Property owners at the Lake of the Ozarks are upset over a recent Federal ruling.
Some property owners along the lake now frustrated after being notified that all or part of their homes, decks, gazebos and patios were built on land that belongs to Ameren Missouri’s Bagnell Dam and Osage hydroelectric project.
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission — the agency that regulates the lake, the dam and the hydroelectric plant — issued an order stating that all of the so-called nonconforming structures must be removed, complicating matters further.

St. Louis-based Ameren, has asked the federal agency to reconsider, at least with respect to the 1,200-plus residences in jeopardy. The utility, which manages the shoreline under federal oversight, wants to redraw the hydroelectric project boundary to exclude most, if not all, of the homes in danger.
Some blame the neighborhood’s developer; others, the title companies or the county. Many vent at Ameren. Almost universally, the shoreline restrictions are seen as massive overreach by the federal government. FERC has become a four-letter word.

St. Louis Today reported that while many affected homes were bought many years ago, at least one was constructed as recently as 2009.

Ameren, then known as Union Electric Co., created Lake of the Ozarks in 1931 when it completed the 2,500-foot Bagnell Dam impounding the Osage River. For the last 80 years, the 93-mile serpentine lake has been the reservoir for the Osage hydroelectric plant and has been transformed into one of the nation’s largest recreational lakes. The lake’s 1,150 miles of shoreline is longer than California’s coast, and dotted with numerous coves and inlets.

For 50 years, shoreline development was managed by the Army Corps of Engineers. In the 1980s, responsibility fell to Ameren.

The dam and plant are owned and operated by the utility under a license issued by FERC. The most recent 40-year operating license, issued in 2007, required a master plan to manage the lake and its shoreline in the face of continued development.

Broadly, the shoreline management plan aims to balance the public’s recreational interests with environmental protection and ensure development doesn’t interfere with the use of the lake for electricity generation.

The plan was a decade-long effort, going back to 2001 when Ameren first organized a team and began holding meetings to outline common goals. The coalition included county and state officials, homeowners associations, chambers of commerce, landowners, real estate agents, title companies and business leaders. The utility finally submitted a proposal to FERC in the spring of 2008.

The proposed shoreline plan makes clear that Ameren knew at the time that thousands of structures, some dating back 75 years or more, were built on utility land or easements. Some of the structures — homes, docks, gazebos and patios — were built before any restrictions or formal permitting procedures were in place. In other cases, they may have been improperly situated, the plan said.

Ameren proposed redrawing the project boundary to exclude as many structures — in particular homes and condos — as possible.

FERC spent more than two years evaluating the plan. On July 26, it issued a 28-page order approving the plan with one major change, requiring Ameren to remove the 4,000-plus structures that sit too close to the shoreline and within the boundary of the Bagnell Dam project. In most cases, the commission said they ‘should be removed in a timely manner and the site restored to pre-existing conditions.”

Ameren sought a rehearing last month, asking FERC to reconsider that piece of the 28-page order. It has asked to be given until 2013 to propose revisions to project boundaries.

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