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Admin update

11/25/2014

It's been several weeks since my last post and the CLERC crew has been busy moving things along. Here's where we stand:

First off, we had a wonderful level of response from people over Labor Day weekend at the Lake County Fair. The entire CLERC Board was present for most of the 4 day fair event and we had the chance to speak with hundreds of folks about the CLERC vision and what we hope to accomplish. One thing that was clear by the end of the weekend was that lots of people know a lot about Clear Lake and lots of people have misunderstandings about Clear Lake. One common question that kept coming up was people asking if we've ever found a brain-eating ameba in the Lake (we haven't found it.....yet).

Lake County Fair

Clear Lake Cleanup Day

We held our first big event, the Clear Lake Cleanup Day, on Sept. 20 and the event was a huge success. We had over 55 people come out to take advantage of the low water levels this year and remove a lot of rubbish that is covered by water during normal, non-drought years. Overall we removed 90 tires, about 4 dozen bags of trash, and old row boat. Since the lake is still low, CLERC is organizing another cleanup day on December 6.

We received our first grant! CLERC was chosen by the Redbud Healthcare District to receive a grant. Thanks to the efforts of CLERC Board member, Carolyn Ruttan, CLERC was awarded $625 for the purpose of covering our booth costs at the Lake County Fair. We had originally asked for $500 to cover the fair booth rental charge, but once Carolyn presented the CLERC vision to the Redbud Board, they decided to provide us $625 in order to cover our insurance costs in addition to the rental fee for the fair booth. The CLERC Board is absolutely delighted to continue finding more and more members of the community that believe in what we are trying to accomplish and hopefully this grant is a sign of more good things to come.

Funding Received

Business Plan

The CLERC Board met on November 16 for about 6 hours to start drafting the official business plan. This plan will be submitted to the IRS along with our tax-exempt status application around the first of the year. Stay tuned for a draft copy to be available for review around the first of the year.

Committees

Once we wrap up the business plan we will be focusing on establishing the committees that will drive the CLERC machine. We already have significant interest from several scientists and researchers wishing to be on the CLERC Scientific Advisory Board. We also have several folks interested in spearheading the Fundraising, Marketing, & Events Committee. Our goal is to get these committees up and running and have them report back to the Board of Directors by the end of March with recommendations for moving forward. If you are interested in any of the following committee s please let me know:

Scientific Advisory Board
Fundraising, Marketing & Events Committee
Facilities Committee
Education Committee
Administrative Committee

That's it for this installment. Be on the lookout for another edition of the Admin Update around the first of the year. Happy Thanksgiving!

-Will

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a message from the webmaster

11/24/2014

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Greetings everyone, I wanted to let those who are following us here at CLERC some of what is going on.

I know that we have not been very active on social media, and that is one reason I wanted to say something. Just because we haven't seemed to be active, there are alot of behind the scenes things going on right now. Some of the things the board of directors are;

Developing the pusiness plan.
Budget.
Recruiting members for committees.
Assessing and recruiting members for future board positions.

On top of that I know that they have alot going on with their day jobs, and the holidays are fast upon us. With the holidays and winter coming fast, there are also less outdoor activities going on, as well as more demands on personal time.

We do have an event planned for Dec 6th, starting at 8:30 and going to noon, to clean up more of the shoreline. You can read more about that here.

When I have more information, I will get it out to the world. In the meantime Happy Holidays!

Adam Roon
CLERC Webmaster

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My First Boat Ride on Clear Lake

8/27/2014

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I've lived in Lake County for over three years and have seen Clear Lake many times, but until today I'd never seen it from the water. I switched county departments on July 14 from Planning to Water Resources and this afforded me the opportunity to see the Lake up close. I accompanied the Water Resources Technician on a mission to drop some hazard warning buoys on shallow rocks that had surfaced as a result of the drought. We took the air boat so we wouldn't run aground anywhere; the boat is great except for having to wear ear protection, especially at high speeds.

Check out the video I made from clips shot from the air boat!

I noticed some interesting things out on the Lake. One thing I saw right off was how expansive the view is compared to from land. All those trees and buildings everywhere really block the view! I saw a flock of geese take off and fly for over a mile, then land back in the water. Something that I've seen from the land before, but they always take off and fly out of view.

Another thing I noticed was all the different small organisms in the water and how they all seemed to cluster and live around each other. There were different types of aquatic weeds with a bubbly mold-looking substance and particles of Cyanobacteria intermixed with it.

Another interesting site that day was the albatross flying around. This flying boat was being used for the filming of a Bollywood action flick where the final scene involves a world champion water skier using a grappling hook to barefoot water ski behind the giant plane. Unfortunately, the water skier is going to be added in digitally, so I didn't get to actually see anyone trying to carry out this stunt.

I also got to see tons of grebes! I've noticed the different grebe species around Clear Lake for years, but never have I seen so many nests in one location before; it was impressive. We took the air boat near Rodman Slough, and also between Tule Island and the mainland. The area is really shallow due to the significant amount of sediment deposited there from Middle Creek and Scotts Creek. There were grebe nests as far as the eye could see. These birds make their nests out of aquatic weeds that float on the water. I'll have to go back out sometime with my SLR camera and the long zoom lens so I can get shots of these birds up close.

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the admin update

8/26/2014

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Welcome to the first installment of my new blog! As one of the directors of the newly formed Clear Lake Environmental Research Center (CLERC), this will be the location where I will keep everyone updated on CLERC's progress towards becoming a world-class research and education center. I'm looking forward to using this blog as an outreach tool to extend invitations to anyone who may be interested in helping us achieve this goal, as well as keeping interested folks updated on where we stand on a regular basis.

So far, we've made significant progress. After holding weekly brainstorming sessions in May and June, we held a day-long strategic planning session on July 12 with about 20 people in attendance where we solicited more input and molded the brainstorm in to a more concise vision and direction with goals laid out for the next several years. A summary of the ideas generated that day can be found here or on the sidebar. Since then we've also built this website and virtual office, established the initial Board of Directors, secured a location for a booth at the Lake County Fair, and this past weekend we attended the Health in the Park gathering at Clear Lake State Park, celebrating 150 years of the parks system. It was nice discussing CLERC with members of the local community. Everyone really seemed to like looking at the different types of cyanobacteria under the microscope and comparing the two buckets of water we brought, one from Library Park in Lakeport and the other from Redbud Park in Clearlake.

clerc_planning_summary_2.pdf
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Next weekend, Labor Day weekend, we will be at the Lake County Fair speaking with lots of people about what CLERC is trying to accomplish and hopefully generate some interest from people in volunteering. One of our major tasks over the next few months will be establishing standing committees for programs (research and education), fundraising, administrative, marketing, and facilities, which will all need volunteers to fill. We are also seeking volunteers to participate in the annual Clear Lake Clean Up Day event held on September 20.

Stay tuned for the next installment where I will let you know how the fair goes.

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Admin update

a message from the webmaster

My First Boat Ride on Clear Lake

the admin update

By Will Evans

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