Michigan's Rivers Are at a Crossroads: Your Access Hangs in the Balance
Michigan is defined by water. With more than 11,000 inland lakes and 51,438 miles of rivers and streams, our state is a hunter's and angler's paradise a place where catching a cold-water brook trout at dawn or working a river bend for smallmouth feels less like recreation and more like birthright. That water, and the public access to it, is not guaranteed. Right now, two separate dam-related issues are unfolding across the state that could permanently reshape who gets to fish, paddle, and hunt along Michigan's most storied waterways.
The Michigan Chapter of Backcountry Hunters & Anglers is watching both situations closely and we're asking our members to do the same.
The Boyne River: A Century-Old Dam, A Resort's Ambitions, and a River's Future
Tucked in the rolling hills of Charlevoix County in Northern Michigan, the Boyne River is one of the state's most recognizable trout streams a cold, clear tributary that draws anglers from across the region in pursuit of salmon, steelhead, and brown trout. For decades, it has also been dammed.
Originally constructed in 1909 and partially rebuilt in 1929, the Boyne River hydroelectric dam has been owned and operated by Boyne Mountain Resort a subsidiary of Boyne USA since the 1980s. The facility generates a modest amount of electricity, reportedly around 660 megawatt-hours per year, covering an estimated fraction of the resort's total energy needs. Now, Boyne is seeking a 30-year extension of its operating license from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), and the stakes for public access and river health have never been clearer.
Access Restricted, River Stressed
When FERC originally issued operating conditions for the Boyne dam, the commission recommended public access improvements including a boat ramp, restrooms, and lighted parking. Those conditions were never fully realized. Today, meaningful public access to the impoundment and the stretch of river upstream remains largely unavailable to Michigan sportsmen and women. While access is our primary concern, there are additional issues that need to be addressed.
The situation has grown more contentious recently. As Boyne Mountain has pursued plans to expand the resort including high-end glamping cabins, a spa, and mixed-use development on 18 rezoned parcels along the river corridor U.S. Rep. Jack Bergman has asked FERC to remove the existing public access requirement near the dam, citing safety and liability concerns. Stripping that condition from the re-permitting process would effectively close the door on public use of a public trust resource to benefit a private resort's bottom line.
The water quality record is alarming and well-documented. The Michigan Department of Natural Resources declined to stock steelhead and brown trout in the Boyne River due to excessive turbidity a measure of water cloudiness caused by suspended sediment and has signaled that stocking may be withheld again until conditions improve.
Independent monitoring by the Friends of the Boyne River (FOBR) has made the problem impossible to ignore. FOBR documented turbidity readings measured in Nephelometric Turbidity Units (NTU) more than twice the level at which Michigan's Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy (EGLE) requires mitigation. These readings were taken during routine dam operations, not during a storm event. The operator's own self-reported data submitted to FERC told a very different story, raising serious questions about whether the operator is accurately monitoring and disclosing conditions on the river and whether FERC can rely on operator-submitted data alone.
The dam was not operating run-of-river as required. The operator apparently did not monitor the release. It remains unclear whether they reported it to EGLE at all. The Michigan DNR withheld trout stocking again in 2024 and has signaled that may continue if conditions do not improve. For a river whose identity is built around its trout fishery, this is not a manageable inconvenience it is an ongoing crisis, unfolding under the watch of an operator that wants another 40 years.
Critics of the re-permitting effort have also raised a fundamental economic question: it is hard to justify relicensing a failing structure that produces a shrinking fraction of the resort's total energy footprint, when modern alternatives (solar and wind) could meet those same needs without impounding a living river. The Friends of the Boyne River has stated it plainly: non-critical dams should be removed, not renewed.
What We're Asking
The Michigan Chapter of BHA believes that the Boyne River is a public trust resource, and that any re-permitting of the Boyne hydroelectric facility must include strong, enforceable public access conditions not a rollback of the protections that already exist. FERC should require meaningful and permanent angler and paddler access as a condition of any new license, and the commission should carefully weigh whether the limited energy output of this aging structure justifies the continued ecological and access costs it imposes on Michigan's sportsmen and women.
The Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians are active participants in the relicensing proceeding, raising concerns about fisheries, erosion, and water quality. Their voice matters in this process. So does yours.
Consumers Energy's Dam Sale: 32,000 Acres and a Question of Who Controls Michigan's Rivers
While Northern Michigan grapples with one dam's future, a much larger question is taking shape downstate. Consumers Energy has proposed the sale of 13 hydroelectric dams and approximately 32,000 acres of associated lands currently open for public use across Michigan. The Michigan Public Service Commission is reviewing the sale, and the public comment period is open now.
The Access We Take for Granted
Those 32,000 acres aren't an abstraction. They are the boat launches you've backed your trailer down on a Saturday morning. They are the shore fishing spots your dad showed you. They are the trailheads that put you on the river above and below the dams the kind of informal, reliable access that forms the backbone of Michigan's outdoor heritage. Under Consumers Energy's ownership, those access points have been routinely available to the public. Under new private ownership, that is not guaranteed.
Consumers Energy is proposing to sell this portfolio to private equity interests firms whose business model is built on buying and selling assets to generate returns. Thirty-two thousand acres of Michigan real estate tied to active waterways is an extraordinarily valuable portfolio. Without permanent, legally enforceable public access protections written into any transfer agreement, those lands could be treated like any other balance sheet item, and the public uses we've long taken for granted are on the chopping block.
We've Seen This Story Before
We don't need to speculate about what can happen. Michigan has already lived it. At the Au Train Dam in the Upper Peninsula, a century-old private dam fell into financial distress. Key parcels of land around the dam were lost through foreclosure and sold, including property tied to longstanding public use. The loss of control over project lands became part of the record that ultimately led FERC to terminate the dam's operating license. State-managed recreation facilities that depended on leased access were forced to close when the underlying land changed hands.
The hunters and anglers who relied on that access for generations had no say. They showed up one day and the gates were locked. That is the future we risk if the Consumers Energy sale proceeds without ironclad protections for public access.
What We're Asking
The Michigan Chapter of BHA is urging the Michigan Public Service Commission to require that any approval of this sale include permanent, enforceable public access provisions covering the lands currently open to recreation. Language of intent is not enough. The commission must ensure that boat launches, shore fishing sites, trailheads, and informal access points are protected in perpetuity as a condition of the transfer not as a courtesy that can be revoked when a new owner finds a more profitable use for the land.
The public comment period is open now. To submit a comment to the Michigan Public Service Commission, visit the case docket at this link and click Submit Comment. Case Number: U-21985. Make your voice heard before the window closes.
Why This Matters to BHA
BHA's mission is simple: ensure North America's outdoor heritage of hunting and fishing in a natural setting through education and work on behalf of wild public lands, waters, and wildlife. That mission does not stop at forest boundaries or trailheads. It extends to every river access point, every public boat launch, and every stretch of water that belongs by law and by tradition to all of us.
Dams are complicated. Some serve critical public purposes. Some are aging relics that impose costs far greater than their benefits blocking fish passage, smothering spawning habitat, impounding sediment, and locking off public access to benefit private interests. We approach each situation on its merits. What we will not accept, in any case, is the quiet erosion of the public's right to reach and use Michigan's waters.
The Boyne River and the Consumers Energy situation are different in their specifics, but identical in what's at stake: whether the rivers, lakes, and lands that Michigan sportsmen and women have relied on for generations will remain accessible or whether they will be quietly transferred into private control with no guarantee of return.
Public lands and waters are not a commodity. They are a covenant. And right now, in Michigan, that covenant is being tested in two places at once.
Take Action
On the Consumers Energy Dam Sale: Comment now at the Michigan Public Service Commission. Case Number U-21985. Tell regulators that any approval must include permanent, enforceable public access protections for all 32,000 acres.
On the Boyne River Dam Relicensing: Follow the FERC relicensing process for the Boyne River Hydroelectric Project (FERC Project No. 3409). Engage your local legislators. Make clear that public access must be strengthened not stripped as a condition of any new license.
And share this post. Talk about it at hunting camp, at the boat ramp, at the fly shop. The people who will be most affected by these decisions are the people who least expect it because right now, the access is still there. The fight is happening before it disappears, which means we still have time to win it.
If you care about access, fisheries, and the future of Michigan’s rivers, now is the time to stay informed and involved.
Comment on the Consumers Energy dam sale (MPSC Case U-21985): https://mi-psc.force.com/s/case-comment?caseId=5008y00001wnQ5ZAAU
Follow and comment on the Boyne River relicensing (FERC Project No. 3409): To view current status download the FERC: Pending License, Relicense, and Exemption Applications docsument to comment https://ferconline.ferc.gov/QuickComment.aspx )
Additional resources to stay informed:
Friends of the Boyne River: https://boyneriver.org/latest-news/
Michigan Trout Unlimited: https://michigantu.org/core-values/reconnect/stop-the-dam-sale/
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