The Metro Parks crew trying to pull a submerged car out of Wapato Lake stopped Wednesday afternoon to come up with a better plan.

They’d towed a dock to the beach near the car. They had a Bobcat on shore. They had a sturdy chain with a hook at the end. And they had Josh Azinger in a rowboat, trying to hook the car visible about a yard under the surface.

They did not have a swimmer in the water, which the Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department is monitoring. Until July 25, the lake had been unsafe for fishing or swimming because of toxic algae. Since then, it’s been unsafe for swimming because a treatment intended to bind phosphates in the water and carry them to the lake bed went horribly awry. A contractor pumped the wrong mix of alum solution and sodium aluminate into the lake on July 25. On July 26, the lake was perfectly clear, except for thousands of dead fish.

The park district is working on correcting the chemical balance in the lake, and it’s removing all the detritus that became visible in the overnight clarification. It has sent people out in boats to snag bikes, shopping carts, televisions, skateboards and trash cans.

“Last week, that fellow over there came up with a prosthetic leg,” Tony Council said, pointing at Azinger.

Maybe it was a mannequin leg, Azinger said later. Either way, it was creepy.

The car has been the big mystery, Council said. He and his son, Tamar, 10, have been waiting to see it come out of the water. Tamar is an auto enthusiast with an encyclopedic knowledge of car parts.

Around 11 a.m. Wednesday, Azinger hooked the bumper, the Bobcat pulled, and something white shot to the water’s surface.

“They got the bumper,” Council said.

“That’s a Honda. It looks like a Honda,” Tamar said of the foam bumper liner.

On the next pull the slimy bumper cover came out, complete with Oregon license plate ZUM 409, renewed in November, 2005. Tamar was right. It was a Honda, apparently white. Crew boss David Horstman phoned the license number in to the police so it could be traced.

Among the spectators, Jim Guthrie and Bonni Parker wondered how the car got so far out in the lake, sideways from the shore with doors and windows closed.

Years ago, when the lake froze, teens would drive on it, Guthrie said. But the lake hasn’t frozen lately.

Perhaps, they thought, someone stole the car, gunned it toward the lake, jumped out and slammed the door, and the car floated for a while.

Crew member Eric Johnson hoped no one got lost and drove in.

The Bobcat backed up, and the chain went slack.

“Well, they lost the hook,” said freelance videographer Tito Brown.
They’d bent it earlier, and reshaped it. Now it was just gone.

Time for lunch, and a better idea, Horstman said.

The Health Department might okay the lake for swimming, and someone could snorkel down to the car. A towing company might have better equipment. Someone else might have a better idea. But keeping a crew trying in vain all day would be a waste of taxpayer money.

Horstman will let us know when they try again, and we’ll let you know.

Let’s call it Word on the Water today.

I’ve been at Wapato Park this morning, watching a Metro Parks crew try to pull a long-submerged car out of the lake. They’ve broken for lunch and expect to be back on the job around 1 p.m. It’s interesting, amusing and mildly exciting. I mean, how often, outside of the movies, do you get to see a mystery car pulled out of the water?

If you’re having a lazy afternoon and can break away, the action’s by the bath house off of Sheridan and South 72nd St.

This car came to light, literally, when a park district contractor doused the lake with an alum solution to trap algae-friendly phosphates in the sediment on the bottom.

The first thing the dump did was kill all the carp in the lake. Next it cleared the algae out of the water, giving the lake a lovely tropical clarity. For the first time in years, you could see everything all the way down to its 12-foot maximum depth.

Spotters found bikes, televisions, shopping carts, a plastic leg, and, near the bath house, the car.

The Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department has a no-swimming order on the lake. That means the crew has to get it out without sending anyone into the water to attach the chain. That’s a problem, because the doors are closed and the windows are rolled up.

Josh Azinger has been trying to s nag it with a hook on a heavy chain attached to a Bobcat on the shore. So far, they've been able to turn the car toward shore. And they've pulled off the bumper.

The car is a Honda with Oregon plates renewed in November of 2005. Crew leader David Horstman called the plate number in to the Tacoma Police Department, which is tracing it.

I'm heading back to the lake with Peter Haley. I'll introduce you to some of the crew and the spectators, and let you know how the operation ends.

Meanwhile, we hope you enjoy Peter's photos, taken from the crew's row boat.

UPDATE: They've given up for the day and are mulling over how to proceed. More to come.

Metro Parks Tacoma is celebrating the 100-year anniversary of the W.W. Seymour Botanical Conservatory in Wright Park with a public event Saturday.

A 5-kilometer race will begin the celebration. Organizers are offering guided tours, walking tours, refreshments and turn-of-the-(20th)-century games like croquet. The event runs from 10 a.m.-2 p.m.

The Victorian-style glass house opened in 1908 after William W. Seymour – then president of what is today Metro Parks – donated $10,000. According to a release, the conservatory is a 12-sided dome with more than 3,000 panes of glass. Inside, more than 250 species are on display.

Click below to read the press release:

=> Read more!

As Ruston voters mull a decision to change the town’s form of government from mayor-council to council-manager, I decided to ask one of the men most recently in the executive post.

Michael Transue was Ruston's mayor from 2005 until his resignation in June. He says the mayor’s job is too much for a part-time person right now, but he doesn’t believe a permanent switch in government format is the answer.

“It’s too much for a part-time person right now. It’s too much, unless you had the right retired person with the right schedule, managerial experience, project management experience – that sort of thing – but that sort of person doesn’t exist in Ruston right now.”

Transue said he proposed the town hire an administrator who would work with the mayor and the council to guide Ruston through all its changes.

“The council has the authority right now to hire a town administrator. And they have the authority to do it in the fashion that puts every check and balance into a consultant contract that they want. They could do that today. My view is that they should have done that months ago when I proposed it.”

“I put out a (request for proposal) and said, ‘What do you think? What do you think?’ No response. So I tweak it here, tweak it there. I put out an RFP. And then they say, ‘Whoops, just kidding.’

How is that a good way of doing business? If we had (hired an administrator) 18 months ago or whenever I proposed it, we’d be much better off today.”

Today I'll be talking to someone who fled the war in Iraq, came to Tacoma as a refugee and is fighting to bring her child here.