Dredging that Would Put Sand on Caswell, Oak Island Beaches Held Up in Congress

The Congressional paralysis in Washington, D.C., is being felt by residents of the Cape Fear region as the planned Wilmington Harbor maintenance dredging has been delayed by at least one month because of budget constraints.

The good news for Oak Island is that an emergency sand placement project—separate from the harbor work—is on track to resume this winter.

Dredging of the Inner Ocean Bar is supposed to occur every two years, but storm-related cost overruns pushed the project back from 2016 to this winter. This summer, officials from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said they expected to award the bids in November and see work begin by January 2018.

Now, the corps is hamstrung by the lack of a new budget and forced to operate under a continuing resolution.

“That essentially means that we must be given enough obligation authority to cover the federal portion of the contract in order to both open bids and move to contract award; as of today, we have not been given enough obligation authority to cover this contract within the first period of the continuing resolution,” a corps official stated in an e-mail to an Oak Island town leader.

The corps official stated that the agency expects to have additional authority that would allow it to open bids and award a contract in December.

The harbor dredging is important to shipping interests, who need the channel maintained to its federally authorized depth of 44 feet. It is also important to the communities of Bald Head Island, Caswell Beach and Oak Island, which depend on the dredged sand to rebuild eroded beaches.

Oak Island’s contract engineer, Johnny Martin of Moffatt & Nichol, recently told town officials the corps’ basic plan is to place 587,000 cubic yards of sand on Caswell Beach and Oak Island, including 163,000 cubic yards of sand from the Caswell Beach town limits to SE 78th Street in Oak Island. The work will create a berm 120 feet wide up to a height of six feet above mean high water.

Oak Island has agreed to contribute up to $3-million to extend this project. If bids are favorable, the work is expected to place an additional 231,000 cubic yards of sand as far west as SE 58th Street, which is the limit of the environmental permits. This work will create a 6,000-foot-long, 120-foot-wide berm, Martin wrote.

Source: stateportpilot.com