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Astoria council authorizes mayor to sign state consent order for Bear Creek Dam work
Summary
Council approved a motion authorizing the mayor to sign a consent order with the Oregon Water Resources Department regarding repairs and studies at Bear Creek (main) Dam; staff described required operations planning, a gate replacement and a longer-term emergency spillway plan estimated at about $4 million.
The Astoria City Council authorized Mayor Sean Fitzpatrick to sign a consent order with the Oregon Water Resources Department addressing identified deficiencies at Bear Creek Dam and the city’s two other watershed dams.
City Manager Paul Spence and Public Works Director Jeff Harrington told the council the state identified deficiencies late last year that require corrective action. Harrington said all three dams the city manages are designated “high hazard” because failure could endanger downstream properties; the city has completed emergency action planning, seismic studies and a hydrology inflow analysis to assess overtopping and scour risks.
Harrington said near-term work includes an operations plan to lower reservoir elevation as needed and repair or replace a 48-inch outlet gate on the main lake dam, a component he described as a high priority for funding. He said the city had installed a temporary 18-inch drain for interim lowering and rebuilt a canal gate that controls reservoir elevation. Harrington told councilors the emergency-spillway need has been identified for decades; staff estimated a conceptual cost of about $4 million and said the city hopes state funding will help cover that work. He also said the city is pursuing mitigation and design options where prior emergency repairs did not provide required fish passage; those sites need further work coordinated with Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife.
Councilor Davis moved to authorize the mayor to sign the state consent order; the motion was seconded and adopted by voice vote.
Harrington said the consent-order timeline calls for completion of an operations plan in the current year and progress toward repairing the 48-inch outlet over the next one to two years. The long-term spillway alternatives will require more analysis and a multi-year schedule, he said.
The city presentation also summarized recent watershed work, including a variable retention timber sale that returned about $485,000 in net revenue, a road-maintenance budget of roughly $65,000 last year, and ongoing planning for pre-commercial thinning and road decommissioning to reduce sediment risk to the drinking-water supply.
