Inks Lake drawdown starts Oct. 1
Inks Lake will be lowered by about 8 feet for eight weeks starting in October 2025 to allow for flood damage repair and maintenance. Pictured is Devil’s Waterhole on Inks Lake at Inks Lake State Park. File photo
The Lower Colorado River Authority will lower Inks Lake by about 8 feet this fall so property owners can work on docks, boat slips, and other shoreline structures like retaining walls; dredge up to 2,000 cubic-yards of material; and remove debris from the lake and shoreline.
The drawdown will begin on Oct. 1, with the lake being lowered by about a foot a day. The lake will be at its fully lowered level of 879 to 879.5 feet above mean sea level by Oct. 9. The refill will begin Nov. 24 and conclude on Nov. 28.
Inks Lake was last lowered in 2020.
The LCRA currently does not plan to lower any of the other pass-through lakes, such as Lake Marble Falls, Lake LBJ, and Lake Austin, in 2025. The next opportunity for a routine drawdown will be the fall of 2026, and the river authority will make a determination about which lakes, if any, will be lowered next year based on conditions at that time.
In the past, the LCRA has lowered lakes for shoreline maintenance and dock repair between January and February but now performs drawdowns in the fall to ensure hydroelectric generators at the dams can be fully operational in the winter, when electricity use can rise dramatically.
Floods or power emergencies could change or cancel the drawdown to pass water through the Highland Lakes. Property owners should not leave equipment unattended in the lakebed and should remove tools from the shoreline when not in use.
To lower Inks Lake, the LCRA will release about 5,000 acre-feet of water through the hydroelectric generator at Inks Dam. The water will flow downstream through lakes LBJ and Marble Falls into Lake Travis, causing Lake Travis to rise about 3½ inches.
Without additional rainfall, the water to refill Inks Lake will be released from Lake Buchanan, causing the lake to fall slightly less than 3 inches.
- For dock repairs: No permit or registration is required, but work must meet LCRA’s Safety Standards for Residential Docks on the Highland Lakes.
- For other work: Property owners must register projects at www.lcra.org/lakelowerings before beginning maintenance dredging, up to 2,000 cubic-yards, and repairs on retaining walls, boat slips, and boat ramps under LCRA’s Army Corps of Engineers Lakewide Permit. The permit notice provided at LCRA.org must be displayed in a visible location at the worksite.
- Deadline: All work should be completed by Nov. 28, when the refill concludes.
New construction must meet the requirements of the Highland Lakes Dredge and Fill Ordinance.
The registration form and Lakewide Permit Notice are available:
- online at www.lcra.org/lakelowerings
- by calling LCRA Water Quality Protection at 512-578-2324
Burning debris in the lakebed is not allowed. For more information, visit www.lcra.org/lakelowerings.
The LCRA is a joke!
They need to get off their tails and spend some time on Buchanan. It’s always take, take, take from Lake Buchanan. When was the last time they did anything positive for the folks living on or around Buchanan?
The LCRA marketing machine touts themselves as stewards of the water. Ha. They are essentially a socialist organization playing Monarch or dictator over the serfs of Lake Buchanan. Their arrogance knows no bounds.
For once let’s see them do something constructive for Lake Buchanan.
1. Set that dredge upriver around the Tow area and start removing years upon years of silt and debris clogging up the mouth of Buchanan. There is tons of silt and debris all up and down the lake from Garrett Island North.
2. Give every LCRA employee a bonus for every dangerous stump they remove, tree cut that has grown up over the past few years to endanger boaters and shoreline debris brought in for disposal. For the past few years it has been crickets out of the LCRA. When Buchanan was down about 20 feet there were thousands of stumps begging for an LCRA steward to remove it from the dry shoreline before it potentially killed people.
The LCRA requirement for permits, registrations, ordinances and then for you to get on your knees and beg is a joke. Why should anyone on Lake Buchanan bow down to King Wilson or Court Jester Hofmann after the Buchanan damage and turning a blind eye?
Now the Burnet County Judge, Commissioners and others are voting themselves yet another raise? What is our county and state devolving to? How long are those paying the salaries of these people going to be fleeced? What does it say about county employees that keep giving themselves a raise time and time again?
We need to rise up and hold the LCRA accountable for YEARS of mismanagement and while we are at it Burnet County for the same types of embarrassments (if not worse) caused upon our beloved county by previous “leaders”. Rubber stamping what is now $35,000,000+ of spending for years by commissioners and other employees needs to stop now! Learn to live within your means!
We all need to share in cleaning these messes up. Inks, LBJ, Marble Falls, Travis & Austin should be made to share in the pain when our droughts hit. Imagine the gnashing of teeth if ALL of the Highland Lakes had to mirror the percentage to full of Lake Buchanan!