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Take a fresh look at its effect on our waterways
Wednesday, May 30, 2001
The state Department of Environmental Protection essentially split the difference when reissuing river dredging permits to four companies. It reduced the permits' duration and instituted new restrictions on their operations.
Frankly, it is time to rethink completely the logic and public good involved in mining the bottoms of the Allegheny and Ohio rivers for sand and gravel. When there are other sources for the roadbuilding and construction materials, does it really make sense to plow up the river bottoms and damage the ecosystem, threaten endangered species and potentially harm water supplies?
Those questions need to be asked and answered in a systematic fashion, and the five years granted in the new permits is more than enough time to assess the costs and benefits of the operations. Previous permits had been granted for 10 years, and the DEP's shorter authorization is a recognition of the questions remaining and the controversy surrounding river dredging.
The DEP crafted the permits to deal with some of the issues raised. For example, in addition to the already existing restrictions against dredging around dams, islands, bridge piers, pipelines, public water supply intakes and in Allegheny River Pool 6 (to protect habitat), the companies are subject to new restrictions in dredging in Pool 8, in Armstrong County, because of the sighting two years ago of Northern riffleshell mussel, a federally endangered species.
The permit says that dredging can only occur where diving surveys have been conducted to assure that the mining won't harm threatened or endangered species, such as the silver chub, black bullhead, smallmouth buffalo, mooneye and river redhorse. It will also be limited to areas where dredging has been done in the last five years.
Charles A. Duritsa, the DEP regional director, said that his agency is working on a computer model that will help determine the impact of dredging on public water supplies. In the meantime, companies would be restricted in the kind of mining they could do in those areas.
Unfortunately, the permits do not set a maximum allowable tonnage, which would have been a prudent approach to limiting the damage done.
In some ways the new permits, issued to Glacial Sand and Gravel, Hanson Aggregates, Tri-State River Products and Lane Construction Co., are a vindication of the benefits of the public hearing process. In December, DEP had issued 10-year permits with less significant restrictions. But it rescinded those permits when it was discovered that legally required public comment and hearings had not taken place.
The new permits reflect the concerns raised during that period. Although environmentalists and other public agencies like the state Fish and Boat Commission and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service may not be completely satisfied with the result, it is at least a somewhat better outcome thanks to public involvement.
The Ohio and Allegheny rivers are far from pristine. They have been dredged, dammed and dumped in for decades. But with strong laws, effective enforcement and a vigilant public, the water quality and ecosystems have gotten better, with room for more improvement.
The new permits are a step forward in that long and painstaking process.