Jill Robbins, a Lake Freeman homeowner, wears a sandwich board reading, 'Where's the water' during a Saturday, Oct. 3, 2020, rally in downtown Monticello aimed at getting federal regulators' attention over low water levels this summer. Staff photo by Dave Bangert
MONTICELLO – Susan Wagner, climbing the steps to the gazebo at the White County Government Center, looked over the 200 or so gathered Saturday afternoon on the plaza in downtown Monticello for what was billed as the Lake Level Rally.
“I don’t recognize hardly any of you without a boat, I’m sorry,” Wagner, owner of Susan’s Freeman Bay along Lake Freeman, said.
“I need you in your boat.”
The line brought a few laughs but more groans from a crowd who knew that getting to Wagner’s gas pumps and convenience store by water on the most southern of Monticello’s Twin Lakes has been impossible for much of the summer. As of Saturday, after a year of scant rain, the lake was down roughly seven feet, exposing docks and boat lifts and stranding a big chunk of the region’s summer economy.
If the landlocked faces, many behind masks during the pandemic, weren’t immediately recognizable, the simmering frustration in the crowd and among those called to the microphone was plenty familiar after months of fighting, without much luck, for the attention of federal regulators to address what they called a desperate situation.
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