CLEARWATER TOWNSHIP, MI -- Despite her house being approximately four football fields away from Torch Lake's popular sandbar, Michele Fortuna-Schellie said her entire home was rattling from the music blasting as part of the annual Fourth of July festivities on the lake.

Every year on the Fourth, revelry breaks out on the sandbar over the mouth of Torch River, which sits at the south end of Michigan's second-largest inland lake. In the past, these parties have primarily consisted of families, said Greg Payne, president of the Torch Lake Protection Alliance.

But in recent years, a sprawling mass of boats and partiers have converged. Payne said the demographic has shifted to 18 to 25-year-olds, using the national holiday as a reason to "rave."

And they come by the thousands, with this year being the worst the small Clearwater Township community has seen. Payne said police officials told him there were an estimated 8,000 people in the water last Saturday morning -- and the crowds only grew from there.

"This is more than a rave in some club," said Payne, a resident of the nearby Milton Township who also owns property in Clearwater Township. "This is basically an unrestricted party."

Payne said there is only one small public access point to the sandbar that people can walk out onto, with no adjoining parking lot. As a result, partygoers crowd private property, blocking off driveways and standing in people's yards.

"This community is not prepared for (the crowds)," Payne said. "This is not a state park. It's not a public park. It's just a lake."

As a result, locals have begun banding together to create an atmosphere that is more respectful of their properties. A private group on Facebook, "Torch Lake Preservation: Save our Sandbar" now has more than 500 members.

Fortuna-Schellie said she saw a fight break out in the middle of her driveway. The extreme crowds were part of the reason she stuck around her house last weekend.

"I was not able to go out on a boat because I felt it more important to stay around my house and protect it," Fortuna-Schellie said. "I'm not against having a good time, but it's starting to interfere with the safety of the rest of us and -- environmentally -- it's horrendous."

Carrying a fishing net, Payne went out on the lake on the night of the Fourth. Within an hour, he had scooped up a trash bag's worth of plastic bags, wrappers, empty and full beer cans and more. Fortuna-Schellie saw heaps of trash as she rode her bike around the neighborhood that evening.

"They're not taking any responsibility and then leaving the mess behind," Fortuna-Schellie said, adding the community came together to help clean up the mess in a matter of days.

Trash isn't the only thing that dotted the landscape of Torch Lake following the festivities. Only nine portable toilets were stationed outside of the public access point. Fortuna-Schellie said her neighbors have seen human feces wash up on the shore in the past few days.

This year, the TLPA took water samples after the festivities.

"The preliminary results show there is an increased level of ammonia and content that you would associate with people urinating in the lake," Payne said, adding that he doubted there was a risk for an E. coli contamination in the water because of the active nature of the lake.

Despite that, Payne said he no longer visits the lake with his family on the Fourth of July because of what he's seen.

"That's one of the big negative outcomes," Payne said. "The people who live here, the people who normally want to enjoy it, they're not because they're essentially, at their own bequest, forced out."

Fortuna-Schellie, 56, said she first started celebrating Fourth of July on the Torch Lake sandbar when she was 16 and continued the tradition up until five years ago. At that point, the partiers were getting to be too much.

"It's too ugly, it's heartbreaking," Fortuna-Schellie said, who still enjoys the lake on other days of the year.

On July 15, residents will have the opportunity to raise their concerns at the Clearwater Township board meeting.

Fortuna-Schellie said she hopes to see rules enforcing no glass bottles, no alcoholic beverages walked into the lake and a designated parking space so visitors are not parking along the roads.

Payne hopes for much more restricted access next year.

However, Payne and Fortuna-Schellie both say they're not trying to curb a good time on the lake.

"None of us want to stop having a good time on the sandbar," Fortuna-Schellie said. "What we want to do is be a community voice for the safety of our woods and our homes.

"Gosh darn it, we all love it. We all have a good time with it and we all need to respect it."