Tagged: Great Salt Lake

The public turns out in droves to discuss the Sugar House Streetcar, Great Salt Lake Minerals is scaling back their expansion plans, and the Medicaid Community Workgroup meets at the capitol for the first time.

Utah’s Attorney General calls for an investigation into the bribery allegations brought against him, KUER’s Bob Nelson goes shrimping on the Great Salt Lake, and Utah schools see the lowest participation in the free breakfast program in the nation.

The Great Salt Lake occasionally smells strange during the summer and then there’s the “lake effect” in the winter. But within the waters of North America's most salty lake lies a unique variety of brine shrimp species that has spawned a rare public/private partnership between the Utah Department of Natural Resources and more than a dozen businesses.

The Utah Division of Water Quality has begun a long-term project to set new pollution standards for the Great Salt Lake.  The lake contains significant levels of toxic pollutants such as arsenic, lead, selenium and mercury, among other things.  Jeff Ostermiller, the chief of the Water Quality Management Section at the division, says some of that comes from industries surrounding the lake.  But he says there are many other sources as well, including urban runoff from streets along the Wasatch Front.