Lake Lanier dock permits

Always a huge controversy on Lake Lanier the Corp of Engineer is ready to annouce lottery winners for its last 174 dock permits.  As lake property owners already know properties are zoned red, yellow, and green for having a dock.  Those properties zoned red are no go for docks, yellow is possible but only through continued application, and green is zoned acceptable for a dock.  With Lake Lanier on the back side of its development the Corp of Engineers posted an open lottery for dock permits this year and residents are ready to see the results.  The result of this lottery come with mixed results but one fact is certain, your Lake Lanier property with a dock just became more valuable.  Contact Jeff Barnwell for more information on Lake Lanier properties for sale.

As written in the Forsyth County News:

 By Jennifer Sami
Staff Writer
POSTED  Nov. 2, 2009 11:05 a.m.

He has a lakefront property, a brand new home and a scenic view. Now all Joseph Aeschliman needs is his “boat sitting in the back of our house.”

But nearly two years after first trying to get a permit, Aeschliman is banking on lucky No. 4 — his place in a line to receive one of 174 remaining permits for docks on Lake Lanier.

About 280 people entered the lottery sponsored by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to set a priority order for reviewing qualifications.

“Being No. 4 tickles me to death,” said Aeschliman, a ForsythCounty resident. “With the lake coming up as far as it’s come up, this couldn’t be better.

“It’s just with the moratorium now up, we’ve probably got a really good chance of getting one now.”

The corps stopped issuing permits two years ago when the drought began drying up the lake. Earlier this year, after the lake’s elevation began rising because of a wet winter and spring, the corps released the moratorium and set up the lottery.

The lake reached full pool of 1,071 feet above sea level last month for the first time in four years.

Tim Rainy, corps spokesman, said the unofficial lottery results must be verified and posted online for 30 days.

Requests will be reviewed in the order determined by Wednesday’s drawing. Appointments will then be set so the corps can “meet with those people and if everything seems appropriate, we’ll provide them with applications.”

“They have 90 days to turn in those applications,” he said. “Once they send in the application, it’s just a matter of processing the applications and paperwork … that’s usually turned around anywhere from two to four weeks.”

Rainy said there still is hope for those whose names were drawn at 175 or further back.

There’s a chance some of the first 174 applicants might not return their application within 90 days or their request could be denied due to environmental restrictions or other reasons, he said.

It’s also possible those with numbers before 174 may not get a permit after community dock applications are reviewed and accepted. Community docks, he said, are done on a two-for-one basis.

“So if the permit is for a 20-slip community dock, that will actually take … 10 permits,” he said. “So 10 permits will be gone before we get to [the next] applicant.”

Ernest Noe, chief ranger with the corps at Buford Dam, said the application and paperwork for the permit carry an assortment of fees.

Noe estimated the entire process could take about a year to complete.

“Until we issue that last permit, we’ll keep that list valid,” he said.

Audrey Schudy, who came in at 128th in the lottery, is excited there’s a chance she can have a permit when she moves into her new home. But she is cautiously optimistic, knowing the lottery was just the first step.

While she said others who have tried in the past to no avail may disagree, the lottery is “the fairest way they can probably do it.”

This was Schudy’s first time applying for a permit.

“I’m happy because we’ve been told they’re not going to release any more permits, so this is kind of the first and last chance, I guess,” she said.