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Meadow run/ Deer Lake dredging and dam construction project
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DEP: Deer Lake dam reconstruction fouling trout steam

Don Hopey/Post-Gazette

DEP: Deer Lake dam reconstruction fouling trout steam

For at least the past year, the contractor working on the Deer Lake dam reconstruction and lake dredging project in Fayette County has had trouble keeping wet, muddy dredge material from fouling Meadow Run, a state-designated High Quality stream and cold water trout fishery.

According to the state Department of Environmental Protection’s online database, 15 site inspections were conducted during the past year, resulting in 120 alleged violations. Many of them were repeat offenses, for storage of dredge material outside the permitted project area and failure to implement erosion and sediment controls or address concerns about sediment flowing into Meadow Run.

Eight of those violations allege that “sediment or other pollutant was discharged” into the creek, including two based on site inspections Nov. 2 and Nov. 7. The department also issued two compliance orders, the latest on Sept. 6.

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The DEP and the state Fish and Boat Commission have separate, ongoing investigations at the privately owned dam and village just off Route 40 near the town of Chalk Hill, about 65 miles south of Pittsburgh.

The Deer Lake Improvement Association, the private homeowners group undertaking the replacement of the earthen dam built in 1906 and the dredging the 74-acre recreational lake, has asked the DEP to approve a major modification of its existing permits. The modifications would expand the dredge material storage area to include the dredge piles cited in the DEP violations.


(Click image for larger version)

James Thieman, president of the association, said the discharges from the worksite into the stream were “very minimal” but otherwise declined to comment on the violations. He said Fayette County commissioners and state Sen. Patrick Stefano, R-Fayette, have spoken to the DEP on behalf of the homeowners.

“We at the Deer Lake Improvement Association are doing our very best to work with the DEP to get the project completed,” Mr. Thieman said, noting the lake has been drained for seven years. “It is an extremely complicated undertaking. We have lots of outdoorsmen and fishermen who live here and we share an interest in preserving the environment.”

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Ben Wren, Mr. Stefano’s chief of staff, said the senator met with the DEP in an attempt to expedite the permitting process.

“We’re urging that common sense be used to get the project done,” Mr. Wren said. “The longer it goes on, the more potential there is to impact the watershed.”

The permitting change would allow work to continue on the dam and dredging without requiring the contractor, Custom Contracting of Acme, Westmoreland County, to fix the storage violations, essentially “rewarding the applicant for its malfeasance,” said Krissy Kasserman, the public advocate for the Youghiogheny River with the Mountain Watershed Association, an environmental organization.

Ms. Kasserman said the “multiple recurrent and ongoing problems and violations” at the dam and dredging project should preclude the DEP from granting the requested permit change, under a provision that penalizes “serial violators.”

“The dredging contractor’s response to the DEP about prior violations was filed Nov. 7, the same day a county conservation district inspector found sediment being illegally pumped through a hose and into the stream,” Ms. Kasserman said. “This wasn’t a case of the operator being sloppy or a 100-year rainfall event. The illegal point discharge into a designated High Quality stream shows intent and changes the narrative.”

Ms. Kasserman urged the DEP to enter a consent order with the homeowners association that imposes tougher permitting standards and assess a significant fine before considering the permit expansion request.

Civil & Environmental Consultants Inc., which has responded to the DEP on behalf of Custom Contracting, did not return several calls requesting comment. Custom Contracting could not be reached for comment.

In a Nov. 7 response to the DEP for Custom Contracting, Aaron Lavage and Michael Sheleheda, the project manager and principal for Civil & Environmental Consultants on the Deer Lake project, respectively, wrote that “Custom has not observed any sediment from the waste site causing a danger of sediment pollution to Meadow Run.”

Neil Shader, a DEP spokesman, said the department is “aware of complaints of sediment from the Deer Lake property entering Meadow Run . . . (and) is currently investigating these reports.” He said the department’s monthly inspections of the dam site, creek and dredged material storage site have found and noted numerous violations.

Mr. Shader said the Deer Lake Improvement Association’s application for a permit revision is under review, “and a decision will be made in accordance with science, law and current regulations.”

Don Hopey: dhopey@post-gazette.com, 412-263-1983, or on Twitter @donhopey.

First Published: November 30, 2016, 5:15 a.m.

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Meadow run/ Deer Lake dredging and dam construction project  (Don Hopey/Post-Gazette)
Meadow run/ Deer Lake dredging and dam construction project  (Don Hopey/Post-Gazette)
Meadow run / Deer Lake dredging.  (Don Hopey/Post-Gazette)
Don Hopey/Post-Gazette
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