Crawford County Officials Seek Deadline Extension For Levee Study
Last updated Wednesday, April 2, 2008 9:07 PM CDT in News
By Aaron Sadler
The Morning News
WASHINGTON - A western Arkansas community was left high and dry when the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers cited a little noticed law and refused to perform the work to certify whether levees were safe.
After providing cost estimates, Corps attorneys halted the agency's plans to evaluate the Arkansas River levee system in Crawford County and Van Buren earlier this year. They cited a 2000 law aimed toward preventing the agency from completing work that can be done by private companies.
A Corps spokesman in Little Rock said the agency was initially unaware of the law.
The Corps' action leaves Crawford County and Van Buren scrambling to meet a tight deadline to provide the Federal Emergency Management Agency what is referred to as "levee certification."
If the community fails to certify levee safety by April 2009, many property owners could be forced to purchase costly flood insurance.
A spokesman for the agency said that the deadline might be flexible if the municipalities show a "good-faith effort" toward working to prove the 23-mile system is safe.
Local officials learned of the agency's mandate last year as part of the agency's ongoing process to modernize and reissue flood plain maps. Crawford County was one of the first communities affected, said Van Buren Mayor Bob Freeman.
"This is all new to us," Freeman said. "If you're the first one hit, your head's kind of spinning. You ask, 'What is this about?'"
Freeman said it was natural to ask the Corps of Engineers to complete a certification study, especially since the corps originally constructed the levees in the 1940s. The cost estimate provided by the agency was $160,000 for the city and $260,000 for Crawford County.
The cost to fix possible deficiencies was not included in the estimate. Repairs could take much more time and money, Freeman said.
"The corps started their scope of work and agreement and then the corps attorneys come back with this, 'Well, wait a minute,'" Freeman said.
The lawyers cited the Thomas Amendment, a provision tacked on to a 2000 water resources bill. The law keeps the agency from work that private industry can do in reasonable time and at a reasonable price, said Henry Himstedt, spokesman for the Corps of Engineers' district office in Little Rock. In addition, the Corps must be "uniquely qualified" to perform a service, he said.
"The Thomas Amendment is somewhat new, new in government terms, and we weren't aware of all the limitations of that until it kind of came on the radar," Himstedt said.
Now, the community is in talks with a private Little Rock-based company for the work, Freeman said. He anticipates a higher cost estimate than that produced by the Corps.
Officials are not sure whether the work could be completed by April 2009. The corps would have started this month and work would have taken about six months, Freeman said.
Himstedt said the corps is working with city and county leaders to identify private architectural and engineering firms that can do the work.
Agency spokesman Butch Kinerney said his agency's requirement for levee certification dates to a 1986 law that orders the agency to consider the condition of levees when producing flood plain maps.
The agency gives communities two years to gather the documentation proving levee safety. The levees are temporarily certified for those two years.
"We want to ensure that the levees are doing what they're designed to do, that they still do what they were meant to do originally," Kinerney said. "I think it's entirely possible that we would show some flexibility."
If the deadline passes without levee certification, new maps would place Van Buren's downtown and its industrial park in a drastically expanded flood plain.
Property owners in the affected area would be required to buy flood insurance in some instances. Building construction would be prohibited outright in some areas.
On Wednesday, 3rd District Rep. John Boozman, R-Rogers, said he wants the deadline extended.
"There's no mechanism in place right now for flexibility, but does that mean it's not going to happen? No," Kinerney said. "Especially if they've got another year left, in the next year there's a lot of things that can happen."
Boozman testified at a House transportation subcommittee hearing on flood plain mapping.
He said it was unlikely the municipalities meet the certification deadline.
Boozman said he hoped Congress and federal agencies could "provide reasonable accommodation for levee owners who are making their best effort to get their levees certified."
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