Posted on August 21, 2018
The waves of Lake Erie are consuming Sturgeon Point Marina boulder by boulder.
Without as much as $2 million in repair work, experts say the 31-year-old town-owned marina in Evans could be unnavigable within two years.
“The armored stones are breaking and missing and are out of place,” said Jeff Jondle, the president of Erie County Federation of Sportmen’s Clubs, citing a report prepared by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. “They’re telling them the failure is imminent. It’s not a question of if; it’s a question of when and how.”
The October 2016 Corps of Engineers inspection report to the Town of Evans said the marina’s condition – especially along a diagonal section of breakwater facing Lake Erie – “warrants serious concern” and recommended repairs be done “as soon as possible to improve the stability and reliability of the structure.”
When could it fail?
“We are unable to speculate when a significant failure will occur, given the unpredictable nature of Lake Erie conditions and weather,” the Corps of Engineers told The Buffalo News in a statement. “We can’t predict if or when a failure may occur. Any project that is not fully maintained is susceptible to additional risks.”
The condition of the Sturgeon Point Marina matters because it is the only safe harbor of its size between Buffalo and Dunkirk for boaters to take refuge when storms hit.
“Where are these people going to be taking safe refuge when that happens?” asked Rich Davenport of the Erie County Fish Advisory Board.
“I’ve been out there when it’s snotting,” Jondle said. “Your life is in your hands. We can’t lose the facility.”
The marina – classified as “recreational” by the federal government – attracts boaters, charter boat captains, anglers, divers and other water sports enthusiasts.
It’s also used by scientists, researchers and law enforcement officers from agencies such as the Department of Homeland Security, U.S. Coast Guard and state Department of Environmental Conservation.
“There are too many lives at stake and too many benefits that we would be missing,” Davenport said.
Storm surge
Seasonal storm-generated waves, winds, seiches and high lake levels could be causing the most serious damage.
“Lake Erie is a dynamic system, and the Sturgeon Point Marina is subject to the weather forces of the lake,” the Corps of Engineers said. “Each poses a specific threat, and the severity of any particular threat may depend on a specific event or condition.”
Over time, the elements have pounded a section of breakwater — loosening rocks, pulling them away from the structure — and even created a new sand beach that was not designed to be there.
“Water is incredible,” Jondle said. “It’s dense. It’s heavy. And it can move stuff.”
What’s more, waves and an eastward current force sand through the breakwater, filling in the channel where boaters move in and out of the harbor.
That has resulted in annual dredging and maintenance costs for the town that officials fear is swamping its ability to sustain the marina.
The town is responsible for the operation and maintenance of the marina though 2035, under separate agreements it struck with the Corps of Engineers and the DEC in the 1980s, when the marina was built with millions of dollars in federal and state funds.
Evans Supervisor Mary Hosler said the marina suffers from a combination of misfortune and circumstance that has her cash-strapped town straining to meet obligations signed by her predecessors three decades ago.
“Do I wait for it to collapse and have to have the Corps of Engineers fix it?” Hosler asked. “That’s not a strategy that I’d like to entertain.”
Besides the structural issues imperiling the marina, Hosler said there are other issues: its size, classification and construction, as well as funding sources.
When the marina was built, it came with smaller slips. Over the years, boat sizes have grown considerably.
Two-thirds of Sturgeon Point’s slips are equipped for boats that are 20-feet or less in length. Most boats now on Lake Erie are 24 feet or longer.
Hosler said that’s capped revenues the town can receive from slip fees, the largest of which run from $1,000 to $2,000 per season.
The marina is also federally classified as a shallow-draft recreational harbor that offers a small commercial benefit from the charter fishing industry. That matters because the federal funding for recreational harbors such as Sturgeon Point was cut off in 2005.
Instead of a 12 percent reimbursement for the town’s nearly $90,000 annual dredging costs, the town now receives nothing, Hosler said.
What’s more, because of the way the Corps engineered the breakwater, dredging the marina harbor has become a yearly proposition.
That combination of factors sets Evans – and Sturgeon Point Marina – on an unsustainable path of losing money, Hosler said.
“In two years, we easily could be looking at a $200,000 deficit,” she said.
The Corps of Engineers said any reclassification of the marina would require an act of Congress. It also said that Sturgeon Point would not normally be eligible for funding by the U.S. Army because it doesn’t reach the priority level needed to justify spending on commercial navigation and flood control projects.
Corps of Engineers officials said the district has recommended how Evans can reduce dredging volumes in the marina channel and reduce the breakwater’s permeability.
“It is important to note that dredging cannot be eliminated altogether,” the Corps of Engineers said.
As for the construction, the Corps of Engineers said Evans got what it selected in the 1980s.
“The Corps of Engineers worked extensively with the Town of Evans to evaluate multiple design alternatives; the Town of Evans selected an alternative as a locally preferred plan, which was the plan that was ultimately recommended and constructed.”
It added: “The agreement also required that the town provide and maintain, at its own expense, all project facilities, including dredged depths.”
The Corps of Engineers’ offered two possible alternatives in late 2016 for the town to repair the breakwater.
The first calls for a simple overlay of the affected breakwall areas with about 3,000 tons of new armor stone at a cost of more than $800,000.
The other would require installing 1,120 square yards of a textile-like material to prevent sand from getting into the breakwall after excavating 1,100 tons of existing stone and 170 cubic yards of beach sand. Then, the stone would be put back with 4,600 tons of more stone at a total project cost of nearly $1.2 million.
What will Evans do?
“I don’t want to close it,” Hosler said. “My goal is to save it, and we need a long-term strategy.”
But, she added: “It shouldn’t just fall on taxpayers.”
A new vision
It’s why Hosler; Davenport of the Fish Advisory Board; county Commissioner of Environment and Planning Thomas R. Hersey Jr.; and others are pushing for an upgraded, expanded Sturgeon Point Marina that could handle larger boats and more marine traffic.
Sturgeon Point doesn’t need a $2 million Band-Aid to fix a spot that’s already struggling, it needs a wholesale upgrade to fix it, Hosler said.
“This is a regional asset,” Davenport said.
Hosler said a new design concept for the expanded marina could solve the issues at Sturgeon Point Marina.
An expanded breakwater and boardwalk would mitigate the structural dangers. Expanded boat slips would be added along with a boat launch, personal watercraft ports and a new lodge area with a nature center, office space, an outdoor plaza, a cafe and shop and a public beach.
That will cost money – maybe as much as $10 million. It should come from a bigger pool and should be fast-tracked, supporters said.
But others say fixing the immediate problem to save the marina is more important for right now.
Either way, the marina may have taken another blow last week, not from the weather, but on the political front.
Rep. Chris Collins has been involved in the effort to bring attention and money to Sturgeon Point Marina. But he has announced he will not run for re-election following his indictment on insider trading.
Five days before his indictment, Collins, in letters to the Department of Homeland Security and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ Washington, D.C. headquarters, asked for federal assistance for the marina.
He requested the Corps of Engineers to “elevate the priority level of this project to ‘high’ and identify resources to review potential design flaws and assist with expansion design that would make the marina more financially viable.”
Collins asked Homeland Security to identify “any funding opportunities within the agency that the town might apply for to protect this marina.”
For Sturgeon Point, the Collins news “wasn’t good,” Jondle said.
Because the funding would be more than what the town, or even Erie County, could commit to, state or federal agencies have to be involved.
“It needs to be on their radar,” said Hersey, the county commissioner of environment and planning.
Could a future plan involve Evans offering the marina to the state Department of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation, as was done on Buffalo’s Outer Harbor?
What about privatizing it?
“We’re definitely looking at long-term strategies,” Hosler said. “All options are on the table.”
Source: The Buffalo News
