Whispering Creek subdivision deferred after dispute over floodway acreage and water-rights math

The Midway Water Advisory Board on Jan. 5 deferred a decision on the Whispering Creek subdivision (515 West Perry Lane), asking staff to recalculate the FEMA floodway acreage used in the city’s water-rights requirement before the board reconvenes the item in February.

Staff summarized the project's history: an earlier board decision recorded higher water-rights requirements (roughly 16.73 acre-feet in 2020) that were reduced to 6.4 acre-feet after boundary adjustments and credits applied during subsequent review. The current outstanding requirement reported in the meeting is about 3.4 acre-feet remaining to be turned in based on water shares already provided, staff said.

Applicant Jeremy Clark (speaking remotely) described the subdivision as a small family-focused project to create lots for his children and said he and his team engaged a wetlands consultant and engineer (Paul Berg) to map the FEMA floodplain and floodway. Clark said Berg's site calculation identified about 0.6 acres of steep, constantly wet floodplain area adjacent to the creek that the applicant believes should not be counted as irrigable acreage for the water-rights calculation. "That entire area is just constantly wet… so it's kind of a steep bank that we just — we don't have any need to irrigate because it's already just kind of wet and steep," Clark said.

Staff and board members discussed the difference between FEMA floodplain (a broader area) and the floodway (the faster-moving channel portion). Staff recommended recalculating using the FEMA floodway rather than the broader floodplain to determine how much irrigable area should be excluded. The board specifically asked for a recalculation that isolates the floodway, because removing the 0.6 acres from the irrigable area would reduce the water-rights requirement by an estimated 1.8 acre-feet (roughly — staff asked for a precise computation), lowering the outstanding requirement accordingly.

The board made and seconded a motion to continue the item until the next meeting after staff provides the precise floodway calculation; the motion passed by voice vote. Applicant Clark said he had already purchased approximately one additional water share and asked whether the board or community could assist with a short-term lease of an additional share until he can acquire the final required shares.

After the motion, staff and members confirmed next steps: staff will run the floodway-specific acreage calculation, provide exact acre-foot adjustments based on that change, and return the item for board action at the February meeting.