying of any pesticides adjacent to its shoreline, and the Board of Trustees wishes to and reserves its right to first review a final Environmental Impact Statement before deciding whether to authorize the said spraying,” the resolution stated.