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Tulsa District Regulatory Permits for Public Comment

PURPOSE: The purpose of these public notices are to inform you of a proposal for work in which you might be interested and to solicit your comments and information to better enable us to make a reasonable decision on factors affecting the public interest.

SECTION 10: The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is directed by Congress through Section 10 of the Rivers and Harbors Act of 1899 (33 USC 403) to regulate all work or structures in or affecting the course, condition, or capacity of navigable waters of the United States. The intent of this law is to protect the navigable capacity of waters important to interstate commerce.

SECTION 404: The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is directed by Congress through Section 404 of the Clean Water Act (33 USC 1344) to regulate the discharges of dredged and fill material into all waters of the United States. These waters include lakes, rivers, streams, mudflats, sandflats, sloughs, wet meadows, natural ponds, and wetlands adjacent to other waters. The intent of the law is to protect these waters from the indiscriminate discharge of material capable of causing pollution and to restore and maintain their chemical, physical, and biological integrity.

U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Tulsa District

Regulatory Office, Chief

918-669-7400

SWT-2013-564

Published Dec. 21, 2016

Expiration date: 1/19/2017

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Location: The proposed project is in the City of Wichita Falls, Wichita and Archer County, Texas. The project site can be found on the Lake Wichita, Texas 7.5 Minute USGS Quadrangle map at North Latitude 33.83995 and West Longitude 98.54684

Purpose: The basic purpose of this work is to excavate the lake and to construct recreational and commercial activities in Lake Wichita. It is a water dependent activity.

The overall purpose of this work is to excavate, reconstruct, and stabilize a portion of Holliday Creek, Pecan Creek, and Lake Wichita to construct a waterfront park for the citizens of Wichita Falls.

Authorization: The Water Resources Development Act of 1986, Public Law 99-662, dated November 17, 1986. The construction was completed in 1996 with the purpose for flood control.

History: The reservoir was completed in 1901 and was originally constructed for 2,200 surface acres. In 1996, the dam alteration lowered conservation pool from 980.4 feet to 976.0 feet, which reduced the lake area to 1,342 surface acres. Due to sedimentation, the recent bathymetric survey concluded the reservoir has 1,200 surface acres and now the average depth is 4.5 feet with a maximum depth of 9.5 feet. The CWF has a water rights permit to authorize impoundment of 13,050 acre-feet. The water is not currently being used by the CWF for municipal use.

Additional Information: CWF has proposed to drain the entire conservation storage. CWF has completed a lake volumetric survey of the lake. The proposed contours would increase the overall depth of Lake Wichita to a maximum depth of 15 feet. This project is scheduled to continue for approximately 10 years. The CWF has completed a technical memorandum for the Lake Wichita 404 application and is anticipating future fundraising to complete the project with an estimated cost of $94 million (excavation $40-50 million only).

Description of Work: The applicant has proposed to excavate approximately 9.9 million cys of lakebed within the existing Lake Wichita conservation pool (1,270 ac), Holliday Creek (2,700 lf) and Pecan Creek (2,000 lf). The applicant has also proposed the permanent loss of waters of the United States related to the discharge of dredged and/or fill material into 1.34 ac existing depressional wetlands, 8.09 ac of lacustrine wetlands (these fringe wetlands are small and scattered along the entire existing shoreline of the lake), and 25.15 ac of open water areas within the existing lake for associated proposed recreational amenities.

The total types of fill material is 122,715 cys of open water for amenities. The fill material types for 10,996 cys of sand, 2,127 cys of concrete, 2,635 cys of gravel, 18,197 cys of 6” diameter rock, and 87,534 cys of native soil from reservoir that would be redistributed for project areas as part of the proposed project.

The method of removing the accumulated sediment is a “discharge of dredged material”. This includes the excavation, addition, placement, or redistribution of dredged or excavated materials within waters of the United States.

The fill material would be excavated from within Lake Wichita. The work would be completed using wheeled and tracked excavation equipment (backhoes, track hoes, dozers, dump trucks, and front-end loaders), drilling rigs, concrete trucks, concrete pumping equipment, compactors, and graders.

Return water from an upland contained dredged material disposal area. The return water from a contained disposal area is administratively defined as a “discharge of dredged material” by Section 404 of the Clean Water Act (CWA) and is controlled by the state through the Section 401 of the CWA certification procedures. The applicant has proposed to haul excavated material to an upland area located on private property and/or in the current CWF landfill.

Public Notice Document