Nevada to do own Tahoe boat count

Thursday, April 16, 1998 | 11:30 a.m.

Fred Messmann, boating law administrator for the Nevada Division of Wildlife, hopes to start counting boats at Tahoe and across the state starting July 1.

A statewide boating survey had been planned for 1999, but controversy over pollution caused by watercraft fuel justifies a speedup of that project, Messmann said.

Scientists need to know how many boats and personal watercraft are using the lake as part of any effort to accurately measure water pollution.

The boat count is a key element of several studies at the lake following the bistate Tahoe Regional Planning Agency's 1997 decision to ban carbureted two-stroke marine engines from Tahoe starting in June 1999.

The engines, which power Jet Skis, Sea-Doos and other personal watercraft, dump unacceptable levels of gasoline unburned into a lake that must by law be protected from pollution, the TRPA contends.

A coalition of agencies studying pollution issues had hoped Nevada and California would join in a special $100,000 survey of boating at the lake this season. But the California Department of Boating and Waterways balked, Messmann said.

But TRPA officials and Dennis Machida of the California Tahoe Conservancy say they haven't given up hope that California will participate at some level.

The Nevada project would include a count of boats along Tahoe's Nevada shoreline. Counts from the air also are planned, which would pick up some boats coming from the California side, Messmann said.

The last statewide boating survey was done by Nevada in 1988. Since then, there has been a dramatic proliferation of the personal watercraft that are driving much of the debate over Tahoe pollution.

While a survey hasn't been done, the Division of Wildlife has an annual boat registration requirement. Agency statistics show there are 18,287 boats registered in Carson City, and Douglas and Washoe counties, which all have a piece of Nevada's Tahoe shoreline.