Rice Lake Owners to Hear Plan - KXNet - Bismarck/Minot/Williston/Dickinson

Rice Lake Owners to Hear Plan

Property owners battling high water around Rice Lake learned tonight about a plan to pump water from the lake.
The State Water Commission has pledged 2-point-8 million dollars to the project, but its total cost is pegged at something close to six million dollars.

Tonight, property owners were told there could be more financial help coming, but without that, each property owner would have to pay about 100 dollars per month for 20 years to pay the three million dollar local share of the cost.
Steve Zaun of the Rice Lake Recreation District says the need for the project can be seen in how little the lake has dropped during the current dry spell while pumping has been going on under a temporary plan.

(Steve Zaun, Rice Lake Recreation District) "The pumps have been going steady for about 2.5 weeks and I just figured it out last night in those 2.5 weeks of 95 degree temps, no rain, perfect evaporation weather, we've dropped only about 3.5 inches."

Zaun says with normal evaporation rates, the lake should have dropped about three times that amount in the past few weeks.
The plan calls for underground pumping to Douglas Lake and, ultimately, to Lake Sakakawea.