When Temple resident Tim Cedar came home from being out of town recently, the 79-acre lake that his home had previously overlooked was no longer there.

Trestle Creek Run Reservoir, the private lake that about 15 homes in the Ivey Lake subdivision surround, was recently the focus of a failed investigation by city officials after a large-scale fish kill was found shortly after the September floods. Temple officials informed EPD after the dead fish were discovered — some reportedly as large as 20 pounds — and tested the water for everything from sewage to oils and greases, but found no elevated levels in any of the tests to indicate what was killing the fish. The investigation ended there because the lake was on private property.

“The only thing the city got involved with is that we have utilities that are in proximity to the lake so we wanted to make sure we didn’t impact that lake causing the fish kill,” Public Works Director Sam Russell said. “We wanted to rule that out and if it was us we wanted to take corrective measures, but it wasn’t. It’s not a city-owned lake, so it’s a private homeowner matter.”

When he found the lake empty, Cedar asked around and couldn’t find anybody at the city or county level who knew anything about the lake being drained. However, through researching the property tax records he found that the dam is on property owned by Willard Strickland on Taylors Gin Road.

“I like to think people do things for good, but then I started thinking that whoever put the contaminates into the lake pulled the plug because they were trying to hide what they did wrong,” Cedar said.

Strickland, whose home is not in the city limits, said he did open the dam on his property, releasing the water in Trestle Creek Run Reservoir, but not because of the contaminants. He said the sole reason for draining the lake was a build-up of debris that was threatening the dam. Though he said he didn’t need permission to open the dam’s valve because it was on his property, Strickland said he called several agencies in Carroll County to inform them of his plans but never received a return phone call.

“We called everybody and nobody came out to check it because nobody was concerned,” he said.

Russell said he remembers someone coming into City Hall to ask about draining the lake, but he informed them he couldn’t advise them one way or the other because it wasn’t a city-owned lake.

“I told them I didn’t know what there next move should be, but the City of Temple doesn’t have any jurisdiction over that lake,” he said.

Strickland, who has been living in his home on the lake nearly 60 years, said he isn’t sure who built the dam that created the lake, but that the dam was built on his property after he moved into his home and the lake has been drained and filled back up several times over the years.

“It’s what you call a watershed lake,” he said. “It wasn’t built for fishing; It was built for flood control. Before the lake was built I’d seen the water get up against my house.”

Strickland added that he’s not concerned with flooding now that the lake has been drained because it serves the same purpose with the dam open as it does closed.

“There isn’t but so much water that comes through,” he said. “Now, there’s so much debris around it that could stop it up. If there comes another rain like it did last time and its gets stopped up, it could break that dam very easy.”

Strickland said his opening the dam had nothing to do with the dead fish in the lake, but his opinion is that sewage in the lake killed the fish even though the city’s tests showed no elevated levels of fecal coliform they said would have been present if sewage had been spilled into the lake.

“It smelled so terrible at my house and my nephew’s house that lives close to me,” Strickland said. “You couldn’t hardly stand it.”

Strickland attended a meeting with the Ivey Lake homeowners Monday night to discuss the issue and the reason behind his opening the valve to drain the lake. Once the issues were discussed, the property owners agreed to clean the lake if Strickland would reopen the valve to fill the lake.

“Everything worked out good,” Strickland said after the meeting. “Everybody is trying to get things worked out and we’re going to get it cleaned up.”

Cedar said several helpers in the neighborhood are going to clean the lake out on Saturday morning and he’s just glad the issue has been taken care of for the good.

“I was just shocked that somebody had that much control over something like that,” he said of the experience. “I made several calls and nobody really knows is what it comes down to. I don’t blame him really, but from my side of the fence it’s just shocking to look out there and see that it’s not there. I was really excited, but I think we’ve got it taken care of.”