Officials with the International Joint Commission, the organization created by the United States and Canada to manage its shared waterways, say their new plan would bring Lake Ontario and St. Lawrence River levels to "a more natural level."

The main goal of the proposed plan is to bring wetlands back to a more natural state and provide areas for fish spawning.Commission spokesman Frank Bevacqua said research and data show average monthly water levels in Lake Ontario would increase 2.4 inches in April, 1.2 inches in June and 2 inches in October under the new plan compared with current regulations.

"People are thinking about these large events (in the past) when there was flooding; they imagine that with any change it will be catastrophic.," Bevacqua told the Syracuse Post-Standard.

The primary reason for the new draft plan, known as Plan Bv7, is to protect wetlands along Lake Ontario and the St. Lawrence. Environmentalists hail it, saying that regulators are paying attention to fragile wetlands for the first time. However, property owners and others along the shore, especially those on Lake Ontario, are angry, with some comparing the plan to government theft of their land.

David Turner, director of the Oswego County Office of Community Development, Tourism and Planning, said the numbers from the International Joint Commission are just averages. What bothers him and others along the lake shore is "the differences between the permitted high and permitted low" in the plan. "Those are more than a couple of inches," Turner said.