Plaintiff in appeal over access to Oswego Lake speaks with KATU
2 min read
A significant legal decision has been made in the long-standing battle over public access to Oswego Lake.
On March 4, Judge Kathie F. Steele ruled that the City of Lake Oswego’s ordinance restricting public access to the lake is unlawful.
The court’s decision comes after a two-part jury trial and years of legal proceedings initiated in 2012 by Lake Oswego resident Todd Prager and a Portland resident.
The plaintiffs argued for public access to the lake, which has been managed and preserved by the Lake Oswego Corporation. Residents near the lake pay a fee to the corporation, and the public has been prohibited from swimming, fishing, or boating on the lake.
Prager believes the issue is and always has been about exclusivity.
"I think you know there’s a real kind of deep history in Lake Oswego of excluding outsiders. There’s deed restrictions on many of the properties that prevent ownership by Black and specifically Black people, people of Asian descent, and that’s how this town in many ways was established based on fear of people from the outside and people that are perceived as different," Prager said.
Now Prager has been named in an appeal filed by the Lake Oswego Corporation to return Oswego Lake to a private body of water.
KATU’s Christina Giardinelli has more on this story here: https://katu.com/news/local/appeal-filed-in-13-year-legal-battle-over-access-to-oswego-lake
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Author: KATU News
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News post in at: March 15, 2025, 3:00 am.
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