Lake Depth Proposal

April 2025 Dredging Discussion Summary

Over the past several months, the Board has been researching a potential dredging project to address shallow areas in the lake and fallen trees.  The Board is very grateful for all of the resident input from in person discussions, emails, and town hall meetings over the past several months.  Based on resident input, the original proposal has been radically modified.  There are two major strands to this project that have emerged:  Removal of trees that are leaning into or have already fallen into Skinny River AND deepening of shallow areas identified in our bathymetric survey.  It is probably best to split these two major projects into two separate components.  This is the Board's conclusion:

Tree Removal:

• Trees will soon become a safety hazard in Skinny River for Ginger Cove residents

• There are two types of tree situations:  those that are leaning/drooping over the water and those that have already fallen.

• The trees that are on land belong to our neighbor to the west.  The trees that have fallen onto Ginger Cove property are Ginger Cove’s.

• Our neighbor has indicated that he will allow tree service contractors onto his land to facilitate downed tree removal. 

Deepening Shallow Areas and Sand Removal:

• There seems to be a good amount of resident support for this project if it’s being done affordably and for safety reasons.

• The investigative/planning phase must not be rushed in order to meet a self-imposed timeline however the Board must act in a timely fashion to mitigate the safety risk that has been identified.

• A smaller scale approach to address immediate safety issue near Lot 6 is to hire a long-reach excavator to pull sand from the lake and retain the sand on the island.

• Once the immediate safety risk is mitigated, a larger scale operation that utilizes a suction dredge can be investigated to deepen other shallow areas.

• An engineering consultant should be hired to advise the HOA Board on the safest way to conduct this operation.

• There is a desire for residents to be able to enter into private agreements with a dredging contractor to deepen their shoreline areas at their own cost.

• Attention must be given to developing a post-project erosion control plan for the dunes.

• Residents have serious concerns about heavy trucks making multiple trips across our bridge and over our neighborhood roads, therefore hauling over the bridge should only be a last resort.

• To eliminate trucks on our bridge and roads, the spoils would either need to be pumped over the levee or retained on the island.  

• An alternate route could be to exit the levee onto Ginger Woods Road, but that would need to be cleared with the City of Valley.

Next Steps:

• Obtain bids from three tree service companies to remove fallen and leaning trees from Skinny River.  

• Obtain bids from land-based excavation companies to scoop sand from shallow and narrow areas of Skinny River and retain sand on the island.

• Once the previous two steps are completed, research the necessity to dredge other shallow, but less critical areas of the lake.