Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, September 30, 1995 TAG: 9510020021
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: RON BROWN STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: BLUE RIDGE LENGTH: Long
On summer evenings, he could be seen picking up trash around the lake.
When its small beach got low on sand, he bought more.
Some homeowners remember him as a partner, who talked about his plans to build horse-riding and nature trails - and possibly, one day, another lake.
Those dreams ended in 1990 when Nininger died at age 84.
Nininger, a one-time Roanoke County school superintendent, left public education after 27 years to work in real estate and manage his family's properties.
"Everybody had a lot of respect for Mr. Nininger," said Rodger Reynolds, president of the newly formed Lake Forest Homeowners Association. "He had a love and interest in the lake. But since he died, his estate hasn't done any maintenance."
That has attracted the attention of state authorities, who say the earthen dam that retains the lake's water is unsafe.
Now, the attorney general's office is being asked to take legal action to force Nininger's estate to either drain the 35-year-old private lake or repair the dam.
Neither alternative would be cheap.
In a July 19 letter, Botetourt County building official J. Wayne Utt notified the lawyer for the Nininger estate, T.L. Plunkett, that an erosion and sediment plan must be submitted to the county.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has told homeowners that it would require assurances that sediment released from the lake would not hurt surrounding streams.
In order to make repairs, trees would have to be removed, roots and all. Care would have to be taken to shore up the dam where roots have dug through the dirt. The capacity of the dam's spillway also must be increased.
And those are just the hurdles that must be cleared before the lake's future can be decided.
The homeowners contend that draining the 3-acre lake is not an option, and they have hired a lawyer to protect their interests.
They argue that their deeds guarantee their right to have a lake in their subdivision. Advertisements used by Nininger to entice buyers showed a panoramic view of sunbathers on a lakeside beach with majestic mountains in the background.
County records show that about 60 of the subdivision's 92 lots are occupied.
"We have a legal, deeded right to the lake," said Allan Haga, vice president of the homeowners association. "I'm not sure it wouldn't be a violation of the law to drain the lake."
Both Reynolds and Haga said the homeowners have expressed a willingness to take over maintenance of the dam, if the Nininger estate will bring it up to state standards.
But they say that contact with Plunkett, the estate's attorney, has proved fruitless.
On Aug. 22, Reynolds said, he contacted Plunkett about the homeowners' taking control of the dam. He said Plunkett offered to meet with homeowners and help them in any way he could. But since then, Plunkett has not returned phone calls, Reynolds said.
The Roanoke Times contacted Plunkett's office Wednesday and Thursday. He did not return those phone calls, and a receptionist said Friday morning that he would not be in the office all day. He did not return a message left for him at his home Friday afternoon.
The problems with the dam came to the attention of state authorities in 1992. Dam safety officials on many occasions attempted to have Nininger's estate acquire the necessary safety certificates and have the dam inspected as required by state law.
Joseph S. Haugh, the state's chief of dam safety, said the dam should be inspected every two years. The state has no record of the dam ever having been inspected until this past spring, Haugh said.
The state has given the 33-foot dam a Class I rating, which means a loss of life is probable should the dam fail.
Haugh said the potential danger will come in the long term.
"It is not an imminent danger," he said.
The most troublesome problem is that the downslope of the dam is covered by trees, which could have their root balls blown out by windstorms or can die and rot, leaving a gaping hole in the dam's soil.
If the dam collapsed, nearly 15 million gallons of water could rampage down tiny Laymantown Creek.
With little progress being made, state inspectors, led by Haugh, checked out the dam in March, and found cracks in its concrete spillway and animal holes and burrows in the dam's upper side.
The dam's spillway does not have the capacity to withstand some floods, their report said. If the spillway couldn't handle the water, the creek could flow over the top of the dam, which contains only grass and no riprap - a wall of loose stones used to shore up the sides.
"If the water goes over the top, it is going to start eroding the soil," Haga said.
The Virginia Soil and Conservation Board last week authorized Haugh to contact the attorney general's office to begin legal action to force the dam into compliance. He said that letter should have gone out sometime this week.
If nothing is done, Haugh said, the state could have the problem corrected and bill Nininger's estate.
Wendy Wingo, who represents the Blue Ridge District on the Botetourt County Board of Supervisors, said the state report may be overstating the problem.
But Wingo said the dam should be brought up to standards.
Wingo, who lives in the subdivision, said the spillway has been adequate during heavy rainfalls that led to major flooding in other parts of the region.
She said the dam actually may have some flood control benefits.
Wingo said that the lake level typically does not rise significantly even during heavy rainfall.
She does have a safety concern about draining the lake
"As a county official, I would be concerned if any place was deprived of a water source in case of fire," she said.
Jim Ruhland, a state police investigations supervisor and chairman of the Botetourt County School Board, remembers helicopters swooping over the lake and collecting water on their way to forest fires.
When floods rampaged over U.S. 460 downstream in 1985, the dam held back a lot of the water, he said.
Still, Ruhland remembers a federal soil and conservation expert telling Nininger 12 years ago that the trees growing on the dam were going to cause problems.
"Even less maintenance has been done following his death," Ruhland said.
The state's push may cause that maintenance to get done now. Ruhland has no question about who's responsible for the bill.
"Certainly, whoever owns it should bring it up to state standards," he said. "It would devastate our neighborhood to let it go dry."
by CNB