In The News

Politicians from both sides of the Savannah River came together Thursday morning to fight to keep the water in the river at full pool and against a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers plan that would significantly lower it.

U.S. Reps. Joe Wilson, R-S.C., and Rick Allen, R-Ga., came to Riverwalk Augusta to urge people to speak out at a Thursday night public comment hearing in Augusta about the Corps’ plan. The congressmen who represent the districts that border both sides of the river said they will fight to keep a strict reading of the Water Infrastructure Improvements for the Nation Act 2016, which requires the Corps to “maintain the pool for water supply and recreational activities that existed on the date of enactment,” which on Dec. 16, 2016 when the act passed was at 114.5 feet above sea level.

Col. Daniel Hibner, commander of the Savannah District of the Corps, has said the Corps believes that the act only requires it to keep the pool at a level that would maintain those functions.

The Corps’ recommended plan to replace New Savannah Bluff Lock and Dam with a rock weir dam and fish passage would result in an average lower pool almost two feet lower at the Fifth Street Bridge downtown and significantly more so at the lock and dam, and would also require a deeply excavated flood plain be built 275 feet into Lock and Dam Park that would wipe out much of that park. The Corps plan is required mitigation for damage expected to spawning grounds near the port of Savannah from deepening that is part of the Savannah Harbor Expansion Project.

Wilson and Allen, along with the cities of Augusta and North Augusta and Aiken and Columbia counties, are pushing instead for a plan the Corps studied and did not recommend that would repair the lock and dam and put in a fish passage on the Georgia side. The Corps rejected that option.

The WIIN Act deauthorized the lock and dam so it would have to be reauthorized again through federal legislation, which Allen said it could be for recreation and fish passage purposes. Allen and Wilson said they have expressed their concerns about maintaining the pool to the Acting Secretary of the Army.

“We went right to the top,” Allen said.

Wilson cited recent action by the South Carolina House of Representatives that would not allow a South Carolina agency to issue the Corps a permit needed to complete the rock weir work and said those state representatives are in the fight too, as well as U.S. Sens. Lindsey Graham and Tim Scott.

“This should get the attention of the Corps,” he said. “It should get the attention of community leaders.” On this issue “both sides of the river are working so well to maintain the pool.”

Allen said he would be meeting soon with U.S. Sens. Johnny Isakson and David Perdue of Georgia but that both are in favor of maintaining the pool at its current level. “The senators want a solution,” he said.

By: Tom Corwin