The ex-wife of the R&B singer Usher is calling to drain the largest lake in Georgia, where his son was fatally injured 11 years ago.
Fashion designer Tameka Foster has collected more than 2,500 signatures for her online petition imploring officials to “drain, clean and restore” Lake Sidney Lanier, to allow for safety improvements and the removal of dangerous debris and other obstructions.
Kile Glover, her 11-year-old son with Bounce TV founder Ryan Glover, died in July 2012 after a personal watercraft struck the boy while he was floating in an inner tube on the lake.
“Draining, cleaning and restoring Lake Lanier is not only necessary, but also an opportunity to honor the memory of those who have lost their lives and prevent further tragedies,” Foster wrote in her change.org petition, which she has also promoted on her Page. from Instagram.
Located about an hour’s drive northeast of Atlanta, Lake Lanier covers almost 60 square miles (155 square kilometers) and has waters up to 160 feet (49 meters) deep. It’s far from just a getaway for millions of boaters, fishermen, and other annual visitors.
The lake provides drinking water for about 5 million people, according to the conservation group Chattahoochee Riverkeeper. And the Buford Dam at the southern end of the lake generates hydroelectric power for the Atlanta metropolitan area.
The Army Corps of Engineers built Lake Lanier in the 1950s. The Corps’ district office in Mobile, Alabama, which still operates the lake, did not immediately return phone and email messages seeking comment Thursday. .
Heavy traffic on the lake has led to hundreds of boat collisions over the past three decades, according to the Georgia Department of Natural Resources. The agency reported more than 170 boating and drowning deaths between 1994 and 2018.
Foster and Usher married in 2007 and divorced two years later.