Lake Delton dyed blue after residents thought water looked bad

CREATED Jul. 27, 2012

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  • Todd Hicks reports Video by tmj4.com

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LAKE DELTON- A big change at a well-known lake.

The home of the Tommy Bartlett's Water Ski show is now a blue-green color.

500 gallons of blue dye were dumped into it.

Residents requested it because they thought the water looked bad before.

The beautiful blue water of Lake Delton is stirring up quite a controversy after it gets a cosmetic makeover.

"It's basically a cosmetic treatment of the lake  by putting blue dye, which is harmless to anything," said Thomas Diehl a Village of Lake Delton Board of Trustees.

Liquid coloring turned the popular lake from a murky pea green to a brilliant blue.  It has some people who live there like Joan Smoke mad.

"It's not nice to fool mother nature," said Smoke.

Smoke was not only worried about the environmental impact, but the $30,000 used to fund the dye job.

"It's got a significant price tag attached to it," said Smoke.  "And yet it's not solving the problem, it's measly covering it up."

The dye only lasts two weeks to a month.  A short term fix some say hides the lakes real problem, algae from polluted runoff.  Village Board Trustee Thomas Diehl who approved the dye job stands by his decision.

"We were at the village getting a lot of complaints from resort owners and users of the lake they were losing business because people didn't want to swim in it," said Diehl.

The state confirmed it has received a handful of complaints about the lake dye job and is looking into it.

Diehl says village leaders are just looking out for the lively hoods of businesses still impacted after this disaster in 2008 -- when a dam gave way, draining the entire lake.

And while there is money left to do a second dye job on this lake, right now village officials say they're not sure if that will happen.