Lake Tahoe is an easy place to love. It’s long been a destination for visitors beyond California, and it’s an important ecosystem.
But for decades, it’s been plagued by all kinds of environmental issues — from pollution to invasive species to warming waters brought on by climate change.
That’s why lawmakers, local leaders and others gather annually at the Tahoe Summit. The first happened in 1997, launched by the late senators Diane Feinstein and Harry Reid. The two lawmakers had seen Lake Tahoe’s water quality suffering and wanted to create a space for discussion about issues affecting the lake and possible solutions.
“Lake Tahoe waters were losing their famous clarity at an average rate of nearly a foot per year,” said California Democratic Senator Adam Schiff, who hosted this year’s summit. “Urban centers were decaying, and overstocked forests posed a profound fire threat. Many worried at the time that Lake Tahoe was at a worrying tipping point.”
This year marked the summit’s 29th anniversary. Alongside speeches about persistent environmental issues plaguing the lake, lawmakers and other leaders in attendance addressed one big factor hanging over all their work: Federal rollbacks.
Since President Donald Trump took office in January, people working in conservation and other environmental fields have seen all sorts of upsets — like pauses in critical funding, rescinded grants, and staffing cuts.
California Democratic Congressman John Garamendi, who attended the summit, described this as a big shift in priorities.
“Basically, the federal government appears to be backing out of not only Tahoe, but environmental restoration programs, forest restoration, water quality programs across the nation,” he said.
A growing divide
Since its inception, the Tahoe Summit has brought together both Democratic and Republican lawmakers invested in the lake’s future.
And those meetings have had an impact: Alongside the first summit came the launch of a multi-jurisdictional collaboration to protect the area known as the Environmental Improvement Plan.
This plan remains in place almost three decades later, and pulls together government agencies, the private sector, researchers and the Washoe Tribe of Nevada and California for projects to preserve Lake Tahoe’s environment and support local communities. The program has seen the completion of over 850 projects in the Tahoe area.
“The continued improvements we witness at Lake Tahoe are a testament to the dedication demonstrated by Nevada, California and the federal government,” said Nevada Republican Governor Joe Lombardo.
But this year, many of those in attendance spoke of a growing divide between the two parties over environmental issues.
“We are facing really the most radical retrenchment against the efforts to protect our planet, our environment, that the country’s ever seen,” said Schiff.
Federal rollbacks have already started to impact work around Lake Tahoe. Heather Segale, the education and outreach director for the UC Davis Tahoe Environmental Research Center, said her work relies heavily on work from AmeriCorps members and federal grants.
Both saw cuts earlier this year. Segale says this forced her to scramble and look for funding elsewhere.
“There are foundations and donors who are trying to fill the gap, but it's nothing like the federally funded programs that existed,” she said.
Lawmakers from California and Nevada supported the EXPLORE Act as one way to keep up funding for environmental work. It was passed in January and it’s aimed at supporting conservation projects and improving outdoor access nationwide.
Then, in June, that group of lawmakers sent a letter to the administration asking that funds from the EXPLORE Act be directed specifically to Tahoe conservation efforts.
Schiff was among the lawmakers who sent the letter. He said it was partially prompted by his own concerns about what he sees as the administration being more partisan when deciding where federal resources go.
“That is a terrible precedent,” Schiff said. “We don't want to be treating natural disasters or um efforts to protect against natural disasters on a partisan basis. We also don't want to just protect beautiful pristine places in some states, but not other states.”
Lawmakers also noted cuts to the U.S. Forest Service, which manages a majority of the land surrounding Lake Tahoe.
Nevada Democratic Senator Catherine Cortez Masto said the U.S. Forest Service has already reported 3,400 layoffs across the entire agency. This loss, she said, would hamper conservation and safety efforts in the region.
“If we want to fight for mitigation control, fuels reduction, fighting these fires, a healthy forest, protect the quality of the lake, we need all of our partners,” said Cortez Masto. “And that includes the Forest Service.”
Coming together
In the years since the first Tahoe Summit, the lake’s health has seen progress.
Segale says her center’s research shows that Lake Tahoe’s clarity tends to get worse in the summer. But in the winter, she’s found it’s actually improving. And although the lake’s clarity was getting worse in the nineties, she said it seems to have plateaued since then.
“So, all of the things that are being done for lake protection are having an effect,” she said.
In recent years, there’s also been more collaboration with the Washoe Tribe of Nevada and California, whose ancestral lands encompass the Tahoe area.
Washoe Tribal Chairman Serrell Smokey noted the importance of reimplementing the Tribe’s traditional practices and ecological knowledge when caring for the land. That includes the Indigenous practice of introducing fire to an area known as cultural burning, which can help clear overcrowded forests.
“We're a little overgrown right now,” Smokey said. “It looks beautiful, but the fires that have happened within recent years have proven that if another fire comes through here, we're not going to be able to stop it, and we have to use fire.”
And despite a growing division over environmental issues, attendees at the summit included both Democratic and Republican lawmakers.
Nevada Democratic Senator Jacky Rosen said drawing diverse support for the area is key to keeping conservation work going.
“Whether you're a Democrat, Republican, Independent, just a lover of Lake Tahoe, it's why we're here all together working to preserve this national treasure,” Rosen said. “And this, again, is the national model we should all work and strive for. It's how government should work.”
For researchers at places like the Tahoe Environmental Research Center, federal rollbacks have created a level of uncertainty that’s already impacting their work.
Alison Toy, manager of both the center’s education program and facilities, said she’s concerned about what funding will look like for the center’s projects moving forward. And without stable funding, it’s hard to plan long-term research.
She said that fact has, at times, made it hard to stay positive.
“You have to say goodbye to certain things that have been built up for a really long time,” Toy said.
But Toy is determined to keep pushing the center’s work forward anyway.
“I have a one-year-old daughter and so I don't think I'm allowed to lose hope,” she said. “I have to maintain hope because I have her, and so I need to make sure that we're doing all that we can to maintain the environment for her.”
