Damn it.


Pe Ell Council Votes to Support Dam as Preferred Option
Alternatives: The Department of Ecology Recently Accepted Comments on Four Different Options for Flood Control, Aquatic
Potential Future Site of Pe Ell Dam
Eric Schwartz / eschwartz@chronline.com
Potential Future Site of Pe Ell Dam


Posted: Thursday, November 17, 2016 10:13 am
By Aaron Kunkler / akunkler@chronline.com
The Pe Ell Town Council voted Tuesday to support a flood mitigation alternative that includes a dam and water retention facility near the town. The option, known as Alternative One, is one of four alternatives presented in a Department of Ecology environmental impact statement designed to tackle flood reduction and aquatic species enhancement in the Chehalis River Basin.
Pe Ell Mayor Lonnie Willey said the council was presented with a resolution from the Chehalis River Basin Flood Authority, comprised of municipalities in Lewis, Thurston and Grays Harbor counties, which they approved and signed, lending support to Alternative One as the widely preferred option in Lewis County.
“The council approved Alternative One with one stipulation — that we would like to see a reservoir,” Willey said.
There are two options for the proposed dam within the alternative, one that would hold water back all year in a permanent reservoir and another that would only retain water during storms and heavy rain.
The dam and reservoir would provide the town with an influx of revenue during construction as workers purchase goods and services from local merchants and restaurants, Willey said.
As for a variation of the dam option that would not create a permanent water retention facility and only hold water during a flood, Willey said it would not generate continuing income for the town.
With water retention, however, Willey said recreation opportunities such as fishing, camping and boating could draw income and tourists from outside the town and possibly provide a water boost to the river system during drier summer months.
“If you had a reservoir behind it, two things, you could release water in the summertime, which would be better flow for the fish, and you could have recreation,” he said.
He said some residents have expressed concerns over a water retention facility, but Willey said he has confidence in the state and federal engineers to design a dam which could withstand major natural disasters like an earthquake.
Other options include building levees around Interstate 5 and doing nothing on the state level and letting local municipalities tackle individual projects on their own. Another option, which would see the state attempting to buy some 21,000 acres along the Chehalis River, would relocate the residents and restore the natural floodplain. A fifth unofficial option is to do nothing, which would see flood damage to the area reach into the billions of dollars over the course of the next 100 years, according to Ecology.
Most upper basin governments — including county commissioners, the Flood Authority and the Centralia and Chehalis city councils — have also voiced support for a dam.
Ultimately, the final proposal will be in the hands of the Governor’s Work Group, a group of basin leaders and representatives of governments, tribes and citizens through the basin. Then, the Legislature would have to deliver the necessary funding.
A representative of the Chehalis Tribe recently spoke out against the dam.

Certainly not good news, but also not unexpected. I suspect "Alternative 1" will receive less enthusiastic support from the counties that don't have the flooding problems (because they didn't build in their flood plains).
QIN, Chehalis Tribe will probably oppose it. Grays Harbor County Commission may go for Alternative 1, even if the citizens aren't on board. Commissioner Raines is a vocal dam supporter, and I don't know where the others stand now.

If Thurston County jumps on the bandwagon, we'll know the fix is in. Still time for this to end well.

It's up to QIN and Chehalis to stop it. Everybody else political needs the money that they think it will bring in.

Kinda ironic those we critique the most are the only option for saving us from ourselves.

Indeed. Strange times make strange bedfellows.

The enemy of my enemy is my friend.

One of the problems in American politics is that we seem to demand total agreement before we will cooperate. So, the Tribes and Sporties won't work together when they agree, the R's and D's never agree, and so on.

Interesting that the article describes this as a state proposal, such that funding would have to come from the WA Legislature. There is no mention of Corps involvement and federal funding. Maybe the Corps won't sign on because all of their studies have found any dam proposal to be not feasible economically. I don't see the state Legislature coughing up the $$$ the project would cost - over half a billion on the low end, to $1.2 billion at the upper - without the 75% federal dollars that come with a Corps and local sponsor project.

The state Legislature can't or won't fund education (the number one priority for funding in the state constitution) under the McCleary decision, so I don't see them sending all that money to Lewis County to pacify a few local fat cat developers when they have political favors owed to many other more influential movers and shakers scattered around the state.

Our family lived below Chester Morse Dam and Reservoir for nearly forty years. It was all it was "cracked" up to be...repeated floods and evacuations, constant fear of the Pineapple Express, worry about dam failure, erosion, levy destruction from flood events, and neglected maintenance of those levies. Scouring flows occurred regularly; fish runs tanked. Most of these concerns followed years of extreme clear cutting, including logging of sensitive sites, in the Cedar River watershed. Down stream development helped create runoff flows that could no longer be controlled. In the end, numerous agencies participated in a buyout of our entire neighborhood.

That project is detailed in this video: https://vimeo.com/111058132

Hopefully, the QIN, Chehalis, and Thurston County authorities will just say, "NO DAM IT!"

Fantastic video, CR ..... outstanding, simply outstanding.

Here's another one on how to do it right

https://vimeo.com/110595261