WASHINGTON – U.S. Congressmen Jerry Costello (D-IL) and John Shimkus (R-IL) today introduced legislation that would streamline the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers section 408 approval process for levee and other improvements.  The bill recognizes the need to give local entities a greater ability to plan and execute levee improvements, which is critical given current federal budget constraints.

“Given the lack of resources at the federal level, it is imperative that local governments take the lead in making levee improvements, and we must empower them to take on this work,” said Costello.  “The Corps is a tremendous asset to our country, but from our experience with the Metro East levee improvements, there is great difficulty in expediting their approval process.  We have held meetings with Assistant Secretary of the Army Jo-Ellen Darcy, Mississippi Valley Division Commander General John Peabody, and St. Louis District Commander Colonel Christopher Hall.  They all agree that this project is a top priority and that they want decisions to be made whenever possible at the district level, but the project has ground to a standstill.  Our bill is a launching off point for a discussion on how to streamline this process.”

“As someone who loves the Army, I am most frustrated with the process that has unfolded between the Corps and the Flood Prevention District,” stated Shimkus.  “I know both sides have the public’s interest at heart.  Yet every time we think the paths are merging, they end up farther apart.  This legislation allows us to give specific guidance to the Corps in how to handle situations with local entities leading a project instead of them.”

Currently, the process for granting permission to alter levees is governed by 33 USC Section 408 as implemented by Corps procedural guidance.  While projects deemed minor 408 by the Corps can be expedited, major 408 projects essentially proceed according to the Corps’ planning and development process, which includes extensive internal and external reviews.  There is no doubt that the Corps should have a central role in this process, but it must proceed more quickly.  This new legislation seeks to unlock the potential for faster, district-centric project approvals by the Corps.

“We believe that the Corps has great latitude within existing law to expedite critical investments in the nation’s levee systems, but has instead imposed, through internal guidelines, an onerous, costly and multilayered review process that delays those essential projects from moving forward,” said Les Sterman, Chief Supervisor with the Southwestern Illinois Flood Prevention District Council.  “This bill formalizes the Corps review processes and establishes firm deadlines for those reviews.  This will allow project sponsors like the Flood Prevention District to plan ahead with greater certainty and move far more quickly to protect public safety and the local economy.  We thank Congressmen Costello and Shimkus for recognizing this problem and taking action to fix it.”

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Belleville News-Democrat
June 29, 2012
By Mike Fitzgerald

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The metro-east’s federal lawmakers helped defeat a measure Friday to require owners of homes and businesses — including those in the American Bottoms — behind structurally sound levees to buy flood insurance.

U.S. Rep. Jerry Costello, D-Belleville, teamed with U.S. Rep. John Shimkus, R-Collinsville, and U.S. Sens. Dick Durbin, D-Springfield, and Mark Kirk, R-Highland Park, to reject the measure…more

Corps’ continued refusal to certify its own levees also will cost the region more time and money 

Collinsville, IL., February 23, 2012 … The Southwestern Illinois Flood Prevention District Council (FPD Council) last week finally received the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ (USACOE) Approved Review Plan for the proposed Metro East levee improvement project, a full six months later than it was originally promised. Les Sterman, chief supervisor of construction and the works for the FPD Council, noted that, while the USACOE continues to publicly promise to expedite the review process, their actions to date don’t live up to that promise, nor do they provide any assurances on the future timeline for approvals.

At the February 15^th board meeting of the FPD Council, Col. Chris Hall, commander of the USACOE’s St. Louis District, also re-confirmed that the Corps will not be able to certify the Chain of Rocks Levee or the segment of the Wood River Levee that they are repairing as a result of damage it sustained during construction of Mel Price Locks and Dam. He cited the Corp’s internal policy that permits them only to certify entire levee systems, but not individual levees or levee segments, even if they own them or are responsible for their operations and repair.

“The Corps’ unwillingness to certify their own levees is incomprehensible and will cost us yet more time and more money as it leaves us with no choice but to have our team of consultants do the certification,” noted Sterman. Later in the meeting the board reluctantly authorized preliminary funding for the FPD’s design/construction manager to begin the process to certify the levees in question, a process that ultimately could cost upwards of $500,000.

Others in attendance called into question the Corps’ contention that its number one priority is public safety, asking how they can legitimately talk about safety considering how long it takes them to get things done. Rich Conner, President of the Leadership Council Southwestern Illinois, which administers the Levee Issues Alliance, noted that the Alliance will continue to push for policy changes at the Corps that may help to expedite the process.

Following the meeting, Madison County Board Chairman Alan Dunstan stated, “What we’ve seen to date gives us little confidence that things will continue to move at a pace that meets our deadlines, and every delay from this point forward threatens the public’s safety because it threatens our ability to implement the locally-funded planned improvements by 2014.”

Based on completion of the 60% design documents, the total cost of the project is still estimated at approximately $160 million and, according to the Council’s financial advisors, can be paid for by the money raised from the quarter-cent sales tax that was implemented in Madison, St. Clair and Monroe counties beginning in January 2009. The preliminary schedule optimally provides for construction to begin in 2012 and be substantially complete by the end of 2014, with the submittal of certification documentation to FEMA to occur in 2015.

“We’ve done everything possible here at the local level and are ready to move forward with this project that will create jobs, safeguard 156,000 residents and 55,000 existing jobs, and secure the economy of the area,” noted St. Clair County Board Chairman Mark Kern. “Our region cannot afford to have our plans threatened by continued bureaucratic delays.”

Also of concern to Sterman is the ongoing poor communications with the Corps of Engineers, largely a result of their internal policies that result in routinely withholding essential information from the FPD Council at critical times. He cited, as an example, the lack of willingness to share any draft version of the Review Plan for any input from the FPD Council and then a three week delay in releasing the final version, even after it was complete.

Monroe County Board Chairman Delbert Wittenauer shares Sterman’s concerns. “This lack of communication is just one more challenge in this relationship with the Corps of Engineers that is to adding to the schedule and cost of the project,” noted Wittenauer.

Copies of the presentations made at the February 15^th FPD Council board meeting are available on the FPD Council’s website at www.floodpreventiondistrict.org, along with a wealth of additional information.

The St. Louis Metro East Levee Issues Alliance serves as the organizational framework for the regional, public/private effort to help prevent the unintended economic consequences produced by FEMA’s update of the flood insurance rate maps in our region. While the Flood Prevention District Council is charged with improving the levees, the Alliance’s growing coalition of business and civic organizations, community leaders and concerned citizens is working together to eliminate the proposed designation by FEMA of the levee-protected areas in the American Bottom as Special Flood Hazard Areas (SFHA) and reduce the economic damage produced by the new insurance requirements and construction restrictions.

To learn more about the Alliance efforts, visit www.stlmetroeastlevees.org. The site makes it easy for individuals and organizations to officially join the Alliance, while also providing helpful tools for those who would like to support the legislative or outreach efforts in the coming months. For more information, visit the website or contact the Leadership Council at 618-692-9745.

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New York Times
Feb. 4, 2012
By John Schwartz

EAST ST. LOUIS, Ill. — When the Army Corps of Engineers declared last year that the levees here were “unacceptable,” it kicked up a storm of protest from officials and residents of the broad Mississippi River flood plain known as the American Bottom.

Local officials said the corps, shaken by the widespread destruction from levee collapses after Hurricane Katrina, had raised its safety standards to unreasonable levels, overstated the risk and heaped millions of dollars of unnecessarily expensive repair and insurance costs on the community…more

St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Jan. 26, 2012
By Terry Hillig

The Army Corps of Engineers has published a draft finding that planned levee system improvements in Madison, St. Clair and Monroe counties will have no significant environmental impact.

The agency’s environmental assessment of the project is available online at www.mvs.usace.army.mil/pm/pm-reports.html. The public may comment on the document by contacting Timothy George of the Environmental Compliance Section by telephone at 314-331-8459 or fax at 314-331-8606 or email at Timothy.K.George@usace.army.mil by noon on Feb. 20…more

Belleville News-Democrat
September 22, 2011
By Mike Fitzgerald

COLLINSVILLE — Work on a $161 million project to improve 64 miles of flood  protection levees in Madison, St. Clair and Monroe counties could be delayed  indefinitely because the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has not disclosed criteria  for issuing required construction permits… more