EDITOR’S NOTE: This is the first in a five-part series looking at the historic issue of flooding in Richland County, its impact and potential ideas in dealing with the problem.
LUCAS — More than 103 years ago, Richland County — and countless communities across 20 states — experienced a flood of historic proportions.
When the rain fell, it didn’t stop until our streets were inundated and our minds were stumped. How could we protect our businesses, homes, bridges and land from inevitable catastrophic deluges?
The Great Flood of 1913 hurled the nation into a conversation that continues today through watershed conservancy districts and subdistricts, emergency management agencies, policies, policy amendments, campaign rhetoric, ordinances, etc.
Since the conversation is more than a century old, most have stopped listening. The issues, now spearheaded by politicians and environmental lobbyists, get lost in translation.
This five-part series aims to clear the muddy waters. It starts at the ground level with two local landowners frustrated by the bureaucracies of a system seemingly too large to navigate. It then seeks to understand their questions through both current and historical lenses, until finally it explores achievable solutions for tomorrow.
‘It keeps cutting away’
As lakes, ponds and bridges in the Ohio Midwest freeze, streams and rivers flow gracefully, continually. To the rest of us, the ever-flowing rivers keep hopes of spring and summer alive through the winter doldrums. But for farmers like Richard Masters, they are a reminder of a seemingly ever-growing problem.
Not long ago, when Masters noticed the river in his backyard cutting away at his farmland, he was concerned. Trees, rocks and debris were regularly falling into the Black Fork and Rocky Fork of the Mohican River that converge on his backyard in Lucas off Ohio 39.
When the skies open up to let loose a flash of rain, the waters spill into his farmland, flooding his crops — his livelihood. So, he made a call to the Richland Soil and Water Conservation District.
“You used to be able to take a canoe all the way up (to) the dam. Not anymore,” 80-year-old Masters reminisced.
He would know. He’s lived here since 1965.
As of April 2016, more than a year after his initial call, Masters has yet to receive favorable answers from the county level. He said officials visited his farm only to examine the problem and tell him, “I’ll get back to you.”
“I just want someone to care. Those rivers haven’t been dredged since the late ‘50s. And every year, it just cuts and cuts and cuts into my fields,” Masters said. “My kids and grandkids, that’s what worries me.”
Masters plans on passing on his 92-acre plot to his children. But he worries about the “uncontrollable” rivers that are gradually cutting away the farmable land.
Masters decided to take the matter into his own farm-worn hands. He began removing debris from the rivers. He said he pulled out trees, rocks and more trees. Along with a backhoe he borrowed, he recruited a crew of four men, each equipped with trucks and chainsaws.
“It keeps cutting away, and then everything falls right into the river,” he said.
It had never crossed Masters’ mind that he might be breaking state and federal law when he attempted to dredge the rivers flowing through his backyard. In Masters’ mind, they are his rivers, and they pose a real threat to his land.
According to Heather Lauer, an Ohio EPA spokesperson, he toed the line.
“Farmers are allowed to remove log jams,” Lauer said. “Now … there are some caveats to that.”
She said farmers who intend on dredging portions of their rivers and streams should first contact the Ohio EPA or the Army Corps of Engineers. One of these entities will help farmers determine if a permit is needed for the dredging.
Lauer said, when dredging, new channels cannot be created. Also, the debris removed needs to be relocated in an area that is not considered a wetland and cannot be replaced in another section of another stream or river.
“We want to ensure that there is as little sediment flowing downstream as possible,” Lauer said. “The idea is that anytime you’re dredging or digging in a stream, it’s going to affect the water quality. So you need to be able to explain why it’s necessary and know what you need to do to ensure that you’re not going to cause environmental harm.”
If you are not a farmer, however, dredging a river in any way in Ohio is illegal — the law requires a permit for that.
Sounds complicated right? I thought so too, so I did some more digging and found a Mansfield man who owns farmland and a business — both of which happen to be situated where state-owned rivers flow.
Check back tomorrow for the second part, when we talk to someone from Richland Soil and Water Conservation District and Dan Tucker of Tucker Brothers Auto Wrecking.
