In the last decade, residents along Lake Erie have noticed the waters appeared in better shape than in the industrial era of the 1960s and 1970s. A report issued last week, however, has put a damper on those assumptions.

Co-sponsored by the U.S. and Canadian governments, the report calls the condition of our Great Lake “poor and unchanging.” While the document highlighted no problems with drinking water and swimming in the lake, there were other concerns noted.

In habitat and species, coastal wetlands are poor for fish and plants, fair for amphibians and birds. “Most of the wetlands in lakes Erie and Ontario have degraded plant communities as a result of nutrient enrichment, sedimentation, invasive species, past water level regulation or combinations of these factors,” according to the report. Also spotlighted are the “poor” nutrients and algae category with harmful algae blooms are often formed from nutrient concentrations in the western basin.

Overall, Lake Erie is the only one of the five Great Lakes listed in the report as poor. Lakes Huron and Superior are assessed as “good” while Lakes Michigan and Ontario are called “fair.”

These are not the conclusions this area had been hoping to read. Lake improvements, while noticeable over 50 years, still fall short of where they need to be. It’s an environmental issue that cannot be ignored.