VANDERBURGH COUNTY

DRAINAGE BOARD

DECEMBER 18, 2007

The Vanderburgh County Drainage Board met in session this 18^th day of December, 2007 at 4:31 p.m. in room 301 of the Civic Center Complex with President Troy Tornatta presiding.

President Tornatta: Good afternoon, Mr. Jeffers. We’re going to start our Vanderburgh County Drainage Board meeting. It looks like it’s 4:31, Tuesday, December 18, 2007.

President Tornatta: We need a motion to approve the previous meetings minutes.

Commissioner Nix: So moved.

Commissioner Korb: Second.

President Tornatta: All in favor?

All Commissioners: Aye.

President Tornatta: Mr. Jeffers?

Bill Jeffers: Okay, in your second meeting in November you received a petition from Gerald and Linda Dennis, 2740 Anthony Drive; Clark and Linda Conway, 2724 Anthony Drive; and Patty Dee Wazny, 5725 Caesar’s Court. All of those are off Ward Road, immediately north of St. George Road, west of Oak Hill. They allege overgrown bushes and vegetation obstructing a drain or natural surface watercourse at 2701 Pine Tree Drive, and name Tim Harris as the owner of that property upon which the obstruction is alleged. I just want to give you a brief preliminary report today. I have viewed the site. I thought it would be an easy one. I don’t think it’s going to be an easy one. We’re going to have to have a hearing. Knob Hill Subdivision, the subdivision in which Tim Harris owns 2701 Pine Tree Drive was recorded in 1947. There’s no drainage easement and no drainage plan for that subdivision. So, I do not know whether the drain that’s alleged to be obstructed was a planned drain, or whether it was something that occurred over time, etcetera. Roman Acres, the subdivision in which the three petitioners own property was recorded in July of 1979. It does have a drainage easement. If I can find it, it may have a drainage plan prepared by Sam Biggerstaff. After his passing, James Morley and Associates purchased those records, and I will try to find if there’s a drainage plan there. In 1996 there was an extended period of rainfall in the spring, and Ward Road had several problems that had to be corrected. There is a lot of water going down through this area from Ward Road and Knob Hill. Pardon me. Okay, so, it appears there’s a drain there, or an open watercourse. It appears as if some vegetation has been allowed to grow up in it, and there’s been deposits of sediment. At this time I would say it was not intentional, it was a natural happenstance over a long period of time. When I look at the old aerial photographs I see that these trees and this brush existed over a long period of time. Now it comes to you as a petition. I’m just laying the ground work. That’s my preliminary report at this time. I would ask that you contemplate setting a hearing for this sometime the second or third week of January. I’m not asking you to do it at this time, just when you set your meeting dates the first meeting of January, set a hearing date for this petition. That will be within 60 days of your having received it. The latest you could have it, I believe, would be February 13, or the Tuesday closest to February 13.

President Tornatta: So, would you like to set that date February 13^th?

Bill Jeffers: Well, I don’t know if that’s a Tuesday. I went to look for a 2008 calendar, and I couldn’t lay my hands on one.

President Tornatta: February 12^th, or 19th.

Bill Jeffers: I will be out of the country on February 12^th.

President Tornatta: February 5^th.

Bill Jeffers: Good enough.

President Tornatta: Okay, February 5^th.

Bill Jeffers: That’s my 60^th birthday, February 12^th. I’m flying away.

President Tornatta: Alright. Are you coming back?

Bill Jeffers: I’ll be back.

President Tornatta: Okay.

Bill Jeffers: I’m just going to go visit some friends on an island.

President Tornatta: Okay. So, I won’t be here either then.

Bill Jeffers: On the 12^th?

President Tornatta: Oh, I just want to go with you.

Bill Jeffers: Oh, you want to come?

President Tornatta: Yeah.

Bill Jeffers: Okay.

President Tornatta: I like celebrating 60^th birthday parties.

Bill Jeffers: Let’s do it.

President Tornatta: Okay. Oh, we’re not having a meeting. Double bonus. Okay.

Bill Jeffers: Okay, so, that takes care of my preliminary report on that alleged obstruction.

Bill Jeffers: I do have several claims in a folder in front of your recording secretary. They are all for work on ditches that has been completed. The inspections have been made. The paperwork’s attached. Most, all but two of those ditches, all but three of those ditches are in the far northwest quadrant of the county. A couple of them are in the industrial area.

President Tornatta: Bill, it looks like, over behind Kohl’s on the west side, that there’s a beaver dam starting to layer some of the drainage going back through the Expressway.

Bill Jeffers: Right.

President Tornatta: I didn’t know if that was of any issue. I just drove by and saw that, and brought it to my attention that we had talked about that at one time.

Bill Jeffers: Right. That beaver dam, to the best of my knowledge, is located in a portion of Carpentier Creek, within the city of Evansville. I will report that to the Board of Works and the Levee Authority. We do not have any, that is not a regulated drain. We do not have any funds to address it. If there could be something worked out between the Board of Works and the County Drainage Board to find funds to address Carpentier Creek, I would be happy to work with you and their board and the City Engineer to address it. But, at this time, I have no funds available–

President Tornatta: Okay.

Bill Jeffers: –I’m not aware of any that you have.

President Tornatta: If you would just pass that along, I would appreciate it.

Bill Jeffers: Yes, sir.

President Tornatta: Okay. Motion to accept claims?

Commissioner Korb: Second.

Commissioner Nix: Is there a motion?

President Tornatta: Is there a motion to accept claims?

Commissioner Korb: Oh, I’m sorry, yeah, I’ll make that motion.

Commissioner Nix: Second.

President Tornatta: All in favor?

Commissioner Korb: I’m so used to you making the motions all the time, I just–

President Tornatta: Any other business?

Bill Jeffers: Well, I think there are two gentlemen in the audience, one of whom expressed at Area Plan Commission that he had a drainage comment to make, and you may wish to ask for public comment at this time.

President Tornatta: We will, we’ll do that. Gentlemen, any public comment? When you come up here, if you’ll please state your name, address. Is that all we need? See ya’, Judge. Merry Christmas.

Ralph Effinger: My name is Ralph Effinger.

President Tornatta: Where do you live, Ralph?

Ralph Effinger: I live at 629 East Columbia Street, Evansville, Indiana.

President Tornatta: Okay.

William Ritzert: I’m William J. Ritzert. I live at 3645 Voight Road.

President Tornatta: Alright. Good afternoon, gentlemen.

Ralph Effinger: Our comment is, or my comment, I should say, is on the water problem that we have that develops from these subdivisions that the Drainage Board, I guess, okays, or the Surveyor, or the Engineer. I was at the last meeting of this Johnson out on Heckel Road and Green River Road. They got, they’re taking 80 acres of land, which is on flood plain, which floods at different times. They’re going to raise this land to some “x” many feet. They are going to make catch me basins to take care of the water, I presume. But, I still have the problem that you take that many acres out of the flood and put it over on “x” many more people’s ground, which I am adjoining owner of this farm. It’s been in my family since 1900. I can tell you a lot of history about this farm, but at that meeting they didn’t care to hear it. So, that’s where I left it. When my mother talks about it, it was on the very lower end of the farm, which was real close to Green River Road. Now, since we don’t have all that, we’re within a half a mile of Oak Hill Road, and it gets up on that at different times. So, that tells you that there’s a lot of water being put out there. I’ve seen water from this place to Chandler, in the low places, all of Morgan Avenue. I think there should be some way that these catch me basins, be, put smaller pipes in, it drains out of them within a day. You should have a block of them, and make them lakes raised when they want to put all this street and house water in them basins, and then when the ditches get down, let them out. But, you go around and look at them and they’re all running out at the same time as the ditch is full. Then you’ve got the other problem, when you’ve got all this water up north and this water comes down Pigeon Creek , and you fellers are going to raise Green River Road I don’t know how many feet, I’m sure that’s going to hurt us, as a farmer. This ground is not, in my opinion, to be developed, like housing and that. I think it should be some other use. I know that Evansville needs progress, but we still need some way to plan this out that you don’t kill the people that’s living around here.

President Tornatta: And, very good points, and I, I mean, they’re all valid. I think that one thing that we’re trying to do is work with the architects, and, of course, we have to work with the Army Corp of Engineers, any amount of wetlands that we destroy we have to replace. If, Mr. Jeffers, if I’m not mistaken it’s a one for one? Or is it two for one?

Bill Jeffers: When you mitigate for a wetland, it depends on the quality of the wetland that you are destroying. Sometimes it’s as high as four to one, depending on the quality.

President Tornatta: So, one of the things that we’re doing right now is working with the Army Corp of Engineers. Although we’re raising to over the 100 foot flood level, we are also trying to make sure, and we have to comply, with giving them the proper amount of wetlands that they had to accommodate the water, and also with making sure that all these plans are in place for drainage and what have you as they go through and under, or as they’re doing now, going over Green River Road. So, we’re trying to address all these issues as they are coming about as well. So, we’re very concerned about it, much as you are, because we don’t want to have any problems come back on us.

Ralph Effinger: You ain’t getting rid of the water. The water, you’re displacing this water, and you’re putting it over on “x” many other people when you let these subdivisions go into these places. I know you’re putting this water in a catch me basin, or something like that and it runs out within 24 hours or something like that. Our rivers and our ditches are all full, now we get another big rain up north, up Pigeon Creek, say at Petersburg or wherever it starts at up there, and I know Pigeon Creek involves a lot of ground, here comes the water, it has, in this place, between here and Chandler, that’s the low place, it runs out there, because it can’t get down the river, to the river. So, you ain’t helping us any by letting, taking more of this land out of that plain, that’s what I’m trying to say to you. You done it in Keystone, it happens in all subdivisions. It seems like there’s no stopping to it. It just keeps a gettin’ bigger. You just give us more water all the time.

President Tornatta: Well, I would, obviously, let our Surveyor address some of those issues, how this goes down, because in taking this position, I didn’t claim to be a surveyor, and I didn’t claim that I would know the ins and outs of drainage. Although we’ve learned a lot, we do defer to professionals. In the engineering business there are professionals that work on hydraulics day in and day out, and our Surveyor has had quite an extensive amount of that type of work that he’s come across, so, I would defer to him.

Bill Jeffers: What Mr. Effinger is, Ralph Effinger is saying to you is true. What we do, in this case he’s talking about 80 acres of land that is all in the flood plain, and we’re going, and the rules, by the federal government and the state government dictated to the local authorities, particularly in this case the Building Commissioner, dictates that we tell the developer to raise the finished floor elevation of the dwellings two feet above the 100 year flood. Okay, so, in doing that they have to bring in several feet of dirt in some instances. As you get north on this 80 acre parcel, it’s quite a bit. So, yes, we are displacing any water that when Pigeon Creek floods, as Mr. Effinger describes, and, yes, there are several hundred square miles of watershed from Princeton all the way down, when all that water comes down here and spreads out into the flood plain, this new 80 acres of filled ground will displace 80 acres of however deep the water would have laid there in the flood plain. Now, we have to do that if we allow construction of dwellings. And we are allowed to do that by state law, and we are dictated exactly how we do it. Now, the state law also says that if the cumulative effect of all this filling is greater than .14 feet, fourteen hundredths of a foot, which is just under two inches, if the cumulative effect over the entire flood plain area is greater than two inches, let’s just round it off, then we are not allowed to issue those permits. So, a study is performed to determine whether the filling of these areas will amount to raising the flood elevation of the 100 year flood greater than two inches in vertical, you know, in elevation. If that is not going to occur, then the state allows us to move forward with development. As you can see, and as Mr. Effinger described to you, this flood plain is vast, I mean, it’s all up past Stevenson’s Station, all the way to Chandler, back up the back road between Chandler and Boonville. I mean, it’s a huge area of flood plain, and at this time all the development that we’ve allowed in Vanderburgh County has not displaced enough water to raise the flood elevation greater than .14 feet. When it does, we will have to stop. Every project that is done, the Corp of Engineers and the Department of Natural Resources checks every road project. When Lynch Road was built it raised the flood elevation one tenth of a foot from the front face of the bridge opening to the downstream face there’s a one, just over a one inch gradient, and they allowed that. That was a state project. The same types of calculations were performed for I-164. The same for your Green River Road project. Any project that causes, an increase is put into that total. Another one of his suggestions, Mr. Effinger’s suggestions is to let the detainment facilities the catchment basins, to let them stand full of water longer than one day. Currently our code wants them emptied out within 12 hours, for safety reasons. In other words, some of them are lakes already, and then that charge of water that raises them an additional four feet causes some safety concerns, and we want those back down to their pool elevation within 24 hours. Now, we could require, on a case by case basis, we could require a longer detention time to satisfy some of Mr. Effinger’s and other farmers concerns, some of their catchment basins, their WASCAB’s and so forth on their agricultural land, they do hold water longer than 24 hours, but they are way out in the middle of a field where there aren’t any children or liabilities involved. If we were to require a longer detention period, we would probably want some safety regulations in place to compensate for the liability. I think I’ve covered most of what Mr. Effinger is saying, or addressed most of his concerns. However, it will be an everlasting, ongoing discussion between pursuing development and preserving farmland between, you know, moving forward with economic development and protecting our natural resources. That’s a discussion that will never cease, and it’s just up to us to find a way to find the middle ground. I’m not sure if this gentleman had anything to say.

William Ritzert: No, you’ve all covered everything that I had on my mind.

Ralph Effinger: I have a question to ask on this, what you’re telling us that it’s approximately two inches. Mr. Jeffers says that we have two inches on this elevation of this water, from a hundred year flood plain, I presume?

Bill Jeffers: Anything over about a two inch increase is prohibited. Yes, sir.

Ralph Effinger: Now, this is all the subdivisions in Vanderburgh County, more or less?

Bill Jeffers: That would be with regard to all the filling activity, subdivisions and other filling activity that occurs within the Pigeon Creek watershed. Whether it occurs in Vanderburgh County, Warrick County, Gibson County, it’s a cumulative effect. The Corp of Engineers and the Department of Natural Resources is not going to allow the cumulative effect to be greater than about two inches.

Ralph Effinger: Okay. What I’m getting back to is trying to tell you the history of this ground. Now, he says two inches, now, I don’t know where they come up with this figure, if they come up in ‘37, the flood of ‘37, or if they come up with the flood back in 1800. What I’m saying is, my parents had this place, or my grandfather did, and the water was on the lower part of that farm, at the first that they ever seen it. Then in ‘37 it put water on the farm, and since ‘37, since I was out here and able to see water get on this farm, they sold 20 acres to the east, and that was the wet piece. From that time on I have seen three different times, and I’ve seen it come up to Voight Road, where they had to use sandbags to save these people that was built in there before the county or the city had any regulations for building on a certain low level of ground. Now, it tells me by common sense that somewhere we either started out on a too high a water level, and now we’re going to put two more inches on it, or my sense don’t make sense. I started out here in ‘37 with water there. Now we’re putting more to it and it keeps a comin’ up. Somewhere along the line we’re getting more than two inches extra on this than we started out with at a point. Somewhere, I don’t know where this point started out at to get two more inches.

Bill Jeffers: Again, I don’t dispute what Mr. Effinger is telling you. You have to consider all high water evidence that comes in from property owners and neighbors who have experienced it. His family has been out there since 1900. I believe his grandmother was the first, and they’ve been there continuously. The ‘37 flood was a 500 year flood, so, we throw that out the window, that was not an event that’s used as a gauge. However, in 1961, I believe, again in ‘65, the Green River Road bridge went under water, and Green River Road went under water. The Corp of Engineers subsequently used those high water elevations as the 100 year flood, and did a study in 1981 and established a benchmark that says this is the 100 year flood elevation for this entire watershed. They came back after our, I believe it was ‘94, they came back and they ran cross sections all the way up to Green River Road, and I believe some additional study was done up to I-164 when it was built in the ‘90's, but there are floodways designated and flood plain elevations designated all the way up Blue Grass Creek and Furlick Creek, which affects this ground here. The Corp of Engineers has established positively this is the 100 year elevation for these waterways. Now, again in 1996, well, we had a couple of them, ‘82 and ‘83 that you saw those.

Ralph Effinger: There in ‘96–

Bill Jeffers: ‘96 was the big one that Mr. Effinger is talking about in recent times that came up on Voight Road and flooded everything around there, sandbagged houses, etcetera. In ‘96 it did not quite attain the same elevation as it did in ‘61 and ‘65. We went out and measured that, and shot a lot, and, you know, it just almost got there.

President Tornatta: Can I just throw something in real quick? We’re getting ready to expire on a little time here, but what I would like to do is, your concern is vital to what we want to look at. The problem is we can’t do anything right now on this board, nor would we be able to examine it ourselves. What I would like to do is maybe direct Bill to potentially either go out there or give us some recommendations on an idea of how to attack this, or how this will be addressed in the future. At that point then we can discuss that and go over it in the way that we can in directing either somebody to address the problem or to direct it to be handled through nature.

Bill Jeffers: Well, that’s a good idea, and I know we’re going to shut down here before 5:00,or right at 5:00 so we don’t go into the next half hour on Channel 9, they’ve got scheduled programming. But, I think what we can do, I mean, I would like to leave it with we are observing the current regulations, federal, state and local regulations. You will see this come before you in the next few months when Mr. Johnston brings in the 80 acres of R-3 development. The plan that he puts forward will be reviewed according to all the local, state and federal regulations, and it will not be recommended to you for approval unless it meets those. I would say that what Mr. Effinger and the other gentleman here could do is we could sit down, not only with the County Surveyor, but the County Engineer, discuss what’s going on in Green River Road, because there’s a lot of study data, there’s a lot of information generated from that data that tells us exactly what to anticipate. I’ve found, believe it or not, that when we go out and check these rainfall events, and we look at the rainfall charts that we get from the airport, which is right out here in this area, and we look at what the Corp of Engineers tells us the elevation of the water should achieve according to their computer programming, it gets very, very close. That’s why there’s that two inch cushion that they want to maintain, because it does get very close. Now, we are not, and because we have a two foot elevation for a dwelling, we are not going to flood any dwellings that we build under these new regulations. But, the farm ground remains a concern, not only for Mr. Effinger and the other gentleman, it remains a concern for all of us to do what we can do.

President Tornatta: Okay, William, Ralph thanks for coming out and giving us your concerns, and we will stay on top of it.

Ralph Effinger: Could I talk to you sometime on some other issues in Vanderburgh County?

President Tornatta: I would appreciate it if you would talk to Mr. Jeffers on that, because he’s the one that brings it to us during this Drainage Board meeting. Okay?

Ralph Effinger: Thank you.

Commissioner Nix: Thank you.

President Tornatta: Thank you very much.

Ralph Effinger: Thank you very much for your time and for your listening–

President Tornatta: Oh, no problem.

Ralph Effinger: –of my request.

President Tornatta: No problem at all.

Commissioner Nix: Thanks.

President Tornatta: Thank you for coming. Okay, that being said, if there’s nobody else, I would entertain a motion to adjourn.

Commissioner Nix: So moved.

Commissioner Korb: Second.

President Tornatta: All in favor?

All Commissioners: Aye.

(The meeting was adjourned at 5:00 p.m.)

Those in Attendance:

Troy Tornatta                                      Jeff Korb                         Bill Nix

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.                    Bill Jeffers                       Madelyn Grayson

Ralph Effinger                                     William Ritzert                Others Unidentified

VANDERBURGH COUNTY

DRAINAGE BOARD

Troy Tornatta, President

Jeff Korb, Vice President

Bill Nix, Member

(Recorded and transcribed by Madelyn Grayson.)