Pumping required to reduce high water levels along White Lake Road

PENTICTON – Water levels are rising and surface water continues to pool in the White Lake and Willowbrook areas.

On White Lake Road, 21 kilometres south of Penticton, the regional district is working with the owners of St. Andrews Golf Course to reduce high water levels at Prather Lake.

With no natural outlet for the lake, which is already at high water levels, the province recently ordered a reduction in the water levels on the lake. Water from Prather Lake will be pumped into Kearns Creek, which has been flooding downstream in Willowbrook and is already under a state of local emergency.

The regional district reported yesterday, April 4, the controlled pumping of Prather Lake will offer protection to all homes in the watershed by preventing uncontrolled or emergency pumping later this spring, after the snowpack melts.

A section of Carr Crescent in Willowbrook is also being removed to allow water to move freely downstream.

At higher elevations in the region, reports of Twin Lake pumping water into Park Rill Creek are unfounded.

Twin Lakes resident and Lower Nipit Improvement District administrator Coral Brown says she’s heard rumours that the flooding in Willowbrook is the result of pumping operations to reduce water levels in Twin Lakes.

“The Twin Lake pump was removed in 2017 for repairs and the pump is still not in the lake,” she says.

She says residents in the Twin Lake area expect to see flooding this year.

“So far, the lakes are still frozen and there is no surface water running from the high country of Horn Creek,” she says.

An up-to-date map locating sand and sandbag locations can be found at this regional district website.

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