VANDERBURGH COUNTY

DRAINAGE BOARD

OCTOBER 16, 2007

The Vanderburgh County Drainage Board met in session this 16^th day of October, 2007 at 4:42 p.m. in room 301 of the Civic Center Complex with President Troy Tornatta presiding.

Madelyn Grayson: Hey, Bill, just for the record, we’ve got two sets of minutes to approve.

Bill Jeffers: Okay.

Madelyn Grayson: The September 25^th and the special meeting on September 28^th.

Commissioner Korb: Oh, that was the long meeting.

Bill Jeffers: Put an “s” behind meeting. Approve minutes of previous meetings on the agenda.

President Tornatta: Okay. Good afternoon. We’re here for the Tuesday, October 16, 2007 Vanderburgh County Drainage Board meeting. It’s about twenty till five on a Tuesday.

President Tornatta: Motion to approve the previous meetings minutes?

Commissioner Nix: So moved.

Commissioner Korb: Second.

President Tornatta: All in favor?

All Commissioners: Aye.

President Tornatta: Alright.

Bill Jeffers: Good afternoon, President Tornatta and Commissioners and staff. I had a five page text prepared for today, but I was told to be done by 5:00. So, we’ll proceed. Under drainage plans, Value Place Motel is located on three lots in the southeast corner of Charleston Square on the lake. It’s a motel that provides basic service lodging. It’s located immediately north of the Lloyd Expressway, immediately east of I-164, and straddling the Warrick-Vanderburgh county line. The majority of the storm water run off is conveyed directly to a large lake existing in Charleston Square Apartments, and an insignificant amount of storm water run off will continue to discharge into the state right-of-way for the Lloyd Expressway, and thence eastward to Howard Ditch in Warrick County. The plan comports with the Vanderburgh County drainage code, and the County Surveyor recommends approval of the plan for Value Place Motel. It’s right there at the interchange of I-164 and the Lloyd, as you can see on your picture. With the understanding that the board’s approval of this plan does not negate any requirements that may exist with regard to State Highway Department approval, or approval by pertinent Warrick County agencies. I have notified the Warrick County Surveyor of the plan developments. So, for our part, I recommend approval.

Commissioner Korb: Bill, this is backward from what a lot of those other hotels are, isn’t it?

Bill Jeffers: Well, Commissioner Korb, just north of that is a large apartment project.

Commissioner Korb: Right.

Bill Jeffers: The rest of the development is, there’s Les Shively’s law office right there where it says Citadel, on Citadel Drive.

Commissioner Korb: Okay.

Bill Jeffers: The rest of it is industrial and construction offices, and construction shops. The hotels are across I-164, there are several hotels across there and then to the south.

Commissioner Korb: Can we scroll down?

Bill Jeffers: John Dunn’s development.

Brenda Jeffers: Down?

Commissioner Korb: Yeah, please.

Bill Jeffers: Yeah, go down to the south.

Commissioner Korb: Other way, other way.

Bill Jeffers: Go north. You’ll see the new hotels and motels to the south along Eagle Crest Boulevard–

Commissioner Korb: Got it.

Bill Jeffers: –there by Cracker Barrel and the new Cheeseburger In Paradise, that big lake right there.

Commissioner Korb: Yeah, got it.

Bill Jeffers: John Dunn’s development.

Commissioner Korb: Okay.

Bill Jeffers: So, it’s catty corner from John Dunn’s hotel complex.

Commissioner Korb: Yeah.

Bill Jeffers: It’s not an ideal location for access, because you have to go all the way out to Epworth Road and back to Spry Road to get to it. But, it is an appropriate location for the zoning.

President Tornatta: At what point is the county line?

Bill Jeffers: Right along the yellow, right along that subdivision line. That is the county line. Yes, where it says Citadel, that road right there is the county line.

President Tornatta: Okay. So, just a small portion is in Warrick County, is that correct?

Brenda Jeffers: That’s where it is. Where you see the white part.

Bill Jeffers: Essentially, the county line runs right down through here, and that ditch right there will drain a small portion of the water off the development and out into I-164 on ramp and over into Warrick County. The rest of the water goes up to this lake. So, I mean, I’m just taking the necessary precautions to notify the Warrick County Surveyor that there is a small percentage of water discharging from this corner and out here into Howard Ditch, which is a regulated drain in their county. That’s Howard Ditch right there.

Commissioner Nix: I move that we take the recommendation of the County Surveyor.

Commissioner Korb: Second.

President Tornatta: All in favor?

All Commissioners: Aye.

Bill Jeffers: Okay, the second subdivision drainage plan is an amended final drainage plan for Glenn Gauger Subdivision, Lot two. The original plan was designed by Billy Nicholson, and proposed an open channel along the natural surface water course across the lot. That would be that dark area where you see, that’s water coming across that lot. That’s out on Hogue Road, west of Schutte Road. The current lot owner wishes to build a house, construct a driveway and grade her front lawn in such a way that a pipe is required to replace the open water channel. So, Gary Yellig has updated, Gary’s here in the audience today as the engineer, has updated the drainage plan to include a 15 inch pipe, along with specific grading details that if constructed in accordance with the plan will provide an emergency overflow route adequate to prevent backwater from flooding the neighbors property to the east. If the amended plan is to work effectively, the lot owner and her construction and landscaping contractors must be directed to follow the plan exactly, and to that end a copy of the minutes of this meeting should be forwarded to the lot owner, along with copies of the plan by Mr. Yellig with a cautionary note to abide by the approved plan. The plan does comport with the county drainage code, and the County Surveyor recommends approval.

Commissioner Nix: Move approval.

Commissioner Korb: Second.

President Tornatta: All in favor?

All Commissioners: Aye.

Bill Jeffers: Okay, Mr. Yellig and I will see to it that information is conveyed to the property owner.

Bill Jeffers: Okay, tonight I would like to, or this afternoon I would like for you to receive the final reports on three regulated drain studies. They were commissioned earlier in the year studying major urban drains on the east side and the north side that have been impacted by two decades of extensive land development. While many drains have been annexed into the city, the County Drainage Board and the County Surveyor continue to administer and maintain these drains and reconstruct them in accordance with State statute. In 2003 the Indiana Department of Environmental Management adopted a few new rules that essentially are unfunded mandates to assess, monitor, remediate the effects of storm water run off affected by construction activity and post construction pollution that may result from new land use. Okay. Rather than go, you can read this if you wish, rather than go into all this I’ll simply say that the first study, Sonntag Stevens, was completed by Morley and Associates. Mr. Alvey will give you a copy of that. Sonntag Stevens and Keil Ditch is located in the industrial area between Lynch Road and St. George Road. The study identifies various conditions, structural insufficiencies, the discharge of industrial pollution and so forth into the storm water and suggests a comprehensive plan to institute best management practices to address all those things in accordance with state, federal regulations regarding the Clean Water Act. So, you may read this at your leisure. If you have any questions, there’s lots of photographs detailing each of the 41 observation points that we’re directed to maintain over the years, and to move forward with a plan to abide by our mandates.

Commissioner Nix: In a nutshell, Mr. Jeffers, was there anything in this report that jumped out at you as far as things that need attention in a timely manner?

Bill Jeffers: These reports, all of them, the three that you have coming to you tonight and the one from Structure Point, American Structure Point on the east side and Harper Ditch, all can be used by John Stoll, the MS4 Operator, to identify sources of storm water pollution into our MS4 conveyances. These ditches qualify as what they call MS4 waterways. It identifies every point of discharge, every pipe coming into those ditches that may be carrying industrial, in this case there was the identification of some, of a discharge of hydrocarbons from one of the factories. Those things need to be addressed fairly immediately, yes. Because, then this ditch empties into Little Pigeon Creek, which empties into Pigeon Creek, and, obviously, we’re trying to work with other agencies, including the city and EPA to clean up Pigeon Creek and so forth. That jumps out at me. There are some other structural deficiencies, a couple of pipes under a railroad that are decaying that need to be replaced, some invasive non native weeds growing along the banks, some sorts of Asian honeysuckle and so forth that have escaped from people’s gardens and landscaping that needs to be eradicated, other invasive species of plants that are not beneficial to our native habitat, and some embankment stabilization that would help keep the ditch banks in good, long term shape. Those things jump out at me, but it is a rather extensive report, and it gives us several years of recommended planning and execution of those plans that lay ahead of us for five years or more.

President Tornatta: Mr. Jeffers, you have some of that lined out in your report that you submitted to us as well, right?

Bill Jeffers: Yes, sir.

President Tornatta: Okay. So, first, let’s have a motion to accept his report in the minutes.

Commissioner Korb: So moved.

Commissioner Nix: Second.

President Tornatta: All in favor?

All Commissioners: Aye.

Bill Jeffers: Okay, so that accepts what I typed out here for you into the minutes so you can read that along with the reports.

Commissioner Korb: Bill, are we in a position to have contacted the businesses or industries saying, hey, we potentially have a problem here with emissions?

Bill Jeffers: Yes, sir, because your Board, what, Mr. Ziemer, a couple of months ago adopted an ordinance that’s a part of the MS4 program? It’s called the Illicit Discharge Detection and Elimination Ordinance, which gives John Stoll as the MS4 Operator the ability to notify, if we were to go to these 41 points in Sonntag and Keil Ditch and actually do water samples, take them to the lab and positively identify pollutants, then discover the source of those pollutants, we could notify the landowners from whose land the pollutants are emanating to either eliminate or minimize the pollution. We have that ability. Mr. Stoll might be able to give you more technical and detailed information in that regard, but that’s the way I understand it.

Commissioner Korb: Okay.

Bill Jeffers: The second report is from Bernardin Lochmueller and Associates, and it’s Eagle Slough, which is a six and a half mile drain, carries all the water discharged from the levee pump stations along I-164 from the southeast side of Evansville. Basically, the report identifies the same issues associated with Sonntag Stevens and Keil Ditch and other urban drains with regard to pollution, but it additionally identifies two unique concerns of beaver infestation and need for more full access for maintenance equipment. The rest of it is part of the text that President Tornatta has entered into the record. You can read that at your leisure. It does contain suggestions, ranked in priority that suggest an aggressive program to control the beaver population and make other specific improvements. In this case we have a reoccurring beaver dam we’ve eradicated several times right at one of the levee pump stations discharging from the neighborhoods that were severely flooded last September. So, this is very important and we want to follow the recommendations and, you know, proceed with a good program into the future on Eagle Slough. The last report I have to submit tonight is Kolb Ditch. Mr. Alvey will give you a copy of this one as well. It’s from Wessler and Associates. Kolb Ditch is located south of Covert Avenue, east of Price Park, the soccer park, and west of Angel Mounds. It drains basically all single family residential development, but has some unique problems associated with this extremely flat grade and sandy soils. One particular item that I would like to point out is that the homeowners on the lake in Audubon Estates have been chronically frustrated with the fact that the lake water, in such sandy soils, just sinks down into the water table and their lake goes down three or four feet in elevation every summer. You can imagine how low it is this summer. Then, when you have a rain storm the water rushes in from various pipes and ditches and just erodes away at the sandy embankments, and it really makes it hard for those residents to maintain their property the way that it was originally constructed. We can’t do everything to solve this for them, but there are resolutions, or there are proposed methods to control the situation in this report that will require that the County Drainage Board work together with the residents, because it’s their lake even though our ditch passes through it. We can do our part where our ditch passes through it, they may incur some expenses if they want to. For example, use bentonite to seal the lake. That was a recommendation we had made ten, 15 years ago, but it’s a very expensive process. So, we need to work together to see if we can resolve that issue for them. Other recommendations from Wessler include engineer improvements that will hopefully address the extremely flat ditch grade out there, possibly take some water to a pump station in a different fashion, and relieve some of the pressure on the rest of the ditch and that lake. That’s a brief overview of the three reports that are on your desk at this time. They, along with the report you will receive from American Structure Point on the east side and Harper Ditch basically provide the basis on which the County Surveyor and the Drainage Board will be working over the next several years. I would like to point out that we have already initiated some of the recommendations. For example, we cleaned out three eight foot diameter culverts along Morgan Avenue, regraded the channel. That will move water more efficiently through the Wabash and Eerie Canal. We just finished this weekend the embankment repair through Wesselman Nature Center, where Wesselman Nature Center is donating $5,000 to that effort, and we’re picking up the other $10,000. Also, along Stockfleth Ditch, Kelly Ditch and Nurrenbern Ditch we removed some obstructions and repaired some embankments that were holding water back up into the apartments in the commercial area and other property on the east side. So, we’re moving along with the problem. If there are any specific questions at this time, representatives of each of these three firms are here today to answer your questions. Otherwise, you may bring your questions to us at any time in the future and we will submit additional reports.

President Tornatta: Motion to take all these reports under advisement.

Commissioner Korb: So moved.

Commissioner Nix: Second.

President Tornatta: All in favor?

All Commissioners: Aye.

Bill Jeffers: I thought I had some claims to pay, but, apparently, I’ll bring those to you next week, because I don’t have them with me today, and have no further business.

President Tornatta: Okay, no other business? Any business of the board at this point?

President Tornatta: Any public comment?

Commissioner Nix: I make a motion that we adjourn.

Commissioner Korb: Second.

President Tornatta: All in favor?

Call Commissioners: Aye.

(The meeting was adjourned at 4:59 p.m.)

Those in Attendance:

Troy Tornatta                            Jeff Korb                                   Bill Nix

Bill Jeffers                                 Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.          Madelyn Grayson

Brenda Jeffers                          Others Unidentified                   Members of Media

VANDERBURGH COUNTY

DRAINAGE BOARD

Troy Tornatta, President

Jeff Korb, Vice President

Bill Nix, Member

(Recorded and transcribed by Madelyn Grayson.)