SUN JOURNAL • October 15, 2023
For more than two years high water levels in Tripp Pond, also known as Tripp Lake, have flooded and damaged properties, leaving docks underwater, eroding and washing away beaches and opening the possibility of septic systems leaching untreated sewage into the lake. Some residents say they are considering lawsuits to help pay for the damage. Despite a second consecutive summer of high water and flooding, members of the Tripp Lake Improvement Association insisted the water levels were “dangerously low” and took extreme measures to ensure water levels remained elevated. The disagreement between those who view the water as too high and those who see it as too low has erupted into a fight over the lake’s health, erosion of long-standing beaches and whether the lake’s improvement association overstepped its bounds by installing bladders to dam the water without landowner permission. State environmental officials were forced to step in.