<img src="http://www.joplinglobeonline.com/images/zope/extra.gif" border=0>Kansas group, federal agency work to restore Spring River<font color="#ff0000"> w/ link to Cherokee County Restoration Plan and Environmental Assessment</font>

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August 13, 2008

Anonymous The Joplin Globe Wed Aug 13, 2008, 10:35 PM CDT

By Roger McKinney

rmckinney@joplinglobe.com

BAXTER SPRINGS, Kan. — A group hoping to restore Spring River and its tributaries in Cherokee County is trying to decide among potential demonstration projects as a way to educate the public about the river’s condition and ways to improve it.

On a separate track, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has developed a draft plan to restore terrestrial and aquatic habitat in the Superfund site in Cherokee County that was damaged by decades of mining.

The Spring River Watershed Restoration and Protection Strategy group met Monday night in Baxter Springs to discuss nine potential demonstration projects. The Kansas Alliance of Wetlands and Streams, a nonprofit group, has about $12,000 from the Kansas Department of Health and Environment for demonstration projects in Cherokee County. Doug Blex, field coordinator for the alliance, said the money may pay for one or two projects.

The Spring River restoration group appointed a committee that will recommend one or two projects at the group’s September meeting.

The proposals are:

A wetland including viewing stations on the south side of Schermerhorn Park in Galena.

Microbiological waste recycling, in which microorganisms consume human waste.

Vegetation and tree planting.

A phytoremediation wetland using vegetation that removes heavy metals from the water.

A rain garden at the Baxter Springs High School parking lot to prevent erosion and runoff into a nearby stream.

A wetland near a stream connecting to Spring River in Baxter Springs.

A wetland connected with Willow Creek in Baxter Springs. The creek is discolored from metals contamination.

A wetland in a drainage area in the Southridge subdivision in Baxter Springs.

A wetland for storm water from the parking lot of the Downstream Casino Resort.

The demonstration projects will provide information and education to residents about the watershed, said Carl Hayes, chairman of the Spring River restoration group.

Blex said that ideally, a demonstration project would be on public land or land accessible to the public. He said that would complicate the subdivision wetland proposal.

“We’ve got to have a willing landowner, whether it’s the school district or the nature center or a private individual,” Blex said.

Linda Phipps, with the Southeast Kansas Nature Center in Schermerhorn Park, proposed the wetland there.

“It would be an ideal outdoor classroom,” Phipps said. “The kids could watch the waterfowl fly in and the critters crawl out.”

Hayes said one of the proposed wetlands for Baxter Springs is on the site of an old trolley car bridge that transported miners to work in the Tri-State Mining District. He said that idea was proposed by Dennis Burke, the school district superintendent, as was the parking-lot wetland.

There was enthusiasm among the group for the wetland off the parking lot for the Downstream Casino Resort. Group members said the Quapaw Tribe of Oklahoma, which owns the casino, is willing to pay for the project, with technical assistance from the Spring River group and the alliance.

“They’ll want to stay green,” Blex said of the tribe and casino.

Federal plan

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s restoration plan is on a much larger scale and is much costlier that what the local group is proposing. The purpose of the plan is to determine the best ways to use $2.6 million available from EaglePicher Industries and LTV Corp. from bankruptcy proceedings to clean up forming mining land in the county.

According to the draft plan, the preferred option for restoring the land is to preserve the native prairie at a cost of $4,300 to $5,600 per acre, plus fencing. The area covers 470 to 600 acres.

The preferred option for aquatic-habitat restoration includes preserving high-quality river and stream banks, and Empire Lake in Riverton. The river and stream banks project would involve 290 to 560 acres and would cost $4,600 to $8,900 per acre.

The Empire Lake buffer involves 470 to 640 acres at a cost of $4,100 to $5,600 per acre.

Not ideal

Officials with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service could not be reached for comment Tuesday or Wednesday, but the plan notes that the aquatic option is not the ideal solution.

“Fish and Wildlife Service’s first and second overall priorities do not address the issue of metals contamination in aquatic resources,” reads the plan’s conclusion. “FWS’s third priority does address aquatic contamination; however, addressing this issue in any reasonably effective fashion is expensive and it is this consideration that makes addressing mine wastes FWS’s third priority.”

The plan includes dredging Empire Lake and installing underwater sediment retention structures on Short Creek. The cost would be $149,000 per acre, plus $1.3 million for dams and $350,000 for dam operation and maintenance.

The option also includes dredging other waterways, improving buffers and restocking. The cost would be $292,500 to $3.2 million per stream mile, $10 million for a water-treatment system, and $5,000 to $113,000 per species per stream mile.

No time frame for the projects is specified in the plan.

The federal proposal also includes demonstration projects and public outreach.

The report’s executive summary says the agency anticipates that the projects will result in significant ecological benefits for the area.

Mark your calendar

The Fish and Wildlife Service will conduct an informal session on the draft plan beginning at 4 p.m. today at the Baxter Springs Community Center. A formal presentation and public comment session will begin at 7 p.m.

The Spring River Watershed Restoration and Protection Strategy group is sponsoring a bluegrass festival starting at 5 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 13, in Kiwanis Park at Baxter Springs.