Harris also said that the Forest Service would not need water from the lakes to suppress fire in populated areas of the Arroyo Seco canyon.  The current water sourcing strategy for fighting fires calls for either using water from the river itself (although the large size of present day fire-fighting helicopters make that a risky undertaking in the narrow river canyons) or trucking some from borings made in the area just beyond the Greenfield bridge, where the river goes underground into the so-called Arroyo Seco Cone. 

Other individuals familiar with fire fighting in the Los Padres Forest, particularly those fires that have damaged the watershed of the Arroyo Seco River , strongly disagree with this , and are convinced  the Lakes were by far the most convenient and safest source of water for the helicopters and the resuscitation of the lakes should be a high priority of the Forest Service, both for to assist fire fighting in the watershed and for the local citizens who have lost the enjoyment of swimming and fishing in the lakes and enjoying their beauty. Many members of the Arroyo Seco Citizens Association agree with this position.

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Except for rainfall and a sulphur spring in the upper lake, Abbott Lakes have received no fresh water for more than 20 years.  The Fairbanks Morse electric pump purchased and installed in the 1950s by the Southern Monterey County Sportsmen’s Association currently reposes at Salinas Valley Pump.  It has been dismantled and apparently needs a new shaft and impeller.  The Association has yet to decide how – or whether -- to pay the bill, now estimated at more than $20,000 to repair it.   If the answer is yes and the river water starts moving up from the pumphouse to the lake via conveyances already in place, pumping will be limited to Dec. 15 to March 31, the season of high river flows.

Restoring the pipeline connection, should the occasion arise, figures to be a complex proposition, in part because a dozen state, federal and local agencies, including the California Department of Fish and Game and the National Marine Fisheries Service all have interests in Abbott Lakes.   The Arroyo Seco’s fragile steelhead run and endangered species like the two-striped garter snake and the southern Pacific pond turtle are also considerations.

Despite these multiple agency complications, in 2015, the U.S. Forest Service launched the Abbott Lakes Restoration Project, which aimed to “re-fill the lower and larger lake to provide a year-round available water for use in emergency wildfire situations.  It proposed to increase the lake’s storage capacity by removing tules and other vegetation taking up lake space by mowing and hand cutting. The project is still a bird in the bush.  Lower Lake is a forest of tules and a mosquito breeding ground. District ranger Tim Short acknowledged in an interview that a separate item for funding the proposed restoration improvements at Abbott Lakes is not included in his agency’s current budget.