2009 Dredging Update
October 19, 2009 by Dave Bergen · 4 Comments
The 2009 dredging season has begun. The dredge has been working over on the south shore for a few weeks now. They need to get Cold Spring, Fresh and North Sea done before they come over to Southold. The good news is that I received word today that the permit for Budd Pond (Port of Egypt area) was released today and is in the hands of SCDPW. I have been told that it will be done this season.
Our dredging list for this season is very long. Locations include Budd, Cedar, Richmond, Corey, Little, James, Town and Brushes creeks. I am still fighting the battle for Halls, but it appears that the permits for Halls will not be released prior to January. How many locations they will get to depends on weather and the scope of the jobs. The permits for many areas run out December 15. The rest of them run out January 15. I did lobby the County to approve overtime for the crew so that they can work six days a week, ten hours each day. This is significant given the County budget status. I will update the members once the dredge is done with the south side. As a side note, please get everyone out to vote on November 3. Your vote is very important.
Dave Bergen
Great news, Dave! Thanks for all your hard work. We appreciate it.
Ahoy John Kramer:
I too am very glad to hear about the dredging program.
New subject: Does SoutholdVoice have a list of candidates they recommend I vote for. If so let me know?
…..Paul Schineller
I wanted to provide you with an update on dredging. Two challenges have come up which will impact Southold Towns locations. First, the drill housing on the dredge cracked, which took the rig off line for about a week. Second, it appears that the survey crew under estimated the amount of material to be removed from the Southampton locations. Our goal was to have the rig over in Southold by November 1 to commence with our creeks. It now appears that the rig will not be coming over to Southold until they are done with North Sea Harbor. This is troubling as most of the permits for Southold locations have an end date of December 15. Budds Pond is an exception with January 15 as an end date as Budds Pond is not located in a critical habitat area. The critical habitat area runs from Cedar Creek west to Little Creek. I will keep you posted.
Dave Bergen
So here is my December update on dredging. The dredge came over to Southold just over a week ago. They completed Little Creek, and have since moved to Corey Creek. They hope to be done wih Corey Creek by this Saturday and move over to Cedar Beach. Our challenge is that the dredging window for Cedar runs out on 12/15, as in next Tuesday. So they will pump both Monday and Tuesday, for 10 hours each day. While we wish that they could do a complete job, when darkness falls on Tuesday the dredging at Cedar must stop. The rig will then go back over to do one creek across the bay, then return to Southold to do Budd Pond, Brushes Creek and possibly a couple of more locations before the season ends on January 15. I will keep you posted. Happy Holidays. Dave