To more effectively raise funds to keep Tomahawk Lake beautiful, the Association is starting its “Angel Giving” drive and is looking for Association members to donate funds to cover specific and concrete projects and activities planned for 2010. Details on all projects, which range in cost from $1,000 to $14,000, are noted on the Angel Gift Pledge Form.
A successful campaign would result in pledges exceeding our goal of $100,000. The Angel Gift opportunities are concentrated in the following initiatives that are critical to our success in protecting Lake Tomahawk:
- Hydraulic Conveyor System – We have had great success with the HCS last summer and the program promises to pay great long term dividends. The investments to be made in 2010 allow us to expand the capacity of the HCS and support its full time staffing. This two person team is headed by April Londo who has been with us since the inception of the HCS program. She is a Graduate student in Marine Biology, and is a real asset to TLA. Our second diver is Jonathan Pierce, whose family has had a home on Tomahawk Lake since 1938 in the Pottawatomie Colony. He is a senior at UW-Stevens Point in Limnology (Study of Waters), and turned down a DNR internship to work on the Hydraulic Conveyor.
- Clean Boats, Clean Waters - Three Boat Landing Inspectors/Educators will work at our boat landings from Friday afternoon through Sunday evenings each week, from Memorial Day through Labor Day. They will be our front line against the introduction of existing and new Aquatic Invasive Species into Tomahawk Lake. They will meet and greet every boat that visits our lake during these peak hours, and make sure that our visiting boaters are aware of, and are removing AIS from their boats before they enter, and as they leave our waters. There is a lot more that we could be doing to make the Clean Boats Clean Waters program more effective if we had the funds available.
- Research and Surveying - We will be undertaking partnership research with Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, UW-Stevens Point and the Army Corps of Engineers this year. A critical measure of long term success for our work on Lake Tomahawk depends on us understanding the behavior of herbicides used to treat EWM and determine the optimal level of application. This research will help us maintain TLA’s leadership in understanding and treating the threats to our lake.
- Lake Chemical Treatment - Because of the growth in the number of EWM infestation sites in the lake, we will be chemically treating well over 50 acres of Eurasian Water Milfoil this spring. Because of the structure of our grant from the Wisconsin DNR, a portion of the expenses for the first 27 acres will be funded by the DNR. TLA needs to step up to the challenge to treat this entire acreage.
Details on all projects, which range in cost from $1,000 to $14,000, are noted on the accompanying pledge form. If an item is too expensive for a single donor, we encourage you to partner with a neighbor or friend to pledge jointly. We also plan to contact a small handful of donors requesting them to commit to an incentive gift if all of the Angel Giving commitments are pledged on or before July 10th. We will also honor donor requests who wish to give anonymously.
