By Tom Hintgen (Contact) | The Daily Journal…Published Saturday, February 23, 2008

Impervious surface — a term used often during recent public input for revisions of the county Shoreland Management Ordinance — is at the crux of the debate as commissioners try to balance manageable development while at the same time protecting lakes.

The term refers to a constructed hard surface that either prevents or retards the entry of water into the soil.

This, in turn, causes water to run off the surface in greater quantities and at an increased rate of flow than prior to development near lakes in Otter Tail County.

As stated in the current and in the proposed Shoreland Management Ordinance, to be finalized by commissioners in the near future, no more than 25 percent of a lake lot can be covered by impervious surfaces.

Examples of impervious surface include decks, rooftops, sidewalks, patios, permeable pavers, storage areas and concrete, asphalt or gravel driveways.

“Surface water running off the lake lot property — rather than soaking into the ground — runs off into the lake itself, oftentimes carrying nutrients and chemicals,” county Land and Resource Director Bill Kalar said. “Ordinance requirements are written to help curtail the amount of runoff.”

Gone are the days, he said, when people, for the most part, were satisfied with small lakeshore cabins.

Today, he said, dwellings and associated construction “seems to get bigger all the time.”

In previous decades, at lakes throughout Otter Tail County, the norm was pretty much a small unpaved driveway with people parking vehicles, outside, alongside their cabins.

“Today,” Kalar said, “you see not only larger dwellings but also large garages, larger driveways and side buildings such as pole sheds. People oftentimes want more things on their property than what the lakeshore property can sustain.”

Thus far the five-member board of commissioners (Sydney Nelson, Everett Erickson, Dennis Mosher, Roger Froemming and Robert Block) support the 25 percent rule.

The board will hold its next regular meeting on Tuesday, Feb. 26.