Rain bogs down muck cleanup

It's nearly impossible to operate heavy machinery in standing water and the permits won't allow it.

[Times photo: Steve Hasel] Jim Saltmarsh of the Road Maintenance Department crosses a silt barrier at a muck removal project near Trail's End in Floral City as Jimbo Banks watches.

By JOSH ZIMMER

© St. Petersburg Times, published June 23, 2000

INVERNESS -- The onset of seasonal rains may prevent the county from completing all the much-awaited muck clearing projects approved this week by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, a county supervisor said Thursday.

"The rain the last two weeks has really slowed it down," said county Aquatics Operations manager Mark Edwards as a bulldozer dropped soil and dead vegetation into a dump truck. "We would love to get this done, all of our sites. We've got workers working long, overtime hours because we know the rain is coming."

Accumulated water already has caused one setback. At Old Oaks South near the Leslie Hefner Canal, one of the six navigational trails where the county received permission to clear 25-foot pathways along dried out shorelines, earth-moving equipment was moved to another site because the corps permit forbids digging in standing water, Edwards said.

If the rains cause other delays, the situation would represent a worst-case scenario for residents and county officials who considered the dry conditions an ideal time to remove years of accumulated muck.

At first, residents led by the water advocacy group TOO FAR (Taxpayers Outraged Organization for Accountable Representation) pushed county commissioners to apply for corps permits. Although the Army corps said it was acting as quickly as federal guidelines allowed, officials quickly became frustrated by the slow pace of the application reviews.

TOO FAR also is disappointed that the work is being confined to navigational trails. Group president Frank Robinson, who has his own large-scale muck removal application with the corps, said he wanted to see areas within the lake system cleared to create new spawning areas for fish.

The permits issued Monday allow the county to clear away 172,000 cubic yards at five sites throughout the Tsala Apopka Chain of Lakes, records show. The permits cover sites in each of the three water bodies comprising the lake chain -- Old Oaks South and North in the Floral City Pool, Hickory Hills and Magnolia Beach in Lake Henderson and River Lakes Manor in Lake Hernando.

The county got permission for a sixth project at Lake Park in the Hernando Pool, but residents combined their resources to do the work, Edwards said.

Despite their uncertain future in some areas, the projects are generating excitement with property owners. People have readily granted workers permission to cut through their yards to reach the canals, Edwards said.

Cheryl Parrish, who lives a few hundred yards away from the current muck clearing at Hickory Hills, said she and her husband walked down to the site as soon as they heard the dump trucks go by.

"I think it's wonderful," she said, hoping the project is not delayed by rain.

To the north at Magnolia Beach, Juanita Henschel can see the other current project from her window. It's a welcome sight, Henschel said, while sharing the same concerns that Parrish has.

"I wish they could have got to me before the water came," she said. "If they have to stop, they have to stop."

As a light rain wetted the ground even more Thursday, Edwards described an effort on emergencylike footing. County employees have been casing each of the approved sites this week to locate areas without standing water.

In addition to the corps prohibition, standing water makes it nearly impossible to operate heavy machinery, he said.

At Old Oaks South, "The equipment couldn't get in there," he said.

In general, the work is slow going. Despite removing truckloads of muck, Edwards estimated 95 percent of the job is incomplete. The ideal time to begin would have been several weeks ago, he said.

"We're making progress," he said. "I just don't want people to be discouraged because we left Old Oaks South."

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