Army Corps Terminates Levee Project

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    The Chehalis River Basin Flood Authority learned Thursday the Army Corps of Engineers has terminated its Twin Cities Levee Project study after a new cost-benefit analysis demonstrated the cost of building levees to a 100-year flood level exceeded the benefit of doing so.

    “We can’t pursue constructing the project as authorized,” Army Corps of Engineers Project Manager Bill Goss told the assembled members of the Flood Authority Thursday in Chehalis.

    The reason? In 2003 the benefit-cost ratio, or BCR, was 1.34, a number that told policy makers there was a benefit to increasing the height of levees in the Twin Cities to meet a 100-year flood level. In 2007 that Twin Cities Project was authorized by Congress. But the Corps later conducted an economic evaluation, and added hydraulic analysis and controversial new flood data into the project study, which dropped the BCR to 0.65, according to Goss.    

    “The reasons for (terminating the project) is we have loss of benefits; the authorized project does not offer 100-year protection,” Goss said. “One of the large benefits we had previously was the protection of I-5. That was an avoided cost of raising I-5. Now that we can’t offer 100-year protection, we can’t count that as a benefit.”

    That is, the cost of raising the levees now exceeds the protection benefits those levees would provide.

    Part of the BCR change was also due to a new formula used to calculate the BCR, according to Goss. The new formula is a “risk-based cost analysis,” which uses different contingencies than the previous formula. The new formula increased costs on parts of the project, including raising the height of the Skookumchuck Dam, which was part of the flood protection project.

    In 2010, engineer estimates for raising the Skookumchuck Dam, which would have added 11,000 acre-feet of additional water retention, increased from $10 million to $50 million.

    “Fifty million dollars is probably going to cause some issues, and there may be some cheaper alternatives,” Goss said at the time about the chance of the cost increase derailing the project’s cost-benefit ratio. “... If you put a $50 million cost to the dam, it has to offer a $50 million benefit.”

    Although the Flood Authority was not entirely surprised by the announcement — Lewis County Commissioner and Flood Authority member Ron Averill had informed the board of the announcement at a workshop earlier in the day — members’ comments were still pointed.

    “I must admit that I react to this with ambivalence, predominantly because this is a project that started in 1997,” Averill said. “This is (2011) and we’ve spent by my estimation ... in excess of $15 million on this project during this period of time.”

    Averill said he had repeatedly asked the Corps if there were problems with the project. The answer was always no, he said.

    “In a way I feel sideswiped,” as both of the Twin Cities and even the state, which has also spent money on the project, should feel, Averill said.

    “This was a project that was designed to protect the Twin Cities and the (Interstate 5) corridor,” Averill said.

    A critic of the levee project, Averill felt the it had “huge holes in it.” Those holes, he said, had grown larger as the Flood Authority began discussing the potential for water retention along with 100-year flood protection.

    Others were even more pointed in their opinion.

    “Please don’t take this personally — because I know you just work for them — but I am absolutely disgusted with the amount of time we’ve wasted since 1996 on this one general investigation study,” Julie Balmelli-Powe, who represents the city of Chehalis on the Flood Authority, told Goss. “The state last year put over a million dollars into it, and we are no further along than we were in 1998.”

    Flood Authority members searched in vain for possible alternatives to save the project and possibly incorporate other ongoing studies into the federal project. Balmelli-Powe suggested incorporating water retention into the study. Centralia City Councilor and Flood Authority member Edna Fund asked about modifying the current Corps project study to include a broader scope.

    “Can we put this on pause ... and then as we move forward modify it so it can be basin-wide verses having to go through reauthorization?” Fund asked. “We’re moving ahead on a lot of different fronts. Can we modify it?”

    Goss replied that, other than a few minor modifications to the project, there is no way to incorporate the entire Chehalis Basin without going back to Congress for reauthorization. That would require new feasibility studies — and more delay.

    Army Corps of Engineer projects must be specifically authorized by Congress under the Water Resource Development Act. However, that authorization is only for studies and does not appropriate funding to build the project itself. To modify the Twin Cities Levee Project would require another congressional authorization if the scope of the project is modified, such as including the entire Chehalis Basin in the study.

    The project would have built 11 miles of levees and offered flood protection for parts of the Twin Cities and the stretch of I-5 that have been covered by water during heavy flooding.



Flood Authority Funding Tied to Cooperation

    A representative of Gov. Chris Gregoire told the Chehalis River Basin Flood Authority it must be conscious of how it spends its funds — and how it gets along with each other and tribal governments —  at the group’s regularly scheduled meeting Thursday.    In what he termed “slightly more delicate territory,” Keith Phillips, executive policy advisor to Gov. Gregoire, offered the Flood Authority two suggestions regarding how to go about its work. Both suggestions were implicitly tied to language in funding agreements that have yet to be entered into between the state and the Flood Authority. There remains about $2.9 million of the original $3.9 million appropriated by the Legislature for flood mitigation issues, including $1.3 million for the Flood Authority.

    The first suggestion involved the technical review of the Flood Authority’s “products” — information the group or its contractors create in the process of studying the Chehalis River basin. Phillips essentially told the group it needed to be more transparent and accommodating.

    “One way that might be constructed going forward with this is for the funding agreement to basically say, when you have a major study ... send it to the federal, state and tribal agencies with expertise in their jurisdiction,” Phillips said. “Solicit their comments, and when you get them back you will have both some cheap expert review. You’ll also have the agencies — many of whom have permit decision or a say on these projects — you’ll know what they’re thinking. But different perspectives will be out in the open.”

    The Confederated Tribes of the Chehalis Reservation left the Flood Authority in March, citing what they felt was a myopic approach to Chehalis River flood mitigation by the group: dams. The tribe later joined forces with Thurston and Grays Harbor counties to form the Chehalis Watershed Cooperative, a splinter flood group that later attempted to gain control of part or all of $1.3 million set aside for the Flood Authority. The Watershed Cooperative was later unsuccessful in entering into an agreement with the State Office of Financial Management for the funds, who said the group did not qualify due to language in legislation that specified the money strictly for the Flood Authority.

    Phillips also suggested the Flood Authority include comments in the back of final reports and studies “so that it’s transparent,” although he didn’t go so far as suggesting the Flood Authority offer written replies to those comments. At least not yet.

    “I just think you will benefit from seeing the comments,” Phillips told the Flood Authority.

    Members of the Flood Authority felt that the time it takes for those reviews to return from tribal reviewers was an issue, according to Flood Authority Chair Vickie Raines of Montesano.

    Phillips noted that, as with any large organization, tribal deliberations within the context of their government takes time. In his own recent discussions with the Chehalis Tribe about the issue he said, “the response was fairly constructive,” noting that comments on an issue could occur in a meeting rather than in writing.

    “Their only request was that it be on the record,” Phillips said, who offered the state’s intervention in the event a roadblock is encountered.

    His second suggestion involved government-to-government discussions with tribal governments such as the Chehalis Tribe, and respect within the Flood Authority itself.

    Phillips said the state was obligated to consult with the Chehalis Tribe. But while the tribe was working cooperatively with the Flood Authority, state involvement was unnecessary.

    “But they’re no longer here and now the state has an obligation,” Phillips said. “I would like to put that obligation on you, at least in part.”

    He again suggested when the Flood Authority produces something that requires review they send it to the Chehalis Tribe to solicit their comment.

    “This isn’t about control, because we disagree with the tribe all the time,” he said. “It’s about open dialogue with folks who are either your partners or your neighbors; being respectful about it.”

    Phillips said the state offers training on government-to-government communications with tribal nations, and that “any 15 folks can request it and the governor’s office will put it on.”

    “Most of us around this table have tried to communicate with the tribe,” Raines said. “They have a place at the table, and they are certainly welcome.”

    Lewis County Commissioner and Flood Authority member Ron Averill told The Chronicle before the meeting that when someone has to work in the river they “cannot discount the tribe.”

    “We can’t ignore them,” Averill said.

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    Lee Hughes: (360) 807-8239