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December 3, 2004
Tecopa Springs eternal conflict
By ROBIN FLINCHUM Although many expected protests of some kind by bathers who object to new policies implemented by California Land Management, the morning passed peacefully, said local site manager Ruth Harper. About 25 people had come into the office to pay their fees and receive their daily pass armbands without complaint, Harper said. The deputies left Tecopa at about 10:30 a.m. While many local residents have expressed consistent outrage at Inyo County's decision to lease the baths to the private company, one woman said she had decided not to participate in or encourage active protests at the bathhouses. "I'm not going to bring war paint to a healing place," said Glynn Hazlett of Tecopa. "A vigil or a prayer circle maybe, but no war paint." Hazlett added that other avenues of protest were being pursued and that she had hopes that the three newly elected Inyo County supervisors would be willing to reconsider the hot springs question once they assume their seats in January. Meanwhile, the changes imposed by California Land Management effective Monday were not as drastic as some had feared. Though the company originally proposed a monthly camping fee of more than $300, the rate now stands at $205, a $45 increase from the county rate. "I can live with that," said Wes White, a senior who spends several months each winter in the Tecopa campground. White says he was disappointed in the lack of county supervision and management that led to the need for bringing in a private concessionaire, but that he was pleased by the improvements the private firm was making. "A lot of people were upset by this and aren't coming back this year," White said. "I wasn't going to but I came over for a day to check it out and the rates weren't as bad as I thought they would be." White said the campground is only about one-third as full as it would normally be by this time of the year. The campground fee includes use of the pools, but local residents or visitors must pay the $5 per day or purchase a $150 annual pass. "One woman I know that lives here brought her kids to take showers and baths. There's five of them, multiply that by $150 and I don't know how she could do it," White said. The ones hardest hit, White said, were those who depended upon the water for the relief of physical ailments and who live on fixed incomes. The other major change implemented by California Land Management is that the pools are now closed at 9 p.m. each night and reopen at 6 a.m. In the past, the pools were open 24 hours per day. The baths also remain sex segregated and nude only, according to tradition. A new "1 Hour Parking" sign on the bath houses is not intended as a strict limit, but rather to discourage overnight parking, Site Manager Harper says. She says these policies will remain in effect for the foreseeable future and the firm also plans to open a camp store possibly in the next month or two. Harper said misinformation about new park policies was one of the many challenges facing the company in its new position at the hot springs park. "I wish people would just call us and ask about things instead of listening to gossip," she said. In their efforts to improve the site, company workers have encountered a variety of challenges, including harsh weather, flooding, and an environmental misstep that caught public attention last week. Concerns over the new management of the hot springs park heated up last week when bath patrons said they witnessed employees of the California Land Management Corporation dumping surplus paint into a water runoff drain that partially empties into a nearby area of critical environmental concern called Grimshaw Lake. Photos of the paint-stained drain cover and an account of the paint dumping were posted on a website maintained by the Hummingbird Family Resource Center. The center's site charges the new owner with "routinely polluting Tecopa wetlands_" but California Land Management officials say the incident was isolated and a mistake. "That kind of thing wouldn't be tolerated anywhere we operate," said Red Wood, the company's Coarse Gold-based general site manager. Wood said that, after finishing work painting one of the Tecopa bathhouses, a company employee cleaned his brushes and rollers in a can of water. Then, he made a "less than wise decision" and dumped that water down the runoff drain. "He has been advised not to do that any more," Wood said. He added that, after seeing the resource center's report on the Internet, the company investigated the incident, filed a report with Inyo County, and held a meeting with their Tecopa employees to discuss the proper disposal of "anything other than drinking water." Wood said the paint was water based. Kathy Nixon, an Inyo County employee who has worked with the Tecopa sewage pond and water supply for several years, says the water flows from the drain in question at a rate of 225 gallons of spent water per minute, with 324,000 gallons a day flowing through the drainage ditch. At that rate, Nixon said, if any paint were poured into the drain, it would have been diluted with 13,500 gallons of water within the hour. Brad Mastin, Bureau of Land Management Recreation Officer who deals with the Tecopa area, said an isolated incident would probably not have any serious consequences for the Grimshaw Lake area. "But what we worry about is the cumulative effect of small, repetitive actions that may seem like they'd have a mild impact." Mastin said he was glad to hear that California Land Management had informed the county of the incident, but that the Bureau of Land Management would also check into it. Officially, the Tecopa Hot Springs property belongs to the federal government and is leased to Inyo County, which in turn recently leased the property to California Land Management. Most of the surrounding land, including the Grimshaw Lake riparian habitat that receives much of the bathhouse runoff water, is still managed by the BLM. |
