Officials, residents await dredge spoils progress by Corps

Development of a program to deposit dredge spoils on eroding county beaches continues to move slowly in the offices of the US Army Corps of Engineers.

Wahkiakum County officials are working with residents of Puget Island and the Cape Horn areas to set up a 10-year program that will allow dredgers to deposit spoils on the eroding beaches. Each week residents attend meetings of the board of commissioners for updates.

On Tuesday, Commissioner Dan Cothren said he had spoken with Karla Ellis, the Corps staff member in charge of the process. He had learned that Corps attorneys are still working on an update of the right of entry permits needed to allow dredgers to access private property for their work.

The Corps wants a large area for sand disposal. In the past a property owner has objected to the dredging and not signed a right of entry permit, and the disposal sight ended up smaller than proposed.

Commissioners have said they don't want people opting out of the program and reducing the size of the disposal, so they want volunteers collecting signatures on entry permits as soon as possible.

"What I explained to her is that we need the right of entry permits right away," Cothren said Tuesday. "If there's going to be someone to balk at this, we've got to get going right away.

"I also asked why it's taking so long. We're not the first to do this. This (the delay) is ridiculous. This should have been done long ago. If we don't hear something by Friday, we'll talk to the congressional people."

Commissioner Mike Backman said he would be in Washington, D.C., later this month and would bring the delay to the attention of the area's senators and congresswoman.

Commissioners Cothren, Backman and Blair Brady also all commented that they're discussing dredging issues with members of boards of commissioners from up river ports who do the dredging. The ports want to lease a Puget Island farm as a disposal site as part of channel deepening project, but commissioners say sand needs to go on the beaches first. Those commissioners are agreeable, he said.

"They're trying to make Puget Island a designated disposal site," Cothren said.

Commissioners have received a letter from Bob Consentino, a Puget Island resident who is also a professional engineer, and who questioned the boundaries which the commissioners chose for the new boundaries of flood control zone district on the Island and Cape Horn.

In the letter, Consentino questioned the engineering design for setting the boundaries, and he asked if there was "any consideration of the realities of hydraulic flow" in setting the boundaries.

Commissioners said they have had public meetings on the matter and it's settled.

"We've had our folks look at it and we're moving ahead," Cothren said.

"It's not really germane at this point of the process," Brady said.