ABOVE: Jane Koloffski and Jesse Borman stand near the remnants of a boat house found in Budd Lake in Fairmont during the Fairmont Lakes Foundation’s annual clean up, which took place on May 7. This Saturday, the Fairmont Lakes Foundation will hold its Spring Fishing Tournament. Submitted photo.

FAIRMONT- The Fairmont Lakes Foundation is in the midst of its busiest period of the year. The local nonprofit had its annual spring lake cleanup on May 7 and will host its spring fishing tournament on Saturday.

The tournament will be held at Gomsrud Park and has openings for 50 boats with teams of two participants each. Proceeds from the event will go towards the foundation’s restoration work.

The National Weather Service currently predicts Saturday’s weather to be sunny with a high near 71. Food and beverages will be catered by the Martin County Pork Producers.

The cost for entry is $30 per person or $60 per boat. Unlike the contest held earlier this year, the event will not feature any equipment prizes, but cash prizes will range up to $500 regardless of the number of registrants. Payback will be for 10 panfish and four walleye. The foundation will also hold separate contests for biggest walleye and biggest yellow bass which each have an additional entry fee of $10.

The tournament’s rules meeting will be held at 6:30 a.m. and the contest itself will run from 7 a.m. until weigh in at 1 p.m.

This year’s spring lake cleanup attracted approximately 135 volunteers made up of 15 foundation members and 120 congregants from Grace Lutheran Church. The event was originally scheduled to be held on May 6 but was delayed one day so that it would coincide with the church’s God’s Grace is Amazing Day when church members would be available to volunteer. In less than three hours volunteers removed around 100 bags of garbage, leaves and other debris from Sylvania, Ward and Gomsrud Parks.

“Many hands make light work and the parks department is busy enough so it’s good for us to get out and be seen and do things that are good for our community,” said Jim Utermarck, a member of the foundation’s board.

Utermarck also said he hopes this year’s partnership with the church will pave a way for future collaboration. On May 19 members of the Fairmont football team will collaborate with the foundation for an additional clean up and Utermarck expressed an interest in holding another cleanup event this fall.

“I think that’s good for the clean up. It was awesome to have the help from Grace Lutheran and I hope we can keep that connection with them,” said Utermarck.

Utermarck also hopes next year the foundation can have additional boats available to help with the clean up.

Outside of these events the foundation has resumed its kayak rentals with some changes to the program. This year kayaks will be rented at the Shell gas station at the intersection of Lair Road and Albion Avenue.

Additionally the foundation has been in communication with the city of Fairmont, the Martin County Soil and Water Conservation District and the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources regarding the possibility of planting additional vegetation along shorelines. Like earlier vegetation planted by the foundation, this could help filter out runoff and other waste that’s washed into the lakes from city streets. The organization is looking for property owners interested in having vegetation installed near their coastlines and is also searching for more feedback and proposals from the community at large.

“I would like our shareholders, whoever’s a shore owner, whoever’s a boater, whoever’s a fisherman to give us ideas for what they would like to see the lakes foundation do. We can sit there and say ‘this is what we’re going to do’ but if people who use the lake don’t want us to do that it’s kind of a moot point,” said Utermarck.