By Beth Keck for Sugar Creek Chapter
In a victory for the environment and our communities, the Bentonville City Council unanimously voted on May 27, 2025, to remove the remnants of the Lake Bella Vista dam and let Little Sugar Creek flow free.
The decision came after more than a decade of advocacy by the Friends of Little Sugar Creek and The Ozark Society Sugar Creek Chapter. City officials originally planned to spend millions of taxpayer dollars to replace the dam which formed Lake Bella Vista.
Water quality in Lake Bella Vista had been problematic since the creek was dammed in 1925. The huge 56,000-acre watershed overwhelmed the tiny 22-acre lake which had been off limits for swimming for many years.
As with any advocacy effort, there were many twists and turns. In an early win, using a grassroots grant from Patagonia, the Friends sued the Corps of Engineers and stopped the re-issuance of the permit needed for dam construction. When the City Council was on the verge of voting for a free-flowing stream in 2018 Cooper Communities, who had given the lake to the city, threatened a lawsuit. The Friends provided the City of Bentonville legal support resulting in a ruling in favor of the City.
The final hurdle was a consent agreement the City entered into with Cooper Communities that required unsound side impoundments. The Friends and Ozark Society vigorously protested. In May 2024 Cooper Communities transferred the consent agreement to BV Developers who in turn renegotiated the terms. Sugar Creek Park will now be an “environmentally friendly, an aesthetically pleasing, and financially sustainable public park” with a free-flowing stream (and no side channels).
In the course of the decade- long campaign, the Friends built a coalition of like-minded citizens and organizations, organized letter writing campaigns, educational seminars and webinars, maintained a Facebook page and activated large crowds for city meetings.
