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05/19/2007$35,000 fine is blasted as 'absurd' by green groups
A bulldozer moves soil behind the Cherry Tree Inn in November 2006. TRAVERSE CITY — Area environmental groups call a $35,000 fine against the Cherry Tree Inn and Suites for sending a bulldozer into Lake Michigan a "slap on the wrist.” Last Thanksgiving weekend a bulldozer went up to 122 feet into East Bay, where it dredged and moved large quantities of Great Lakes bottomlands, state and federal officials said. A fine negotiated between the inn and federal and state regulators is woefully inadequate, some local environmentalists said. "The fine is an absurd amount; it should be in six figures, easy, for the destruction they did to those wetlands,” said John Nelson, baykeeper for the Watershed Center Grand Traverse Bay. The Cherry Tree Inn, located north of Traverse City off U.S. 31 in a corner of the bay identified as a natural wetlands area, is owned by Omni Hospitality of Medina, Ohio. "The bulldozing went far beyond the boundaries of both federal and state laws,” said Northern Michigan Environmental Action Council board member Gregory Reisig. "Any fine less than $100,000 is nothing more than a slap on the wrist and will not discourage future violations.” Omni attorney Joseph Quandt of Traverse City said the $35,000 penalty is significant. "You have to go a long way to find a wetlands violation where a $35,000 penalty was assessed,” Quandt said. Quandt said that under the settlement agreement negotiated with the Army Corps of Engineers and Michigan Department of Environmental Quality, Omni will pay the fine to the DEQ, replant a portion of the shoreline with native wetland vegetation, and remove invasive vegetation from public lands, starting with a nearby road end at Four Mile Road that is used as a park. "That should take them about 20 minutes,” Nelson said. "There's some (invasive vegetation) there, but not very much.” Quandt said Cherry Tree Inn officials probably also will do some work on additional public lands. The hotel's previous ownership also committed environmental violations at the site, but Army Corps of Engineers spokeswoman Lynn Duerod said it was the first violation since Omni took ownership, so the Corps' policy is to not levy a fine. The agreement allows the hotel to maintain 150 feet of beach, but its officials are responsible for replanting the balance of its 400 feet of bay frontage. Watershed Center representatives unsuccessfully tried to both have a seat at the negotiating table and to oversee the restoration work, but were rebuffed by state and federal regulators. Nelson has been critical of Omni consultant Civil & Environmental Consultants Inc., after the company said 95 percent of the disturbed area suffered no significant impact. Nelson said the Watershed Center would have put together a team that included leading experts on Great Lakes wetlands to oversee the restoration. "Instead, they'll use a company out of Columbus (Ohio) that doesn't know a Great Lakes wetland from a reservoir,” he said. But Quandt said Omni's consulting firm is a well-qualified contractor with extensive experience working in the Great Lakes. Restoration work is scheduled to begin next week. "There's not much to do now. It's destroyed, and the Army Corps and the DEQ will allow them to keep it that way,” Nelson said.
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