Ottawa County considers expensive precedent at Crockery Lake

Crockery Lake homeowners want Ottawa County to pay the lion’s share of the cost to restore their lake. Historically, Ottawa County has never paid more than a token amount toward local lake restoration. Lake Macatawa, Spring Lake, Lloyd’s Bayou and Pigeon Lake are ALL currently being restored; and none receive significant Ottawa County funds.

There is a Crockery Lake Association that oversees the lake. Membership is voluntary and costs only $40 per year. Because Crockery Lake is small and membership is voluntary, there are a limited number of members. The yearly dues barely scratch the surface of what is needed, so what can they do?

Historically, lake restoration projects in Ottawa County have NOT been funded with general taxpayer dollars. They have been funded by mechanisms that require lakefront property owners to pay for restoration themselves through a special tax assessment district; or organize a privately funded initiative to restore their lake. This is the clear precedent, so which option is Crockery Lake choosing?

Crockery Lake considered establishing a special assessment district to pay for lake restoration, but they rejected that option. Instead, they petitioned Ottawa County to pay nearly $600,000 to fund the bulk of their cleanup.  That is way more than the token amount historically provided by Ottawa County for other lake restoration efforts. Why does Crockery Lake deserve taxpayer funding but the other lakes do not? Perhaps there is more here than meets the eye ...

Aside from rumors of political patronage, there is little to suggest a good reason for this change of precedent. If the county pays the lion’s share of Crockery Lake’s restoration costs, hang on to your wallets. Spring Lake, Lloyd’s Bayou, Lake Macatawa and Pigeon Lake will be submitting petitions, soon.

Ken Willison

Spring Lake

Missing a true opinion forum at The Sentinel

Ever since the removal of Sarah Leach from running The Holland Sentinel, the opinion page has changed how it serves us. It has lost much of the local flavor it used to have and it seems to have taken a turn to the right. The editors rely upon the USA Today opinion writers and frequently shovel Ingrid Jacques our way, who is famously a product of Hillsdale College and could be mistaken for a Trump campaign staffer, or an author of Project 2025.

The corporate masters who run our local papers from afar have decided we are all conservative just when we have decided we are not, or at least many of us have had enough of that kind of thinking. This kind of top-down opinion reporting is not working for me anymore and I won’t put up with it. Ingrid Jacques and her kind are lying to me and I won’t stand for it. Donald Trump is a fascist and he needs to lose or we all lose. Nothing his propaganda ministers say to the contrary matters to me.

David Barnosky

West Olive

Outside thoughts brought things into perspective on Trump

A few days ago, I received the following WhatsApp message from my brother-in-law, who is a German citizen. I found his European perspective on what’s happening in America to be a whack to the side of the head. We’ve all become so used to how our media — conservative and progressive — is framing the upcoming election that we’ve lost sight of what the rest of the world thinks about our country.

Greetings to you in Michigan! It is scary what we’re hearing here about the elections. Just recently was the anniversary of when the Nuremberg Court passed the verdict and hanged the cult followers of Hitler. It is unbelievable that the Republicans are willing to hand over power to an unstable, lying, cheating, bullying, egomaniac Trump. What he has announced makes one want to throw up — that he has done more for Black Americans, is the father of IVF, and is going to hunt down his critics. He made an idiot of himself in front of the UN when he said that he had achieved more than any other president in history and everyone laughed at him. But no Republican senators or members of the House have said anything.

I am speechless. From my parents and grandparents, I often heard the question: How was it possible that Hitler came to power? Well, here we have the answer.

Daryl Fischer

Grand Haven

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