Not wanting to jump the gun, one cannot determine if Trump’s new budget line item to fully funds the remainder of the Savannah Harbor deepening project provides sufficient monies to resolve Augusta’s dilemma. Today’s headlines trumpet good news for Savannah; but with no mention of Augusta, what should we think?
In defining a textbook example of a “Catch-22” for the New Savannah Bluff Lock and Dam (NSBL&D), the Corps, with the behind the scenes guidance of the Savannah RiverKeeper, achieved the reclassification of the functional dam as “decommissioned” in order to wipe their hands of ownership and maintenance responsibilities, and thereby paving the road for its removal and replacement (that being a massive tumor like presence of an immovable rock weir). Yet, simultaneously, the Georgia Port Authority’s (GRP) requirement to get sturgeon upstream of the current structure, has defined the NSBL&D’s proposed removal within the scope of their federally mandated environmental mitigation obligations. Despite the literal begging of the affected GA/SC state and local governments and area business leaders to provide GRP a mitigation option that maintains the gate controls of the L&D (flood and silt control) while adhering to the 2016 WINN act language that requires maintenance of current river levels, it is difficult to see whether our Senators have been listening.
Meetings with Sen Perdue, and now Sen. Kelly Loeffler, have procured assurances that they have Augusta’s back in the matter. However, this news, while positive for Savannah, makes no indication that collateral problems Augusta and North Augusta will be assuming have been addressed in this new budget. One should maintain faith in their Senator’s word; but, with news like this, one also cannot help wondering if they have simply taken the “sorry, my hands are tied” Corps of Engineers excuse, since the federal government no longer owns the dam and therefore cannot repair it (but the federal money for Savannah can remove it).