On Saturday, Utah State University professors and graduate students presented the preliminary results of a six-month research study on the impacts of increased tourism at Bear Lake on ecosystems and communities at Garden City Hall. The study conducted by USU’s College of Humanities and Social Sciences included interviews with over 40 different scientists, Bear Lake community members, and nonprofit representatives.
Over 40,000 people visit Bear Lake in Rich County each weekend, with the number of tourists rapidly increasing in recent years. The study findings show that both the ecosystems of Bear Lake and its residents have been significantly affected by increased tourism. Researchers are urging residents to make their voices heard to protect both their community and the lake.
The communities have historically been extremely tight knit. One graduate student who took part in conducting the study, Alex Theophilus, analyzed the interviews of residents. He said they all expressed concerns about losing the closeness of the community due to increased housing costs, short-term rentals, and development that comes with the millions of visitors the lake receives each year.
"People are really passionate about the community,” Theophilus said. “A lot of people have really long-time, long-standing connections to Bear Lake. So, they are excited about bringing their kids here, their grandkids here, keeping traditions going. They obviously want to make sure that a high quality of life is continued for people here.”
Researchers asked residents questions about general well-being, including what contributes to quality of life, what makes their community good or bad, how the population has shifted, and what environmental issues they perceive the lake to be facing. The results show that short-term rentals and increased housing costs have not just affected the housing market, but also the quality of life for residents.
"A lot of people brought up how they don’t feel like they have the same connection to their neighbors anymore because people are just constantly changing out, and there's kind of just a constant stream of people who are maybe just here for a weekend or a couple of nights,” Theophilus said.
Betsy Brunner, a USU professor of communication studies, who helped conduct the study, said interviews with various scientists showed one of the biggest environmental issues facing the lake is water quality. Plastic nanoparticles are affecting the lake’s water quality, leading to harmful algal blooms, and the lake is slowly losing its ability to clean itself, leading to sediment build-up.
"Bear Lake’s unique water composition allows a self-cleaning function. But if you keep putting sediment in the lake, it messes that up, right?” Brunner said. “It doesn’t allow the lake to do this really cool thing that it can do."
Increased tourism, along with decreasing snowpack and snow events, has also affected water quantity, Brunner said. Certain Bear Lake fish species need specific water levels to lay their eggs and hatch them. If the water levels keep rising and falling, this could severely affect fish populations.
Interviewed scientists said there are various stakeholders who can affect the lake. Brunner said residents can participate in citizen science, business owners can take actions to reduce the amount of plastic that ends up near or in the lake, education efforts for tourists can be made to teach them how to recreate responsibly in the area, water managers and water rights users can be educated on water levels necessary for wildlife, and housing developers can be more cognizant of the sewer systems they are putting into place.
“We have the opportunity to save Bear Lake, it is not too late,” Brunner said. “We just need to start yesterday.”
The first step in addressing these challenges, according to Jessica Schad, a professor in the Department of Sociology, is to plan. The study's main goal was to create data that could lead to collaborative efforts to address concerns surrounding Bear Lake, she said.
“Residents are very concerned about environmental, but also social change that is happening up here," Schad said. “There's a lot of people who care and want to preserve the sense of place and sense of community, and so bringing people together to just talk about these issues and think about long-term planning will be really important as we go forward.”
According to Garden City resident and vice president of local nonprofit Bear Lake Watch, Claudia Cottle, the first step to creating change was Saturday’s event.
"These are the same conversations we've been having for years,” Cottle said. “But this pulls it together, puts it on paper, and makes us legitimate."
Another long-time resident of Garden City, Paul Webb, said the results of the study resonated with him.
“With the growth of the Wasatch Front, growing as fast as it is, to expect that we're not going to be hugely impacted, is probably pretty naive on our part,” Webb said. “I don't know how we can keep our little community, a little community anymore, because it's just the nature of the beast.”
Garden City resident Claudia Conder said she would like visitors to be more aware of their impact.
“Just be cognizant of the environment that you are in and appreciate the beauty and what we have here and try and preserve that and keep it that way," Conder said.
