Parts of Ohio are suffering from severe drought, but Akron has plenty of water in its reservoirs.
“We’re in good shape,” said Ray Flasco, acting water plant superintendent for the city. “The reservoirs are down a little bit, but we have an ample supply of water.”
Lake Rockwell, north of Kent in Portage County, is full, although LaDue and East Branch reservoirs in Geauga County are down, he said.
In fact, Lake Rockwell, a dammed section of the Cuyahoga River, actually is above capacity, he said.
That is possible because the city can install 18-inch wooden splashboards atop the dam, letting the city store more water in the 645-acre reservoir, Flasco said. The water is probably 12 to 13 inches up the boards, he said.
When filled, Lake Rockwell can hold 2.01 billion gallons of water. Its current capacity is 2.24 billion gallons, he said.
The other two reservoirs are down: LaDue is down 3 feet from full, and East Branch is down about 7 feet, Flasco said.
LaDue, at 1,477 acres, can hold 6.03 billion gallons when full. It currently holds 4.59 billion gallons, meaning the lake is 76.1 percent full.
He said 395-acre East Branch can hold 1.49 billion gallons and currently has about 590 million gallons. That means it is 39.6 percent full.
What Akron typically does is collect rain and snow melt in the reservoirs and slowly lower East Branch and LaDue through the summer to keep Lake Rockwell near capacity, Flasco said.
“That’s our normal way of operating,” he said. “So to have East Branch and LaDue down is not too unusual.”
Akron typically draws 34.66 million gallons a day from Lake Rockwell to provide water to its 300,000 customers in Akron and suburbs.
Akron is seeing algal blooms on Lake Rockwell that can affect taste and produce odors, but the problem is not severe, said Flasco, a retired Akron water employee who is now working for the city as a private contractor.
“We’re OK,” he said. “It has not been terrible algae. We’re getting normal algae levels.”
Algae will remain a concern into late fall, when temperatures start getting colder, he said.
Other reservoirs down
Other reservoirs in Northeast Ohio are down, in large part because of the drought.
Wingfoot Lake State Park in Portage County’s Suffield Township is down about 2 feet from normal summer levels, said Bruce Carpenter, a regional park manager with the Ohio Department of Natural Resources.
The boat ramps and docks are still usable, but park officials are keeping a close eye on water levels, he said.
Water levels in the Portage Lakes in southern Summit County are heavily managed to assure enough water, Carpenter said, and there have been no problems there.
That system also provides water to the Ohio & Erie Canal in Akron and the Tuscarawas River that flows to the south.
Berlin Reservoir on the Portage-Stark-Mahoning county line is 9 feet below its normal summer level, said spokesman Dan Jones of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in Pittsburgh.
Michael J. Kirwan Reservoir at West Branch State Park east of Ravenna is also down, by about 8.3 feet, he said.
Recent rains “helped some,” but the forecast is for the lake to drop slightly this week, Jones said.
Stumps and sandbars are starting to emerge at West Branch as the water level drops. Those could pose problems for boaters and anglers, Carpenter said.
“We’re starting to see things we don’t normally see this time of year,” he said.
Bob Downing can be reached at 330-996-3745 or bdowning@thebeaconjournal.com.