A former watershed director from the Finger Lakes said Tuesday that it is crucial to have the support of residents to enact rules and regulations for the protection of Otsego Lake's water quality.

"You have to have an enlightened, committed citizenry willing to do something. If you do, the municipalities will be responsive," said Peter Landre, Executive Director of Water Quality for the Yates County Cooperative Extension. Landre was instrumental in implementing Keuka Lake's septic system management program. He spoke to a joint meeting of the Otsego Lake Watershed Council and Supervisory Committee.

"Peter was in the trenches for the two years it took to convince the eight municipalities involved that new regulations were needed to better manage lakeside septic systems," said Otsego Lake Watershed Manager Win McIntyre.

Landre said it was his experience that residents around Keuka Lake saw great returns for little investment.

"People had the mentality that it's not just for themselves, but for future generations," Landre said.

Landre was invited to Tuesday's meeting to discuss his experiences with bringing together many different stakeholders to enact local regulations which were designed to regulate septic systems in the watershed.

People living in the watershed came to the realization that protecting the lake is a "forever proposition."

Landre said that there are six towns and two villages in two counties in the Keuka Lake watershed which had to come together before regulations could be put in place.

People, he said, recognized that pollution does not respect political boundaries. The municipalities around the lake benefited differently, but all realized that if the lake was to be protected some kind of collaboration was necessary.

The watershed council and supervisory committee have been talking about the need for new septic tank regulations for the Otsego Lake watershed.

"We're at a crossroads with where we need to go," said Joe Homberger, chairman of the supervisory committee.

"You're a lot further along than when I came on board. We didn't have a watershed management plan when I started, Landre said, adding that initially there was not a lot of trust between the municipalities around the Keuka Lake.

"We've certainly all covered a lot of that ground. I think we're above that now," said Homberger.

Municipalities around Keuka Lake recognized that in order for regulations to work, it they had to be uniform throughout the watershed. Those municipalities did not want to give up their home rule and when regulations were promulgated they included representation and oversight for those towns and villages. "Local control was not usurped by the county or state," Landre said.

"It all came down to public support," he said.

People understood they were all part of the problem and part of the solution, Landre said. It became a question of "If not now, when? If not us, who?"

Watershed Council chairman John Mitchell said the presentation reinforced for him the importance and value of the lake for drinking water, tourism and tax revenue. Tourism is an industry that benefits from the lake and schools and municipalities benefit from the tax revenue.

"It has been shown that when a lake goes bad, property values go down. When property values go down, the tax base goes down. If the lake goes bad, everybody suffers, not just the guy with a house on the lake," he said.

"We have covered a lot of ground," said Homberger, pointing to the first Otsego Lake watershed regulations put in place in 1985.

It is becoming increasingly apparent, he said, that those regulations need to be refined to bring them into conformity with today's state of the art watershed management.

The theme underlying all the discussion, Homberger said, is that "we're all in this together."