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Clermont Soil and Water outlines $3.5 million plan to stabilize eroding Lower East Fork banks
Summary
Clermont Soil and Water and partners described a design-build restoration for about 1 mile of the Lower East Fork stream segment, identified by Ohio EPA as impaired, and said the project has been recommended for up to $3.5 million in WRSP funding and could begin construction in 2026 if permits and weather allow.
Clermont County soil-and-water officials on May 7 described a design-build project to stabilize about a 1-mile stretch of the Lower East Fork of the Little Miami River, a segment Ohio EPA has listed as impaired for stream-bank erosion and sedimentation.
Becky McClatchy, watershed program manager for Clermont Soil and Water Conservation District, told the Board of County Commissioners the project focuses on chronic bank failures that are generating sediment and transporting nutrients downstream. "We know we have at least half of our streams that are not meeting state water quality standards," McClatchy said, and she identified nutrient and sediment runoff — including nitrogen and phosphorus that can fuel harmful algal blooms — as key concerns.
McClatchy said the Lower East Fork restoration covers roughly a 1-mile reach just above the Little Miami confluence and is driven by willing landowners and a high ranking in Ohio EPA's Water Resources Restoration Sponsor Program (WRSP). "Because the area is documented as impaired by Ohio EPA, it ranks really high for their water resources restoration sponsor program," she said. McClatchy said the project was recommended for funding "up to $3,500,000.0" through the WRSP and that DV Resource Group was selected earlier this year as the design-build contractor to complete assessments, modeling and permitting.
Design concepts described to the commissioners include regrading and sloping back high banks (the presentation noted banks average roughly 15 feet in height in places), installing vegetated, bioengineered revetments, and placing in-stream structures such as log vanes and cross-vanes to shift high-energy flows toward the channel midpoint and away from eroding banks. McClatchy said some areas will be given greater floodplain access to reduce bank stress and improve habitat.
Officials said field assessments and permitting will continue through the remainder of 2025. McClatchy said, "If all lehi is well, permitting in place and weather works with us, we should expect construction next year," and the team plans two years of post-construction monitoring with the design-build firm to track stabilization and habitat improvements.
Commissioners and partners at the meeting noted the area's history of channel migration visible in historic aerial imagery and thanked the landowners and contractor partners for their cooperation.
The commissioners later added a $250,000 supplemental appropriation for the Soil and Water Conservation District tied to this restoration to the county's 2025 appropriations (recorded elsewhere on the agenda).
