Agencies clash over mapping of ‘old-growth’ fens
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Skiers
and snowboarders meander through the base area of Wolf Creek on Monday.
The Village at Wolf Creek, proposed not far from the current base area,
is continuing
to stir up controversy. The Army Corps of Engineers and
the Environmental
Protection agency are currently at odds over wetlands
regulation.
/Photo by Todd Newcomer. |
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by Adam Howell
Wetlands are currently boiling with controversy in the vicinity of Wolf
Creek Ski Area. According
to recently obtained e-mails, two agencies
are throwing jabs in a
recent bout over the regulation of wetlands as
they relate to the
proposed Village at Wolf Creek. According to the
exchange, the Army
Corps of Engineers’ Albuquerque District has
prevented the Environmental
Protection Agency from verifying the
locations of wetlands at the site
of the proposed developed.
Courtesy of the Freedom of Information
Act (FOIA), several work-
related e-mails were recently acquired from
the EPA regarding the
proposed “Village,” which would include 2,172 new
units and 222,100
square feet of commercial space on 287.5 acres near
the base of the
current Wolf Creek Ski Area. Proposing the development
is the
Leavell-McCombs Joint Venture funded by Texas billionaire Billie
Joe
“Red” McCombs, co-founder of Clear Channel Communications Inc.
Unaffiliated with the family-run Wolf Creek Ski Area, McCombs and
his
venture partner Bob Honts, a Texas-based developer, want to build
what
opponents call a “Vail-sized city” within the property boundaries
of the
current ski area at the base of the Alberta lift.
As part of the
development process, the Army Corps was reviewing a
map prepared by the
developer’s consultants. Such delineations are
done to outline the
boundaries of and prevent impacts to wetlands. In
the case of the Wolf
Creek wetlands, the Army Corps had previously
accepted a request from
the Environmental Protection Agency to
participate in the field
verification of the wetlands boundaries. As a
result, Project Manager
Anita Culp of the Corps’ Southern Colorado
Regulatory Office offered the
EPA dates in September for when the
two agencies could work together on
the project. But shortly thereafter,
her boss, Dan Malanchuk, chief of
the Corps’ Albuquerque District,
refused to clear it and ordered her to block the EPA’s request to review
their wetlands delineations.
At
that time, Culp called Gene Reetz, the EPA’s wetlands team leader,
saying that their original offer was “off the table,” according to the
emails.
Furthermore, since the EPA does only a couple delineations per
year, it
would be inappropriate for them to get involved, Malanchuk said
in a
recent interview.
Reetz responded to the turn-down the next
day in a letter to Malanchuk,
writing, “To say that I am disappointed
is to put it mildly.” Given the
controversy surrounding the proposed
“Village,” Reetz said he desired a
more cooperative effort; at the same
time, he did not leave out legal
action as a possibility. He also cited a
1979 legal precedent under
former U.S. Attorney General Benjamin
Civilleti that gives the EPA
jurisdiction under the Clean Water Act to
make the final determination
as to what constitutes “waters of the
United States.”
Although the Army Corps implements the
delineation
program, the EPA has enforcement authority and can veto
permits authorizing the discharge of dredged or fill materials
within
waters of the U.S. in “special cases,” Reetz said.
Plus, the
Corps’ exclusion of the EPA comes amid their
shared responsibilities to
implement the Clean Water Act. In
the Corps’ Regulatory Program Mission
Statement, it avows,
“During the permit process, the Corps considers the
views of
other federal, state and local agencies, interest groups, and
the general public.”
For the Corps to exclude the EPA suggests
that political meddling
is occurring, says Jeff Berman, director of the Friends of Wolf Creek.
Especially disconcerting to Berman is that a FOIA
request to the Corps’
Albuquerque District has received no response.
“They should tell us
if Red McCombs and their attorneys in Washington,
D.C. are pulling
strings,” he said.
Meanwhile, the Rio Grande
National Forest continues to write the
final Environmental Impact
Statement (EIS) for the Village at Wolf
Creek. As the process unfolds,
the development proposal continues
to generate opposition.
Spearheading
opposition to the development, the Friends of Wolf
Creek includes
representation from a variety of conservation groups
like Colorado Wild,
the American Lands Alliance, the Colorado
Mountain Club, San Juan Citizens Alliance and the Wilderness
Society. In addition, the owners of
the Wolf Creek Ski Corp. and
Congressman John Salazar have gone on the
record,
opposing the development.
This opposition coincides with
the “significant likelihood of direct,
indirect and cumulative adverse
impacts to wetlands that could result
from the proposal,” as the EPA
warned in response to the Rio Grande
National Forest’s Draft EIS.
Specifically,
the EPA has serious concerns about the
protection of fen wetlands at
Wolf Creek. Considered old-
growth wetland ecosystems, fens are
irreplaceable habitats,
according to the EPA. As groundwater driven
systems
dependent on a seasonally stable water supply, fens are
particularly susceptible to groundwater interception or
any alteration
of hydrology.
Whether or not the developers will need a 404
permit to
discharge dredged and fill materials into surrounding fen
wetlands is irrelevant to their protection, according to wet-
lands
experts and hydrologists at the EPA. That’s because
the permit-regulated
fens on the parcel are fairly sensitive
to minor changes to the land
surrounding them, according
to Mike Wireman, a groundwater hydrologist
with the EPA.
Mark Williams, a hydrologist at the University of
Colorado
at Boulder who looked over the site last June with Wireman,
agreed about the risks, saying in an interview that the
development most
likely will impact groundwater that feeds
into the wetlands there.
Despite
proposals by the developer to avoid impacts to
wetlands by bridging
tributaries and wetlands in the base
area, Sarah Fowler, a wetlands
expert at the EPA who also
walked the site in June, remains concerned.
The construction
of below-grade foundations in the area, for example,
can
significantly lower groundwater in adjacent wetlands.
At the
Breckenridge Ski Area base facility, for instance,
groundwater models
completed there have demonstrated
that even minimal impingement into
groundwater from
foundations will have far reaching effects on
down-gradient
wetlands, Fowler said.
Moreover, foundations from
buildings in the vicinity of the
fens on the developer’s land could act
as groundwater wells
creating cones of depression impacting critical
groundwater
supporting the fens, she said.
However, Honts
believes that the project can be done without
impacting the parcel’s
wetlands. To assure there’s no downstream
impact, the uplands
development will be monitored and studied
with underground monitoring
wells, he said.
In response to the Corps’ verification of his
consultant’s wetlands
delineations for the land, Honts concluded, “We’ve
complied with
the law, and we’re pleased to say that.” As for the EPA’s
exclusion
from the process, “It sounds like the environmentalists want a
second bite at the apple,” he said. •
by Adam Howell ~ The Durango Telegraph ~ 12/29/05
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