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Show Hox 6310 Lincoln, Neb, 60506 Tofol Change in Project Concept Seen On Mill Creek Due to Costs Rapidly escalating costs have brought about what may become a major change in plans on the projected Mill Creek water and flood control project, i was announced this week by K. E. McDougald, chairman of the Grand County Water Conservancy District. Officials of the U. S. Corps of Army Engineers and the Utah Division of Water Resources met in Moab Tuesday with officials of the District, and were instructed to finalize new plans, which would eliminate the major storage reservoir in Mill Creek Canyon just east of Moab Valley, and would instead impound water behind berms in a 250-acre lake in upper Spanish Valley, at the mouth of Sheley Tunnel. By eliminating the proposed 210-foot earthfill dam at the Plainfield Site just out of Moab, and moving our storage reservoir to upper Spanish Valley, we can reduce the overall cost of the project , dramatically," Mr. McDougald stated. Also eliminated by dropping the big dam in Mill Creek in favor of a shallower storage reservoir in the upper valley, would b the flood control benefits that the dam -Would provide. However, Lee McQuivey, district engineer for Utah for the U. S. Corps of Engineers, stated Tuesday that the Corps would construct a flood control channel through Moab Valley which would safely carry the largest floods through the valley and into the Colorado River, for about the same amount of money that the federal agency would be spending as their share of the originally-planned Mill Creek Project. Costs Have Doubled "When we first began planning the Mill Creek Project several years ago, our total costs involved were in the neighborhood of $3.5 million," Mr. McDougald stated. Since that time, with the inflationary spiral of building costs, the project expenses have been raised to well over $8 million, with around $6.5 million involved in the construction of the Plainfield Dam itself. Disadvantages of the original plan would be that water from the Plainfield Reservoir would have had to be pumped to upper Spanish Valley to be utilized on the approximately 1,000 acres of new land to be placed under irrigation. By placing the storage reservoir in a limited-purpose reservoir behind a shallow berm, water can be placed on the acreage without pumping. "It would reduce the cost of water to the farmer from around $20 per acre foot to around $15 per acre foot if we eliminated the need to pump the water," a state official reported. Much More Economical Ev Schumaker, director of the Grand County Water Conservancy District, stated that the total irrigation project, which would include completion of the Sheley Tunnel, a small diversion dam in Mill Creek, the storage lake of approximately 250 acres with an average depth of 20 feet, a main pipeline 16 inches in diameter and lateral lines to get the water to the farmland, could be built for around $4 million. "That makes the cost-benefit ratio a whole lot better than before," he said. Officials of the District, along with their state and federal partners, will make a final decision in the next few weeks, but after Tuesday's meeting, it appeared that the new thinking would prevail in the end. "We can accomplish all our goals for less money, and leave Mill Creek Canyon pretty much alone," one official said. Flood Control Project The overall project will be funded to the tune of about $3.5 million by the Corps of Engineers for flood control. Irrigation and municipal-industrial benefits bene-fits will have to pick up the balance of the project cost. There will be some grant money available and a large loan (interest free) from the Utah Division of Water Resources has been pledged. There will, however, be a need for local money in the project, and that would have to be raised from the sale of bonds authorized at a bond election. It had been planned earlier that the election would be held along with the regular election this November, but now it is planned to cancel that date due to the need for further planning. "We hope to be in a position to go to the voters with our new Mill Creek Project plans sometime this winter, and believe we can give them a whole lot more for their money," Mr. McDougald stated. |